Jesus Talks Money: Self-Sufficiency
Being financially self-sufficient can help us experience a comfortable life on earth, but not so much in heaven. In fact, being self-sufficient doesn’t do us any good in heaven. Being self-sufficient means, we depend on ourselves, but God wants us to depend on him. Find out what God wants us to do with our ability to be self-sufficient. (Matthew 19:16-30)
Transcript
INTRODUCTION
Growing up, I enjoyed shopping with my mom because she would let me buy what we wanted, but I’d grow impatient with her as she browsed the things she liked. And as much as she told me to stay with her and wait, one day I decided to run to the toy or electronics section by myself, but hurry back to make sure that I didn’t lose her. I got used to this and over time, I became confident in my strategy. I started spending more and more time away from her feeling independent and self-sufficient in my knowledge of navigating the store by myself and my mom’s shopping tendencies until the day I lost her. I remember the one time I ran back, and I didn’t see where she last was. My confidence immediately vanished, and it was replaced with my fear of the worst-case scenario. Even right now, I can still feel the panic in my body. My heart felt like it was beating out of my chest, my eyes started to water, and my pace hastened as I quickly ran through the aisle of the stores frantically glancing in all directions for my mom. The store felt a hundred times bigger and what felt familiar began to feel so foreign. Thankfully I found her, and that experience taught me that I couldn’t depend on my smart self. As independent and self-sufficient as I thought I was, I needed to depend on mom. Being self-sufficient and independent has its strengths, but when we rely on them too much in our faith it can be unhealthy. And as we continue in our third week of our Jesus talks Money series, we’re going to look at what Jesus says about self-sufficiency and money.
THE YOUNG RICH RULER
Earlier Choua read Matthew 19:16-30 for us. And I’m going to summarize it. So, a man approaches Jesus and asks what he must do to get eternal life. This interaction is also in 2 other places, the gospel of Mark and Luke so I think it’s worth paying attention to. Throughout the passage in Matthew, we find out that this man is also young and rich. And in Luke’s gospel, we find out that he is a ruler. So generally, this story is referred to as the rich young ruler. Now, imagine everything our Asian parents want in their children. Success at a young age, lots of money, influence over people, and a good reputation in the community. The young rich ruler was the definition of self-sufficiency. He was successful, independent, and respected. Although the rich young ruler had everything everyone wanted, he wanted to make sure that he was going to receive eternal life. So he approaches Jesus asking how he could get eternal life. Jesus responds to his question by telling him to follow the commandments and he lists five of them.
Do not murder
Do not commit adultery
Do not steal
Do not give false testimony
And honor your parents.
He also adds “Love your neighbor as yourself”, which is found in Leviticus. Loving your neighbor is the basic summary of the second half of the 10 commandments. Loving your neighbor deals with how you should treat others whereas the first four commandments summarize how you treat God. Now, interestingly, Jesus leaves out the tenth commandment, do not covet (or excessively desire, want) what your neighbor has like their house, wife, servant, ox, or donkey. Lets keep this on the back burner I’ll get back to it.
The rich young ruler confirms with Jesus that has kept all of them and asks if there’s anything he lacks. Not a smart question when you’re asking the person who gives eternal life. Jesus tells him to sell all his possessions, give to the poor, and follow Jesus. On hearing this, the rich young ruler left feeling sad. The sadness that the rich young ruler felt might be better understood as sorrow or disappointment because his heart was divided between Jesus and his possessions. The cost of eternal life was too much because he had to give up his possessions.
It makes me wonder if Jesus left out the last commandment, do not covet. Was this a point Jesus was trying to make to the rich young ruler? That as self-sufficient as he seemed to be and in search of receiving eternal life, he was blinded by his desire to want something else and not eternal life. And after the rich young ruler leaves, Jesus turns to his disciples and tells them this,
“Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. 24 Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
Jesus compared the rich young ruler’s chance of entering the kingdom of God to a camel going through the eye of a needle. The camel was the largest of animals in the area where Jesus lived and they obviously knew it was impossible for a camel to fit through the eye of a needle, but the illustration provided an understanding of it would be impossible for those who are completely self-sufficient to enter the kingdom of heaven. This shocked the disciples and bit, so they responded by asking Jesus,
“Who then can be saved?”
There was an assumption that rich people were blessed by God. They received their wealth because God gave it to them. They became wealthy because they received God’s favor. The rich young ruler was the ideal image of what the disciples wanted to be. They assumed that he was the ideal candidate to receive eternal life. The rich young ruler must’ve done something right to get his good fortune on earth, so he was probably going to receive good fortune and get eternal life. And to be fair, some Old Testament verses like Proverbs 10:4 or Job 42:10 talk about that. Proverbs 10 says this,
“Lazy hands make for poverty, but diligent hands bring wealth.”
And the book of Job is all about Job being faithful to God even in his trials. Job lost everything he owned. He lost his riches, possessions, and even his family but because he was faithful, God restored his fortunes. This is what Job 42:10 says,
“After Job had prayed for his friends, the LORD restored his fortunes and gave him twice as much as he had before”
So when the disciples saw that the young rich ruler couldn’t receive eternal life, who could? Certainly not them. They were uneducated fishermen, your average Joes. So Jesus responds to them by saying this in verse 26,
“With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
Jesus responds to the disciples informing them that eternal life was only possible because of God. Humans could not do anything to earn eternal life. It doesn’t matter how rich they are, how much they give to charity, what good things they do, what where they volunteer at, none of that matters. If a person is banking on their self-sufficiency to get them to heaven, it doesn’t work. I wonder if the rich young ruler was so used to getting his way because he had the money to buy himself out of a bad situation or the authority to authorize whatever he desired. I wonder if he thought the same about eternal life? I wonder if his thought process was something like this. I am self-sufficient and I have what it takes to take care of myself here on earth so I just need to make sure I do what it takes to get me to heaven. So, assuming that it was probably another task or charity to donate to, his world got rocked when Jesus told him to go sell all his things.
Jesus was probing the rich young ruler’s heart trying to help him determine what he was hopeful in. Jesus wanted to see if the rich young ruler believed he could attain eternal life through his own ability or through his faith in Jesus. Jesus wanted to see what the rich young ruler anchored his hope in. Was his hope anchored in all the things he had or was it anchored in God? And when Jesus invited the young rich ruler to sell all his possessions, give to the poor, and become a disciple, this is what Jesus was telling him.
Trade your self-sufficiency for God’s sufficiency.
The young rich ruler could depend on his self-sufficiency for some things, but not everything. And Jesus was inviting him to depend on God’s sufficiency for everything. And we get the same offer too. We are invited to that.
APPLICATION
Now, it doesn’t matter how much you have in your bank account. It doesn’t matter if you’re rich or poor. Regardless of your financial situation, you could find yourself trying to be self-sufficient and independent from God. You might have possessions, personality traits, skills, and abilities that get you through, but they won’t be able to get you through everything. So we also get invited into this question of how you can be dependent on God and not yourself. Sometimes we feel like we have to be capable and do everything. But that’s not true. One of the major pillars, when we believe in God, is that we can’t do enough. Instead, God has done it all for us and we just have to accept his love, mercy, and grace. So here are two things we need to remind ourselves of when it comes to our self-sufficiency.
First, stop trying harder and start trusting more. There comes a moment when you just have to admit that you can’t do it by yourself and surrender to God. God gave us Jesus who took on every and any challenge you can think of so that we wouldn’t have to. Instead of focusing on what you’re trying to overcome, be aware of how much you focus on what you have to do. If you have to do this or that for your reputation you might be trying too hard. Instead, focus on God’s goodness, his grace, and his mercy. Focus on what God has done for you so that you can simply be. Trust that what he is saying is true. Trust and faith is such a major component of what it means to depend on God.
Second, when we stop being self-sufficient and simply trust then we obey his commands and promises. Trust what the Bible says and obey it. That means follow it. Trust or faith is such a major component of what it means to depend on God. Maybe it’s worth to simply trust what God tells us to do. It seems a bit naïve, but interestingly, the three verses right before this encounter between Jesus and the young rich ruler talk about a concept that could be helpful for us to understand what it means to trade our self-sufficiency for God’s sufficiency. Let me read it for us.
13 Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. 14 Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” 15 When he had placed his hands on them, he went on from there.
Maybe that could be a start to how we can trade our self-sufficiency for God’s sufficiency. Maybe we try to see what it means to be like the little children and how they have total dependence on their parents. Could we have that kind of dependence on God’s sufficiency? Knowing that we are cared for and loved by God.