The Tragedy of Idolatry | Mt. 19:16-30
Here’s my sermon from Sunday in our Matthew series. You can check out the audio here. You can also subscribe to our podcast here.
Back in the early years of Karis, in 2007, excitement over Mizzou football was at a high that hadn’t been seen in 40 or 50 years. We were on the cusp of playing for a national championship. That is, until we ran into the team we played just last night, Oklahoma, in the Big 12 title game. And we were exposed - or at least our offensive and defensive lines were - by those Sooners - in a 38-17 defeat.
But sometime before that, the quarterback for that team, arguably our best to ever wear the uniform, was a man named Chase Daniel. He’s now on ESPN all the time. He had a long NFL career. One of our Karis guys at the time, Brian, was enjoying his Chipotle burrito at the location over on 9th, when nature called. He headed for the bathroom. He flung open the door, and there, seated on his throne, in all his glory, was the king of Mizzou football himself. Our quarterback gave Brian this glare, like, “Dude, do you mind?” And Brian looked back, like, “Maybe lock the door?” Our Heisman Trophy finalist got exposed.
Today, that’s one of our biggest fears, right? Getting exposed. For who we really are. And getting cancelled. We see that happen, it seems, at least once a week. Somebody famous, who’s been to the top. Who then gets tossed to the bottom. And they’re done. Exposed. Over. The curtain is pulled back. And we don’t like what we see.
Today, we see Jesus approached by a wealthy young man. And the Lord reveals what lies under his facade. The guy gets exposed. And as Christ does that, we learn something about us, as well. But we’re going to find out something about our Lord. He’s not doing it to harm us.
Now today, I’m going to buck against all of my tendencies. There is so much here. I can’t possibly dig as deep as I really want to go. So what I’ll do is walk us through this passage, quickly pointing out four big things. But then I’ll camp a bit more on the final, biggest thing. What’s clearly the main thing we need to hear.
Approaching the Lord Like Children
Well, a couple weeks ago in Matthew, Pastor Jeff took us through the verses just right before. Some parents bring their kids to Christ to be blessed. And the disciples try to turn them away. But Jesus rebukes His guys instead of those moms and dads. Jesus says in verse 14, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” Jeff reminded us of how much the Lord loves little kids. But also how we’re to approach the Lord. As humble children. Aware of our need. Filled with trust.
The Inadequacy of Works
Now the man we see here - is his posture like that? No. He approaches Christ in a quite opposite way. You may have heard this called the parable of the “rich young ruler.” As we’ll see, the guy is wealthy. He’s young, healthy - and likely handsome. And Luke 18 also calls him a “ruler.” He’s a man of power. He’s so filled with pride. And that’s apparent in these questions he’ll soon ask. But scholar Michael Green says that’s maybe even seen in how he addresses Jesus. His disciples don’t call Him “teacher.” He’s likely trying to patronize the Lord.
But we can see his heart through the questions he asks. He wants Jesus to tell him that he’s kept God’s commands. That he’s done that “good deed” that’ll push him over the edge.
But Jesus tries to take the man’s focus off him and his works. And to move it above, to the one standard that matters. The Lord and His righteousness. Jesus says in verse 17, “There is only one who is good.”
Christ plays along with this man; He’s trying to take him somewhere. He answers that first question - “what deed?”, saying, “Keep the commandments.” Now Jesus isn’t saying lawkeepers earn life with God. He’s trying to expose him as a lawbreaker. But the man isn’t grasping that. He’s not coming like a child.
When he asks, Christ gives examples. Lists five of the six commandments that address our relationships. And He ends with that summary statement from Leviticus 19, that we’ll see later in Matthew - here in verse 19: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus is holding up a mirror. But the man still can’t see. He says, in verse 20, “I’ve done this. I’m good.” And he then asks, “What else?” He knows something’s missing. And Christ shows the young man just how unwilling he really was - to truly love his neighbor. He says, in verse 21, “Sell everything you have. And hand it to the poor.” And the rich young ruler, he walks away sad.
Now here’s something we all want to feel. “I’ve done enough.” That we’ve done more good than bad. Or that we’ve done that deed to push us over the top. Saving the environment. Bringing abortion to an end. We want to be validated like that. Earn our way ourselves. Prove ourselves as good. “I’ve done enough.”
But Jesus isn’t having that. He’s tearing those fig leaves away. The standard’s way to high. It’s God himself. It’s His perfection. We’re in desperate need of help. We first see the inadequacy of works.
The Cost of Discipleship
The Lord makes clear life can’t be bought. But that doesn’t mean it comes at no price. We can’t blitz pass this fact from this text. Christ tells him to give it all. Verse 21: “Go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
David Platt says we have two tendencies here - as we see what Christ commands. To universalize it. This is what everyone has to do: give it all away. Or to minimize it. And act like Jesus asked this only once. Some of us, like our friends the Reeces and the Starks, will get on a plane, taking only a few bags, and end up in Africa. Leaving our friends and family behind. To share the love of Christ.
Now that maybe isn’t what Jesus asks of you. But for each of us, we’ll have to give things up. We have a family here that works in real estate. But instead of raking in as much cash as they can, they’ve chosen to buy property and use it for the homeless. There are women in our church that are advocates for foster kids. They could have found more lucrative jobs, for sure. But they’ve heard Christ’s call. And they’ve followed Him in faith.
However He’ll call us, following Jesus isn’t easy. And as Dietrich Bonhoeffer once put it, it certainly isn’t cheap: “When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die.” And he wasn’t just spitting philosophy there. This is the man who stood against Hitler and gave up his life. He had no patience for what he called “cheap grace.”
Now here’s a second thing we convince ourselves of. “I’ve given enough.” Jesus really isn’t asking that much. I don’t really have to change. I can put a fish sticker on my car. I can layer a bit of Jesus on my life. And keep things pretty much the same.
But Jesus says, “No” - to this guy and to us. To follow Him truly, He says, “Deny [yourself] and take up [your] cross and follow [me]” (Matthew 16:24). We second see the cost of discipleship here.
The Necessity of Grace
Well, that man walks away, and just imagine the disciples. Shock on their faces. Mouths open wide. This man, who had it really good, who most would call blessed. Jesus shows Him up. He sends him home sad. So Christ turns to His disciples and gives them this illustration:
Matthew 19:23 And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 19:24 Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”
Shoving the biggest animal - through the smallest opening. That would be easier than this rich man getting in the kingdom. Now this is certainly saying something about the power of cash. There’s nothing quite like it - except probably sex - to grab us and pin us and keep us in its grasp. 1 Timothy 6:10 calls “the love of money” a “root of all kinds of evils.” It’s not just hard to get free from. But impossible to slip from its grip. But it’s here just an example of the power of sin. That entangles us so tightly.
Here’s another third thing we assume today. “I am enough.” I’ve got the power to be who I want. I can change anytime. Remake myself starting tomorrow. But those are lies. We’re far less free than we think. And to be who we’re meant to be - and to please the one we’re made to please - we need help.
The disciples cry out, then “who then can be saved?” And Christ responds with words of hope there in verse 26, “‘With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.’” The Lord can bust into a sinful human heart. He can make us alive in Christ. This man - and the disciples there, as well, needed to hear - along with us - that change happens only one way. Through the power of God. See third, here, the necessity of grace.
The Promise of Treasure
Now in verse 27, Peter responds with a question. “Jesus,” he says, “[We’ve] left everything and followed you. What then will we have?” Now here the disciple sounds just like that rich man. He’s pointing to his works, also. “We’ve given everything up. What you asked him, we’ve done. What’s that gonna get us? Aren’t we doing pretty good, Jesus?”
Isn’t the Lord kind? He doesn’t hammer poor Peter. He just answers His question. And it’s pretty glorious what He says. Let’s read through it again:
Matthew 19:28 Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
Matthew 19:29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life."
What does Jesus tell them? You’re gonna rule. And you’re gonna be rich. Right? “You’ll have all that guy has and so much more! When I returns. And sets up my reign. In the new world. It’ll all be worth it. And you’ll live with me forever.” Whatever we’ve given up - the cost of our discipleship - will all be worth it in the end. We’ll receive it back a “hundredfold” - and with it, “eternal life.”
Here’s a fourth cry that comes from our hearts. “I’ve struggled enough.” There’s so much suffering and pain - living in this fallen world. And following after Jesus - it just makes things harder. Despite what those TV preachers might say. There is a cost to speaking the truth, to walking in love. And Jesus reminds us that it’ll all be worth it. But we’ll suffer even more if we follow Him as disciples.
Listen to how Bonhoeffer put it, in his book, The Cost of Discipleship:
“Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field; for the sake of it a man will go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price to buy which the merchant will sell all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ, for whose sake a man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble; it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him.” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)
Bonhoeffer resisted a church that cozied up to Hitler. He was part of a plot to even assassinate the man. But he died just a few short days before Hitler was killed and the war came to an end. Many would say, “How was that worth it?” But when that rope snapped his neck, in that Nazi concentration camp, Dietrich Bonhoeffer entered into glory. And he rejoices there today. His struggles are over, church. Fourth, see the promise of treasure. That’s also in our future if we follow after Jesus.
The Tragedy of Idols
So we’ve seen thus far:
the inadequacy of works
the cost of discipleship
the necessity of grace
the promise of treasure
But there’s something far deeper going on. What seems to be the main point of this text. In verse 21, the Lord tells this man to give it all away. To follow after Him, with His group of disciples. And verse 22 reads, “When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.”
What Jesus exposes is what rules this man’s life. Where he finds his joy. What he fears to lose. What he truly worships. That’s why the man sulks away sad. Because he doesn’t want to give up his treasure. Now when he had asked Jesus, which commands he had to keep, which ones did Jesus leave out? The first four, right? That deal with our relationship with God. And most importantly the first commandment. “You shall have no other gods before me.”
Martin Luther once explained that if we violate the first - put other things before God - everything else will quickly fall apart. We try to take a good thing. And make it a god thing. We ruin that thing. And we harm ourselves and others. This is what the Bible calls idolatry. Now our minds go to idols of metal and stone. But remember that those statues represented things that still control us today. Like love and sex or wealth.
Why would we ignore the poor? Cook the books at our job? Or work 80 hours a week? And obsessively track our stocks? We can’t just focus on externals. We have to get in deep in our hearts. There’s sin under the sin. The love of money. False worship. Idolatry. Our horizontal problems are rooted in a deeper vertical issue. Turning from the Giver to His gifts. Idolatry.
Calvin called our hearts “perpetual factories of idols.” Kierkegaard said it’s the “natural state of the human heart to try to build its identity around something besides God.” Ira Glass of This American Life fame once said, “I used to completely identify myself through the work I did. It completely absorbed me.” I can identify with that. Most pastors, in fact, put all their identity into their church. An idol is anything that, if taken away from us, we’d be devastated. Like we’re in hell. Of if we get it, we’ve found our way to heaven. We’re overjoyed. It’s what we place our trust in. It’s what we give our time to. It’s what we worship and serve.
Tim Keller put it like this:
"What is an idol? It is anything more important to you than God, anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, anything you seek to give you what only God can give...An idol is whatever you look at and say, in your heart of hearts, “If I have that, then I’ll feel my life has meaning, then I’ll know I have value, then I’ll feel significant and secure.” There are many ways to describe that kind of relationship to something, but perhaps the best one is worship.” (Tim Keller)
What was Jesus exposing here for this man? Money was his idol. But I think we need to go even deeper than that. What is it we’re wanting that money to give?
Richard Keyes talked about two layers of idolatry. There are idols that are more visible at the surface. There are idols that are hidden deep within our hearts. Surface idols and source idols.
Surface idols might be things like work or possessions or sex or family. You work 85 hours a week. You worship your work. You obsessively guard and clean your car or your house. You worship your stuff. All you think about is sex. You worship that.
Your kids have to succeed at school and in sports. You’re constantly tracking them on your phone, making sure they’re safe. You worship your kids. We’ve put them in a god place.
But underneath are what we could call four source idols. Now, hear me clearly: the Bible doesn’t list them like this. This is just a helpful tool, I think, for understanding our hearts. Why are we at the office all the time? Why must our house be spotless? What are we looking for in relationships? Why are we so obsessed with our children? There’s something going on deeper. The things in and of themselves are good. That’s for sure. But we’re wanting things from them that can only come from God. Keyes says those main source idols are control, comfort, approval, and power.
Let’s go back to this man and his money. Why was it that he couldn’t walk away from his stuff? Maybe it was control. He didn’t like uncertainty. To worry about tomorrow. Maybe it was comfort. He enjoyed all that stuff. It distracted him from his pain. Perhaps it was approval. He loved the status riches bring. Impressing his friends. Or it could have been power. He liked being successful. Telling others what to do. You can take whatever it is that you worship and serve. And you can run it through the very same grid. Schoolwork. Sports. Relationships. Hobbies. Jesus wanted to free that man - and us - from idols. Because they’ll always leave us brokenhearted, friends. They’ll never deliver what we thing they can bring. As David Foster Wallace once put it:
“Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship… is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.” (David Foster Wallace)
Another thing that I think we want to believe. “I’m good enough.” You hear it all the time. When someone falls. And they halfway apologize. They say, “That’s just not who I am.” But it is.
The bad things they did - and we do, as well - they spring from the heart. From the god that we worship. So we have to own who we are. And again, reach out for help.
Maybe you’ve heard us talk here about the 4 Gs. They’re a way to think about and group together God’s attributes. God is great, good, glorious, and gracious.
Think about our desire for control. Because God is great, He rules over all, we don’t have to be in control. Take comfort. God is good. He truly satisfies. He alone. And we don’t have to go elsewhere. What about our quest for approval? God is glorious. We don’t have to fear others. It’s His reputation we should be all about. What about power? God is gracious. We no longer have to prove ourselves. We don’t have to earn our way with Him or anyone else. We can relax.
God is all these things to us through His Son Jesus. And Jesus brings us to His Father who is all these things. We don’t have to turn from Jesus sad. We can run to Jesus with joy. Fifth, here, we see the tragedy of idols.
Turning from Idols
Well, how do we get free? I want to sum it up this way. Ask and pray. Repent and trust. First, ask and pray. Ask yourself good questions, to get to those idols. And then be willing to go deeper. For the why under the what. David Powlison gives these really helpful diagnostic questions.
1. What do I worry about most?
2. What, if I failed or lost it, would cause me to feel that I did not even want to live?
3. What do I use to comfort myself when things go bad or get difficult?
4. What do I do to cope? What are my release valves? What do I do to feel better?
5. What preoccupies me? What do I daydream about?
6. What makes me feel the most self-worth? Of what am I the proudest? For what do I want to be known?
7. What do I lead with in conversations?
8. Early on what do I want to make sure that people know about me?
9. What prayer, unanswered, would make me seriously think about turning away from God?
10. What do I really want and expect out of life? What would really make me happy?
11. What is my hope for the future?
Let’s ask ourselves these questions. To understand our idols. Let’s ask our brothers and sisters - what they see in us. Where do they see us giving our worship? And what do they think is under the surface? And then, let’s ask the Lord. To show us these things. And to help us get free. It’s only possible with the power of God. Ask and pray.
But also, repent and trust. When the Lord gives us insight into our idols - with His help, we have to do the hard things like what this man here just couldn’t do. Stop being stingy with our money. Stop working so many hours. Stop trying to control our kids so much. Stop scrolling, finding things to buy. We have to turn away from these things. And then turn to Jesus. Not walking away sad, but running to Him in joy. Believing that He and He alone can give us what we long for.
No, I’ve not done enough. But He completely obeyed the law. For you and for me.
No, I’ve not given enough. But Christ, came to earth. He gave His life for us.
No, I’m definitely not enough. But Jesus can do miracles. And give us new hearts.
No, I’ve not suffered enough. At least what I deserve. But there is an “eternal weight of glory” ahead for His children.
No, I’m not good enough. But you and I know the One who is. And He can transform us and satisfy us forever. There’s no need for us to run off to idols. That’s because, Jesus is enough.
The Upside-Down Kingdom
Now again, it’s striking what we’ve seen in this chapter. Those you’d think would get rejected - or at least were in that day - children - were received. And the one you’d think would surely get received - a rich, powerful man - gets rejected instead. It reminds us again, that Christ’s kingdom seems upside-down. Backwards from our world. But really the Lord’s awakening us to what’s right-side up.
Where the Lord is our focus. He’s at the top. In the place He deserves. And He loves to lift up those who will get low like kids. To push down the proud, who make gods of themselves. And that, of course, is our biggest problem. From the garden, to today. To get free, to get where we need to be, the doors must get flung open. The curtain must be torn down. We have to be exposed.
But as the Lord does that, He’s doing it for our good. It’s not so we’d be rejected. But ultimately received. If you look at the parallel account of this over in Mark, there’s a few additional words we see. After the man boasts about all the things He has done, Mark 10:21 says, “Jesus, looking at him, loved him.” The Lord was exposing the idol controlling his heart. But, it was all for love. And it’s that kindness Jesus extends also to us. I love the way author John Starke puts it:
“Just as he did with the rich young man, Jesus looks at us and loves us. He sees with his searching eyes the things that keep us frail, fragile, and distant from his presence. And he asks us, ‘If your life continues on in the way it's going, is this the life you want?’
And with a tender voice, he continues: ‘These things must die in order that you might live.’ This is a word of love for us. But its also one that demands a sober reckoning, because death feels like death.” (John Starke)
Will you open yourself to Christ’s love for you today? Will you welcome Him as He gently, kindly exposes your idolatry? Will you let Him keep you from a life of tragedy? Because spending your life rejoicing in the gift - and forgetting the Giver - is a terrible, tragic, no good way to live. Jesus wants to expose what rules our hearts so we can experience real love in Him.
But here’s the gospel, the good news, also for us. Jesus, the Ruler of all, the owner of all riches, gave it all up. He laid it all down. So we could have life. So we could be freed. From bowing before idols. And restored to true worship. As John Stott has famously put it:
“For the essence of sin is man substituting himself for God, while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man. Man asserts himself against God and puts himself where only God deserves to be; God sacrifices himself for man and puts himself where only man deserves to be.” (John Stott)
Karis, receive the love of Jesus today. See yourself as you really are. So you can see Him as He really is. Jesus wants to expose what rules our hearts so we can experience real love in Him. Let’s pray.