What's Missing?—Luke 18:18-23

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Please read today's text here: Luke 18:18-23

In the paragraph headings of most Bibles and commentaries this incident is entitled "The Rich Young Ruler". If you are just reading it in Luke's gospel, you may wonder why this title. All three gospels indicate that he was rich. But Mark's gospel as well as Luke's gives no indication of his age. And the phrase "I have observed these rules since I was a youth" in v. 21 gives the impression that he was no longer a youth. Furthermore, Luke alone of the three gospels calls him a "ruler" (Greek arkhōn), a responsible religious and political position in Jewish society that was normally achieved only in maturity.

Yet Matthew, who omits the above-quoted statement "since I was a youth", calls him a "young man" (Greek neaniskos, 19:20); and there is no good reason for him to have perverted the historical tradition here. We therefore have a situation in which a precocious young man had already achieved somewhat exalted and respected status as a "ruler". That he did so, not just because he was wealthy, but because of his religious devotion and hard work, is reflected both by his apparently honest answers to Jesus about keeping the commandments, and by the remarkable statement—only preserved in Mark—that after he had honestly testified to his keeping five of the Ten Commandments, Jesus looked at him and "loved him" (Mark 10:21). To my way of thinking, this was more than just the love that Jesus had for everyone.

The standard New Testament Greek lexicon (BDAG, p. 140) gives the following possibilities for an arkhōn in a Jewish setting:

a. of Jewish leaders … of the high priest Ac 23:5 (Ex 22:27). Of those in charge of a synagogue Mt 9:18, 23; cp. ἄ. τῆς συναγωγῆς Lk 8:41; Ac 14:2 D. Of members of the Sanhedrin Lk 18:18; 23:13, 35; 24:20; ἄ. τ. Ἰουδαίων (cp. Epict. 3, 7, 30 κριτὴς τῶν Ἑλλήνων) J 3:1; cp. 7:26, 48; 12:42; Ac 3:17; 4:5, 8 (ἄρχοντες καὶ πρεσβύτεροι as 1 Macc 1:26); 13:27; 14:5. τὶς τῶν ἀρχόντων τ. Φαρισαίων a member of the Sanhedrin who was a Pharisee Lk 14:1. Of a judge 12:58.

That's a pretty impressive array of possible offices that this youngish man may have held! The young man's zeal for God led him to approach Jesus, whose good reputation he knew, in order to find what he had no assurance up til now that he knew how to achieve: "Good teacher, what can I do to inherit eternal life?" Matthew omits the word "good" and records a slightly different response of Jesus to the implications of that word. But both Mark and Luke retain it in the address. What did the young man mean by "good teacher"? First of all, it was obviously a compliment and an innocent remark. Jesus was well-known as a teacher. And all but his harshest critics viewed him as both "good" in the sense of kind and merciful, and in the sense of pious or God-fearing. By addressing Jesus as "good teacher" this man—even if he was a Pharisee and a member of the Sanhedrin (the Jewish council), as we saw above is a possible implication of his title arkhōn—was associating himself with those who admired and supported Jesus.

The young man wanted to know how to "inherit eternal life". The word "inherit" in a First Century Jewish mouth had nothing to do with inheriting wealth by virtue of lineage. This man had all the wealth he could want, and he had impeccable Jewish lineage. Instead, the word "inherit" in this context meant to gain entrance into God's eternal Kingdom. This was what Jesus' public ministry had been announcing. He had been calling the nation to repentance and proclaiming that God's Kingdom was available to be entered. At an earlier point in Jesus' public minhistry he had told another Jewish nobleman, a member of the Sanhedrin named Nicodemus: “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit" (John 3:5). Being "born again" or "born of the Spirit" meant a new beginning to life: a drastic turn-about, changing from a self-guided and self-motivated life concentrating on personal fulfillment and enjoyment to a God-guided and God-motivated life of service to others and putting God's Word above all other forms of wisdom and guidance. Such a turn-about is not accomplished by human will power, but by inviting Jesus into one's heart and life—to use the Gospel of John's term, by "receiving" Jesus. A person so transformed by God, would surely look to others as if he had started his life over as a newborn baby. And when that transformation happens, Jesus said, then and only then does a person become a "child of God" in much more than just the sense of being a part of the human family ultimately created by God. And as a child of God, as St. Paul once pointed out (Romans 8:17), he or she becomes an heir of God. In that sense the term "inherit" eternal life approximates its literal meaning.

Jesus sees two aspects of the question that need his comment. First, in the strict sense of the word no-one is "good" but God. We are all sinners. Was Jesus therefore claiming that he was not God? In view of his other plain claims in the gospels, this is unlikely. Perhaps he was hinting to the questioner that by his own word "good" he was admitting that the teacher he was addressing was much more than he at first thought.

Another possibility, which need not eliminate the first as well, is that Jesus was again pointing back to the Old Testament revelation as the authoritative words of the One "Good Teacher" who had revealed them to Moses and the Prophets. In other words, he might have been saying what Abraham said to the rich man in Hades about his brothers needing a new warning: "They already have Moses and the Prophets. Let them receive warning and instruction from them". This second possible motivation for Jesus' words "there is only One who is 'good'", is supported by what he adds: "You already know the commandments" (v. 20). Jesus wants to know how this man reads Moses and the Prophets. Does he see how far short he has fallen of what they require? Does he see why he needs God's forgiveness? Does he see why there must be a Suffering, Dying and Rising Messiah?

Jesus quoted only five of the ten commandments. And some interpreters think the omission of "You shall not covet" was why this wealthy and proud man could claim to have obeyed them all since he was a boy. But however that may be, Jesus referred him to this standard of life, and the man claimed he had mastered these and needed something more. His very presence here indicated that his previous life of keeping the ten commandments, as he saw them, left him wondering (according to Matthew's version): "What am I still missing?" This sense of something missing together with his apparent honesty and sincerity was what elicited Jesus' looking upon him and loving him. Would he be able to accept what Jesus was about to tell him was still missing? Our Lord was able to read people's minds, so perhaps he already knew. But he was still "fishing for people" and would not refuse to make the offer. Here was the "kicker" again:

When Jesus heard this, he said to him, "You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."

Like all achiever types today, this man was addicted to what he had achieved. He could not give it up. It had taken him too long and too much effort to gain what he had—of wealth and the position in society it granted to him, and even the religious status it conveyed. He could simply not give it up in order to become a poor itinerant follower of Jesus. So with downcast and disappointed face, he slowly turned away and went home. What a sad scene that was. Jesus loved that man, and all the zeal and fervor he had shown in order to make what he had made out of his life. But he was unwilling to simply give it all up in order to start all over with Jesus.

Does Jesus require this of every disciple? In the literal sense, no. Just read the gospel accounts of the calling of other disciples. A few had to leave their businesses, like Peter and Andrew who left their father and servants in the fishing boats. But many others were not asked to do this.

But in the non-literal sense Jesus requires this of us all. We may not be required to literally sell all that we have, but we must renounce the prior claim of all things other than obeying and following our Savior. When business or social obligations—and sometimes even family obligations—threaten to compete with the terms of our discipleship, we must always put Jesus first. And we must always be on the alert for things in our lives that we sense have become "indispensable". That's a good sign that they have become competitors to Jesus—"idols", if you will.