Mark 10:17-22 • Repentance That Sings

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(This transcript was prepared using software tools and has not been reviewed for complete accuracy.)

 Jeff and Laurie's song, "Your Grace Still Amazes Me," is very much on topic of what I want to address with you today, and that is Mark 10, verses 17 through 22, an account we've looked at before of the rich young ruler, but a reason to go back there is to see the grace that still amazes.



 It's an account that's unusual to us, the rich young ruler, as Pastor Carey was saying to me just before the service, he said, "You know, this is the man you would love for your daughter to date," right? He's asking spiritual questions, he's apparently been righteous all his life, been a good guy, he's obviously well to do and therefore he can take care of her. You know, this is the guy you want come calling.



 Except he does not understand the grace that amazes.



 And to help us understand and him understand, the Lord Jesus approaches him with questions that should rock him, but don't seem to faze him at all until he turns away.



 The Lord would not have you turn away nor me.



 Let's look again at Mark 10, verses 17 through 22, at a young man who has much to teach us as well as to learn himself.



 Verse 17, "And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"



 And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good?



 No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments. Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud.



 Honor your father and mother."



 And he said to him, "Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth."



 And Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said to him, "You lack one thing. Go sell all that you have and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me."



 Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.



 Let's pray together.



 Heavenly Father, we know it is not Your will that any would go away sorrowful here, but that we would perceive in the largeness and wideness of the mercy that is offered in Jesus Christ a means to have our sin put as far away as the east is from the west.



 You teach us in this passage what repentance is, but it seems so difficult and so far from us. Help us to understand, for we would not even come to Your Word without asking Your help.



 Help us to discern what You would have us know and to yield what You would have us yield to, that we might know the wonder of the grace that still amazes because it is so good and great and wondrous an expression of Your heart for us. Grant Your gospel to help us, we pray, in Jesus' name.



 Amen.



 Since I was gone last week, a number of you have asked this week, if I was to come back, now my hand is doing. Now you know I'm getting a lot of mileage out of this, right? I mean, it's not many times in your life you can talk about poisonous fish off the coast of Spain, spined you. Yeah, I mean, you just don't tell that story very often, but happened to me and as some of you know, my hand had trouble healing and that led to a certain number of medical procedures, including x-rays.



 And as I looked at one of those x-rays of my hand a few weeks ago, I just began to kind of think of what was being revealed. Now those of you who are in the medical profession, this is going to be the amateur explanation, okay? But you know, what is an x-ray after all? I mean, you know, the x-rays come through your hand except the bone absorbs the x-ray, it's the soft tissue that lets the x-ray go through so that the film actually is marked by the x-ray that goes through. But what is defined, what you see most clearly, is actually what does not come through. The image of the bone that's blocking the x-ray.



 There's a sense in which Jesus is enabling us to x-ray, not the physical, but the spiritual body of this rich young ruler in this account.



 And what we are able to discern by the x-ray is what repentance is. Now you say, "Well, how could that be?" I mean, the rich young ruler does not repent, he does not acknowledge his sin. But you see, that's just the point.



 It's what does not come through that we're able to see most clearly in order to define what biblical repentance should be because it's the very thing that's lacking in this young man. Why do we need it?



 Because there's so many misconceptions about what repentance is, what we have to do to make our lives right with God. And we wonder and we worry. What do I actually have to do? The question of this rich young ruler is not really so foreign to us. What do I have to do, God, finally, to be right with you when I recognize the struggles of relationships, the difficulties of my honesty, integrity, lust, anger, ambition, when I recognize the realities of sin in my heart and life? Lord, what do I have to do to make this right with you?



 The word repentance is the answer.



 But what that means is important to discern in the x-ray of this rich young ruler. What first of all do we see as missing? It's pretty obvious, I suppose. There's missing a perception of his offense.



 After all, you recognize in verse 17 when he says to Jesus, "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus just begins by saying, "Why are you calling me good? You come up to me and you say good teacher, what must I do? But why do you call me good?



 Only God is good."



 Now, in that short little phrase of Jesus, "Only God is good," there is a world of revelation that is meant to humble the young man. I mean, think of what you know about biblical standards already in biblical history. Whenever God begins to reveal his nature, there is an intended effect upon humanity that we would be humbled. If that's who God is, if he is the only one who is holy, righteous, and good, entirely pure, if that's who he is, I begin to recognize I have no basis of standing before him.



 So the prophet Isaiah, you remember the account, when the heavens opened up to him and he sees the holy, holy, holy God. What does Isaiah do?



 "Woe is me, I am ruined." If that is who God is, I cannot stand before him. I cannot stand myself when I recognize how great is his holiness. And it's not just true of prophet. Some of you may remember that in the Old Testament, in the book of Leviticus, in the ninth chapter, there is that time that the priests are themselves being sanctified for their work of sacrificing for the sins of the people.



 But in their own dedication as the priests themselves are set aside for the sacrificial service, the first thing that Moses does is has sacrifices put upon the altar. And it's not the priests who light the fire.



 But rather the Shekinah glory of God comes as God himself says, "I am the one who must sanctify. I alone must establish the right of mankind to be made right before me." And so God establishes by his goodness the path by which humanity would know him. And as the people see it and perceive it, here is the only good God who comes to make himself right with his people. They fall down on their faces.



 If he is that good, we cannot stand.



 And it's not just the people. For generations later, when King Solomon dedicates the temple to God, no longer the tabernacle in the wilderness, but the permanent temple that would be established. Again, the Shekinah glory descends. And now the glory is so great that the priests cannot even remain inside the temple. But they leave. No one can stay in. And the people of the whole town fall down on their faces and even the king. Whenever we perceive how good is the unique glory of God, people and priests and prophets and kings fall down.



 I cannot stand if he is that good. I see myself and know myself too well. But the young man does not see that. He does not perceive that. You know, we went through this a few weeks ago. Jesus says to him, "Only God is good." If you want to know what you do, if that's the question, what you do to inherit eternal life, then keep the commandments.



 Now, it's really important that you see which commandments Jesus cites. Do you remember the account? It's in verse 19.



 As Jesus is speaking to the young man, he says, "Now you know the commandments. Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother. If you're counting, there are not ten there."



 Which commandments is Jesus listing for the young man?



 You might say, "Which ones are not listed? What do you not see there?"



 There's nothing about no other gods, nothing about idolatry, nothing about the Sabbath. The commandments that are listed are those that are known as the second tablet of the law, those that focus on human relationships.



 And so what Jesus is doing to the young man to try to reveal him to himself, if he's saying, "Listen, only God is good, you must know this." If you're really saying, "What do you do to inherit eternal life?" Just think about your relationships for a little bit.



 How are things with your wife, your family, your employer, your community, your neighbor?



 And there is an expectation that if only God is good, the young man will look in the struggles of his relationships and he will begin to be humbled and recognize his life is not all that it should be, but he doesn't see it at all, does he?



 "Only God is good," says Jesus. And the young man, after he hears this list of commandments, what does he say about himself?



 "Teacher, all these commandments I have kept since I was a boy."



 Remember? Jesus just said, "Only God is good." And what does the young man now say about himself?



 Me too.



 In which case he is making himself as good as God.



 He gives himself the nature, the status, and the stature of God, in which case he now breaks the first tablet of the law, which was, "You shall have no other God." You know other gods. I mean, and by the way, while he's saying, "I've kept all the commandments," if you look at James 2 in verse 10, what does it say? If you've broken one point of the law, how much have you actually broken?



 All of them. They're all interconnected. He's saying, "I'm fine, I've kept them all." Jesus is saying, "You're not fine, you've broken them all."



 But he can't see it.



 And in the revelation of what is happening, Christ is trying to help him see himself. And so there came these words that even distress us as we read them. Verse 21, "Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said, "You lack one thing.



 Go sell all you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me."



 What is the distress?



 You and I look at these words and we say, "Now, wait a second. Is what's really going to make this young man right with Jesus, is he has to give up his goods and give it to the poor?"



 Listen, if you read just that far, you haven't read far enough.



 Jesus said, "Go sell all that you have, give to the poor, and what?



 Follow me."



 And if he follows Jesus, where will he go?



 To Jerusalem, where the chief priests and the scribes will have him arrested.



 And then the Gentiles will flog him and spit on him and mock him and crucify him.



 And three days later he will rise.



 Jesus does not believe that what this rich young man does, even giving away his goods, is what's going to make him right with God. But here is this path of revelation of the young man to himself.



 You've been good? Now, just think about this. Jesus does not debate this with the young man. I mean, it's not like the woman at the well. Remember when Jesus said, you know, "Go call your husband and come back," and she says, "Well, I don't have a husband." Well, that's right.



 You've had five husbands, and the man you're living with now is not your husband. I mean, Jesus is not going down the same path with this young man. He's not saying, "You say that you have kept all these things since you were a boy," but the fact of the matter is you've not. I mean, he doesn't do any of that. He just lets the claim of righteousness sit there and says, "Oh, really?



 So you're good enough."



 Well, then there's just one more thing you have to do, in which case what's really being revealed is all your righteousness is not enough because ultimately you must come and follow me and see that I must provide my righteousness for you.



 Ultimately, at the cross will be the message that your righteousness is not enough, that your best works are filthy rags, that when you've done all that you should do, you are still an unprofitable servant. But the young man sees none of it. All he sees is that he's done the best he can, and it's still not quite enough, and yet that's the point to be made, that our righteousness is not right enough before a holy God. There has to be the perception of our inadequacy before we're ever able actually to repent.



 You know, I grew up in West Tennessee, and even though I was not in a rural family, I have rural roots. And that meant that my father always wanted to make sure that his sons kind of kept family legacies going, which meant even though we grew up in the suburbs, I had to do some farming things. I had to learn to do them, like learning to use a two-man crosscut saw, okay? It's not that we didn't know about chainsaws, okay? But you know, my daddy and his daddy before him had learned to use a two-man crosscut saw. Do you know what I'm talking about? Handles on both ends, long saw blade, ever use one? Not easy, is it? Right? I mean, you just have to learn a certain rhythm and a way of gliding the blade. I mean, that's hard to do, and I had to learn just as my brothers had to learn. And I can remember on one particular crisp, fall morning that we were out sawing through some logs, and we got into a log. We didn't know it, but it was rotten on the inside. And so we got just a little bit into the log, and it split, it fell off the cutting frame, and it hit the ground hard, so hard that it sheared down a face of the log. And one of the pieces of that log that was on the ground to my adolescent brain looked kind of like a horse's head.



 So at the end of the day, cleaned up our tools, got in the truck, and the last thing I picked up was this rotten piece of horse head-looking log, tucked it into my arm, took it home. And a few weeks later, either for my dad's birthday or Christmas, I can't remember which, because those are both very close together, my dad's birthday and Christmas, I took that rotten piece of horse head log and I nailed to it a two-by-four, and I put some sticks on for legs.



 And I tied on a rope for a tail, and I put some nails down the side, and I wrapped it in some butcher block paper and put on a ribbon, and I presented it to my father. And I can remember, you know, he took off the ribbon, he took off the paper, and he looked at it, he said, "Why, that's wonderful.



 What is it?"



 And I said, "Dad, it's a tie rack. You see those nails going down the side? You can hang your ties on them."



 Now let me tell you something. When I first presented that work to my father, I thought it was really good.



 I mean, I thought this work of art was ready for a museum somewhere, you know, but I had to get just a little bit, oh, a little more mature, and you know what I would do? I would go, "Oh, Dad, will you please get rid of that thing?" But what he did was, he actually leaned it against his closet wall because it wouldn't stand on its own, and he used it as his tie rack, not because it was good, because he was.



 What you and I are supposed to perceive is our best works, as good as we think they can be, are not good enough for the God who alone is good.



 And if even our best works do not merit his righteousness and forgiveness, then think how much more our sin requires our repentance and confession to him.



 But the young man doesn't see it. And because he does not have a perception of his offense, even though Christ is making clear to him, even your good works are not enough, they are not enough. You must come see what happens at the cross. When he can't see that, that means the next thing he cannot do is he cannot confess his offense, which, of course, is what repentance means as well, that we are not simply perceiving our sin, but confessing it to God. If he were to perceive that at the cross, this Son of God would be giving his life as a ransom for sinners, that he would shed his blood even for the young man who'd been good since his youth. If the young man could see that, he would perceive his sin for the repugnance and the malignancy that it truly is. But he cannot see it, and therefore he does not confess.



 What he is lacking, of course, is some acknowledgment of offense. It is what always happens in biblical repentance. You know the words. Remember the psalmist?



 In Psalm 51.4, as he confesses to God, he says, "God, against you and you only have I sinned and done this evil in your sight."



 There is a turning from a concern for self, "What do I do to get the eternal life that I want?" To actually grieving for the grief that our sin is for God, when it's truly perceived for its horror, for its wrongness, and that God would send his Son to die for it, and yet we still persist in it. We begin to perceive how awful is our sin, and we understand why the Apostle Paul would say in Ephesians 4.30, "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit."



 It's practically impossible for us to perceive that here we are, these little creatures on this little planet in this vast universe, and the one who made it all grieves because of our sin and the damage it does to our relationship with him, so much so that he would send his Son to die to make their relationship right again. And for us to come before God and not long for renewal of that relationship is evident when we can't confess. Now, you have to think what an odd thing confession is.



 I mean, why do we confess our sin? Do we think God doesn't know?



 Are we telling him something he wasn't aware of?



 No, confession by its very nature is saying, "God, I trust you enough to tell you the things that I think are between us so that you can assure me that these things are not really between us, that this too has been taken to the cross, that Christ also paid the penalty for this." We are not somehow by our confession meriting the favor of God. We are instead God saying to God, "God, you take this away. Assure me what your word says, your gospel promises is true, and that confession is my acknowledging the poison within me, the poison in my life and wanting to spit it out." It's the natural thing that happens when God's people recognize how wrong is their sin because they want to have a nude relationship with God. And it's that longing for relationship that makes us want to confess, "God, assure me this is right with us, that your gospel is true, that it's profoundly real, that I'm right with you." It's so different than what this young man is doing in verse 17. As he comes on his journey, he kneels before Jesus. Yes, there's humility.



 But then the question is, what must I do to inherit eternal life?



 All right, God, what do I have to do to fix this?



 It's the first wrong step in repentance.



 The question is not what you do, but your dependence on what Christ has done.



 The Reformers, kind of the forefathers of the church of which we are part, tried to make a distinction between what they called evangelical repentance and legal repentance.



 Legal repentance is always trying to merit the forgiveness of God.



 All right, God, what do I got to do to make this right with you?



 How much money? How many prayers? Or is it just feeling bad or longer?



 How long do I have to cry? How long do I have to feel bad? I mean, when is this going to be okay? What do I have to do? And legal repentance is always the tit for tat, the balancing the scales, the what currency is going to be enough to pay off God so that he will forgive.



 But evangelical repentance is not seeking to merit mercy, it's seeking to drown in it.



 I'm going to stop flailing.



 I'm going to stop striving.



 I'm going to give up trying to do what I can do. I am going to die into the mercy of the gospel.



 I am just going to claim its reality. I'm just going to dive into it. I'm just going to say, "God, you have to make me right." Well, then you haven't done enough. No, you don't understand.



 What you do is not what makes you right with God. If it's what you do, then you've got one more thing to do, and that's to go to the cross



 and give it all to Him.



 What you do is not the point. It's dependence upon what Christ has done. Repentance is not so much a doing as a depending. It is not so much an activity as an attitude of total resting in the goodness of God. If it's drowning, it is dying to self that I might recognize it as the mercy of God that lifts me up and revives me and refreshes me. It's dependence upon Him.



 Ah, but you say, if repentance is just depending upon the mercy of God, don't we have to turn from sin?



 And the answer is yes, but we have to put that in its biblical context too.



 If repentance is perception of the offense, if repentance is then confession of the offense that we have perceived, ultimately you must recognize that repentance finally is claiming the joy that is meant to be the result. Now, how do we claim that joy?



 Jesus said, "Come and do what?



 Follow Me."



 Now, you must recognize what the young man actually did. I mean, it's so sad.



 He went away.



 What's the consequence of that?



 You know, many times I hear teaching on repentance and I hear people kind of get stuck in just the biblical definition of an Old Testament word. The Old Testament word for repentance is the word shuv, which means to turn. And so people say, what repentance is means to turn from sin.



 But listen, if repentance is merely what you do, you're turning. Who are you depending on making you right with God? You're depending on whom? On yourself. Just your turning. And by the way, I have to ask you, how many of you think you have adequately turned from your sin for a holy God?



 No, it's following Jesus. Now, that is turning from sin, but it's ultimately, even in this passage, turning to the path of the cross.



 It's dependence upon Him.



 The Reformers, when they tried to identify what repentance was, defined it this way, they said, "Repentance unto life is a saving," listen to the words, "grace."



 It's not what you do. It's what God Himself only provides. Repentance unto life is a saving grace whereby a sinner, out of a true sense of his sin, yes, we perceive it's there, does with grief and hatred of his sin. You mean Jesus had to die for this, does with grief and hatred of his sin, turn from it unto God.



 Not just turn from it in my strength with my ability, now God will let you know. It's turning from the path of misery to God Himself with full purpose of and endeavor after new obedience, yes. But it's the recognition that I'm turning to God. I'm not turning to my strength, my efforts, my being.



 What I'm ultimately saying is what we so often think is my repentance is going to be actuated, activated, made right, made sufficient, made adequate by the depth or intensity of my feelings. And so what we begin to trust is not Christ, but my tears.



 Not Christ, but my sighs. Not Christ, but my sorrow. Not Christ, but my prayers.



 But the gospel is doing the opposite thing. The gospel is saying don't trust your tears, trust Christ. Don't trust your sighs, trust Christ. Don't trust your prayers, trust Christ. Don't even trust your repentance. Dive into the mercy of Christ because it's in Him that you will know the fullness of the mercy that is needed, not in the fullness of your sorrow.



 Do you see what the passage says? The young man went away in what attitude?



 Sad.



 Now if the x-ray of repentance is really the inverse of what's being related here, then you recognize that if repentance was really on display, sadness would not be the result. What would be the result of repentance?



 Joy.



 Joy.



 What we have to recognize is what God is actually wanting us to perceive is that our repentance, when it's true dependence upon Christ alone, the gospel frees me that what I ultimately say is I'm turning from the path of sin into the path that puts me into the presence of Christ.



 That's what I'm desiring. More of Him. He said, "Well, no, no, there's a danger here. If I don't make repentance solely an aspect of turning from sin, won't people continue in sin?" And I will say, "No, they won't."



 Repentance. I want to make clear what this is. Repentance is a combination of two things at one point.



 Repugnance.



 How much I hate my sin and rejoicing. How much I love my Savior. They come right together. Because what can happen if we don't recognize that the young man is actually intended by Jesus to know joy, by his repentance, by following and turning from the path of self-righteousness? What Jesus actually wants this man to know is joy. If we don't know that, we'll begin to think that the mark of spiritual maturity is being morose.



 How do I know I'm really holy?



 How do I feel really bad?



 If we begin to trust our sorrow rather than our Savior, then repentance will be our hurt and shame.



 Here's the mistake we make.



 Because repentance necessarily involves grief for sin, we think that grief is the goal.



 It is not.



 It's the way station where we are learning the weight of our sin that Christ has put away. And we are confessing our need of Him. But the goal is joy.



 You know it. You know it. Remember the most poignant Psalm on repentance is Psalm 51. And you know the key words there. "Lord, against you and you only have I sinned." Yes, it's there. "But restore unto me the," what?



 "The joy of my salvation." What God is wanting us to do is to recognize that when repugnance has been replaced by joy, strength comes. The joy of the Lord is our strength. We say, "But I can't just rely on a repentance that does not require my absolute turning from sin because I've struggled with the sin for years. I've struggled with this compulsion. I've struggled with this addiction. What do you actually want me to do? I want you to repent.



 I want you to acknowledge before God that it's wrong. I want you to turn from it into the path of seeking Him. But you're saying, "But don't I have to make it right?" Listen.



 You have to confess your need of Christ.



 Not that you have to make it right before you do, but what happens when you do? If over and over again you say, "Well, I repented yesterday and I did it again today, what shall I do now?"



 Repent now.



 What if I sin again today?



 Repent tomorrow.



 What will happen?



 In the human heart, what will happen?



 If repugnance and rejoicing continue day after day, the sin will become more poisonous even to me. I will begin to recognize it's repulsion to my own heart. If I really, truly confess it before a good God who sent His Son, if I really, truly will repent and say, "God, take me in another path. Show me Jesus again more clearly the cross. When I'm rejoicing day after day in the release from sin, then the more that I repent, the more God is going to distance me from the longing for that sin and will take me deeper and deeper into the loving of Jesus."



 We will grow in strength because what happens when we are freed of the knowledge of the sin that condemns us is that we will know joy and the joy of the Lord is our what?



 Repentance is the path to joy and joy is strength. Listen, if we weren't just talking in spiritual categories, but if we could see things physically, we would understand exactly what is the dynamic of repentance that ultimately brings us the joy that is our strength. Let me put it this way. I can remember some years ago at Covenant Seminary, there was a couple that had a new baby, Dan and Carol Walker.



 And as they were rejoicing the hospital of this new birth just a few hours after the baby was born, Carol was nursing, feeding the baby, and suddenly the baby began to struggle to breathe, and then was not breathing.



 And suddenly Carol called out, "Somebody help." The nurses came, she said, "I don't know what to do," and the nurses swissed the baby away, and Dan and Carol began praying, and they called to friends and seminarians all gathered in a room, and they began to pray, "Lord, we can't fix this.



 We can't help it. We don't know what to do. You alone are the one who can fix this." And they began to pray and to pray, and didn't know for hours until after a while the doctor came in and said, "The baby will be fine."



 And then what did Dan and Carol and all the seminarians in the room do? When they recognized that God had rescued from death a child who could not take care of itself, could not help itself, they began to rejoice.



 They had gone from darkness to hope.



 They had gone from destitution to new life, and they began to sing.



 What happens when our repentance takes us from darkness to life, when we have seen the repugnance of our sin and recognize our release by a Savior who died to save us from it? We don't claim what we have done. We say, "God, we can't fix this, but we trust you can."



 And when we follow Him deep into His love, deep into His ways, we know day after day how great is the love, and we too sing, "Great is the Lord, greatly to be praised, for He has given us life.



 We repented, and He showed us the love that embraced us, the claim that already claimed us.



 We experience the love that is already all around us.

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