One Thing

As (Jesus) was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to Him and knelt before Him, and asked Him, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” ...Jesus felt a love for him and said to him, “One thing". Mark 10.17, 21

Let us first set aside the idea of "doing" to obtain eternal life. Jesus "finished" all that needed to be done when He offered Himself as a sacrifice for our sins. In another place Jesus responded to the question, "What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?" by saying, "This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent". John 6.28-29


It is an important question; is there anything in my life that if the Lord asked for it I would say "no". Take anything but that Lord, ask me to do anything else Lord... but not that.

• Would I take my children out of school, away from their friends and move?
• Would I quit my job, give up my "security" and go to the mission field?
• Would I simplify sacrificially?
• Would I, could I?

Jesus is no kiljoy, He is not out to make our lives miserable, in fact quite the opposite is true. He came to "give us life and that more abundantly"; He deisres to see us experience a life that is "exceedingly abundantly above all we can ask or think".

But what the Lord does want is for us have absolutely nothing standing between us and Him. What is important to Him is that we have "no other gods before Him".

So it is a profitable exercise to take inventory, to ask myself, "Is there anything that if the Lord asked me to give it to Him or do it for Him, I would say "no".

I want to stay in a place where my life belongs to Him completely. And not just hypothetically or theoretically but actually and literally.

Now you might be saying, "Come on Scott, is the Lord that serious about all that? I mean do you really think it is that important to be willing to give the Lord anything and everthing? The Lord wouldn't test us like that just to see if we would and then not have us actually follow through!

Really? Ask Abraham!

• “Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.”
• He said, “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him;
• for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”

With God it is always about our heart. He wants us to know what is in our own heart.

If I find that there is "one thing"... I will be faced with a choice: go away sad as the rich young ruler did; or take that "one thing" to the altar as Abraham did. We can choose to remain bound and covetous and trying to save our lives or we can be free and find the blessing of what it means to truly lay our lives down for the One who laid down His life for me.