Approach | Growing Closer

Undivided Heart

Jon Fredricks

Today’s Scripture: Luke 18:18-30 NIV

Luke 18:18-30 NIV

18 A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

19 “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. 20 You know the commandments: ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.’”

21 “All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.

22 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.”

23 When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was very wealthy. 24 Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! 25 Indeed, 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.”

26 Those who heard this asked, “Who then can be saved?”

27 Jesus replied, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”

28 Peter said to him, “We have left all we had to follow you!”

29 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus said to them, “no one who has left home or wife or brothers or sisters or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God 30 will fail to receive many times as much in this age, and in the age to come eternal life.”

Mark 1:17 NIV

“Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.”

1) HUMILITY: AN HONEST ASSESSMENT OF MY HEART

Luke 18:21 NIV

“All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.

Isaiah 53:6 NIV

We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

2) HUNGER TO KNOW CHRIST

Luke 18:18 NIV

A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Philippians 3:10 NIV

I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,

3) HARDINESS: A RESOLVE TO SMALL SACRIFICES

Matthew 16:24 NIV

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.

4) HALLELUJAH: CELEBRATES THE WIN

Philippians 3:7-8 NIV

But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ

Romans 8:18 NIV

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

5) HEART: KEEP MOVING

Philippians 3:13 NIV

Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,

Hebrews 12:1-3 MSG

Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!