“Looking at him, Jesus loved him and said to him, “You lack one thing: Go, sell all you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” 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.” “Truly I tell you,” Jesus said, “there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the gospel, who will not receive a hundred times more, now at this time — houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions — and eternal life in the age to come.” Mark 10:21, 23, 25, 29-30 CSB https://bible.com/bible/1713/mrk.10.21-30.CSB
The American definition of Christianity is not God’s definition of who will live with Him forever in His eternal kingdom. American Christianity promotes believing in Jesus for salvation. Jesus, Who is God, requires the surrender of all loves before Him. Some love money more than God and are required to remove as much money as necessary to enter the kingdom of heaven. Failure to love God more than money is a failure to live forever in the kingdom of heaven. How do we know if we love money more than God? We work harder at obtaining money than people in God’s kingdom. We compromise conviction and confession for fear of job loss, clientele, or other economic favors. It is not just money that we love more than God; it is also family. We again compromise conviction and confession of God’s ways and God’s requirements for men to be saved when around those we love who think differently than God. So many Christian parents have now become sympathetic to pagan homosexual thinking because their children have embraced that thinking and even that lifestyle. Loving God means loving Him most, as demonstrated by living according to His ways and teaching those ways to others until all people obey everything Jesus commands. Jesus decides who will live forever in His kingdom and not us. Our thinking will not change God’s thinking, as He revealed in Scripture. If we are truly children of God, we must deny ourselves, take up our cross, and embrace the persecution from wholehearted identification with Jesus to receive eternal life and reward. Compromise is the path to condemnation. We must love as Jesus loved, God first and unequivocally, serving humanity without compromising God’s standard, even at the loss of our life, relationships, or economic welfare.
