Good People Go to Hell
Good People Go to Hell
They say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It’s also paved with good deeds.
Have you ever wondered why Jesus gave the rich young ruler a list of things to do in order to inherit eternal life, if in fact the Good News of Jesus was and is that we are saved through faith alone, as an outpouring of God’s grace on humanity (Ephesians 2:8-9)?
This used to really bother me, because it felt like a contradiction. So I kept reading this account, over and over again, trying to make sense of it. Then one day, I noticed something I hadn’t seen before. Jesus wasn’t contradicting Himself; He was setting the man up with every bit of truth that he would need in order to eventually understand and (hopefully) one day receive the reason to hope that only Jesus was able to offer him.
Let’s take a closer look at the conversation between Jesus and the man…
As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.’”
“Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”
Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.
Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!”
The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 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.”
The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, “Who then can be saved?”
Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”
- Mark 10:17-27, NIV (emphasis added)
When the rich young ruler came to Jesus, I don’t think he was looking for information. I think he was looking for affirmation. You see, we know from the dialogue that he’d spent his whole life trying to be good (“all these [commands] I have kept since I was a boy”).
So why would this man come to Jesus and ask Him how he could have eternal life?
Because from the man’s perspective, Jesus was exactly what he’d called Him: a “good teacher.” The man had surely heard about Jesus (Matthew 4:23-25); and from what others were saying about Jesus, he recognized Him as someone who knew the Scriptures, who spoke with authority, and who had a reputation for being morally upright.
If there was any man on earth who was worthy of giving the rich young ruler God’s stamp of approval, it was Jesus.
And because the man believed himself to also be morally upright — probably moreso than anyone else he’d ever engaged with up to that point — while he recognized Jesus as an authority on the matter, he also saw Jesus as his equal. In this man’s eyes, they were both good men.
Jesus saw right through this. And I believe that’s what led to Jesus’ initial reply:
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.” - Mark 10:18, NIV (emphasis added)
Jesus wasn’t suggesting that He wasn’t God. Rather, Jesus was establishing right off the bat that He and the man were not on the same level. Either Jesus wasn’t good, and therefore, was not worthy to declare the man righteous (or unrighteous) in God’s eyes. Or Jesus was good, in which case, He was also God — the only Righteous One.
But since the man had come prepared to show off his credentials and to have them assessed by the “good teacher,” Jesus played along. Jesus listed off a number of God’s commandments to the man who was surely beaming with pride. He’d kept them all (v 19-20)! I can only imagine that he was expecting Jesus to give him a pat on the back, a “good job,” and the reassurance that God most certainly must have been pleased with him.
What the man hadn’t been expecting was for Jesus to say this: “One thing you lack” (v 21). The man’s heart must’ve dropped to his stomach upon hearing those words.
He’d asked Jesus for a list of things to do, fully expecting to be told that he’d already done enough. And since he’d asked for a list, Jesus gave him one — one that he couldn’t possibly live up to, but one that he’d have to live up to, if he had any hope of earning eternal life for himself.
(Spoiler alert: he never had any hope of earning eternal life for himself. And that was the whole point.)
This man had followed the letter of God’s law, but he’d missed the heart of it. So Jesus honed in on what was hidden in his heart — hidden even from himself.
By telling the man to sell all of his worldly possessions and to give them to the poor, Jesus exposed the man’s selfishness and greed. This man loved his possessions, and he did not love the poor.
And surely, once the man’s eyes had been opened to his sinful state for the first time, in time, he’d also recognize other sins within himself. He’d realize that he was proud, self-righteous, a hypocrite — a far cry from the good man he’d been believing himself to be before his encounter with the “good teacher,” the only truly Righteous One (1 John 2:1).
We’re told that this man walked away from Jesus sorrowfully, thinking about all that he owned, all that he didn’t want to have to give up (v 22). Another way to think about this is that the man went away focused on his sin problem.
And the thing is, Jesus let him walk away…
I used to read this part and wonder why Jesus never told the man the real answer to his problem. How come Jesus never shared the explicit gospel message with the rich young ruler, as He had done with so many others?:
“For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life.” - Jesus (John 6:40, 47, NIV)
Jesus had the answer! Jesus was the answer!
After the man walked away, Jesus continued the conversation with His disciples who were with Him, acknowledging how hard it was going to be for that rich young ruler to enter God’s kingdom (v 23-25). Jesus’ disciples seemed troubled by this — perhaps because, in their culture, wealth was often attributed to God’s favor. And if the most deserving of men — the ones upon whom God looked most favorably — were not welcome in God’s kingdom, who then could enter? Or in the words of Jesus’ disciples, “Who then can be saved?” (v 26).
And this was where Jesus wrapped the whole interaction up neatly:
Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.” - Mark 10:27, NIV (emphasis added)
When the rich young ruler came to Jesus, he’d asked Jesus what he could do to inherit eternal life (v 17).
Jesus had responded by proving to the man that what he was trying to accomplish based on his own merit was impossible, because his “goodness” was never going to measure up to God’s goodness (v 19-22) (Isaiah 64:6).
But Jesus went on to declare that what was impossible for the man to achieve on his own was not impossible with God (v 27).
And though the rich young ruler walked away that day fixated on his sinfulness and his seemingly unsolvable problem, Jesus had actually revealed the answer to him, if he’d only have eyes to see it. Because there was one thing that the man had been right about from the beginning: Jesus really was good.
And since Jesus was good, Jesus was God.
With Jesus, the rich young ruler could inherit eternal life. All he had to do was believe.
I think it’s safe to speculate that the rich young ruler never forget about his conversation with Jesus. Jesus’ words were likely etched into his memory.
And just as he’d heard rumors about this “good teacher” who knew the Scriptures, who spoke with authority, and who had a reputation for being morally upright (all of which proved to be true), I bet the rich young ruler also later heard about Jesus having been crucified for claiming to be the Son of God (John 19).
In fact, since any good Jewish man would have been in Jerusalem for Passover, it’s likely that the rich young ruler would have also been present when it happened. He was likely standing in the crowd amongst those who were demanding that Jesus be crucified when Pilate declared that he could find no fault in Jesus (John 19:6)!
And upon hearing those words spoken by a man who had the authority to proclaim that someone was guilty or faultless, I bet the rich young ruler would’ve remembered the words Jesus had spoken to him before, right after the man had addressed Jesus as a “good teacher”: “No one is good—except God alone” (Mark 10:18).
The rich young ruler had come to Jesus to be pronounced guiltless, but instead, had been found guilty.
Jesus was brought before Pilate to be pronounced guilty, and instead, was found to be guiltless.
When Jesus revealed the rich young ruler’s sinfulness to him, He didn’t leave him there in a state of hopelessness, without ever having given him the answer to his sin problem. Jesus went on to become the answer to his sin problem — the answer to all of our sin problems — when He went to the cross in the place of sinners.
1 Corinthians 5:21 puts it like this: “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (NIV).
I can’t say for certain that the rich young ruler ever did inherit eternal life, because the Bible never tells us the rest of his story. But I’m certain of this: he had the opportunity to receive it, because he had an encounter with the God who makes all things possible!
Good people don’t go to heaven, because good people don’t exist.
But there is a good God who made a way for us to spend eternity with Him, through faith in Jesus, the Righteous One!
The righteousness of God is through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe, since there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; they are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. - Romans 3:22-24, CSB
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. - John 3:16-21, NIV
For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift— not from works, so that no one can boast. - Ephesians 2:8-9, CSB
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As Christians, you and I are called to always be ready to share the reason we have to be hopeful with anyone who asks us (1 Peter 3:15). When you’re wearing this shirt, you can show up ready with your answer and let someone else start the conversation. Everybody’s searching for a reason to be hopeful, so let’s give them one!
Related blog post: “Are You Ready with Your Reason?”
