Jesus and the Rich Young Man

Did you know that Jesus loves little children with all of His heart? 

One day, as a great crowd of people gathered around Jesus, several mommies and daddies brought their little children to Jesus for Him to touch them.  But when Jesus’ disciples saw what was happening, they told the parents to keep their children away from Jesus because He didn’t have time for them.  

Jesus was not happy with his disciples for saying that!  In fact, Jesus said, “Don’t you dare keep these children away from Me!  I came for them – they are Mine and I love them.  They belong to Me!”  

Then Jesus took the children in His arms and blessed every one of them.

A nicely dressed young man came up to Jesus and said, “Excuse me, Teacher, what good thing must I do to have eternal life?”  Jesus said, “Why do you ask Me what good thing you can do?  God is the one who is good.  Keep the commandments that He has given you. ” The young man asked Jesus, “Which commandments do You mean?”

Jesus said, “Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not lie, honor your father and mother, and love your neighbor as yourself.”  The young man confidently smiled and said, “I’ve kept all of those commandments since I was a little boy!  Is there anything else I should do?” 

Jesus looked at the young man and said, “Yes there is something else you need to do.  Sell everything that you have and give the money to help the poor people.  Then you will have treasure in heaven and you can follow Me.”

The young man’s smile went away. His heart sunk.  What Jesus said made him very sad because he had lots of money and he loved all of his many possessions.  With a frown, the rich young man turned and walked away from Jesus.

It’s so sad that this young man decided to walk away from Jesus. We all like to have nice things, don’t we?  We enjoy our toys and our clothes and our houses and our cars and all of that’s okay; but we should never love any of those things more than we love Jesus.  Everything on the earth will one day be gone because things can’t last forever.  But what does last forever is the love of Jesus!  Nothing should ever be more important in our lives than Him!