Mark 12:28-34 | The Great Commandment
NOTE: This sermon is probably better listened to than read. While the preaching of it was very closely tied to the manuscript, there are some exhortations and pleadings included in the recorded sermon that you will not find in the text below.
28 And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” 29 Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” 32 And the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher. You have truly said that he is one, and there is no other besides him. 33 And to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” 34 And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And after that no one dared to ask him any more questions.
Mark 12:28-34
“You are not far from the kingdom of God.”
What does it mean to “not be far from the kingdom of God”? In the past few weeks, we’ve seen groups of people debating with Jesus in the temple court. The Pharisees, Herodians, and Sadduccees all prove they’re far from the kingdom of God. But here we have a scribe, likely a member of the Pharisees, whom Jesus says is not far from the kingdom of God. He came closer than all the others. But, of course, being not far does not mean being in, and being in is what matters.
So what brings a person into the kingdom? Is it one’s knowledge of God’s word? It is one’s agreement with God’s law? Or is it something else entirely? That’s what we’re going to think about today.
First, we see that knowledge of God’s law isn’t enough
All who debated with Jesus that day knew God’s law. The Pharisees certainly did. They were the teachers of Israel. The Sadducees knew it as well—at least well enough to know what they didn’t like about it. And this scribe certainly did. He was a recognized expert in God’s law, employed for his ability to transcribe it. So we have here a bunch of really smart people who knew their Bibles way better than probably all of us combined yet not a single one was in the kingdom of God.
That’s a bit surprising, isn’t it? These are the type of whom we’d say, “Man, they really know their Bible.” But their knowledge of the Bible didn’t do them any good when standing before the Word made flesh. Their knowledge of the Bible didn’t translate into being in God’s kingdom. Why is that? The scribe is a great case study. Perhaps better even than all the others we’ve seen. He wasn’t combative. He wasn’t trying to trap Jesus. He didn’t treat Jesus as a threat. He cames to ask a question because he saw how well Jesus answered everyone else. So here’s a guy who knows his Bible and doesn’t hate Jesus. He’s a good example because he represents the way so many people treat Jesus.
Look at his question. He has an important theological question to ask. “Which commandment is the most important of all?” That question was a hotly debated issue in his day. It would have been the theological trending topic on Twitter, with all the seminary professors and pastors and lay people jumping in with their opinion. The scribes identified 613 laws in the Old Testament. That’s a lot of laws! And as with any complex system, some laws were considered light and some heavy. But could you summarize it? Lots of people tried. For example, a famous rabbi who taught twenty years before Jesus’ ministry said, “What you would not want done to you, do not do to your neighbor. This is the essence of the law. Everything else is mere commentary on it.” (Rabbi Hillel) But that seems a bit lacking, doesn’t it? It doesn’t even mention God’s name! Well, Jesus has a better answer in verses 29-31: love God and love your neighbor.
The scribe loved this answer because it was deeply rooted in the Old Testament, and it highlighted two important passages. The first is from Deuteronomy 6:4-5 about loving God. This was something every Israelite knew by heart. They recited it every day. The most important command was, first, to love God with all that you are.
The second passage Jesus combined with Deuteronomy 6 is the “love your neighbor” passage from Leviticus 19:18. This combination summarized the law in a way that actually made sense. It captured the whole thing. God wants both love for him and love for others. But one comes first. Loving others as yourself flows from loving God with all you are.
Now, this is massively important, and there are entire sermons we could preach (and will preach) on loving God and loving others. But the main focus in this passage is on the interaction between Jesus and the scribe. What Mark wants to show us is the danger mere knowledge can be. The scribe only wanted to know what Jesus thought rather than live what Jesus taught. His interest was entirely theological. It was not spiritual. Great knowledge of God’s law alone only brings one near, not in, the kingdom.
That doesn’t mean God doesn’t want us to have knowledge. He wants us to think through the Bible. He wants us to reason with him (Isaiah 1:18). He wants us to think over what he’s said (2 Timothy 2:7). He wants us to come to logical conclusions and reasonable answers to hard questions. In no uncertain terms, he wants us to know him, and knowing him means we must know about him. Knowledge, in fact, is part of what the New Testament writers urge all believers to achieve about God’s word. Knowing that we are saved by Christ grants so much assurance in the Christian life.
God gave us a mind so that we could think deeply about him. But that mind must be given over to him and used in humble submission before him. That’s why Jesus says part of loving God is loving him with all your mind. The scribe didn’t do that. Instead, he used his mind as a way to avoid God’s real call. He was a really smart guy, but he kept is on the surface, as theory alone. He didn’t hand his mind over to God. He didn’t use his knowledge to get him closer to God but to win an argument, to settle a debate, to notch some theological precision points into his belt.
But God wants us to use our mind not for our pride but for his glory. Mere knowledge of God’s word isn’t enough to bring us into the kingdom of God. Why not? Because knowledge for knowledge’s sake can be used for all kinds of misguided purposes. Knowing your Bible isn’t proof of salvation. I hope we all know our Bibles. There’s a reason we teach it each week. We want you to know it! But it’s not enough. The devil and his demons know the Bible but it doesn’t save them! Paul said knowledge puffs up. Knowledge is a great garden for pride. And as our pride grows, our felt need for God dies. This scribe shows us it is possible to stand before the very Son of God and because of the desire for knowledge miss the entire point of it!
Do you know God or do you only know about God? That’s the all-important distinction. It is possible to know God’s words inside and out but it does us no good at all if we don’t know Jesus. Jesus said, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me” (John 5:39). Knowing our Bible isn’t enough. If all we do is know it, we will be not far from the kingdom but not in the kingdom. We must have more.
So, what about agreement with God’s law? That’s the second thing to consider.
Second, agreement with God’s law doesn’t save
There was another problem with this scribe. He not only knew God’s law, he also agreed with it. How’s that a problem? It’s a problem because he stopped there. Though he agreed with God’s law on a surface level, he didn’t allow it to change him. His interest was intellectual, not spiritual. He agreed with Jesus’ answer but did not go on down the path to actual obedience.
He was like some people who think they’re Christians but are really only interested in theology. They like to use their mind to think about God but never really give their mind over to God. Theology becomes merely a hobby. It remains theoretical. It’s a point of conversation and debate. It doesn’t settle down into the heart. The scribe is like so many others who treat God as an object of study rather than an object of worship. The danger is that knowledge remains theoretical because it’s merely agreement.
Look how the scribe applauded Jesus’ answer in verses 32-33. He agreed with Jesus. Moreover he seemed to know and agree with the intention of the law—that God wants men and women to obey him from a pure heart rather than merely with outward actions. But did the scribe apply this? Was he not doing the very opposite here? He applauded Jesus’ answer, but as Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, “The law is not to be applauded; it is to be applied.” Agreement with God’s law doesn’t save. The law is not something only to be considered and thought about or even agreed with. The law is something to be applied to one’s life.
As smart as he was, he didn’t think hard enough. If he loved God with all his mind, he would have taken the journey Paul took in his thinking. Remember the letters to the Romans and the Galatians, where Paul thinks through the implications of the law. He concludes that the law is good because it shows us we are bad. He understands how to use the law rightly. It shows how disobedient we truly are. It grows in us a need for a rescue, for a savior. It prepares us for Jesus. The law came not to save but to show that we need to be saved!
If the scribe had stopped discussing it for a minute and started trying to obey it, maybe he would have asked Jesus a different question. It’s when we try to obey God’s law that it begins to work its purpose out in our lives. Let’s just consider what it would mean to obey the law as Jesus set it forth here. What does it mean to love God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength? Well, for starters, it means that we must give all our ourselves over to God. He doesn’t want just a part of us, he requires the whole thing—heart, soul, mind, and strength—full tilt all the time without fail. God must come first in everything we feel, think, and do. It must all be done for his glory alone out of a pure love for him. That’s a high calling isn’t it? It requires not just a Sunday morning worship service or a Tuesday night community group but our fully devoted life of love to God. Can you do that? Can you obey his law?
What about loving your neighbor as yourself? If the first doesn’t show us how far we’ve fallen, this surely will. J.P. Moreland puts the command in context for us. He says, “In the context of Leviticus 19:13-17, we are warned not to oppress ([the word “oppress” means] to keep someone in hardship; to cause distress, anxiety, or discomfort)” our neighbor, judge our neighbor unjustly, slander our neighbor, hate our neighbor in our hearts, and take revenge or bear a grudge against our neighbor. Rather, we are to love our neighbor as ourselves, implying that self-love is first…In Romans 13:9, Paul repeats Leviticus 19:18 and simply adds in verse 10 that love ‘does no harm to a neighbor,’ presumably because one would not do a wrong to oneself.” That’s a high mark to achieve! And to make it even harder, when asked, “Who is my neighbor?” in the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus says our neighbor is even our enemy; it is anyone who needs our love, which is a way of saying everyone in the world.
What’s so difficult about this is that Jesus frames the law in such positive terms and actions. We tend to think of laws as what we’re not supposed to do. And that’s true. They are prohibitive, but they are also call to action. They not only tell us to avoid some things but to pursue other things, and that’s what makes it so hard to obey.
And if you don’t yet believe me, let me use a couple of examples from the Ten Commandments. God said, “You shall not murder.” Okay. I think we can all obey that today, can’t we? No one has plans to murder tonight, right? Good. But in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said the true meaning of that commandment isn’t only to avoid the physical act of murder but to avoid the inward act of anger and hatred toward another. To hate is to commit murder in God’s eyes.
Let’s try another. The Ten Commandments tell us “You shall not commit adultery.” Okay. I bet a lot of us will make it through life without committing adultery on our spouse. But again, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says if you lust in your heart after another, you’ve committed adultery in God’s sight. Who of us aren’t in danger of doing that very thing today?!
God isn’t only calling us to avoid negative actions, he’s demanding from us loving, positive actions that spring from a pure heart. That’s God’s law! Have you obeyed that law? Can you obey that?
Of course, the answer is no. No one has obeyed. The Bible is very clear on that. And therefore we all stand condemned before God. We do not love God with all that we are and we do not love our neighbor as ourself. We may agree with Jesus on what the most important law is—and many do—but until we obey that law all our life without fail, our agreement means nothing.
Do you see how sweeping a condemnation this is? The scribe liked Jesus’ answer because he kept it merely as a theological interest rather than a matter of personal, spiritual application. We must not treat God that way. If your Christianity is something other than a desire to be like Jesus and is instead only for pursuit of theological correctness, repent of your self-righteousness. No one has nor can obey the law. It is condemning. It is damning. God meant for it to be. But the scribe never seems to get here, does he? He never seems to realize that the kingdom of God isn’t entered merely by what you know but through who you know. What should this scribe have done? Should he not have fallen at Jesus’ feet and cried out, “I can’t obey that! Who will save me?” But he didn’t say that, and if we never do either, we’ll remain near to the kingdom but not in the kingdom.
The kingdom of God is not entered through theological knowledge and agreement alone. It is entered another way, which is our third point.
Third, coming to Jesus is the only way
The scribe made a great first move. He came to Jesus. But he didn’t come close enough. He came to Jesus to ask a question but he didn’t draw close enough to see the true answer. If he had, he would have seen that Jesus not only knew God’s law but obeyed God’s law. He would have seen Jesus wasn’t only a teacher but a savior, a man like himself in appearance but unlike him in divinity. He would have seen a perfect man there before him who loved God with all he was, who never disobeyed for a second, and loved his neighbor as himself, headed to the cross to prove it. But the scribe didn’t see that because he didn’t come to Jesus as a sinner in need of saving but as a scribe in need of a theological answer. How have you come to him?
The difference between being near and being in the kingdom of God is simple, though I admit, not easy. It comes down to this: What do you do with Jesus? Is he a teacher or a savior? Can you see him for who he is and what he did or do you merely admire him for what he taught?
Standing before Jesus, the scribe never saw him for who he truly was. He who transcribed the Old Testament events about God’s glory coming into the temple didn’t see it when glory stood before him. He never saw the crushing weight of the law. He never realized the man before him was a Rescuer, the Son who, as Paul said in Galatians 4, “God sent forth…born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” Jesus was there to pull him from under the law by taking his place. The scribe remained a slave to the law, but how close he was to being a son! How close he was to finding in God not only a great law-giver but a loving Father! Jesus was there for that very reason, but he missed it! And because he missed it, he was outside the kingdom. He wasn’t far, that’s true, but to be not far is to be altogether out.
Please, let’s not miss Jesus. Let’s beware of standing in the presence of God and missing the hope of the gospel. Let’s beware of our knowledge and agreement shielding us from repentance and belief. Let’s not merely discuss matters with Jesus but fall down in worship before him, crying out for rescue. There is only one way to enter the kingdom of God, and the Bible is clear from cover to cover that the one way is faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone.
So here’s the hope for any of us that feel not far from the kingdom but want in. As great as his teaching was, Jesus did not come only to give you tips on how to live. He did not come merely to show you how to be kind to others. He came to rescue you from sin and death. He came to save you from the crushing weight of the law. He came, as he said in John 10, to be the door by which you enter the kingdom of God. He came to have his flesh torn open so that by his blood you find cleansing and hope. He suffered the separation on the cross that you deserve to give you the peace of God that you don’t deserve.
So if you want to be a citizen of his kingdom, all you have to do is ask him to bring you in. He will gladly do it. If you’re tired of trying to obey a law you’ve already failed and you’re tired of gaining more knowledge for knowledge’s sake and you’re tired of just agreeing with God and you’re ready to lay it all down at his feet and ask for new life, he’s ready to welcome you. How do I know? Because he said he would. To all who are weighed down by their sin and their failed attempts at obeying the heavy yoke of the law, Jesus says this morning, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” The kingdom of God is not for high-achievers. It is for repenters. If you can repent and admit your need for Jesus, the kingdom of God can be yours. If you see the law is killing you, Jesus will be your life.
I want you to know about God and I want you to agree with everything God says, but that alone won’t get you into heaven. And, in fact, the first step is knowing and agreeing with God that you’re a sinner in need of a savior. You enter God’s kingdom by coming to Jesus as your only hope and laying every other merit down at his feet. Your hope cannot be in your obedience. It cannot be in your character. It cannot be in your knowledge or agreement with God or anything else. Your hope must be placed in the power of Jesus Christ crucified, raised, ascended, glorified, and coming again. If it is anywhere else—even God’s law—you stand outside the kingdom looking in. But you must be in. Life is in there!
That’s not a matter of theological debate. It’s the truth of the gospel—something to rejoice in and enter into. And if you’ve not come in yet, well, the door is still open. Hurry inside.
Let’s pray.
