Homily on Matthew 19:16–26
From the Holy Metropolis of New Zealand
A young man comes to Christ with the most direct question: “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?”It sounds noble enough, but the Fathers discern what lies hidden beneath it. The man assumes that eternal life is something he can secure by doing. St. John Chrysostom observes: “He came, not to learn who Christ is, but to receive a rule for the conduct of life. And therefore when he heard the higher commandments, he went away, unable to bear them.” (Homily 63 on Matthew).
He assumes that eternal life is something that can be secured through an action, a possession, a “good deed” that he can perform or acquire. St. John Chrysostom comments that the man is not yet seeking God Himself but the reward; he comes as if he were making a trade deal with heaven.
Christ first meets him at the level of his own imagination. “Keep the commandments,” He says. He lists the commandments that have to do with loving one’s neighbour: do not kill, do not commit adultery, do not steal, honour your parents, love your neighbour as yourself. The young man replies, “All these I have kept. What do I still lack?” It is the honesty of this question that opens the deeper truth. For if righteousness were only keeping commandments externally, then eternal life could indeed be earned. But he senses within himself that something is missing.
And here Christ puts His finger on the wound: “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.”
This is not simply about wealth. St. Cyril of Alexandria says: “Christ does not bid us to abandon possessions as though they were evil, but to renounce our attachment to them, for the sickness is not in the things themselves but in the passions which cling to them.” (Commentary on Luke, Sermon 122). The call is deeper: to release the illusion that we can hold our life in our own hands, to strip away the false self, to stand empty before God so that true life may be received.
But the young man walks away sorrowful, because he cannot imagine life without what he owns. He cannot conceive of himself apart from his possessions. He has kept commandments, but he has not yet died to what he thinks he is.
Christ then turns to His disciples and utters those terrifying words: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.” The disciples are astonished—not because they are wealthy, but because wealth in their world was often seen as a sign of God’s blessing. If even the rich, with all their resources, cannot enter—then who can be saved?
And here comes the heart of the Gospel: “With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
These words are not a pious slogan. They are a revelation of the human condition and the divine economy. Salvation is not simply difficult for us—it is impossible. No man, no matter how disciplined, how righteous, how generous, can bridge the chasm between death and life. The camel does not simply squeeze through the eye of the needle with effort—it cannot pass through at all.
And yet: “With God all things are possible.” St. Maximus the Confessor says: “The grace of the Spirit makes man godlike, accomplishing in him what is beyond nature: union with God.” (Ambigua 7). Salvation is not God helping us to complete what we almost could do; it is God doing what we cannot even begin to do—raising the dead.
In Fr. John Behr’s language, this impossibility is precisely the Cross. It is only when Christ Himself enters death—that the way to eternal life is opened.
“With men this is impossible”—the Cross reveals the utter incapacity of man. “But with God all things are possible”—the Resurrection reveals the power of God, not to improve human possibility but to create new life out of death.
Salvation is not a project of self-improvement, but communion—participation in the very life of God. What is impossible for us is to make ourselves alive. But God does not ask us to make ourselves alive; He asks us to follow, to surrender, to die with Christ so that His life may become ours.
The rich young man wanted a deed to do. Christ offered him a death to die and a life to receive. He walked away because he thought the cost too high. Yet what he missed was that the “impossible” was already being offered as gift.
And so the question comes back to us: what must we do to inherit eternal life? Nothing—because eternal life is not for sale. But we must die to everything we cling to as our life, so that God Himself may be our Life.
“With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Not because God makes the difficult easier, but because He alone is Life, and He gives Himself to us as gift. The camel does not pass through the needle’s eye by effort; rather, the needle itself is opened by the Cross of Christ, and in Him we pass through into the Kingdom.
