Mark 10:29

Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or mother, or father, or children, or lands, for my sake, and for the gospel's sake, but he shall receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.

This tremendous threefold promise of: (1) possessions and (2) family being multiplied a hundredfold in this present life, and (3) of eternal life in the world to come is one of the grandest in the word of God. No man ever tried this promise without finding it true; and yet, as Taylor said: "Such an utterance cannot be tested by human observation, because the motives that impel any man to give up temporal comforts cannot be known."[33]

The rich young ruler would have been far better off if he had followed the Lord, giving up all of his wealth. If he lived so long as 70 A.D., everything that he owned was wiped out in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish state. Whereas the Christians survived that debacle without the loss of a single life, the non-Christian portion of Israel was utterly destroyed, some 1,100,000 of the population being put to the sword.[34] Thus, when the rich young ruler turned away from Jesus, he turned his back upon his highest secular interests as well as the promise of eternal life. The Lord knew what was best for him; but it is also true that the Lord knows what is best for every man!

Houses ... and lands, with persecutions ... That the material and temporal benefit of Christ's disciples is enhanced through their following of the Master is here categorically stated. The very qualities of truth, integrity, honesty, dependability, diligence, thrift, humility, self-denial, etc., which virtues are an essence of Christianity, are inevitably rewarded. Every corporation on earth is trying to find employees who will manifest such qualities. Persecutions however, are also to be expected.

And in the world to come eternal life ... One may only be astounded at such a work as The Interpreter's Bible omitting this clause from both the exegesis and the exposition. This is the most important line in Jesus' entire reply, carrying the promise of eternal life in the world to come and a necessary inference of the Lord's deity. Who but Almighty God come in the flesh could make a promise like this? The conviction of Christ's church for nearly two millennia has found here in these eternal words of Jesus the most confident expectations of life after death and of an eternity of happiness with the Lord in the hereafter.

[33] Ibid.

[34] J.R. Dummelow, Commentary on the Whole Bible (New York: Funk and Wagnalls Company, 1937), p. 704.