“You call me good! You should know my Father!’

The eternal life he sought was likely but the poor idea of living forever, all that commonplace minds grasp at for eternal life. When a man has eternal life, that is, when he is one with God, what should he do but live forever? But without oneness with God, mere existence would be but a curse...

He could not make himself naked as a little child and let his Father take him! To him it was not the word of wisdom the “Good Master” spoke. How could a rich man believe he would be of more value without his money...

Was the refusal of the young man of necessity final? Because he declined to enter into life, was the door of life closed against him? Verily, I have not so learned Christ...

Was the Lord then premature in his demand? Was the youth not ready for it? I do not believe it. He gave him the very next lesson in the divine education for which he was ready; it was time the demand should be made upon him...

The youth was so pleasing in the eyes of the Master, that he would take him to be with him—to walk with him, and rest with him, and go with him only to do for him what he did for his Father in heaven—to plead with men, be a mediator between God and men...

The immediate end of the commandments never was that men should succeed in obeying them, but that, finding they could not do that which yet must be done, they should be driven to the source of life and law...