14The Pharisees, who loved silver, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. 15He said to them, “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.

It's like also the parable of the rich man who wanted to justify himself.
The response from the disciples to Jesus's statement that he needed to 'sell his possessions' was WHO THEN CAN BE SAVED.?
This has nothing to do with earthly wealth, and their astonished question focuses on one thing only - that what Jesus was actually stating was that they were justifying themselves through something and they needed to sell it....

If it is God who justifies man....and man is convinced that he can justify himself.....wouldn't the natural question be Who then can be saved if someone comes along telling them to sell what they were justifying themselves through?