Today we are looking at the second in our series on the parables of Jesus. This particular parable is given in a context though which is important to consider if we are to understand the meaning of this parable. Remember last time we said that some parables are explained by Jesus, in some cases the central thought is given by the author, and in some cases we are left to figure it out on our own from the context. In this case, Jesus gives some instruction beforehand which helps us to understand what He is teaching in the parable.
So to begin let’s look at vs 13. Jesus has been teaching about the kingdom of God and suddenly a man from the crowd calls out to him. The man says, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.” In effect, this man addresses Jesus as a rabbi, a teacher. According to Jewish law, inheritance disputes could be settled by a rabbi.
The brashness of this man’s request showed that he really wasn’t interested in hearing about the kingdom of God, but he was interested in his own selfish concerns. It’s as if he was sitting there listening to Jesus preach, and thinking, when is he going to get to something that I can relate to? When is he going to tell me how I can profit from this? And so he finally reaches the end of his patience and interrupts Jesus. He wasn’t interested in what Jesus had to say, but in what Jesus could do for him. For this man, Jesus represented an opportunity for financial gain. He can’t wait for the Lord to stop talking about heaven, salvation, God, forgiveness, revelation, and get to the really good stuff. This guy wants to turn it into a Tony Robbins seminar.
I think that kind of mentality is common today in the church. That’s the kind of thinking that is behind the popularity of the prosperity doctrine. They really aren’t interested in spiritual things, they are interested in carnal things, and how to manipulate God into giving them prosperity.
So Jesus responds with a warning against greed, or covetousness. Notice vs Luke 12:14-15 “But He said to him, ‘Man, who appointed Me a judge or arbitrator over you?” In other words, Jesus isn’t interested in arbitrating trivial civil cases. Then He said to them, "Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not [even] when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.’”
You know, when we think of moral failings, what the Bible calls sin, chances are covetousness is not something that readily comes to mind. And even if it does, if we’re truthful, we really don’t think it’s all that bad of a thing. After all, there are a lot of worse sins it would seem to us. But God thought enough of it that He made it one of the 10 commandments. Think about that for a moment. Of all the things He could have included in the 10 commandments, He includes coveting. And chances are, if you’re like me you probably don’t really think coveting is all that bad. In fact, more than likely you do it all the time and never really feel guilty about it.
It’s interesting to me that this man who called out is coveting what his brother has. I have a brother that is very close to my age. We grew up doing everything together and competing in everything. But we also were constantly fighting. We had epic battles that sometimes lasted for days. They were pretty brutal. As we got older we graduated to using BB guns in our battles. It’s a wonder we didn’t put our eyes out.
But as we matured into adults we stopped fighting. However, I guess there is still some sense of competition between us. My brother is a pastor as well. And I have to admit that at times I have to guard against being jealous of how my brother compares with me. We’ve both had churches about the same length of time. But his church has about 600 people in attendance. He has just finished his third building program and has a huge church, another large children’s church, and acres of property. Meanwhile, my church doesn’t seem to grow, and we probably will never have a building. To make it worse, he just bought a new house on 20 acres. It’s a horse farm with barns and a big Tudor style house. And I still live in the same old farm house that we’ve been renting for 20 years.
Now as I said, I have to guard against wishing that I had some of what he has. The Bible calls that coveting. And it’s a serious sin. In Colossians 3:5 Paul equates covetousness as amounting to idolatry. And we would all recognize that idolatry is a serious sin against God. Coveting causes hatred, jealousy, anger, resentment. It leads to theft, to murder, to adultery, to every form of greed. Wars are often started by one country desiring what a neighboring country has. That was the situation with Nazi Germany. Or Saddam Hussein invading Kuwait.
Politicians exploit coveting by class warfare, promising to give to you what belongs to your neighbor.
Covet is to desire what is not yours, to desire what belongs to another. This man that called out to Jesus to tell his brother to share his inheritance with him was desiring what was not his. It was his brother’s inheritance. In Jewish culture, the bulk of the inheritance of the father’s estate went to the eldest brother. According to the law of the day, the elder brother received two-thirds of the inheritance and the younger brother received one-third. So this man wants what is not his. He desired what his brother had inherited. That is coveting.
So Jesus tells this man, “Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.” Jesus uses the Greek word for life which is zoe, which really speaks of the fullness of life, not just physical but spiritual. It’s the abundant, full life that we are given in salvation, which is everlasting life. So Jesus says that the fullness of life does not consist of possessions, or of riches. You cannot find true satisfaction in riches or possessions. Contrary to the popular mantra of our generation, he who dies with the most toys doesn’t win, and if that was what they lived for, they end up losing their very soul. So beware, Jesus said, be on your guard against becoming controlled by greed, being covetous, desiring more, desiring what is not yours. That is a form of idolatry instead of putting God first.
So beginning in vs 16 Jesus told a parable to communicate the danger of covetousness. Jesus said, “The land of a rich man was very productive. And he began reasoning to himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?” Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.”
The ground yielded to him a bumper crop. It would seem that year after year it was very productive land. This man in Jesus’ parable was blessed with fertile ground; we can assume that by adding hard work to the fertile ground, he was a financial success. He was so successful that he had trouble finding a place to store it. But what he failed to realize was that it was God who provided the means by which it was prosperous. God provided the nutrients in the soil, the rain, the sunshine, the good weather that did not damage the crops. God gave him the health and strength to plant and harvest.
God blessed him, but this man did not think of sharing his prosperity, or giving back to the Lord. It was his hard earned money. It was his! He thought it was due to his genius, due to his work ethic, due to some inherent goodness in himself. This man never thought of giving anything back to God or to be generous with others who had not been so fortunate. One sin that this man committed was that he robbed God of His fair share of the proceeds. He really shows by his use of his riches that he has no regard for God or man and is selfish.
This man is described as rich. Being rich is not sinful in and of itself. We see men in scripture who were rich, such as Abraham, or Job. Or in the New Testament, Joseph of Arimathea. Paul says in 1Tim. 6:10 “For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” So greed, making money an idol is the root of all sorts of evil, but having money is not sinful in and of itself. But I will say that it is difficult to separate having money from the love of money. It’s difficult to be rich and have your treasure in heaven and not make an idol of your money. It’s your attitude towards riches that are the problem.
The other description of this man is he is a fool. That’s a pretty harsh thing to say about someone. But if it’s true, then it’s legitimate. And God says that this man is a fool. He is a fool because he put his trust in material things, in temporal things. He is not concerned with eternal things, but he is living for today. He is living for all he can get out of this world.
To be a fool in Biblical terms does not mean that you are stupid or unintelligent. There is a difference between stupidity and foolishness. To be a fool is to have a disregard for God. The opposite of a fool is one who is wise. And Psalm 111:10 says, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” This man had no fear of God, and thus he was a fool. The Psalms say, “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’” This man was a fool because he did not honor God.
So this man who gets a bumper crop, who has become wealthy as a result of God’s providence, talks to himself. He does not thank God, or honor God for what He has done for him. But he consults with himself. You know, when someone has conversations with himself that’s a pretty good indication that there is something wrong upstairs. Or at least that you may be heading in the wrong direction mentally. And when you talk to yourself and then answer yourself that’s a sure indication that they are going nuts.
So he’s not interested in God and he starts a discourse with himself. And he comes up with a strategy which is very typical of the natural man’s thinking. Store up treasure on earth, build bigger houses, and bigger barns. Grow your investment. Manage your investments so that you can retire comfortably and then eat, drink and be merry. Work really hard and make the accumulation of wealth your primary goal for 25 years, and then retire on a golf course in Florida. That’s really the goal of most people’s lives. The one who dies with the most toys wins. Live as long as you can, grab as much gusto as you can, eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. This life is all there is. Make the most of it.
If you drive around Sussex County you may notice that it looks like one of the most profitable building projects that are going up are storage facilities. There are more storage facilities than you would think would be necessary. But they keep building more, and they seem to fill them. And it seems like every other local that has some empty lots behind his house turns it into a storage lot for boats and trailers and RV’s. And those seem to fill up with no problem as well. It’s amazing that people buy all kinds of things, and then they put them in storage so they have room in their house to go out and buy new things.
This rich fool thinks that storing up his treasure and hoarding it and building bigger and bigger barns to keep all his possessions is the answer to a satisfying and rewarding life. It’s a godless formula for happiness that can never provide the fullness of life that we were intended to have.
This rich fool talks to himself, consults with his own reasoning, and decides on his course of action that he thinks is going to set him up for the rest of his life. But then God speaks. Proverbs 16:9 says, “The mind of man plans his way, But the LORD directs his steps.” God speaks and He’s not complimentary of how smart He thinks this guy is - He doesn’t congratulate him on how well he’s done financially. God speaks; “You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?”
While this man was celebrating how well he had done, God brought the accusation of foolishness against him. That very night, the rich fool’s soul was demanded of him. God was not impressed or satisfied with the rich man’s wealth and possessions. Sadly, although he was rich in treasures, this man was not rich toward God and was not prepared to meet the Lord.
“Tonight your soul is required of you.” In one night, all the man’s accomplishments and plans came to an abrupt end. He made business plans and life plans, but could not control the day of his death – and all his accomplishments and plans were instantly terminated. The Bible says, “It is appointed unto man once to die, and after that the judgment.” Psalm 90:12 in light of that says, “So teach us to number our days, That we may present to You a heart of wisdom.”
Jesus said in Matt. 16:26 "For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? “You can’t trade God your possessions for eternal life. God doesn’t want your house or cars or even your bank account in exchange for eternity.
“Tonight your soul will be required of you”. That’s the language of obligation. This man owed his life, his livelihood, and his wealth to God; but most of all he owed his soul to God, and that night it would be required of him. He was obligated to God every day of his life, but his soul would be required on the day of his death.
If the rich fool stood before God in eternity and said God I will give you all my possessions in my barns now, God would say to that man, you no longer have it to give. You can’t take it with you. You didn’t really possess it then, you were merely a caretaker of what God gave you. It’s no longer yours. You left it on earth and furthermore it’s the wrong currency in heaven.
Everyone on earth looking at this man’s life would think the man in the parable was a great success, but God said he was a fool. Eternity proved the man a fool, and his story showed that it isn’t only sin to give earthly riches first place in your life – it is also foolish.
The rich man in the parable had thought that his possessions was all for him. He said, “I will, I will, I will, I will, my crops, my barns, my goods, my soul. Everything was about him, and nothing was about God. But at the end of his life he found that nothing was his – even his own soul was subject to God. He no longer had any crops, any barns, any goods, and he was spiritually bankrupt.
He who lays up treasures for himself and is not rich towards God is like this man. So how do we become rich towards God? We must give first place in our lives to God. We reverence God, we honor God. We come together to worship Him on the first day of the week. We honor Him with the first fruits of our labor. We use our possessions for spiritual purposes and not just to fulfill our fleshly desires. We become rich toward God by sacrificial giving to those in need. Luke 12:33 says, ”Sell your possessions and give to charity; make yourselves money belts which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” And as Luke 18:22 says, When Jesus heard [this,] He said to him, "One thing you still lack; sell all that you possess and distribute it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.”
Another text that tells us how to be rich towards God is 1Tim. 6:17-19 “Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy. [Instruct them] to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is life indeed."
We can also be rich towards God by trusting in Jesus for the righteousness which no amount of money can buy. In Rev. 3:17-18 Jesus says, 'Because you say, "I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing," and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and [that] the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see.”
Jesus said in Matt. 6:24 "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” (or riches) We can’t ignore the fact that earthly riches often keep us from the pursuit of heavenly riches as we should. Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 6:9, “But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition.” Most of us are afraid of poverty; we should be afraid of wealth. Let us instead lay up treasure in heaven, where moth and rust does not corrupt. Let us be rich towards God, so that in the day when our soul is required of us to stand before God, we will not be classified as a fool who wasted his life that God had so graciously given him, by focusing on the riches of this world rather than the true treasure which is God.
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