Hello, and welcome to this week's posting of the Weekend Sermon. I hope that you are doing very well today.
I have mostly recovered from my illness. However, I am having trouble with asthma. I had severe asthma when I was younger, but it subsided greatly when I was about half way through college. Of this I am grateful to the Lord. For about the past three or four months, I've been having trouble with it again. Please pray that this will be able to be controlled again. Thank you.
I have something that I want to thank the Lord for. I had poetry accepted this week for publication in a literary journal published by the University of Arkansas. I am very thankful that the Lord has allowed me to be a poet and a writer.
In prayer this week, please continue to pray for those who have experienced natural disasters in their area. About one week ago, I heard that there was a bad storm that hit Madagascar. Please pray that this nation will recover from any problems that they might be having.
Also, I read an article last week that hunger among children in Africa is increasing rapidly. Please pray that the children will have their needs met, and that peace and justice can come to this world. Pray for peace in Syria, Iraq and in all the war ravaged nations of this world.
For our prayer focus countries this week, please pray for those living in China and Tunisia. Pray that many in these two countries will hear the good news about Jesus.
Last week, we stepped away from our series on the parables of Jesus to focus on the the theme of holiness. Today, we will return to our parables of Jesus series with a message on the Parable of the Rich Fool as it is often called.
Let's set the stage for this parable. Jesus was teaching one day when a man called out to Jesus asking Him to tell his brother to divide the inheritance with Him. Jesus replied that He hadn't been appointed as the arbitrator between the two. Jesus then went on to say in Luke 16:15, "Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one's life does not consist of possessions."
At this point, Jesus told the crowd a parable to illustrate what He was saying. There was a rich man who had an abundant harvest. He had such a big harvest that his barns couldn't contain it all. The rich man decided to build bigger barns to hold all the harvest. The rich man said that since he had so much stored up that he could eat, drink and be merry.
God said to this man, "You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you, and the things that you have prepared, to whom will they belong?" Jesus concluded in Luke 16;21, "Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God."
This parable has a very clear meaning as far as I am concerned. Some might find my interpretation of this parable to be controversial. I don't know. There at least four things that I think Jesus is teaching in this parable.
First of all, this parable is an illustration of the fact that we are not to be greedy. Greed is one of the sins that is most spoken about in the Bible. The desire to obtain more and more at the expense of others is clearly condemned throughout Scripture and in our parable today.
Greed is a form of selfishness. The one who is greedy only cares about himself and what he can get. The greedy one doesn't care if he hurts other people or the environment. His thoughts certainly aren't fixed upon the things of God where true riches are found.
Jesus clearly taught in the Sermon on the Mount that His followers can't serve God and money. We are called by Jesus to lay up treasure in Heaven where moth and rust do not corrupt and where thieves do not break in or steal. The treasure that is laid up on earth is fleeting and will soon pass away.
The second point that I think Jesus is making is that there is a limit to wealth. There comes a point when a person accumulates a certain amount and then anything else is considered excessive and sinful. What is that point? That is hard question. This is the way that I understand it. How many houses can a person have and live in? How many cars can you drive? How many boats can you sail the seas in? How many luxuries do we really need?
If all of us stop and think about questions like this, I don't think it is really too hard to find when enough is enough. I don't think that the Lord is upset if we have a nice home and have some nice things in life. However, just like anything else, it can go too far.
I think that one way to gauge when wealth has become excessive is when our desire to keep and obtain it hurts others like it did in this parable. This rich man would have had workers who harvested this grain. They would have loved to have had a little of it to help feed their families. There were multitudes of desperately poor people in Israel in Jesus' day who needed something to eat. Instead of being concerned about them, the rich man was only concerned about himself.
In our day and age, we might think of the parable in another way. If you have enough to meet your needs and more and you are in a profession where people's lives are dependent on you, are you still charging them high rates or not seeing them because they can't pay. I think that that is similar to what Jesus is saying in this parable.
I believe that this principle applies on the national level as well. Is it right for any nation to take from its poorest citizens to give to those who already have so much. This is something for those like me who live in the United States to think about right now in light of the new budget details that have just been released.
We as believers need to seek the Lord and ask Him to lead us into a sense of "enoughness". We need to think about what Paul said when he was taking the collection for the church in Jerusalem. In II Corinthians 8:13-14, Paul speaks about equality among the brethren. It is a good passage to read and ponder its meaning.
The third thing that I believe Jesus is teaching in this parable is that we should have a heart that is willing to give. As I've said, there are many people in this world who have great need. If we have been blessed by the Lord with more than enough, maybe we can all work to help others who have little or next to nothing.
Finally, I believe that Jesus is trying to show us in this parable that our focus and our trust is to be on God alone. Even when a person has great wealth, that is not something to be relied upon. It may be gone tomorrow. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, many people lost all of their fortune over night. Some of them were so depressed that they took their own lives.
Those who believe in Jesus need to trust in Him alone. This life and its riches count for nothing. Jesus counts for everything. We need to follow Him and do His will in this world. If we trust in Him, we will be with Him forever, and there is nothing greater than this in all the world.
I haven't presented this message with the intention of putting anyone down. I hope that you will study these things and let the Holy Spirit guide you as you seek His will.
Next week, I will be posting the verses on Monday and the second installment of the book on Tuesday. I will have a review of a dog book on Wednesday and the sermon will be posted on Friday. May God bless you all. Amen.
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