Luke 12:13-21 Pentecost 8 C
Pastor Ron Koehler
Grace-Tucson, AZ
July 31, 2022
Good morning, rich people! “Wait a minute, that’s not the way he’s supposed to start a sermon. Also, he’s going to talk about money—not a big fan of that in church.” If you’re thinking anything like that, I’m going to ask you to hear me out. More importantly, I’ll ask you to pay attention because it is Jesus who has the story you want to hear. The thing is, I can begin by calling you all rich because you are. We are all rich. You may not think so, but we are. We may be rich in terms of earthly wealth and possessions. What is rich though? Americans feel that if your net worth is $774,000, you are financially comfortable, but their opinion of what it takes for a person to be wealthy, rich, is a net worth of $2.2 million—$2.7 million if you live in Phoenix (2022 Charles Schwab Modern Wealth Survey). But I would guess that most of us might label as rich someone who has far less than $2.2 million. And ask people in the rest of the world to assess your life, and many, many of them would call you rich, no question about it. We may be rich when it comes to God. If you’re sitting here today with an understanding of God’s grace, his undeserved love shown to us in Jesus—and you trust in him as your Savior—you are spiritually rich. Most, if not all of us, are rich one way or the other. And some of us might be both. The real issue though is a matter of the heart: what kind of riches do you depend on? I think I know what our answer to that question is. After all, here we are in God’s house. But we need to think more deeply about this. As we listen to Jesus’ story, think about this: Which Type of Rich Person Are You? 1. The One Who Depends on Earthly Things 2. The One Who Depends on God Out of a large crowd came a man who had a request to make of the Teacher whom I’m sure he saw as wise and authoritative. He told Jesus to step into a family disagreement about their inheritance. One of the brothers was clutching the family’s money and possessions when he should have divided it with his brother. Jesus sharply responded: “Man, who appointed me to be a judge or an arbitrator over you?” Jesus had not been elected or appointed to some government position like a judge that would allow him to step in. He wasn’t a third-party mediator assigned to settle disputes over the division of assets. Jesus had been appointed to a position, but it wasn’t the one this man was looking for. Jesus was appointed by his Father to come into the world to be its Savior, to show that with his life and teach people the way to heaven by faith in him.
And so, he turned the man’s request into a teachable moment for everyone there. Jesus addressed the sin of greed when he said: “Watch out and be on guard against all greed, because a man’s life is not measured by how many possessions he has.” As he often did, Jesus told a story to make his point that riches and eternal life are not on the same level—not even close. The rich man Jesus talked about gave serious thought to his crops and his ability to store the abundance he had been blessed with. Bigger barns was his determination. Bigger barns. Then he would have room for all his goods and grain—the things that made him rich. His problem would be solved and he could look to the future. As he did so, what he saw was his ability to do whatever he wanted. He wouldn’t have to work so hard. He could eat and drink to his heart’s content. He could have a great attitude toward life—he would be happy. This man didn’t need a side-hustle like Uber driving or tutoring—he was already rich. And now this abundant harvest really set him up for the future. It was a windfall. All that he had earned and would store away would be his security. It would allow him to work less and enjoy life’s luxuries and finer things without having to worry. Perhaps this was an early retirement that he was thinking of. Smart man. Work hard. Plan well. Manage well. Keep an eye on the future. He thought he had it all figured out. Smart man. Except he wasn’t so smart. God called him a fool. Why? Because he gave no thought to God. This man’s wealth and his management of it left God out. He was the kind of rich person who depended on earthly things, the kind who bases their future on them, who finds their happiness in them. This is the kind of rich person who really lives for the nice things that the world offers. What a fool. On the very night he dreamed of his future of enjoying all he had earned, his life would end, and he would stand before God. His things would go to someone who didn’t earn them, and he would be judged. How useless then were his work and possessions and life! Solomon would say, “What vapor!” Yeah, what a fool! With a short story, Jesus makes it clear that it is a gross error to live this way that shows disrespect to God and a lack of love for him who gives all things. It’s so obvious that this rich man had things messed up. But don’t we have to ask if we are guilty of the same damning sins Jesus warned against. Could it be that Jesus needs to respond sharply to us because of our attitudes toward worldly wealth and our attitudes concerning spiritual riches? Does he need to tell us to stop our worrying, to stop focusing on what is temporary, to stop thinking that we’re fine when we’re not? We have some similarities with the rich man. You have built up earthly wealth to some degree—it might be extremely modest, it might be an awful lot, or it might be in between. And even if it’s not bigger barns, you put it somewhere. You might own a house…or two…or other properties. You store some of it in a bank, a fund, retirement
accounts. It is stored for you in Social Security, maybe a pension too. Or like these brothers, it is kept within the documents concerning an inheritance that will come eventually. It is stored in your closets and kitchen cabinets, your dressers and drawers and boxes. It is kept in your garage and parked in your driveway. Many of us have lots of “barns” and a decent amount to store in them! Even if you wouldn’t classify yourself as rich, what you have may add up to something that many would call substantial. I hope that as I gave you some examples, you thought about the money and things that you have. Now think about how focused you are on them. Think about how much time and energy you give them. Think about how much you stake your future on them. Jesus makes us consider whether we are The Rich Person Who Depends on Earthly Things. The alternative is that we might be The Rich Person Who Depends on God. The way Jesus terms it is being rich toward God. Being rich toward God means to be rich with respect to God, rich concerning God. There are a number of things we ought to consider when it comes to this. The Bible tells us to use our gifts and abilities to be industrious, to work to provide for self and family, even to store things up in a proper way (Proverbs talks like this), and to not worry and fret that we won’t have enough. It says that we are to trust God with our lives. To be rich toward God means to push away thoughts of greed and to squash covetous desires because those feelings tell God that he has not given enough or the right things to make us happy. They scream out to God that though he has lavished you with riches enough, you are One Who Depends on Earthly Things. SO, we don’t want to do that. We don’t want to feel that way. That’s not what we want to tell God. We treasure his undeserved love! We place the highest value on our forgiveness in Jesus! We prize the gift of an eternal life with him! The love of Christ for us compels us to be rich toward God. I love my Savior so much that I want to live that love as a reflection of the love he lived for me. I want my heart and mind and actions to cry out that I am One Who Depends on God! There are some practical ways we express that. We use what we have and accumulate to be generous to others, to help when we see a need. God talks about his people doing that. Another way is to be sure our families are cared for. God actually says that someone who doesn’t do that is worse than an unbeliever. Jesus tells us to pay taxes out of our wealth. He tells us to be good managers of all his things and his money that he has entrusted to our care. Being rich toward God is shown through our offerings. It’s funny how greed and a lack of trust in God to provide pop up so easily when it comes to giving back to him. Of all of the ways to use what we bring in and store up, this should be the easiest one of all for The One Who Depends on God!
This can all be so hard to do, can’t it? Some treat their earthly wealth as if that is entirely disconnected from faith. Some people’s actions send the message: “This is all mine because I worked hard for it.” God had something to say about that. He said, You might say in your heart, “My ability and the power of my hand have earned this wealth for me.” But then you are to remember that the LORD your God is the one who gives you the ability to produce wealth (Deuteronomy 8:17-18a). It would be a grave mistake—a potentially damning one—to think that God does not notice or care what we do with our money and things. If you don’t prioritize and manage your wealth to do the things that God tells his people to do, it is sin. And if you just continue with this greed, it can grab a hold of your heart. How bad can it get? How bad did it get for the foolish rich man Jesus talked about? If our thought is that we cannot be rich toward God AND have the Disney vacations, the cruises, the house, the cars, the education or whatever else requires our wealth—and we choose these other things—we ARE the rich man. Maybe you think that sounds harsh, but you cannot argue with God. If you are living for these and other worldly things, but you are not rich toward God, he calls you a fool because you have prioritized the wrong things and poorly managed what he has given to you. Taken to its end, your eternal future might not be so bright. But don’t get this twisted. Pay close attention to what I’m about to say. We don’t do these right things to avoid punishment, as if we just live a certain way and then God will accept us. That would be living by the law, wouldn’t it? That would be, “I’m saved by what I do.” We can’t leave here today thinking that we have been bad—foolish in God’s eyes—so we need to change things. This is more than behavior; it has to do with our heart. We love Jesus because he actually did all of this perfectly and credited his perfection to us. The love for Jesus that is in our heart drives our actions. Here is the other thing about being rich toward God or rich concerning God—he has made you a spiritually rich person! What is more valuable to us than Jesus? And the Father sent him for you. Jesus offered himself for you. The Holy Spirit gifted you with saving faith. Money can’t buy those things! Knowing your sins are forgiven—even the sins Jesus addresses today? No Trust Fund is big enough to hold that! Heaven? Are you kidding me?! God has made you so spiritually rich! He just gave it all to you! Which Type of Rich Person Are You? I suspect that I’m looking at a whole bunch of spiritually rich people who Depend on God. We’re the kind of people who want to change whatever has been wrong in our lives in order to thank God for his incredible, eternal generosity, who care about how we treat our worldly wealth because we know that he has made us rich now and forever. Amen. Now the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.