Sunday, January 5, 2014

The Rich Fool.



Photo by Hugh Lee
http://www.flickr.com/people/40609437@N04

Then Jesus said to them, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions. 

And he told them this parable: "The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. He thought to himself, 'What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops. "Then he said, 'This is what I'll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. And I'll say to myself, "You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry."'

"But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?'"
This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God."
Luke 12:15-21

Someone once asked C.S. Lewis how much one should give. C.S. Lewis

“I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I am afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare. In other words, if our expenditure on comforts, luxuries, amusements, etc, is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, we are probably giving away too little. If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charitable expenditure excludes them.”


"Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys."  Luke 12:33

Jesus taught about our earthly possessions more than he taught about heaven and hell combined. One out of every three parables is about the relationship between a person and his belongings. In the book of Luke, one out of every seven verses mentions a person's relationship with money.  (I'm paraphrasing from a sermon by Jeff Miller.)

I think when Jesus said to sell our possessions he meant all the things we have that we don't really need. But, I could be wrong. He did tell some to sell all their goods, give it to the poor and be his disciple. To each person God will reveal what he wants them to give.


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