THE ULTIMATE TREASURE

July 31, 2016

Pastor Mark F. Bartels

Old Testament Lesson; Ecclesiastes 1:2

                                      Ecclesiastes 2:18-26

Epistle Lesson; Colossians 3:1-11

Sermon Text; Luke 12:13-21

The Word of God we look at for today is taken from Luke, chapter 12, verses 13 through 21. It reads as follows in our Savior's name.

Someone in the crowd said to Him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” But He said to him “Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?” And He said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” And He told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, 'What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?' And he said, 'I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”' But God said to him, 'Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

These are your words, Heavenly Father. Lead us in the way of truth. Your Word is truth.

Amen

All right. You are going to have to use your imagination, a little bit. Up here I have a jar. It is a see-through jar, and there is nothing in it, right now. This jar is going to represent time. Everything inside this jar are things that only last for a time, and then eventually they are gone. They don't exist, anymore.

Everything outside of the jar are going to stand for eternity, things that last forever, and ever.

So, you are outside the jar. You are eternal, because even though, physically, your body is going to die, you are going to live forever, and ever, and ever, either in Heaven for eternity, or in Hell for eternity. But, you are eternal.

As we look at things that are in time, one of the things God has given us in time, is money. And things God has given to us that belong to us in time are our possessions. Money is a temporal thing. It is only ours for awhile. Then, it is gone, and we won't have it, anymore. When you die, nobody is going to put a U-Haul Trailer behind the hearse, carrying all of your money, and your possessions. They are gone. They won't be yours, anymore.

The money, and the possessions God gives us are intended by God to be blessings to His people, and to be used wisely for His Kingdom.

But, as you know, as sinful people, we don't always use our time, our money, or the possessions God has given to us, wisely, all of the time. Sometimes, we use them foolishly, or even sinfully.

But, many of those things we can recover from. Let me give you an example. How many of you have ever, maybe, spent some money foolishly? Maybe you realized you spent way too much money for something, and then you had buyers remorse. And then, you thought, “Oh, why did I spend all of that money?” But, you can recover from that.

Maybe you have invested some money, and it turned out to be a really bad investment, and now that money is gone. You thought, “Oh man. That was a bad way to use my money.” But, you can recover from it.

Or, maybe you have put way too much on your credit card. You got into real deep debt, and had to declare bankruptcy. Well, that is one you can recover from, too.

But, in today's scripture reading, Jesus is going to talk to us about a financial mistake someone can make where there is no recovery. He loves us so much that He doesn't want any one of us to make this mistake. Here is the financial mistake some people can make. If I put my hand in the jar that represents time, and hold onto that money, I am stuck. I can't get my hand back out. We can become so captivated by money, and possessions that we think, “That is where I find my security.” “That is where I find my identity.” “That is where I am going to be safe.” “I am going to live my life, so get those things.”

We can become so wrapped up in those things, and get so stuck in the things of time, that we forget to focus on the things of eternity. If that happens, on the day we die, and we are focused not on eternal things (Jesus and His cross and the forgiveness of sins), but we are focused on the things of time, well that is something we will never recover from, ever.

Hell is for eternity.

It is forever and ever.

And so, in love, Jesus wants us, as His people, to have a correct view of the things of this world, and the things we use in this world, including our money, and possessions.

So, what happens in today's scripture reading is a young man comes up to Jesus, after Jesus had been preaching. The young man asks Jesus to tell his brother, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” The young man was concerned about money, and possessions, the things of this world. Most likely what had happened is that these brothers' father had died, and left an inheritance. Generally, in those days, the oldest brother got two portions of the inheritance. The inheritance was divided amongst all of the brothers, but the oldest one would get two shares, so he could take care of Mom, and whatever sisters there were. Then, he would give the rest of the inheritance to his other brothers, when he felt they were ready for it. Apparently, this older brother had not given a share of the inheritance to the younger brother, yet. So, he comes to Jesus and says, “Tell my brother to give me my share of the inheritance.”

Jesus answered this young man in a very interesting way. He said, “Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?” That is not why Jesus came. Jesus' primary function here on earth wasn't to decide who gets how much money, or how to divide up inheritances.

Jesus came to be the Savior of the world.

Now, He is going to focus His answer in a way so that we really look at the eternal purposes and things, and see how important they are compared to things in this time, things that last just for a little while.

You will notice Jesus obviously can read this young man's heart. He is God, and He knows everything. Apparently, this young man was struggling with something we call covetousness. Jesus said,

“...be on your guard against all covetousness...”

Some Bible translations translate it 'greed'. It is a word that is kind of hard to translate in Greek. It can be 'greed'. It can be 'covetousness'. It can be something called 'avarice'. The root word means 'more'. It is this idea “I just need a little more. If I just had a little more money, then everything would be OK.” “If I had just a little nicer car, then everybody would respect me.” “If I just had a little more in my retirement account, then I would be secure, and everything would be OK.” It is this constant desire, to think, “If I had just a little more, then I am going to be secure. Then, life is going to be OK. Then, people are going to respect me.”

It can be rich people. It can be poor people. Any of us can struggle with it. In fact, Jesus said,

“...be on your guard

against all covetousness.”

So, 'greed' and 'covetousness' is something that sneaks up on us. That is why Jesus said,

“...be on guard...”

You know, there are some sins we commit that really don't sneak up on you. If you commit adultery, you know you are committing adultery. If you kill somebody, you know you are killing somebody. But, 'greed' and 'covetousness' is one that can sneak up on us. Maybe we don't even realize how much importance we are really putting on money, or possessions, or the things of this world.

And so, in order to keep us from getting trapped in the things of this world, and the things of time, verses the things of eternity, that are the things that can save us, Jesus tells a parable. As He tells this parable, I want you to notice He is going to show you warning signs that show 'your hand might be stuck in the jar', and you might be more focused on money, and the things of this world. You might be struggling with 'greed' and 'covetousness', (and we all do), more than focusing on the things of eternity. So, this is how the parable goes.

“The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, 'What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?' And he said, 'I will do this: I will tear down my barns and I will build larger ones, and there I will store all of my grain and my goods. I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”

“But God said to him, 'Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will the be?'

“So it is with the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

Now, does Jesus say it is a sin to be wealthy? He does not say that, at all. There is nothing wrong with being wealthy. This man was, in a way, taking care of his retirement. It appears he was being a good steward. He was putting away his crops, so he could have a good retirement. The Bible doesn't say that is wrong, either. But, what was wrong was the man was a fool. Jesus said he was a fool. Those are really hard words for Jesus to say about anybody. The reason the man was a fool was because the man had become focused on money, and possessions, rather than on eternal things. Here are the signs.

       Number one, this man took credit for having his own possessions. You will notice he says, “What shall I do, now that I have no where to store MY crops.” Then, he said, “This is what I will do. I will tear down MY barns, and build bigger ones. There I will store all of MY grain and MY goods.”

You see, he took credit for everything he had, as if it had come from his hand. One of the dangers, one of the warning signs you are becoming wrapped up in the things of this world, is when you take credit for what you have, for your money, and your possessions, as if it all came from your hand, rather than realizing it is only God who even gave me the skills, the abilities, and the mind to be able to accomplish what I have been able to accomplish.

It is all a gift from the hand of God.

So, number one, “Who gets the credit?”

       The second warning sign was the rich man in the parable took pride in his possessions, and his wealth. That is where he kind of saw his self worth. That would cause people to really respect him, if they could see he had possessions, and wealth.

He could have done all kinds of things with the money he got from the grain he had produced, that his land had produced so plentifully. But, the one thing he decided to do was what? He said, “I am going to tear down my barns and build bigger ones. I am going to have the biggest, baddest barn in the whole county. That way everyone can see I am really successful.” He took pride in his possessions and his wealth.

If that is happening, if you are taking pride in your 65 inch TV, when people come over to your home, or you are taking pride in the latest phone you have, and you really want people to see it, and show it off to them, that is a danger sign.

Maybe the things of this world are becoming more on your heart, than the things of eternity.

       The third sign that was happening with this man was he found his security in his money, and his possessions. That is where he found his security. He says to himself, '...I have nowhere to store my crops'. He thought, 'I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all of my grain my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.'”

And so, the warning sign was he thought “Now I am secure. I have money. I have possessions, and I am going to be OK. I am going to be OK!”

That is a warning sign that can happen to us. Sometimes, we worry and think, “If only I had a little more money in the bank account.” “If only I had a little more money in my retirement account.” “If only I had this, or that, then I would be secure.”

If we find our security in our possessions, and our money, that is a warning sign that you are struggling with covetousness and greed, and you want more, and more of the things of this world, rather than focusing on eternal things.

       The fourth warning sign was this man thought his purpose in life was to take care of himself. He said, “I know what I will do. I will build bigger barns. I store all of my goods away for many years. I will say to myself eat, drink, and be merry. That is why I am here. I am here to use these possessions to take care of myself. To eat. To drink, and to be merry.” He had lost focus on the fact that he has a different reason for being here.

Now, on the day you die, (and it is going to happen to all of us), I don't know what you are going to die possessing, but it won't be yours, after the day you die. Do you think you are going to look back on the day you die, and say, “Boy, it is a real tragedy that I only had a 32 inch screen TV, and never got that 65 inch screen TV”? You are not going to say that was a tragedy. It may be a little bit of a pain you can't watch the Packer Game on a big screen TV. And, maybe friends don't want to come over to your house, and watch the Packer game, because it is too small. But, that is not going to be a tragedy on the day you die.

Do you think you are going to say to yourself, on the day you die, “Boy it is a real tragedy I could only afford a land line, while everybody else had smart phones”? It may be inconvenient, but that is not going to be a tragedy.

The tragedy, the real tragedy would be if on the day you die, 'your hand is stuck in this jar', and you have been focusing on your money and possessions, and forgot to keep your focus on the most important, eternal things. That is a tragedy there is no recovery from.

So, what is the solution, because we all struggle? Every one of us struggles with 'greed' and 'covetousness'. It is in our hearts, by nature.

The only solution is Jesus.

He is the only solution.

There is no other solution.

I love the Bible passage that says,

“You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

That though He was rich,

yet for your sakes He became poor

so that you,

through His poverty

might become rich.”

It says,

“You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Grace is this undeserved mercy, and love Jesus has for you.

It says,

“Though He was rich...”

How rich was Jesus? Jesus, in Heaven, as God, had all the riches of all the kingdoms of the world. Everything you can possibly imagine, it is all His.

“Though He was rich,

yet for your sakes He became poor.”

Jesus left His throne in Heaven, because He saw us in our delima. He saw our 'covetousness', our 'greed', all of our other sins, and perversions. He saw that, left His riches in Heaven, and He became poor.

How poor did He become?

       -He took on humble, human flesh.

       -He was born, and wrapped in strips of rags, and clothes.

       -He was laid in a manger, a feed trough, for animals.

But, ultimately, His deepest poverty was this. There was one thing Jesus was looking for in this life. He sought it desperately. It wasn't money. Do you know what it was?

He wanted your sins.

That is what He wanted. He wanted to take everything that makes you worthless in the eyes of God, and take it to Himself. He did that.

       -Every single sin we have committed, that makes us worthless in the eyes of God, Jesus says, “I want that”.

       -He became so poor, by taking all of our worthlessness on Himself, that He suffered death on the cross to wash away all of our sins.

“You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Though He was rich,

yet for your sakes He became poor,

so that you,

through His poverty,

might become rich.”

What are the riches Jesus gives us?

       -Jesus gives us the riches of His holy life, as if it were our very own.

       -Jesus gives us the forgiveness of all of our sins.

       -Jesus gives us eternity in Heaven.

       -Jesus gives us a right relationship with God.

       -Jesus takes care of all eternal things for us.

That is the solution to keep from 'getting your hand stuck in this jar' of focusing on the things of this life.

Think about this.

       -Do I really want to find my identity in money, and possessions? When I have an identity in Jesus, Jesus has made me worth more than I can possibly imagine. Look at what He has done for me. He has paid for all of my sins.

       -Do I really want to find my security in money, and the things of this world, when I can find my security in a much greater security in Jesus, knowing God loves me for Jesus' sake? All of my sins are forgiven. He is going to take care of everything, and work it out for my good. I have a secure eternity in Heaven.

       -Do I really want my life's purpose to be to live for myself, and these things, when I can live for Jesus, because of what He has done for me?

When we focus on Jesus, and what He gives us, the riches He gives us, then, then, we will use the things of this world, not in a way that will be hurtful to us, but in a way that will be helpful, helpful to us, and helpful to those around us.

For Jesus' sake.

Amen