Living The Life! Series

Some of my favorite cartoons growing up were the Road Runner cartoons. Take a look at this 30-second excerpt from one of them (show Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote—Free Bird Seed). Do you know? In not one of the 49 Road Runner Cartoons produced does Wile E. Coyote ever get the Road Runner.

It reminds me of a lot of people, who are in pursuit of the good life. They never get it. That’s because they pursue all the wrong stuff—stuff like possessions, power, or pleasure, thinking that stuff will give them the good life, but they always end up empty.

Do you really want to live the good life, then I invite you to turn with me to the Gospel of Luke, chapter 12. Luke 12, where Jesus tells the story about a man who pursed the good life and missed it, just like Wile E. Coyote.

Luke 12:13 Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me” (ESV).

According to Jewish custom, the eldest son received twice the inheritance of any of his siblings, so perhaps this brother was a little envious of his older brother and wanted more. Whatever the case, he wanted Jesus to help settle the dispute between him and his brother over exactly what was a fair and equitable division of assets.

Now, in Jesus’ day, people often asked rabbis to help settle personal disputes, especially if they involved ethical issues. So this brother’s request was not out of line. However, Jesus response must have rattled him and the audience. It was not the usual response.

Luke 12:14-15 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” (ESV).

Unlike most rabbis, Jesus refused to help settle the dispute between these two brothers. Why? Because He saw something in their hearts that no settlement would satisfy. He saw covetousness. So Jesus gets to the root of the issue and warns them to guard against all forms of greed. Why? Because life does not consist in the accumulation of stuff. My dear friends, if you want to live the good life, do what Jesus says here and…

PROTECT YOURSELF FROM ENVY.

Get safe from greed. Guard against covetousness and be content with what you have.

In the Greek, “covetousness” is literally the desire to have more (BAGD) but having more never satisfies ultimately. It always leaves you wanting more. Mark Twain once described it as “a limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities” (Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary, 1996).

Author Bill Bryson noticed many changes when he returned to America after spending 20 years overseas. One observation he made involved the number of choices available to the American consumer:

Abundance of choice not only makes every transaction take ten times as long as it ought to, but in a strange way actually breeds dissatisfaction. The more there is, the more people crave, and the more they crave, the more they, well, crave more. You have a sense sometimes of being among millions and millions of people needing more and more of everything, constantly, infinitely, unquenchably (Bill Bryson, I'm A Stranger Here Myself, Broadway, 1999, p.246; www.PreachingToday.com)

Getting more always leads to wanting more, which keeps you from ever being satisfied, which keeps you from living the good life.

Marshall Shelley, director of the Doctor of Ministry program at Denver Seminary, wrote in Leadership Weekly:

My wife's father is a Kansas farmer. He's spent a lifetime raising wheat, corn, milo, beef, and along the way some sheep and chickens. One morning while I followed him around the farm, we talked about the differences between city living and a rural lifestyle.

“Most city folks I know expect each year to be better than the last,” he said. “They think it's normal to get an annual raise, to earn more this year than you did last year. As a farmer, I have good years and bad years. It all depends on rain at the right time, dry days for harvest, and no damaging storms. Some years we have more; some years we have less.”

Shelly said that “law of the harvest”—some years being fat and others being lean—applies to much more than agriculture. Growing in spiritual maturity requires gratefully accepting the “seasons of more” and the “seasons of less” that God weaves into specific areas of our lives—our friendships, marriage, career, finances, ministry, and spiritual growth (Marshall Shelley, Leadership Weekly, 11-30-10; www.PreachingToday.com).

Hebews 13:5 says, “Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’”