INTRODUCTION
None of us would argue that money is a necessity. There is virtually no way we can exist without it, at least not in our economy. Many Americans place a great deal of stock in their money. We feel a certain sense of security when we have money or at least material resources we can sell for money should we need it. There was another time in our history when Americans placed great stock in the security of having money only to have their dreams dashed. In the early part of this century, much of the available capital in the United States and the entire world was invested in the stock market. During the bull years of 1928 and 1929, the market was the economy. In August of 1929, John J. Raskob, Wall Street mongul, wrote an article for the Ladies’ Home Journal entitles "Everybody Ought to Be Rich." He stated that anyone could be worth $80,000 in ten years if he or she invested a mere $15 a week in the market. Then it happened. September’s prices began to slide. By the end of the month, the leading issues on the New York Stock Exchange has lost $2.8 million. Still in October, Irving Fisher, professor of economics at Yale, announced that prices had reached what looked like a permanently high plateau. He was confident that in a few months the plateau would be even higher. One week later, sell orders overwhelmed brokers the minute the doors of the New York Stock Exchange opened. Everything began to drop. By the end of October, through Blue Monday and Black Tuesday, $50 billion dollars was lost. Thousands of banks closed. Runs on banks were common. They were named such because people literally ran to remove their money from the banks. There was no insurance to protect a person’s money should the bank fail as it is now. Because of the stock market crash and the many bank failures, Americans would learn to distrust what they placed so much security in. The world of money had failed, and in the process betrayed the implicit trust of the Americans. One of Rollin Kirby’s most effective cartoons portrayed an unemployed man sitting disconsolately on a park bench. He had nothing to feed the squirrel that sat in front of him begging for peanuts. The squirrel asks, "But why didn’t you save some money for the future when times were good?" The man replied, "I did."
If we are not careful, we too can place our trust in things that are not permanent or eternally secure. The rich fool that Jesus told of did just that. He was condemned because he was rich, but it was his actions that made him foolish. We must keep money and material possession in proper perspective. Clear thinking in these areas can sometimes be difficult. Jesus tells the parable to illustrate how foolish it is to find our security in earthly things such as money and material possessions that do not last while neglecting those things that bring eternal security.
Again, we find a crowd of people surrounding Jesus. One man works his way to the front with a complaint, hoping Jesus would settle it for him. It seems his brother would not divide the inheritance with him. It is not unusual for estate settlements to cause family quarrels. Probably most of us have been involved in such a quarrel or are familiar with someone who has.
Jesus asks the man why he came to him with his problem. In Jewish society, rabbis usually settled these disputes. Jesus had no official standing as a judge that this man’s brother would listen to him. In addition, Jesus had more important work to accomplish than to involve himself in such trivial matters such as this. In light of his mission to save people, inheritance rights were of little concern.
Normal Jewish practice was for the firstborn to inherit double that of the other sons. This man obviously held a grudge against an older brother, perhaps for not dividing the estate. After answering the man, Jesus turns his attention back to the crowd. He warns them against greed, telling them that a person’s life does not consist merely in the abundance of material possessions he might have. The question that man asks of Jesus shows that he mistook ownership for possession. Greed is a poison that blinds people. This man obviously assumed that ownership of material wealth would automatically mean a meaningful life for him.
To illustrate the poisonous effects of greed, Jesus tells the story of the rich fool. The ground of this certain rich man produced a good crop. So abundant was the harvest that the rich man had no place to store his crops. In this time, grain was one of three crops raised by Jewish farmers, the others being grapes and olives. Raising grain had become a route to financial security for many farmers. In looking for a way to store his crops, the farmer wrongly assumed that his wealth would last.
So the farmer devises a plan. He will tear down his existing barns and build bigger ones. Then he will have a place to store his crops. When finished with that, he had plans to take life easy enjoying the wealth he had accumulated. He would adopt the Epicurean mindset of eating and drinking while not worrying about tomorrow. Again, he made a mistake by assuming that because his body was pampered his soul was equally cared for. His plans make it evident that he lived as if there was no God to whom he would one day give account.
Then God appeared to him. He told him that very night he would die. Then who would enjoy all he had accumulated. God would require his soul from him that very night. The verb for required suggests the idea of a loan that must be returned to God. Thus our lives are on loan from God. One day he will take them back.
Jesus warns his listeners that all who follow the example of the rich fool will come to his same fate. The solution, he tells them, is to be rich toward God. The parable points our four mistakes that greedy people make. They mistake ownership of goods for possession of life. They mistake wealth for security. They mistake body for soul and they mistake time for eternity.
The parable also bears out several very important principles for us about security.
I. GOD’S PEOPLE MUST HAVE DIFFERENT PRIORITIES
It is very easy to see the misplaced priorities of the man who asked Jesus the question and the rich fool that Jesus spoke of. Now both were doing what seemed right. They were focusing on inheritance and goods which are necessary to a certain degree in this life. The Bible does instruct us to be wise investors and to take care of our families. We must have money and resources to do this. And so the inheritance the man from the crowd was concerned about and the storing of his goods that the rich fool was equally concerned about were not wrong in themselves. The foolishness of their requests and decisions was in the priority of these things.
The kingdom of God arrived in Jesus Christ. They should have been concerned about following him. They needed to hear what he taught about priorities in life. In like manner, Christians must have a different set of priorities than unbelievers. It is not difficult to determine people’s priorities. They devote time, energy and money to their priorities. Any of us could study the life of someone, and very soon we would see where their priorities lay by looking at their actions and decisions.
For the child of God, our priorities must surround service to our Savior. Serving him and living a life of commitment to him must at the top of our list. There are many other things in life that are important also, but our attention to them must be governed by our service to God. Otherwise, we will find ourselves taking time from God to indulge in those other things we enjoy.
A radiantly happy woman was once asked her secret of success in life. She replied: "I have never allowed the dollar bill to get bigger than my God."
II. WE MUST HAVE A DIFFERENT ATTITUDE ABOUT WEALTH
The man from the crowd and the rich fool obviously desired wealth. They found their security in wealth. We can say they were greedy. Greed is a poison that will destroy a person. That person will harm many others along the way in their pursuit of wealth since it is motivated by greed. When wealth leads one to make the same four mistakes the rich fool made, it is wrong.
The Bible never says money is the root of all evil. It says the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. When a person has an inordinate love for money, there is nothing they will not stop at to get rich, dishonesty included. Being wealthy is not wrong. There are wealthy Christians who are very committed to God. However, Jesus does warn in another place that it is very difficult for a wealthy person to enter the kingdom of God. He says it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. He may have meant this literally or have been referring to a small door in a city wall that a camel would have to stoop very low to enter. Wealth, then, is not the problem. It is our attitude about wealth.
There is certainly nothing wrong with being industrious in life, enjoying all we can. However, we must never forget that what we have God has enabled us to get. It all belongs to him and must be used in his kingdom work. If we look to it for security or use it to harm others or to place ourselves above others, we have failed in having a proper attitude about our possessions. Wealth is temporary. It does not matter how much we accumulate here, we cannot take it with us. We can only leave it behind for others who will often fight and feud over it.
You have heard it said that we will never see a hearse pulling a U-Haul.
III. SECURITY IS FOUND IN GOD NOT FINANCES
Jesus has already told us in another place that we cannot serve God and money. The man from the crowd and the rich fool found their security in wealth not God. The man in the crowd wanted his brother to divide the inheritance. The rich fool took his ease since he had many goods laid up for many years. They forgot that their lives could end at any moment, and the rich man’s did. He thought he had many years, but God said his life would be required of him that very night. What God had loaned to him, he would now give an account of.
It is very tempting, even for the Christian, to find our security in the possessions and money we have accumulated. Living in an economy that measures security by these means makes it even more difficult for us. However, we cannot fall into the trap of finding security there. Our security must be in our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Possessions and money can disappear overnight as many that lived through the Stock Market Crash of 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression found out. Only our relationship to Christ and our service to him will endure.
CONCLUSION
There is a type of segregation that is even more sinful than racial segregation. It is the approach to life that supposes our business and religion are completely different and unrelated matters. The idea that their faith has something to say about how they get and use their income offends them. They assume money management is not included in God’s area of operation. How untrue. Money and possession management are a vital part of our religion. We must have different priorities than the unbeliever, we must have a different attitude about wealth and we must find our security in God rather than our finances.
