The Gospel of Luke 12:13-21 Beware the stuff!

Good morning. We're going to be venturing into this passage, Luke 12, 13 through 21. that Courtney just read for us here. First, I want to just let people know Glenn Sandy was granted a visa for two years. I was blown away. Ordinarily, they'll approve something maybe weeks or months long. A two-year visa is unheard of, so it's nearly miraculous.

He'll be coming to stay with us January 13th until February 26th, going through Bible training, similar to what was done with Hassan in the summer of 2010. And by the way, it just is amazing to me what the Lord has done with that. So I'm looking forward to some good things from this.

Also, just to let you know, we have three great electives planned for next year. First Corinthians, taught by Roger, Bob, and Randy, principal of position. by Mike and Courtney and JD. How to Study the Bible, Version 3. This is, if we've been there previously, this is a year-long rather than the three-month-long elective we had before by myself, Craig Case, and Jeremy.

Anyway, sign-up sheets are in the lobby, and the sooner people can sign up, that helps a lot in terms of, you know, where things are located and getting materials ready and that sort of thing. So, anyway, please take advantage of that. So now, into Luke 12, 13 through 21. And Luke 12, 13 starts like this.

Someone in the crowd said to him, Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me. So, he called out, you know, teacher, rabbi, right? That's the same idea. The rabbis would, by tradition, be invited to mediate disputes among Jews, particularly if it involved the Law of Moses. If it's an application of the Law of Moses, or some of the traditions, then certainly the rabbi would be invited to get involved in mediating this dispute. In that capacity, the rabbi would be essentially a neutral go-between. He would say, this guy wants this, and this guy wants that, and he would go between them, mediating.

And he would also say, the law says this, and so he would inform each side what the law says regarding that. The Law of Moses did have some statutes regarding inheritance, and those are found in Numbers 27, 1 through 11. and Deuteronomy 21 15 through 17 and so they would look at those passages and say okay this is what the law of Moses says and the rabbi would make it clear to the various parties what the law required but Jesus saw an issue deeper than the stuff here in what this fellow said understanding not just what the fellow said but understanding hearts and seeing into hearts Now, just in terms of what the law would spell out, the older brother would receive a double portion of the inheritance. Essentially, if there were two brothers, for example, you might have, like this instance, the older brother would get two-thirds of the inheritance, and the younger one would get a single third. And then it would typically be the older brother who would also dish out the portions to the younger brothers. So those two things would be traditional.

It's very likely then, since he's calling out and saying, hey, make my brother do this, that this is a younger brother and he's asking for his portion, whatever that happens to be. His older brother had either been slow or reluctant to give his brother his portion. And there may have been actually some reason for that, especially since Jesus doesn't immediately just jump on it, but rather instead says, hey, there's some issues here, right? And so one other thing, we've seen this before.

You may recall back in Luke 10.40, Martha was busy making meal preparations, right? And Mary was there at Jesus' feet learning from Him the expression, the way it's put there in Luke 10. is that Mary was learning as a disciple, right? As a woman disciple. And by the way, the rabbis did not, traditionally, did not have women disciples. Jesus broke the mold on that.

So here's Luke 10.40, But Martha was distracted with all her preparations. She came up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the serving alone? Then tell her to help me. So here's Martha instructing Jesus as to what to say to Mary.

So in this instance, rather than inviting Jesus to mediate, which would have been the proper thing to do, and it would have been traditional among the rabbis, This man was telling Jesus what to do and telling him what he must tell the man's brother to do as well.

So he's directing Jesus and that was out of line in multiple levels. It may also be that this man did not realize that Jesus was deity. As a matter of fact, I would say quite likely because he calls out you know, just teacher, a rabbi. So he just saw him as a rabbi, and I'll get this rabbi to come in and instruct my brother what to do. That's what it seems like he's doing.

Application-wise for us, while we may ask for God to do this or that, we're never in a place to tell God what to do. God, you need to do this, right? And so this guy very likely just was looking at Jesus as just a teacher, But never is it appropriate for us to be telling God what to do. The Lord may in fact answer our prayer favorably, but not in the way we expected it. Right? Not in the way we expected it.

I would think of one instance, for example, the family was praying very much for my grandmother on my dad's side. for her to be saved in some way. And we were envisioning, you know, one of us in the family sharing the gospel with her. Well, the Lord answered our prayer. There were neighbors. After my grandmother repeatedly refused to listen to any family member, there were neighbors that came in and brought her the gospel. And a few weeks before she died and went home to be with the Lord, she became a believer. But the Lord answered our prayer just differently than what any of us expected. None of us knew about these Christian neighbors. All right, so here's Luke 12, 14.

But he said to him, Man, who appointed me, a judge or arbitrator, over you? So this unnamed man told Jesus what to do, presumptuously. But Jesus was questioning this man, not just to push him back But it was intended for him to think about who Jesus was.

What is his level of authority? Especially since this man was presuming Jesus' authority to do what he did. And so it has some things for us to think about. Where does authority come from? It's part of what Jesus was wanting to get this man to do. Can someone of lower authority command someone of higher authority? Is that the way authority works? Who is the ultimate authority? Who is the ultimate authority? So these are good questions for us to ponder. Authority comes from, ultimately, the Lord. Authority comes from the Lord, and authority is given at different levels, and it doesn't go upwards. It doesn't go upwards. Authority is exercised downwards, not upwards.

So here's Luke 12, 15. Then he said to them, Beware and be on your guard against every form of greed, for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions. So beware. He has already said, beware, as we've read before about the Pharisees and the scribes, also called lawyers. And he says in this passage, beware about the motivation of greed. So the earlier bewares had to do with particular groups of people. In this case, it's not the group of people, but it's the motivation of greed.

So Jesus gets underneath the surface in this passage. He's not simply telling a man, well, do X, Y, and Z, or I won't do X, Y, and Z. But he's getting down to, what's the motive here? Are you really just wanting justice? Or have you got something deeper going on that is maybe a reason why your brother is so reluctant? It is possible for a person to do the right thing for the wrong reason. Greed is always going to be the wrong reason. So that's a key thing here.

One of the points that we make here is that there is a physical realm and there is a spiritual realm. The spiritual realm and the physical realm are both things created by God. God is the source of both. So essentially we say God, out of the spiritual realm, created spiritual beings, spiritual entities, including us, and he created the physical realm. God is the source of it all. In addition to that, the Bible describes mind, emotions, and will, and getting to that deep place between the soul and the spirit, is something that the Word of God can do.

That's Hebrews 4.12. We saw that as we were going through the book of Hebrews. And so just kind of understanding this is key as we step into the rest of the passage here.

Something else, the word for life in here, God's Word teaches there is physical life and there is spiritual life for us human beings, okay? Understanding the fundamental principles about life is spiritually essential. When I use the word principles, that's either a fundamental truth, or the way things work, or both. So in this passage, Jesus is going to tell us some of those fundamental principles, fundamental truths, about life that are important for everyone of all time.

Sometimes we'll say, well, that was just for the Jews. And sometimes we'll say, well, that was just for the church or something like that. In this case, what we're saying is that Jesus is going to give important principles that apply to everybody. This isn't something where we say there's an Israel or Jewish and church distinction here. This is a principle for everyone of all time.

These are not just basic truths for a particular group, the church or for the Jews, and so it's a universal principle. Another perspective for us to get is one that the Jews would bring to a discussion like this, and that's out of Deuteronomy 28, 1 through 14, and I'll read just portions of it.

Now it shall be, if you diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments which I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. All these blessings will come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord your God. And the blessings for the Jews then were conditional, if, right? And the blessings for the Jews were also earthly. So conditional and earthly. Bless shall you be, bless shall you be, and including in that list, and I put dot dot dot, the produce of your ground. So that fits with this particular parable that Jesus is beginning to tell them. And the Lord will command the blessing upon your barns and all you put your hand to.

Now I've got to mention about barns. We think of a barn and we typically think of something with wood on it. This particular word doesn't necessarily mean just a wooden barn as we might conventionally think. It may also be, and very likely is, a rock silo which may either be above ground or below ground. sunken into the ground.

So command blessing upon you and your barns and all that you put your hand to to bless you and the land which the Lord gives you. The Lord will make you abound in prosperity in the produce of your ground. One of the assumptions that many Jews would make, not all of them, but many Jews would make, is that if you had highly productive land, crops, you know, flocks, etc., that that must mean that you're obeying the law.

So they reason kind of backwards from this. If someone was well off, it must be because they're obeying the law. So they would use this as a tool to think, oh, that guy's really doing well, and so he must be obeying the law and obeying the Lord God. So Jesus turns that on his head here in this parable.

One of the principles that comes out of this is physical abundance does not mean spiritual abundance. We want to point that out here. From Deuteronomy chapter 28 and related passages in the Law of Moses, because there are other passages that say the same basic message, some Jews thought that someone who had physical abundance was well off because they followed the Law of Moses. Not necessarily so.

They may be very unspiritual, as Jesus tells this parable here particularly. Today's prosperity doctrine teachers convey a similar kind of faulty thinking. Oh, if I do everything right, then I'll be prosperous. And that's a spiritual principle. So we have teachers who teach that sort of thing.

Those who tell everyone to tithe and even to catch up on past tithing also carry on another similar error. By the way, the tithe was only of your agricultural produce, not of your checkbook. In the Law of Moses, the tithe was right after the food laws, and right before the law that says you let your land life follow every seven years. So what you do is you'll have pastors go and preach a sermon on tithing, and then they'll go out to Red Lobster and eat the wrong food, and they'll go home to their house, where they definitely don't let the land life follow, and their lawn go dead every seven years.

Right? Alright, so anyway. Okay. The other principle here is physical abundance cannot satisfy spiritual need. Adequate provision in health and supply in the physical realm can't supply the spiritual needs of a person, of a marriage, of a family, or a church body. No physical abundance, not even adequate provision, not health, anything is going to carry over into dealing with and addressing the spiritual needs. of people, of families, marriages, or church bodies. Not going to happen. Even having great abundance in these things will not even begin to satisfy the spiritual needs of a person, marriage, family, or church body.

So, Jesus is going to tell a parable that underscores this very point. So here's Luke 12, 16 and 17, and he told them a parable saying the land of a rich man was very productive. Alright, so he's a rich man, right? So does that mean that he certainly follows the law of Moses, right?

Well, as we'll see, not necessarily. And he began reasoning to himself saying, what shall I do since I have no place to store my crops? Now the question So far, has this guy done anything wrong? No. We'll see his error in a bit. He's a rich man. He's very productive.

This, for example, I mentioned, you know, barns may not be a wooden barn, but may in fact be a place. Here is a grain storage silo at Megiddo, where we visited earlier this year. And so that would be an example of a place where they would store grain. In this case, it's actually below ground.

This man was already rich from the agricultural productivity of his land, and that's before he ran into this problem. It had even gotten to the point that this man did not have the storage capacity for all the crops that he was bringing in. So this is a problem. I'm producing crops, I have nowhere to store and put them.

So far we don't see any problem in what is happening with this rich man. Everything's okay. He's asking a question about storage capacity. You might even call it wise in some sense there in the physical realm. So the fact that he's rich is not bad. The fact that his land is productive is not bad. And the fact that he's asking this question, where do I put this? It is not bad. There's not a problem so far.

Over the centuries, Christians have come to various conclusions about the physical realm that are not the problem or the solution. or even the right spiritual perspective. One of those has been asceticism, severe self-discipline, the avoidance of any kind of indulgence, starting about the 3rd century asceticism began to be a movement within Christianity. And so that was one solution and assessment, but boy, I just need to get rid of anything that's luxury, anything that I don't need absolutely for survival, and I need to deny any sort of indulgence. So that would be one approach that people have taken, and it's mistaken.

And then the reverse one that's becoming real popular today is prosperity doctrine. The idea that you deserve or can achieve physical wealth by following the right spiritual principles. What's very interesting is the guys who teach this are very prosperous.

Yeah, Cruffalo Dollars has a net worth of about $27 million. So that's one. This guy down below, His net worth is in about the same range. He has several of those prosperity teacher folks out there that have tens of millions of assets. Some of them as high as $40 million in personal assets. And what's interesting, like Creflo Dollar, the top guy there, he lives in a community where the average income for the household is about $30,000. But he rakes in the millions. So they're teaching a prosperity doctrines really making them very prosperous.

Okay, they're in it for the money Now is asceticism that is denial of all possible indulgence the spiritual answer is Colossians 2 20 through 23 if you have died with Christ to Kate this is died to died in relationship to the elementary principles of the world this world system and Why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees such as do not handle, do not taste, do not touch, which all refer to things destined to perish with use, in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men?

These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body. but are of no value against fleshly indulgence." So scripturally, the ascetic answer, the denial of self, the extreme denial of self, is not biblical. It's not the Bible's answer, although it has been the answer for a number of people. Here's Philippians 4, 10 through 14, also stands in contrast to that. Paul writes to the Philippians as he's under house arrest in Rome.

But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at last you have revived your concern for me. Indeed, you were concerned before, but you lacked opportunity. Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need.

I can do all things through Him who strengthens me." And that's probably the most misquoted verse in the New Testament, because people imagine themselves weightlifting or getting a Heisman trophy or all sorts of things based on that verse. What does he mean by all things? I can do the abundance and I can do the lack, both through Christ who strengthens me.

Nevertheless, you have done well to share with me in my affliction. So here's Luke 12 18, then he said, this is what I will do. I will tear down my barns and build larger ones. And there I will store all my grain and my goods. The problem with my having very productive land was not the man's problem. That isn't by itself a problem. Asking the question about where to store his abundant crops was not this man's problem. Making a plan to increase his crop storage capacity was also not this man's problem.

Jesus hints at this man's problem with the word my. My grain and my goods. As if he actually had possession of it. We'll sometimes use the word, you know, my for this or that, but the reality is, as believers, things are entrusted to us. Things are entrusted to us. We don't get to take anything with us.

Here's Luke 12, 19, and I will say to my soul, okay, now here's where the problem really gets intense. I will say to my soul, soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. That's it. So here's the problem. The real issue is what a person says to his soul. A soul is on the spiritual side, as we showed in the diagram. A soul is on the spiritual side of a person.

Only this man failed to recognize his spiritual need. Complete lack of recognition of a spiritual need. The fact that he was prosperous, the fact that his land was productive, the fact that he was rich was not a result of his being a spiritual man, not even under the law. It's possible to have wealth and productivity and everything and have nothing going on spiritually.

And that's exactly what Jesus' parable talks about. And so this man had a serious problem with his perspective. His self-talk, talking to himself, reveals he does not recognize his spiritual need, and that is dangerous. That is dangerous. Reveals that he thinks that physical abundance is enough. I've got lots of stuff, and that's good enough. So we can ask what's missing here.

This man's self-talk says that he failed to recognize any spiritual need at all. Do you see that in what he says? There's no, zero recognition of his spiritual need. The fact that he has great physical abundance doesn't begin to address his spiritual need. He doesn't even see it, apparently. There's no mention of any relationships with God or with others.

He just had abundant stuff. If a family is involved, a wife, children involved, he makes no mention of it. He doesn't see their spiritual needs either, assuming that there are others involved in the family. He just has lots of stuff. No physical wealth or abundance can be transferred into the spiritual realm. You've heard the expression, you can't take it with you.

And at the risk of overdoing a joke, this joke goes this way, that there is this fellow who makes a deal with God, really unique, because this never happens. He makes a deal with God, and so anyway, he's in line at heaven's gates. And of course, as the story goes, Peter's there standing at the gate, and he's the only one with a briefcase. Nobody else has a briefcase.

So he gets up there, and Peter says, well, what is this? And he says, well, I made a deal with God. Well, Peter says, well, open it up. Let's see what's in it. And Peter looks in there, and the guy had made a deal to bring in gold bricks. And Peter says, well, I guess it's OK, but I don't know why you'd need to bring paving stones in here, right?

So in this situation here, this makes a joke of the fact we can't transfer anything into the spiritual realm. It's not just that we can't take it with us. It's not just that. But you can't transfer anything from the physical realm into the spiritual realm. There's just no way to do that. And this fellow is not seeing that.

Anyone who does not recognize their own Spiritual need for God has got a really big problem. A very big problem. Anyone who does not recognize others need for God also has a big problem. I've known some people who have brought up kids in a completely godless household. God was not brought up, there was no spiritual discussions of any kind. And so the difficulty is that the kids are then brought up to be adults in a complete spiritual vacuum.

That's a failure to recognize the spiritual needs of others. So recognizing one's own spiritual need, recognizing the spiritual needs of others, is very important. Very important. no amount of our physical or emotional fulfillment will satisfy or address spiritual needs, even if you increase the quantity and quality greatly. It does not begin to address spiritual needs. We human beings cannot consume enough or of sufficient quantity to positively impact ourselves spiritually. You can't ramp up the quantity, you can't ramp up the quality, of anything in the physical realm and have a spiritual impact, at least not a positive one.

No amount of stuff of any kind, nor the financial equivalent in money will be enough to satisfy our spiritual need, which can only be satisfied by God and only in the way that God has revealed. so here's Luke 12 20 but God said to him you fool this very night your soul is required of you and now who will own what you have prepared one of the things to recognize here is God made us as physical spiritual beings we are combined physical spiritual beings It says in Genesis 1, 26 and 7, God made all of us here as physical beings, and here's how they're going to be sustained, but also spiritual beings made in his image and likeness.

That teaching, by the way, is not ended at the Garden of Eden, but is continued on to the New Testament. Mankind has been made, even though stained by the sin of Adam, made in God's image. There are a number of respects in which we have parallels to God's very own character and that's by God's design.

We are physical and spiritual beings. We can accumulate money and stuff. People get really impressed. Maybe we're impressed with all that. But God is not all impressed. Not at all. He knows our real spiritual needs. In fact, that's what he's looking at. He knows about all this other stuff, but he's ultimately looking at our spiritual needs. One of the things, death is separation. The body is separated from our spiritual being, that is our soul and spirit. Everything physical that we once owned just stays here.

One instance, there was a fellow who was talking to his wife, he was getting close to the end of his life, and so he asked his wife, you know, I want you to put all of my assets in the casket. And so she says, yep, I'll do that. And so on the day of the funeral, she wrote a check, put it in the casket for all of his assets, slipped it right in there. Yep, she sure did.

Whatever's here stays here, okay? Whatever's here stays here. What's interesting is we look over the centuries and millennia at various burials. A lot of times you'll see instances. Here's this warrior who is buried with his armaments and things of that sort. People are in various ways buried. You'll find some headstones that are just phenomenal. One guy had a headstone that was a Harley. And here he is sitting on top of the Harley. at least in stone. So people do some amazing things but it all stays here. It all stays here. Everything that's owned stays here and it passes on to somebody else. Those who had the most stuff in this world or the financial equivalent are going to leave it all behind.

He who dies with the most toys doesn't win. perhaps to people who are equally deluded about the stuff. Someone dies and it's not uncommon to have the family members squabbling over the stuff that's left. I used to live in Carson City and the largest piece of undeveloped commercial property was inherited by three sisters. who just sued and sued and sued and sued each other over this property until the judge says, I'm sick of seeing you in here.

This is how we're going to deal with this. So this is something a lot of people don't realize. You accumulate all this stuff and then you're going to pass it on to somebody else. Are they going to have the same illusion and delusion about what this stuff is worth and how important it is?

So Luke 12, 21, Jesus says, so is the man who stores up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. Treasure on the physical side, treasure on the spiritual side. So there's a confusion problem that this man has. The man in the parable was called a fool for confusing time with eternity.

Is this all there is? Or is this just a getting ready kind of place? He confused his body for his soul. Hey, I'll go ahead and feed and drink and be merry and that's good. No, that's not good. He confused what was his for what was God's. So a confusion problem there. People can get really mixed up about those things. There are things that we ought to see very clearly in light of God's Word and avoid the rampant confusion that this world system contributes to.

When I went through business school, one of the classes I took several of was marketing. Essentially, a lot of marketing that's out there, and they pour billions into this, a lot of the marketing that's out there is designed to perpetrate these confusions. you will be really, really, really happy if you go into debt and buy this car instead of that one. And if you buy this car, you get the girl with it. Is that the way it works? Not so much. The flesh, that is the sin nature as it acts in and through our bodies, will simply add to this confusion. by selling you on things, and it's just fine if it's not the truth.

How about this rich toward God? There's no being rich toward God that doesn't originate with God in the first place. I can't do or accumulate things that have richness towards God that don't originate from Him. For us in the body of Christ, It is His riches in His very character.

What do I mean by that? Because of who He is and what He has done, we who believe already have a treasure in this earthen vessel. And when we're all done here, we don't leave any of it behind. Except the earthen vessel, right? Here's Ephesians 1, 7 and 8. In Him, that is in Christ, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished on us.

By the way, that's not just rich in grace, it's multiple magnitudes of riches. And we could substitute the word wealth. According to the wealths of His grace. Multiple magnitudes of grace. And guess what? He didn't say, I've got it, you can't have it. But instead, he turned around and lavished it on us. Isn't that amazing?

Here's Ephesians 1.18.

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened. In fact, the Greek there is, I pray that the eyes of your heart, having been enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of his calling, what are the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints. Wealths.

Glory. It's the radiant character of who God is. Here's Ephesians 2, 4-7, but God being rich in mercy, God being wealthy in mercy, because of his great, by the way, great love with which he loved us, it's not just stingy love, it's not just barely adequate, great love, mega love, with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you've been saved, perfect tense, and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ, so that in the ages to come, and this guy in the parable wasn't even thinking of the ages to come, so that in the ages to come he might show, and that word show means to demonstrate the surpassing, that's overthrown, Riches, plural, multiple magnitudes of His grace. We're going to be gasping on into eternity, amazed and astounded at the riches of His grace. And when you're amazed and astounded, shortly thereafter you'll be amazed and astounded again. In rolling ages to come, astounded and amazed, overwhelmed, by the wealths, the multiple magnitudes of God's grace, in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 3, 8 and 9, To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches, wealths of Christ. Not just a little bit of wealth. Unfathomable. surpassing, overthrown, awesome magnitudes, wealths of Christ. Here's 2 Corinthians 4, 7, but we have this treasure in earthen vessels, here's the earthen vessel, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves. Where does the power come from for what God wants to do in our lives?

Him. It's not you. It's Him. He does not want us to feel delegated. Okay, you've got to get this done. He does not want us to say, okay, I've got to crank this out to prove that I'm worthy. He's saying, no, the power will be from God and not from ourselves. It's not what you and I produce, it is what He does. As we said, it's only one life, it will soon be past, so the lyrics go. Only what's done by Christ will last.

That treasure in earthen vessels, that's what gets it done, not you and me. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you that you have put this treasure in these earthen vessels and that that treasure is where you want the power to come from. That treasure is where you want life to be generated. And thank you that we do not have to generate it ourselves, but it is an investment you have made in us. How amazing. We thank you for your amazing grace. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.