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Jesus says, take care, be on your guard against all covetousness. For one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.
You may be seated. In the name of Jesus, Amen.
But dear saints, being a Christian requires courage, especially because Jesus and the Spirit which proceeds from Jesus in the throne of the Father sets us against the world and against the devil and against our own sinful flesh. We are at war.
And one of those wars is brought forth with such clarity in the gospel lesson for today, the war against covetousness, against wanting what we should not want, about finding our life in the abundance of our possessions, about living for bread alone.
There was an ancient philosopher, Epicurus was his name, and he was seeking after the untroubled life. And he came up with two things. He said that this life is troubled by two doctrines that we must reject. Epicurus said, first of all, we must not believe that God acts in the world, that God is involved with the things that are happening. And number two, we must reject the idea that there is life after death and a judgment.
Epicurus said that even if those are true, we have to reject them because they cause too much trouble. It’s too much trouble thinking that God could intervene in this life, and it’s certainly too much trouble to think that after this life we have to face the judgment day. So Epicurus said, put it out of mind.
In fact, Epicurus had a creed. I don’t know if they had Epicurean churches where you could go on Sunday morning, but if they did, and when it was time for the creed, everybody would stand up and their creed was this: let us eat, drink, and be merry because tomorrow we die.
What happened after that, I’m not sure. You can kind of imagine it. That’s the Epicurean creed. That’s the creed of our own culture. That’s the creed of our own sinful heart, that we live for bread alone, that we think that our lives consist in the abundance of our possessions, that we think that if we have enough, we’re safe, or if we don’t have enough, we’re not safe and insecure.
So, Jesus was walking along, and there was a crowd, and in the middle of the crowd was a man who had been wronged by his brother. It’s every family, from the beginning to the end. There’s a dispute over the inheritance. I imagine – I don’t want to do it – but I imagine if I asked you to raise your hand if your family has a dispute about some inheritance in your history, that almost every hand in here would go up. It’s dangerous inheritance, by the way. We should be warned about it.
But here this man had been wronged; apparently, his brother had somehow, maybe rightfully, probably wrongfully, gotten all of the inheritance. He didn’t get any of it. And so he hears the teaching of Jesus, and he thinks, well, maybe Jesus, who seems interested in righteousness and justice, maybe Jesus can make it right. So he says, teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.
But Jesus refuses, man who made me a judge and arbitrator over you? And then Jesus turns from the inheritance to the thing that matters most to Him. He turns right to this man’s heart, right to your heart, right to my heart, and with as strong a language as Jesus ever uses to warn us about anything, He warns us about covetousness. Take care, he says, be on your guard against all covetousness.
Now we, I think, when we think of covetousness, think, well, that’s at the way, tail end of the commandments. You have the big ones at first, right? Idolatry, blasphemy, rebellion, murder, adultery, theft, lying; all those are the big ones, and then at the tail end, just to finish out the ten, there’s covetousness.
You know, we think that that’s probably the least of the commandments, but Jesus says no. No. In fact, Paul – did you hear this? This is a – I mean, it’s kind of a punch in the face when we’re reading through Colossians, and Paul’s talking about all the stuff of our sinful flesh. And he says, put to death therefore what’s earthly in you, what’s worldly. He says sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and then covetousness, which is idolatry.
Did you get that? Idolatry? That’s the first commandment. But Paul says that they’re the same, that they’re equivalent. That covetousness, which means wanting the wrong thing, which means desiring what you don’t have, what you’re not authorized to have, wanting that is just as bad as falling down and worshiping a false God.
Now that should sting. But Jesus knows, and this is the spiritual wisdom that we should have today, that every single sin is born in covetousness. James says it like this: sin is conceived in desire, and when it’s fully grown it brings forth death. Every single sin you commit, every commandment that you break is born in wanting the wrong thing, desiring the wrong thing, and especially our sinful hearts are prone to this kind of covetousness that we want stuff.
And especially this, that we find in our stuff, in our money and our possessions and the thing that we have, we find in them security and identity. We think, if only I had a little bit more, then I could be safe from the days to come. If only I had this or that, then I could be secure. Life, one’s life, this is what Jesus says to us, one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.
Man does not live by bread alone. Now, we have to hear this, and we’re going to hear Jesus preach a parable about it because this is always, I think in every culture, this is the temptation to think that the thing that matters is the stuff that we have, the things that we gather up, what’s in our wallet or in our bank account or in our backyard or garage or barn or whatever.
We think that that’s our identity and that is our safety. And Jesus comes right after that. He tells a parable of a rich man. I don’t know of another parable like this that our Lord tells because nothing actually happens in the parable. Nobody goes on a journey and comes back. No one plants seed to see if it grows. No one’s given a talent to see what will happen to it. It’s just a guy, a rich guy, who looks at his field full of crops and he talks to himself. That’s the whole parable.
The land of a rich man produced plentifully. So he thought to himself, what should I do? I don’t have anywhere to store my crops. And he said, this is what I’ll do. I’ll tear down my barns and I’ll build larger ones. And then I’ll store all my grains and all my goods, and then I will say to my soul – this is the picture of the rich man preaching to himself – and listen to the sermon that he preaches. Soul, you have ample goods, laid up for many years, relax, eat, drink, be merry.
He preaches an Epicurean sermon. He assures himself that he’s got plenty, that he doesn’t need to worry about tomorrow, that somehow he’s safe and secure because of all of these possessions. But look, and I think it’s quite amazing here how Jesus takes that last part of the Epicurean creed, remember, eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we will die, and Jesus says, no, it’s wrong, tonight you’re going to die.
God said to him, fool, this night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be? You can’t take it with you, and they do you no good. Your balance sheet does not matter on the judgment day. The big, full barn with all the wheat and all the stores out back does not matter on the judgment day. Your clothes, and jewelry, and closet, and garage, and all the stuff, it doesn’t matter on the judgment day. It does you no good. Who knows who will have it after you die, but it’s not you.
And then Jesus gets to the point. Now, this came up in Bible class last week, and I think it’s an important question for us to ask. Is it wrong to be wealthy? The Scripture does not say it’s wrong to be wealthy. The Scripture says it’s dangerous to be wealthy. And the danger comes in that we trust and we put our identity in the wealth.
But here’s the point that Jesus is going to make here. He’s going to say that your possessions, if they’re great or if they’re minuscule, that they have a direction, that your money has a velocity or a vector to it, that all of your stuff is either pointed at yourself or pointed to God and your neighbor. And that’s the thing that matters.
Listen to the last verse. This is Luke 12, verse 21, the last verse of our gospel lesson. Jesus says, whose will they be? But so it is for the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. The world and the devil and your own sinful flesh want you, want me to lay up treasures for ourselves.
To think that the things that we have are for our own life, for our own ease, for our own comfort, for our own safety, for our own security, or for our own whatever. And Jesus says this covetousness is idolatry, and He calls us to repentance. Jesus calls this false god Mammon, and Luther reminds us that it is the most common idol in the world, and I don’t think it’s any different now than it was in the Middle Ages, than it was in the day of Jesus, than it was from the very beginning, that we’re always tempted to trust this idol.
Repent. Your safety is in Christ alone. Your security is in Christ alone. Your riches and your value and your hope and your peace are in Christ alone. It doesn’t matter how much or how little you have if Jesus has you.
And the only thing that you can take with you on the judgment day, you don’t get to take your wallet or your credit cards or your ledger of good works or achievements or anything else. The only thing that you have on the judgment day is the blood of Jesus, but that dear saints is more than enough so that we can be in this life content.
And if the Lord gives or if the Lord takes away, we rejoice. If the Lord has given us plenty, more than we know what to do with so that we have to go shopping for bigger barns, or if the Lord has taken everything away so that we’re looking for a little corner behind someone else’s barn to lay down our head, it doesn’t matter. If Jesus has you, you have everything.
His kingdom, and His name, and His word, and His kindness, such that He even forgives all of our sins, even our covetousness, even our jealousy, even our sinful desires. Jesus, who was rich beyond all imagination, He Himself became poor so that we might have the riches of God in Him, and you have them.
So we count ourselves dead to the world, but alive to Christ. Now what does all of this mean?
And first, it means that we would pray that the Holy Spirit would give to us the wisdom of God so that we can fight against our own covetousness, not only in our own hearts but in the world, and that we would know that all that the Lord has given us is not to be directed towards ourselves but to the Lord. But most importantly, it means that we should have the confidence that Jesus looks at us and delights in us.
Of all the treasures in heaven, of existing with the Father before the foundation of the world, of all the riches that Jesus had in eternity, do you know what He wanted most of all? Do you know what Jesus desired? Do you know what He coveted? You. You are His treasure. You are His desire, you are His delight, and He is busy storing up treasures in heaven. That is, He’s busy rescuing sinners. He’s busy gathering you to His name.
So let us rejoice in this. Your life does not consist in the abundance of your possessions, but in the one thing that’s needful, Jesus Christ. And you by his death and resurrection are rich toward God; you are already seated in heaven with him. You are His treasure, and He is yours. May this give you comfort and peace.
In the name of Jesus, Amen.
And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.