We are all familiar with the television show "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" Well USA Today recently said the answer is: "Everybody." In an article entitled, "Everyone wants a shot at being a millionaire," I found out that we are a country drowning in millionaires.[1] The estimate is there are now close to 15 million Americans with assets of $1 million or more[2]; while just ten years ago there were fewer than half that number. Billionaires are multiplying even faster. In 1983 Forbes counted 13 American billionaires; today there are 607.[3] Never before in the history of this country has so much money been made so quickly by so many people.
Well, on the one hand it may not be wrong to want to be a millionaire, but it can be very dangerous. You know it is amazing how many things have warning labels today. I have read warning labels that have alerted me to defective car seats, inhaling fumes at a gas station, opening hot radiators, drinking diet soft drinks, smoking cigarettes, and wearing seatbelts. When is the last time you saw a warning label on a $10 bill? a stock certificate? a bank deposit slip? imprinted on a credit card?
Well, sometimes I think there should be. Because there really is a danger to money and material possessions. Now I know people don't like to hear preaching about money, and if I preached as much in the Bible as there is about money, I would probably preach on it at least every other Sunday. As you know I am preaching through the parables right now, but you may not realize that out of the Lord's 38 parables, 16 of them dealt with man's relationship to money and material things.
We're going to study a parable today about a man that God calls a fool. My Dad used to say, "A fool and his money soon part." This is a parable about a man who was a fool not because he would part with his money, but because he would not part with his money. This man was a fool not because he had money, but because money had him. This man eventually died with the cancer of covetousness. We learn from this man why truly "the world is not enough." There are some tremendously valuable lessons that we can learn from the man in this parable that will help us rightly relate to money, and make sure that money is rightly related to us.
I. Be Sensitive To What You Want
"And He said to them, ‘Take heed and beware of covetousness...'" (v.15) Now literally translated, Jesus used two words: one word means "watch out" and the other one means "be on guard." In other words, Jesus is telling us up front we had better put our heart on maximum alert when it comes to covetousness.
The Greek word for covetousness is very interesting. It literally means "a thirst for having more." It refers to the attitude of wanting whatever you see, and wanting more of it once you get it. I read about an old lady who moved to a retirement home, and she began to stare at this one particular man who had been in that retirement home for years.
She would go to breakfast and sit right across the table from him and just stare at him. She would go to lunch, sit right across the table and stare at him. She would go to dinner and do the same thing. If he went out to the front porch to rock she would go out and sit in the rocker next to him and just stare at him. After she did that for about four days, he said, "Lady, why do you keep staring at me?" She said, "You look just like my fourth husband." He said, "How many husbands have you had?" She said, "Three."
Now there is something about covetousness that makes it a particularly dangerous sin. First of all, it is a sin that nobody notices. You can commit this sin twenty-four hours a day and nobody would ever know it but you and God. I could be coveting something that belongs to you right now and you would never know it. The lady sitting next to you could be coveting the dress that you wear. The man sitting next to you could be coveting the Rolex on your wrist. But you would never know that.
But not only do others not notice it; we don't even notice it. If there is one sin that doesn't seem to really bother any of us it is the sin of covetousness. Francis Xavier, who was the leader of the Roman Catholic Church many years ago, and a priest who listened to many confessions, once said, "As an older man, I have listened to thousands of confessions and I have yet to hear one person confess to the sin of covetousness."
Now in this instance the man Jesus tells us about who was covetous, was also a rich man. He wanted more than he already had. Let me ask you a question. Who has greater contentment: A man with seven children, or a man with $7 million? Well, the answer is the man with seven children because he doesn't want any more.
But I want you to understand you don't have to be rich to be covetous. Some of the poorest people on earth have the disease of covetousness flowing through their veins. You don't have to be mean to be covetous. Some of the finest people in the world are eaten up with the cancer of covetousness. It's probably the easiest sin in all the Bible to commit.
I heard about a mother who saw her two year old boy swallow a nickel. She immediately ran over to him, picked him up, turned him upside down, began to beat him on the back. Well the little boy coughed up two quarters.
This time she did go into a panic. She yelled for her husband who came running up and said, "What happened?" She said, "Billy just swallowed a nickel and I hit him and he coughed up two quarters. What should I do?" He said, "Keep feeding him nickels!"
The problem with covetousness is it betrays a misunderstanding of what real life is all about. For Jesus goes on to say, "One's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses." (v.15b) Now I love the way the Living Bible translates this. "Beware! Don't always be wishing for what you don't have, for real life and real living are not related to how rich we are."
The point that Jesus was trying to make was simply this: Your worth is never determined by your wealth. Life is more than bank accounts, stocks and bonds, and real estate. In case you are wondering what life really is and what life really consists of, listen to these verses:
"I have come that you might have life and have it more abundantly." (Jn. 10:10)
"I am the way, the truth, and the life." (Jn. 14:6)
"He who has the Son has life." (1 Jn. 5:12)
You see life is not found in possessions; life is found in a person and his name is Jesus. That's why you must be sensitive to what you want.
II. Be Satisfied With What You Have
Now Jesus tells a parable about a rich fool. It was a man who was foolishly rich but he was also richly foolish. "Then He spoke a parable to them, saying: ‘The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully." (v.16) Now I must caution you that this farmer was not fool because he was rich; he was not a fool because he was prosperous and successful. The Bible nowhere condemns well-earned, well-deserved financial prosperity.
This man earned what he got. He was honest, hard working, paid his taxes; he was a good business man. That was not the problem. So why was this man a fool?
First of all, he misunderstood where his wealth had come from, which is why he misused the wealth that God had given him. If you had asked him where his wealth had come from he would have told you, "I worked for it and I earned it." After all, he had plowed the fields, he had planted the grain, he had tended the soil, he had gathered the harvest. That's not the way Jesus viewed it. You notice Jesus did not say, "A certain man worked very hard and accumulated a great fortune." No, He said, "The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully." (v.16) In other words, it was God that had given him his harvest. It was God that had given him his money. The problem was not that he had money; the problem was he worshipped his money, and he replaced the eternal God with a material god.
To put it another way, the problem was not that this man had money, the problem was that he loved money. In verse 17 we read, "And he thought within himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?'" Now first of all, this man was talking to the wrong person when he "thought within himself." He never spoke to God about anything. All he cared about was how he could support his addiction to the habit-forming narcotic of materialism. In verses 17-19 you will notice that eleven times he uses the first personal pronoun referring to himself.
"And he thought within himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?' So he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods.' And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry.'"
Not once do you hear about others. Not once do you hear a word about God. It is all I, I, my, my.
This man could not see the God who gave him all of his wealth; he could not see the poor who needed some of his wealth. Greed had pulled the shades of selfishness over his eyes and had coated his heart in the concrete of covetousness.
So he did the only thing he knew to do.
"So he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods. And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry.'" (vv.18-19)
When you looked at this man's life you saw that it revolved around barns, buildings, budgets, and bank accounts. He was caught in the maze of materialism. He lived for "the art of the deal."
The problem was this man thought his security was in his money. He wanted to hold on to everything he had so he could guarantee his future. Job made this observation: He said, "If I have made gold my hope, or said to fine gold, ‘you are my confidence'...this also would be an iniquity deserving of judgment, for I would have denied God who is above." (Job 31:24,28) That is exactly why God calls this man a fool.
"But God said to him, ‘You fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?'" (v.20) Here was a man who thought he had many years to live, and he didn't have another day. This man had probably kept many appointments that day, but he was unprepared for the most important appointment that every man will have to keep, for "it is appointed unto men once to die and after this the judgment." (Heb. 9:27)
I can just see this man. He has settled down for the night; he has just gotten between those satin sheets; laying on that soft fluffy pillow. He's so satisfied with himself. As a matter of fact, he may have even sang himself to sleep with this little song:
Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray my cuisinart to keep;
I pray my stocks are on the rise
And that my analyst is wise;
That all the wine I sip is white
That my hot tub is water tight;
That racket ball won't get too tough
That all my sushi is fresh enough;
I pray my cordless phone still works
That my career won't lose its perk;
My microwave won't radiate
My condo won't depreciate;
I pray my health club doesn't close
And that my money market grows;
If I grow broke before I wake
I pray my Mercedes they won't take.[4]
But it was not to be. That very night death says, "Your soul is required of you." That term "required" is a fascinating term; it is a commercial term. It is a banking term which literally means "to call in a loan." Did you know your life is not your own? It is on loan from God, and God can call that loan in any time He chooses.
Notice that God did not ask for his silver, God asked for his soul. One of these days the bony hand of death is going to knock on the door of your heart, and he is going to collect the soul that belongs to God. When he knocks on your door he is not going to ask for your wallet, he's not going to ask for your checkbook, he's not going to ask for your stocks, your bonds, or your deeds. He's going to ask for you.
You see the great tragedy was not what was left behind this man, but what lay before this man. This man worked all of his life for everything, and died without anything. Somebody has said that money talks; it does—it says "Goodbye!"
On his tombstone could have been written the words that are found on a tombstone over in England of a rich man who died and left nothing behind but his money:
Here lies a miser who lived for himself
And cared for nothing but gathering wealth,
Now where he is, or how he fares,
Nobody knows, and nobody cares.
III. Be Serious About Where You Are Going
Now who did Jesus tell this story for? "So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God." (v.21) Now listen carefully. Every one of you are doing one of two things: You are either laying up treasure for yourself, and when it comes to God you are going to die dirt poor; or, you are literally becoming rich toward God. Let me give you some good news. I cannot guarantee that you will live rich, but I can guarantee if you will put money in its proper perspective, and money in its proper place, and if you will learn that it is more blessed to give than it is to receive, and that God blesses you so that you can be a blessing to others, you can die rich.
Billy Graham once told a story of a time he and Ruth were on an island in the Caribbean. One of the wealthiest men in the world asked them to come to his lavish home for lunch. At that time the man was 75 years old, and throughout the entire meal it seemed he was very close to tears.
The man finally blurted out and said, "I'm the most miserable man in the world. Out there is my yacht, my plane, my helicopters; I can go anywhere I want to go when I want to go there. I have everything I want to make me happy, and yet I am as miserable as hell."
Billy Graham said he talked with him; had prayer with him and tried to point him to Christ. But the man would not get saved.
Billy Graham said they then went down the hill to a small cottage where they were staying. That afternoon the pastor of the local Baptist church came to call. He was an Englishman, and he also was 75. He was a widower, and he had spent most of his free time taking care of his two invalid sisters. He was jumping up and down, full of enthusiasm, full of love for Jesus and love for others. They were talking and the Baptist preacher said, "You know, Billy, I don't have two pounds to my name, but I am the happiest man in the world." Billy Graham said when they walked out of that man's house, he looked at Ruth and said, "Ruth, of the two men we have met today, who do you think was the richer man?" Billy said "we both knew the answer."
You see the truly rich person is the person who is rich toward God. You know what that means? It means first of all that God is preeminent in your life. He is first in your life and is more important than anything or anyone else. It means that He is present as your Lord. He is in complete control of all that you have and all that you are. It means that He is predominant as your love. It means you love Him, and Him alone, with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and He is more important than all of this world put together.
I pray that you will be rich toward God. I want you to imagine that you are living in the South during the Civil War, and you had accumulated a large amount of Confederate currency. Now suppose that you knew ahead of time that the North was going to win the war, and that your money would soon be useless. Let me ask you a question. What would you have done with your Confederate money? Well, if you were smart, you would have cashed in all of your Confederate currency for US currency. Because that is the only money that would have value once the war was over.
I want you to hear me carefully. We've got inside information that this world is coming to an end. We've got inside information that either when we die or Jesus returns, the currency of this world is going to be absolutely worthless. That should radically affect your investment strategy. For us to accumulate vast earthly treasures and never ever be generous toward God and His work, in the face of the inevitable future that we know is coming, would be equivalent to stockpiling Confederate money, knowing that one day it's going to be worthless.
Even if you could gain the whole world, the world would never be enough. But God is—that's why with what God gives us let's be careful that we invest it and not hoard it that we might be rich toward God.
1. "Everyone wants a shot at being a millionaire," USA Today, Maria Puente. N.D.
2. https://dqydj.com/how-many-millionaires-decamillionaires-america/
3. https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/#5b419eb6251c
4. Cited by Steve Farrar, Better Homes & Jungles, p. 63.
