How Jesus Explained It: Covetousness
Part of a Series by Derek Helt
Gallup Christian Church, Gallup, New Mexico
Luke 12:13–21
Someone in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me." Jesus replied, "Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?" Then he said to them, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions." And he told them this parable: "The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’ "Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I’ll say to myself, "You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry."’ "But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ "This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God." (New International Version)
The story is told of an elderly Quaker who, to teach his neighbors a lesson, put up a sign on a vacant piece of property he owned. The sign read, "I WILL GIVE THIS LOT TO ANYONE WHO IS REALLY SATISFIED."
A wealthy farmer read the sign as he rode by and said to himself, "Since my Quaker friend is going to give this piece of land away, I might as well have it as anyone else. I am rich and have all I need, so I am well able to qualify." He went up to the Quaker’s door and, when the aged man appeared, the farmer explained why he had come.
"And art thou really satisfied?" asked the owner of the lot. "I surely am," was the farmer’s reply. "I have all I need, and I am well satisfied." "Friend," said the old Quaker, "if thou art satisfied, then what dost thou want with my lot?" See, the question revealed the covetousness that was hidden in the man’s heart.
Biographer Philip Guedella often lectured on the art of writing biography. He used to say that a biographer’s most difficult task is finding out what kind of person his subject really was. And then he would describe what he had done when preparing his biography of the Duke of Wellington. In order to find really hard evidence of Wellington’s true character, he delved into the Duke’s old checkbooks. And he said that in the process of going through the check stubs and the canceled checks, he was able to discover the man’s deepest concerns. He was able to find out what kind of a man the Duke had really been.
What we do with our money and all the things that it can and does buy says a lot about us. For example, how many people here this morning think money is itself evil? Now, before anyone raises their hand, I’m going to warn you — if you think it’s evil in and of itself, then I’m going to ask you to give it to me. In fact, it’s my Christian duty to keep you from sin! If money’s evil, you don’t want it in your wallet or your purse! You’d better get it out right now and get rid of it. See, saying that money is evil is one thing, but if we really believed that, then we wouldn’t hesitate to give it all away, would we? The fact is that Scripture does not say that money is evil. Jesus talked about money a lot. Many, many of his parables, including this one we’re looking at today, are about money or material things. And never once did Jesus tell his followers to give up their money, to not have anything to do with it.
Some people will misquote Scripture and say, "Money is the root of all evil." But what Paul really told Timothy in 1 Timothy 6:10 was that "The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil." And that’s really what Jesus was talking about here in this passage, when this fellow said to him, "Teacher — Rabbi — tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me."
He and his brother were evidently having a disagreement over how the family estate should be divvied up between them. And this was something that well-known teachers of that day were often asked to get involved in. "I’m having an argument with my brother, Rabbi, help us to work it out." But, you notice that Jesus didn’t want to get in the middle of that fight. Instead, he took that opportunity to teach about the proper place that possessions should have in a person’s life.
Now, when you talk about money, wealth, possessions, materialism, you have to careful. Politicians know that people, for the most part, don’t vote out of ideology or beliefs, they vote out of their back pocket. If you want to start a controversy and get the most meek and mild person all riled up, just start talking about money and taxes and who ought to be paying less and who ought to be paying more. We’ve all got strong opinions about those issues. You want to get me excited, just tell me what you think I ought to be doing with my money that I’m not.
So, with that realization in mind, it was with a little bit of trepidation that I approached preaching on this passage. Preachers can get a reputation for hitting some subjects too often and too hard. Money is one of those subjects. But I’ve been here over three years now and I’ve preached specifically on giving only once and on money and stewardship only indirectly. So I don’t want anybody going away today and saying, "Well, there’s that preacher goin’ and talkin’ about money again." In fact, this passage really isn’t about wealth, money, mammon, material possessions, filthy lucre — whatever you want to call it — no, it’s about one’s attitudes towards obtaining and using wealth.
Jesus makes several contrasts here between the world’s attitudes about wealth — the worldly view represented here by this ‘certain rich man’ in the parable — and God’s attitude about wealth, as taught by Jesus here and in many other passages in the Gospels. So let’s look at these contrasting attitudes about wealth and money and it’s proper place in life. But before we get into it, I want to preface it all by saying that, ultimately, what a person does with their money is strictly between that individual and God. This is one of those areas where I believe every Christian should be informed of what the Bible teaches and then go and prayerfully, carefully, make their own decisions about how they will get and what they will do with their own money.
To begin with, Jesus reaffirms the sinfulness of greed, of covetousness, of always wanting more of anything. It sounds like maybe this fellow’s question kind of reminded Jesus about the subject of covetousness. Reading it, I almost get the sense that after Jesus said to him, "Who made me the arbiter between you and your brother?" that he was just going to go on with what he was talking about before. But it’s like he pauses and says, "Oh yeah, and by the way . . . Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed." And then the tells this little story of a man who, it doesn’t look like, made his fortune in any immoral way, but was nonetheless in trouble with God because he trusted in that fortune for his security.
Jesus says, "This isn’t the way it ought to be, this is not right. A man’s life does not consist of the things he has."
The worldly view, represented by this man in the parable, is that greed, covetousness, and always wanting more is not a sin, but something natural, something good, something that’s even a part of the survival instinct. Sometimes we even dress it up and call it, "Saving up for a rainy day." Not that savings are an example of covetousness, but taken too far, they can be. I’m convinced that greed, covetousness, and materialism masquerade in our culture as many things that are not labeled as sin by Christians. Sometimes it’s the desire to get our money’s worth. "I paid good money for that and it had better do what it is supposed to, or I’m taking it back." Sometimes it masquerades as the desire for quality, "We might as well pay the extra money and get the top of the line model, after all, you get what you pay for." There’s a fine line between legitimately using these reasons and using them as an excuse for our greed and covetousness.
And sometimes, folks, we can see the sins greed, envy, and covetousness masquerading as the virtues of "fairness," and "equality." Now, I hate to bring politics ‘into the pulpit,’ as it were. I really do. I hate to see politicians of any party or stripe on TV during the worship service at a church or a synagogue speaking about why God is on their side and why he’s against the other side. I’ve seen both Republicans and Democrats do it and I don’t like it at all. It’s presumptuous, and it cheapens worship and the community of God. The church should be above politics. Salvation is a whole other realm, subject. And I believe it’s much more important, frankly, than who wins an election. That being said, however, I really feel strongly that I have to mention a couple of things about politics in conjunction with greed, envy, and covetousness this morning.
I don’t like it when I see an elected official try to sway people to their point of view by planting the seed of envy in their listeners hearts. I think it’s wrong when the President tries to snuggle up to the poor and middle class by saying the rich aren’t paying their fair share and that they need to divide up the pie more evenly. I don’t think it’s right when he does it or when Dick Gephardt does it; and I didn’t think it was right when, during the Republican primaries, Bob Dole and Pat Buchanan tried to make us dislike Steve Forbes because he’s wealthy. Does that make sense? Your opinions about any of these jokers are your own and that’s not what I’m talking about at all. What I’m saying is that envy is being promoted in the hearts of people for political purposes. And we have enough greed, and envy, and covetousness going around already without some politician planting that sin among us so he can get elected to office.
As Christians, Steve Forbes’ or anyone else’s wealth should not be a source of sin for us. It should be irrelevant to us on a personal basis. We’re not to worry about what others have, but about what we have and where it stands in our relationship to God. Jesus affirmed strongly here that greed, envy, covetousness — whatever you want to call it, the desire to have more, especially if you can get it by taking it from someone else — Jesus said that is sin despite the fact that the world may call it something different.
In 79 AD the city of Pompeii, in Italy, was buried by the explosion of Mount Vesuvius. Many people were killed and when they excavated the city earlier this century, they found that many had been embalmed in the ashes that fell and covered the city. When their bodies decayed, a void in the rock that formed from the ashes was left. Archeologists were then able to fill these voids with plaster and in so doing get a cast of the final moments of the people who died that day.
When they did this, they found one woman whose feet were turned toward the city gate, but her face was turned backward toward something that lay just beyond her outstretched hands. The prize for which those frozen fingers were reaching was a bag of pearls. Maybe she herself had dropped them as she was fleeing for her life. Maybe she had found them where they had been dropped by another. But, be that as it may, though death was hard at her heels, and life was beckoning to her beyond the city gates, she could not shake off their spell. She had turned to pick them up, with death as her reward. But it was not the eruption of Vesuvius that made her love pearls more than life. It only froze her in this attitude of greed.
Jesus makes the same point about covetousness and the Christian. Our desire for more "things" will keep us from God just as surely as that poor woman’s desire for those pearls kept her from escaping the city. Our desires for a nice home, two nice cars, a big-screen TV, and all the finer things of life can easily become the sin of covetousness. And that sin, no matter how minor and unimportant it may sound to us, no matter what nice name the world gives it; will keep us from following God just as surely as can a bottle, or sexual immorality, or thievery, or gossip or any of the host of things that we readily and enthusiastically label as sin.
The second comparison that Jesus makes between this "certain rich man’s" attitude toward wealth and the attitude that the Christian should have is in the area of self-centeredness. There is no other parable in the New Testament that is so full of personal pronouns. Just look at the parable: "What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones in which to store my grain and my goods. I will say to myself, ‘You have plenty of goods things laid up for many years.’ I will take life easy."
I read a description of a young woman named Edith. It was said of her that "Edith lived in a little world — a world bounded on the north, south, east, and west by Edith." That’s this fellow in Jesus’ parable. Everything was me, me, me! This is what I will do, etc. See, he was not condemned for being a prudent business man or for having a good year with his crops, or even for being rich. No, he was condemned because he thought only of himself.
Now, contrast that attitude with the picture that the Bible paints of Jesus and people who have followed after him. We’ve been studying the letter to the Ephesians in our Wednesday night Bible study and Paul has a lot to say in it about love. And you know what? After reading Ephesians and, for that matter, the whole New Testament, if you had to pick out a word that was most closely identified with the word love, it wouldn’t be warmth, feelings, sex, or comfort; it would probably be the word sacrifice, or a close kin, maybe commitment.
The story of any Christian should not be told with words like I, me, my, and mine being the primary pronouns. No, the Christian’s story should be told with words that emphasize others, that talk about putting others ahead of ourselves. The rich fool only thought of himself when it came to his possessions. It never entered his mind to use them — even a small portion of them — for others. This man’s whole attitude was the very reverse of Christianity. Instead of denying himself he aggressively affirmed himself; instead of finding his happiness in giving, he tried to conserve it by keeping.
By the world’s standards, most of us are wealthy. You may not think so, but there are probably a couple of billion people who would say every one of us here is wealthy. In some countries the people can’t imagine the wealth it takes just to have a car payment. And our wealth opens up choices for us that allow us to pursue our own interests in a variety of ways. Such pursuits can easily keep us from using resources in a way most honoring to God. And please note that Jesus is not condemning wealth as such, but its use. How do we use what God has given us? Do we seek to pile up treasure for ourselves? Or is generosity our habit? Or does compassion take a back seat to our personal desires? These are the types of questions raised here in this passage. Our checkbooks tell us a lot about our priorities.
And finally, the third point of comparison here between the worldly man — this ‘certain rich man’ — and the Christian is in the area of vision.
In the book A Savior for All Seasons, William Barker relates the story of an Anglican bishop from the East coast who many years ago paid a visit to a small, Midwestern religious college. He stayed at the home of the college president, who also served as professor of physics and chemistry. After dinner, the bishop declared that the second coming couldn’t be far off, because just about everything about nature had been discovered and all inventions conceived.
The young college president politely disagreed and said he felt there would be many more discoveries. When the angered bishop challenged the president to name just one such invention, the president replied he was certain that within fifty years men would be able to fly.
"Nonsense!" sputtered the outraged bishop. "Only angels are intended to fly."
The bishop’s name was Wright, and he had two boys at home who would prove to have greater vision than their father. Their names, of course, were Orville and Wilbur.
Now, what does that story have to do with this covetous, greedy, selfish rich fool? Well, like Orville & Wilbur’s father, he too could not conceive of anything beyond what he could see. The rich fool was convinced that there was nothing beyond what he could see and experience. He never saw beyond this world. All his plans were made on the basis of life here. And what happened to him? God said, "Oh, you poor, foolish fellow. Tonight is the night that you have to answer for your life before Me. And what good will, big, full barns and warehouses do you now?"
We tend to hoard our possessions because we are convinced that this life is all there is; at least that is the view our culture promotes. A good example of this attitude is the commercial jingle, "You only go around once in life, so grab for all the gusto you can get." The problem with that is that there is no accountability, no sense of a future with God, or no sense of honoring values that he has set forth in that now-or-never approach. The Christian is said in the Bible to be in this world, but not of it. We are called to live in this world, but keep our eyes set upon the promise of a world beyond, of something that follows this life here that we know now.
In his novel Clear and Present Danger, Tom Clancy introduces one of the characters, a Colombian drug lord, this way: "Standing on the verandah of his house, he was master of all that he laid his eyes on." And he goes on to describe how this man truly believed that he was in complete control of his life. No one could touch him that he did not allow to touch him. There were no unknowns for him and he was in the dark about nothing.
Of course, during the novel, he learned differently as his self-constructed world was torn apart by forces he knew nothing about. The same message is found here in Jesus’ parable of the rich, but foolish, man. The Christian is never to forget that what we see with our eyes is not all that there is and we are called to take that into consideration when we decide how we will use what God has given us.
Permission is granted to subscribers to use this document in total or in sermon preparation in the context of the local congregation only. Publishing it in a book, on the Internet, or anyplace beyond the local congregation is prohibited.- The author of this sermon, Derek Helt, may be reached at: dphelt@actionnet.net