Rich Toward God

RICH TOWARD GOD

         One of the multitude said to him, “Teacher,

         bid my brother divide the inheritance with

         me.” But he said to him, “Man, who made me

         a judge or divider over you?” And he said

         to them, “Take heed, and beware of all

         covetousness; for a man’s life does not con-

         sist in the abundance of his possessions.”

         And he told them a parable saying, “The land

         of a rich man brought forth plentifully; and

         he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for

         I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he

         said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my

         barns and build larger ones; and there I will

         store all my grain and my goods. And I will

         say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods

         laid up for many years; take your ease, eat,

         drink, be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘Fool!

         This night your soul is required of you; and

         the things you have prepared, whose will they

         be?’ So is he who lays up treasure for him-

         self, and is not rich toward God.”

                                Luke 12:13-21

We’re not living in the Garden of Eden where the tem-

perature is just right, delicious food waits on trees

to be picked when we’re hungry, and abundance is every-

where. We’re living in a world where the

- weather turns cold,

- people get sick,

- food becomes scarce....where you have

to pay for what you get...when sometimes you can’t

even find a job.

There are only two ways we can live in such a world as

this,

- by covetousness,

- or by faith.

Our natural bent is to be covetous...to want to grab

everything we can and pile it up against the uncertain

future. But our calling - now that we have begun to

follow Jesus Christ - is to walk by faith.

The proof that you are saved, my friend, is not that you

raised your right hand and walked down to the front of

the church in tears, or that you say you love everybody,

or that you say you have faith.

The proof that you are saved is that you have begun to

handle money, to deal with success and failure, to face

uncertainty, without letting anxiety and lust eat you

up. And without mooching off other people’s work and

calling it faith.

We may know all kinds of deep spiritual truth, and ex-

press it well, and develop impressive ministries.. But

if we haven’t learned to conquer our own covetousness,

our ministry in this world will be sterile and our situ-

ation in the next might be like the shock that come to

the rich man when he saw Lazarus in Abraham’s bosom and

himself in flames.

Take heed and beware of all covetousness.

-Covetousness for mammon,

- money and things.

-Covetousness for status,

- for a reputation among the saints.

-Covetousness to build “a great work for the Lord.”

Covetousness starts, of course, with mammon, money and

things. And most of us are struggling to find the right

way to handle mammon. Some of us are prospering finan-

cially and we want to know what to do with this prosperity

so that it won’t destroy us as it has destroyed so many.

Some of us are on fixed incomes and having tight going,

and we look with longing for a little more financial lee-

way. As a congregation we want to make sure that the

offerings which pour in from people‘s hearts are offerings

to God...are never used to build our own little religious

empires.

There is also a covetousness which has nothing to do with

money. Some of us aren’t bothered by money at all... we

can get by with very little. We aren’t that excited about

fancy cars or sumptuous meals. We are covetous about our

image. We are lusting after a reputation for being

“totally committed.” And this lust compromises us as

much as any lust for money. .

As we wrestle with covetousness we are tempted to set up

some external standard. “Give 10% and you’ll be all

right. Or 20%, or 50%, or 100%.”

And those of us who are covetous for recognition try to

fight this tendency in ourselves by keeping our names out

of the news papers and the church bulletins and maintaining

a low profile.

But covetousness can never be cured by setting these ex-

ternal standards for ourselves.

- We can give away all we have to feed the poor.

- We can offer our bodies to be burned.

- We can bury our names fifty miles below the

ocean floor,

- and still be covetous.

Covetousness is an inner thing,

a disposition of the heart. If it is ever

to be cured there has to be a new disposition to replace

it. When our Lord says,

“...So is he who lays up treasure for himself

and is not rich toward God,”

- he is talking about two dispositions:

the disposition of covetousness,

and the disposition of being rich toward God.

Covetousness is that disposition within us which is

forever gathering to itself. It doesn’t make much

difference whether it is gathering money,

things,

people,

or influence.

To be rich toward God is the disposition, which from the

heart, gathers whatever it gathers to God.

He said also to the man who had invited him,

“When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not

invite your friends or your brothers or your

kinsmen or rich neighbors, lest they also in-

vite you in return, and you be repaid. But

when you give a feast, invite the poor, the

maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be

blessed, because they cannot repay you. You

will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”

Luke 14:12-14

He’s not saying you shouldn’t invite your family over for

Thanksgiving, but He’s putting His finger on the tendency

to use every dinner for our own covetous ends. If you

invite your kinsmen and your rich neighbors you are

gathering to yourself, it’s going to pay off for you in

the end. But if you invite the poor and the maimed and

the lame and blind you’re gathering to God, for it won’t

pay off for you in this world. This is the disposition

Jesus bought for us with His blood and gives us in the

Holy Spirit. But we have to enter this disposition.

We enter into the disposition of being rich toward God by

deliberately gathering to God instead of ourselves in

specific ways.

1. We gather people to God through intercession.

The foundation stone of a life which is rich toward God

is praying for people.

Then he. .said to his disciples, “The harvest

is plentiful, but the laborers are few;

pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to

send out laborers into his harvest.”

Matthew 9:37,38

Pray at all times in the Spirit, with all

prayer and supplication. To that end keep

alert with all perseverance, making suppli-

cation for all the saints... Ephesians 6:18

Intercession is the purest and mightiest labor of gather-

ing souls to God. Nobody sees you do it but God. Those

for whom you pray are drawn not to you, but to God. What-

ever other gathering to God we may engage in will only be,

as effective as our labor of intercession is real.

Day after day we keep lifting up names before the Throne;

and as we do,

- streams are opened up in the deserts of

their hearts,

- angels are dispatched to attend to their need,

- demons are driven from their minds,

- chains are broken from their very bodies.

And in a mystery the power of the blood of the Lamb begins

to work upon them.

2. We gather people to God by doing mercy.

“If you love those who love you, what credit

is that to you? For even sinners love those

who love them. And if you do good to those

who do good to you, what credit is that to

you? For even sinners do the same. And if

you lend to those from whom you hope to re-

ceive, what credit is that to you? Even

sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much

again. But love your enemies, and do good,

and lend, expecting nothing in return; and

your reward will be great, and you will be

sons of the Most High; for he is kind to the

ungrateful and the selfish. Be merciful,

even as your Father is merciful.”

Luke 6:32-36

Mercy... loving-kindness... shown to those who are crying

out for it, and who often have nothing to give us in

return, is a manifestation of God - whether

- it’s food,

clothing,

some money,

a listening ear,

a letter to cheer them,

a card,

a visit,

a word of encouragement,

or a little hospitality...this pleasant surprise will

be a clear sign of God’s love.

When we get all tangled up in religious covetousness,

trying to gather people into our church, or bring people

over to our point of view, it gets complicated and

wearying. Sometimes it’s hard to find likely prospects.

But when we‘re gathering people simply to God by touching

them with His kindness, it’s so easy to find people to

touch. They’re everywhere. There is no end to things

we can do for them and share with them.

And when our motives are right, when we‘re not worrying

about our image but just gathering people to God, it’s

easy to know when to say “no” to a free loader his third

time around, or speak a word of rebuke to someone who

wants to take five pieces of chicken before the folks at

the end of the line have had one. And if people are un-

grateful it doesn’t bother us in the least. We aren’t

building a clientele of admirers, we’re gathering people

to God.

3. We gather people to God by sharing in the sufferings

of Jesus.

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake,

and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in

Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body,

that is, the church, of which I became a

minister according to the divine office which

was given to me for you, to make the word of

God fully known... Colossians 1:24,25

It was clearly understood by the apostles that when they

suffered in any way, as a result of their obedience to

Jesus, this suffering was redemptive. It was an extension

of Jesus’ cross. This suffering in a mystery conveyed

divine life to the world around them.

Watchman Nee spent the last twenty-five years of his life

in a prison, sick,

cold,

hungry,

cut off from his wife and his friends. But

his suffering, along with that of countless unknown saints

will one day be seen as a sacramental means by which the

living Word breaks forth in the midst of the very regime

that imprisoned them.

Others carry crosses no one sees but God. They look serene

and happy and without problems, but God sees their pain

and uses it. Our suffering may be mild by comparison with

others elsewhere on earth - at least for now - but what-

ever it is, this pain,

this inner anguish,

this cross you carry, is being used by the

Lord to gather men and women to Calvary.

4. We gather people to God by binding and loosing.

Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on

earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever

you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Again I say to you, if two of you agree on

earth about anything they ask, it will be

done for them by my Father in heaven.

Matthew 18:18,19

There is a tendency among some believers these days to

skip over all the other ministries and grab hold of this

one. Without the labor of intercession or the down-to-

earth discipline of showing mercy, or the pain of redemp-

tive suffering they want to be the healers and the exor-

cists. They start playing with spiritual fire and are

burned. Binding and loosing...bringing the power of

heaven to bear on the needs of earth-bound men is safe

only in the hand of those who are gathering to God in all

the other ways.

Nevertheless, the need to be able to bind and loose is

urgent. How else can these captive minds and bodies rise

into fellowship with God? How can they be gathered to

Him unless we can in fact free them from the power that

oppress them?

Who of us hasn’t been alcoholic, mentally oppressed,

an addict, or one who is obsessed

with middle class success. Just as surely as we’ve been

set free we’ve been sent to free the captives.

And he said to them, “Take heed, and beware

of all covetousness; for a man’s life does

not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”

Luke 12:15

There are only two ways we are going to live in this

world: - by covetousness,

- or by faith.

May God help us to free our lives of all covetousness and

live by the disposition which gathers to Him alone, never

to itself.

May the Spirit help us to live lives in this uncertain

world which are rich toward God.

“Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s

good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell

your possessions, and give alms; provide your-

selves with purses that do not grow old, with

a treasure in the heavens that does not fail,

where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.

For where your treasure is,. there will your

heart be also.” Luke 12:32-34

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