Rich...toward God? Sermon preached August 3, 2025 at Cason United Methodist Church.

Luke 12……….Rich toward God

LUKE 12: 13-21.  Someone in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me." But he said to him, "Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?" (Note: ‘family inheritance’ is a technical term referring to the allotment in the Book of Joshua.)

 And he said to them, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions."

Then he told them a parable: "The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, 'What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?' (Note: What he should have done is quite clear in the Law and the Prophets.)

Then 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; relax, eat, drink, be merry.'

But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God."^[1]

“You fool!” Now where have I heard that before? Ah, yes. Pastor said that last week. Not to me! He would have been wrong, of course, at least about the ‘rich’ part.

 Pastor used the Gospel reading for the day, in Luke chapter 11, where Jesus was talking to the Pharisees. He accused them of harboring greed inside them while working hard to present themselves on the outside as the righteous brothers. So, two of the themes of this story, greed vs. righteousness and foolishness vs. wisdom follow naturally from the previous chapter.

When I am doing a Bible study, I always ask: “What came before?” We have begun to answer that question. Jesus was involved in a long conversation about hypocrisy, greed, and foolishness.

Another question that you should ask is: “What is the setting for this passage?” By that I mean, “Where are Jesus and the disciples, what are they doing, and who else is there?” At the beginning of Chapter 12, Jesus has just walked away from a hostile group of Pharisees when a crowd of thousands began to gather around him. There were so many that the text says, “they trampled one another.” While Jesus waited for the crowd to sort themselves out, the text says, “he began to speak to the disciples,” not to the crowd.

So, Jesus is out in the open, the disciples are nearby, and a crowd is gathering. Jesus warns the disciples to beware of the Pharisees and others who may attack them. Jesus tells the disciples not to worry because they are precious in God’s sight.

Who is speaking? Well, Jesus was speaking to the disciples although those nearby in the crowd could overhear what he was saying. Suddenly, out of the nameless crowd came the voice of a man intruding on the conversation. Now, Jesus is used to this, it happens all the time.          (Have someone in the congregation shout out what the man said.)

Another question that I ask in Bible study is: “What words here are repeated, that is, the same or similar, or contrast with other words?” Something stands out to me right away. The word ‘brother’ and the word ‘divide’. They are closely tied to another contrasting pair: ‘family’ and ‘inheritance’. You can have a family and act like brothers should, until it comes to the money and possessions that Mom and Dad left behind. Then the prospect of dividing up the inheritance often causes trouble.

First, a historical point to frame this exchange. According to Jewish Law (Deuteronomy 21:17), the eldest brother should receive double the amount that the other children receive. Why? Because the law was concerned with keeping families and property together rather than continually dividing it up until no one had enough.

Second, on the matter of possessions, Jesus has already established “Kingdom priorities.” Earlier in Luke, Jesus gives a rather famous sermon:

“But I say to you that listen, ‘Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you’” (Luke 6: 27-31).

In all his sermons, Jesus stressed ‘building relationships’ over ‘storing property’. Here he says to the disciples that “one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Always ask questions of the text, I say. So the question here might be: ‘Then what does life consist of?’ Well, let’s see what the parable tells us about that and perhaps we will see how it might answer the brother’s question.

The parable begins this way: “The land of a rich man produced abundantly.” What do you see there?

Q: Did the rich man produce the crop? No.

Q: Then who did produce the abundant crop? The land. In the Old Testament, the land is portrayed as an agent. God speaks as if the land can do things. For example, in one place God says, “the land will vomit you out for defiling it” (Leviticus 18: 25, 28; 20: 22).

 Q: Was the rich man a farmer? No. He did not work in the fields. A farmer knows pretty much what kind of crop to expect. This landlord did not, and he was surprised.

 Already this parable undermines secular concepts of the ownership of property. God made his position clear before the Israelites moved into the Promised Land. Here is God’s claim: “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants” (Leviticus 25:23). Interesting, the people of Israel do not own the land. They are aliens and tenants on the land.

 Consider that theology of possessions, because it is not the way people think about ‘their’ possessions today. When you think about it, we are all aliens and tenants who have been put into temporary possession of land and houses and goods…for a purpose? That is why Jesus said to the disciples, “Take care. Be on your guard against all kinds of greed!”

 Back to the parable. “And he thought to himself, 'What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?”

 Q: Where is everyone else? Isn’t this a bit unusual? Especially in biblical times? Yes, it is. As you read through the Bible, you will note that a person talking to himself is often a sign that something evil going on. The wicked man seeks no advice from friends, because he has no real friends. Where is his family? He is alone: he has many possessions, no friends nor family.

 Q: How did the man accumulate the amount of land implied here? When you go home, take some time to read Leviticus Chapter 25. It is crucial for understanding God’s theology of the land, and it is a lesson about possessions and relationships. When the Israelites entered the Promised Land, Joshua followed Moses’ instructions and divided the land according to clans and families, each receiving an allotment that was inalienable. They should not sell it.

But, in this parable, we have a man all alone with a lot of land. How did that happen? The people in that crowd who heard Jesus would have thought that this sounds fishy. The prophet Isaiah had something to say about that kind of man.

“Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is room for no one, and you are left to live alone in the midst of the land!” (Isaiah 5: 8).

Q: In light of the Old Testament Law and the Prophets, let’s consider the Rich Man’s question: What should he do?

The Old Testament is clear. People have family and community obligations. There are claims on their property that must be met. The abundance came from God; therefore it must be shared.

 First, it must be shared with those in need. Poor people, and even animals, must be permitted to glean after the harvesters have finished taking in the crop (Leviticus 19:9-10; 23:22; Deuteronomy 24:19-22). When there is wheat and barley on the ground, the hungry must be given access to the food.

 Second, travelers and even neighbors must be permitted occasionally to satisfy their hunger from other people’s fields (Deuteronomy 23:24-25). Remember that the disciples did when they were walking by a field (Luke 6: 1-5).

Next, from the gathered harvest, the landowner owes a tithe to God. God says that it is for the Levites, for aliens, for orphans, and for widows. “When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce …, giving it to the Levites, the aliens, the orphans, and the widows; so that they may eat their fill in your towns, then you shall say before the LORD your God: "I have removed the sacred portion from the house, and I have given it to the Levites, the resident aliens, the orphans, and the widows, in accordance with your entire commandment that you commanded me; I have neither transgressed nor forgotten any of your commandments” (Deuteronomy 26: 12-13). 

Finally, it is clear that the Jubilee, which is the 50-year Sabbath celebration when all debts are forgiven and lost land is returned, existed “to protect this kind of land tenure,” (Wright 1990:176) to “counter the tendency for land to accumulate in the hands of a few,” (Wright 1990:177), to support the family, and “as a safety valve to release the pressure of economic forces on the poor” (Wright 1990:178).  In addition, the Jubilee as a social proposal comes forward into Jesus’ program as a powerful metaphor for liberation; so those listening to this parable are not neutral to its details (Volschenke and van Aarde 2002:813-814). The crowd knew how the Rich Man should answer his own question.

 Q: Will the rich man remember God’s commands and share out the crop?

“Then 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.”

The rich man convinces himself to build bigger barns to store the grain and his goods for himself.  What will be the effect of this?  First, it removes food from his family, from the community, and particularly from the most needy in the community, the poor and the wild animals.

 Second, storing grain raises the price of grain for everyone else, because it takes the grain off the market and thus reduces supply.  So, he may profit, but others will have to pay for him to profit. 

Third, storing the grain puts everyone else potentially in his debt, thus embedding the landlord and the needy in the patron-client system (see Proverbs 11: 26). Those who are in need will have to come to him to beg for what is rightfully theirs. The rich man gains power because he can distribute the grain to those who honor him and do favors for him; and he can withhold grain from those he does not like. That is evil.

Finally, this practice shifts his trust from God, if he ever had any trust in God. Instead, if he does this, then he puts his faith in his own provisions and possessions.

Q: What does God think about the rich man’s claim that the possessions are his so he can do anything that he wants with them?

“But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God."

 The Rich Man thought he had achieved what we all try to gain: peace and prosperity. I seek peace and prosperity; you probably do too. In Hebrew, the word for peace is the familiar Shalom. That word does not mean the absence of war. Instead, peace is the sense of wholeness we have when we are at peace with God. It is when our relationship with God is good and we can hear echoes of his approval: “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”

The Hebrew word for prosperity is the less well-known shalvah. The Rich Man thought that shalvah or ‘prosperity’ is achieved when he had a large pile of goods, enough to last a lifetime. He was right, in one way, because his life only lasted for a day.

 Here is what Eugene Peterson, well-known pastor and translator of the Bible as The Message, says about ‘prosperity’.

 “The root meaning is leisure—the relaxed stance of one who knows that everything is all right because God is over us, with us and for us in Jesus Christ. It is the security of being at home in a history that has the cross as its center. It is the leisure of the person who knows that every moment of our existence is at the disposal of God, lived under the mercy of God” (Eugene Petersen, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an Instant Society, 1980/2019. Page 51).

 So, how is it with your soul? Do you have peace and prosperity? Consider again God’s commands and Jesus’ confirmation of what a godly, peaceful, and prosperous life looks like. Only in a good relationship with God, and with a proper concern for your family and community, will allow your soul to rest while you serve the Lord.

[1] My analysis here has benefited from the following.  “The Parable of the Rich Fool,” Chapter 23 in Kenneth E. Bailey, Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels.  (2008) Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP Press,  Pp. 298-308; Joel Green (1997) The Gospel of Luke. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans; and Christopher J. H. Wright (1990) God’s People in God’s Land: Family, Land, and Property in the Old Testament.  Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.