How to Get Rich

Luke 12:16-21
"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. 19 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." '
20 "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?'
21 "This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God."

Webster's dictionary defines "fool" this way:
A person lacking in common sense
A harmlessly deranged person who lacks simple understanding
A clown kept in a large household for other people's amusement.
Jesus says in the sermon on the mount that anyone who calls another a fool will be in danger of hellfire. In other words, it’s a sin to call another person a fool (Unless they actually are a fool, of course.)
But what if God calls you a fool.?

God calls many people fools: atheists, blabbermouths, anyone who holds grudges and resentment, anyone who is bath-mouths another, anyone who fights with his relative, who cannot control his temper, who fights with his relatives, who does not forgive others, who doesn’t listen to advice, or anyone who does the same stupid thing twice. Also, a fool is anyone who becomes an addict or a drunkard. This is just the categories we find in the Old Testament. The New Testament goes farther than that.

Just when we think we understand what a fool is, then Jesus throw us a curve: A fool is a man who saves his money.
What? How can a man who saves be a fool? Isn't the saving a good thing? Why would God call a decent, thrifty, hard working man a fool? Jesus did just that in this parable.

Understand, it’s not saving that makes a man a fool. It is why he is saving his money. It’s not a bad thing to have wealth. Neither is it a bad thing to accumulate wealth. The man is a fool who trusts in the wealth he has accumulated. If we think we can save enough money to keep us from harm, if we stake our future on what we have saved, then we are fool.

Wealth is an addiction. It behaves just like a drug. The more we have, the more we want. When we do not have it. The more we want it. If we don’t watch ourselves, wealth will take over our lives, just like a drug.
There are many good things that wealth can do for us. But when we depend upon it, it becomes a curse. In this parable. We can see five reasons this man accumulated wealth. From those five we may infer a sixth.
1. Money gives us safety. "What shall I do, I have no place to store my crops."
2. Money gives us a reason for living. "This is what I'll do"
3. Money gives self esteem. "I will say to myself 'you have plenty.'"
4. Money gives us future rest "take life easy."
5. Money gives us happiness. "Eat drink and be merry.
Behind these five, we can infer a sixth reason. Money buys us love. If we have money, we an be happy, and people will like us.
Safety. Self esteem. A reason for living. Rest. Happiness. Love. We are not fools for wanting these things. We'd be a fool not to want them. However, if any of these six things are conditional upon us having money, then we are doomed. Sooner or later, the money drug runs out, and we have to go a painful withdrawal.
We want to be safe. But what happens when we lose our jobs. Suddenly, we feel vulnerable. We stay up at night worrying about whether our car will break down, or someone might et sick.
We want to feel good about ourselves. But if the bank forecloses on our home, and we have to move into a winnebago in the woods and live off roots and berries, what happens to our self esteem? I goes right down the drain.
We want to eat, drink and be merry. But it's hard to do that when you are living off crackers, vienna sausages, and only had a deck of cards for entertainment.
When we look to money for any of these six things, then money no longer is a tool to happiness; It is our master. Money is not just our means of happiness. It becomes our master. It's like a drug.
Now, try to imagine what our lives would be like if we did not look to money for all these things. What if we could find them a difference way? How would our lives be different>
We could give away our money freely. We could all be cheerful givers.We could take life at a slower. We would not have to work so hard to make a living.We could not have to keep such big houses with big closets, and more sheds.We could have more time to enjoy your family.We could hold you head high anywhere. We would not envy the rich.
There is a way to be free of our need for savings. What’s more, it is free. Anyone who chooses to get those same benefits from savings that he can get free is a fool.
In Luke 16: 21, Jesus gives the moral of this story.
"This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God."
We may achieve the same results that we seek through savings by having a full, rich relationship to God. Instead of seeking for happiness from money, we seek for a greater source of happiness in God.
Do you know what drop shipping is? It’s a term people use who sell goods on the internet. It works this way—suppose you want to go in the business of selling Japanese watches over the internet. You could by a ton or so of Japanese watches, keep them in a ware house, and mail them to your customers. Or, you can order your watches one by one, and have them shipped directly to your customers. You keep the profit. That’s called drop shipping. You don’t have to have a single watch. You just have to know the source.
The person who is rich in God does not have to accumulate His blessings. He gets them directely whenever he wants them from the source. He places the order and it arrives immediately. This way the blessings never run out.
How can we live like that?
The Bible says that sin has cut us off from the supplier of all blessing. Because have not obeyed Him, God will not bless us. When we discover Jesus’ forgiveness, we can now receive directly from Him, and share his blessings with others. Jesus’ death on the Cross gives us access to God, storehouse.
But Jesus does not say we should just have access to him. He wants us to be rich in him. He wants us to learn, though constant communication with God, just how full and rich his blessings can be. Then the security we seek from material things will come to us directly from the supplier. We will know an endless supply of joy and happiness from the Sours of all supply.
So let’s try to imagine how we might become rich towards God. Let's rewrite the parable.
“A certain man lacked a good crop. He had neither money power of wealth.
“He said to himself. ‘How can I have what the rich man has?’
“So he says to himself. "Here's what I'll do. I will seek my riches from God. Instead of warehouses and barns, I will build install a dedicated phone line I my heart to God, and a loading dock for His blessings. I will regularly call and ask, and I will regularly receive. I will read His word, and so I will be regularly reminded fo how much He has already given me. I will tear down my small image of God and build a bigger one. I will take the small time I spend each day in the company of God and make it bigger. I will regularly receive shipments of blessings from God, and daily load my troubles on Him for return shipment. I will even drop ship His blessings to others through prayer. That way, I won't need a big warehouse: the blessings will come in daily and go out daily. Instead of living on stored blessings, I will live on renewable blessings that will not ever run out. In the security of His provision I will eat, drink and be merry. Then, if tonight I a suddenly die, I will go to be go to be with the Lord, who is the source of all I have or own. There I will enjoy what I have laid up for me there forever. "
Which of these two stories seems best to you? Would you rather depend upon the fickle security of this world, or know the eternal security of knowing God's hand on your life?
If you died tonight, what would happen to all your savings? How many of them could you take with you? Being prepared for death is the only sensible purpose in life. Are you ready?

The Clean Cup

Washing dishes is not just for looks. We do it to keep from getting sick. It makes a difference whether a dish is clean on the inside or the outside.

Suppose you sat down in a restaurant and the waitress brought you a cup of coffee with a wee bit of food stuck to it. Does it matter to you if it is on the outside or inside of the cup? Wouldn't you rather find it on the outside?

Out of this unlikely picture Jesus fashions one of his little parables. He compares the Pharisees to a dirty dish.

The Pharisees were one of three main branches of Judaism in Palestine. The word Pharisee means literally "The Separated Ones." The Saduccees controlled the temple, but the Pharisees dominated the synagogues all through the world.

The Pharisees said that God was judge peopled according to the Law. They tried to practice what they preached, too. Obedience is a necessary part of being pure and holy:
People who are not pure, but are trying to be. They are ffrustrated, consumed with guilt, and obsessed with perfection. Nothing they ever do is good enough.
People who think they are pure, but aren’t. They were proud , supreme in their self-confidence. They have faults, but they do not see them. They have sins, but do not acknowledge them, even to themselves. They have no desire for grace or forgiveness, because they think they are getting what they deserve.
People who know they are not pure, but act it anyway. These are closest to the truth. They cannot be pure. Instead of acknowledging this, however, they cover it up. These people have split themselves into two people--one pure, the other a sinner. At church they are one thing, in private they are other. This is the ultimate end of the Pharisee impulse--to produce hypocrites.
Jesus does not hate these people--He pities them. He calls them foolish, and says woe unto them. He knows that they are caught in a way of thinking that only leads to misery. He pronounces six woes over him in verses 42-49.
They care more about the law rather than people.
"Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone.
There is a scene in Victor Hugo's novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame when the unfortunate Quasimodo is dragged before a judge for a crime he did not commit. Quasimodo is deaf from years of bell ringing. The judge is also deaf. The judge cannot hear Quasimodo, and takes his silence for insolence. Quasimodo takes the judge's silence for approval. He is therefore unaware when he is suddenly taken out and whipped. The judge takes no interest in Quasimodo's cries for help, because he cannot hear them. He only knows the law and does not care for anything else.
Hugo intended this scene as an illustration of the Pharisee mentality. Pharisees are deaf judges. They read the Law, but they do not listen to people, not even themselves. They are so trapped in their legalistic myopia that they are oblivious to the pain around them.
They care about position over passion for the truth.
"Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces.
Jesus meant this to be ironic. These Pharisee/Puritans want to be known as the holiest people in town. They want this, because people look up to them. They want to be loved and admired. The problem is that what they are loved and admired for is not something that they deserve. It is like cheating on a test. We want the recognition of others, even if we do not deserve it.
They are a quiet corruption.
"Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which men walk over without knowing it."
To a Jew walking over another man's grave made them unclean, and unworthy of entering into the temple or synagogue. But if he unwittingly walked over a grave, they became unclean, and did not even know it.
This may sound silly, but it is exactly the sort of thing the Pharisees would say. Jesus turns it back on them. Spending time with the Pharisees was spending time with sinners. If being with sinners made you unclean, then you could become unclean by spending time with them.
Churches are full of sinners. If going into bars make us unclean because of the sinners in there, then what does going to chjrch make us? There are just as many sinners in churches as there are in bars.
They care nothing for people's burdens
One of the experts in the law answered him, "Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also." Jesus replied, "And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them.
A conversation with a Pharisee goes thusly
"What must I do to be saved?"
"Straighen up. Fly right. Quit sinning. Go to church."
"Will you pick me up and take me to church next week?"
"Sorry. That's not my responsibility."
A Pharisee care nothing for others. He is like a great loudspeaker, pronouncing God's word over the crowd. He does not care that he is way to loud, and that others cannot understand what he is saying. All he cares about is that he is doing what he is supposed to do, blaring God's word at the top of his lungs.
The Pharisee is the perfect beaurocrat. He believes that his job--his only job--is to teach the law. He is not in business to help people.
You cover up violence with niceness.
"Woe to you, because you build tombs for the prophets, and it was your forefathers who killed them. So you testify that you approve of what your forefathers did; they killed the prophets, and you build their tombs.
There is a world of difference between compassion and niceness. We think that just because we don't raise our voice when we are doing wicked things, and keep an outward measure of propriety, that we are not doing violence. Give me a straight up fight, over a concealed dagger from someone who is pretending to be nice. There is more hope of redemption for a violent bully than for the quiet, destructive whispers of the gossip, who destroys a life and then goes to see if she can help. The Pharisees believed that as long as you did not appear to lose your temper, you were not being wicked.
You block people from finding the truth.
Because of this, God in his wisdom said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and others they will persecute.' Therefore this generation will be held responsible for the blood of all the prophets that has been shed since the beginning of the world, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, this generation will be held responsible for it all.
"Woe to you experts in the law, because you have taken away the key to knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you have hindered those who were entering."
This is the worst condemnation of all. Their insistence on perfection actually keeps people from finding the truth.
A Pharisee keeps people from Christ by misrepresenting the heart of God. God is our father, our Daddy, our lover. He wants us around. The god of the Pharisees was a cosmic policeman, trying to arrive at his quota for arrests for his day. The God of the Bible wants us to prosper. The god of the Pharisees only wants the perfect to prosper. The God of the Bible loves us as we are. The god of the Pharisees only loves us is we are as he is. As a result, heaven is shut for all, and have lost the key of the knowledge of God’s love.
Here is the truth of it. We are imperfect people. We will always be imperfect people. Anyone who thinks he is not imperfect is simply blind or willfully ignorant. Our only hope is that God will forgive us.
Jesus is the opposite of the Pharisees. To them, God's acceptance only comes at the end of a long path to holiness. To Jesus, acceptance begins at the moment we turn to Him and ask for it. From there, we begin the process of being cleansed, but from that moment on, God gives us Himself. He walks with us through the mess.
He does not just give us rules. He gives us Himself.

A lesson in the Thunderstorm

One of the good things about being a preacher is that you really don't have problems--just future sermon illustrations. So one day, I'll be using this last vacation in many a future sermon. In fact, I've already put one incident in my future file. It happened last Tuesday, when Joy and I were visiting her family in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Her 82 year old father is an amazing man. He is still playing the trumpet in at least three marching bands. At one time, he was playing in more. I deeply admire him for his love of life and music, but I must confess I do not share his enthusiasm for band music. He has been known to listen to it for three hours straight. My limit is about ten minutes.


Anyway, last Tuesday night, the band he was supposed to be playing with had planned a seven o'clock outdoor concert in a park about twenty miles away, in the city of Wyoming. We could tell he really wanted us to go, so we agreed to go and listen. It was a sunshiny Michigan summer afternoon, but there were dark clouds on the horizon. The weather bureau had put us under a severe thunderstorm warning and a tornado watch. They called a few band members, and no one knew whether it was being called on account of weather. They had been told in case of inclement weather to go where the concert was and wait for instructions. So he decided he wanted to go anyway. Joy and I went in our own car, and my in-laws went in theirs.

As we traveled west towards the park, the weather deteriorated rapidly. Dark clouds gathered at an alarming rate. Lightning lit the sk. It was beginning to look like something out of the book of Revelation. It was soon clear that the band concert was not going to happen.

But my father-in-law was going anyway.

My in-laws do not possess a cell phone so there was no way to call and tell them we were going back. Besides we were worried about them. We could tell this was going to be an ugly one. We could see the hook formations in the sky that are potential tornadoes. We kept going because we wanted to keep an eye on them.

My mother-in-law pled with him to turn around, but he was determined to go on. They were to meet at the place, and meeting at the place was what he was going to do. Besides it had not yet started raining.

When we got within about a mile, it started raining. Buckets, sheets, and waterfalls of rain. The wind whipped the tried around like blades of grass. At that point, my father in law, whom we werefollowing, pulled into a CVS drugstore parking lot. I followed him. He opened the window and said cheerily over the screaming storm, "Guess we ought to turn around." Then he rolled up his window and took off for home.

I was not about to drive through that mess. I pulled in behind the CVS, beside a large concrete wall., to wait out the storm. At that moment, disaster struck. An oak tree, which had been growing in a neighbors yard for at least forty years, suddenly decided to break. The main part of it fell over the wall, and onto the hood of our car. It took two men to get it off, so we could get out of there. A branch penetrated my windshield just above my head. Praise God, no one was hurt. The damage was repaired well enough for us to get home. The dents will be fixed later. My father- in- law made it home just fine.

But the whole incident seemed eerily familiar to me. Then I realized that what I had was our own Abilene paradox.

The Abilene Paradox is a leadership principle coined by Dr. Jerry Harvey in his book of the same name. it explains how a group of people can get together and pursue a course that none of them want, to an end that none of them desire. It comes about when everyone is afraid to say "no" to others.

My father-in-law did not want to go out in that mess. He just did not want to let his friends down. We did not want to go, but we did not want to let him down. Four consenting adults were out in a storm doing something that not one of us wanted to do. We just did not want to say "no."

One of the most destructive forces in the world, one that does more damage than any others, is niceness. I don't mean compassion or empathy, or even good manners. I mean niceness--the compulsion we have to be liked and to be well thought of. None of us want to be disagreeable. So whenever someone in our family or on a church board makes a suggestion, no matter out casual or silly, there is a part of most of us that wants to go along. For that reason, we frequently find ourselves in corporate predicaments. No one wants to say no to a family member, a friend, or a boss. But how do we, if it is the best thing for us to do? We go along, because we have not adequately prayed and thought through an issue. So in the end, we find ourselves in a storm, and pay the price.

Problems in any organization usually start with small, careless decisions. We let bad influences in. We keep good ideas out. We keep going down the path of least resistance, even if it leads to a cliff. In the end, we forget what got us there in the first place-- that it was our niceness that caused us to go along.

I cannot help, every time I look at the dents on my car, to regret my decision just to go along that night. But in a way, I am glad it happened. God took care of us, and taught us a valuable lesson besides.

Maybe next time, I'll have the good sense to say "no."

Wild Child and Good Son

Wild Child and Good Son is a book I started on years ago. It grew out of a sermon I preached on a Fathers Day while I was at Neelys Creek. It is a short, simple novel with a strong moral message.  It is now available through Amazon and on Kindle.  I am also getting ready to make a version available for Nook as well. 

I believe in this book. It has a message for parents that is desperately needed today. I invite you friend, whoever you are, to read it, especially if you are a parent or grandparent.  You can order it below.

I hope you purchase and enjoy it.  If you do,  please do me a favor. Write a review of it on Amazon.com, and send me a copy, so I can include it in an upcoming website.  My hope is that this will be the first of many books that I will make available in the future through this means. 

Here is the link.  https://www.createspace.com/3512138
May you enjoy reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it!