Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - When Enough is Enough | New Testament | Luke 9

Episode Date: March 30, 2023

Want to know the guide to happiness? Step one: it's time to curb your consumerism. In today's episode, Patrick discusses Luke 9 in the importance of rooting your satisfaction in God and not possessions. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Join the TMBT community in reading the entire New Testament in one year. Get your FREE reading plan here. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Luke 9

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. John D. Rockefeller was once asked, how much money is enough money? His answer? Just a little bit more. Some of us are judging, but most of us are seeing ourselves in the mirror. I've heard people say a lot of things, but I've never heard someone say, I have enough money. The simple fact is that being born in America, we have been trained from birth to believe that happiness is found in abundance.

And abundance is found in the power to buy things with more and more and more money. That's how our consumer economy works. And that consumer economy certainly has brought about a tremendous amount of wealth and quality of life for many people. But do you want to know what's striking to me? Jesus never once teaches his apprentices to pursue money. Now, sometimes we think of Jesus as a penniless beggar who is going from town to town. The reality is that was probably far from the truth. His ministry gathered enough money that he needed one of his students, a guy named Judas,

to manage their bank account. But still, Jesus showed far more skepticism about money than we do today. He said that no one can serve God and money any more than a servant can serve two different masters. But beyond that, he made some radical claims about how to have enough. In Luke 620, we read, blessed are you who are poor for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Apparently, having things that really matter like God's kingdom and genuine satisfaction,

apparently the path to that is not more money. It's being poor and being hungry. The path is not an abundance of possessions. So is it simply to sell everything? Well, Jesus certainly gives exactly that advice to one person. I think his point, though, is more complex. I think he understood that having an abundance of wealth and possessions, and let's just pause here, if you have a place to live, food on your table, and a car, you are among the

most wealthy people in the world. You are by percentage points in the top 10% of the world. But back to the point, I think Jesus understood that having an abundance of possessions and wealth could lead someone to trust in their wealth rather than trusting in God. to put our true happiness in our possessions, not in God, to grow greedy and stingy because it's more blessed to keep than it is to give. Now, I don't think that these are temptations unique to us, and because of that, Jesus gave a radical picture of God's power to give abundantly apart from wealth and possessions. He gave a picture of what it looks like to be filled and to be satisfied

apart from wealth and possessions. You gave a picture that it's more blessed to give than to receive. Eve. Let's pick up this story in Luke chapter 9, verse 12. Late in the afternoon, the 12 came to him and said, send the crowds away so that they can go to the surrounding villages and the countryside and find food and lodging because we are in a remote place here. And Jesus replied, you give them something to eat. They answered, we only have five loaves of bread and two fish, unless we go and buy food for this crowd. And at this point, Luke gives us a little aside. There were about 5,000 men there, so probably 10,000 or more people total, but the story continues. But he said to his disciples, have them sit down in groups of about 50 each.

The disciples did so, and everyone sat down, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven. He gave thanks and broke them. Then he gave them to the disciples to distribute to the people. They all ate and were satisfied. And the disciples picked up 12 basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. I love how a Catholic scholar named Luke Timothy Johnson says, summarizes this story. The wonderful abundance of food stands as a double lesson to the 12.

Abundance is not found in the power to purchase with money, but in the power of the Lord. And here's the second lesson. Those who give receive back even more extravagantly. You see, Jesus's economy transcends all human economies, socialist, capitalist, whatever is you are because Jesus' economy is rooted in the power of the Creator God. Jesus wants his apprentices to clearly see that he's capable of abundantly providing for them, and not just them. You see, this miracle happens in a deserted place. Just like God fed manna to the Israelites wandering through the desert of Sinai, so Jesus fills the bellies of a new Israel following him.

In fact, there are 12 baskets of bread left over, and 12 is a symbol of the 12 tribes of Israel. Again, this is all just suggesting that Jesus is saying that all who put their trust in him, well, they'll be blessed if they're hungry because he will satisfy. How would our lives change if we stopped putting our trust in our wealth and our possessions to keep us safe and happy? How much more generous would we become? How much anxiety would we be set free from?

There are those of us whose fear keeps us from trusting God in this way. There are those of us whose greed keeps us from trusting God in this way. But what do we have to fear if we put our trust in the living God? What greater gain could we be greedy for than His kingdom? Why are we so short-sighted that we fixate on things that do not last and do not ultimately satisfy it in this world? So practically, how can those of us among the world's most wealthy people? What can we do to put our trust in God's power? Well, here's a small idea. Learn to say enough. Curb your consumerism. If your closet is full, make a rule. I won't buy any new clothes unless I've got old clothes to give away. If your house or apartment is overflowing with shelves of stuff you haven't used in the last year, take Amazon off your phone, ban yourself from online shopping. You don't need more. Happiness is not in an abundance of possessions. Or here's a crazy idea. Get rid of things you haven't used in the last year. Or even crazier, make yourself wait a day before you purchase

just to make sure that you're buying something you really need. Or even crazier, live on a budget and start making your budget, not with how much you want to spend or how much you want to save, but how much you want to give, because God turns a few loaves and fishes into a feast for the many. Once we stop using shopping as therapy and purchasing power as a gauge of our happiness, could we be set free to say, I have enough because I know that enough isn't measured by my 401k, but by the very power of God. Will you trust God to fill you, to satisfy you, to welcome you, and to His, economy of divine abundance, I pray you will and be set free.

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