The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 3: Rich Toward God

Episode Date: May 7, 2017

To be rich toward God is to GLORIFY GOD by leveraging your temporary RICHES for the building of God’s eternal Kingdom, not your temporary kingdom.

Amen, amen. How we doing, chairs, doing all right? Looking good. If you got your Bibles, I hope you do, grab them. We're going to be in a few places. Luke chapter 12, Luke chapter 16, and if you listen fast enough, we may even hit 1 Timothy 6, okay? So grab your Bibles, go to Luke. I'm going to get this question all weekend after seeing a video like this.

Somebody, very well-meaning, will say, so let me get this right. So why is 1122 planting an autonomous local church called Anthem Church right here in Jacksonville? I don't get it. And they'll use words like market share and competitive advantage. And, oh, gosh. You were talking about the wrong kingdom. See, some people are like, and we're trying to send 100 people to go with Ed and Leonard to launch that. Go, yeah, yeah.

And so I need you to pray about it. And if God tells you to go, then you should go. And then if he doesn't tell you, he'll tell me, I'll tell you, and then you'll still go. That's how that works, okay? And here's the reason. Here is the reason, the reason we are planting Anthem Church and 99 other church. around the world, primarily Brazil and East Africa, and while we're putting locations, 1122 locations all over. Next, we hope to go north and then norther and even souther and all over the place.

The reason that we are doing that is the quote, an old dead theologian named Abraham Kuiper, he says, there is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is sovereign overall, does not cry mine. So we believe every square inch of Jacksonville and every square inch of this one. world deserves the worship of every person to the one true God and his name is Jesus. And so we're not going to stop until we've got churches, gospel-centered churches, literally all over the world. I would plant one in the parking lot out here, okay?

We probably need it most in the parking lot, by the way, I hear we act. But anyway, that's a different sermon. You see, and so we as a church, we want to be rich towards God. As a church, we want to leverage what God has given us to build his kingdom. I build the kingdom of 1122. There is no such thing. I don't care about the brand 1122. All I care about is the brand of Jesus.

That's what we are all about. And so we do that as is church. We give our first and best to the expanding kingdom of God. And what we do as a church, Jesus also challenges us to do individually. And so today in Luke 12 and Luke 16, we are going to talk about what does it mean to be rich towards God. Now, I didn't make up that phrase. Jesus did. And so over the next hour or so, we're going to unpack what that means. That means we're going to talk about money. Now, I know a bunch of you get nervous again, okay?

A couple of things. One, if you're a visitor, just take a breath and relax. And if you brought a friend, you're like, dang it, I should have come next week. We'll come back next week. We're talking about prayer. That's easy, all right? And I know some of you came two weeks in row and you're like, I'm not coming here anymore. This is hard. Last week we dropped the F-bomb. Forgiveness. That wasn't easy, wasn't it? Everybody's just crying up here making debt ledgers. And so this week, we're going to talk about money. Part of the reason is because Jesus does. He's got 2,350 verses on money. And here's why he talked about it a lot. Because money could be really, really, really helpful or it could be really, really, really hazardous. And the hope is,

just so you know, at the end of the service, we don't take up an offering, there's no thing you've got to fill out. This is for you. We don't want anything from you. But what we would hope is that you and I could be rich towards God. You see, there's a couple of ways to be rich. Rich. Rich. There's a good way to be rich, being rich towards God, and there's a not good way to be rich. So Jesus is going to help us with this. In Luke chapter 12, beginning in verse 13, he says this. He says, someone in the crowd said to him, teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. Verse 14, but Jesus said to him, man, and here's why I think he said it that way.

Because if you look at the first 12 verses of this chapter, Jesus isn't even talking about money. He's talking about hell, about surrendering your life to the Lordship of Christ, what it means to grieve the Holy Spirit. He's talking of things with eternal impacts, and in that conversation, this guy's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, enough with all that eternity stuff. My brother's got some of my money. And I think Jesus is kind of frustrated, as he would be if he hung out with us for very long at all. And he goes, man, man, who made me judge or arbitrator over you?

And then I think he looks into a man's eyes, and into his eyes he can see his soul. and so he follows that up with this. He says to him, take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness. Because I think he can look at his soul and think, uh-oh, uh-oh, we've got a problem here, brother. Because it looks like some riches may be coming your way, and obviously they can be helpful,

but if you're not careful, these riches can be very, very, very hazardous. And so he says, be careful. You see, brother, you were at a fork in the road here. You're at a crossroads, two ways. And if you go the way of this world, it only leads to covetousness. In other words, no matter how much you have, it'll never be enough. No matter how much you have, it'll never ever be enough. But there is another way, and that way is my way. And if you follow after my way,

I will teach you how to be rich towards God. And when you do that, then you can have, check this out. You can have this secret of contentment, no matter the situation. Because you're you learn the secret is Jesus that he is more than enough, then no matter what you have or what circumstances you're in, it's always more than enough. Those are your two options. So he says, take care and be on your guard against all covetousness. For one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. Now, I think we would all agree with that, that life is more than the stuff we have. I mean, how many VH1 behind the musics do you have to watch to get that through our heads? And yet, somehow, in a practical day-to-day, we tend to

kind of go for the stuff of this world, that the world kind of dangles this shiny thing in front of us, and we just feel like we have to have it. And what Jesus is saying here, remember in the first parable, one of the soils that the seed landed on, he said, be careful. Because sometimes the seed, the word of God lands on a soil, but it gets choked out by the worries of this world and the deceitfulness of riches. You see, the stuff of this world is deceitful. In other words, money and stuff promises something that it just can't deliver. Like, darling, I hate to break this to you, but your shampoo is not going to make you sexy. It just ain't.

I don't care how much you whip it around in there, you know? I don't even know what that's like. I'm sure it's amazing. Bro, your car is not going to make you awesome. I'm not saying it's not an awesome car. You're going to be the same, less than awesome that you were before you bought the car. That's just true. And I'm telling you this, light beer is not going to give you.

fun friends that like to play volleyball. It's just not. And the only six-pack you can get is the one you purchase. It's going to ruin all of those other dreams about that six-pack you've been working on. It's just true. And even though we know this, somehow we keep going for it over and over and over, and so to drive that home what Jesus is going to do, because he's the master teacher, he's going to tell a story, a parable. Verse 16, and he told him a parable saying, the land of a rich man produced 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 tear 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 and be merry verse 20 but God said to him fool now what makes this man a fool Is it because he's rich? No. There is no sin in your land producing a big crop. There is no sin in you making buckets of money. We need godly men and women to run godly businesses that make buckets and buckets of money,

more than you know what to do with. What this man's sin is, the reason that he is a fool, is he just didn't know how to be rich right. You see, instead of being rich towards God, he's going to be rich towards himself. If you notice here, what are the two primary words he uses? I and my, I and my, over and over. You got six eyes and five my, my, my, my, my.

You see, he was at the center of his own universe. He says things like, what shall I do for I have nowhere to store my crops? I think the Lord would lean in and go, whose crops? I don't know if you got a lot of farmers in the house here, but did you know you can't make anything grow? Now, you can till up some dirt and you can throw a seed out there, but can you make the sunshine and the rain rain and can you do this miracle that is a seed falls into the ground and dies and out of that death comes life? No. No. You see, but he is at the center of his own universe. And he leverages everything just for him. You see, in his world, God is not before all things. He is before all things. And he leverages all of this for what he values most. And what he values is not honoring God, is not thanking God, is not thanking God, is not. giving credit to God. He also, he thinks more has got to be mine. He doesn't look compassionate at a

compassionately at a broken world. He doesn't try to push back darkness in any way. All he is thinking is of himself. And what he values most is relaxing, eating, drinking, and being merry. Now, what's the problem with that? Confession time. I like all of those things. I like to relax. I hope to do some tonight. I like to eat, obviously. I like to drink, obviously. And I want to be merry. I don't necessarily use that terminology except around Christmas,

but I think we're all on a merry quest, are we not? So is there anything wrong with that? The problem is it's only wrong if that's the only thing that you're after. See, here's how Paul would say it in 1 Corinthians 1532. If the dead are not raised, let us eat, drink, and be merry. For tomorrow we will die. In other words, if the tomb is not empty, then the best we can hope for is a party here. But if the tomb is empty, then we are called to something much greater than just our temporary entertainment.

If the tomb is empty, then you and I are on a mission that is infinitely bigger than just what are we going to eat and what are we going to wear and what are we going to do this weekend. You see, the problem here is this brother was in the middle of his own world and it all revolved around. him and God says to him, you fool, you fool. You see, here's the dangerous thing about money. Here's the dangerous thing about money is that money and riches and wealth and just stuff of this world. And it doesn't have to be a lot of stuff, man, any kind of stuff can begin to impact your soul. I mean, here's what the brother says. He says to himself, he says, and I will say to my soul, soul. You see, the problem with money, the problem with stuff is all this stuff that we worked so hard. to own, if we're not careful, begins to own us.

And instead of us, loving God and using money, we begin to love money and try to use God. And this is what happens to this man. Now, again, there is no problem with this man being productive. No problem. There is no problem. God never condemns him for being rich. He just doesn't know how to be rich in a righteous way. And the other thing is we read this kind of thing and we think this isn't us.

This is us. Did a little Google search. Did you know there are 33 million individual storage units in the United States right now? 33 million stores. And adding daily. I mean, here across the street from our San Pablo campus, you can see one six-foot or six-story storage unit looking at another six-story storage unit. And these things are nice. I mean, we don't just build like little garages anymore to put our junk in.

We go climate-controlled. Man, literally the storage units are nicer than the apartments I lived in when I was in college. We didn't have climate control. We had a window we opened up. I'm a fan. And for real, man, we have so much stuff that we have to buy homes or little apartments for our own stuff. We go multi-site with our stuff. And look, and I'm not trying to bust on you.

I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand. Does anybody got some stuff you hadn't seen since, you know, in the last three years? But it's climate control, and I'm sure it's fine. You're paying tuition for it, all right? me too me too i don't have one of those things but you know what i do have man you know what i spent yesterday doing cleaning out my garage on the weekend where i'm talking about building bigger barns and stuff because here's why see i don't know about you but in my world okay i got so much stuff i live in the biggest house i've ever lived in my life that somehow it's not big enough to house all of our stuff

and so you know most of us are so rich that that i know there's homeless people in this world but even our cars aren't homeless, right? We have a little houses to put our cars in so they can be climate control because, you know, it's Florida and I'm not sure why, but anyway, we put them in there, but I got so much stuff that I had to kick my cars out of their house and I had to put my stuff in my car's house. And then, and then, which is fine, and then I got another vehicle back, not a car, but a motorcycle, just like Jesus would have us drive, all right? That's what he would have us, but I got Bible verses on the gas tanks. I know it's cool. All right, and so 1122 sticker all the way. And so I pull up to my garage and I don't have a lot. I don't have

a spot in my garage to put my bike. So yesterday I spent the day cleaning out my garage. Taking some of my stuff out and reorganize it and putting it in the truck so I could put some more of my stuff in the place where too much of my stuff was kicking out some of my stuff. Follow me, okay? So I just saw that to say, this is us. There's nothing wrong with stuff, with owning stuff.

The problem is if you put your hope in that kind of stuff. God says, you fool, you fool. This night your soul is required of you and the things you have prepared. Whose will they be? Do you guys realize this, that everything that we own, everything that you own,

one day is going to be sold in a garage sale, or if you're making bank, it'll be an estate sale. It's the same thing. They just serve wine and cheese at one. That is the only difference. Everything you have. I mean, think about this.

Think about your favorite possession. And don't give me something weak, like, pictures of my children, not that junk. I'm talking about some stuff. Like, whatever it is, your car, whatever it is, your, you know, your golf clubs that you just had to have. Those pants that make you feel like you're still in college. All right, do you understand if there's going to be a day? Some other chick's going to be in your pants. Just wearing them.

Looking better than you. Some other brothers are going to be playing golf with the dead man's clubs and doing better. better than you and you're the dead man. Everything we have. You understand. There will be a day. You need to think this through. The problem with money is we don't think this through.

We just kind of think about it right now. And there will be a day where your kids got to go to your house and clean out all your junk. Think about this now. The death rate in America is still hovering right around 100 percent. So this is true for all of us. There's going to be a day where your kids are going to be, your grown kids are going to be frustrated. What are you doing this weekend? Can't go with you.

You got to go to Mama's house. through her junk and they're going to go through and they're just going to criticize your stuff but look at these pants mama we're wearing with a nine-inch zipper up those going and then some of the grandkids are going to go through dad's shirt and be like oh this is vintage back in style again okay plaid never goes out praise god so and then they're going to take you're going to be shocked by the limited amount of junk they take from you that they find valuable and everything else that we've worked so hard for they're going to pile it up and sell it in hopes closet for eight dollars that's it that's your life.

And if you buy into that, God would say, hey man, don't be a fool. You see, we live in a world that says study hard. Very few people ask why, or then what? Well, you got to study hard, then what? Well, you make good grades, then what? Then you go to a good school, then what? Then you get a good job, then what? Then you buy stuff.

Why? To impress people that you don't know or don't like. And then what? And then you got to buy more stuff. Well, I thought I already bought stuff. Yeah, but when stuff gets old, you got to get rid of that and get more. stuff, okay? You got to get new stuff that won't do for you, even what the old stuff didn't do for you, and then what? And then you die. And then what? And then what? If you don't take some time right now

to ask, then what? Then you're a fool. I'm not saying you're uneducated. I'm not saying you're not smart. You're just a fool at life. You see, what this guy, what made him a fool, is he did not begin with the end in mind. He did not think about what his purpose on this earth was. And so he thought he went for the lowest rung on the ladder. It's just going to eat, drink, and be merry, because I've got stuff. And yet the moment he finally got it all worked out, his soul was required of him and the things that he had prepared. Whose will they be? Verse 21, then Jesus is going to give us commentary on this story.

He says, so is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich towards God. And so we're going to unpack what does it mean to be rich towards God. Jesus is going to help us in verse 22. He says to his disciples, therefore, and he says, In other words, based on the reality that I just laid out, that all of us fall into one of two categories. Either you can store up treasures for yourself or you can be rich towards God. Therefore, since those are the two options laid out for us, I tell you, don't be anxious about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will put on.

For life is more than food and the body is more than clothing. In other words, don't be so concerned about the temporary. And then he gives us the two broad categories that all of us find ourselves in in regards to worrying about money. There are spenders and there are savers. And what's crazy is it's just the way God has wired us, okay? There's some of us that by nature spend and some of us by nature save. And the crazy thing is, is usually those two people find each other very attractive. They get married so they can fight about it for the rest of their life.

What Jesus is saying, it's not right to spend or save, he's going to show us how to do it correctly. So he starts out this way. He's going to come against the savers first. Verse 24, consider the ravens. Okay, savers, he's talking to you. And the raven is not like some kind of majestic bird, okay? It's just like a rat with wings. They're everywhere.

There's not a lot impressive about him. It's just a regular old bird. Consider the ravens. They neither sow nor reap. They have neither storehouse nor bear. storehouse nor barn and yet God feeds them of how much more value are you than the birds. He's talking to the savers. Now don't tell this to Pita, but according to the Bible, people are more important than pets. Okay? And he's saying, look at this, birds, okay? These birds, they don't have

a 401k, they don't have a retirement program, they don't have storehouses or barns, and yet somehow God Almighty takes care of them. And God is not primarily a zookeeper, He's primarily a father. How much more would he take care of you? Now, the question is, is it wrong to save? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. The problem is not in saving.

In fact, if you read through the whole scriptures, it will say that you should do such a good job at saving that your children's children are blessed by the legacy that you leave. The problem is not in saving. The problem is when you put your hope in saving. The problem is, because what you're actually looking at, you're looking for, money to do something for you that it just can't do. And if you are looking for money to be your security instead of your savior being your security, then you got a problem. That's where worry and anxiety comes from. And nobody, see, nobody thinks they're a saver that they save too much. Oh,

you mean save too much? That's like being too good looking. How in the world could you do that? Let me tell you, if you do this, you might be a, you might be putting your hope in saving. If when you log on, you get online and you log on to some account, or if you're really good, you probably have multiple accounts. And when you bring together your portfolio, God bless your ministry. I just got that one thing. But, you know, whatever. And you log on it.

And what you're looking for is you're looking for a number on a screen to make you feel a certain way in here. To quote Jesus, I would say, watch out. Watch out. You see, because that number cannot give you the security that you are looking for. Only the sovereign God of the universe can offer you protection and security. because that number could be three times whatever you dreamed of and one phone call from the doctor, one phone call from a relative,

and everything changes. And everything changes. And so Jesus says, listen, listen, consider the ravens. Okay, God takes care of them and how much more important are you? And then he asks a very practical question to the savers and which of you, by being anxious,

can add a single hour to his span of life, If then you were not able to do as small a thing as that, why are you anxious about the rest? In other words, savers, how's it working for you? I mean, you thought once you invested fully in your retirement, you thought you were just going to have this peace like a river. Then why are you going to check it every day? And how come the market does anything and you freak out? It helps your prayer life. We'll talk about that next week.

But it's not helping your peace life at all. Now again, am I saying you shouldn't be invested? that is not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying you should not invest your hopes in your investment. You should be wise stewards with the riches God gives you, praise God. But only you and Jesus can be honest with each other about, am I actually putting

my hope there? And he says, so don't do that. Because how's that working for you? And now he's going to shift gears. Because some of the spenders are going, you get them, pastor. I told you we ought to do something with that and just said they're just piling it up. Okay, now he's going to come after you. Okay? Now he's going

come after you. And he says, he says, and consider the lilies. He's talking to the spenders. Consider the lilies, how they grow. And they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon and all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. And he's talking to the spenders. He says, look, spenders, look at the flowers. They've never been to the town center. And look how beautiful they look. And if God, who's not primarily a gardener, he's primarily a father, if he can take of that, then don't you think he can take care of you? So the problem is not spending. Is there a problem in spending?

No, no. That's how the world goes around. You got this? I'm not saying don't spend. Because listen, man, when we buy stuff, that makes, that's how everybody else gets money to buy stuff. You understand? Like, and you buy a house, there's some people really excited that you bought a new house.

You know who? The realtor and the people selling the house. And they need you to so that they can have money and provide for their family. and honor God with the wealth that God gives them. And then you move into your house and you're like, we need new cabinets. Guess who gets really stoked when you need new cabinets? The brother that makes cabinets. This is the gift God has given him and then he can feed his family and so forth and so on.

And you want to get a new car? Praise God. Guess who gets stoked about that? The people that sell cars. No problem. That's how the world goes around. So should you spend? Yes, you suspend.

But the problem is, is when you are looking for that, when you think that spending is going to give you that ultimate satisfaction. It just won't. It just won't. We lovingly call this the cul-de-sac of stupidity around here. Okay? When you think more of what you already have is going to give you something that what you bought at first could not give you. Like if you think the problem with your soul is you just need 200 more square feet and a half bath. And then, take another lap, darling.

It just isn't going to give it to you. And so he's saying, consider the lilies. You see, the problem is it spinning. And the problem is if you put your value there instead of putting your value in the giver of all good things. The second problem is this is there's a bunch of folks and you don't have the money to spend on that thing, but you don't let that stop you. And that's where you get in trouble. The Bible says the rich rule over the poor and the debtor is slave to the lender. And a bunch of us, even in messages like this, we want to be rich towards God, but we can't because we have another master card that we are rich toward.

every single month. Or we've been on that American Express into debt or we got a visa into the American dream and it's crushing all of our God-size dreams that we have now. You see, fundamentally, what Jesus is saying is, don't put your hope in money.

It cannot provide you with the satisfaction that you think it can, nor can it provide you with the security that you think it can. You need to put your hope in your heavenly father. He's a good dad. He knows how to take care of his kids. You see, I grew up with a good dad. And I can tell you, when I would go fishing with my daddy growing up, we would go every weekend.

We didn't go to church much, but we went fishing a lot. And we would, we didn't have like a really nice boat. We had a handmade John boat that Joseph Perry Martin Sr., my granddaddy, and Joseph Perry and Martin Jr., my dad. You know, I was almost junior junior, that happens where I'm from, all right? And I'm the third, and we got a fourth at my house, all right? So we're really into us. But we would go fishing. Me and my daddy and my younger brother Russ, we would go fishing in a handmade John boat,

the little Pedy River with cane poles and crickets. And when we went fishing, when I was with my dad, do you know what I worried about? Nothing. Nothing. Why? Because my daddy's got it under control. I didn't worry about where we were going to go. I didn't worry about did we have gas in the truck and the boat.

I didn't worry about license. I don't know that he worried about license and stuff like that either, but I didn't worry about it. We didn't worry about limits, and there was no catch-in release. There was catching groceries. That's what we did, okay? And it was incredible because I just knew my dad had it under control. what Jesus is saying, whether you're a spender or a saver, is just relax. Quit worrying about it.

Don't put your hope there. Put your hope in your heavenly father. He's a good dad. Verse 28. He says, but if God so closed the grass, which is available in the field today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you? Oh, you of little faith. And don't seek what you were to eat and what you were to drink or be worried.

For all the nations of the world seek appellate. these things. This is a tough verse here. Here's what he's saying. He's saying that your bank account will expose what it is primarily in your heart. And when you worry about the stuff of this world, whether when you put your hopes in the security of money or you put your hope in the satisfaction of stuff, you're a practical atheist. Now, I'm not saying you don't believe in God and go to church and sing rooftops with two hands up with your eyes closed because you memorize words and the moment I say Luke you're the first one to get there in your Bible he's like great all that is fine but when you worry about the stuff of this world then it's it's evidence that you're

acting like people that don't even believe in God but he's your father in heaven that's why that's why he says oh you of little faith for the nations of the world seek after these things and your father knows that you need them instead seek his kingdom and these things will be added under you So the question then is, you know, are you trusting stuff, your barns full of stuff, or are you trusting your heavenly father? And so the legitimate question then is, so how? How am I to be rich towards God? How do I seek first His kingdom? If you'll flip over a couple of pages in your Bible or scroll through and you go to Luke chapter 16, Jesus is going to share another parable here that primarily explains what it means to be rich towards God.

or what it means to put his kingdom first. Luke chapter 16. We'll pick it up in verse 19. It says, there was a rich man. Now, let's stop right there. Anytime the Bible says that there was a rich man, you're probably like me. You're thinking like, well, these rich people need to read this, okay?

And we don't consider ourselves rich. And the good news, or the good news is this. Did you know, globally speaking, that if you have a annual household income of $25,000, you're in the top 2% of richest people in the world. Congratulations. Most of you in the room, you're rich. I'm always waiting for the guy to stand up,

be like, I told you Martha knocking it down, 25K, baby. Woo, we're rich. All right. I mean, rich people do things like if you open up a closet today and it was full of clothes and you said, I don't have anything to wear, you're rich, congratulations. If you got in your own form of transportation and came here today, you're rich. It's just part of it.

Just globally speaking. I know it's hard because you don't feel rich, but somebody, somebody in our services right now, you're the richest person at all of our services right now. But even you don't feel rich, because your yacht is like only this big, and you know a guy that's getting into real money, and your yacht can fit inside of his yacht, and you're thinking, man, when I make some money, I'm going to get that kind of boat. Okay, right? That's some people.

And then some of us are like, John Boat. I love a John Boat. Okay, so it's just all relative. But relatively speaking, compared to the whole world, if you make 25,000, you're in the top 2% of richest people in the world. So, praise God, all right? So there was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen. Sounds like an LSU fan. And feasted sumptuously every day.

And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. Let's just be honest, that's gross. And a part of the reason Jesus is being gross and graphic is to let you. you know, this brother is in rough shape. Financially, he's in rough shape. Socially, he's in rough shape. He's got no community.

He wouldn't be allowed into the temple. I mean, this guy is just, he's got it rough. Verse 22. And the poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side. This is just the Bible's way of saying he went to heaven. And the rich man also died and was buried. And in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and he saw Abraham far off and Lazarus by his side. So they died, the rich man goes to hell, and the poor man goes to heaven.

Now, time out real quick. Now, what Jesus is doing here is he's telling a story. He's telling a parable. Okay? The rich man didn't go to hell because he was rich, and the poor man didn't go to heaven because he was poor, but the Bible is very, very clear all throughout the scriptures that we are saved by grace through faith in Christ, period. It is not by what we do.

It's what Christ did on the cross for us. This is not some kind of weird karma thing where if you got it rough here, you're going to get it great in the next life. The Bible is very, very clear that it is by faith in Jesus, by his grace poured out on the cross. When he says it is finished on the cross, that your full sin debt has been paid. And when Jesus died on the cross, somehow that counted for you. And for anybody that would trust him instead of yourself, then you could be saved. That identity always precedes activity. Now, when your identity in Christ actually changes, it will change your activity from the inside out, not the outside end.

Also, this is a story to prove a point, to show the point. And the point is how to be rich towards God. That's what he's going to talk about. He's going to talk about how to leverage what you have now for an eternal payoff. Did you leverage the short time you have here on earth? And you leverage that for the long time that you're going to spend wherever you spend after day. And a part of the reason that we know this, see, this isn't like a documentary on hell. This is not like exactly what hell is about.

This is a story to prove this point of you leverage what God has given you now for eternity. The reason we know this is if you back up to the beginning of chapter 16, there's one of the most difficult parables in the gospels. It's called the parable of the dishonest manager or the shrewd manager. And this parable goes this way. It goes, there's a guy who gets fired from his job. It's like his boss comes in, Johnson, you're out of here by Friday. And so from Tuesday to Friday, that dude goes around to all the relationships that he has,

and he cuts their debt to his boss in half so that when he doesn't have a job anymore, that he's got kind of the hookup on that end. It's called the Parable of the Shrewd Manager. It basically means this. You use everything God has given you in the short term for the long term. In other words, everybody spends forever somewhere, hell is hot, and forever's a long time. That should matter. And so, when he's giving this parable, he's saying,

one guy goes to heaven, one guy goes to hell. And part of the reason he's talking about money, we find out in verse 14, he's talking to the Pharisees, and it says the Pharisees are lovers of money. He keeps going. And the rich man from hell, he cries out. Father Abraham, have mercy on me. And send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.

See, part of the reason that we know this man has never repented is because even from hell, he's barking out orders of what other people need to do for him. And Abraham said, child, remember, that you in your lifetime received your good things and Lazarus in like manner bad things. But now he is comforted here and you are in anguish. And besides all this, between us and you, a great chasm has been fixed. In order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able and none may cross. from there to us. In other words, Jesus does not want us to lose sight of the gospel.

The gospel is this, sin separates us from God, and every single one of us, by nature and nurture, our sinners, that we have gladly rebelled against an almighty God, and yet God sent Jesus on a rescue mission to not just like bridge the gap

from where we are to where God is. The cross is not necessarily like a bridge to get us over that chasm. It's because that would require us to go running across the bridge and some of us just couldn't make the journey. It's more like the gospel is Jesus is the helicopter pilot that drops in on the other side of the chasm and rescues any single person that would surrender their life and say, God, I need your help. I am not a staker in need of a life coach.

I am a sinner in need of a savior. God, it's not about me trying to do better. It's I'm a dead man and I need life. And that, that is what the gospel is to take us over that chasm. Now, let me tell you, one of the biggest. dangers of money. This is partly why Jesus is telling this parable. One of the biggest dangers of money are the comforts of our world numb us to the eternal realities that everybody spends forever somewhere. You see, because what's just going to happen today is you hear a message,

God starts stirring up some stuff in you, but then afterwards, man, you go to lunch, and you should, and you eat, and you laugh, and you're merry, and then you go home and you sit on your couch, and watch the big screen TV and flip through 10,000 channels and go, there's nothing on, there's nothing on, there's nothing on, there's nothing on. And there's nothing wrong with that, except that it numbs, the comforts of this world numb us to the realities of eternity. That today there will be people, and some will be taken to heaven, and some will go to hell.

And we don't care because we're watching reruns of full house or something stupid like that. And the reality is when this man sees the chasm, when he experiences the chasm, everything changes in verse 27. And he says, then I beg you, Father, to send him, send Lazarus to my father's house. For I have five brothers. And so that he may warn them less also they come into this place of torment. You see, the reality is if somehow we could see, if we could see eternity for a second, it would change everything about us. Like if we could all, if God would just rip open the heavens for just literally one second,

and we could see the joy that is everlasting peace face to face with God Almighty. If we could see the place where every tear is wiped away, where nobody walks with a swagger or a limp, where there's food for everybody, where gold is in such abundance, they use it like asphalt up there. And that's not even the prize. The prize is that we are face to face with our heavenly father. if we could experience that joy and and if we could experience the torment of hell

for just a second. Like, the closest thing that I know to hell on earth is, have you been on Tower of Terror? Have you done this? Hollywood Studios, okay? See, we go and Gretchen won't ride it, and J.P. is like, I ain't having it. And Reagan Capri loves it.

My seven-year-old little precious psycho daughter. And I hate it. I hate it, but I'm not going to put it on her by herself, so we go. And we go. And you get into that thing, and, you know, and I'm telling you, I don't like it. I don't, you know, they kind of like, do we go now? And every time they take the picture, I look like, and she's going every time, okay?

But if we all got on Tower of Terror together, okay, one big old Tower of Terror, you know, they dropped you and they drop you, but if it's just for one second, they dropped us into the depths of hell, just a second, and we experienced, firsthand like this man experienced, just the utter torment, total depravity, void of the presence of God, the author and the source of anything good and right and beautiful. And look, man, people can argue about when Jesus is talking about hell, like in these parables, is that literal or is it figurative? Let me just tell you, I believe the Bible teaches very clearly hell is a real place of eternal torment. And even if this is, even if it isn't a literal description, just know that.

this, it's a real place and it's real bad. It's at least this bad. It may be infinitely worse. And if we saw it for one second, I mean, we were in that thing, and we saw it for a second. We popped up out. You know what would happen the moment we unbuckled our seatbelt? It would change everything about everything about us. It would change everything. You would be like this. You'd be like, I got to go to my brother's house. Why? Because if he continues on the road he's on, that's that's where he's going and I don't want him to go there. It would change everything about the way you spent your time. It would change everything about what you did with the talents that God has given you. It would change everything about your budget and mind too. You would want to leverage

everything you had on this earth to make an eternal difference instead of just more stuff for me. He would be like, God, it's all my stuff for the saving knowledge of Jesus, for anybody that you have placed in my life and to the very ends of the earth. It would change everything. But Abraham replies to his request. He goes, they have most. and the prophets. Remember, he's talking to the Pharisees. Moses and the prophets wrote the Old Testament. So he's saying, they got their Bibles. They've been reading that every morning. He says, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. And he says, no, Father Abraham. But if someone goes to them from the dead, they would repent. And he said to him, if they did not hear Moses

and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead. He is talking about his own resurrection. So what does it mean to be rich toward God? Here's the point. Here's the point. To be rich toward God is to glorify God by leveraging your temporary riches for the building of God's eternal kingdom, not your temporary kingdom. That's the difference. That to be rich towards God is not enriching God, nor is it trying to get God to enrich us, but realizing that God is our riches. To be rich toward God means you're not laying up treasures for yourself. To be rich towards God is heart moving towards God as your ultimate treasure. To be rich towards God is using earthly riches to display the richness of God.

And there is great benefit. And in that, when we're rich towards God, when your circumstances don't drive you, but your sovereign Savior does, you can learn the secret of being content in every situation. So my question is, are you rich towards God? and I want to share a few things that I do in my life. It is a high, high priority for me and my house to be rich towards God. And God has taken us a long way on this journey over the 43 years that I have been alive. And in particular, the last 14 or 15.

And this is what we do in my house. Number one is this, to be rich towards God. before even talk about money and stuff, I cultivate my relationship with Jesus, that I do the kind of things that stir my affection for Jesus, like what you're doing right now, like go to church. I mean, I kind of have to be here, but I like to be here too. By being with God's people, by worshiping privately,

individually and corporately, by being in Bible study with some other brothers where we just kind of wrestle through the text, by spending time with him, for me, by reading big chunks, of the Bible. And it stirs my affections for the Lord because here's what I've found. The closer I am with him, the more I invest in my relationship with the Lord, the easier it seems to me to stiff arm the shiny things of this world that make promises that they can't keep. It's very similar.

You ever go to the grocery store hungry? And you come back and your wife's like, are you eight years old? Whoa. Captain Crunch, really? Did you get some Band-Dash? too to bandage up your mouth after they cut you open okay but they look good i remember when i was seven but when you eat before you tend to just do better make better choices well the same thing is true it's the way we used to sing it in my old baptist churches turn your eyes upon jesus look long in his wonderful face and the things of this world grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace so to be rich towards god is not just rope discipline you can You can have a very sharp pencil in a really great budget and give buckets of money away and not actually be rich towards God.

You see, to be rich towards God is a heart moving towards God where He is your ultimate riches. And so that's step one. And then what we do very practically, me and my house, we bring our first fruits to God every week. Our first fruit. The first money that we spend is on the first day of the week to the one who is in first place in my life. You see, because if Jesus is not before all things, you can reorientate the whole rest of your life and your whole life is out of order. And so that's what we do. That's the way we have decided to do it.

Before we spend money on anything else, we bring our first fruit, tithes, and offerings to the Lord. And we do it electronically. I do it in my office every single Sunday morning. And then not only, this is the part I didn't know if I'd tell you or not, but I'm going to tell you. Not only is he first in priority, but he's also first in amount. That this did not happen overnight. This has happened over a long period of time for us, but we wanted our generosity towards the kingdom of God to be the financial decision that changed every other decision that we have. So tithing and making offerings are not a bill, but if you look at our bills, our biggest monies that come out of our accounts, it's to the building of the kingdom of God.

You know why? Because he is before all things in our life. Before all things in our life. And I feel like the most blessed man on the planet. So we give, first and foremost, we give from a place. And the place that we give from is that of utter gratitude. Who am I that you would take my place? And God, because you are first and you went first and you love me first,

and you gave your first and best in Jesus at the cross, we will gladly bring our first and best to you. And then secondly, a part of the reason that we sew into the ministry of the Church of 1122, now admittedly I'm kind of biased. I think it's going good, all right? And if I didn't think we were doing godly things with the money, I'd either quit or change it, all right? But what we do here is we are not about building the brand of 1122.

We are about the expanding kingdom of God. It is why we are involved in a jobs initiative right now. It's why we're trying to put campuses all over. It's why we're planning churches all over the world. It's why we preach the gospel, the gospel, the gospel, the gospel, the gospel, because you see at 1122 we care about all human suffering, especially eternal. And so I believe that when I invest, into what God is doing here.

I am not building up my little temporary kingdom, but we are partnering in building up the kingdom of God. So that's what we do financially. We're bringing our first fruits to God. Then the second thing we do financially. You ready? Is we save some? Probably not enough.

Pray for scholarships from the Martin kids, okay? But probably not enough. Then we put some away. And then the third thing we do, you know what we do with our money? We spend the rest of it. gladly with no shame and no guilt. You see, to be rich towards God is not just paying a God tax at church and then feel guilty about what you do with the rest of it.

To be rich towards God is to generously give towards God's ever-expanding kingdom and then you need to save some for sure, don't put your hope there, and then you spend the rest to the glory of God. You should, every dime he gives you should be to his glory, not just that which goes back into gospel ministry, but also, listen, man, we'll get our family of four together and we'll go out to dinner. And we love to go out to dinner.

And we'll sit around, and I want to, what I want to do is I don't want the worship to terminate on the food that we're eating. I want the worship to stir up in the one that gave us the food. And I'll just say to my family, you know how few people get to just walk into a place and point at a picture and that food shows up? You can see what kind of high-class places we're eating at when we're pointing at pictures, but you're with me.

And I tell my kids, I'm like, look, kids, you realize, man, when I was growing up, we were broke and didn't know it, all right? It had to be your birthday to go to Pizza Hut, all right? We were eating vienna sausages. And they were, J.P.'s like, what's a vion of sauces? Is it good? I'm like, oh, it's terrible. Boy, if you ate one, it makes it turn inside out. It ain't good, all right?

But we ate them all the time. We didn't know it. And we will say, who are we? Who are we? Last night, just we decided to stay in and we rented a movie. You know, you just cook movie, boom. And the movie comes on. I'm like, buddy, we used to have to go to a place called.

blockbuster. It's crazy. And if the movie came out and everybody wanted it, man, you'd have to like kill it. It's shank a guy just to get you a copy of Forrest Gump. All right? And so now we just hit the button. Boom, there it is. $5. He's like, what? It's crazy, right? But we do that to say, how good is God to us? And listen, when you've been rich towards God, there's no shame, there's no guilt, there's no condemnation in that. First Timothy 6 drives us. First Timothy 6, beginning of verse 17, this is the Apostle Paul talking to this young pastor named Timothy, and he says, listen, in your church there's going to be rich people. So when you talk to him, tell them this. He goes, as for the rich in this present age, again, globally speaking, that's

most of us in the room. As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, not my, my, my, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. That every good and perfect gift is from above. And we are to enjoy it. And you can't enjoy it when you're just trying to lay up treasures for yourself. He goes on to say, they are to do good, to be rich and good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that

they may take hold of that which is truly life. I want to ask you four questions, tell you a story, and we're done. Question number one. Are you rich towards God? Now listen, I'm not trying to manipulate you. You just know. You know. Are you rich towards God?

And if you're not, what Paul says that you're missing out on is you're missing out on that which is truly life. So are you rich towards God? Here's how you know. Has your generosity towards God changed your spending? if not you're probably not bringing him first and best you're probably bringing him leftovers you probably are are you giving first and best to the building of his kingdom now in this moment right now if you're doing mental gymnastics as to why this does not apply to you watch out and some of you're like what's the name of the church anthem i'm gonna go there they're gonna talk about this stuff

all right let me leave me alone i'm like why i quit going to my last church all right you can leave it's no problem, no problem. I hope that the Holy Spirit chases you down for the sake of your own soul. Like, and a few minutes, we're not taking up an offering, we're not doing, there's nothing. We're just going to sing a song like we always do. Okay. And I'm telling you, I feel like the most blessed man alive because we've, in our family, by his grace upon us, have tried to leverage what he has given to us for the sake of his kingdom and what we enjoy changes. What we enjoy changes like crazy. And what we enjoy like crazy is being a part of this

movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus. And the last question is this. Where do I need to make changes? Where do I need to make changes? So I can tell you, the guy that taught me this lesson

of what it looks like to be rich towards God, he taught it to me at his funeral. He wasn't even there. He was in heaven and I was at his funeral. it's Gretchen's grandfather. Gretchen's grandfather. His name's Lloyd White.

He's a pastor. He was a bivocational pastor. He planted and pastored churches for the majority of his life. And he had to be bivocational because the churches couldn't even afford to make it like his full-time job. I mean, how blessed am I? And so he painted and he was a pastor. And in fact, he pastored like average-sized churches. The average-sized church in America right now is 124 people.

So what God's doing here is not average. And so his family on a bottling company up in Boston. And he was in line to take that thing over. And if he did, like his brother did, he would have been a millionaire, a millionaire. The only problem with that is God had a different idea for him. And he felt called into the ministry. And so he stepped away from millions to go into ministry. I don't know if you know this.

You don't make millions in ministry. And his family wasn't even believers. So they didn't have a category. for what Lloyd was doing. And so I obviously got to know him a little bit when I was dating Gretchen. He did our wedding. I love this guy. He had like the spiritual gift of sarcasm and cut downs.

I just loved it. Remember one time Gretchen's got this cousin, and she had this piercings and crazy hair. She looked like 1122 or whatever. The rest of her family doesn't. And she comes walking in for Easter, and Lloyd in front of everybody goes, well, the Easter eggs here.

I mean, I just thought, I love this man. And so, So he planted in pastor churches all over the place. In fact, Gretchen grew up in her granddad's church. And so he did our wedding, and then we'd been married about three months, and he passed away. And Gretchen's family asked me to do a part of the graveside service. So, man, you want to talk about being nervous, you know? I mean, I barely just got in the family.

And so we show up to the church, and then later we go to the graveside. And the crazy thing is, the church, I miss about 125 people, but at his funeral, there was like this many people. Like over a thousand people. They are everywhere, everywhere. And I'm like, what is going on here? So I asked Gretchen, what are all these people doing here? I mean, he was a pastor of a little church, but I mean, there's no way. I don't think this many people live in your town.

What are all these people doing here? And she's like, well, don't you remember? You see, when he retired, when everybody told him, okay, I think maybe you're too old to be doing this. it's time to retire. He said, you know what? I've read through my whole Bible, and there is no retirement in the Bible, because we are on mission from God. And so he and his wife, Gretchen's grandmother, who's still living today, for 15 years post-retirement from the ministry, they went to be house parents at Patrick Henry Boys' home for 15 years. They poured their lives into these young men who the adults that were supposed to take care of them didn't. And just

think about this man when they were at this boys home they don't send the gifted program to the boys home you understand these boys are rough and they love them and they pour it into them for 15 years and so when i lean over to gretchen at the graveside and i go what are all these people doing here i don't understand i mean i look at the license plates and there's ohio and there's pennsylvania and there's florida and there's georgia and there's there's jordan there's virginia they're from all over and gretchen's like you remember they were they were house parents at this boy's home for 15 years and all those boys they're about our age and now they've grown up and they've got families of their own, and they came to pay their respects to my granddad.

And so I've got my Bible in my hand, and I'm walking up to the casket, to the grave site. And there's one of these boys who's now a grown man, and he's got his son with him. And the reason I know it's his son is because this guy had like the crazy red, like Ronald McDonald's hair. I mean, it was like bright red. It was startling.

And then you know this is his son because he's got the same hair. There's Ronald and there's small fry. They're right here, you know. He's got him by the hand. And I'm trying to make my way through the crowd and I kind of stuck behind him. And then I see the dad who grew up in that boy's home, lean over to his little boy and says, hey, buddy, the reason we know Jesus is because of that man right there.

I decided in that moment that as for me in my house, we would be rich towards God. That if I was going to begin with the end in mind, there would come a day that they're going to dig a hole and put me in it too. and my prayer is not that I would store up treasures for myself. What a waste of a life. But that I would pour myself out, just like Gretchen's grandfather poured himself out,

and that he knew what it was to take hold of that, which is truly life. So, church, are you rich towards God? Let's pray. Our good and gracious Heavenly Father, God, I thank you that because you who were rich stepped out of the glories of heaven and made yourself poor, God, we can be rich in you. God, I pray that you would help us to be rich towards you.

God, corporately as a church, that it would never be about this organization. We only organize so that we can bring you glory, God. Lord, may we join with the saints that declare every square inch of this whole world is yours, Jesus. And God, would you help us then individually to not fall into the traps of this world? they are so deceptive they never follow through on what they promise but God may we be rich towards you for your glory

and for our joy we pray it in Jesus name amen