March 187 2017 – Luke 12
People will say:
"You have plenty laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be
merry." But God said: "You
fool!" Luke 12:19
Fools live for the temporary,
the wise live for eternity.
I really wish this story was not in the Bible. I’ve
often thought about blacking it out with a marker!
My dream for life was to marry well, raise a family, work a
successful career, and retire from work early enough to enjoy playing golf and sitting
along the beach in a sun-drenched state.
It not only seemed like a valid dream, it seemed appropriate and
acceptable. Like a roadside ‘vista
point’, I was ready to set my sights on that view as I entered adulthood.
But then Jesus has to spoil that dream by telling this story
about the rich foolish man. Understanding
it for the first time around the age of 22 really shook me up. In fact, I STILL struggle with reading it,
and try to find ‘loopholes’ that will allow me to justify being godly AND
pursuing a retirement lifestyle.
But God’s label for that dream stings me every time: “You Fool!”
While my soul knows it’s foolish, my heart still wants to
argue. I know in my soul:
-
It’s foolish to think I should have riches while
millions go without food and water daily.
-
It’s foolish to put my focus on financial
independence over spiritual purpose.
-
It’s foolish to think that Jesus paid for my
sins on a cross so I could buy for a beach house.
-
It’s foolish to believe that worldly pleasure is
what I was created for.
-
It’s foolish … extremely foolish … to settle for
the temporary, instead of living for the eternal.
Jesus told the story of the rich fool, who squandered his
life working for retirement instead of serving the Lord. What the man got for his trouble was an empty
life and a lost eternity (all for a few beers and periodic trips to our favorite
destination). From the vista point of
eternity, that’s really foolish.
But we live in a culture and a world that values the
retirement plan. Our vista point can
only view the small valley of this existence, and it looks pretty limited. So we see many take the foolish route, and
think it’s the only way to go. How
disappointing to waste what God could have done with us.
I don’t mean to rain on your calling or suggest that people
with wealth are far from God. Wealth
isn’t really the issue here. Jesus uses
the story to challenge the “retirement mentality”. We weren’t made to retire FROM life, but to
reproduce IN life. While I may not be
gainfully employed all my life, I am to be productive for as long as He gives
me life. To be otherwise is simply
foolish.
Every time my heart tries to press for ‘retirement
living’, those words: “You Fool”, echo
from out of my soul. Maybe that’s a good
thing. While I don’t want to always hear
them, I’d rather be warned about foolishness than become a fool.
So I guess I’d better keep that story from Jesus in my Bible
after all.
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