Luke 12:15-32
Pastor Craig Ledbetter
14 Feb, 2010
AM
Song: It is
well with my soul!
Props: Dust,
Dry Grass, Iron for vapour steam
I.
Introduction (James 4:14)
A.
Jesus Teaches a
B.
Asks
all of us some very important questions about life
C.
One
of them is amazing – What IS your life?
D.
Compares our life to a load of different things:
1.
Vapour – like steam
(James 4:14)
2.
Grass (James 1:9,10) –
Rich people are not compared to mountains, or gold, but GRASS “Let the brother
of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: But the rich, in that he is made
low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.”
3.
A
Weaver’s Shuttle (Job
7:6) "My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle."
4.
A
Breath of Wind (Job 6:7)
"O remember that my life is wind."
5.
A
Flower (Job 14:1-2) "Man
that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble. He cometh forth
like a flower, and is cut down: he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not."
6.
Dust (Ps 103:14-16) "For
he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust. As for man, his days are
as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over
it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more."
7.
A
Passing Shadow (Ps
144:4) "Man is like to vanity: his days are as a shadow that passeth away."
E.
Well, the Western world has definitely a
lot to learn about life! Oh yes, we have gadgets, and cars, and millions of
miles of roads, and cookers, and washing machines, and the internet
F.
But
how many people have a life?
1.
Did
you know, that most people by the time they are 35, have given up on living.
They live simply because they have to. They have bills to pay, they have people
needing them; they have places to go, but they don’t enjoy it.
2.
I
want to fix that for some of you this morning!
II.
Message
A.
The Contradiction (Luke
12:15)
1.
Jesus explains what Life is NOT
2.
Starts off by saying life is NOT what you normally think it is – “a man's life
consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.”
3.
Isn’t that what everyone is learning these days?
a.
That
what we hold onto, disappears, fades, rusts, is washed away, crumbles
b.
Everything can be going just fine and dandy, and then BAM, an earthquake hits
and 110,000 people die in
c.
Then, when nobody is noticing, an 8.8 earthquake hits
d.
People are driving their BMW’s down a highway, and next thing they know, they
are being pulled out of the car in pieces
e.
Children as young as 2 years old are contracting cancer, and normal looking
people are walking around with a time-bomb that could go off at any moment – a
heart attack
f.
Hey!
Life has to be more than what man is living and experiencing today!
B.
The Lesson – Jesus uses
a Parable (Lk 12:16-21)
1.
A
Prosperous Man (Lk
12:16)
a.
A
farmer
b.
A
Blessed Farmer – no real troubles or problems to speak of
c.
Things were working out very well for him
d.
He
had never had so much in all his life – such an enviable situation
e.
He
is happy!
f.
Isn’t it true that, We all normally consider a good life to be when we are happy
1)
If
we are not happy, then we feel that we do not have life – not one worth living
2)
We
only gauge our life by what we have, own, control, can show off, boast about
a)
If
we don’t have people around us adoring us…
b)
If
we don’t have a wife or a husband to show off (many a person has rushed off to
get a partner, a wife a husband thinking NOW, I will have a life, be happy)
c)
If
you don’t have a child
d)
If
we don’t have a thing that we can call our own
e)
Then
we usually don’t think we have much of a life!
3)
To
us in the western world, life consists of things, of our dreams, our
expectations
4)
And
as long as those things and desires are being met, then we think we have a life
- We think we have a good life. And we can show it off, and hold our head high
2.
A
Pondering Man (Lk 12:17)
– thought about things hard
a.
So
this man has dilemma.
b.
He
had reached his limit – he is concerned about the future
1)
Not
of family
2)
Not
of his health
3)
Not
of heaven
4)
But
about where to store more THINGS!
c.
Ran
out of room to store all his crops and his money and his investments
d.
He
had to do something or his financial growth would stop
e.
So
he sat and pondered, and thought, and researched, and wrestled with this dilema
3.
A
Purposeful Man (Luk
12:18) – decided what he had to do
a.
He
decides exactly what to do – nothing wishy-washy about this man
b.
He
said, “Pull down my barns, and build greater”
c.
He
decided to prepare for greater things – an optimist
d.
Planned on things just getting better and better, and bigger and bigger
e.
Did
you ever notice that people don’t normally prepare for things getting worse?
4.
A
Philosophical Man (Lk
12:19)
a.
Oh,
he was such a philosopher
b.
Saw
things deeper than the normal Joe – saw things at the level of the soul, and yet
no further
c.
Talked to himself quite a lot - his best friend seemed to be himself
d.
Very
proud of himself – actually applauds himself! Pats himself on the back.
Congratulates himself on his awesome wisdom!
e.
Here
is a man who now is…
1)
Very
happy
2)
Very
content
3)
Very
blessed – “much goods”
4)
Very
confident- things were going to stay this way for a very long time
5)
Very
relaxed – “take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry”
5.
A
Foolish Man (Lk 12:20;
Ps 14:1)
a.
But
while he was applauding his own wisdom, "God said unto him, Thou fool!”
b.
What
was this wealthy, successful man’s problem?
1)
No
thought of God
2)
No
thankfulness towards God
3)
No
time or effort seeking God’s will, or seeking His pleasure
4)
Only
thought that his life was made up of the things that HE wanted, and that HE
possessed. All he talked about was:
a)
My
fruits, my barns, my goods, my soul, my ease
b)
My
decision, my plans, my dreams, my future, my life!
5)
But
there was Someone he completely forgot about – GOD!
a)
Oh
yeah, He is still around!
b)
No,
He didn’t disappear with the dark ages
c)
He
is still the Creator and Sustainer of all life
c.
So,
God shows up!
1)
Time’s up!
2)
Your
soul is sought now (Heb 9:27)
3)
All
the things you possess, and all the life you have lived matters nothing at that
moment (Ps 73:18,19)
4)
ALL
that we own is going to someone else at our death!
d.
Folks, you had better learn this lesson - Only your SOUL matters!
1)
This
rich, famous, prosperous man died a poor man (Luk e12:21) – not rich toward God!
“So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward
God.”
2)
You
had better make sure it is right with God – forgiven and owned by Jesus!
3)
Your
soul is priceless
4)
All
of the accumulation of wealth, of lands, of things in this world can’t match the
worth of your soul (Matthew 16:26)
6.
Who
do you think Jesus just described?
a.
Marilyn Monroe – 36 years old drug overdose
b.
Kurt
Corbain – 27 years old, blew his head off with a shotgun
c.
Judas Iscariot – had the money, had the power – jumped off a cliff at 30 yrs old
d.
Jimi
Hendrix – 28 years old, peak of his career - drug overdose
e.
And
absolutely every person who has ever lived, or ever will live!
C.
The Challenge (Luke
12:22-32)
1.
Luke
12:22 And he said unto his
disciples, Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye
shall eat; neither for the body, what ye shall put on.
2.
Take no thought
- Speaking of worry, becoming consumed with the affairs of this life
a.
This
is going to be THE struggle in your life!
b.
To
NOT worry about what to eat - About what to drink
c.
Life
is about more than food and clothes. More than friends and family. More than
money and possessions! More than children or friends!
d.
It’s
strange that we haven’t changed in 2,000 years
3.
Study the Ravens
(12:24) – Yucky, scavenger black birds are pretty well taken cared of
a.
Can’t plant, harvest, store up their crops
b.
GOD
takes care of them
c.
Aren’t you more important than them?
4.
Study Natural Growth
(12:25,26)
a.
Worry never helped anyone grow one inch
b.
As a
matter of fact, mankind is shrinking, not growing taller
c.
Before the dark ages, people were taller and healthier
d.
Worry and stress, anxiety, pressures haven’t helped anyone one bit!
e.
If
you can’t help yourself grow by worry, which is least important, why worry about
all the rest of your life?
5.
Study the Lilies
(12:27,28)
a.
Study HOW they grow
b.
Lilies grow and are so beautiful without any fuss at all
c.
No
toiling, no sweat, no stress
d.
Yet,
king Solomon was not clothed as beautifully as just one of them!
e.
A
Lilly is nothing more than pretty grass – something that grows out of the
ground, and is cut down, and withers, and is burned
f.
Aren’t human souls of much more value than they?
6.
Then, Start Living by Faith in God
(Lk 12:29-32)
a.
Look
at the words in 12:28, “O ye of little FAITH!”
b.
Look
down at the end of 12:29, “neither be ye of doubtful mind” – worrisome
c.
The
temptation has always been the same – to get our eyes off of Jesus, and to start
thinking about THINGS, about the LACK of things, about the problems, the
pressures, the dilemmas, the obstacles
d.
It
all begins when we think we can do better than God can
1)
We
can build better, bigger
2)
We
can plan and prepare, and work harder
3)
But
then we forget to pray
4)
We
don’t wait on God, and do things God’s way
5)
And
we forget to say, “Not my will, but thy will be done”
6)
And
our world is none the better for all our independence!
e.
God
knows what you need, and He is constantly supplying what you need – in the good
times and bad
f.
Everybody is focused on finding “life” (Luk 12:30)
For all these things do the nations of the world seek after: and your
Father knoweth that ye have need of these things.
g.
The
one thing we must do is seek God’s kingdom (12:31). Luk 12:31
But rather seek ye the
1)
Don’t get your eyes off that
2)
Don’t forget that God is still in control
3)
Don’t forget that He is working out His plan
4)
Don’t forget that He has a kingdom coming
5)
And
He offers it to anyone who will just simply follow His Son (12:32)
6)
Get
back to believing that God will take good care of you if you just obey Him!
D.
The Point (
1.
Jesus said “I am come that you might have life and that more abundant.”
Now, THAT is life!
a.
More
abundant than what?
1)
He
did not promise us things
2)
He
did not promise a wife
3)
He
did not promise us children
4)
He
did not promise us a husband
5)
He
did not promise us riches
6)
He
did not promise us health
7)
He
didn’t even promise us good weather!
b.
What
He did promise us was…
1)
A
sound mind (2Ti 1:7) “For God hath
not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound
mind.”
2)
The
peace of God (Joh 14:27) “Peace I
leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto
you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”
3)
A
home in heaven (Joh 14:1,2) “Let
not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my
Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go
to prepare a place for you.”
4)
A
holding hand (Heb 13:5) “he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake
thee.” and, (Deu 33:27)
“The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms”
5)
He
promised us HIMSELF
6)
These are the things that matter!
2.
Where we have gone wrong, is we have decided that the things that everybody else
has is what we have to have, to have life!
a.
But,
He that hath the Son hath LIFE (1st
b.
And
he that hath NOT the Son of God, HATH NOT LIFE!
c.
That’s the truth!
d.
Without the Son of God in your life you HAVE NO LIFE!
e.
If
you have the Son of God in your life YOU HAVE LIFE – YOU’VE GOT IT!
3.
Anything else that you think you need, or that you think that you have to have
more than Jesus is covetousness!
a.
You
and I have been lied to and deceived by the devil (the god of THIS world)
b.
And
it has crippled your Christianity, and you have grieved and quenched the Spirit
of God
1)
Who
wanted to reveal to you HIMSELF in the lack of things;
2)
His
POWER in the lack of strength;
3)
His
GLORY when things are dark!
4)
In
the trials, heartaches He wanted to be so real to you
5)
Not
that you should lash out, and fight back, and get depressed and get defeated,
get upset
6)
He
wanted to make somebody sweet, soft, yielded, firm in their faith in God
c.
Shame on you Christian!
1)
When
you let the lack of things, and the lack of worldly peace
2)
When
you look at the missing and the lack of unfulfilled dreams cause you to give up
on God
d.
You
ought to thank God that He cannot change, that He cannot deny His character
e.
If
He was anything like you and me, He would have abandoned us 6,000 years ago
f.
It
is time that we got on our face before God and said we are sorry, so stinking
sorry that we are addicted to things
g.
Hey!
1)
It
may not be well with my flesh, my body
2)
My
flesh is as grass
3)
My
body is as a vapour, as a smoke in the wind
4)
And
just as quickly as it appears, it disappears
5)
It
may be two week’s, two years, twenty years and a hundred years, and it is just
snuffed out, wiped out before people’s eyes!
6)
But
because of Jesus Christ, it is well with MY SOUL!
III.
Conclusion
A.
I
said earlier that,
1.
We
all normally consider a good life to be when we are happy. If we are not happy,
then we feel that we do not have life. We only gauge our life by what we have,
own, control, can show off, boast about. If we don’t have people around us
adoring us, if we don’t have a wife or a husband, if we don’t have a child, If
we don’t have a thing that we can call our own, THEN we usually don’t think we
have much of a life!
2.
And
as long as those things are desires are being met
a.
then
we think we have a life - We think we have a good life
b.
And
we can show it off, and hold our head high
B.
BUT…
if Jesus Christ is ALL you have, then you truly ARE RICH towards God!
1.
There is no Christian in this room who shouldn’t hold their head high because
they have Christ in them, Jesus as their eternal God and Saviour and Friend! If
that is all you have!
2.
Job
teaches us this!
a.
Job
knew that his redeemer liveth
b.
His
wife wasn’t beside him, or behind him in his trial – he was alone!
c.
His
wife didn’t care about the heartache he was experiencing
d.
She
didn’t care about praising God
e.
And
yet he said, I will not turn away from my God! I will not stop trusting Him
f.
Now,
he found it hard, and wished he had never been born
g.
But
Job did not consider that the things that he had the reason for him to say that
he had LIFE
h.
When
everything was gone, he still had GOD!
i.
AND
ever better, God still had Job!
C.
Ps
39:4-7 "LORD, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days, what it is;
that I may know how frail I am. Behold, thou hast made my days as an
handbreadth; and mine age is as nothing before thee: verily every man at his
best state is altogether vanity. Selah. Surely every man walketh in a vain shew:
surely they are disquieted in vain: he heapeth up riches, and knoweth not who
shall gather them. And now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in thee."
D.
Search your heart – where have you focused your energies? Where are all your
investments? How is your dependence on God? When was the last time you cried out
to Him and admitted you have been seeking to live JUST LIKE THIS MAN in Luke 12?
E.
Don’t be so careful about outward things, diligent in doing good, and exact in
outward duties – some of you are so concerned about all of those but have no
continuing relationship with God in heaven, and especially with His Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ!
F.
A
few days from now, a few weeks, a few years, you WILL step into eternity; where
earthly things will be of no avail What benefit will you get from all that you
have laid up in this world? What satisfaction will you have in all that you have
treasured up -- all that you have left behind?