The twelfth chapter of the Gospel of Luke reveals to us some great encouragement with some rather stark warnings. In this chapter we learn yet again how valuable each of us are to God, that we are more precious to him than the birds of the sky or the grass of the fields. We are also warned about the perils of our own sinful hearts.
This message is repeated over and over again in Scripture and begins to give a very different vision of the world than the one that is so pervasive in our culture. Obviously this sinful nature is not something new, but something that mankind has been struggling with for thousands of years.
Luke writes these God breathed and Holy Spirit inspired words in the twelfth chapter, verses 16-21:
And he [Jesus Christ] told them this parable: "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. 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." ' [emphasis added]
"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?'
"This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God."
The heroes of the Dave Matthews song, Tripping Billies, seem to have this idea well in hand, but they have a very different reaction than the one Jesus asks of us.
Dave Matthews Band - Tripping Billies (Lyrics, Listen)
Eat, drink, and be merry
For tomorrow we die
…
So why would you care
To get out of this place
You and me and all our friends
Such a happy human race
Rather than recognize the glaring issue of death and the need for repentance, the Tripping Billies, simply ‘take life easy’ and just focus on self-indulgent happiness. The more and more we understand the need to be ‘rich towards God’, the more we see just how backwards the world thinks and where our sinful hearts want to go.
We focus on the moment (Carpe Diem), rather than the eternal pleasures of being in God’s presence. We exalt leaders that focus on their power to rule and not their ability to serve. We search for peace first in our own hearts, rather than looking upward toward God and outward to those around us. Everything is backwards, but there is always hope.
The Apostle Paul took an opportunity to speak with the people of Athens (Acts 17:16-34), which at the time was much like our modern cities with great architecture, a focus on education and full of idolatry. He found himself speaking before a juxtaposed group of pleasure seekers (Epicureans) and an indifferent (Stoic) audience.
Paul spoke about the sovereignty of God, our relationship with Him, our need for repentance and His resurrected Son. He urged them to turn away from their disbelief out of a sincere desire to introduce them to Jesus Christ and give them hope. This led to three reactions from the Athenians which are the same three reactions we experience today when we share the good news. People will believe, be intrigued or be enraged. They will always have their choice.
Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we'll:
a) Repent and are born anew
b) Seek an answer to a question
c) Die
We have the opportunity to become Disciples of Christ or Tripping Billies. Which are you?
Posted by price at June 15, 2005 04:31 PM | TrackBack