Proper 13 Year C 8/3/2025
Hosea 11:1-11; Psalm 107:1-9, 43; Colossians 3:1-11; Luke 12:13-21
Rev. Mark A. Lafler
Our Gospel reading today brings us to the 12th chapter of Luke…
Where we can place ourselves along with the others in the crowd that circled around Jesus.
Jesus was teaching people “by the thousands” it says at the beginning of our chapter…
Jesus warns the people about hypocrisy…
About fearing people rather than a healthy fear of God…
He encourages them by describing their value in God’s eyes…
And encourages them with the promised guidance of the Holy Spirit.
And then suddenly there is a man in the crowd who speaks out:
Teacher, order my brother to give me a fair share of the family inheritance.
To our ears this sounds way out of place…
Where is this guy coming from?
Why in the middle of Jesus’ teaching is there a guy in the crowd asking for Jesus to settle a family inheritance matter?
But it actually works for the Jewish customs of that time.
You see, the man calls Jesus, “teacher.”
Which in Hebrew would be rabbi.
In that day, rabbis were expected to be knowledgeable regarding the law and ready to give a legal ruling.
Jesus was recognized as a rabbi and therefore, the man in the crowd was trying to get his family matter solved.
But not just solved with some good arbitration.
It wasn’t his desire to just have the case settled as the judge sees fit.
He wanted his way.
He wanted things according to his rights and his perspective.
Scholar Kenneth Bailey points out that he didn’t say:
Rabbi, my brother and I are quarrelling over our inheritance; will you mediate?[1]
Oh no…
He is ordering the judge to carry out his wishes.
Teacher, order my brother to give me a fair share of the family inheritance.
And Jesus sees straight through this and gives a gruff response and a tone of disapproval.
Jesus responded saying:
O man, what makes you think it’s any of my business to be a judge or mediator for you?
Jesus wanted nothing to do with this role of the rabbi.
In fact, that’s not what Jesus came to do.
He was on a different mission…
To bring reconciliation between God and people.
It’s clear that the man in the crowd had a broken relationship with his brother.
And it appears that instead of trying to bring a resolution…
He wants a judge to call the matter in his direction.
Jesus mission in this world was to bring people together in the Kingdom of God, not to bring them some final separation.
And then Jesus goes on…
Remember this is not just a private conversation…
What Jesus goes on to say is a pointed parable to that man in the crowd, but also to the entire crowd, to the disciples, and on to us as well with the Holy Scriptures passed on to us.
Now, Jesus gives a bit of wisdom before the parable, saying:
Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed;
for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.
In my studies this week, there was another translation of this verse that used a different word than greed…
Where Jesus says: Be on your guard against all kinds of greed…
Theis other translation said: Take heed, and beware of every kind of insatiable desire… [2]
I got to thinking about that word usage – insatiable desire.
Insatiable means an appetite or desire impossible to satisfy.
So it’s not just greed… it’s greed plus envy…
It’s something that just eats at you and won’t go away…
And as you try and try to satisfy it…
it only gets worse.
What came to my mind was when you sit down in your favorite spot to watch something on television.
Before long you get up and get a snack… something sweet.
A few minutes later, you are back in the kitchen getting something savory or salty.
And when you finish…
then comes that desire to get something sweet again.
And guess what comes next?
The popcorn or potato chips… salt again.
If you get in that snack vortex you really have to fight to get out of it, right?
I speak from experience here.
Because if you don’t break this loop, you will consume 1200 calories of snacks in one evening.
It is an insatiable desire…
You will never satisfy the longing until you break it.
Jesus said: Take heed, and beware of every kind of insatiable desire. For life for a person does not consist in the surpluses of his possessions.
And then Jesus gives the parable.
This rich farmer has a surplus of crops…
An overabundance of goods.
Which creates the problem for him,
“What do I do with all my extra crops?” he says.
No where in the parable is there an acknowledgment of God’s blessing.
No where does he dialogue with friends…
In fact, his only conversation partner is himself…
His own soul discussing in self-talk what to do with my abundance.
2 things here…
First, this man is all alone.
He doesn’t talk with anyone else.
In the first century agricultural village, community was how people lived. They were tight communities.
This rich farmer loved his over-abundance…
His possessions so much that he no longer had people to talk with.
One commentator wrote:
He has the money to buy a vacuum and live in it.
In fact, secondly, possessions can do that to you.
Things do not provide the joy of life.
Sure, there is happiness in the purchase of things…
Completing a collection and so forth…
but it doesn’t bring the joy of life.
In fact, in our world, in North American culture, we have to be very careful, very intentionally careful, to guard our hearts from a the pervasive consumerist mindset.
Consumerism is not the call that Christ has for our lives.
So, this Rich Farmer tears down his barns and builds larger ones and begins to live out life in abundance… all alone.
That is until God shows up.
Jesus completes the parable and our reading with this:
“Just then God showed up and said,
‘Fool! Tonight you die. And your barnful of goods—who gets it?’
“That’s what happens when you fill your barn with Self and not with God.”
It kind of hits like a load of bricks, right?
I mean, in the parable, God shows up and addresses him with Fool.
That can’t be good.
In fact, there are four words for fool in New Testament Greek…
and the one used here is of the strongest terms out of the four.
God wasn’t messing around.
And in the midst of this man’s self-focused insatiable desire upon his abundance of goods causing him to lack any social place in his village – God asks: All these things you have…, whose will they be?
When you die?
What’s it matter – especially if you are all alone.
It comes across to me like Charles Dicken’s story A Christmas Carol.
Where Ebenezer Scrooge held on to all of his wealth while others suffered…
He was alone, he was self-focused and saw only what mattered to himself in his vacuum of a world.
Until the unthinkable happened with the ghosts.
His life changed after that fateful night.
Now going back to the way this whole parable started…
There was a man in the crowd with an issue regarding his family inheritance.
The problem is not the dividing of inheritance.
The real problem in this story has to do with reconciliation.
The man in the crowd refuses to reconcile with his brother…
he will only settle for his way.
The Rich Fool refuses to reconcile with the people in his village…
he only wants the abundance for himself.
Are we so focused on our self, our rights, our reputations,
our way of life, our wealth, our possessions…
That we miss the whole idea of serving God through serving others?
We might ask: Are we bringing reconciliation into this world…
Or are we bringing division?
That’s where Jesus goes in our reading.
And this parable is for us too.
Even if it makes us feel uncomfortable.
But nevertheless, let us be ever thankful, that the very fact that Jesus is telling this parable in human form shows his grace.
This isn’t just some wise sayings from an ancient book.
These are the words of God Incarnate – the Son of God, Jesus Christ.
God did not stay in the heavenlies looking at all our problems saying:
You made your bed, now lie in it!
Oh no!
God sent his only begotten Son into this world to redeem the world.
So that all who believe in Jesus Christ…
Who confess his Name…
Who call on him as Lord and Savior…
Who come to him in faith believing in his redeeming death on the cross and in his resurrection glory…
Will be reconciled, born again, made righteous,
made co-heirs with Christ,
these believers will be saved by grace through faith in Jesus.
This very act of grace…
this gift of Jesus Christ…
This is it!
And we walk in that grace…
And because of the grace that we have received…
We share this abundance of grace with others.
We share this gospel… this good news of Jesus with others.
Let it overflow.
Unlike the man in the crowd demanding the rabbi see things his way.
Unlike the Rich Fool who kept all his blessing to himself.
Let the grace of God overflow in our lives impacting those around us…
Through actions, through words, through kind deeds and gifts, through patient listening, and sacrificing our own desires for the sake of others…
By being Jesus to the people in this world.
Praise be to God.
For sending his Son, Jesus, into this world to reconcile us to God.
Amen.
[1] Kenneth E. Bailey, Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes, Combined Edition (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983), 59.
[2] Ibid., 62.
