Too proud to beg and too old to dig

I watched the news last night with trepidation, as the stock markets fell and clean up begins after Hurricane Ike. Men are fainting with fear and the expectation of things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens are being shaken. There is perplexity upon the earth and dismay amongst the nations at the roaring of the sea and the waves, at the collapse of financial institutions and looming wars between nuclear super powers.

I ask myself, are we are living in the times preceding the coming of the Son of Man, times of great testing, when men’s faith will fail in the darkness of events, making us doubt whether we have a Father in heaven who cares for us? Will the Lord find faith on earth when he returns? How many believers will be swept away by storms that batter our house and home, storms which Jesus promised would test the quality of the work, test the soundness of the faith which has been delivered up to the saints?

Will we be measured and found wanting? Have we acted upon the words of Jesus and made them our own, or have we been merely hearers of the word of God and so built our house on sand? The coming storms will test the house and our foundations will be exposed as having been built either on sand or on rock. There will be a great falling away of those whose foundation has been built on the sand of personal gain, of those who never counted the cost of suffering loss.

Luk 16:1 And He also said to His disciples, There was a certain rich man who had a steward. And he was accused to him, that he had wasted his goods.

I saw a man on the news who had lost his position at Lehmann brothers investment bank..He reminded me of the steward in Luke chapter 16 that had squandered his master’s possessions and was found to be wanting.These investment banks have lost all the money that they were stewards of.The steward in the Bible lost his position and he was too proud to beg and too old to dig.

Luk 16:3 And the steward said within himself, What shall I do? For my lord is taking the stewardship away from me. I cannot dig; I am ashamed to beg.

So he used his master’s resources to make friends for himself. There are many who are about to lose all their investments in the coming financial collapse. When Mammon fails we should not be found wanting in heavenly investments. Woe to those who have set their minds on earthly things and failed to store up treasure in heaven!

Luk 16:9 And *I* say to you, Make to yourselves friends with the mammon of unrighteousness, that when it fails ye may be received into the eternal tabernacles.

The Gospel of Grace is a wide door that accepts all. Jesus will in no wise turn away any that come to him. But will we remain faithful to him? Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, that you may be tested. Are you ready for the purging fires of persecution? Will you curse the Lord in the day of famine, when Mammon fails, or will your faith be proven to be as real as gold?

We are living in an age where the Gospel has been so compromised that it has become merely a means toward personal gain,in an age when premium is given to the acquisition of earthly goods. But our citizenship is actually in heaven, and we should be learning to place our hope in heavenly things where Christ is. The loss of all things on earth should not terrify us or make us faint, but should cause our hearts to look to the eternal dwelling which is our true home. Do you have friends in the eternal dwellings that are eager to receive you? Have you been a shrewd steward of what is not yours? This is your time to make friends for yourselves by means of the Mammon of unrighteousness, that when it fails, you have friends to receive you!

Luk 16:9 "I'm telling you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous riches, so that when they're gone you'll be welcomed into eternal homes.

Sell your possessions and give to the poor! Make for yourself a purse that does not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near, nor moth destroys. Don’t be like the rich man who could have made friends with the beggar who used to lie at his gate, and missed his chance once the beggar had died. When he subsequently died and was buried he could have met up with his friend, the beggar, in Abraham’s bosom. Instead he ended up in Hades.

Luk 16:19 There was a certain rich man who was customarily clothed in purple and fine linen and making merry in luxury every day.

Luk 16:20 And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, who was laid at his gate, full of sores

Luk 16:21 and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table. But even the dogs came and licked his sores.

Luk 16:22 And it happened that the beggar died and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom. The rich one also died and was buried.

Luk 16:23 And in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.

He died, and thus the mammon of unrighteousness failed him. His money was unable to save him; and he could not take it with him. That man’s treasure was left behind to five brothers, and now he found himself on the wrong side of a great chasm that could not be crossed. Lazarus, who used to lie at his gate, could have been his friend, a heavenly friend who would have received him into the eternal dwellings! How many poor Christian widows lie dying at the gates of Johannesburg and Cape Town, in Zambia and Zimbabwe, how many opportunities are being missed for you to make friends by using unrighteous mammon!This unrighteous mammon which does not really belong to you, but of which you are a steward. You have the opportunity of making friends with your master’s money, friends who will receive you with joy into paradise, saying:

“Welcome, friend , here is the place I have been preparing for you!”.And you may say:

“Who are you? I don’t know you!”

And it will be some unknown Chinese or Indian person, or some Zambian widow ,or orphan , or Muslim who has been helped , or someone brought to Christ with the use of unrighteous mammon!

Instead of this, the rich man of Luke 16 found himself being tormented by having lost all that was dear to him, all his earthly treasure, and was now tormented by the realization that he had used none of it to make friends for himself in the eternal dwellings! All was spent on purple robes and fine linen; all was wasted on gaily living in splendour every day!

I am sure that those who have lost all their investments in Lehman brothers are wishing now that they could have made some friends while they had the opportunity. Now it’s all gone.

The rich man, realizing this, begs Abraham to send someone to tell his brothers to rather give away their money to the poor so that they, also, do not end up in that place of torment with him!

Luk 16:27 And he said, I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father's house,

Luk 16:28 for I have five brothers, so that he may testify to them, lest they also come into this place of torment.

Abraham says , No, but they have got Moses and the Prophets, let them hear them.(The law says a lot about giving to the poor.) The rich man, knowing that in his life he had ignored Moses, replies,

“No, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!”

No, says Abraham, if they don’t listen to Moses and the prophets neither will they be persuaded if someone rises from the dead! Quite right Abraham!

Abraham is right because today we have Moses and the prophets, and besides that we even have some one who has risen from the dead, namely Jesus, who told us clearly to give our wealth to the poor, and most of us are still not persuaded! Jesus was right in this parable he was teaching, we would rather pass on money to family members and risk that they also follow us into torment. Even the crumbs falling from our tables are being thrown away, crumbs that are looked at with longing by those who are in need. What heartlessness! What a crime against humanity and God! All that we own is His, we are merely stewards, do we have a right to do as we please with what belongs to Him?

Dogs were coming and licking the sores of Lazarus while the squandering was in progress, which shows that even dogs are more compassionate! How many unbelieving NGO’s are out there in Africa, like dogs, licking the sores of the poor, while the mammon of unrighteousness is being squandered by Christians on fine living and gaiety, on fancy new cars and homes?

The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, were listening to Jesus as he spoke these things, and they scoffed at him. Are you scoffing at these words?

Luk 16:15 And He said to them, You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.

Money is detestable in the sight of God. The honour that it accords is abominable. It is unrighteous mammon, and it is useful, yes, it is useful for making friends in the eternal dwellings, but not for gaily living in splendour! Under the Law and the Prophets wealth was seen by the Jews to be the proof of God’s blessing, but from the time of John the Kingdom of God is being preached and everyone is forcing their way into it.

Luk 16:16 The law and the prophets were until John: from that time the glad tidings of the kingdom of God are announced, and every one forces his way into it.

This is the Kingdom that John preached, and Jesus also preached:

Luk 3:7 Then he said to the crowd that came forth to be baptized by him, O generation of vipers! Who has warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

Luk 3:8 Therefore bring forth fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say within yourselves, We have Abraham for our father. For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones.

Luk 3:9 And now also the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bring forth good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire.

Luk 3:10 And the people asked him, saying, What shall we do then?

Luk 3:11 He answered and said to them, He who has two coats, let him give to him who has none. And he who has food, let him do likewise.

The Pharisees lived within the dispensation of the Law and and had an entirely natural and earthly understanding of what God’s blessing was. Obedience meant prosperity, and disobedience meant poverty. How could God’s Mosiach be this Nazarene, this uneducated upstart from Galilee! What kind of Kingdom was this where the King was a pauper over a rabble of fishermen and tax collectors?The proof to them that Jesus was a impostor was that he ended up on a cross.!

If you want to live under the Law and enjoy the fruit of your labour, if you want to live in the dispensation of building Temples and living like Solomon, then you must also live under all of the Law. The Law is made for the natural man, the Law is made for sinners. We Christians however, are called to live in heavenly places, we are called not to live with our home in this natural realm, we are forcing our way into the eternal dwelling places! Let the man who has two tunics share with him who has none, and let him who has food do likewise, said John the Baptist. This is not what the Law taught. The Law was just a temporary provisional package, a plan which filled in because natural man could not hope to attain to what God has got in mind for a people called out of this world.

The Gospel of the Kingdom is of a far higher order of life than that which is according to the Law. The natural man can by self effort attain to a degree of righteousness which is according to Law, like Paul,but can never attain to the righteousness of Christ. If we are only looking to create a natural Christian world within the boundaries of this world, a kind of alternative Christian world with Christian laws and activities, then we are doomed to become a second rate imitation of the world system. If you want to live under the natural dispensation, raise up armies to protect your blessings! If your inheritance is earthly, you better fight for it!

The Kingdom of God, on the other hand, can only be inherited by a peculiar kind of people who love not their lives unto death! Only through loss can it be won. The greatest fault of the modern church is the desperate avoidance of the Cross of Christ. To the Pharisee the cross is the disfavour of God.It was proof to them that Jesus was not the messiah. To a real Christian it is the path to glory. The early church accepted joyfully the seizure of their property, knowing that they had a better possession and an abiding one.

I recently heard about a man in Africa who was driven from his home by war and famine, suffering the loss of home, family, and all his goods. He was sitting on the ground in the only clothes he had, and he was asked how he could endure such terrible loss. He replied that Christ became all to him when Christ became all he had.

We are called to attain to the righteousness of Christ, something that cannot be done in the flesh but can be done in the Spirit. The church is called to be a supernatural body of people who are living out the laws of a Kingdom which is not of this earth, higher laws of a heavenly order that are unattainable to mere humanity. We are called to be heavenly beings that demonstrate the existence of a realm that is unearthly, an existence which astonishes the world and turns it on its head. The response of the world to the church should be hatred, not yawns! The Kingdom of God is to be taken by violence, and violent men lay hold of it!

Luk 16:16 The law and the prophets were until John: from that time the glad tidings of the kingdom of God are announced, and every one forces his way into it.

What we need is a violent revolution that will change the Church from being a flimsy imitation of the world into a force that undermines the entire world system, including the ecclesiastical systems and the economic system.

As we hasten to the day of God, to a time of universal judgement when the earth and its works will be burned up, let us fix our eyes on the heavenly inheritance and despise all that is highly esteemed by men, every work of men that is built on the love of this world . What is esteemed by God is that which is eternal, that which has been built by him and not by man: The eternal church of God made up of individuals from every tribe, kin and nation! Make for yourselves friends who will receive you into the eternal dwellings!