Last week’s sermon (which through technical issues didn’t get recorded) looked at how our relationship to money is a direct indicator into our relationship to God. If we wish to know how mature we are as Christians, we need look no further than how we handle money. We saw this in Luke 12:13-21, where Jesus says the love of money (greed) can turn us into ‘blind enslaved fools’.
To begin with, greed has the power of invisibility (blind), by coming up with any excuse needed to hide its presence in our heart. It does this primarily through comparing ourselves with those who are richer or greedier than us. Although Australia is the second richest country on the planet in terms of average adult wealth, most Aussies don’t think they are rich, because ‘so and so’ spends way more than I do.
Second, greed takes control of all our decision making (enslaved). This is seen most clearly in the 3 Christians virtues of faith, hope and love. Greed controls our ‘faith’ by telling us we won’t have enough left if we give more. Greed controls our ‘hope’ by convincing us to sure up our financial future before giving. And greed controls our ‘love’ by suggesting we ignore the deep needs of the poor, and rather spend on our wants.
Thirdly, greed tells us to reject God’s view of reality (as outlined in the Bible) and live according to the reality we think makes sense, which the Bible richly calls foolish. To place our ultimate value in eating, drinking, relaxing or partying (Luke 12:19) is just plain dumb, when the infinite worth of Jesus Christ is available to us.
May we not fall into the trap of the ‘blind enslaved fool’ from Luke 12. May we rather show with our giving that God is our ultimate treasure. We do this through (i) loving the church and the poor with our money, (ii) not looking to our bank account as our future hope, and (iii) trusting that God will look after us if we give the way the Bible calls us to.
