Of The Folly Of Laying Up Earthly Treasure In The Neglect Of God

Adapted From A Sermon By

Philip Doddridge

So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.

(Luke 12:21 ESV)

The Lord Jesus Christ left heaven for earth so that he could lift us from earth to heaven. The first step of that rescue lifts our hearts upward while our feet still walk the ground. In this way we learn to love what lasts forever instead of what fades away.{Colossians 3:2} Jesus gives us many clear lessons about this. Several of them will appear as we move forward together. One day two brothers asked Jesus to settle a fierce argument over their father’s land. Even the closest family, then as now, can turn against each other when money is at stake. Jesus wisely refused to pick a side, yet he seized the moment to warn them. He said, Take heed and beware of covetousness. Then he gave the reason every heart needs to hear: a man’s life, its true comfort and joy, does not come from owning a mountain of things.

To drive the point home he told a short, sharp story. A rich farmer’s fields produced far more than he expected. He worried only about bigger barns and longer vacations. “Soul,” he told himself, “take your ease, eat, drink, be merry.” That very night God spoke: “Fool, this night your soul is required of you.” Jesus looked at the crowd and added, “So is every man who piles up treasure for himself and stays poor toward God.” This morning let us open these words together. Four simple questions will guide us.

1. First, what does it mean to be rich toward God?

2. Second, what does it look like to hoard treasure only for ourselves while staying poor toward him?

3. Third, why is that choice so foolish and so dangerous?

4. Fourth, what shall we do about it right now Let every heart here listen.

It is tragic to think that so many let the noise of this world drown out the voice of God. May every forgetful heart snatched back from the trap the devil has set. Therefore let every one of us lift our eyes to God right now. Ask him to drive these words deep, like a nail fixed in a sure place, so that they hold fast and never slip loose. May every heart here open wide. May every careless man feel the weight of his own danger. May every soul turn and find the mercy that is already reaching out to him.

I. We will no consider very quickly what it means to be rich toward God. It includes these four points.

1. To be rich toward God may mean being rich in his account or esteem. That happens when he looks upon us as indeed rich. We know that his judgment matches truth. Yet it often differs greatly from the judgment of men. This difference exists because men are often carried away by vain appearances. God’s eye pierces everything and sees things exactly as they are. For this reason, what men prize highly is an abomination to the Lord;{Luke 16:15} for "man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart."{1 Samuel 16:7}

God judges many people foolish even when the world calls them wise. He judges some people poor even when they and others think they are rich. The Incarnate Wisdom of God spoke to the church of Laodicea. You say, I am rich. You do not realize that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.{Revelation 3:17} To the angel of the church of Smyrna he says, "I know your tribulation and your poverty." He means their humility, their sufferings, their low place. "But you are rich."{Revelation 2:9} They are rich in his eye and esteem. They are spiritually rich and therefore truly rich. They stay rich even when they seem poor to themselves and to others. A man may rightly be called rich toward God when God esteems him and looks upon him as a rich and happy creature. We may add a second point about such a person.

2. To be rich toward God may mean being rich in the favor of God. Scholars note that the Greek word translated “toward” can also mean “in.” Thus, to be rich toward God equals being rich in him. This must be the highest and best wealth. Those whom God blesses truly possess blessing. Nothing greater exists than to own, so to speak, the Most High God who made heaven and earth.{Genesis 14:22}

Every soul made happy this way receives grace to feel the worth of God’s favor. It becomes the one thing the soul wants most. The Psalmist speaks the very words of that soul. "There are many who say, Who will show us some good? Lift up the light of your face upon us, O Lord."{Psalm 4:6} "Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you."{Psalm 73:25}

Such a person seeks God’s face with all his heart. He listens closely to every teaching that brings him nearer to God. He can say with David, "The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces."{Psalm 119:72} He seeks God’s favor only in the way God himself has set. The gospel declares that Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through him.{John 14:6} The seeker accepts this truth. He sees Christ as the pearl of great price. Like a wise merchant he gladly sells all he owns to gain that pearl. He comes to God through Christ. He comes as a poor, weak, empty, guilty creature. He does not try to buy favor. He begs for it.

When divine grace brings a soul to this place, God makes an everlasting covenant with him. The heart of that covenant is simple. God says, I will be your God. You shall be one of my people. Such a person truly is rich toward God. He is rich in God.

3. To be rich toward God must include being rich in faith and in every fruit of holiness. You recognize both as plain Bible words. God chooses the poor of this world to be "rich in faith."{James 2:5} Those who own much are commanded to be "rich in good works."{1 Timothy 6:18} Faith and good works form a treasure no money can buy. No man stands rich in God’s sight or rich in his favor while he lacks them. The apostle states it plainly. Without faith that works by love, "it is impossible to please God."{Hebrews 11:6} Scripture therefore calls faith more precious than gold. It calls faith better than rubies.

The man who is rich in this faith carries, as Scripture says, a good treasure inside. "The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good."{Matthew 12:35} He brings forth good words. He brings forth good actions. He does both with cheerful freedom and joy. He sets his heart to stay "steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord."{1 Corinthians 15:58}

One clear mark of this heart is this. A ready hand for mercy and giving forms a large part of it. God is rich in mercy. The good man copies him as far as he can. He aims to be merciful as his Father in heaven is merciful.{Luke 6:36} He forgives those who hurt him. He supplies those who lack. He comforts those who sorrow. These are sacrifices that please God. The soul that keeps on giving them with holy joy and open hands may truly be called rich toward God. It may be added,

4. He is rich in the glories of the heavenly world that wait for him. For this reason he may be called rich toward God. No work we do earns those glories. Our best efforts do not deserve them. Every gift comes by grace, not by debt. Still, the Bible speaks plainly on this point. It pictures heaven as a place where God stores treasure for his people. The amount grows with the zeal they show on earth. Paul told Timothy to command the rich to build a firm foundation for the future.{1 Timothy 6:19} Christ told everyone to store up treasure in heaven, to own "moneybags that do not grow old."{Luke 12:33} He called it a treasure in heaven{Matthew 6:20} that never fades. A man who owns this treasure is rich toward God. His riches lie safe with God in Christ. Scripture says, "You have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God."{Colossians 3:3}

The Christian keeps his eye on this treasure. He counts it above every other wealth. He measures every choice by it. He knows he will live forever. He works to secure forever joy. Day after day he adds to that joy. Every act of grace increases his store. This is what it means to be rich toward God. Now look into your own heart. Ask one plain question. Do you live this way, or do you not? By the explanation which I have given, you will easily see what it means,

II. To store up riches for ourselves while ignoring the first point. Here we must first notice that the two parts of the text belong together. The action forbidden always includes the failure to become rich toward God. Apart from that failure, saving for our own needs and for the support of a family is not a sin at all. When a man does it in a wise, fair, and moderate way, it is a required duty. We owe it to ourselves. We owe it to others. We owe it to society. We owe it to God. We invite trouble from Providence if we show no care about it.

The parents, says the apostle, ought to lay up for their children.{2 Corinthians 12:14} Elsewhere he observes that "if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever."{1 Timothy 5:8} He brings greater shame on Christianity and so harms it more than he could have done had he stayed a heathen in name. Keep this truth in mind. Then it will be clear what is meant by storing up treasure for ourselves. It may mean that a man directs all his goods to himself alone and makes worldly pleasures his main and ruling goal. These two errors always appear together, though each deserves separate notice.

1. They store up treasures for themselves who direct all their worldly goods to themselves alone. These are people with a narrow and selfish spirit. They have no higher goal than their own gain and their own pleasure in every role and duty of life. I have noted how generous the true Christian is. He is ready to give. He is eager to share.{1 Timothy 6:18} It marks a very corrupt and truly evil mind to care only for self. Such a mind angers God greatly. We anger Him when we treat our goods as fully ours and spend them with no thought for others. The prophet Hosea rightly blames this spirit. He says, “Israel empties his vine; He brings forth fruit for himself.”{Hosea 10:1 NKJV} Therefore, no matter what fruit they produce, selfish desire poisons it.

The case is almost the same when a man looks no farther than his own family. Our children are part of us. Yet if we work so hard to make them rich and great that we grow blind to our neighbor’s pain, if we refuse to help the suffering, if this care pushes God out of sight (though we ought to seek His glory even in plans that first serve ourselves), then such people plainly fall under the blame of the text in its clearest form.

2. They store up treasure for themselves who make worldly pleasures their main goal. The Christian does care about such things. Yet when he follows godly principles, he keeps them in their right place. He seeks first "the kingdom of God and his righteousness,"{Matthew 6:33} because it matters most. He longs to fix his eyes on things unseen and eternal, not on things that are seen. So in the end his treasure is in heaven. His heart is there also.

The worldly man, however, is one whose whole share is in this life. In the apostle’s words, he sets his "mind on earthly things."{Philippians 3:19} He loves these things. He chases them above all else. The parable draws this picture in the preceding words where the rich man rejoiced in his goods. He used every thought on them. He spent them on fleshly pleasure.

You see, then, that many people fall under the blame of the text who are not known as wicked. It is not only the rich man who cheats his brother. It is not only the merchant who carries false scales. It is not only the shopkeeper who praises bad goods with open lies so he can rob the buyer yet stay inside the law. It is not only the man who crushes the poor, or borrows what he knows he cannot pay or will not pay when he is able.

No. The honest dealer, the kind neighbor, the man who simply ignores God and the Lord Jesus Christ, the man who loves only today’s joys, the man who never asks how he can serve others here or find joy hereafter—he is the man who lays up treasure for himself. He is not rich toward God. We now move on,

III. To consider the great foolishness of people who live this way. Consider them next to those who are rich toward God, even if we picture the godly in the poorest conditions of life. It will then be clear that the godly are far wiser and far happier than the sharpest children of this world. The foolishness of the man who stores up treasure only for himself, in the way that was just described, will stand out if we face four plain facts. First, he never finds full joy in his goods while he owns them. Second, sudden accidents stand ready to rip them away. Third, he himself will soon and surely be torn from them. Fourth, in the world to come he will own nothing except stores of wrath. I wish to God that we all weigh these truths with care while we pause on each one for a few moments.

1. If you store up treasure only for yourselves, you will never find full joy in it while you hold it. Solomon states it plainly: "He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income."{Ecclesiastes 5:10} Check your own heart. Does your life not prove the same? If you were truly satisfied, why do you chase more day and night?

The rich man in the story promises himself the good life. Soul, take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. He can eat. He can drink. He can laugh. Yet will food, wine, and noise ever fill an immortal soul? It is a sad thing to be so lost in the body as to dream of nothing greater. If you do dream of something greater, do you think money can buy it?

Job speaks true of the wicked man: "In the fullness of his sufficiency he will be in distress."{Job 20:22} It is always so. The soul and this world’s pleasures do not fit. A man might as well try to feed hunger with a picture of bread or quiet thirst with a song. The Christian who is rich toward God finds sweet rest in Him. He speaks the way David did: "Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you."{Psalm 116:7}

Because God is his, he can open his mouth wide and God will fill it. He can stretch every desire to the limit and still find more than enough in God. His rock is not the rock of the wordly. We dare say it now, and you yourselves must judge. Yet we will drop this point. Suppose your taste is so ruined and the best parts of your soul so asleep that you could live on these things alone. Even then the case stands. Consider,

2. If you store up treasure only for yourselves, countless sudden dangers stand ready to rip it away. Anyone who has lived long enough knows the truth of Solomon’s words. Riches grow wings. They fly off like an eagle toward the sky.{Proverbs 23:5} Do you not see the power of his point? Why fix your eyes on what is not real? Why chase what barely exists at all?

Our Lord says moth and rust ruin such treasure. Thieves break in and steal.{Matthew 6:19} You know how fast it can vanish. A robber. A few failed debts. A storm at sea. Bad weather. Worst of all, a fire. In days, the rich man may lose almost everything. He may keep only the bare necessities of life. The apostle rightly calls them uncertain riches.{1 Timothy 6:17} Our Lord names them the "unrighteous wealth."{Luke 16:9}

The Christian, however, owns true riches. No man can steal his peace. No man can steal his wealth. He may lose every outward thing, just like others. Yet God, his greatest treasure, lives inside his soul. A man would have to tear him from himself before he could tear him from God. Suppose he lost all, like those brave believers who watched their goods taken away. He could still overflow with joy. He would know he has in heaven a better and lasting treasure.{Hebrews 10:34} Suppose he, like them, wandered in sheepskins and goatskins, in caves and holes in the ground. Though he owned nothing, he would possess all things. He could still cry out in the apostle’s victory, Who shall separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus? Yet one more thing. Suppose someone found a way to lock up wealth so no danger could touch it. Can life itself be locked up? This leads us to a third truth.

3. Even if you do keep your goods until the end, death will tear you from them fast and sure. What man lives and will not see it? The Psalmist says those who trust most in riches cannot pay to save their brother.{Psalm 49:7-8} They cannot save themselves from the grave. The cost of a life is too high. It stays forever out of reach. Those who gain wealth by wrong means have special reason to fear. God may strike them dead in the middle of their years. The prophet says, "He who gets riches but not by justice; in the midst of his days they will leave him, and at his end he will be a fool."{Jeremiah 17:11}

Yet even the honest man, like the rich man in the story, cannot hold his wealth with sure hands. Life itself is weak. It is a mist that appears for a moment and then is gone. How then can anything that belongs only to this life be safe?

Nothing is clearer. Every earthly thing must be left behind. "We brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world."{1 Timothy 6:7} When our soul is required, the life that was lent must be given back. What then are these things? What good do they do their owner in his last hour except make the leaving harder? When life ends, they end with it. When his glory is carried to the grave and the music stops, when his fine tomb is built, it only keeps the memory of empty riches alive. As long as stone lasts, it tells every passer-by that the wealth left its owner to rot close by. For all his show, he fell to ruin in a moment.{Job 21:23-26} Does this mean nothing to you? It is far different for the man who is rich toward God. His treasures live in his soul. They are safe in the unseen world. The blow that strips the Christian of his body and every outward comfort cannot touch this inner wealth that never dies. This will shine even clearer if we add

4. That if you store up treasure only on earth, nothing waits for you in the world to come except stores of wrath. You will lose every earthly comfort, as I said before. The Christian will lose them too. Yet when they fail, he will enter everlasting homes. If this earthly tent is destroyed, he has a building from God. It is a house not made with hands. It lasts forever in the heavens.

But what do you have? You will stand naked and alone. Earnestly consider, What will you do in the day of judgment? How sad for a soul to outlive all its joy! How far worse to be thrown into endless pain! That is the share you must expect.

God will one day force you to admit that the treasure you hoarded for yourselves was never yours. He will open the record of your stewardship. What answer will you give? Every gift you received will prove wasted. Every wasted gift will bring vengeance on your soul. When God judges your sins, your past plenty will only make the pain sharper. One thought will cut like a blade: Sinner, "remember that you in your lifetime received your good things."{Luke 16:25} The rust of your unused gold and silver will then eat your flesh like fire. You will see that you only grew fat for the day of slaughter.{James 5:5}

Will you not then look with rage and envy at the poorest Christian who steps into his endless reward? He wears an unfading kingdom. He rules a treasure in heaven that never fails and will outlast an immortal soul. Let us close with a few words of application.

IV. Consider the use we should make of these truths.

1. How wretched is the real state of many who believe they are the happiest people on earth. You have heard the living Wisdom of God call them fools. Judge for yourselves. Do not judge by outward looks. Judge with honest judgment. They stand on slippery ground. Ask if there is any reason to envy them. Ask if there is any reason to complain because we lack their plenty. The Christian would shrink back in horror from the mere idea of trading places with them.

2. How earnestly sinners ought to plead with God for a share in these better blessings. We should carefully examines ourselves to make sure that we do not belong among these unhappy creatures. Consider the doom of the wretched man in our text. What if that doom were yours? What if God should require your soul this very night? Who would manage your affairs tomorrow? Who would divide your estate? These are small questions. Here is the great one: where would your soul be?

When the spirit returns to God who gave it, when God reclaims that noble treasure he once lodged within you, what then? Go to your gods, Jehovah once said to Israel, and let them save you. Go to your riches, to your darling possessions, God may say then, and let them save you. How could you reach them? How could they help you?

Rather, if you have not already done so, run to God! Feel your desperate need of his favor. Seek it through Christ. You have many duties, but plainly: this is the one that must not wait. All else may be postponed without ruin; this cannot. May God grant us all the grace to feel its urgency.

3. The Christian ought to thank God deeply for these better riches. You have seen, at least in part, how precious they are. Do you owe them to your own sharp mind? Surely you can name some who lack them yet are just as clever in this world. If even earthly wealth, as Moses clearly says, cannot be grabbed by human power, how much less these heavenly treasures? What reason, then, to praise God who has turned your heart!

You who are poor, give thanks if you are rich in faith. You are heirs of the kingdom. God has promised that soon the scene will change. Need and pain will give way to endless joy and pleasure. This poor hut will become a shining throne.

Are you rich? What a sign of special grace that you are rich for both worlds! Our Lord has said that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Yet He adds that with God nothing is impossible.{Matthew 19:24; Mark 10:25; Luke 18:25} Praise His name that you stand as living proof of His grace.

Take care. Watch out that these earthly goods do not take too much of your thought and effort. Do not forget your heavenly birthright. Do not lose your eternal inheritance.

4. We all ought to burn with desire to grow this better treasure. We ought to store up more and more in heaven. Do we not have every reason to mourn our slow pace? If we are children of light, must we not admit that many children of this world are wiser in their own time than we are? Let us bow low before God. Let us pick up our speed.

And this duty ways all the more on those whom God has given much. Make friends for yourselves with the unrighteousness wealth. Spend your earthly wealth so that it truly builds your endless inheritance. Timothy was told to bind this on the hearts of the rich. Here are his exact words: "As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy."{1 Timothy 6:17}

May God, by the gentle power of His grace and Spirit, make every one of us wise for salvation. May He teach us to live above the world while we walk in it. Then, when the time comes to leave it, the change will bring no fear.

If God requires our souls tonight, we will lift our eyes and shout with full hearts, Welcome, death! Welcome, glory!