Luke 16:22-23
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-Let me encourage you to...
Turn QUICKLY back to Luke 16...
Follow along in your own Bibles.
We’re going to be...
...picking back up where we left off...
...in looking at the story of “The Rich Man and Lazarus”
And for sake of time...
I’m not going to say any more than that...
...by way of introduction this morning.
We’re just going to jump on in.
-Luke Chapter 16… Beginning in Verse 19...
And we’ll read the whole thing again...
(Down to verse 31)
Then we’ll ask for the Lord’s help.
This is his holy word:
19 “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.
20 And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores,
21 who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores.
22 The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried,
23 and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side.
24 And he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.’
25 But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish.
26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.’
27 And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house—
28 for I have five brothers—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.’
29 But Abraham said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.’
30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’
31 He said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.’ ”
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Pray
-Last week we spent our time in Verses 19-21.
They laid an important foundation for us...
...for everything that follows.
I think it will be worth...
(even our limited time this morning)
...to review them briefly.
Look at Verse 19:
19 “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.
So remember what this told us:
This man was fabulously wealthy
He lived a decadent and luxurious lifestyle
And my premise to you was, that...
...Jesus was making a connection between...
This Story
The warning up in Verse 13:
13 No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”
-Now, in Verses 20 & 21...
...a second man was introduced:
20 And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores,
21 who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores.
Lazarus was in the truest sense of the word, “pitiful”
Mike McKinley has this helpful, time-saving summary:
These men could not have been more different.
One was rich; the other was poor. One feasted while the other starved. One was clothed in purple; the other was covered in sores.
The nameless “rich man” was unconcerned to keep the law of God because he had enough money to meet all of his needs; the other man had nothing except a name, Lazarus, which means “God helps.”
But they did have one thing in common—the one thing that all human beings have in common: they died (v 22).
Their radically disparate lives came to an identical conclusion. They died and went to meet their eternal fate. — Mike McKinley
-And that's where things pick up in Verse 22:
But before we unpack it...
...let’s notice its bookends.
It illustrates what McKinley was talking about:
22 The poor man died . . . The rich man also died . . .
What happens to poor people...
...who have no support network?
They die!
What happens to wealthy people...
...who have...
The safest cars and houses
The best healthcare
Gym memberships
Can afford to eat organic foods?
Eventually...
They die too!
This is a good reminder, to us...
...of three important things:
#1 The Brevity of Life
#1 The Brevity of Life
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”—
14 yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.
#2 The Ultimate Futility of Mortal Saviors
#2 The Ultimate Futility of Mortal Saviors
3 Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.
Why?
4 When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish.
5 Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God,
That’s Lazarus!
#3. The Inevitability of Death and Judgment
#3. The Inevitability of Death and Judgment
27 ...it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
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We need to bear these three truths in mind...
As we consider wealth, and...
Our relationship to it...
Our relationship to those who possess it.
It is fleeting...
And it’s of no help or benefit to us...
...once we’ve come to the end of our earthly lives.
-But… let’s look back at verse 22...
...and consider the death of Lazarus.
22 The poor man died...
(Remember that the Pharisees...
...who were hearing this...
...would have probably assumed, that...
...this man’s condition was God’s judgment upon him...
...as an evil doer)
So, what he goes on to say...
...probably came as quite the surprise to them:
22 The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side...
So, the poor man’s earthly body...
...appears to have received little to no honor...
...upon its expiration.
No mention is made of a funeral service...
...or even a proper burial...
...or anything of that sort.
On the earth...
Lazarus most likely starves to death...
And no one even cares.
But remember that “Lazarus” meant:
“He Whom God Helps!”
I’m taking that as implying that...
...Jesus is portraying Lazarus as...
A man of faith!
A man who had rested his hope in the God of Abraham.
Remember what we read last week?
5 ...has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom...
It seems to me that the implication is...
...that Lazarus...
13 ...died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.
And that he...
16 ...desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one...
And since...
15 Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.
...when Poor Lazarus breathed his last...
...The God of Abraham immediately...
...dispatched his servants to bring him home.
Philip Ryken says:
The very moment Lazarus died, he was gathered into the arms of God’s angels. Then his name came fully, finally, and forever true: “God has helped.”
When there was no one else to help him, Lazarus was helped by almighty God, who rescued him from all his troubles and healed every wound of his broken body. Everyone else may have forgotten Lazarus, but he was remembered by God. — Ryken
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-Now, don’t overlook the significance of...
...the fact that Lazarus was taken to Abraham’s “bosom” or “side”
Do you remember the...
...”Parable of the Wedding Feast” in Chapter 14?
Do you remember where...
...the place of highest honor was?
Right beside the host!
So, here’s this idea of an eternal heavenly banquet...
And Abraham...
The father of the Jews
The Patriarch of Israel
The Progenitor of the whole nation
The man to whom the promises had been made
The man whom Romans 4 describes as...
11 ...the father of all who believe...
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And he’s seated at the center of the table...
And Lazarus, who, on earth...
...while dwelling among the physical descendants of Abraham, was...
Homeless
Neglected
Despised...
Was brought by the angels of God...
...and placed at the seat of highest honor!
His earthly situation...
...was completely reversed in heaven.
Why… How?
Grace and Faith
GOD helped him!
(Can you imagine how the Pharisees...
...would have reacted to this?)
-Alright, let’s read on in Verse 22:
Back on earth, The Rich Man...
...seems to have fared a lot better...
...in his death.
Here’s why I say that:
22 ...The rich man also died and was buried,
I’m guessing that the idea here is, that...
...he was buried with honor and dignity...
...and his financial beneficiaries...
...made a great fuss over his earthly body.
But, that was the last benefit...
...that he was ever to derive...
...from the master to whom, and for whom...
...he had committed the entirety of his earthly life.
Gold was this man’s help and hope...
Not God
And Gold, which seems almost OMNIPOTENT...
...here on the earth, in our present lives...
Has no power whatsoever...
...in or over, the life to come!
-Look at Verse 23:
The Rich Man’s reception into the afterlife...
...was very different.
He too, experienced a complete reversal.
He was carried somewhere else.
He awoke, not to the grand banquet of the redeemed...
But...
23 ...in Hades, being in torment...
So again, we see an absolute reversal.
He went from experiencing every earthly comfort...
...to being in conscious torment.
Do you think this would have...
...come as a surprise...
to him?
To the Pharisees who were listening to it?
I think so
He probably had a fine Jewish pedigree.
His prosperity was probably seen...
...as God’s stamp of approval on his life.
-Now, I think we need to be cautious...
...as to how much literalism...
...we try to impose on these next few verses.
This story is (I think) meant to be a parable.
So we need to be more concerned with...
...the point that it’s making...
...than we are trying to figure out what it tells us...
...about the geography of heaven and hell.
Just like the “being carried by angels to Abraham’s side”...
...in the previous verse . . .
...doesn’t need to be absolutized and universalized...
(Think about what that would imply if so)
I think that when people try to do that, here...
They come to positions that...
...are hard to harmonize with...
...clearer teachings of Scripture, elsewhere.
So, in what follows, let’s be careful...
...to not miss the forest for the trees.
(I think you’ll see why I say that...
...in just a minute when we read on)
-But, that being said...
...let’s do talk about the Rich Man’s location.
The ESV translated (really transliterated) the Greek word as...
23 and in Hades, being in torment...
You may have a translation...
...that uses the word “hell” . . .
(Though I think that can be a little misleading)
(In modern translations, the word gehenna...
...is what’s usually translated as “hell”)
Hades, seems to me...
...to be a much less precise word than gehenna.
It is the Greek equivalent...
...of the OT Hebrew word “Sheol”
The realm/region/sphere of the dead.
As such, it’s often used almost synonymously with death:
For example, Peter supplants it for Sheol...
...when he quotes Psalm 16:10 on the day of Pentecost:
27 For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, or let your Holy One see corruption.
There it basically means death
Death wouldn’t keep its hold on the Messiah
He would be released from it.
How do I Know that?
31 he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.
That doesn’t mean that Jesus went to hell...
But simply that he was given over to death!
But not for long! (Why ?)
Amen?
Similarly:
18 ...I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.
-But, so that it won’t be too simple...
...we also have hades used:
As the antithesis of heaven
As being distinct from eternal hell (as we conceive of it)
Let me show you those two quickly:
15 And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You shall be brought down to Hades.
Though, that could just be a metonymy for its final destruction
13 And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged...
14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.
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-So, “hades” was a broad term in some ways.
2 Things seem clear enough, though:
1.) It was associated with the state of death...
...and the intermediate state...
2.) It wasn’t a state or place...
...that anyone desired to be in.
-So, how does all of that...
...help us with our text?
A.) I think it helps us to see that it was...
...intended to be understood as a parable.
It’s just about impossible to...
...make a consistent cosmology or eschatology from it.
B.) It helps us to better understand...
...the contrast between the two men.
Think about what this commentary says:
Believer’s Bible Commentary X. The Rich Man and Lazarus (16:19–31)
It must have come as a shock to the disciples when Jesus said that this rich Jew went to Hades.
Believer’s Bible Commentary X. The Rich Man and Lazarus (16:19–31)
They had always been taught from the OT that riches were a sign of God’s blessing and favor. An Israelite who obeyed the Lord was promised material prosperity. How then could a wealthy Jew go to Hades
Indeed, I think Jesus was intending...
...to shock his hearers!
-Alright, let’s read on.
The Shocking reversal of...
...the two men’s fortunes...
...only gets worse:
23 and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham...
Well Alright! … It’s father Abraham!
Perhaps there’s hope?!?
Abraham is the one through whom...
...the Rich Man presumes...
...to be connected to God.
It’s his physical descent from him...
...that he would have been relying on...
...to put him in a favorable position with God.
But...
23 ...he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off...
Guys, if Abraham was at the center of the banquet...
Then this man...
wasn’t even seated at the table!
He’s not even in the dining room.
He’s not even in the same house!
What’s the point?
He has no part in the blessings of Abraham!
But guess who does?
23 ...he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side.
“He whom God had helped”...
Not the one whom gold had helped...
The one who depended on Grace and Faith...
He was the one seated next to Abraham!
He was the one who...
...would share in the blessings of Abraham.
And brethren, that may have come...
...as a surprise to the Pharisees...
...but it shouldn’t come...
...as a surprise to us!
Why?
Because the Word of God is very clear on that:
There are short, powerful affirmations of that, like:
28 For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical.
29 But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God.
13 For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith.
But, I love Paul’s treatise on the subject in Philippians 3.
(Brothers, could you distribute the elements...
...while we’re reading through this?)
He begins with a warning:
2 Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh.
3 For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh—
4 though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more:
5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee;
6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.
7 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ.
8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ
9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—
10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,
11 that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
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Do you see the reversal in that?
We are called to release all other hopes.
We are called to put away all other masters.
We MAY be called to forsake:
Money
Notoriety
Friendships
Earthly Pleasures
Things we’ve worked hard to accumulate...
We MAY be called on to do that...
We may lose EVERY earthly advantage...
...for the sake of following Christ.
But, you know what?
That’s okay.
It really is.
When we close our eyes in death...
Even if we have to do it in earthly desolation...
We’ll gain Christ!
We’ll awake, not just in the bosom of Abraham...
But in the bosom of Abraham’s Lord and Master.
We’ll be seated at the table of Christ!
-And The Lord’s Supper reminds us...
...of how/why that is true:
Because: “God was our help”
He provided what was necessary for our salvation...
...that we, like Lazarus, had to have...
...but could never produce:
Perfect Righteousness
Forgiveness of Sins.
How did he do that?
Through the body and blood of Christ!
Amen?
Let’s remember what he said:
19 And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”
Pray and Partake
27 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you,
28 for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
Pray and Partake
Amen!
Remember:
26 ...as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
Amen!
Maranatha!
