Certain Comfort

God, Alone, Is The Source of All Comfort

8.7.22 [Luke 16:19-31] River of Life (9th Sunday after Pentecost)

If you don’t listen carefully, you’re bound to make crucial mistakes. It’s a lesson we’ve all already learned the hard way and are likely to learn again in the not-too-distant future. It’s true in marriage and in parenting. It’s true in finances and fitness. It’s true in relationships with friends and in business dealings. If you don’t listen carefully, you’re bound to have flawed assumptions; make crucial mistakes, and look pretty foolish.

As we tackle the spiritual story Jesus tells today, it’s important that we listen carefully. Not because the story is unfamiliar, but maybe more so because it is so familiar. If we only casually listen to this story, we might walk away thinking that Jesus is teaching us that every dog will have its day. Rich people are going to struggle in the afterlife and people that struggle in this life are going to be richly rewarded. Or maybe what goes around comes around. If you disregard or degrade those in need, no one will help you when you're in need. Or perhaps we think Jesus is teaching us that money is the root of all evil through the plight of this rich fellow.

If we don’t listen carefully, we’re bound to make crucial mistakes. If Jesus’ point were every dog has its day, or what goes around comes around, or that money is the root of all evil, the story would end at Luke 16:25 Rich man, you had your good life and Lazarus had it bad. Now the tables have turned. But it doesn’t end there. Jesus has more to say, more to show us. Of all the moral lessons we came up with, the last one is probably closest to the truth. Only if we listen more carefully.

The Bible doesn't says Money is the root of all evil. (1 Tim. 6:10) For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith & pierced themselves with many griefs. Passion for prosperity, a deep desire for dollars, or an infatuation with affluence leads many who think they’re doing just fine spiritually, to wander from the faith & make crucial mistakes. We see that.

Through this story Jesus reveals 3 things for us. 1) God sees everything that goes on in this world—and in our hearts. 2) God will set everything right. 3) God is the source of all comfort—on earth and in heaven.

God sees what goes on in this world and in our hearts. What we see in this story is a tale of two disgusting individuals. One man is disgustingly rich, self-absorbed, self-indulgent, and disgustingly selfish. The rich man’s home is so palatial it needs (Lk 16:20) its own gate. He dresses in (Lk. 16:19) purple, like royalty. Even his skivvies are expensive white linen. Every meal was a decadent feast. This rich man lived (Lk. 16:19) in luxury every day like Emperor Caligula. His opulent lifestyle disgusts us.

Outside his gate was a second disgusting man, (Lk. 16:20) a beggar named Lazarus. He was covered with sores, likely crippled, & quickly running out of time. (Lk 16:20) Perhaps friends who could not help him anymore deposited him outside the rich man’s gate. Or maybe, as happens today, he was relocated by those who considered his presence a burden.

Whoever put Lazarus there likely figured the rich guy, who hosts the big parties in town, would help Lazarus out. But they were wrong. Despite proximity to aid, poor Lazarus' condition deteriorated. The rich man, his affluent party guests, and nearly everyone else ignored Lazarus. (Lk. 16:21) Even the dogs came and licked his sores. That may seem like a silver lining to Lazarus’ dark cloud. But these weren’t man’s best friends. These were (1 Kings 21:19) blood-thirsty mutts. Their tongues weren’t cleansing his wounds, but likely causing poor, hungry, crippled Lazarus’ wounds to fester and contract new diseases. These unclean canines also made Lazarus unclean, so people had fine-sounding reasons to ignore him.

But God saw everything. And in death, God set everything right, as only he can do. Lazarus was comforted in heaven and the rich man was in torment in hell. In hell, the rich man finally feels the pangs of suffering. He begs his father Abraham to send Lazarus (Lk. 16:24) to show him mercy.

The irony is thick. And it makes us more gleeful than we care to admit aloud. This rich guy, who once couldn’t spare a morsel for a man dying at his own gate, is now begging that same man (Lk. 16:24) to dip the tip of his finger in water to cool his tongue a little bit. This punishment feels more than a bit satisfying. Until we see what Jesus is showing us.

After Abraham explains the impossible nature of the rich man’s request, the rich man proposes something new. He wants to spare his 5 brothers this torment. (Lk. 16:27-28) Let Lazarus warn them, he begs. (Lk. 16:30) If Lazarus comes back from the dead, they will repent.

Warn them of what, exactly? Did they need to repent for being rich?

Of course not! Abraham was a rich man. Nowhere in Genesis does he repent of being rich. This rich man recognized his brothers needed to repent of serving money and despising God and his Word. They’d been serving the wrong master and God knew their hearts.

This is where we need to listen carefully. If only exposing the sin of serving money were as easy to spot as the rich man’s ostentatious wardrobe. If only we could distill it down to a certain tax bracket, or zip code, or if you wore a certain clothing label or drove a certain kind of car or carried a certain purse. It would be easy for us to identify and deal with. But God doesn’t do that for us.

You know why? If God told us here’s the line, human nature would spend right up to that amount, before taxes. We’d be obeying with our ledgers, but our hearts would be far from him. Our actions wouldn’t be about serving God, they’d be about staying off his radar. Think about how much time and energy we put into making sure we get every tax break we can. You don’t think you’d put in more work to stay out of hell? Of course you would!

But you wouldn’t be doing it because you love God anymore than you pay your taxes because you love your government. That’s not what God wants. (2 Cor. 9:7) God loves cheerful givers. He wants us to be generous not because we will be punished if we aren’t, but because we recognize how generous he has been with us.

All the wealth, the fine clothes and food, & the temporal comforts the rich man received in his lifetime came from God. (James 1:17) Every good and perfect gift comes from above. The rich man was fabulously wealthy because God was fabulously generous and loving. But the rich man misconstrued that as proof that he was doing pretty well. He did not understand that (Mt 5:45) God sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous alike. So as God’s gifts stacked up, he sought out more and new ways to delight himself, rather than meet the needs of the man dying at his gate. In the end, the rich man was condemned to hell, not because he was self-indulgent & didn't help Lazarus, but because his heart was self-idolatrous, and he did not believe his help came from the Lord.

This is testimony of Moses and the Prophets and of the Old & New Testaments. Over and over again, the Lord our God shows us that it is very nature to be generous and gracious. The God who is love loves to bless his creation. And he is patient. He doesn’t shut off the tap of his love when we are wasteful or selfish or even anxious. He blesses us beyond what we deserve because that is his nature.

So what about Lazarus? It seems like the good guy struggled & suffered far beyond what was right. As we read this story, we know we don’t want to end up in agony like the rich man. But we don’t want to be Lazarus either. Who wants to be deposited at a gate, covered in sores, hungry and thirsty, and surrounded by filthy animals? Even if we were told this were the only way to get to heaven, there is a part of us that would still be reluctant.

But that is precisely what the Son of God did for us. Consider all he left behind in heaven—heaven's honor, glory, and wealth.

It’s hard for us to even begin to comprehend, but have you ever stayed at a crummy hotel? Maybe the pictures online seemed fine, or you recognized the hotel chain, or you blindly snagged what you thought was a great deal. Then you show up. And it is gross. Seamy. Bugs creep and crawl all over your room. And you can find their ancestors, too. The clientele is sleazy. You would get out of that squalor as fast as you could and never go back, right?

As the eternal Son of God, Jesus was accustomed to a certain standard of living for eternity. Perfection surrounded him all the time. But he left all that behind for us. He was laid in a feeding trough & wrapped in whatever cloth scraps Mary and Joseph could find.

During his life on earth, he had no material wealth. No fancy horse or vacation home. Jesus was totally dependent on others to support him. (Lk. 9:58) The Son of Man had no place to lay his head.

In his final days, he was despised by nearly all the rich & powerful. Those who could've saved him refused to get their hands dirty. He was beaten and abused. The crowds reveled in his suffering. He was sub-human to them—(Ps. 22:6) a worm, not a man. (Ps. 22:16) At the end, the dogs surrounded him. Villains encircled him and pierced his hands and feet. (Ps. 22:15) His thirsty tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. He was covered with our shame and guilt. Our festering sins were placed upon him so that we could be healed. He bore our sins so that we might be carried to heaven. Eternal comfort comes at a tremendous cost. And God gives it freely to you and me, to all who believe in his Son as their Savior.

God is the true source of all comfort—temporal and eternal. There may be times where our lives feel closer to Lazarus’ than the rich man. In those moments, we cling to God’s promise that (Rom. 8:32) he who did not spare his own Son will graciously give us all that we need for our bodies and life until he bears us home to heaven.

But for most of us, for most of our days, we live far more like the rich man than poor Lazarus. We have many fine clothes, more food than we can eat, & live comfortable lives. God has been very generous. So as his children we are to be generous, too. God has given us deeper pockets than we deserve. Our pockets are to be holy and holey—freely shared with those who are in need around us. Our material goods are not our masters, they are gifts, tools, & resources from our Master who has richly lavished his love upon us. Amen.