Stewarding Eternal Wealth — Luke 15-16

0:33 Good morning. Good morning. I'm gonna go ahead and open up with a word of prayer. Dear Lord, I wanna thank you so much for the opportunity to come here this morning and and preach your word. Pray that the words that I have would be a word from you, oh Lord, that the people who hear would would find wisdom in it and that they would find it applicable to their life and that they would be convicted by it.

0:55 I also wanna pray that the words of my mouth would be pleasing to you, oh lord. As we thank you so much for the gift of life that you've given us that we have been redeemed from death and that we no longer have to face the the the fear of hell because of the sacrifice of your son and we pray this in your name. Amen. Now I may not look like a middle aged Mexican man right now but I do want to say that I am taking my inspiration for today's message from Ray and that I'm going to try to get through a whole chapter as efficiently as possible. Also taking inspiration from Ray talking about stewardship of resources, another one he is passionate about.

1:33 And it kind of happened by accident because you know the old expression like your eyes are bigger than your stomach and then you take on a lot and then you realize this is too much. You put too much on your plate and then you have to try and eat it all and it's hard to finish. And so we are going to try to finish today. But today we are talking about Luke chapter 16. And for those who are taking notes and want a quick simple message and for those who are going to be posting this, the title would be Stewarding Eternal Wealth.

1:59 It is the topic of most of this chapter and it is all interconnected. But before I get too far into the chapter, it's important to talk about some of the background that is present here. Who is the audience that Jesus is talking to here? It's a continuation of the conversation that was started in Luke chapter 15 where Jesus was with the tax collectors and sinners. And then the pharisees came up and said why are you with these sinners?

2:25 And then that's where the book of... Or chapter Luke 15 is about with the parable of the lost coin, the lost sheep, and the prodigal son saying Jesus talking about how just the value of one sinner coming to repentance is so important to him. And that alone as Christian said last week was worth it for him to come and die on the cross for us. And what an amazing gift we have through that. His disciples were also present with him.

2:47 And that is who the beginning of this chapter is originally directed to. It says at the first phrase, he also said to his disciples. So that is who the first part is being communicated to. When is this happening? This is happening towards the end of his earthly ministry.

3:03 He's making his final journey from Galilee to Jerusalem before the eventual crucifixion. It's a long meandering journey but that's where he's at on his journey. And I'm going to start off by reading the first part of this passage. The first section is this parable of the shrewd steward which at first glance seems a little off putting. It doesn't seem right.

3:24 But I'm going to read it and then we'll kind of look at it and see what the meaning of this parable is here. So starting off in verse one. He also said to his disciples, there was a certain rich man there was a certain rich man who had a steward and an accusation was brought to him that this man was wasting his goods. So he called him and said to him, what is this I hear about you? Give an account of your stewardship for you can no longer be steward.

3:51 Then the steward said within himself, what shall I do? For my master is taking away the stewardship away from me. I cannot dig. I am ashamed to beg. I have resolved what to do that when I am put out of the stewardship that they may receive me into their houses.

4:06 So he called every one of his master's debtors to him and said to the first, how much do you owe my master? And he said, a 100 measures of oil. So he said to him, take your bill and sit down quickly and write 50. Then he said to another, how much do you owe? So he said, a 100 measures of wheat.

4:24 And he said to him, take your bill and write 80. So the master commended the unjust steward because he had dealt shrewdly. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in their generation than the sons of light. At first glance it looks like the master is commending the steward for unjust dealings. But we'll see as we go through why that that is not the case in this passage.

4:47 So first off you see that the accusation was brought against the steward of his mismanagement of resources. And this accusation turned out to be correct. He was in fact not good at his job. He's given notice that he's getting the boot. He's out of there.

5:00 And so his thought is how do I fix this? And he said I am too old or he said I cannot dig and I am too ashamed to beg. Now you could infer laziness here on the part of not wanting to work which is the physical occupation of digging. And you could infer pride by saying I don't want to bag. But another way to look at it is that this steward had been working his whole life and he is coming towards the end of his life when this accusation is brought against him.

5:29 He is too physically unfit based on his age to dig and find an occupation that to provide for himself. And he is too ashamed to beg because this man should have been working his whole life putting away funds providing for his retirement. And how embarrassing is it to be as an old man on the street begging for your pittance after what should have been a good career. So he comes up with this plan. He is going to talk to the debtors and use his last vestige of authority that he has to cut their debts and thereby gain some favor with them so they would potentially take care of them.

6:04 Now he is acting shrewdly here because this man was not for the intents of this parable a Christian. The only thing he is looking towards is the things of this world. He is looking towards his retirement. What happens when he can no longer... When his work here is finished.

6:20 And so he is looking to do whatever it takes for him to store up that retirement for his future. So when he approaches these debtors he gives them significant discounts. And some people would say that it was not just a one time discount but it was like a permanent decrease on their own, what they owe to the master. So it would be like a rent payment. So it's like it has like reoccurring effects throughout time.

6:46 So it's actually a significant chunk that he's actually cutting their bill. And he's not doing it by a little bit either because it says that what they owed was a 100 measures of oil. A 100 measures of oil is about 3,000 liters or 900 gallons. It is a significant amount that he is saving them. And a 100 measures of wheat is about 30 tons.

7:09 So a good chunk of wheat as well and he is just chopping a good percentage of that off the top. Now when the master commenced the steward for his shrewd dealings it does seem antithetical to the Christian view. Is he not stealing from the master? Is he not taking his goods and giving it to and taking away his goods from him? But he knows what lies ahead and he's preparing as best as he can in the only way that he knows how.

7:55 And so our purpose here is not to store up treasures on earth but to store up treasures in heaven. And how are we being shrewd in our dealings now with the resources God has given us to store up the treasures in heaven as he has commanded us. Now the things of this world are temporary. They all fade away. The money you get none of this can be taken away with you.

8:18 But the things that you store up in heaven last forever. And this is why it is important to keep that focus because it has eternal value. Now a good passage that summarizes this is from Matthew six verse 19 through 21. And it says, do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moths and vermin destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven where moths and vermin do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal.

8:45 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And I think that's the key verse here is for where your treasure is there your heart will be also. Is your treasure being stored up in heaven? Is that your focus? Is that your primary goal?

8:58 Or is it being stored up here on earth? Where is your heart attitude? Where is your motivation? Now the gains of this world are flawed. Money loses value.

9:06 There are a lot of complexities in the value of this world. There's interest. There's loans. There's taxes. There's depreciation.

9:13 There's appreciation. Everything has these different things. Mean the value of a dollar when my grandmother was younger is a lot more than it is today. I mean she would work to pick berries for 5¢ a quart. Most of us would not even stop to pick 5¢ off the ground.

9:27 So we see how the value changes of these different things. But the gain in heaven is straight forward. There is a straight one to one exchange rate. It never depreciates. It never loses its value.

9:38 Now the best way I can think of this is of that feeling of a small child receiving a dollar bill. Now you give a dollar to a child. He is receiving a dollar. It is all he is thinking about. And it seems like so much money to him.

9:52 He's not thinking about taxes. He's not thinking about the fact that a year from now his dollar is only going be worth 90¢. He is seeing the value of the dollar and what it is worth to him. And I think that this is a great picture of, and I think we have a picture of how much a child values a dollar. Here we see a small child who Levi Westcott, most of you are familiar with him.

10:15 At VBS this year, Logan and Ryan were teaching the smaller class with Jenna. And for the kids who listened well, they would give him a dollar. And this was big for the kids. Big incentive. And you can see how much he treasures this dollar bill.

10:28 He's sleeping with it, clasping it in his hand. Do we have the same value in the treasures that we are storing up in heaven? Is this how we are looking forward to these treasures that we are storing? Is this the same value that we should be placing on our actions now to attain that, to have that feeling, that sense of satisfaction and equipping what we have? Because we have been given a lot of resources in this world.

10:51 We have been blessed by the Lord and all of it comes from the Lord. None of it is ours. We have the physical resources that he has given us and it's important to be shrewd with those dealings as well. But we have been given another resource that we must be shrewd with how we are stewarding it and that is the gift of life and salvation through the gospel. We've been given the gospel as this incredible resource.

11:13 We've been blessed for those who are saved. We've given eternal life and we are commanded to pass it on. And we have been given a reward for sharing the gospel to others. The Lord says go into all the world and preach the gospel and by saving souls you are laying up treasures not in this world but in the next. What are we waiting for?

11:31 Like what is preventing us from doing this? It's so easy to get bogged down in the things of this world that we are constantly focused on the monies of this world and treasures here that we lose sight of what really matters. But you will see by the actions of what people do where their heart is and where their treasure is. It says in Matthew seven that by their fruits you shall know them. And I want to be the first one to point the finger at myself to know that I struggle tremendously in this area.

11:58 Am I doing the things today that hold eternal value or temporary value? And I think this is the purpose of the shrewd steward because he had his end sight in mind and he prepared as best as he could with all of his might for that. And we have as Christians our own end goal in mind. And how are we preparing for that? Are we doing everything we can to lay up as much treasure in heaven?

12:55 And if you've not been faithful in what is another man's, who will give you what is your own? No servant can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Now again from the first verse here it sounds like you are buying friends in this world with your unrighteous mammon but that is not at all what it is saying.

13:17 What you are doing is you are stewarding the physical resources that God has given you by giving to others. God provides through people who rely on him in faith but a lot of that requires financial resources to buy Bibles, to provide tracts, to provide all these different resources that do require money. Now I think of the example of somebody like Jake Nicholson who lives by faith in Mississippi doing tremendous work for the Lord there and he lives in faith. And there's so many miraculous stories he can tell of him needing a certain sum of money and then the next day he'll pray for it and then literally as soon as he needs it God will provide a check-in the mail. But that check came from somebody else who was being a good steward of the resources God has given them and they didn't even know at that time what it was being used for but they felt convicted and they shared their resources.

14:02 And that is the friends that we are gaining through the unrighteous man of this world. Because when we get to heaven we might run into somebody who says you do not know this but you gave $25 to this person on this day and through that I was able to hear the gospel where I otherwise would not have heard it and I was saved. And this is how we can gain the eternal friends of fellow believers in Christ in heaven through the stewardship of our resources. Now we see in North Carolina right now this tragedy Hurricane Helene that went through damaging hundreds of thousands of lives. And you have incredible organizations down there like Samaritan's Purse who are based out in North Carolina.

14:38 And they are helping out tens of thousands of people down there. They are preaching the gospel. The word is going out in tremendous fashion right now. And they are able to do this because in 2023 they raised $1,300,000,000 in donations which is a large chunk of change. I do not have $1,300,000,000 I'm pretty sure most of you don't have $1,300,000,000 And so it can feel like in comparison to that what am I actually doing?

15:01 But part of being a good steward is not how much you raise or how much you can give. It's about being a steward with what God has given you. I mean you see this in the peril of the talents as One is given one, one is given two, one is given five. They are all given different amounts but they all have to give an account for what they have been given. And we see a great example of this in Acts chapter 11.

15:22 And my grandma actually pointed me out to this week and I didn't even... She didn't even realize it but it was going to be coming up in the sermon as an example. And it says, during this time some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. One of them named Agabus stood up and through the spirit predicted a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. This happened during the reign of Claudius.

15:42 The disciples as each one was able decided to provide help for the brothers and sisters living in Judea. This they did by sending their gifts to the elders by Barnabas and Saul. And the important point here is giving as they were able. That is what being a good steward is. It's not about how much.

15:57 It's not about this large amount of money that you're giving. It's not about the tax write offs. It's about God giving you resources and then as you are able and as you are convicted giving out of that out of that amount to help others. Now another thing we need to be careful of in in our stewardship of our physical resources is there is a right way to give and a wrong way to give. And it talks about this in Matthew six verses one through four where it says, be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them.

16:25 If you do, you will have no reward from your father in heaven. So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets as to the hypocrites do in as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets to be honored by others. Truly I tell you they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that your giving may be in secret. Then your father who sees in secret will reward you.

16:49 So another practical application of when you're giving do not flaunt it because when you're doing that where is your heart attitude? Are you looking to raise like to gain eternal treasures in heaven or are you looking to gain the praise of man? So that is an important thing to keep in consideration. To give quietly and without anybody knowing. Now we come to verse 11 through 13 here where it talks about being faithful in what is least and if you will do this you will be given much.

17:20 And the least here is the money of this world because the money of this world is fading temporary. There's no value in it beyond what is here today. And I think it was Chris Schroeder who told the story of the man who all his life like collected his gold and then asked the favor of God if he can bring one thing to heaven with him and he shows up to heaven at the pearly gates and he's got this suitcase in his hand and then Saint Peter's like what you got there? And he's like check it out, I saved my whole life and I got all this gold. How cool is that?

17:44 And then Saint Peter was like great, you brought more paving bricks. Like An inestimable amount of wealth is the road in heaven. It is worth nothing. So it's important to be faithful in what is least here, the things of this world, and we will be faithful in what is much which is the eternal value that we have in heaven. Now the Pharisees heard this and what is their response?

18:24 They saw their job as an occupation to garner as much wealth as they could. They chose their profession to get rich perverting the role that they were supposed to be filling. But it is important because God knows the heart. Even though they were giving large amounts of money because in the Hebrew law you were required to give the tithe, the 10%. And they were giving that 10% and they were right down the line that 10%.

18:51 They were dialed in on that. They would give a 10% of their herbs, 10% of everything they had. But they did it not to be charitable but to strictly follow the law and to show how righteous they were. Their heart was in the wrong place. And God saw that and their their giving was not blessed because of this.

19:08 They were spiritual adulterers and liars. And dare I say it, they were like whitewashed tombs. Well, Jesus said it, not me. In Matthew 23 verse 27, he says, you are whitewashed tombs where you look great on the outside, but on the inside, you're spiritually dead. It's God who sees the thoughts of your mind and your hearts.

19:25 You can hide a lot of things up from your fellow man. It's easy to show up on a Sunday where everything looks great but there's a lot of dirt from the week that needs cleaning up. So it's important to to do what you do out of a heart of service to the Lord. Now in verse 16 through 18 we read a passage that feels like it doesn't really fit with the rest of this chapter. And it says, the law and the prophets were until John.

19:48 Since that time the kingdom of God has been preached and everyone is pressing into it. And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tittle of the law to fail. Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. And whoever marries her who is divorced from her husband commits adultery. And this is another one of those times where I'm taking inspiration from Ray.

20:08 There's a lot to dig into on this passage but I'm going to try to keep the main focus the main focus and and keep keep on moving through. But the important thing here is Jesus is proclaiming the kingdom of God. The Pharisees should have been rejoicing in this. They were the ones who knew the old testament back and forth and they were waiting for the long awaited coming of the of the Messiah, of the kingdom of God to be at hand. And they should no longer have to wait.

20:30 But the opposite was true now. They were deriding him. They were angry at him. They wanted to kill him and the law had passed away. It says in John one seventeen, for the law was given through grace of Moses but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

20:44 The law had been in effect since time of Moses and the transition from that to the kingdom of God was not a painless transition because the law was so set in stone. It was such a fixed entity in the culture. The word press here is actually in the Greek where we get the word agonizing. Where it was painfully people breaking down barriers entering into the kingdom of God. And the barriers that needed to be broken down were the restrictions that had been extra placed by the pharisees on the law.

21:13 It wasn't the law itself but all these extra layers surrounding it that needed to be broken down and people saw though the truth of God and his son and were still breaking through these barriers to press into the kingdom of God. Now in verse 17 Jesus is clarifying though that even though the kingdom of God is here that does not mean that the law is no longer in effect. The teaching of the law were still moral and applicable and should be followed. But Jesus is saying that the Pharisees had distorted it for their own benefit. And this is where we get to verse 18, this verse about divorce that feels out of place.

21:48 Because Jesus is driving the point home that you claim to be righteous. You claim to follow the law, you put up all these extra things but just this basic precept to the God he laid forth of setting up the covenant of marriage and saying this is good and this is how I want it to be. And yet the Pharisees were distorting and perverting marriage and making divorce a rampant issue in that time to the point where it was similar to how the levels of divorce could be looked at today. There was a rabbi that was very popular at that time and his name was Rabbi Hillel and his teaching was that as if your wife was unclean you could put her away for divorce. Now in the Old Testament that had different meaning associated with it.

22:28 But Rabbi Hillel said she makes your food bad too many times unclean put her away. She does your laundry wrong, she folds the clothes wrong unclean put her away. And so the divorce rate was skyrocketing at this time. And Jesus was saying, you claim to follow the law. You set up all these different extracurricular rules that you claim to follow so you can justify your own actions.

22:48 So you can justify in your heart that you look good and that you are right. But in reality you're not even following the basic precepts that were set forth. What are you doing here? Because it says in Malatai, psalm 16, for the Lord God of Israel says that he hates divorce for it covers one's garment with violence says the Lord of hosts. Therefore take heed to your spirit that you do not deal treacherously.

23:09 The Pharisees had the words of the prophet. They knew that they were doing wrong and Jesus was making the point as clear as possible that even though they had this thought that they were in the kingdom of God and that they were holy they were not and they were missing the point based on their own criteria of the law. Now we come to the second half of this passage which is the story of the rich man and Lazarus. And it was told as a story not as a parable. Some people think it's a parable.

23:54 But there was a certain bagger named Lazarus full of sores who was laid at his gate desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table. Moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. So it was that that the bagger died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And being in torment and Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom.

24:21 Then he cried and said, father Abraham have mercy on me and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue for I am being tormented by this flame. But Abraham said, son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things and likewise Lazarus evil things. And now he is comforted and you are tormented. And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed so that those who want to that those who want to pass from here to there cannot nor can those from there pass to us. Then he said, I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father's house.

24:58 For I have five brothers that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment. And Abraham said to him, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. And he said, no, father Abraham, but if one goes to them from the dead, will repent. But he said to him, if they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded that one rise from the dead.

25:22 A very sobering passage to look at for sure. Here we see the stark reality of the consequences of your lifetime of actions played out in real time in a very stark description. And there is again a lot of things to be bogged down in here. There is a lot of different points to get into and I highly recommend you take time to go through some of these points and study them in your own time. More about the concept of Hades.

25:46 Some of the gulf between it. Some of the realities of how things will look like in the afterlife. But don't have time today so for the sake of brevity we are going to keep moving through this story. And before we get through the rest of this I do want to make a point clear that the rich man was not in hell simply because he was rich. Neither was the poor man in the place of comfort because he was poor.

26:05 We are given these details to accentuate the point but obviously Lazarus had to have been saved and the rich man was not. So I just want to make that clear upfront that it is not money that got him into this place specifically but it was in fact his own selfish actions which we will look at later. Now verses 19 through 21 we see how the rich man thought only of his own welfare with his money. He had no concern with other people, with the people around him that he could have assisted. It says that he was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day.

26:36 This man was living a life of excess. He had people around him. He had Lazarus at his gate who he could have helped for. It says Lazarus was longing for just a scrap from his table. But the rich man never gave it.

26:46 He was so focused on his own needs. He was so selfish. And this is what I would assume was his fatal sin was that his own selfishness, his desire for more wealth as opposed to being a good steward of the resources God had given him and helping others. And you know that he knew who Lazarus was based on later in the story when he was able to recognize Lazarus at Abraham's side. So he knew the plight of the beggar.

27:09 He knew who he was and still in this instance chose not to assist him. We come to verse twenty two and twenty three and we see how both of them died and we see the stark difference in reality where one was carried to Abraham's bosom, which for the Hebrews at the time would have been the pace of bliss. This is what they are looking forward to when they are rejoined with patriarchs and the other Christians in heaven. And we see how one is sent to a place of torment. And to briefly summarize from my own understanding and from my own research, a real quick summary of what's happening here and anybody can feel free to comfort me or correct me if they feel like I am saying something wrong.

27:48 So please speak up now if I am saying something wrong. But from my understanding and research before the resurrection of Christ the souls of the dead were sent to Hades or Sheol. And there, for lack of a better term, they are split into two different areas. There is a place of comfort and a place of torment. And this was based on their faith in God, which area they were sent to.

28:09 After the resurrection, the souls of the unbelievers are still sent to Hades in awaiting the great white throne judgment. But as believers our souls are sent to be directly with Christ in heaven. And we see this played out in Philippians one twenty one through 23 where it says, For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain. But if I live on in the flesh this will mean fruit for my labor. Yet what I shall choose I cannot tell.

28:33 For I am hard pressed between the two having a desire to depart and be with Christ which is far better. And in this passage we actually see a great summary of Luke 16 because Paul is faced with a choice. He had not a ton of financial wealth but he had other resources that God had given him. Had wisdom. He had understanding.

28:50 He had these incredible teaching skills. And so he was stewarding those resources and saw that his value was better on earth storing up eternal riches in heaven even though he longed so much to be with his Lord heaven. And then we come to verse 24 where we see that the rich man is sent to this place of torment and he is crying out and asking Abraham to have mercy and send Lazarus to him. And we see even in this position of terrible torment he is still thinking selfish thoughts. He is still thinking how can Lazarus comfort me?

29:21 How can my well-being be better in this situation? And we see that he has still not figured out what he's missing as the point. And in verse 25 we see Abraham said to him, son remember that in your lifetime you received good things and likewise Lazarus evil things. But now he is comforted and you are tormented. This would have come as a shock to the Pharisees because based on their understanding of God they would assume that the people that received the riches from God were people who are wealthy in this world were receiving blessings from the Lord.

29:52 That they were the ones who are righteous. And that Lazarus clearly this poor beggar who dealt with all these issues was probably not blessed by God and he should have been... The role should have been reversed in their mind because obviously the rich man was being blessed by God. But this was not the case and this is the point that Jesus was trying to drive home here is that there is other things that are more important in the kingdom of God. And before we go further I want to really emphasize the point here that we do have our whole life to make decisions.

30:43 And so if any of you today feel like you were unsure as to which place you would go when you die I would highly plead that you would talk to somebody here like one of the elders or one of the older Christians and get comfort and they would love to answer any questions that you have regarding this matter of eternal security. And then closing in verses 27 through 31. We see that this rich man for maybe the first time in his life has an unselfish thought. He is saying to Abraham please this is so terrible. I want no one else to go through this.

31:17 Send Lazarus back to witness to my brothers because if they see someone rise from the dead, they'll believe. If they see a miraculous witness come back from the life, surely they will believe. And Abraham responds, they have Moses and the prophets. This is enough. And we know of countless people in the Old Testament who put their faith in the Lord through the teaching of Moses and the prophets who saw the works of God and believed in him.

31:39 This was enough for people to understand the grace of God. And we see that ironically enough in John chapter 11 which chronologically took place after this story. How Jesus went and raised Lazarus from the dead in Bethany. And what is the Pharisees response to this situation? This miraculous witness coming back from the dead declaring who Jesus is.

32:00 That they saw Jesus raise him from the dead. And we see in John 11 verse 53 their response to this miraculous sign of a witness coming back from the dead that that the rich man thought would save his his his brothers. And we see in verse 44 or verse 43. Now when he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he who had died came out bound hand and foot with grave clothes and his face was wrapped in a cloth.

32:28 Jesus said to them, loose him and let him go. Then many of the Jews would come to Mary and had seen the things Jesus did believed in him. So we have many who believed in him. But then we come down to verse 53 and this next passage is talking about the Pharisees response because word was brought to them of this action. And the Pharisees heard about Jesus raising somebody from the dead and their response is, then from that day on they plotted how to put him to death.

32:52 This does not seem like a a salvation point in their lives. This was them saying, we hate him. He's stealing our power. He's breaking down the barriers that we have put up in the law. He's stealing our authority and he's going to take away what we have worked so hard to earn.

33:05 The Romans are going come and they're going to punish all of us and so we have to kill him. That is their response to this miraculous witness who came back from the dead. And we see their response stayed the same even after Jesus miraculously rose from the dead three days after his crucifixion. And so we see that even though Lazarus was pleading for somebody to go back from the dead that the law and the prophets was enough and the gospel that we now have through the work of Jesus on the cross is enough. Now some closing application I want to give to you is that God has given us all to be stewards.

34:21 He had opportunities to bless others around him and instead he chose to spend all his money on himself dining well sumptuously every day and clothed in the finest garments. And we have to ask ourselves are we being like the rich man? We have the riches of God's grace. It costs us absolutely nothing to share it with others. To give the gift of eternal life to others the most valuable thing in the world.

34:42 And are we hoarding it for ourselves and holding onto it and not sharing it to these spiritual baggers who are around us who and I don't want to demean anything or make ourselves seem like we are hierarchical but there are just people who have not heard the word and can use it and value it so much We and are just not giving it away to them. And I know I just talked to you guys for thirty plus minutes and there's a good chance that an hour from now you're not going to remember 99% of what I just said. Because I know that sometimes it's hard to remember if you don't take notes especially. Just in one out ear, in one ear, out the other ear. So if there's one thing I can impress on you today I want to leave you with this exhortation okay?

35:19 We only have a limited time to share the gospel and we saw this at prayer meeting on Wednesday night. The 10 reasons we can expect the rapture. We only have a limited time to share the gospel and be good stewards of the gift of salvation God has given us. A wise man once said that it could be even perhaps today. Perhaps today it could happen.

35:37 But you should live your life in such a way that on the day when you come face to face with God that you will be on the side of comfort with him and not in the side of torment and that you may hear him say, you have been faithful in what is least and what is much. Well done my good and faithful servant. Servant. Let's close in prayer. Dear Lord, we thank you so much for the blessing of your word and the riches that we have in it.

35:59 Without it, we would be lost and without hope in this world. But you so graciously sent your son to die for us and give us this gift of eternal salvation. And now you have commanded us to be good stewards of the blessings you have given us and to pass it on to others to go into all the world and preach the gospel. I pray that you would help us to do this with boldness and the authority that you've given us through your son on the cross. And we pray this in your name.

36:21 Amen.