Sermon text: Luke 12:13–21
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
We all want to live the good life, don’t we? I mean, we want to have the best life possible for us and our families. It’s sort of a desire in human nature. We’d like financial security and good health. No worries about our financial future. A nice place to live in a good neighborhood, a happy family, good devoted spouses, good friends. Who doesn’t want all of that? Your best life now? Steak on a grill for me and a margarita in the other hand and sitting on a patio in the shade. That’s what I consider to be a good life in the moment. Take it easy. Eat, drink, and be married. And wouldn’t all that be wonderful if that was the condition of all of us?
But what’s wrong with that? Well, after all, our reading in Ecclesiastes today says, “Eating, drinking, and making merry is about as good as it gets, and it is from the hand of God Himself.” The writer says, “There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil.” There it is. Eat, drink, and be merry — from the biblical text itself.
In fact, not only in Ecclesiastes, but the other two readings this morning have a similar idea in the background: those in the readings are looking for the best possible of lives. So, what is the good life? Can we have the best of life now in this sinful world? Is there an easy-to-follow wisdom and guideline that will automatically produce the best life for you in your situation?
The writer of Ecclesiastes is more than likely an elderly King Solomon. He probably wrote the book in his closing years of life. By then, he had seen it all. He was king. He had done it all. He had had it all. All the wealth and prosperity and good times that you can imagine. It’s good to be the king, as the saying goes. And now he’s reflecting back on his experience as a father, as a husband, as a king. And his conclusion isn’t very rosy at all. He’s reflecting back on all of that. And as he reflects his life “under the sun,” he sounds a little jaded and a bit cynical now in his older age.
“Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity.” Meaning: all the things that Solomon had said and done and achieved throughout his life was absolutely nothing before God. It was all emptiness in the end. Dust in the wind, as my favorite secular song says. Solomon had been busy with many things during his career. He wrote, “I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.”
You ever try to catch the wind? When I was a little kid, I remember distinctly a tornado warning. We lived on the very last street in Joliet. Between us and Interstate 55 was a horse pasture, a little swamp, fields of weeds, and high grass farms. And you could see the cars traveling on Interstate 55. What that view gave us was a great view of all funnel clouds headed our way. And I remember getting in a little trouble because I went outside when I was supposed to be inside, to fight the funnel cloud. My mom put an end to that.
Vanity of vanities. It’s all vanity. It’s like trying to take wind in your hand, to defeat a breeze in the air. Well, all ends in vanity because death intervenes and puts an end to all of our striving for wealth and for comfort and for popularity and security in this life. It reminds us of that too: you’ve brought nothing into the world, and it’s certain that we will take nothing out of it. That’s 1 Timothy 6:7. And 1 Timothy 6:7 emphasizes the transient nature of our earthly possessions. It suggests that our entry into the world is marked by a dependence on God rather than material wealth, and that material wealth does not follow us from this life into the world to come.
That this life is a veil of tears and vanity that we call existence. The idea is that true contentment can only be found in true spiritual riches rather than in material possessions or status or our own good deeds. You can’t take it with you, the saying goes. And the pharaohs tried time and time again. Not only were their corpses buried deep within and under the pyramids, they took a great deal of wealth with them — only to leave it behind. And in the short term, pretty much every one of those pyramids was raided shortly after the death of the pharaoh, and all of the riches hauled away by thieves. Vanity of vanities. Their wealth stayed behind in the pyramid while they moved on to the judgment seat of God the Father.
Solomon, on the other hand, wrote in verse 20: “So I turned about and gave my heart up to despair over all the toil of my labors under the sun… For all his days are full of sorrow, and his work is a vexation. Even in the night his heart does not rest. This also is vanity.” Even if you get your best life in this life, in this world, it’s all going to come crashing down in the end. It’ll all simply be worthless stuff left behind, and not credited to you as works righteousness.
It’s a good question, this thing about life and the world to come. It’s the one that the rich fool in the parable this morning did not consider. And what was the occasion for such a parable? A man in the crowd shouted out to Jesus, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” And Jesus said to him in verse 15, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”
After warning the man in the crowd — warning them against covetousness, that is a form of idolatry — Jesus told them a parable about a rich man who had more crops and more possessions than he knew what to do with. He said, “I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’”
It’s good advice sometimes: relax, eat, drink, be merry. Now, imagine you’re this guy. You’re set for life. Your 401(k) has turned into an 801(k). You’ve got a premium health care plan. Everything’s going well for you. You got crops and cash galore. No troubles on the horizon. No worries. You just put the steak on the grill, mix up the margarita, and chill until tomorrow. That’s what the man was looking for in the gospel reading this morning. The problem is, for the rich fool, he didn’t have a tomorrow.
Luke 12:20: when God said to him, “Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” In other words, the fool is departing this life and he will have to give an account of his soul, not his bank account. Death will come calling for him that very night. And even though he had laid up treasure for himself in this world, he was not rich before God’s eyes. And in the end, that’s disastrous.
Now, wealth in and of itself is not bad. People want to do that. We have tax policies and all kinds of things to, quote, punish the rich — or in the language of the day, to make them pay their fair share — as if anybody knows exactly what fair share means. And even though he had laid up treasures for himself, he wasn’t rich. So it’s not wrong to be rich per se. It’s wrong when things get out of perspective. When we lose sight of our relationship to our Lord, provided to us through the person and the work of Jesus Christ. That’s the problem.
Our lives don’t consist of an abundance of our material possessions, or what you do to afford a lifestyle, or even good deeds done in service to both neighbor and your own self-righteousness. If your best life is what you have now, you’re still in pretty bad shape. No matter how rich or how happy you may be, you need a better life that is impossible to have in this world and in this old sinful flesh. When you stand before God on your last day, you’ll need to present to Him a better life than the one that you’ve lived thus far. And where do we find the better life? That’s Colossians. In Christ, in Christ alone.
That brings us to the Epistle lesson: “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”
Christ is your life, your true life, the only life that really lasts. If you don’t have Christ — that is, if you don’t trust in Christ for the remission of your sins and your eternal salvation — you’re already dead in your sins. Your life is vanity of vanities. Dead in your sins and trespasses, you have no hope and no future. Without Christ, you will not be able to appear holy and righteous in the sight of God the heavenly Father on Judgment Day. What good will all of your stuff and your worry and the like do? Life apart from God, life apart from Christ, will not last. It will simply end, as the writer of Ecclesiastes says, in vanity. All is vanity. All your stuff, all your supposed good life, all that you’ve struggled to get and maintain means nothing in regard to your eternal well-being.
But with Christ, in Christ, no matter how poor or how wealthy you may be now, no matter what your circumstance is in the moment, your life is hidden with Christ in God. That means Christ’s life of glory and righteousness covers you over with His righteous robe of true and pure Christian faith and good deeds. Your life may not look much like a good life at the moment. By the world’s standards, you may look kind of foolish with your beliefs and your donations to churches and Christian groups. Now, your life may not look like it, but you are living in Christ an exceptional life. Rest assured, your true riches are hidden from the world’s eyes. And often, most often, they’re hidden even from your eyes. What you see as trials and hardships and temptation, God sees as trials to purify your faith, your trust in Him. Rest assured, true riches are hidden from the world and from you. But Christ’s riches are real, and they transcend anything that this world has to offer. That’s why St. Paul was able to write in Romans 8:18, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”
The Son of God came down from the glories of heaven, became poor for your sake. He emptied Himself of His outward glory, laid aside His earthly wealth, walked a way of suffering and death on the cross for you. He came to purchase for you salvation, which He bought with His holy, precious blood. When Jesus did that, He gave you the biggest treasure you ever could have: namely, the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.
In Christ, the abundant and hidden life of the Christian: “all things work together for good, for those who love the Lord.” In Christ, the grave no longer has power over you. It’s a momentary stop on your way to a heavenly kingdom. Now you have what it takes to pass that test on the night that your soul is required of you. For you have Christ, the perfect righteousness and your Savior. Your life was joined to Jesus in Holy Baptism. So you have been raised with Christ. Even as Christ has been raised from the dead, lives and reigns eternally, so shall you. You have a new life now, and your best life is still to come — on that day when Christ comes again and sets you free from sin, toil, and all striving after the wind. “When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”
When we have things in proper perspective as Christians, we can enjoy the blessings of this life. That’s what Ecclesiastes is ultimately teaching in this section: “There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment?” It is the living apart from God that is the problem. Not the wealth of this world. That’s what the rich fool was doing: living apart from the heavenly Father. He was serving mammon, not God, as can be seen in the last statement of the parable, verse 21: “So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”
Only Christ was rich toward God. He earned the inheritance. And what did He do with the inheritance that He earned? He gave it to you. He made you an heir of His fortune. Colossians 1:12: “Giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.” Hebrews 9:15: “Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.”
So, eat, drink, and be married. Yep. By all means — including and especially eat, drink, and be merry in the means of grace. Come here to this altar. Eat Christ’s very body. Drink His very blood. And be merry, that your sins have been forgiven. Rejoice in the life that Christ gives you. For Christ is the good life. Christ is your best life, both now and in eternity.
1 Peter 1:3–5: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.”
Luther wrote these stanza lyrics. He spoke to His beloved Son: “It is time to have compassion. So go, bright jewel of My crown, and bring to man salvation. Free sin and sorrow, set him free. Slay bitter death for him, that he may live with Thee forever.” Amen.
May the peace that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.