The Lord Is Our Inheritance
Download MP3And, and I'm gonna read to you, a part of Luke chapter 12 starting with verse 13. Someone in the crowd said to him, teacher tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. But he said to him, man who made me a judge or arbitrator over you? And he said to them, take care and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. And he told them a parable saying, the land of a rich man produced plentifully.
Jeffrey Heine:And he thought to himself, what shall I do? For I have nowhere to store my crops. And 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.
Jeffrey Heine:Relax, eat, drink, be merry. But God said to him, fool, This night your soul is required of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be? So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. And he said to his disciples, Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on.
Jeffrey Heine:For life is more than food and the body more than clothing. Consider the ravens. They neither sow nor reap. They have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Oh, of how much more value are you than birds.
Jeffrey Heine:And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to a span of life? If then you were not able to do a smallest thing as that, why are you anxious about the rest? Consider the lilies how they grow. They neither toil nor spin, yet I'd tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass which is alive in the field today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you?
Jeffrey Heine:Oh you of little faith. And do not seek what you are to eat and what you are to drink, nor be worried, for all nations of the world seek after these things. And your father knows that you need them. Instead, seek his kingdom and these things will be added to you. Pray with me.
Jeffrey Heine:Lord, we ask that you would bless all the reading of your word. None of your words are wasted. And lord, now I ask that you would speak through me, that my words would fall to the ground, but Lord, your words would remain, and they would find their mark. God, I know we have hard hearts here, we have hard minds here. Spirit of God crack those open.
Jeffrey Heine:Absolutely, completely change us tonight. And I pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. I love how this scripture in Luke begins. It's pretty random.
Jeffrey Heine:You know last week we looked at the woes to all the Pharisees and the difference between religion and the gospel, And, and then right after that Jesus, he talks about blaspheme, blaspheming the Holy Spirit, and he finishes this and all sudden this guy gets up and he says, hey, tell my brother to give his inheritance to me. It's just it's really random. I completely get it though. I remember one time I was preaching at church in Atlanta, and I was preaching on the supremacy of God and all things, and I just finished preaching my heart out on the supremacy of God. And afterwards a guy came up to me goes, Man, that just so resonated with me.
Jeffrey Heine:I mean, gosh, my boss is a jerk. It's like, what the heck does that have to do with anything? And but but for him, that's the lens that he he saw everything through. Everything revolved around the situation at work. It it be kind of become his idol.
Jeffrey Heine:It become the way that he filtered all of life. And you can see that with this man here. Jesus is talking about all this other stuff but the way he filtered it when when Jesus finished, he said, Hey tell my brother to give me my inheritance. To divide his inheritance with me. And Jesus, he takes this moment and says, no, I'm not an arbitrator, but let me talk about greed.
Jeffrey Heine:Let me talk about covetousness. Look at verse 15. He says, take care and be on your guard against all covetousness for one's life does not consist consist in the abundance of his possessions. Now your Bible might say all forms or might say all types of covetousness or greed, And that would be a really good translation, because what Jesus is saying is that, covetousness is not just one kind of it. It takes all different shapes and sizes.
Jeffrey Heine:It's different than any of these other sins. I'm not aware of any other time that Jesus has to say, you know, take care of all different forms of murder. You know if you commit murder. It doesn't say all different forms of adultery. You either know you're committing adultery or you're not.
Jeffrey Heine:But here he says greed is a lot more subtle than that. It can take all different shapes, all different forms, and you might be infected and not even know it. It's so subtle. As a matter of fact, in 14 years of ministry, I have never had anybody come to my office and say, hey, Joel, I'm really struggling with greed. 14 years, that's never happened.
Jeffrey Heine:I've had people confess addictions, affairs, sexual immorality, just a lot of things, but I've never had anybody say, hey, you know what I really struggle with? It's coveting. And the reason is nobody considers themselves to be, you know, a kind of a a greedy person. That's always somebody else. And the reason we always think of somebody else is because when you look at wealth, you're always going to find somebody wealthier than you.
Jeffrey Heine:You're always going to find somebody who spends money more careless than you. And so there's always, you know, you're, you're never going to draw the line right here through your own heart. You always see right there. Oh yeah. You know, Nicholas cage last year he bought what, 5 homes, 22 cars, 9 which are rolls Royces and his own Island and he has money troubles.
Jeffrey Heine:And so you can always point to him and say, Hey, that's greedy. The line's over there. And then he has somebody in the 3rd world living in the slums and they could look in your closet. They could say, no, no, no. There's greed, the line's there.
Jeffrey Heine:But we always think that covetousness, that line doesn't come through our hearts. And part of the condition of greed is that, there's a blindness to it. There's a blindness. We don't see it in our own hearts. Whenever I do premarital counseling, I always ask each person what what class they would say they grew up in.
Jeffrey Heine:You know, were you poor? Were you blue collar? Were you middle class, upper class? Were you wealthy? You know, I always ask that.
Jeffrey Heine:I have never once had anybody say they were wealthy. I've done a lot of premarital counseling. I've never had anybody say I'm wealthy, and yet the range of salaries and money that these people grew up in was huge, but nobody says they're wealthy because you can always point to somebody else. You're always gonna know people who buy a lot more things than you. And so you're not gonna draw the line through your own heart.
Jeffrey Heine:But you need to understand that part of the condition of greed is a blindness to it. Jesus, he fleshes this out by telling a story about a rich man who became richer. And, one of the things I love about this story is it's very ordinary. Jesus doesn't set up the story and say there was a really evil man. He hated kids.
Jeffrey Heine:You know, he he beat his wife, and he became wealthy through corruption and bribery. He doesn't say that. He just says, there was a man. He became wealthy. He's just a wealthy man and God made him wealthier.
Jeffrey Heine:He had a huge crop. And so he has to figure out what is he gonna do with this huge crop? What's he gonna do with this extra income that he has? It's a very common situation. And so this man, he he he thinks about it and he goes, well gosh I got all this stuff, I should probably save it.
Jeffrey Heine:He makes a very prudent decision. You know, because who knows, there might be famines, you know, in the years ahead. Who knows what's gonna happen? I'll just do the smart thing. I'll, I'll build up my savings.
Jeffrey Heine:I'll I'll make some new barns, store up the grain, and then maybe I can retire a little bit early. And there there's nothing that you would look at this and think, that's evil. That's wrong. But Jesus looks at this man and He calls him a fool. You're a fool.
Jeffrey Heine:Because who knows this very night your soul might be required of you and you can't take any of that with you. And you're gonna have all of eternity to regret that you were not rich towards God. He calls a man who made a decision that many of us make, and he calls him a fool. The man made the mistake that the money was his, That it wasn't the Lord's. You could kind of if you read between the lines, you could kind of see this a little bit.
Jeffrey Heine:Notice all the times that he says my. He says, my crops, my barns, my grains, my goods. And so he definitely has this mentality that everything is his. It's his, and he can use it however he wants to. He earned it through all of his hard work, and I'm sure he would acknowledge, yes, I got a few breaks.
Jeffrey Heine:You know, perfect rain, good sunshine a few years. I got a few breaks, but I made the most of the opportunity that God gave us, God gave me. And so he's thinking that it's his, but the reality is and what God is trying to remind this man of is, no it's all the Lord's. This is all his. I mean, we we we deceive ourselves thinking that it's through our own savviness, and it's through our own hard work that we have made something of ourselves and that we have all of these possessions, but that's a very foolish idea.
Jeffrey Heine:You were born in America, most of you were given a really good education. Most of you got a huge head start in life. A lot a lot of you in here did. What if you had been born, let's say in, the slums in India or in Syria? Placed in an orphanage, I guarantee your life will be a whole lot different.
Jeffrey Heine:You might work just as hard, but I tell you your life will be a whole lot different. And so the reality is that most of the decisions that have led you to prosper like you have, you had zero control over most of the decisions. God's the one who did that, and God's saying the money is his. Now Jesus is saying here that he's not scared, or he's not telling the person, hey, you're worshiping money. What he is saying though is money will always reveal what you do worship.
Jeffrey Heine:The way you spend money will always reveal what you do worship. So he says, watch out. See how you spend your money. Money reveals idols. That's why, Paul in Colossians 3 and in Ephesians 5, he says that coveting is the equivalent of idolatry.
Jeffrey Heine:Says it's the same as idolatry. For instance, if you spend all of your money on clothes, your appearance, your image is your idol. If you spend all of your money on your home, then your home is your idol. If you, if you squirrel away all of your little savings, you're very frugal and don't spend a thing, that means your savings, your security is your idol. But money's always going to show who or what you worship.
Jeffrey Heine:And so Jesus said says here we have to be on guard against all forms of greed. And and when one of the ways that we are on guard, we watch out. We have to keep looking because remember, we're blind to this. And so one of the things that we have to do is begin to ask questions of ourselves. Let me give you some good questions.
Jeffrey Heine:Is it easy for me to spend money on the latest fashionable clothes, yet it is hard for me to give to charity? Is it easy for me to spend money on the latest fashionable clothes, but hard for me to give to charity? Is it easy for me to spend money on my home, but it's hard for me to give to the church? Is it easy for me to put money in savings, yet it is hard for me to give money to the poor? Those are good questions.
Jeffrey Heine:I'm not asking if you do give this money away, but is it hard? Is it hard for you to do those things but you might not even think twice about other things you buy for your home or for yourself? It's easy to do that. Examine yourself. And when I examine myself, it reveals to me, that I have a divided heart.
Jeffrey Heine:It was really hard for me to look at this this week, but I I had to acknowledge that I have a divided heart, and I think most of us in here probably have a divided heart. We do love the Lord. We want the Lord to be part of our lives. But if we're honest, we'd have to acknowledge that we just want him to be part of our lives. We don't want him to be the whole thing.
Jeffrey Heine:And so when we read things like the the psalmist crying out, Whom have I in heaven but you? And on earth there is nothing I desire but you. We look at that and we're like, I always feel guilty when I read that. On earth, there is nothing that I desire but you. I desire a lot of things.
Jeffrey Heine:My heart is divided. And so we have all these other things that we are worshiping alongside of God. We're not worshiping them instead of God. I guarantee if I went up to one of you and I said, okay, you can either buy these clothes here or love God. These are your options.
Jeffrey Heine:Which are you gonna do? Most of you, probably all of you are gonna say, okay. I'm gonna love God. You know if I said, okay, you can either fix up your home here or you can love God. Those are your choices.
Jeffrey Heine:Which do you want in your life, God or your home? Most of you are gonna say, God. If it was eitheror, but most of us try to incorporate. We want both. We want both.
Jeffrey Heine:We want the Lord in our life and we want the Lord plus something else. The Lord plus something. This passage here in Luke 12, it reminds me of a somewhat obscure passage I've preached on in the past, Joshua 13. In this passage, Joshua is about to die. They've gone into the promised land.
Jeffrey Heine:Israel's just conquered the promised land. They're settling into it, and Joshua has gathered together all of the tribal leaders, and he is giving out the land allotments. He's telling everybody what their inheritance is. And, you know for the last few years, they've been in battle, after battle, after battle, and finally the moment they've been wanting has arrived. You know this was the land promised to him 400 years ago, and now it's finally theirs.
Jeffrey Heine:And so Joshua gets up there and he says, Reuben, you get to have all the land from the Arnon Gorge over there to to the east side of the Jordan River, all the way to the to the Sea of Knessareth. That's all of your land. Manasseh, you get all this land over here. Judah, you get all of this land over here. And and he divides out all of this land, and finally he gets to the Levites.
Jeffrey Heine:And he simply says one sentence to the Levites. In verse 34 of chapter 13, he says, to the tribe of Levi, the Lord, the God of Israel, is your inheritance. The lord is your inheritance. And there's a part of me, and I've had to confess this before that when I read this, I think, guys you got gypped. I mean you really got gypped.
Jeffrey Heine:What the heck does that mean? The Lord is your inheritance. I mean, it's not like the other people didn't get the Lord. God was still their God. They still got to worship the Lord.
Jeffrey Heine:They just didn't get to make the sacrifices. So they didn't get, you know, to cut the sheep. But they all got the land plus the Lord, and the Levites just get the Lord. They get to have the duty of continually sacrificing to him. And so when I see that there's a part of me that wants to say, guys you got chipped.
Jeffrey Heine:11 tribes got land plus the Lord. One tribe just got the Lord. Now which got more? Which got more? Think carefully.
Jeffrey Heine:How you answer this question will affect every aspect of your life. It will affect the friends you have, the jobs you pursue, the places you want to live. There is nothing that will not be affected by how you answer this question. Who got more? Which is worth more to you, the Lord or the Lord plus something?
Jeffrey Heine:And that's the question Jesus is asking. That's the question that the Lord tells us we find the answer to when we look at how we're spending our money. When Jesus after Jesus tells the story of the man building the barns and the bigger barns and all of that, He then goes on to say, Hey, you know what? God's gonna take care of you guys. Don't worry disciples.
Jeffrey Heine:Life is more than clothing and life is more than food. Gosh. You know Solomon, in all his glory, is not dressed like like how, like the lilies. And Jesus knew because He saw Solomon in all of his glory. He's not just speaking hypothetically or theoretically.
Jeffrey Heine:He knew Solomon in all his glory and he's saying, hey the lilies, gosh Solomon is no match for the lilies and you're worth much more than that. Don't you know what you were made for? So seek first his kingdom. Concentrate on God and then he's gonna take care of all that rest. And I love it.
Jeffrey Heine:Jesus is telling all these wonderful things to his disciples, how he's gonna take care of them. And then, all of a sudden in verse 32, out of the blue, he comes to this. Look at verse 32. Says, Fear not little flock, for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. And this really seems out of place here because up to this point, they're thinking, what do you what do you mean be afraid?
Jeffrey Heine:You're just telling how you're gonna take care of us. You're just gonna do all these things. Afraid? Why would we be afraid? I mean I mean, Peter's gotta be thinking Jesus if this, you know, following you thing doesn't fall, you know, really work its way out.
Jeffrey Heine:I can go back to fishing. I'm not gonna starve. Take Peter and John with me. Matthew's gotta be thinking, hey, if this following you Jesus thing doesn't work out, I'll go back to tax collecting. I'm not gonna starve.
Jeffrey Heine:And yet Jesus says, don't be scared. And I think the moment Jesus said, don't be scared, they got scared. Yeah. You know how if anybody says, don't be scared, what's the first thing that happens? You know, next time you're on a flight, a pilot, you know, he gets on, goes, you know, just want to tell you there's nothing to be scared about in this moment.
Jeffrey Heine:I mean, is that going to put you at ease? You're terrified at that point. What's going on? What is he not telling me? I think the disciples felt this way.
Jeffrey Heine:They were maybe a little anxious about food and clothes, but they certainly weren't scared until the Lord says, don't be afraid. And then we get to verse 33. Sell your possessions and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with money bags that do not grow old, with a treasure in heaven that does not fall, fail. Where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.
Jeffrey Heine:For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Jesus calls them little flock. Little flock. It's your it's your Father, he delights in giving you the kingdom. I mean, I would have loved to seen the disciples up to this point.
Jeffrey Heine:And, you know, they're probably just saying amen. Jesus saying God's gonna take care of you and they're like, that's right. God's gonna make you beautiful, more beautiful than Solomon. Preach it, Jesus. Hey, and he's gonna give you the whole kingdom.
Jeffrey Heine:Amen. Now, don't be scared. Sell everything you have. Wow. Wasn't expecting that one.
Jeffrey Heine:Give to the poor. Do you see the similarities between the disciples and the Levites? God wanted the Levites to look at him and say, you are my only possession. And he wants the disciples to look at him and say, hey, you're my only possession. God's not gonna rest until he makes you look at him and say, you're my one desire.
Jeffrey Heine:You know, when I look back in my Christian life, I've had a lot of struggles in different areas. But I'd say the biggest hindrance that I've had in my Christian walk has not been any certain sin that I'm aware of. You know, I don't think it's been, you know, lust or or or pride or laziness or something like that hasn't been my biggest sin. Has it hasn't been, I think, a lack of Bible study or a lack of prayer. I think my biggest struggle has been fear.
Jeffrey Heine:Fear. It's the fear of letting God really be everything to me. The fear of really letting God have all of me. Fear. Be honest.
Jeffrey Heine:I'm not gonna ask for a show of hands, but does it terrify you to pray something like this, Lord, remove everything from my life until it's just you. Are y'all gonna go home tonight, get on your knees, and just pray hard that prayer? That's a scary prayer. Remove everything went from my life until there's just you. It's scary because, you know, we don't want everything to leave our lives.
Jeffrey Heine:And and so fear has crippled my my Christian walk at times, and I can remember 16 years ago, I was a junior at the University of Georgia, and I'm going to class. It's about 11 o'clock in the morning, and, I'm outside the Tate Student Center, and there is a free speech platform there, which is the worst idea of all time. I think maybe the University of Georgia is the only school that has that, but anybody can just get up and just speak on whatever they want to speak. And, occasionally, about every other month, there would be some preacher idiots who would come. You know, some psychotic preacher, he'd get up there and he would scream.
Jeffrey Heine:Sometimes he'd have a bullhorn, sometimes he wouldn't, but he would say stupid things like, Rock and roll will kill your soul. He'd look around and he'd say, Hey, you prostitute. He'd start calling people names. You rebel, go to hell. I mean, everybody just mocking them and making fun and I go by, I'm like, oh god.
Jeffrey Heine:Why do you allow this? I mean, I mean, why why? This is what people are gonna think about Christianity is because idiots like this get up there and speak And God clears a bell who said, I know. So why don't you get up there and proclaim the truth? Yeah.
Jeffrey Heine:Right. Like, I'm gonna do that. Get up and preach. And so I just suppressed, suppressed. God said, no, no.
Jeffrey Heine:I want you to get up there and preach. I hadn't preached before. It's like, Lord, you know, I don't do things like that, and I'm pretty certain it's not my gift. It's I know it's not my personality. They're gonna reject me.
Jeffrey Heine:They're gonna think I'm just one of those other, you know, psychotic idiot preachers up there. So, I just kept giving all these excuses but I felt the Holy Spirit saying, no get up there. Get up there and preach. And finally it was like God said, hey what do you have to lose? And I bid on that.
Jeffrey Heine:I mean, I remember when I said, what do I have to lose? Okay. How about my dignity, my respect, maybe some of my friends. I mean, I could lose a whole lot of things. Maybe they'll get angry, I'll lose my health, you know, I don't know.
Jeffrey Heine:Now let me tell you, and I've thought about this a lot over the years. Thought about that moment. It was not my fear of rejection that I was struggling with. Because there is no such thing as a fear of rejection. The fear is this, is that when I was rejected, and all I had is me and the Lord, I would not think he was enough for me.
Jeffrey Heine:That was my fear, was that the Lord would not be enough for me. There's no such thing as a fear of rejection. You see, I wanted, I wanted the Lord plus my dignity. The Lord plus my respect. I wanted the Lord plus my friends, plus the, the 2 and a half kids, and the the nice house, and the good job.
Jeffrey Heine:I wanted the Lord, plus something. I was scared to death if it was just gonna be me and the Lord. I didn't know it at the time, but I was really wrestling with a deep question. It was, Lord if it's just you, will you be enough for me? Or am I gonna get gypped?
Jeffrey Heine:I think that's the fear that holds a lot of us back as a Christian. The fear that holds us back in our worship. It's the fear that keeps us from knowing the true joy of Jesus. Joy that comes from being his child. You know, the fear of giving away your money to the poor is not a real fear.
Jeffrey Heine:Your fear is that God won't take care of you and you lose your security. That's your fear. The fear of, you know, things like, maybe lifting up your hands and being undignified in worship, you're scared of that, that's not a real fear. The fear is that even if other people look at you disapprovingly, the smile of God on you is not enough. That's your fear.
Jeffrey Heine:The fear of, you know, being frowned on by by your peers or your co workers who just think you're some odd Christian. Crazy. That's not a real fear. The fear is that when they reject you and all you do have is the Lord is that his friendship is not enough. Fear of losing your job, losing your health.
Jeffrey Heine:That is not a real fear. The fear of when that happens, Christ will not be enough to sustain you, that's your fear. So the bottom line of every fear is a question, God, will you be sufficient for me? God, are you enough? God, are you really who you have promised yourself to be?
Jeffrey Heine:Are you that pearl of great price that I can sell everything to have because you're worth it? Are you that treasure that's in the field and I sell everything I have in order to possess it because it is beautiful? Are you really that to me? Or am I gonna get gypped? Is the Lord really worth more to you than the Lord plus something?
Jeffrey Heine:The Lord plus your dignity, plus your friends, plus your comfort. The Lord plus your wealth, plus the things that money can buy? Or is it just the Lord alone who is your treasure? And Jesus is saying, hey, be rich towards me. Let me be your treasure.
Jeffrey Heine:See me as one of infinite worth. And you can't just go here and just muster that up. That's religion. This is the gospel. It's the gospel.
Jeffrey Heine:I mean, you see here even in verse 32 when he says, fear not little flock for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. And so he already tells the disciples, God's giving you the kingdom. It's yours. You don't have to do anything for it. After he tells them the kingdom is yours, then he says, now sell your possessions.
Jeffrey Heine:It's righteousness before works. It's the grace of God apart from works. These people are already loved and they're already accepted. They are the kingdom is already theirs before they ever sell anything. But it's because the kingdom is ours, because we are so loved and cherished, that gives us the ability now to sell our possessions and to give to the poor.
Jeffrey Heine:To treat money in a radically different way than the rest of the world. You know, Jesus, he gave up everything in order to possess his treasure. He did. We're his treasure. Jesus, he he loved us, he wanted us to be his, and he made it happen at a great cost to himself.
Jeffrey Heine:The very cost of his own life. He gave his own life in order that we might become his treasure. We are his treasured possession. And in light of that, when we see that we are so moved by love, not by guilt, but we're moved by love that we freely give to the honor and to the glory of one who paid such a dear cost for us. My my prayer for us as a church is that when the world looks at us, they won't just see, hey, here's people who go to church, they kind of talk about Jesus and they have good morals.
Jeffrey Heine:But Jesus wouldn't be just seen as a, our top priority. He would be seen as the entire list of our priorities. He's our everything and that filters down to how we spend money, how we freely give, whether it's to the church or charities or those in need. Money has no hold on us. When people look at us and then money reveals who we worship, they clearly, clearly see that we worship a savior named Jesus.
Jeffrey Heine:Pray with me. Lord, you are our inheritance. You are. And we acknowledge that it's hard because it's an inheritance we cannot see. And everything else in the world here that comes our way, where we look at it.
Jeffrey Heine:It's look good to the eyes, or good to the taste, or good to the touch. And it makes it hard, and we fall. So Lord, what I'm asking right now is through the power of your spirit as we have heard your word, may you be real to us. May through your spirit may you so convict our heart that we cherish you and we see you as a treasure for who you are. Open our eyes to reality.
Jeffrey Heine:Don't let us be the rich fool. Let us be rich towards you. We don't want the the Lord. We don't want you plus something. We want just you because you meet our every need.
Jeffrey Heine:You are glorious, and I pray this in the strong name of Jesus.
