Greed

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info, visit us at thrive-fl.org. Welcome to Thrive. It's good to have you here this day as we move into Thanksgiving week. And I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving. Are you? Good. Some of you, I think, are traveling and I pray that you have a safe trip up north where you're going to freeze. Or wherever that happens to be. We are finishing up our series today called The Seven Deadly Sins with one that I think everybody thinks they don't have but maybe somebody else does. I was hesitant a bit about this series. It's just because when you say we're talking about the seven deadly sins, we end up almost focusing on sin more than our Savior. And that can be a problem. And what we've really said is that we've been exploring this this whole time. Not to kind of say don't ever think or don't even go there. But just how much our human nature falls into these seven different things. And we all struggle with it. But more so, we've got a Savior who's dealt with it. We've got a Savior who's taken care of these things. We have someone that even the deadliness of sin has been taken on by someone who died for those sins. And he is the resurrection and the life. And therefore, as we look at these things, we can kind of put it in that perspective. So we're not coming at it from the perspective of if you do any of these things, you're dead. And you know you're going to hell in a handbag. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. But from the, hey, how do these things impact our lives? And then how is there a better way because of who Jesus is? So today we're looking at the sin I think that everybody else thinks maybe somebody else has. But they don't. And that is, do you know which one it is? Greed. Yeah, we started with pride. Yeah, I know. But greed, it's a good one too, right? Greed. Oh, no, I'm not greedy. You know, it kind of reminds me of how we think about, oh, I'm a patient person. I am patient until I need it. I think I am not greedy until I'm in a situation where something is needed or is requested of me that I want to hold on to. And we're going to see this of all places. And some of you know how this works. Greed really comes up. And I just went through this. Thankfully, my family, when my mom died, we didn't experience any of this issue. Although, you know, if things kind of worked out differently, it might have. When you get to an inheritance. Ouch. All of a sudden, those relationships between brothers and sisters and your whole family, it can take a turn. So this actually is the situation between two brothers that we find in Luke chapter 12. And so we're going to be reading Luke 12, 13 to 21 today. Someone in the crowd said to him, that is to Jesus, teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. Right there, you already see we've got a problem. You know, Jesus, tell, you know, Jesus is being used. OK, but he said to him, man, who made me a judge or arbiter over you? That word arbiter really means divider. And he said to him, take care and be on your guard against all covetousness. We'll look at that word for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. And then he told them a parable saying the land of a rich man produced plentiful. 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 bigger 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. We'll look at that word a little too. But God said to him, fool. And yes, we'll look at that word. 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. So what appears at first as a matter of justice and fairness between two brothers, Jesus sees something else going on. He sees greed behind it all. And the Greek word for covetousness in this text is actually pleonexia. And that Greek word means just to play on is more. You just always want more. You know, even Rockefeller way back when, how much money is enough? A little more than you got. And this guy was as rich as anybody, right? You always want more, more, more, more. And that is what Jesus sees is the heart of what's going on between these brothers. And then he says, as a result, take care, be on your guard against all pleonexia, all wanting of more, more, more covetousness, greed for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions. And then after the parable that he tells, he says, so is one who lays up treasures for himself and is not rich toward God. So we're going to learn in this parable how deadly greed is, how empty it actually is, how it makes you into a fool. The word fool, I don't have this on a slide, but the word fooled is aphron, which is frone ...