Sermon - Trinity 1 - Luke 16:19-31

 Who’s going to heaven and who’s going to hell? What kind of people go to heaven? What kind of people go to hell? I’m sure you have some sort of picture in your mind of the type of people who go to each place. But today Jesus trains us not to look at external appearances, but instead to look at the Word and faith. For the Word of God alone produces faith which clings to Christ’s love instead of any earthly riches.

Today Jesus introduces us to two people, a rich man and a poor man. The rich man“was clothed in purple and fine linen and feasted sumptuously every day.” What’s more, when He dies and calls out to Abraham, he calls him Father Abraham. This rich man was an Israelite, he identified himself as a person of the Jewish religion. 

What’s more, it appears as if he was a good man who lived a righteous life, since Jesus doesn’t mention anything negative about him. Jesus never hesitates to label people for what they are, be they tax collectors, prostitutes, or thieves. But this rich man wasn’t any of those things since outwardly he lived a clean life. The only thing noteworthy about this man is that he was rich. 

So why is it that “The rich man also died and was buried, and in Hades”? What happened that He would go to hell, even though He was an Israelite and lived a good life? Was it that he was wealthy? No, being rich doesn’t exclude you from heaven, there were rich men in scripture who went to heaven, like King David or King Solomon. 

None of the external matters Jesus mentioned about the rich man determined his eternal fate. The Lord said to Samuel, “For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” And again the Lord said to Jeremiah, “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.” The Lord looked to the heart of the rich man and saw that he had not faith. Because those who don’t believe cannot enter heaven as a result of unbelief. 

As a result of his unbelief, we can recognize the fruits in his life from this narrative. The focus of His life was wealth. The love of his life were his riches. He clearly didn’t care for his suffering neighbor, Lazarus, who had been laid down at his gate. Lazaraus didn’t ask for much either, no more than crumbs from the rich man’s table. Both the poor man and the rich man claim to love God because they both claimed the same religion. But the rich man didn’t love his brother. “If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.” Since the rich man didn’t love lazarus, whom he had seen on numerous occasions, therefore he also didn’t love God. He loved only his wealth.

For the Christian who is filled with faith doesn’t concern himself with riches and fine clothing and sumptuous foods. Instead the faithful Christian is only concerned with that which truly matters, namely God. Even then if they’re rich and wear nice clothes and eat fancy foods, they don’t care about those things.

Why don’t Christians care about earthly riches? Because “we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us.” And “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him. And this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Because of God’s magnificent love for us, the riches of this life mean nothing to us. Indeed, God the Father gave His beloved Son Jesus Christ up to death for us. If God loves us so much that gaining us to heaven would cost Him the great treasure of His Son, then what value do any of our earthly riches have? In comparison, they’re nothing. 

Thus we must look upon our brothers and sisters in Christ as our great treasures in this life. Because God shows such love to us, we too ought to love our neighbors. So let the fruits of your faith be love towards one another, not only loving one another in word, but love each other in deeds and actions. For if you like the rich man have no love for your neighbor, then you have no love for God either. For God’s love for us is not mere thought and speculation, but His love is active in that He died for us to give us His glorious heavenly life. 

That’s what faith is, knowing that God’s love has been poured out for us in Christ Jesus. Faith is believing that God gave His most precious treasure in order to buy us back from the debt of sin that we owe. Faith is clinging to God’s love because His love is for us. 

Because of this love, our lives and attitudes are changed. It puts into perspective the rest of our lives and how we should treat others in this life and what value we should ascribe to earthly riches. We should become like poor Lazarus. No, we needn’t give up all of our possessions and become a beggar on the street if we don’t have to. But like Lazarus we must confess that we are poor in spirit, our bodies are sick and dying, and moreover we desire no more than to be fed the crumbs from our Lord’s table.

If our riches in this life are nothing in comparison to God’s riches in Christ Jesus, then we truly are all beggars who absolutely depend on our Lord and Master, God, for salvation from our poor miserable state. Lazarus wasn’t delivered to heaven because He was a poor man, just like the rich man it had nothing to do with his external appearances. It was all about the faith he had within his heart which clinged to God alone. Because of his faith, God counted Him as righteous on account of Jesus’ death for him.

But what is it that works this faith in his heart? The rich man thought perhaps a miraculous event would do it, as he begged Abraham from hell: “Send [Lazarus] to my father’s house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment...if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.” 

Perhaps this is what you hope in as well; some sort of miraculous event that will just change people’s minds. Maybe some miraculous event is even the foundation of your faith. Now I don’t want to shake anyone’s faith in God, but, if your faith is founded in an unusual miracle then your faith is shakey already. It has a foundation not made of stone but shifting sands.

Do you remember those books that came out a fear years ago where a child claimed to go to heaven in a near death experience? Some look to those books as a foundation for their faith that heaven must be real. But what then happens when you discover that the child made it all up? Or what happens when you realize the vision someone saw was drug induced or a result of trauma on the brain? Your faith will begin to crumble and melt. 

Instead our faith, like the faith of Lazarus, is based upon the Word of God proclaimed by the Holy Spirit, as Abraham explained to the rich man. “They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them… if they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.” If you’re looking for a miracle, then look to the miracle of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. But even evidence of that miracle hasn’t resulted in faith for many people across the world.

What does impart faith is the Word of God as proclaimed by the Holy Spirit. “By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.” At Pentecost the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles and through them proclaimed the Word of God. This same Word which is proclaimed today is the foundation of our faith and the Word alone is sufficient to impart faith and deliver salvation.

This Word of God is the same means by which God has been giving faith to His people since creation. By the word of promise spoken to Adam and Eve, they were given faith in Christ. By the word of promise spoken to Abram, he was given faith in the Christ. “And Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted it to him as righteousness.” God speaks His Word, His Word implants faith, and this faith is counted to us as righteousness.

Don’t be mistaken, the Holy Spirit does impart faith in our hearts, but He does it through the means of His Gospel concerning Jesus Christ. This is the way by which God works in your lives, He works through the Word which promises Jesus. What’s more is that He promises to work this way. God hasn’t promised to work faith in our hearts through miracles, so don’t trust in miracles. But God has promised to work faith through His Word, so to this Word we must cling. 

Like Lazarus, put aside all earthly treasures and consider yourself as just a poor, miserable, suffering sinner and beg for crumbs from God Himself. God delivers to us more than crumbs, He feeds us a sumptuous feast of His Word, He feeds us a rich feast at this altar where His Word bespeaks us righteous. He shows such love to us by showering us with His Word of grace and forgiveness. God the Father doesn’t send us some lousy comfort dogs to lick at our festering wounds, but He sends the Holy Spirit to grant us healing through the Word of true comfort that delivers Jesus Christ to us as the forgiving sacrifice for our sins so that we may be carried to heaven upon the wings of the angels.