Covetousness

By Rev. Canon David B. Tabo-oy

“Watch out and guard yourselves from every kind of greed; because your true life is not made up of the things you own, no matter how rich you may be.” Luke 12.15
The 10th commandment explicitly says, “You shall not covet anything that belongs to your neighbour.” (cf. Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5). The above verse is from the gospel assigned this Sunday and the verse from Exodus/Deuteronomy is and are a cross-reference on the gist of the gospel’s message. Covetousness. Greed. It seems that all created human beings are afflicted with this sickness. If we go back to the Bible in the earlier books we can be treated with so many stories about human greed or desire for more. But then again that was not the original character of us – humans. When Yahweh or the Almighty finished creating all that we have now Yahweh always say, “It is Good !” It was us that changed it. We are all created in the ‘image of God’ yet through the years we try to ‘create God in our own image’. It means we want our God to comply to what we desire.
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Our Gospel lesson last Sunday reminded us about the Lord’s Prayer. The Lord’s prayer is not Jesus’ prayer but Our Prayer in its strict form and intention… our guide how we should communicate to the God we depend upon. So we take off from that to our lesson today which focuses on greed or covetousness on the words Jesus said relative to the request of an audience during one of his teaching moments.
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The lesson of our Gospel is based on the incident that occurred in one of our Lord’s teaching sorties in Galilee. Maybe there was an open forum by which every member of the community can ask anything that would somehow eased them. Now a young man called out from the assembled crowd and asked, Rabbi, tell my brother to divide the inheritance of our father.”
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According to a document that I read… Jewish law clearly prescribed that at the death of a father, the elder son received 2/3 of the inheritance, and the young son received 1/3. This is obviously a younger son who is complaining about the inherent unfairness of it all. Nothing will divide brothers and sisters more than dividing up an estate. So it was then, and so it is now. Jesus refused to get involved in a petty family squabble.
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Jesus was concerned, however, with the larger implications of preoccupation with the things of this world. He said: Beware of greed, for life does not consist of things possessed. The sum total of a person’s life is more than their financial portfolio.
He then illustrated this point by telling a story. There was once a man who had an unbroken run of prosperity. In today’s language, he had successfully played the commodities market. So prosperous did he become that his barns could not hold all of his crops. His solution was to tear down these barns and build bigger and better.
The background for our story is an incident that occurred in Galilee as Jesus was teaching to a large crowd. A young man called out from the crowd and said: Rabbi, tell my brother to divide the inheritance of our father.” Now, Jewish law clearly prescribed that at the death of a father, the elder son received 2/3 of the inheritance, and the young son received 1/3. This is obviously a younger son who is complaining about the inherent unfairness of it all. Nothing will divide brothers and sisters more than dividing up an estate. So it was then, and so it is now. Jesus refused to get involved in a petty family squabble.
Jesus was concerned, however, with the larger implications of preoccupation with the things of this world. He said: Beware of greed, for life does not consist of things possessed. The sum total of a person’s life is more than their financial portfolio.
He then illustrated this point by telling a story. There was once a man who had an unbroken run of prosperity. In today’s language, he had successfully played the commodities market. So prosperous did he become that his barns could not hold all of his crops. His solution was to tear down these barns and build bigger and better barns. Then, with his financial security in hand, he could sit back and truly enjoy life. His philosophy was: eat, drink, and be merry.
Truth be told, when we hear this story we find ourselves rather envious of this man. A financially successful man-we see him as savvy and wise. Yet, Jesus concluded the story by saying that this man was a fool.
The issue before us this morning is then: what did this man do wrong? To answer that question we must understand that this is not a parable about money. It is a parable about values and what is important in life.
LET US PRAY.
Let your continual mercy, O Lord, cleanse and defend your Church; and, because it cannot continue in safety without your help, protect and govern it always by your goodness’ through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.