Luke 16, and I want to begin
reading in verse 19. There was a certain rich man
which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and he fared sumptuously
every day. And there was a certain beggar
named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate full of sores, and
desired to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's
table. Moreover, the dogs came and licked
his sores. And it came to pass that the
beggar died and was carried by the angels unto Abraham's bosom,
and the rich man also died and was buried. And in hell he lift
up his eyes, being in torment, and seeth Abraham aforeoff, and
Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father
Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip
the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue, for I am
tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember
that thou in thy lifetime receiveth thy good things, and likewise
Lazarus evil things. But now he is comforted, and
you are tormented. And beside all this, between
us and you, there is a great gulf fixed. so that they which
would pass from hence to you can neither, cannot. So that they which would pass
from hence to you cannot, neither can they pass to us that would
come from thence. Then he said, I pray thee therefore,
Father, that thou wouldst send him to my father's house, for
I have five brethren that they may testify, he may testify unto
them, lest they also come to this place of torment. Abraham
said unto him, They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear
them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham,
but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they
hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded,
though one rose from the dead." Here we have these two people.
We are told that one of them was a rich man, that he lived,
as we often say, in the lap of luxury. He fared sumptuously
every day. And then we have a poor beggar.
a sick man full of sores. And these two men lived their
lives, and they died. The beggar went to heaven, and
the rich man, we're told here, went to hell. Now, what does
this passage teach us? What does it not teach us? I
think it's important to remember what it does not teach us. It
does not teach us that wealth, whatever it may come in, money,
houses, land, material things, wealth is not sinful. Riches
is not sinful. Neither is poverty and sickness
to be desired. Wealth is not sinful. The love
of it is sinful. There is no merit in being poor. This man didn't go to hell because
he was rich. Neither did Lazarus go to heaven
because he was poor and sickly. This has nothing to do with it. This is what Solomon said about
riches and poverty. He said, Don't give me poverty
and don't give me riches. If you give me too much riches,
I'll forget you. But if you don't give me enough
to live on, then I'll steal and take your name in vain. Just
give me that which is sufficient for me, sufficient food and clothing
in this world. So this rich man didn't go to
hell because he was rich. And poor Lazarus didn't go to
heaven because he was poor. We need to be clear about that. The Lord Jesus, when he was coming
into Jericho, as I preached to some of you the other night,
he saved a poor beggar. And when he was going out of
Jericho, he saved a rich publican. So he saves the rich as well
as the poor, and he doesn't save the rich because they're rich.
He doesn't reject the poor because they're poor. He saves who he
saves by his grace. And wealth and poverty have nothing
to do with it. Have nothing to do with it. The
Lord has all kinds of people. He has his Philemon's who are
rich, and he has his Omasimus who are slaves. So what does
it not teach? And what does it teach, therefore? What does this passage teach
us? If we get right down to the nitty gritty, it's more than
just about heaven, it's more than just about hell. It's much
more than that. I thank John Bunyan. probably
made a statement one time that tells us in a nutshell even what
this passage is about. The great John Bunyan, the writer
of Pilgrim Proverbs, he was in his sin, and he said one day
while he was involved in his sinful pleasure, it seemed like
the Lord spoke to him from heaven, and it fell into his conscience,
he said. And he said it was like the Lord
said, Will you have Christ and go to heaven? Or will you have
your sin and go to hell? That's what this is about. Will
you have Christ to trust Him, to give yourself up to Him, to
follow Him wherever He leads you? Or will you have this world
and its pleasure Will you have Christ and go to heaven? Or will
you have your sins and go to hell? I think that's what this
passage teaches us. Luke speaks often of rich men,
and he tells us also of different beggars. And I think, and I often
have thought, as you read about these rich men that Luke talks
about, He tells us of a young rich man, and he tells us of
a rich man who is dying, and then he tells us of this rich
man after he dies. Luke tells us of all these rich
men. And I think in these three rich men he tells us about, we
see this man here. We see him in his youth, we see
him as he lives his life, and we see him as he dies. But I
want you to look here in Luke 18. Look at Luke chapter 18. Here Luke tells us about a young
rich man. And I like to think that he's
illustrating to us this rich man in Luke 16 when he was a
young man. You want to know what this rich
man was like? You want to know something that
happened to him when he was a young man? Luke says, it's like this
rich young man that I'm going to tell you about in Luke chapter
18. Look in verse 18. Luke chapter 18 and verse 18.
There was a certain ruler, and Matthew tells us that he was
a rich, young ruler. And he came to the Lord Jesus
and he asked him a question. Good Master, he said, what shall
I do to inherit eternal life. What shall I do? Now, he wasn't
asking for mercy. He wasn't seeking grace. He wanted
to know if he could make a contribution. He wanted to build up his resume,
because this was a Pharisee, a self-righteous young ruler. And the Lord Jesus said to him
in verse 19, Why do you call me good? There is none good but
God. Do you believe that I am God? Thou knowest the commandments.
Do not commit adultery. Do not kill. Do not steal. Do
not bear false witness. Honor your father and your mother.
And look at him. This rich young ruler said, All
these have I kept from my youth up. And when Jesus heard these
things, he said unto him, Yet like us thou one thing, sell
all that you have, and distribute it to the poor, and you shall
have treasure in heaven, and come and follow me. And when he heard this, he was
very sorrowful. And Matthew's account tells us,
and Mark tells us, he went away very sorrowful. He was very sorrowful. Why? For he was very, very rich. What was this young man's problem? Was it his riches? No, it wasn't
his riches. It was his attitude towards his
riches. And the Lord Jesus went on here
to say in verse 24, How hardly shall they who have riches enter
into the kingdom of heaven, but Mark says this, How hardly shall
they who trust in their riches. It wasn't his riches, but he
set his heart on his riches. He trusted in his riches to bring
him happiness. to maintain the lifestyle of
luxury that he so longed after. And when the Lord Jesus said
to him, if you want me, then give up your riches, he said,
I can't do that. I love my riches. Do you love
them more than the riches of heaven? These riches have brought me
great joy. They bring me into the presence
of great men. Will they bring you into God's
presence? Will they win you favor with
God? He wanted nothing to do with
the treasures of heaven. Sell what you have and give to
the poor and you shall have treasure in heaven. The treasures of heaven? What in the world is the treasure
of heaven? Christ is the treasures of heaven.
The treasures of grace and mercy and life and salvation. Treasures,
eternal treasures. Now what did this man say? I
don't want that. Not at this cost. I can't let
go of my riches. I have great wealth. I can't
do that. I can't do that. He put more
value upon the corrupt, perishing things of this life than He put
upon Christ and that life that is to come. He loved them, He
desired them, He coveted those, and He refused to release them
for heaven's eternal reward. Ain't it amazing that the Lord
Jesus required this of this man? He never required it of Philemon. Joseph of Arimathea, remember
him that came and craved the body of Christ from Pilate? He
never told him, sell all that you have, Joseph, and give to
the poor. Why did he require this of this
man? Because this man had made an
issue out of it. And the Lord knew it. He knows
where our heart is, doesn't He? Don't make issues with the Son
of God. He knows where your heart is.
He knows if you've got something in your heart that you love more
than Him. And here He put His finger on
it. And He says, I know your heart. You've come here and you're
bragging about yourself and your goodness and your marriage and
all that you've done. But He said, you've got a bad
spot in your heart. And here's what it is. You love
your riches more than me. And he said, you go sell them
and give them away and then you come and you follow me and you'll
have treasures in heaven. And he couldn't do it. He couldn't
do it. Issue. Don't make an issue with him
like this man did here. This is one aspect of repentance
that some of us were studying on just the other night in our
prayer meeting. Turning from those things that
you've loved instead of God. Turn in from those things that
oppose His rule and His reign in your heart. Brother Ralph
Barner told the story one time when he was preaching a meeting.
There was a young lady, a beautiful young lady, sitting on the front
row seat. And when he finished preaching,
he went down and said, young lady, Barnard was like this.
He'd just go up and ask someone a point-blank question. He said,
young lady, why won't you come to Christ? She said, I'll have to quit my
dancing. I'll have to give up my dancing. He said, give up
your dancing? Who told you that you'd have
to give up your dancing? She said, I did. I did. He said, yeah, you will, because
you've made an issue out of it between you and the Lord of Glory. That's your idol. That's what
you want. That's what you love more than
Him. I had an old deacon friend of
mine. I talk about him a lot, but he's
a precious friend. He told me when he began to seek
the Lord, He was under conviction for sin. He began to seek the
Lord. And he had this sin that kept coming to his mind. He was
praying and seeking the Lord for mercy. And this sin kept
coming to his mind and he kept suppressing it. You're going
to give this up. You're going to let go of this.
And finally, and finally, he realized, the Lord ain't going
to save me. Lord, He's going to save me until
I lay this at ashes at His feet." And he said, that too, Lord.
That too, Lord. I surrender. I surrender all. All to Jesus I surrender. I think Margaret Harris said
it very well in that great hymn that we sang. Though the way
seemed straight and narrow, all I claimed was swept away. My ambitions, my plans, and my
wishes at my feet in ashes lay." Ain't that it? That's it. Dear Isaac Watts said it like
this, "'For a minute, Lord, that I should boast, save in the death
of Christ my God, all the vain things that charmed me most,
I sacrifice it to His blood. Paul said, I count it loss. Those
things that were gained to me, I counted them loss for Christ. And not only loss, he said, I
count them as done that I may win Christ and be found in Him. What was this young ruler's problem? He could not endear to give up
his heart treasure for the treasures of heaven. The Lord Jesus said in Luke chapter
16, look back over there with me. Look in Luke chapter 16,
just before He told us about this rich man in Lazarus. Look
in verse 13. Luke 16 and verse 13. And here's
what I'm talking about. No servant can serve two masters,
for he either will hate the one and love the other, or else he
will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God
and wealth. Mammoth, money, riches. But here in chapter 18, we see
this beggar. I think that the Holy Spirit
would allow us to look at this beggar in Luke chapter 18, beginning
here in verse 35, and say in a way of illustration, this is
the beggar that lived in poverty and full of If you want to know
something about the beggar's life, here you find it. We find the rich man, when he
was young, he chose his riches over the riches of heaven and
went away sorrowful. But here now we see the beggar
who lived in poverty and sores and died and went to heaven.
Here is a good illustration of him. He must have come to Christ. It's not poverty that takes you
to heaven, it's Christ. But here we have this man, this
beggar. And we're told here in verse
35, It came to pass that as Jesus was come nigh unto Jericho, a
certain blind man sat by the wayside. And what was he doing? He was a beggar. That's the person
we're looking at today, Ed, a beggar. There was a certain beggar. And this man, in verse 36, heard
these multitudes coming by, and he asked what it meant. And in
verse 37, said, it's Jesus of Nazareth passing by, the Lord
of glory. In verse 38, he begins to cry
out, Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me. And in verse
39, they told him to be quiet. And some of them even rebuked
him, told him to sit down and shut up. You're nobody, you're
nothing, you stinking beggar. You've bothered us for years,
bummed from us, and now you're disturbing the Master. Just shut
up. Would you please for once shut
your trap? And what did he do? He cried
them all. You ain't blind, he said. You're
not the one that's begging. You're not the one that's living
in poverty. You don't have running sores.
You don't need mercy. You can afford to shut up. I
can't. Jesus is passing by and soon
he'll be gone. I've got to have mercy. And he
cries the louder. Jesus, thou Son of David, have
mercy on me. And the Lord Jesus stops in verse
40. And says, you bring him here.
And he comes there to the Lord Jesus. And Luke, or Mark and
Matthew tells us, he had this filthy garment on. And he threw
it away. He threw it away. And he comes
to the Lord filling his way. And the Lord said, what do you
want me to do for you? He said, Lord, that I might receive my
son. I'm blind. In verse 42, the Lord said unto
him, Receive thy sight, thy faith has saved thee. Why did Lazarus
go to heaven when he died? The Lord saved him. The Lord
saved him. And what happened to him in verse
43? Immediately he received his sight
and followed Jesus, followed the Lord, glorifying God. Here seems to be the difference
in this rich man and the beggar. The rich man came seeking to
make some contributions to his salvation. Tell me what I can
do. He wanted to add that to his
resume. But this poor beggar, he comes seeking mercy. He didn't
have anything. He didn't have anything. What
he had that was of any value, what did he do? Mark says he
cast it away. He threw it away. And he came
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Here was the difference. This
rich young ruler was not in trouble. The beggar was. The beggar was. The rich man come bragging. Lazarus
comes back in. That's the difference. And you
know what Lazarus did? He gave up the most precious
thing he had. They tell us that this old rag
that he had, this blanket, you didn't see a bagger without a
blanket. Because it got cold, especially in the wintertime.
These fellas didn't have any home or shelter to go to. He
had this blanket that kept him warm. That's one of the most
valuable things he had. And when somebody gave him some
money or some food, if he didn't hide it somewhere or another,
somebody else would steal it. He is blind. So when they gave
him some money or food, he'd hide it underneath this blanket.
And what did he do? That didn't mean nothing to him
in comparison to the Savior. He threw it away. He threw it
away. He threw it away. Here you have
the rich man, and he set his heart on his riches. And here
you have this poor man, and he said, I've got nothing. He threw
away what he had. And you know in the long run,
when looking back in retrospect, what value is either one of these
people have? Where's the blanket? Where's
the blanket? It's gone. But where's the rich
man's wealth? It's gone too, isn't it? It's gone too. It's not about
riches and it's not about poverty. Will Christ be the Lord? Will
you value Him over anything else? If you don't, you can't have
Him. You come to Christ for mercy. He saves you by His grace. You
follow Him unto heaven, or you hang on to your heart's treasure,
and you follow the course of this world off into hell. That's
the lesson of this. That's it. Let's go back one more time to
the rich man. Look at his death. Look over
here in Luke 12. He tells us about another rich
man. And I like to think that in this rich man here also, we
see this rich man in Luke 16 that our Lord talks about. Look
in Luke chapter 12 and verse 15. You can read the context
of this sometime. This is amazing. The Lord Jesus
was preaching about a very serious subject. about the Holy Spirit teaching
a man about them suffering. And here this one man came and
said, Lord, would you come and speak to my brother? My dad's
died and my brother's got the inheritance and he won't share
it with me. Would you quit preaching? You think you quit preaching
long enough to these people? And come and tell him to share
the inheritance with me. And the Lord Jesus makes this
statement in verse 15, takes heed and beware of covetousness
For a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things
which he possesses." And he spake a parable unto them,
saying, now look at this, the ground of a certain rich man
brought forth plentiful. And he thought within himself,
saying, What shall I do? Now here this rich man is, and
he's still asking the same question. He's still asking the same question.
He came to Christ saying, What shall I do? But now his subject has changed. He's not saying, What shall I
do that I may have life? But now he's saying, What shall
I do with all my fruits and my goods? He's overwhelmed with the thoughts
of this world. See what happens so many times.
Whatever a man hangs on to instead of Christ, I'm telling you, it
will eat him alive. It will occupy your mind, your
thoughts, and that's all you think about. What shall I do? I have no room wherewith to bestow
my goods. And look what he says in verse
18. And he said, this will I do.
I'll pull down my barns, and I'll build greater barns, and
there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods, and I will say
to my soul, soul, you have much goods laid up for many years.
Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him,
you fool, you fool, He's a foolish man. This night shall your soul
be required of thee. This man had all kinds of riches.
He was rich when he came to Christ, very rich. And here in verse
17, he says he's still worried. He's not satisfied about his
riches. He wants more. And it was nighttime
and it was keeping him up. sitting there at his desk trying
to figure out, what in the world am I going to do with all these
riches? Oh, I've got to tear down my barns and build a greater
barn. One man said this, when a man willfully hardens
his heart against Christ and sets his heart upon worldly pleasure,
it won't be long until he has lost opportunity to enjoy neither. He cannot and will not enjoy
Christ because he refused Christ. He refused to hear Him and obey
Him, and he missed the season of grace. And he will soon lose
the enjoyments of this world because they are not meant to
last forever. I tell you, I don't envy rich
people. Do you? I don't envy rich people. You
envy Donald Trump. I wouldn't be Donald Trump if
I ran for the world. I remember in my day when I was
young, it was Howard Hughes. You young people don't remember
Howard Hughes. He's the richest man in the world at that time.
He lived for months in isolation and he died. Worried himself
sick about his riches and his health. Rich men. Famous men. All the time it takes
to gather riches together and fame together. And all the time
it takes to maintain it. Who wants it? Who wants it? And notice here about this man
in verse 18 and verse 19. He was still so self-reliant
and self-willed. Notice what he said. This will
I do. What shall I do? I know what
I will do. I will tear down my barn. I will build a greater barn.
I will have all my room to bestow, all my, I'll do, I'll, I'll,
I will, I will, I will. You know what James said about
this? And I think you and I ought to come back to saying this and
believing this. If God will. If God wills. We ought to get in the habit
of brothers and sisters saying that. We ought to be in the habit
of talking about what we're going to do anyway. We talk about tomorrow. Tomorrow
I'm going to do this. Tomorrow I'm going to do that.
We shouldn't be planning to talk about tomorrow anyway, should
we? And when we have to, let's say this, if God wills. And James said, if you don't
say it that way, you're just boasting. That's all you're doing.
You're supposed to. Because you don't hold tomorrow.
God holds tomorrow. And here's a man, and look how
presumptuous he got here in verse 19. I'll say to my soul, soul,
you've got many goods laid up for how long? Many years. Many years. Now take your ease. Drink and be merry. You're going
to live for many years. And he didn't know. He didn't
know they already had the horses hooked to the wagon that was
going to take him down to the funeral hall. You fool! Who do you think holds life and
death? Have you become so presumptuous and so proud and arrogant that
you think you live to yourself and you'll die to yourself? I've
already appointed your death. Who's talking to him? God said. God said. This is this rich man. He came to Christ and chose his
riches over Christ. And now here he is living in
this life, and he's got so presumptuous and so self-willed, he thinks
that he can live or die according to his own power and his own
will. God said unto him, this night,
mister, you go give account. You go begin to give account
for me of your soul. What about this poor beggar?
What about him? While this rich man was increasing
in riches and living in the lap of luxury, what about this poor
beggar? He came to the Lord Jesus for
mercy. He followed the Lord Jesus in
the way, glorifying God. And you know something? While
this rich man was getting richer, this beggar was still following
the Lord Jesus Christ. Still glorifying God. Things
hadn't changed with him. But notice this about him. Luke
tells us that he was still suffering. He was still suffering. He's
still a beggar. Things didn't get any better
with him, in a sense, after the Lord saved him. He still suffered. He was still a beggar. And now
he's full of running sores. When the Lord saves a man, that's
no indication that everything is going to be well with him. How would you have thought, if
you had went by this man, and there he sits under his filthy
old blanket, and he's got these sores running, and he's got his
little cup. And he's asking you just for
enough to buy a sandwich. Would you give me enough just
for a sandwich? Buddy, you got enough just for
a sandwich? If somebody told you that was a child of God,
would you believe it? Sure, to goodness! The Lord,
He can't be the Lord's! Look at Him! Could the Lord love a man and
save a man? Could Christ live in a man's
heart that was so desperately sick and in poverty like that? Look at Him! Smell Him! Everybody
avoids Him. Everybody but Christ. Nobody wants anything to do with
Him. Nobody but Christ. You may live in abject poverty. You may have to get on welfare
and just barely scrape by and yet be a child of God. Would
you ever believe such a thing? You may be so weak and so sickly,
you can't even get up. Wherever you go, you have to
be carried and led because you don't have strength enough. You
may live in pain every day and still be a child of God. And
not only physical suffering, but you may live in a warfare
in your soul. Good and evil battling in your
soul. You may be weak in faith. You
may be weak in understanding. You may be weak in assurance
and hope. You may have a little grace of
it in your heart. And somebody may look at you
and talk to you and say, there's no way such a person could be
a child of God. But yet there he is. There He is. Lazarus. Christ has some Lazarus in this
world. And they suffer with Him. They
suffer for His glory. They suffer for His sake. They
suffer for conscious sake, for righteousness sake. They suffer
because they are His. But they are His. And they follow
Him. And when they die, they go to
glory to be with Him. If God sends the Spirit of His
Son into your heart, you can be assured of this, dear soul,
you're going to suffer shame for His sake. That's so. You're going to suffer shame
for His sake. No such thing as having Christ in your heart and
you not suffer some shame for His sake. If God has determined
to take you to glory, I'll tell you what He's going to do. He's
going to take you there through great afflictions. Afflictions
of your soul, if not your body. If you're going to reign with
Christ in glory, you're going to suffer with Christ here. That's
His ladder system. They suffer. They suffer. They
follow Him, they glorify God, but they suffer. And if you and
I are going to experience the comfort of the upper world, then
we're going to experience something of the trouble of this lower
world. Lazarus, the Lord's people, they
suffered. They suffered. So Luke 16 is
about these two men. One who had nothing and knew
it, and cast it away and come to Christ, and followed Him,
and suffered with Him. The other is a rich man who boasted
in his wealth and trusted in his riches. And he got self-will
and presumptions. And he died. He died. Verse 22 says they died. They
died. Look at that. In verse 22 of
chapter 16. And it came to pass that the
beggar died and was carried by angels into Abraham's bosom.
And the rich man also died and was buried. In hell he lifted
up his eyes. It doesn't matter how a man lives
in this world. It doesn't matter who he belongs
to. It doesn't matter if he's a believer
or a non-believer, a godly man or an ungodly man. He's going
to die. Everybody's going to die. We're
going to die. It's appointed unto men once
to die. And after this, the judgment. After this. That's what we're
going to look at tonight, this afternoon. After this. We know nothing about after this.
How many times have we gone to the cemetery and walked in under
the tent and we said, this isn't as far as we can go. I'm going
to quit saying that. This is what I'm going to say
from now on. This is as far as we can go for now. For now. But it won't be long,
brothers and sisters. We'll all go farther than just
under the tent. We'll go through the doors of
death. We'll go behind the veil. We'll
leave this natural world and the natural realm, and we'll
go off into another realm, just like these two men did here. You and I can trace these two
men's lives by the patterns that Luke has given us. But the Son
of God can trace their lives off into another world, into
another realm. We stopped at the gravesite.
But the Lord Jesus said, that's not where I stop. Death and hell are naked before
me. And tonight we'll see what the
Master says about this. But don't you and I, and shouldn't
you and I, weigh every motive and every thought and every desire
Every word, every action, should we weigh that out in the light
of verse 22? The beggar died. The rich man died. We're going
to die. And to live every day in the
light of that would do us well, I think. May God bless this Word. Let us pray.