The Parables of Jesus: Houses, Barns, and Vineyards

I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage and what God is doing in this passage.

I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage.

I want us to see what God is doing. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage. I want us to see what God is doing in this passage.

We have this sort of very similar passages in both Matthew and Luke. Likely, Jesus will use these similar themes in a lot of his sermons. Because remember, in that day, unlike today, we preach a sermon twice and you're live streaming it and you're putting it on the internet. Everybody knows, right? And everybody can hear the same thing without you having to say it a bunch of times. But if you're speaking to a different crowd in a different location every time, they haven't heard those things. And so we have this sort of the same parable in very similar form. So I'll read Matthew's account. It says, "Everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on the house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock.

And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. The rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat against the house and it fell and great was the fall of it." So very simple parable, right? You've got two guys. They each built a house. One guy takes some shortcuts. And when the storm comes, his house is destroyed. Now, we don't know his motives. We don't know his reasons. You know, people have tried to speculate, well, he was just really lazy or he was really in a hurry. We don't know any of his motives. We don't know any of the reasons why this happens. We just know what he did do, which is he didn't build a foundation, and his house tipped over in the storm.

One guy puts in the work, and when the storm comes, his house sort of survives. And so this is pretty easy to see. In fact, we got an illustration of it last week. And so, you know, houses are built. You dig down deep and you pour footers at the bottom, you know, in the bottom of a trench, and then on top of that, you put your cinder blocks, and you build up a foundation, and then you fill in dirt around it, and then you build your house on top of that foundation. So when the wind blows, it holds really steady. And so this summer, we bought a grill canopy on clearance at Amazon for like, you know, one-eighth the original price. So, you know, it shelters the grill. And it came with these spikes that were about this long, and so we pounded them into the ground.

And so far, up until last week, you know, it held really firm. And then we got a big rain, and the ground got soft, and the wind blew, and what happened? The grill canopy started flying past the trampoline because, you know, it was just anchored just a little bit. And that's the picture here, is that one guy does the work, digs down deep, and in fact, that's exactly what verse 48 in Luke chapter 6 says, "He dug deep and secures a foundation." So, very simple. You know, the whole point of this parable is just build a good foundation. But it's not just talking in general about a good foundation. It's talking about a specific foundation. In Matthew 7, verse 24, "Everyone who hears these words of mine and does them." And in Luke 6:46, "Why do you call me Lord, Lord,

and do not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like." And then he talks about the wise man and the foolish man. And so he's not talking sort of about a general foundation of life, right? Get a good education, get a good job, pay your bills, get a reliable car, right? He's not just talking about those kind of things. He's talking about a specific foundation, which ultimately is obedience. And one of the things that was at least interesting to me about this parable is that this is not a inside the faith and sort of outside the faith pagans type of thing, right? These are two people who have both heard the teachings of Jesus, right? This is not the completely unreached

and the Christians, and we're the Christians with our house on the rock, and we're doing good, right? These are people who have heard the teachings of Jesus and the foundation. The difference is who has obeyed. One of the interesting things also to me is that the storms are inevitable, right? Neither house goes through its future without the storms. And likely these houses looked pretty similar. The difference was in the foundation, which was only revealed through the storm. And that foundation ultimately is revealed to be Jesus, and not just Jesus, right? Believing in Him, but believing in Him to the point of obedience and following Him. Any thoughts or comments about this parable? It's pretty simple and easy to understand this one.

It always makes me think of the kid's song, you know, "Wise man built his house upon the rock." You know, "Rains came down," and then you get to yell, "Smash!" really loud, and so... Alright, let's take a look at our second parable tonight. It's entitled "An Uncomfortable Interruption." We've all been interrupted. I can relate to the guy in the picture with the exception of the Bluetooth piece in his ear, but you're on the phone, and that's when the kids want to talk to you all the time. He's like, they don't want to talk to you when you're off the phone, but as soon as somebody calls, especially if it's important, they have a million things to say. So I'll go ahead and read it, and then we'll talk about it. 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 arbiter 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 possessions." And he told them a parable, saying, "The land of the rich man produced plentifully." And he thought to himself, "What shall I do? For I will 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. Relax, eat, drink, and 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 so we start with the interruption. So Jesus has been teaching, and the context is he teaches a little bit about hypocrisy. He says that this hypocrisy comes from fear. You don't have to be afraid of men. He goes on to talk about acknowledging Christ before men. And in the middle of all this, some guy just pipes up and goes, "Tell my brother to share the inheritance with me." So it's like one of those questions where it's completely off topic, like you're in the middle of a math class, and somebody goes, "What's an adverb?" It doesn't fit with what is being talked about here. Jesus is talking about being afraid of men and hypocrisy and confessing him before men,

and this guy just comes out of nowhere and says, "I want my brother to share the loot with me." It's not necessarily an inappropriate question. It is ill-timed, but rabbis all the time were sort of the arbiter of these kind of discussions. Because remember, we're talking about a culture and a society that was not government on one hand, religion on the other, right? These are intertwined in the Jewish life. Your civil and your religious are together. And so he has this dispute, but it is likely that this is a dishonest question. And what I mean by that is the reason this guy is asking is likely because the decision's already been made. And he doesn't like the answer he got, so he went somewhere else. Sort of like my kids. They go to mom and they go, "Hey, can we have some candy?" And mom goes, "No." And so what do they do?

"Dad, can we have some candy?" And thankfully we realized that, and so we check with the other parent before acknowledging that. And so that's a little bit, it seems like, and a lot of commentators seem to think that this is what is happening, that this guy is unhappy. Because remember in this culture, your older brother gets two-thirds of the inheritance. You know, that's the way it is. Because he's responsible not just for himself, but he's responsible for the household and the propagation of the family. And so this guy is likely unhappy. He tries to appeal it, doesn't get the answer, so he goes looking for someone. And I think there's an important lesson for us as Christians in all this, right? This guy doesn't actually bring any facts to the table, right? He doesn't bring the will. He doesn't dispute that his father was of sound mind and body.

He doesn't bring a folder of evidence for Jesus to look at what does he do. He wants Jesus to be sort of his blunt-edged instrument to go, "Tell my brother to do what I want him to do." And while I understand that feeling, what he's trying to do is he's trying to use Jesus to hit his brother. He's not actually trying to find justice. "I'm just going to hit this guy with Jesus until I get my way." So look at how Jesus responds, "Man, who made me judge or arbiter over you?" He's like, "Not my problem," right? Jesus essentially says, "I'm not getting involved in this." But then Jesus does something remarkable and turns this into a teachable moment, and he does so by dealing with the heart of the question. He doesn't deal with the legal issue. Is this guy entitled to inheritance? Is he not? Is he dishonest?

Is he trying to sort of manipulate his brother into giving him more than he shared? He doesn't touch any of those things, but he deals with the heart that causes this question to be asked, right? So one of the things that I want to just mention before we dive into this parable is that it's not an indictment against wealth or for wealth, right? In the Bible, you can make a little chart, and you write, you know, rich and poor, righteous, unrighteous, and you have righteous rich people, righteous poor people, unrighteous rich people, unrighteous poor people, right? That's not the point of this situation or parable. And the reason I want to say that is because we might say, "Well, this doesn't apply to me," right? Now, this certainly has material things in view, but the ultimate issue is covetousness, wanting more, desiring more.

And so Jesus will say, and here's the point of the whole thing, verse 15, "Take care in your guard against covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possession." So physical things are in view here, but the issue is our heart toward those things, right? How is our heart focused? What is our heart set upon? And he warns against covetousness, and this is one of the ways we know that it's serious. He says, "Take care and be on guard." So he warns twice about this. So take care would be like this, "Open your eyes," or we would say, "Watch out." So when we come out our front door, when it's been a little wet and really cold, we say, "Look out for the ice." Just be aware. Make sure that you're paying attention. And so that's what he says first.

And then secondly, he says, "Be on your guard." And the picture here is unbroken vigilance. And so this was used in sort of two different ways in the ancient world. One was for shepherds, who at night would watch over their sheep, and they would watch for predators or enemies to the sheep, people who would steal the sheep, but they would also watch the sheep for those who would wander away. And so they would be vigilant, but it also would be applied to a military guard. Not probably a good thing if you fall asleep while you're on guard duty. That's the picture here, is that the guard is supposed to be alert and awake and watching. And that's the word that is used. It's a military word, it's a word used for shepherds who are guarding their flocks at night.

And this warning of covetousness, and we might not talk a lot about covetousness, it simply means wanting more. And it can be used in sort of a specific or a general way. So, Exodus 20:17, in the Ten Commandments, you shall not covet your neighbor's house, you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything else that is your neighbor's, right? Specific things, right? You look at those things that your neighbor has, and I don't think it's just limited to these, but you don't look at the things your neighbor has and go, "I wish I had that. He doesn't deserve it." But there's also a picture of covetousness, that is, I have more than, I want more than what I have right now.

You know, we might call this advertising, right? So, you watch the, watch, you know, watching TV, and the advertisement for the car comes on. You go, "Man, I really want that car." You know, it's, we're coming up, what, a couple weeks till the Super Bowl, and people are like, "Well, I don't even watch Super Bowl. I watch the commercials, right? So I can sit down, and people will gladly sell me stuff, and I can be covetousness over these things, you know, covetous of these things I don't have." And so, what Jesus is saying is we are to guard against this desire, this feeling of wanting more. And to help us with that, He tells a parable. And once again, simple parable, you have a successful harvest. The harvest is so big that it overflows the barns.

He doesn't have anywhere to store it, and so He wants to begin a building project. He has this peaceful future in mind where He gets to eat as much as He wants, drink as much as He wants. He doesn't have to worry about work or responsibilities, and He's planning all this in His head. And when He does, God comes to Him and says, "Tonight you're going to die. Take in your soul. What good is all of these things that you have coveted and hoped in?" So, any thoughts or comments before we dive into some application of this parable? All right, I want to take a look at a couple things that covetousness does that we see in this parable. First of all, what we find is that covetousness separates us. And we first of all see it separates us from God.

So, right, the land of the rich man produced plentifully. You know, God is the one who makes the land. God is the one who sends the rain. God is the one who has created the whole process. In fact, some commentators think that this abundant harvest is like a bumper crop, which means you plant one crop, harvest it, and then another crop grows, so you kind of get a two-for-one deal on this season. All because of what God has done, and in this, the man never acknowledges God. And so it sort of separates us from God because we become dependent. If I can get this, if I can have this, and it's putting ourselves at the center. But it also separates us from others, right? The land of the rich man produced plentifully, 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 there. I will store my grain and my goods, and I will say to my soul, "You have ample goods laid up for many years. Relax, eat, drink, and be merry." So if you notice how he refers to himself, you know, the words that are used to refer there, it's "I, I, I, I, my, I, my, my, I," right? There's never anyone else in view, right? It's a whole lot of talking to himself about himself. The community never figures into his plans, either in celebration. Remember, we talked in the lost coin in Luke, where the lost coin is found, and there's a party thrown for one little coin.

You know, the one sheep is found, you know, 1% of the flock, and a party is thrown. The son comes home. What happens? A party is thrown in the abundance, the blessings of God. And this guy, the community never figures into his plans, either in benevolence or even in just celebration. Look at what God has done for me. And so what you see is that covetousness ultimately will separate us both from God and from others, because we focus solely on ourselves. And that's what happens to this guy. The second thing is that it enslaves us to our stuff. Look what he says. "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 I will build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods."

So notice his first reaction to this bumper crop is not necessarily one of joy, right? He goes, "I don't have anywhere to store my loot." You know, it's a problem. It's not necessarily a bad problem, but it's his immediate reaction is, right, to hurry and stress. I've got to tear down the old barns. I've got to build new ones. I've got to do this. I've got to move, move, move, move." Rather than saying, "Look at what God has done for me," and enjoying what God has given him, and being thankful in what God has given him. Instead of a shared joy, what is it? It's worry and fear that we can't get the barns down, and new ones up, and time to store all the stuff, and to keep it safe. When we covet, and when we desire more and more, we have to worry about getting it, and then we have to worry about how to keep it.

That's what the struggle this guy is going through. Then the third thing about this is that it never really satisfies our soul. Look what he says: "I will say to my soul, 'Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years. Relax, eat, drink, and be merry.'" Notice that his satisfaction and his joy is not in the moment. It's not, "Wow, this is amazing. Look at what has happened." It's, "Well, someday I'll be happy. When I get all of this done, when I work really hard, I can finally sit down, and then I'll be able to relax." His satisfaction is fully in the future. We see Solomon learning the same lesson, right? In Ecclesiastes, he talks about wisdom, and pleasure, and work, and building, and relationships. You know, 700 wives, 300 concubines. And his conclusion was he's trying to catch the wind, right?

We can feel the wind, we can see the effects of the wind, but there's no way to corral it or catch it. And this is what happens to this guy in the parable, because he wants more. His soul is not content in what God has given him. And I see this, and we see it in my life, and I see it in a lot of lives. It's, if I get this, I'll be happy, right? If I get this job, I'll be happy. If I get, you know, this thing, I'll be happy. If I get this relationship, I'll be happy. And we fight and fight to get that thing, and then we get it, and it's just dissatisfaction. I think I've shared about this before, but I remember when I was, like, 10 or 11 years old, I made it through, like, the first year of Cub Scouts, but it was far too organized for me.

I still kept my subscription to Boy's Life, and in the back of Boy's Life, they always have these cool deals. And there was one for, like, the Super Survival Commando watch that, you know, you could take off the face, and it'd be, like, fishing line and everything. And it was, like, $6 plus, like, $2 shipping, which probably should have been a clue as to the quality. And so I got Mom to write a check, gave her my money, I sent off for it, you know, wait your eight weeks, because back then there was no Amazon Prime. And then it shows up, and it's just, like, this piece of junk, and this thing that I had desired so deeply. It's like, yeah, this is great, you know. And then I wore it once, and everybody made fun of me.

So it was, like, it just, like, that's what happens, right? We desire something, we get it, and then it still doesn't fill up our soul, because we're filling up our soul with the wrong things, right? The barns, and the big barns, and His plan, it's not necessarily a bad plan. It's good to plan to steward your resources well. It's okay to have, it's, the problem is His hope is in the crops, not in His Savior. One of my favorite verses about this, and we read this a couple Sundays ago, is Isaiah 55. He says, "Come, everyone who thirsts. Come to the waters. He who has no money, come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk, and without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?

Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourself in rich food. Incline your ear, come to me, hear that your soul may live, and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast and sure love for David." And I love this picture because it's saying, you know, bread and all these things that you're working for, they're not bad, but they're not going to be the end of your soul. The end of your soul is found, and the contentment of your soul is found in the one who satisfies us deeply. And God says, "Come to me and eat and drink and find your satisfaction and your contentment and your hope in me." And, you know, I think that's the point of this parable, because at the end of the day, these things are empty.

You know, it's going to go to someone else, right? God said to him, "Fool, this night your soul is required of you. The things you have prepared, whose will they be?" Not the guy from the first parable, evidently, because his brother is getting all the money. But, "So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God." Any thoughts or comments about the covetousness or this parable? Yeah. Yeah, I think that's probably a good translation, because someone's commentary already says like a wanting moreishness. Like they made up a word. It's not just saying, "Man, I really want what they have," but it's also that picture of wanting more than what you have. It kind of reminds me of the parable of the poem, where the one servant still gets an extraordinarily amount of money,

to get as much as the other person, instead of finding something productive to do with it, he says, "Oh, I'm going to put it in one stop. I'm going to hide it away," rather than stewarding in some action. Yeah, the wealth becomes his focus. In that case, it was his fear of his wealth, and in this case, it's the hope in the wealth. Yeah, very similar. But I don't think this is an indictment for the 401k. No, I don't think so either. I think it's the hope. If I have a 401k, that will make me happy. And so I think part of it, the other side of covetousness or greed is contentment.

That's his issue, I think. And I think it would be very different if God blesses him and he says, "Oh, I'm thankful and joyful." Because God wants us to enjoy those things, and one of the things that grabs me with this guy, he never enjoys it. In fact, in the Old Testament, there's the feast where you save up for three years, a portion of your wealth. And you go to Jerusalem. If you can't go to Jerusalem, the Bible says, "Buy whatever your heart desires. Strong drink wine." And enjoy it, and the thankfulness to God was enjoying the good gifts that he had given you. And you don't see any joy in this to let our enjoyment point us toward the Creator. Absolutely. Any other thoughts or comments? All right, I was thinking about this and how to diagnose this in our lives, and so just a couple things.

One of them is, who do you talk about? And so, notice this guy. What does he do? Is it himself? What shall I do? I have nowhere to store my crops. I, you know, right? He just talks about himself. That's what he does. And so, what is the center of our focus? And it's not bad to talk about things, right? That's not what we're saying. We're saying that what is the focus of our hearts? And one of the ways that's sometimes revealed is through our speech, right? Every time I would say something growing up, I would say something, you know, maybe about my brother, perhaps. And then mom would say, "Out of the heart, the mouse speaks," right? And so, one of the things this guy does is his speech reveals where his heart is.

And our speech reveals where our heart is. The second thing is what makes us happy. If we could have one thing, what would make us happy? And this guy is, "I have ample goods laid up for many years. Relax, eat, drink, and be pretty." That's not a bad thing to have ample goods laid up for many years. In fact, wise stewardship, that's probably a good thing. The problem is his hope is in those things, right? He doesn't thank God for them. He doesn't hope in God for them. He doesn't say, "Look at how good God has been to me." It's, "I have done this. Soul, you have laid up ample goods," right? Once again, there's the focus, but his hope is in what he has done and accomplishment. And third, has our desire ever led us to dishonesty?

And so you say, "Well, how is this dishonest?" One of the interesting things that some of the commentators point out is that the reason this guy is storing stuff up in barns. It's like, so when gas prices drop and they bring in the oil tankers and they sit them offshore because they don't want to sell it at that price, and so they artificially run the price up and then park the oil tanker and unload it? There's some good thoughts that that's what this guy is doing, right? He's not necessarily saving up so he'll have grain to eat in the future, right? It's if he puts all of this on the market at once, what happens to the price of grain on the market? It drops. But if he saves it, and if there happens to be a famine in a year or two from now, right, he could really cash in.

And so this leads him, you know, to essentially take advantage of the community, right? He's storing up because he wants to profit in the future. Now, it's not a bad thing to wisely profit in the future, but he's doing this in probably a very shady and dishonest way. Any thoughts or comments about... Yes. And he ended up owning Egypt. But I think, you know, that wasn't his hope, right? That was a survival of the... Right, right. He saw and said, "Oh, people are going to need to eat." Yeah, yeah. Yeah. All right. Any other thoughts or comments? Let's... All right. We're going to save the parable of the wicked tenants for next week, so I don't have to zoom through it at 90 miles an hour. And we'll pick that up next week with just a couple more parables.

Any other thoughts or comments? Let's go ahead and have a word of prayer. Father in heaven, thank you for allowing us to be here this evening. Help us, as we've seen in these two parables, to fix our hearts on you. In how we think, and how we feel, and how we obey. We thank you for all the blessings that you have given us. We thank you for all the good that you have done in our life, and help us not to lose sight of that in self-centeredness.