“Be Rich Towards God!”

“Be Rich Towards God!”(Lk.12:13-21).
Dear friends in the Lord, it’s a brand new day in which we seek the counsel of the Lord so that we continue to grow in wisdom, knowledge, and understanding.
Today, the Lord Jesus Christ teaches us, “Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”
Since this teaching links greed to abundance of possessions, we often limit the scope of greed to material possessions. Greed is, “intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth, power, or food.”
Catholic Theology earlier identified greed as one of the seven deadly sins. They include “pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth.”
The insatiable desire to have more causes a person to act without conscience, become inconsiderate to the plight of others, considers others as objects or means to achieve more, inordinate desire for material accumulation and possessiveness, selfishness, corruption, hoarding, inordinate ambition, unbridled competitiveness and worst of it, the urge to be the only cock that should crow in the neighbourhood!
Watch out! Guard against all kinds of greed! We become slaves to the things that preoccupy us. Two days ago, my wife told me that I take delight in putting any little money I have into building. She said this because I was doing some innovations in the compound. Come to think of it, is it necessary for a senior citizen to worry himself about further developmental projects?
Unfortunately, there is a tinge of the rich fool in every one of us. All our pursuits of expanding our possessions are intended to assure ourselves of comfortability at our retirement. Do we take time to ask, “Do I know whether God has not decided otherwise for my future?” “Do I know my last day on earth?”
If you are a rich fool you won’t know that just at the time you have gathered everything and when it is time to sit back and enjoy the fruit of your labor the LORD will tell you, “You fool! This very night, your life will be demanded from you.”
My friend, “who will get what you have prepared for yourself?”
We may argue that the Lord Jesus Christ, as a man who possessed nothing and was not ambitious for anything, could only prescribe spiteful words that opposed development and progress!
Our Lord Jesus Christ does not challenge the acquisition of wealth as such. He challenges greed.
If we gain a heart of wisdom, we will come to the fulfilment of the knowledge that while we store up things for ourselves, we should be rich towards God; for that alone is the guarantee of our salvation.
Prayer: Holy Spirit, help us daily to guard against all kinds of greed. Amen!
Have a blessed day! Peace be with you!
Rev Babila Fochang.
21/08/2025.