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You Fool!
March 16, 2012
It seems to me rather contradictory that Jesus, who was so gentle at times (Matt. 19:13-15), would call some people fools. Yet, as recorded in the Gospels a number of times, our Lord used this derogatory term to describe those He spoke about—especially the Pharisees (see Matt. 23:17-19; Luke 11:39-40).
Jesus also used the word fool in a parable after warning a man about coveting (Luke 12:13-21). What made him foolish is not the fact that he built bigger barns to store his abundant harvest (vv.16-18). It would have been more foolish of him to leave it out in the fields where inclement weather would spoil it. Nor was he foolish because of his thought that this unexpected windfall was enough to last him a long time (v.19). After all, we are urged to follow the example of the ant in “storing up” the harvest (Prov. 6:6-8).
What made the man foolish? He left God out of the picture. He was called a fool because he failed to realize that his life was in God’s hands. While he was planning carefully for his comfortable life on earth, he failed to plan for eternity and store up treasures in heaven (Matt. 6:20).
Does your plan for the future have God in it? You won’t want to be called foolish by Him in the end.
Oh, why not turn while yet you may;
Too late, it soon will be—
A glorious life you may possess
Throughout eternity. —Anon.
He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. —Jim Elliot
Read: Luke 12:16-21
<< Jeremiah 17 >>
New American Standard Bible
9.“The heart is more deceitful than all else
And is desperately sick;
Who can understand it?
10.“I, the LORD, search the heart,
I test the mind,
Even to give to each man according to his ways,
According to the results of his deeds.
11.“As a partridge that hatches eggs which it has not laid,
So is he who makes a fortune, but unjustly;
In the midst of his days it will forsake him,
And in the end he will be a fool.”
12.A glorious throne on high from the beginning
Is the place of our sanctuary.
13.O LORD, the hope of Israel,
All who forsake You will be put to shame.
Those who turn away on earth will be written down,
Because they have forsaken the fountain of living water, even the LORD.
14.Heal me, O LORD, and I will be healed;
Save me and I will be saved,
For You are my praise.
15.Look, they keep saying to me,
“Where is the word of the LORD?
Let it come now!”
16.But as for me, I have not hurried away from being a shepherd after You,
Nor have I longed for the woeful day;
You Yourself know that the utterance of my lips
Was in Your presence.
17.Do not be a terror to me;
You are my refuge in the day of disaster.
18.Let those who persecute me be put to shame, but as for me, let me not be put to shame;
Let them be dismayed, but let me not be dismayed.
Bring on them a day of disaster,
And crush them with twofold destruction!
