Big Idea: We ought to live with priorities that reflect the Son of Man is coming.
Luke 12, like Luke 11, is a chapter rich in warnings against anxiety. The birds are fed by their Maker, but He is your Father; don’t you realize He will care for you? The sharpest warnings against worry in this chapter seem to be rooted in the fact that the most important things are the ones we could not stockpile anyway. How many smiles can you deposit in the bank? How many hugs from someone you love can you put off today so you can have them tomorrow instead? The things that we can pile up are the very things that we cannot keep anyway. Either they will rot, moths will eat them, or we will die. All the things we can worry about we are going to lose.
When a child is playing hide and seek, how high do they normally count? How would you play differently if you did not know how high the person was counting? Obviously there would be no delaying. Your time could end at any moment! So you would have to be ready all the time. Today, my wife turns 28 and Dr. Charles Stanley turns 88, but God only knows which of His great servants will face Him first! Whether He returns or we stand before Him in death, we need to be ready.
If we realize that Jesus is coming again to set up His Kingdom visibly, we will live with a sense of urgency and purpose. If He finds we have been serving faithfully, then He will come to serve us, giving us rewards which we could never dream of. But if when He returns, we have wasted our time on games, we will lose everything we thought we had. Jesus left us when He died on the cross and took the punishment for our sins, then He rose again on the third day and ascended up to Heaven. He has told us He will return, although we don’t know when, and told us to be about the business of making disciples in the meantime. If we are fishers of men, then we will have nothing to worry about, because the things we love will be the things we can never lose.
Discussion Idea: Why do you think that people who believe in God are still tempted to live for the physical stuff of this world like money, prestige, and power?
Prayer Focus: Pray that Jesus would let us live with the joy of security in Him and the passion of expecting Him to return at any moment.