The Great Exchange

This message was preached by  AustinWord of Grace Church on October  20th , 2019. To listen/download the audio please click here. To listen to the Sunday's worship and propheticcontributions please click here

If you focus on multitudes, you will keep waiting for big opportunities and won’t even reach one. If you focus on one, you have a chance of reaching the multitudes thru that one.

The Great Exchange

Luke 16:19-31 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Rich Man and Lazarus

¹⁹ “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. ²⁰ And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, ²¹ who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. ²² The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side.^[a] The rich man also died and was buried, ²³ and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. ²⁴ And he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.’ ²⁵ But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. ²⁶ And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.’ ²⁷ And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father's house— ²⁸ for I have five brothers—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.’ ²⁹ But Abraham said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.’ ³⁰ And he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ ³¹ He said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.’”

3)  ¹⁹ “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. ²⁰ And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, ²¹ who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. ²² The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side.^[a] The rich man also died and was buried,

NOW BOTH THE MEN HAVE DIED, LET’S SEE WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.

Now Lazarus, the unimpressive man who did nothing in this story was carried by angels to heaven but the rich man who knew the scripture and got a proper burial went to hell.

v The separation of the rich and poor that had been so much part of their life continued into the afterlife, but with a great reversal of the circumstances.

Now the rich man will spend his eternity in hell.

What did Jesus describe Hell as?Can you imagine the intensity and weight of this verse?

So Jesus describes Hell as a place of Torment.

·       Place of No mercy

·       Place of No water

·       Place of Fire

·       Place of Anguish

In hell the rich man’s senses were all active, He was conscious, He could see, feel, touch, talk, and also remember.

Vs 26  says And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.

Life in heaven or hell begins the instant we die. It does not wait for a burial (Lazarus was not buried) nor is there a middle place that some believe is purgatory. 

From this passage,we see there are only 2 places that we go to after we die,  heaven or hell.  There is a great chasm that separates the two which means that no good deeds, offering or prayer will create an escape nor return.  Life in heaven or hell is permanent and eternal. .

Q) Do you think this story teaches that rich people go to hell and poor people go to heaven? NO

There’s a reason why Jesus told this story and the context of this passage was that Jesus was addressing the love of money to the Pharisees and he was mocked by them.

Abraham was a rich man, so this story clearly isn’t teaching that wealth is evil and poverty is good.

Q) Who was the Rich man? Why did he end up in hell?

The fact that the rich man calls him “Father Abraham” is a sign that this man was a Jew and so Jesus was likening him to the Pharisees. His parents raised him and his brothers to go to synagogue every week. They would have heard the words of Moses and the prophets saying things like:

Deuteronomy 15:7-8 (ESV)

⁷ “If among you, one of your brothers should become poor, in any of your towns within your land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother, ⁸ but you shall open your hand to him and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it maybe.

There is no indication in this passage that the rich man was rude or bad to the poor man, neither did he mistreat him, abuse him or drive him out from the gate. He didn’t move with compassion when he saw Lazarus at his gate.

Although the Rich Man knew the scriptures, and the prophets he didn’t allow his heart and life to be transformed by the Word of God.

We have the gospel and the Word and we got to let it transform our lives.

Q) What is the gospel?

Ephesians 2:1-10 English Standard Version (ESV)

We were all enemies of God and the “wages of our sin was death” but God demonstrated his love for us that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. So Jesus lived full of grace and truth and led a perfect, sinless life so that he could pay the price of all our sin past, present and future by dying on the cross and accepting the punishment of our sin which gave us the gift of eternal life.

On the third day Jesus rose from the grave and there he defeated sin and death and to those who believe in him and confess with their mouth that Jesus is Lord – they will be saved.

The key to Heaven is believing in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins.

So what does this story mean for us? There are 3 calls that I would like to highlight today.

1)     The call to respond to the Gospel.

2)     The call to preach the Gospel.

3)     The call to care for our community

The call to respond to the Gospel

 The reason why the rich man was in hell is that he didn’t repent. He knew that his family needed repentance, which implies that he didn’t do the same that’s why he landed up in hell.

Q) What is repentance?

Seeking forgiveness for your sins and making conscious decision to do what is right.

This transformation does not happen overnight but for the rest of our lives as we allow the word to marinate our heart and minds, the transformation takes place. This is a process we will go through for the rest of our time on Earth. Knowledge of the Word alone won’t save us.

This brings me to the second call.

The call to preach the Gospel.

We saw earlier how life in Hell is eternal and full of agony. There is no escape from it.

There was a genuine concern from the rich man for his family. Lazarus and the Rich Man’s family are not here. But we are and our friends, family and community are still here. We know the reality of what life after death looks like and we got to preach the Gospel and tell them the Good News.

Our responsibility is to only tell them the Gospel and it is their responsibility to accept or reject it

Lastly, the third call is to

Care for our community

The rich man neglected, ignored and showed no compassion towards Lazarus. He didn’t bother to offer him even crumbs. Like Lazarus there are many people in our lives. We need to identify who they are.

The ‘Lazarus’ may not be a person physically sitting at your gate and caring for our community is not necessarily always giving money or things.

It can mean acknowledging and appreciating the security guards or watchmen who open the gate for you to enter your society. No matter the weather conditions they get up each time to let you exit or enter and keep your society safe.

It can mean being kind to the person who daily picks your garbage. Offering thanks or a cup of tea or water or even having a quick conversation.

Caring for our community can be done in many different ways.

Ø If you focus on multitudes, you will keep waiting for big opportunities and won’t even reach one. If you focus on one, you have a chance of reaching the multitudes thru that one.

So today’s takeaway is:

The rich man had all the wealth, knowledge, scripture and proper burial but it wasn’t enough. We’ve got to be people who respond to the gospel, preach the gospel and care for our community.

Word of Grace is an Evangelical (Born Again),  Spirit-filled (Charismatic), Reformed, English speaking church in Pune that upholds the Bible as God's inspired Word for life. We are a church community that has people from every part of India and parts of the world. We are here to put the Great Command and the Great Commission into practice by equipping and releasing every member into works of service.  Word of Grace is a part of a wider international family of Churches called RegionsBeyond.To know more about us please log onto www.wordofgracechurch.org.