Are we being rich towards God?

Today's Reading: Luke 12:13-21

When I looked up the word "fool" on Dictionary.com, here were some of the definitions:

1. a silly or stupid person; a person who lacks judgment or sense; 
2. a professional jester, formerly kept by a person of royal or noble rank for amusement: the court fool.
3. a person who has been tricked or deceived into appearing or acting silly or stupid: to make a fool of someone.
4. a weak-minded or idiotic person.

None of these definitions is particularly attractive, are they? I don't think I would want to be described as such. 

But this is the very word that Jesus uses to describe a wealthy man in Luke 12. This man has grown a crop so large that he has no place to store it all, so he has to build bigger barns. He takes pride in his possessions and decides that he will take the rest of his life easy and eat, drink and be merry. God rebukes him harshly, "You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?" And the story ends with the warning that this is what will happen to anyone who is not rich towards God.  

That got me to thinking about how we can be rich towards God. As Creator of the universe, He owns this world and everything in it. He certainly doesn't need usto be rich towards Him. But I believe that He does need usto be rich towards people who don't know Him. We need to be generous with our time to reach out to other people. We need to be generous with our love and compassion towards those who are burdened by life. We need to be rich with our service towards those who need help. 

Most importantly, we need to be rich with our knowledge of Jesus towards those who don't know Him yet. Who do you know that could use some of your riches? Will you pray for God to show you who those people are and then be willing to step forward and share? 

If we aren't willing to share our embarrassment of spiritual riches, we just risk becoming a fool. 

- Holly Barrett