Worthy Brief - November 10, 2026

 Worthy Brief - November 10, 2026

What will you do with the life you've been given?

Luke 12:16-21 Then He spoke a parable to them, saying: "The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. 17 And he thought within himself, saying, 'What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?' 18 So he said, 'I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods. 19 And I will say to my soul, "Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry." ' 20 But God said to him, 'Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?' 21 "So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God."

In our last devotion, 'Rise, take up your bed and walk,' we heard about a man who had been lying by the pool of Bethesda for 38 years, and Yeshua (Jesus) said to him, 'Rise, take up your bed and walk.' Grace enabled him to move. Today we're going to look at the parable of the rich fool, and the question is: what are you going to do with the life that you've been given?

Yeshua speaks of a man whose land brought in a remarkable harvest. The harvest itself is not the issue. Neither is the work. His land was very productive. The problem was what was in his heart when the abundance came.

He starts talking to himself. "What shall I do?" "I will pull down my barns." "I will build greater." "I will say to my soul." And on and on it goes, all inward. My crops, my barns, my goods, my future. His world shrinks as his barns grow. There is absolutely no thought of the poor. There is no hint of generosity. He does not mention the One who gave the rain, the soil, the strength, and the very breath in his lungs.

Moses had warned Israel about exactly this. “When you have eaten and are full, and have built beautiful houses and dwell in them... then you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gained me this wealth.’ And you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth” (Deuteronomy 8:12, 17-18). The rich man forgot where his harvest came from.

Then God speaks one word to him: "Fool!" In the Tanach, the word for that kind of fool is 'nabal' (נָבָל). It's not about lack of intelligence at all. It's about someone who lives as if God doesn't exist. "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God" (Psalm 14:1). Scripture tells the story of a man who bore that very name.

Nabal was a rich man, a man of sheep, with three thousand sheep. When David's men (who had protected his flocks) came to him and asked for a little food, Nabal refused: "Shall I then take my bread and my water and my meat and give it to men when I do not know where they are from?" (1 Samuel 25:11). Note the "my"s again. That very same night he throws a feast "as a king would", and "his heart was merry within him". About ten days later the Lord struck him, and he died (1 Samuel 25:36-38). His wife said it best: "As his name is, so is he: Nabal is his name and folly is with him" (1 Samuel 25:25). That story would have been in the minds of Yeshua's listeners as they heard this parable.

"This night your soul shall be required of you." The Hebrew word for soul is nefesh (נֶפֶשׁ), the life and breath God put into Adam when He breathed into him and "man became a living soul" (Gen 2:7). The rich man spoke to his nefesh as if he owned it. His life had always been on loan from God.

Now contrast that with Joseph. Joseph also built barns. In the seven years of plenty, he gathered in grain and filled the storehouses in every city of Egypt (Genesis 41:48). Joseph wasn't building the barns for himself, though. When the famine came, those same storehouses fed Egypt, neighboring countries, and his own family, the house of Israel. Same crop, same barns, completely different motivation. The rich fool gathered his grain in to keep it for himself. Joseph gathered his to bless the world.

Solomon makes the distinction: "There is one who scatters, and it increases; and there is one who withholds more than is right and it leads to poverty. The generous soul will be made rich" (Proverbs 11:24-25). In Hebrew, the generous soul is nefesh berachah (נֶפֶשׁ־בְּרָכָה) (a soul of blessing). The rich man was talking to his soul about ease. God was looking for a nefesh berachah.

That's what Yeshua means by being "rich toward God". It means living with eternity in the present. It means recognizing that everything we have in our hands is ours to steward: our time, strength, money, influence, relationships, opportunities, experience, and wisdom.

The rich man thought that abundance meant he could stop thinking beyond himself. The Kingdom teaches the very opposite. The more provision you have, the more you can bless. The more influence you have, the more responsibility you have to serve. The more wisdom you have, the more you have to pour into others.

This is not about living in a state of anxiety. It's about living awake. The tragedy of the rich fool wasn't that he had barns. The tragedy was that he thought his barns were security. Moses prayed, "So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom" (Psalm 90:12). To number our days is not to fear death. It is to treasure life.

When your focus in life is Kingdom-oriented, you start to see each day as a gift; you start to pray for opportunities for God's Kingdom, and that's stewardship. Every act of generosity becomes an eternal investment.

You carry a nefesh berachah (נֶפֶשׁ־בְּרָכָה), a soul of blessing, and the King has filled your hands with good things to share. You are right where you are to bring life to others. Today is a gift no barn could ever hold. Every day is full of conversations waiting to happen and opportunities to shine, encourage, give, serve, and worship, so pour it all out with joy. Invest in people, sow into the Kingdom, love fully, and give freely. Every seed you scatter makes you rich toward God, and your Father delights to multiply it!

Your family in the Lord with much agape love,

George & Baht Rivka

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