We think like that man as far as God is concerned; that is what he thinks of us. Why was he a fool? Well there are a whole number of reasons. First of all he overestimated his length of life. He was a rich man, I don't know how old he was, but he greatly overestimated the length of his life, and anybody who does and counts on a future that may never come, is a fool. Do you overestimate the length of your life? Are you counting on another 30 years, 20 years, or perhaps you are counting on another 50 years. You're overestimating the length of your life. You are saying, ‘I have no need to listen to this Bible preaching. It need not press upon my soul or upon my heart, because I have got many years to do what I want to do, and maybe if there's anything in it, then one day I can think again.’ Do you know you could be committing utter foolishness by greatly overestimating the length of your life? You don't know when God will say to you, ‘Come and give an account of your life. Come and give account of the breath I gave you, the abilities I gave you, the time I gave you. Render up the account, your time is finished.’ Don't play the fool; don't overestimate the time you have to rebel and go away from your God.
There's another respect in which he was a fool, of course. This man gave no thought to God or to eternity at all. He simply didn't think of it. It's the same with many of us. You never think about God; you never think about eternity. May you start to use your mind and be concerned about these things and ask questions. We say this gently and with tenderness. If not, one day God will say to you, ‘Thou fool, thou mindless one. You never thought about the obvious, you never thought about your soul. You had no fear of his greatest threat.’
This man was a fool also because he ignored the inner voice. Every one of us has an inner consciousness of God and eternity. There is an eternal realm and you know if you push that to one side and ignore it and go after this world, and carrying on as a rebel against God, on those grounds alone one day the voice of God with sadness must say to you, ‘You fool. All along you knew what you should do, you knew that there was a God in heaven, you knew that I was there, and you even had a sense that I was a gracious God who would receive returning sinners, and yet you went the other way.
There are many things we have got to fear in life, and be cautious about, and be shrewd about, but God will call you a fool if you don't fear things on the right scale of priorities. The thing to fear most is the day when you stand before God who would have been your kindest friend, who would have been your Saviour. You need to fear him if you are on the run from him, if you are rebelling against him. Fear him most. This man was a fool: he didn't fear God most, he didn't fear him at all. He took no precautions, he made no arrangements, and he was a fool chiefly because he got himself into the grip of covetousness. It is painful isn't it when people get into drugs and suddenly the power of the drug takes over – the power of the chemistry – and they find it irresistible and they are hooked on it. It is the same with covetousness. What a tragedy it is, and how foolish it is to play around with covetousness because it's addictive. It will get you and you will need it, and it will get its hooks into you, and it becomes your life's policy from that time on.
A very big industrial farmer with vast holdings from the north of England said to me once that the thing that he asked himself and what he watched for most of all was this: has the time come that his fields own him rather than him owning his fields? That is covetousness. If you play around with that, and you lust after things and you reject the living God, and you say, ‘Don't talk to me about Christianity, about coming to Christ. I am going to make it in this life, I am going to get gain and be somebody’; if you go that way, it will get you, it will control you, it will own you. Don’t’ listen to the nonsensical propaganda of the media and this vain and passing world.
This man was a businessman, and yet he threw away the most wonderful bargain, as it were – if we may say it reverently – he could ever engage in. The living God says, ‘I will pour out upon you riches such as money could never buy. I will give you life and blessing, and forgiveness and peace. I will give you understanding; I will give you a new character and a new life; I will give you eternity, A million businessman couldn't possibly purchase this for one single person. And I will give it to you freely. There will be nothing to pay. You come to me in the rags and tatters of your sin. You come simply confessing that you have been a rebel and a sinner and a selfish person. You cast your life down before me, and I will pour blessing out upon you freely.’
That night he was found to be utterly unprepared for his eternal future. He thought he was rich, but when he heard the voice of God, he discovered he was bankrupt. He had nothing, nothing on earth he could take with him, and nothing in heaven – no place reserved, no favour with God. As Matthew Henry says, he crawled into God's presence a vagrant. He left this earth secure, he arrived in eternity frightened, terrified. He left this world dreaming of his wealth. When the light of the next world turned on, he was in dread, terrified. He left this life self-satisfied; he went into the next full of anguish. He left this life congratulating himself; he crossed the threshold of eternity and found himself gripped with remorse and horror. He left this life astute, he entered into the next a fool. He left this life having a great estate surrounded by servants and staff; he crossed the threshold of eternity and entered into the next without a friend in sight. He left this life a dominant person, he arrived in the next cringing with nothing. No wonder the verdict is, fool.
What is our relationship with Christ who would do so much for us, who would wash away our sins, wash away all our rebellion? He came into this world from heaven, and he went on Calvary's cross in order to personally pay the price which we deserve to pay eternally for our sins. I've been a fool. He took my foolishness on the cross in his own body, and God poured out upon him the punishment due to me for my foolishness. He took the punishment due to me for my unbelief, and for my selfishness and deceitfulness, and all my covetousness. For every single sin that should have been laid to my charge, he was nailed to Calvary's cross, and God the Father veiled his face and punished him instead of me – that is, if I am one of those who will come to him and repent of my sins and ask him to pour out upon me pardon and new life. Come to him. and he will be your friend and your God now and for all eternity.