Consumption is the clean call of nature, and it’s good.

However, consumption can drive you to excess. It may demand you seek luxury, and live a life of extravagance. Consumption may insist you drive a Cadillac, or a mustang… Consumption may dictate you live in a glass condo in the Trump tower, or wear furry coats that transform you into a man in lion’s clothing or a woman in snow leopard attire. Consumption may whet your appetite for lobster, oyster, and caviar… By the way, did you know that Beluga Caviar ranks as the most expensive food item in the world? Caviar is fish eggs and this brand comes from the Beluga Sturgeon fish, found mostly in the Caspian Sea. Beluga caviar costs up to $5,000 per kilogram. That’s about 2.5 grand per pound!!! If you can afford caviar, you must be rich.

Unfortunately, for some of us even the “normal” can be a luxury. Living in the projects of the South side of Chicago can be a luxury for a father. Even a trip to MacDonald’s can be a luxury for a mother. Some don’t usually know where the next piece of pizza is coming from. We call them poor. And others who fall somewhere between the poor-rich spectrum, we might call them middle class.

On this earth’s economy, you are what you consume. You are what you wear. You are what you eat. You are what’s in YOUR wallet. Society gauges you on the scale of consumption. Your resources define your name, your fame, or your shame. Therefore, we hunger for the American dream. That’s man’s economy.

But, is that the end of the story? Is my life about burgers, coke, laughter, and that’s it? Is the good life good enough for you? Is consuming the goal of our lives? Perhaps we need to ask what matters at the end of the day? In other words, does man’s economy sell the right diamond? If not, then what’s the deal in a different economy? What’s the deal in God’s economy?

We find the answer to these questions in the form of a story, a parable the Lord Jesus Christ addressed to the Pharisees, religious leaders at the time, who loved money. As in all other stories Jesus tells, whether true stories or parables, this one speaks eternal truth. The story is in the book of Luke, chapter 16, and verses 19 to 31. Please open your Bible with me in the book of Luke, chapter 16, verses 19 through 31. Luke 16:19-31.

I. Verse 19 reads: “there was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.”

A)  If we could have the rich man stand in your presence, we’d quickly notice a couple of things about him.

First, he is wearing a purple coat and fine linen underneath. Purple clothing, in ancient time, rests on the back of kings and nobles. Have you ever seen a man in a Versace coat ready to face the -20 degree in Chicago’s biting wind? This is the rich man right here. And fine linen. Even the underwear of the rich man is designer’s brand. Secondly, the rich man can afford caviar not just on his birthday or when he visits the White House, but every day. Everyday is better than Thanksgiving for the rich man. His table is so garnished you cannot notice the maroon that polishes the wood. But whole grain bread, wheat bread, brown turkey, white turkey, gravy, stuffing, white wine, red wine; and all kinds of delicacy throng every square inch of his table.

B) Now, let’s go outside. At the rich man’s gate lies a poor man whose name alone, in Jesus’ eyes, is worth mentioning—Lazarus, a name that means He whom God helps. Lazarus! If we could have Lazarus stand in our presence…actually, if we take a look at him as he lies down. His clothes look like rags you place under the coffeemaker to absorb the spills, and then you throw it away in the dusty streets of Palestine. This filthy hand-me-down Lazarus wears serves him both as dressing material as well as medical dressing for the wet boils that cover arms that beg and legs that cannot walk. To add grief to poverty, there is no Salvation Army, no welfare, no Medicare in Lazarus’ town.

And to add abuse to misery, dogs…dogs…not your modern-day man’s best friends, nor your warm fuzzy poodles. I am talking about street dogs in ancient Israel. They don’t take a bath. They never get brushed. They eat scraps from the table. These scavengers would come and lick Lazarus’ sores, while he lies there, helpless like dead meat.

Day after day, Lazarus lies there at the gate that can answer the grunts and whirlwind of his stomach. Day after day, he peeks through the metal bars that let in only people of higher status. He is longing for not the turkey breast, nor the roast beef, nor a piece of caviar, but some of the crumbs that make his mouth water. Such are the two men: the rich man’s life is day. Lazarus’ life is night.

II. But one thing, one thing they had in common. Death. Death is no respecter of persons. Death sees no difference between the rich and the poor, the handsome and the plain, the elegant and the gauche… One-day each has to hit the grave. Let’s look at verse 22: “the poor man died and was carried by angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried,” Notice these two economies, the poor man dies and is carried by angels somewhere (we’ll talk about that place later). But rich man dies, and the only thing worth mentioning is his burial…While the rich man enjoyed a limousine procession in his funeral, Lazarus could not afford a hearse. But Angels carried Lazarus. Angels carried him. I don’t know about you, but when I die, I do not want to be just buried, but carried by angels. Carried, not just buried. What do you want to happen to you when you die?

A) The rich man dies. He leaves behind a life of luxury and pleasure at its best, and is buried. As soon as he closes his eyes here on earth, he opens them in a strange place: v. 23a: In Hades… (that is “Hell”)…

The rich man now is not glancing at poverty at his gate anymore. Nor does he wear the warm fuzzy purple coat. But he is in a surrounding where blazing fire licks his soul. In the agony of the moment, Poor Richie thirsts for relief and he lifts up his eyes. What does he see? Figuratively speaking, a window of heaven opens, and who is in the horizon far off? Who is hanging out with Abraham, just like a guest would lay his head on his friend’s chest at the table?

B) It’s Lazarus. Can that be true? The Rich man realizes Lazarus goes to the same place as Abraham. The same place as the father of those who trust in God. Lazarus is at Abraham’s bosom, that is paradise. And there, Lazarus is not eating just your Giordano’s pizza or even caviar for that matter. Better than that! Lazarus is feasting with fruit from the tree of life that never ends, in the presence and splendor of God himself. But not so with the rich man. Heaven reversed the rich man’s economy.

C) After noticing such an anomaly, with a dehydrated throat, Poor Richie cries out something along the lines, “Father Abraham, I need a time out. I need a respite. Please have mercy. Send Lazarus to dip his finger tip in water and cool my tongue, because I can’t take it anymore in this flame.” I don’t know about you, but I can’t remember the last time I was so thirsty that a drop of water made any difference. But in Hades the rich man longs for just that.

III. Then, with the voice of a relative, Abraham responds to the rich man:

A) Child, remember that in your time before death you received your money, your Cadillac, your hummer, your caviar and lobster, your wine, and you looked sharp everyday. While Lazarus, like Cinderella, he received: rags. Now, glory replaces his rags. And misery replaces your luxury.

And to seal the reversal, Abraham adds: Let’s look at v. 26:  And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm [that is an unreachable distance] 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.”

At this point in the conversation, the rich man knows there is no grace after physical death, no relief, and no end in second death.

B)  1. But what about his family on earth? So, the rich man pleads with Abraham, vv.27-28: Then I beg you, father, send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.

–“They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.” In other terms, Abraham is saying, “your family on earth has the word of God as Moses and the other Servants of God wrote. They have the scriptures. They have the Bible; let them obey it!”

The rich man’s first plea fails. There is no welfare in Hades. His second appeal flunk as well. There is no man-made method to save one’s family. Do you think he will stop nagging Abraham, then?

2. No, he is witty and persistent, he argues in v. 30 and watch his KEYWORD: “No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.”

 “Repent.” Neither the rich man nor any of his five brothers nor his dad has repented, as his answer indicates. By the way, do you know what the rich man means when he uses the word “repent”? “I repent” means, “I make a u-turn on the highway of life. I am switching to the left lane, come to a screeching stop from the natural voice that screams: “This is my life, this is my body, this is my money, this is my this…my that, so I have the right to do whatever I want with it. It’s none of God’s business.” Then I do a one-eighty, take the road where my heart knows, “My life is a gift from God, my body is a gift, my money is a gift, and nothing I am, nothing I have is mine, but His.”

Again, the rich man insists with Abraham, “if someone comes back to life and tell my family, they will turn from self-service to God’s service.”

Then, as you might assume, Abraham replies, “The costumer is always right. Let me see what I can do. Lazarus, go ahead finish your meal, go see the same angels who picked you up after you died, then tell them, ‘Clothe me back with my body of sores, lame legs, and send me back to earth.’”

IV. No!!! Instead, this is the clincher that Abraham drops into the ears of the rich man. V. 31: “If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.”

At this point as we can imagine: silence…an infernal silence reigns on the rich man. His countenance falls, and he reverts his attention back to the flame that never fades. In Hades he is bound for eternity—humanity’s greatest tragedy.

If one can learn one lesson when it’s too late, the rich man heard this: In God’s economy, His word is gold.

In God’s scheme of things, your life on earth is the biggest waste ever, if you do not obey Jesus’ words. But if you listen in repentance, then when you die, angels will carry you to heaven.

That is the difference between man’s economy and God’s economy. Man’s economy leads to the rich man’s fate. God’s economy leads to Lazarus’ fate. God’s economy says, “you are not what you consume. You are not what you wear. You are not what you eat. You are not what’s in YOUR wallet.” In God’s economy you are what you do with His truth: either eternal loss, or eternal success.

Let me submit to you, that no one has the natural power to obey God’s truth. Like babies born with natural inclination to consume, all of us are born with a heart bent on sin, which is rebellion against God. The symptoms of sins appear in each of us somehow. When we depend on drugs to cope with life, or jump from one relationship to another like a monkey hangs from one branch to the other, for we can’t handle being single, we are showing the symptoms of sin. We all can relate. The good news is the power to obey God has to come from Him, and He provides just that in His Son Jesus Christ.

So, a little closer to home, this parable teaches:

A) If you are born with a golden spoon in your mouth, you are not going to hell because you have a fat bank account. Trouble starts not when you have money, but when money has you.

If you are a doctor, or a lawyer, you are not going to end up like Poor Richie, because you are wealthy. The deal is to buy into God’s economy.

If you are retired, and accumulates millions of dollars over the years, and even this recession cannot hurt you, your best bet (actually the only spiritual bet) is to place your trust in God’s economy.

B) Now, if you grew up in a home where bread was a luxury that eludes you better than your own shadow, you need to know that heaven is not open to you because you are in Lazarus’ physical or economic condition. The key was Lazarus’ spiritual condition—faith in God.

http://www.blackandchristian.com/articles/academy/gelin-10-05.shtml

Please remain in prayer for the Haitian people.

Without further do, let’s dive into our topic–prayer. The kind of prayer I want to address is one of the Biblical types of prayer, and more specifically–intercession for others. Interceding for others means bringing their needs to God and asking for His intervention on their behalf. One of my first experiences with intercessory prayers goes back in the Spring of 2005 when I worked as an interpreter in Haiti for a two-week American Mission trip focused on medical outreach by an organization named “Friend Ships.”

During these two weeks of translating for patients to nurses and vice versa, I experienced the most beautiful effect that prayer exerts on the person who prays. The Friend Ships crew set up about six medical tents on a large compound of a Church named Tabernacle de la Grace (Grace Village Ministries). They would see patients from 7:00 am until 5:00 pm with a lunch break in between and dinner at the end of the day. So, for a first-time interpreter I had my hands full. However, the excitement of meeting Americans and interacting with them for the first time in my life gave me more incentive than any addicting drug could. I found myself waking up at about 6:00 each morning and shoveling my toast and coffee into my throat faster than ever so I could join the missionaries in their loving work on behalf of Jesus.

In this devout endeavor for Jesus, the nurses and doctors required each interpreter to pray for each patient that walked into our tents on top of medical care. This policy commanded my utmost respect for the team for it showed their faith and dependence on God. I had fun lifting up every sickness or disease we dealt with. I prayed against unusual migraines, eyes infections, chest pains, intestinal parasites, urinal infections, yeast infections, cysts in hands or legs, etc. Besides the praying, I also enjoyed peering through the deep blue, or brown, or kaleidoscopic eyes of each nurses I work with as I switched my attention back and forth between them and each patient. Being the middle-man could not feel any better. Such a work allowed me to grow both culturally and spiritually.

Unlike the cultural growth I experienced, my spiritual growth did not kick in immediately. It took me the full two weeks of working as a translator and a prayer warrior to realize what God accomplished in me through the Holy Spirit because of intercession. Although I didn’t see the patients afterwards in order to assess their healing or effectiveness of the treatment, I felt closer to God just for invoking Him all day long. That didn’t stop just with feelings. Things would get better.

Before I can tell you how things got better, let me first explain the situation I was in. I was attending back then a college for Social Sciences called FASH (Faculte des Sciences Humaines) and took a break in order to work with the missionaries. School was on saturday as well as late weekdays, so I could afford to skip a few classes. This campus teemed with some of the prettiest girls Haiti had to offer the world. And as a young man, striving to keep a pure mind before the Lord, I found myself battling with certain thoughts when these girls would walk around campus dressed in the most provoking manner I had ever seen. By provoking I mean a way that the church girls didn’t dress. Some of the non-Christian ladies would wear tight-fitting pants and shirts that reveal their belly buttons–things that my young eyes were helpless to. When these females would walk around, that would turn my head around as well as if my neck was magnetically polarized to their hips. When they would sit down in the first classroom rows right in front of mine, I had a harder time focusing on the professor.

Now, after the two weeks of intensive translating and praying for the sick all day long were over, I started to notice a change in the way I viewed women. I went back to school and when these provoking-and-enticing-despite-themselves women would walk by, my eyes would not follow them up as my previous routine would demand. When they would sit in the front rows and I would happen to see what only a doctor or a husband should have seen in a certain context, I would find my thoughts fixed on God’s perspective on these ladies. The girls were no longer sexual objects to fantasize upon or people to put down, to despise or disgust. Rather, they were created in God’s own image.

For the first time in my 9 year-old Christian journey, I realized that I could think with purity about those females who didn’t know God and exposed too much of their bodies. My flesh could not take over my mind and body any more. I began to see these girls with compassion. I would think to myself, “If only so and so knew the Lord, she would value her body more and save her intimate parts for only one man and do so in the proper context.” Along with such thoughts I also felt the need to love the girls despite the darkness they were in and to share the light with them whenever I had the opportunity.

This change of behavior can only originate from a renewing in attitude and thinking. And this transformed mind, for my particular experience, came as a result of time spent with God on behalf of total strangers. Isn’t the Lord amazing? I wonder how many bad habits and inward sins that we Christians could successfully change if we practiced the right type of prayer (among others). How many victories we could get over sins if we just prayed more often for others and forget more about ourselves?Intercession serves sanctification well in the life of the one who prays. Praying for others brings inward purity.

Ephesians 1:16 “I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.”

I am grateful to be a second-semester sophomore in Pastoral Pre-Seminary Studies at Moody Bible Institute. I am currently taking these courses that I love so much: Hermeneutics, Pastoral Ethics, Intro to Philosophy, Intro to Psychology, and Christianity and Western Culture II.

I am learning so much both spiritually and relationally, and the Lord has been blessing me with great friends and prayer partners and a very welcoming Assembly of God church that I attend.

How do I make it financially speaking? Well, I came close many times to discouragement and despair in face of financial challenges but the Lord has proved Himself faithful as always. For instance, last month two anonymous donors sent a total of $1,100 toward my school bills while I was close to be in trouble with deadlines of some of my room and board fees. This was one of the many miracles He has done in this area in my life. I currently work 20 hours a week for Moody Distance Learning Center as a Student Resource Assistant (fancy name for customer service type of job), which helps a little bit with my expenses.

I am so excited and looking forward to accomplishing my B.A. degree in order to enroll in Seminary for M.Div. The vision–although I am open to God to change it whenever He wills–is still to use this training to train Haitian Pastors in Haiti who never got the chance to obtain formal Biblical training. Building a Bible College to this effect is a plan that warms my heart and lights up my face when I think of it. You would be amazed to know how much the church in Haiti is suffering from spiritual malnutrition because of lack of competent preachers and spiritual leaders. As a matter of fact, some of these ministers sadly cannot even read the Bible for themselves really well. Thus I am convinced that God put this burden on my heart so I can use the training He is entrusting me with so I can be a blessing for Haiti somehow.

Feel free to contact me via this blog or by e-mail at weltwok@gmail.com if you want to partner with me in any manner either now for my present challenges or future ministry goals. Feel free to share your prayer requests as well. We are called to carry one another’s burden and I want to use this blog to connect with others in this calling.

God bless you richly.

I remember this story about a fellow tailor among my father’s neighbors, named Matthew, who came to pay him a quick visit one day a few years back. While the two were enjoying their conversation, Matthew’s peripheral father-type-vigilant vision caught his one and only son, about 10 years old, perched on the fence of the house where the shop was at. With a voice tainted with concern he yelled, “Marco, come here immediately please.”  At these words his son came running across the street as if his dad was about to recompense him for his past 4.0 at school or some commendable gestures. When Marco reached our sidewalk, however, the gentle voice of his daddy whispered, “Check out the bottom of the wall.” Upon turning his head toward the fence, Marco’s face fell in a kind of fear that people experience after coming as close as a hair to an accident. Then Matthew continues, “Do you see why I called you to come and see?” He didn’t need to add any more loving warning to these words, for Marco’s face was already displaying a silent resolution to never climb up there until the big gap missing toward the bottom of the wall was fixed.

This story kind of makes me think about how much I wish God was that clear with me when he asks me to do something hard such as believing He has blessed me despite the circumstances, or trusting He is bringing my good out of tough decisions He wants me to make. But the bottom line is that, although God is a logical being, He doesn’t owe us explanations for unwelcome events or suffering of all sorts, or hurtful relationships, or even habitual sins that seem worse when we pray. If you want a witness, go ask Job how he felt when God rebuked him for his discourses during the predicaments Satan inflicted.

Can we humbly trust the Lord to do what He promised in His word? Can we utter a prayer of surrender such as, “God I don’t know what I need but what I want, but would you please bring what serves best your glory?” Until we accept the fact that we are humans and God is God and thus humble ourselves, trusting and obeying wholeheartedly can be really tough.

May this little devotion make sense to you and if there is any spiritual benefit you can glean out of it, do so and disregard my lack of eloquence and knowledge. God bless you who read this blog post.

An ironical reality is that we cannot cope without God’s presence, as Christians. When we suffer spiritual atrophy we lose our joy and thankfulness toward God.  For David, failure to go to God [after he sinned] meant bones atrophy due to constant groaning: “When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long” (Ps. 32:3, NIV). Paul, writing to the Thessalonians church, contends that God’s will for them in Christ is to be joyful always, pray continually [emphasis mine], and give thanks in all circumstances (1 Thess. 5:16-18, NIV). And Paul also instructs Timothy, a young pastor, to train himself to be godly, and then he goes on to give the reason: “For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come” (1 Tim. 4:7b-8, NIV).

I wonder how little we realize what we are missing out on when we don’t exercise our spiritual walk. Otherwise, why would we spend hours a week at the gym while we pray for about 5 minutes a day? Why do we hang out for hours a day with our friends and significant others while we read the Bible less than twice a week (I don’t want to exaggerate or say that these hobbies are wrong)? No wonder that our spirituality is dead at times and we wonder if the God we preach to this world is even real among us. Our spirits have gotten somehow wearier and wearier and started to stagger along the path of a hectic life that is jammed with all kinds of activities and deafened by all kinds of noises.

The good news is that we don’t have to remain in this valley of spiritual atrophy. We can stop the decline the very moment we realize we are slacking. Let’s just keep first things first. Our spiritual routine remains the same as it was for Joshua, David, Paul and other biblical heroes: prayer, meditation on the word of God, and obedience to God’s will. One of my favorite prayers is to beg God to refresh me with a strong appetite for Himself and His Word. We can’t climb our spiritual mountains on our own. We need the Holy Spirit’s impetus. And isn’t that refreshing to know that God is always there for those who diligently seek Him? He is the rewarder of those who earnestly seek Him (Heb. 11:6b).

Thanks for the privilege to be born in a two-century-old free country like Haiti. But it is still in bondage of self-destructive culture where voodoo tendacies such as hatred against those who better themselves, despair in face of problems, and dependence on foreign aids, and wasting food on idols while the people is starving. God, I long for that day when the gospel will set free the hearts of lost Haitians and change their retrograde kind of philosophy into serving for the progress of the whole nation. I long for that day when the Haitian church will rise up and show the world what knowing Christ is really about: loving and working for the blessing of one another. In Jesus’ name we pray! Amen