The UEFA Cup is ramping up for quarter final play. This post has nothing to do with goal keepers or team captains. It has everything to do with our relationship to our souls.
A man from the crowd wants Jesus to play Judge Judy and settle an inheritance dispute (Lk 12:13). Jesus sidesteps that to address a far more important issue, namely, the state of the man’s soul. To underscore his concern that this man is tracking toward exchanging his soul for stuff (Lk 12:15), Jesus tells a parable.
In his story, Jesus talks about a rich man who plans to build bigger barns to store his excess so that he can take life easy (Lk 12:19). God calls this man a fool, because that very night his “life will be demanded from him” (Lk 12:20). Jesus is using marketplace language for “calling a loan”. The rich man’s life is not his own to do with as he pleases. His life has been entrusted to him by God. He is not the captain of his soul but the keeper. He must give account regarding how he has invested that life.
We do not save our own souls. God by grace through Jesus does that (Rom 3:23-24). But those of us who have received God’s grace are to work out our salvation. We are to pick up the responsibility to steward our souls well. We are to be rooted in God and His way and to remove the ‘debris’ that clogs and befouls the stream of our life.
How is your stream flowing these days?