“But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich towards God.” – Luke 12:20-21

John Elwes, one of Britain’s first millionaires, was the inspiration for Charles Dicken’s immortal character Ebenezer Scrooge. Elwes was a famous eccentric and miser who went to bed every evening as soon as the sun set to avoid spending money on candles and once wore a ragged wig that he found discarded in a ditch beside the road for two weeks. Whenever a stable boy put out hay for the horse of a visitor, Elwes would sneak into the barn and steal the hay back before the horse had a chance to eat it. Elwes ultimately died young, unmarried and friendless, with a great fortune, because he refused to spend the money on a doctor to treat his illness. Elwes life truly illustrates the saying, “money doesn’t buy happiness.”

Another rich fool is immortalized by Jesus in the parable of the same name recorded in Luke 12:13-21. The man amasses great wealth, thinks only of ensuring his own future material comfort, and ultimately dies young, never using his wealth on anything at all. The man was rich towards himself, but not towards God. While these examples might be extreme, the sins of self-reliance, of idolizing stuff and money, of pride and selfishness, are all too common in our culture. Far too many people waste their lives on things that have little or no eternal significance. So why is this important to remember now?

In the month of May, students around the country will graduate from High School and College, entering into the next phase of life, many of them into jobs and adulthood for the first time. For far too many people, young and old alike, what they accumulate in life is the measurement of success, of an un-wasted life. I would encourage you to emulate the great theologian Jonathan Edwards, who resolved to live every day in a way that he would wish to spend it on his last day. Be rich towards God by investing your life in His work that will last far beyond your death in this life.

Caleb Land is the director of the Gilmer Christian Learning Center in Ellijay, GA. You can find out more about the CLC at www.gilmerclc.org.