Real Life Radio

David J: Today, on Real Life Radio.

Jack Hibbs: That if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, and he will answer. It's an amazing promise. It didn't say you might answer. It doesn't mean you're going to think about it. You said if anyone wants wisdom for us to ask you.

David J: This is real life. Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I'm David J thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's word, the Bible. Are you looking for some solid biblical teaching that speaks to the world today? At jackhibbs.com, you have access to Pastor Jack's entire library of sermons on demand anytime, anywhere. Whether you're commuting, you're at the gym, or you need a moment of encouragement, you can dive right into some powerful verse-by-verse teachings that make God's word really come alive. From deep dives into scripture to practical messages on everyday issues, Pastor Jack's teachings help you understand the Bible in a way that's clear, it's relevant, and it's easy to apply.

You're going to find sermons that address today's toughest questions with biblical insight and hope in the midst of life's challenges. Now, whether you're new to the faith or you've been around for a long time, these messages are designed to meet you right where you're at and inspire you to grow deeper in your walk with God. So, don't miss out. Visit jackhibbs.com when it just start exploring the sermon library today. You're going to like it. That's jackhibbs.com where powerful teaching is always just a click away. On today's edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack continues his series called The Parables of Jesus and a message titled Parable of the Rich Fool Part 1.

You know, whenever Jesus spoke to the crowds, he often spoke using relatable stories with common everyday themes the Bible calls parables. In this parable, Jesus is teaching about foolish living and a wasted life. You see, when God is not in our thoughts, we fail to realize that everything comes from him. Laying up treasures for ourselves and not being rich towards God makes us hold on too tight. Whether we're poor or rich, it doesn't matter. It's what we do with what we have. So, today Pastor Jack teaches that building up our wealth while thinking that it's never enough, that's a sure sign that God is the last thing on our minds.

To be rich, that's not foolish, but blessings can be a curse when we refuse to use what we have for God's glory. Now, with his message called Parable of the Rich Fool Part 1, here's pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs.

Jack Hibbs: A real life filming. Real life is the internet TV thing that we do and we did one of the recordings, one of the filming uh segments and because Tony Perkins is in town, we interviewed Tony Perkins and because it was in Orange County, we called some friends up and said, can we use your house for the place of filming? You know what I mean? Like a you know a You guys all are you are you listening? Because when I tell you about it and then it comes on on internet TV and you watch this interview, you're going to think, whoa, look at Pastor Jack's house.

It ain't my house. It's a friend of this ministry's house. And so it was, hey, can we can we use your house? Yeah, absolutely. We'd love to have you guys. So, it's just nuts. I mean, it's just nuts. It's amazing. And in fact, you know where we baptized? Down at Corona Del Mar. Uh the house overlooks all of that right there. And they're they they husband and wife, wonderful Christians, love God tremendous. In fact, they do tremendous mission outreaches in Haiti. Uh every month. But anyway, that's not the point. The point is I I said uh Tony, I'll pick you up at the hotel then we'll we'll do this filming and we'll get you back for he had to do a radio program at noon and so we're driving and we're pull onto Ocean Avenue and Tony's looking around.

He's thinking, well, what what are we going to do this? So, we park. Now, you know those homes along there $12 15 20 million dollar homes. So, while we're walk we get out of the car and it's about 9:30 or 10:00 in the morning. It's about 74 degrees. There's a light breeze blowing. There's whales spouting. Seriously. And so Tony Remember, Tony's from the East Coast. And and it's you know 10 degrees where he came from. He stops and he looks out over the Pacific. You could see by the way if you or anyone was near the coast on Monday, you could see not only Catalina, you could see uh which is very unique.

You could see outlines or areas of color where structures were at near Avalon. It was crystal clear, freakishly clear. And you could see San Clemente Island which is very rare. It was remarkable. And Tony said he steps out and he just goes he looks. And he said I wrote it down. He said, it's no wonder why people put up with your insane politicians in this state. Californians, you Californians have no excuse for not worshiping God every day. Think of that. It was the it was beyond perfect. It was a beyond perfect day. The day was beyond perfect.

How could heaven be better than that? It was perfect. And he and he hit him. I mean, we're kind of used to this. Like, okay, come on, whatever. And he just go he just goes, how can you Californians not worship God? You have no excuse. You have no excuse. And then it hit me. It's like, oh my goodness, he's right. He's absolutely right. What? What is that? It's Look, Southern California specifically should have no unbelievers in it. That's a horribly bigoted-minded thing to say. No, no, I mean it this way. Open your eyes and look at God's goodness.

What do you think that comes from? Think about it. You ever seen anybody get out of the car? Oh gosh, they get out of the car. Oh. Oh. It's amazing how all this came together with a massive explosion of accidents coming together with incredible accidental design to make this It's amazing. What an accident. No one would ever do that. Even the world says, wow. That's amazing. His goodness is absolutely awesome. The Bible tells us in Psalm 103 verse 2 and this man had missed it in the parable and but we don't want to miss it.

Psalm 103 verse 2 says, bless the Lord oh my soul and forget not all his benefits. Goodness. You got to nurture that in your life. Psalm 103 verse 2, nurture that. Make that verse part of your life. I'm I'm I'm dead serious about this. Memorize that verse. Watch what it watch what his truth begins to do to your heart. Especially if you're known to gripe about things. If you're a grumbler, don't raise your hand. If you're a grumbler, I don't like that one. It's too bright. It's too dark. That's too loud. That's too soft. You know the Goldilocks syndrome?

Memorize that verse. You know why? Cuz God's word in you, God's word in you, literally, and this is no joke. God's word in you begins to affect your thinking and how you hear things, how you see things. For real, I'm not joking. For real. You take the word of God in your life and you start to memorize it, it affects how you see things and affects how you process things that are going on around you. We have a pastor here on staff. He has uh an amazing heart. Many of you know Pastor Chris May, hospital bed If you're sick, Pastor Chris is going to be there.

I mean, he's like 911. He beats the ambulance. I don't know how he does it. He's amazing. And you know somebody might say something like, well, you know, I can't believe I got a flat my car. And because because Chris deals He's just dealing constantly verses of hope to people. He'll he'll he'll get it come right on he'll just come right back at you and say, well, you know, thank God that you have a car that could have gotten a flat like that. Well, I don't know. My I can't seem to lock the door on my house.

I don't know what the world's coming to. What what's going on in here any And he will come right back at you and say, you know what? Thank God that you had a problem trying to lock the door to your house because there's homeless people in the day. Are you are you hearing that? The word of God in you affects how you perceive things. If you are very anemic on Bible, if your Bible exposure is Sundays and Wednesdays, then you're anemic. If we draw blood from you, it's like water spiritually. And listen, if that's true in your life, you know it's true in your life when everything upsets your cart and there's nothing good.

Somebody says, look at that. Uh that's probably going to break any minute. It's like, oh wow. Hey, what a nice day. It's a little too warm for You know, it's like, oh for crying out loud. You wonder how they're going to do in heaven. Those angels I don't know. Isn't that weird? Anyway. The Bible says in Psalm 13 verse 6, I will sing to the Lord because he has dealt bountifully with me. Sing. He says, I will sing to the Lord because he's been really bountiful with me. All of us can say that. The second thing is this and we'll go as far as we can.

We'll have to wrap it up soon, but in verses 17 and 18 is this is that the parable of the rich fool teaches us this that God was not in his plans. Of course not. How could God be in his planning when God's not in his thoughts? This is convicting in a moment here. We look at our own lives. How many of our plans go astray? Well, I don't mean for you to respond that loud. I'm just just listen. Some guy goes, my life, it's never working out for me ever. Well, here's here's the deal.

The reason why the plans don't work is because God's not in the plans and that's because God's not in the thoughts.

David J: You're listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. You know, to hear more episodes and maybe catch up in the series, just go to jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. And for now, let's get back to our teaching. Once again, here's Pastor Jack.

Jack Hibbs: The reason why the plans don't work is because God's not in the plans and that 's because God's not in the thoughts. Why? How is that? In verse 17 and 18 we learn this that this man's problem is that he was self-wise. He was self-wise in his own opinion. This is very dangerous. We have to be very careful because I would think anyway that we're taught and we're raised that we can do this. My parents were World World War II generation parents. You say, well, who cares? I understand that, but here's the deal. Uh they came out of a they came out of a culture that is both good and bad.

By the way, every culture is good and bad, right? But they came out of the culture that uh if you approach your life without God, but having come out of that culture of survival, there's there's a tendency to be self-wise in your own opinion because they're you know, what were the posters of World World War World War II like that or what we were known for is the can-do spirit. Remember that? The can-do The world knew us as uh can-do. Americans were mocked in a good way that for example in World War II uh if something broke in Europe in the war or whatever, they would call for an American because they would fix it.

They would take the coffee maker and break it up and wind up fixing the machine gun with it. Americans were famous for that. In fact, there's a show that made fun of sort of that whole thing. You guys remember the show MacGyver? Anybody? Mac The MacGyver thing was a a spoof off of Well, if that's messed up, go find an American. We don't know how they do it, but they 'll fix it. And then the British invaded us in the revolutionary period. They did they poor guys. Seriously. They had they did not know what to do with us because there was the British regulars, the trained professional military soldiers of Britain, the greatest army, the greatest military force on earth, ladies and gentlemen.

And King George says, we're going to go teach those Americans a little bit of respect because they think that they can handle this thing. They want independence. They want to think for themselves. Who does that? And so when the British regulars came to slap us back into shape and war break out, Lexington and Concord um one American Minute Man or one American farm boy Remember, we we had an army. We'd pick off for every one American that got shot, we'd pick off anywhere from 10 to 12 British professional soldiers. How did that happen? Because the British shoulders for soldiers for example when they were hungry, they sat down and they had cooks and hunters that would go with them wherever they went in the world and they would The hunters would hunt the food, the cooks would prepare the food, and the food would be brought to the soldiers.

Do you know what Americans Every American had to do in those days? I know it's hard for the young people. Literally, there were no Costcos in those days. Not a one. There were no stores like that. They had to shoot their breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And the American backwoods countryman was the most skilled riflemen probably in the world at the time. And the British shows up with all awesome looking red jackets, very cool looking uniforms. Our guys had holes in their pants. They had horrible They didn't have uniforms. But those guys knew how to shoot.

And from that whole spirit came this thing, I'll take care of it. Without God, that's not a good thing. With God, it's amazing. Without God, what was our strength with God when God's removed? You start to lean on our own resource, right? Our own power. Sound familiar? But there's Listen, God if you lean on your own opinion to live your life, God will let you. How could the creator We'll have to end here. How could the creator of the universe How could God who made a blood cell a blood cell? I hope you're not here tonight, but if you have a fever you know it's a miracle that you have a fever.

Did you know that you I don't feel like a miracle. If you have a fever, it's brilliant. It's genius. You Do you body's doing? Something invaded your body and it doesn't like it. Your body recognized, wait a minute. Something's in me. Something feels funny. Something's in me not supposed to be in me. The brain, central processing unit, checking the chemistry levels, everything going on. Okay, imagine that by the nanoseconds of time in your life. Billions of times a day. How we doing? Okay, pH, all right, oxygenation, right on. Just like, okay, great. Protein level, okay, magnesium, yeah.

Think of it. It's amazing. You Are you You ever Have you ever been hungry for something? Do you know why? Have you ever been like It's like I don't know where. I think I want a steak. Do you know why? Because your brain is checking your chemistry levels constantly and says, you know what? We need some iron. Yeah, I'd like to call in some iron, please. Delivery, iron, half hour. Yeah, that's good. You You You said to yourself, I want a steak and I need to pull over. I need to get I want one. Let's Let's Your body You thought you decided.

I saw the commercial. I'm going to order steak. Isn't it amazing? So, your body says, something's in me and it's wrong. Your body generates the fever. It goes to war. Your body causes your your brain declares and sends out the right chemistry to enlarge your blood cells so that they were rubbing together at the normal rate which when they make contact happens to produce with a burn rate, your metabolism 98.6 brain says, we're good. Something foreign comes into your body and the brain says, all right, we got something in here not good. Let's create an environment that makes the enemy unable to live here.

Your brain is so committed. Look, in this fallen world, imagine how how we were with Adam and Eve. How imagine Adam and Eve in perfection. Of course they didn't have to battle sickness, but think about how the body worked then. When they ate an apple, what happened? Not Well, wait, no, not an apple. We know what happened with an apple. Actually, we don't know it was an apple. Didn't say it was an apple. Probably an apple. But I don't like apples. So was an apple. The amazing thing that happens this your your your body creates an environment that's not hospitable for the foreigner and it will raise the temperature until it has victory.

But because we live in a fallen world, your body will raise the temperature and be so devoted to preserving the integrity of your system that you could actually die of a fever. That's because we live in a fallen world. But how your body works God's goodness, God's grace. Listen, you start thinking about, well, I I'm rich because I did all I planted all these crops and they've produced bountifully for me and I I did it. We're going to get to this next week. This guy you will not read as many uh word usages of exaltation when he says I in such a short period of time.

I think in total there's like 11 or 12 in this little parable of him acknowledging himself. My barns, my soul my crops me. I've talked to me. And we've decided I'm going to build bigger barns for me. We met me, myself, and I and decided I'm going to build bigger barns for me for us. It's absolutely remarkable. You don't hear any of Listen, you don't hear that as profound as you do in Isaiah 14. We mentioned it a little bit on one of the Sunday services where Satan says I will become like God. I will exalt my throne above the throne of God.

I will be like the most high. I will rule. Wow. So, listen, we have to have a mind change and it starts and it ends always with God's word. Father, we thank you for your word. And Lord, as we look to this Father, we ask of you in Jesus' name that you would make us wise. Tonight, we ask as we close in prayer, your Bible tells us that if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God and you will answer. It's an amazing promise. It doesn't say you might answer. It doesn't mean you're going to think about it.

You said if anyone wants wisdom for us to ask you. Father, as we stand right now, as we lift our hands right now, Jesus, we're we're just asking you right now, each and every one of us we're asking you for wisdom. Wisdom about our thoughts, wisdom about our decision making, wisdom about our time, wisdom about our loyalties, wisdom about our conduct, wisdom about what we say, wisdom about what we do not say, wisdom about our husbands or wisdom about our wives, wisdom about our children, wisdom, Lord, regarding our parents, wisdom about our lives to live for you.

Wisdom, Lord, from above from you in this world. Lord, we all come to tonight, you know different levels of education or different levels of experience and how beautiful you are to make all things level before your throne because none of those things can save us and none of those things can exactly better us in life. You said wisdom. Lord, if and where there is foolishness in our hearts we're asking you to wash it out of our lives. Wash it from us, Jesus, and replace it with your wisdom. In Jesus' name. Amen.

David J: Pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs here on Real Life Radio with his message called Parable of the Rich Fool Part 1. We're glad you're here today. You know, this message is part of Pastor Jack's series called The Parables of Jesus. It's a series highlighting the teachings of Jesus while he was ministering here on this earth. And we'll continue on the next edition of Real Life Radio. So, as you heard from our broadcast, Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. And if you'd like to know what a commitment to Christ can mean in your life personally, we would love to help you out with that.

Go to jackhibbs.com/nogod. That's k n o w God. And there you'll be guided through what a commitment to Christ can mean in your life and the freedom that you'll find in knowing God. Don't miss out. That's the no God tab at jackhibbs.com. Hey everybody, we want to introduce you to what we're calling our summer bundle. It's two great books and you're going to want to get them for the little ones in your life. The first book is called Prayers and Promises for Kids. It's a great resource to not only teach your children about the promises of God, but how do we take those promises and pray them into our lives?

You're going to find this a great resource to develop a prayer life with your child. And then the book The Red Coats Are Coming written by our own Nancy Sanders who attends our church. It is a great great book. It is featured by Adventures in Odyssey and the wonderful people at Focus on the Family, Prayers and Promises for Kids and The Red Coats Are Coming. They're two children's books that are very powerful. Get a copy of both these books as we bundle them for the month of July.

Jack Hibbs: That's The Red Coats Are Coming and Prayers and Promises for Kids, a couple of great books available as a bundle for a gift of any amount at jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com.

David J: This program is made possible by the generous contributions of you, our listeners. Visit us at jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. Until next time, Pastor Jack Hibbs and all of us here at Real Life Radio wish for you solid and steady growth in Christ and in his word. We'll see you next time here on Real Life Radio.