Friday 1/2/13

James 5:1-6 ESV

Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you.

Above is a long and detailed warning to the rich after they have died. Once a rich man die, the earthly richest that he was so proud of and loved soon reduce to nothing, corroded, moth eaten, wasted away by foolish successors. Storing up treasure even unto our last day is meaningless, and evil. Richest gives us luxury and self-indulgence, none of which are necessary and good for our soul. However, they flattens our heart for the day of our death and judgement.

We all died naked and faced God's judgement naked.  Then all the evil things we did to get money, cheating our labourers, not paying our harvesters, condemn wrongly righteous people... God will count against us. All who are living must take this to heart and avoid those vanities and evils.