A man in the crowd asks Jesus to tell his brother to share the inheritance with him. Jesus tells him, “Take care against all greed . . . one’s life does not consist of possessions.” We live in a culture in which many judge us, not by the quality of our character but by the quantity of our possessions. The man who approached Jesus may have been rightly entitled to part of the inheritance. But his father may have intentionally given the whole inheritance to his brother. Only men could own property and designate who received an inheritance. In either case there was nothing Jesus could do about it, except possibly to appeal to the brother to be loving and just and caring, and to share the inheritance with his brother. His warning about greed and about not being “rich in what matters to God” was meant for the man, and for his brother who would not share. It is also meant for us. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus taught us, “For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” Where is our treasure? Where is our heart?
