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There is something about traveling in the developing world that sort of scrambles your categories, plays havoc with your assumptions, and raises some very uncomfortable questions. In Cameroon, for example, there is very little middle class. Most people are either dirt poor subsistence farmers, or working menial, low-paying jobs in the city, or are extremely rich. The contrast between the average mud-brick home about the size of your garage (actually not nearly as large as a 3-car garage) and some of the mansions we saw in and around the capital, Yaounde, is astonishing. We met many Christians in that country, but not many of them were wealthy; most were just scratching out a meager living as best they could, praying for the rains at the right time to nourish their crops.

When you see that, you can’t help but ask yourself the question the writer is asking in this psalm. And it is a question that people all over the world, in every culture, ask themselves: Why do the wicked prosper while the righteous go hungry?[1]

As a commentary I read puts it, here’s the question: “How is it possible to avoid being afraid when we face troubling times or troublesome people, who ‘cushion themselves (against difficulty) by heaping up wealth’ (VanGemeren)?”[2] We may not be afraid of rich, evil people, but we have all probably felt some measure of envy. It’s interesting to me that no matter how much we have, there is something built into most of us that always wants more. We don’t even see the houses and cars of those who have less; we see the bigger house, the more luxurious car. We only went to Disney World, but they went to Europe or New Zealand. One of the great advantages of wealth is that it can so effectively “cushion” us from hardships and difficulties. So the water heater went out? Get a new one. You wrecked your car? The insurance will cover it. You’re in the “donut hole” in Medicare prescription coverage? You’ve got the money to pay for it. Rich people naturally trust their money to pave their way through life. They don’t have to rely on God, because they’ve already got it covered. That’s very attractive to most of us.

Not everyone who is rich is also a wicked deceiver, as it says in the psalm, but many are, and those are the people he’s talking about here. All too often, they have come to trust their wealth rather than God, and that makes them insensitive to the needs of others who are less fortunate. If they own a company, they may make 100 times what their lowest paid worker makes, but they don’t see anything wrong with that. If they do something wrong and get caught, they’ll just hire the best lawyer in the country who will get them out of it, with nary a thought for justice. Money is power in our society, and power corrupts. The more money you have, the more likely it is that you will be the kind of person the psalmist is talking about.

The definition of “rich” has risen dramatically in the past century[i], so that people who would have been considered fabulously wealthy a hundred years ago are now part of the middle class. Who in 1910 would have imagined 3,000 – 4,000 square foot homes, with three car garages plus a motor home and a boat and a personal storage space crammed with stuff we hardly ever use? A century ago, you had to be truly rich to be able to travel to another country; now people do it for honeymoons. I was in a conversation with some teens recently, in which they were asked, “What would you like to do for your honeymoon?” I was amazed that most of them wanted to go to some exotic place in another country. We drove 300 miles to stay in a motel.

So the question for us is not so much, Why should I fear the wicked rich, because by any global standard, we are the rich. The question for us is, Why should I envy those who trust in their wealth and boast of their great riches?

The concept of ransoming or redeeming someone was common in Old Testament Israel. It started with the Passover, when the angel of death went throughout Egypt, killing all their firstborn, but sparing the children of the Israelites who had marked their homes with the blood of the lamb. From that time on, God said all the first born of the Israelites belonged to Him—including both livestock and children. It was sort of like God said, You owe me the firstborn, because I spared them in Egypt. The livestock had to be sacrificed to God, but the babies could be “redeemed” by sacrificing an animal (Ex 13:2, 11-13). Also, slaves and prisoners of war could be redeemed—they could buy their freedom by paying a sum of money. So the idea of paying for a person’s life or freedom was familiar to the people of that day.

But this was on the purely human level. They weren’t thinking about what a person was really worth. Jesus put it in that perspective when He said, Matthew 16:26, “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?” The Scripture says, “The soul that sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4,20) and, “The wages of sin are death” (Rom 6:23). So your soul is forfeit already; the default condition of every person is that we deserve spiritual death apart from God.

The psalm says, Even if you are fabulously wealthy, even if you are one of those who boasts in great riches, you still don’t have enough to ransom somebody else. You still can’t buy their soul back so that they would live forever. A human life is so valuable that nothing can pay for it except another life. But you only have one life, and yours is already forfeit. You can’t offer your own life for someone else’s because your soul is already owed. We can’t pay for our own life, and we can’t pay for someone else’s life, which means no one else can pay for our life, either. So we are stuck. No man can redeem the life of another.

This being the week tax returns are due, it is worth remembering the old saw that nothing is certain except death and taxes. The psalmist knew that death was the great equalizer, 3,000 years ago.

A wealthy man died in a small town, and the question was heard in every coffee shop and beauty parlor: “How much did he leave?” The answer, of course, was, “Everything.” You can be the smartest, wisest, person on earth, but it won’t protect you from death. And when you die, your situation is exactly like that of fools: you’ll leave it all behind. Death really is the great equalizer.

Developers get to pick the names of streets in their developments, and they often name the streets after themselves, or a family member. Here are some pictures of buildings named after their developer, Donald Trump.

Very impressive. Nonetheless, when Mr. Trump dies, his grave will be the one permanent piece of real estate he can call his own. And in Europe, it’s not even that good: land is so scarce in many parts of Europe, that the cemeteries stack bodies on top of one another in each plot, and the markers give the names of all the people buried in that spot. They have to share a condo even in death. This just reinforces the futility of putting your trust in wealth.

Physically, we are here today and gone tomorrow. Psalm 103 says our days are like grass, or a wildflower in the field. The hot summer wind blows over them, and they are gone, and nobody even remembers they were there. A hundred years from now, who on earth will remember that you ever lived? James asks, James 4:14, “What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes,” like the morning fog that burns off by 9 o’clock.

“Men praise you when you prosper.” That’s all you get, if you do not get the point of this psalm. You have your reward for your hard work and your great gifts and intelligence and good looks and athletic ability and whatever else got you your money—you have your reward for that here in this life. You can recognize that you are blessed more than others, and people will praise you for your prosperity. But when you die, that’s the end of that.

We need to hear this. We do tend to be “overawed” at the fabulously wealthy people in the world. Who can not be impressed with the home of Bill Gates, for example: 66,000 square feet (that’s right—66 thousand, not 66 hundred), valued in 2009 at $147 million.[3] We hear that kind of thing, and “overawed” is exactly the word to describe how we feel. But verse 17 is a harsh reality that I doubt Mr. Gates thinks about very much: “he will take nothing with him when he dies, his splendor will not descend with him.”

Jesus told a parable[4] to illustrate this. Luke 12:16-20 (MSG), "The farm of a certain rich man produced a terrific crop. 17 He talked to himself: 'What can I do? My barn isn't big enough for this harvest.' 18 Then he said, 'Here's what I'll do: I'll tear down my barns and build bigger ones. Then I'll gather in all my grain and goods, 19 and I'll say to myself, Self, you've done well! You've got it made and can now retire. Take it easy and have the time of your life!' 20 Just then God showed up and said, 'Fool! Tonight you die. And your barnful of goods—who gets it?'” Jesus’ conclusion is, 21 (NIV) “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.”

That’s what the psalm is saying: Don’t be so impressed with rich people and their lavish lifestyles. They won’t take a thing with them when they die. And no one can redeem their life from the grave so that they can live forever.

The assumption that trips people up here is that this life is all there is. Many people want to believe that when they die, they just cease to exist, so they better grab all the gusto and toys and pleasure and power they can get in this life. But this life is just a fraction of our total existence. We will live on earth for a few decades—the average life expectancy in the U.S. today is 79.4 years.[5] But we will live somewhere else forever.

“Forever” is a hard concept to grasp, so let’s just scale it back to something we can understand a little better. Let’s say that when you turn 21, you have to live in a really uncomfortable place for eight months, and then you will move and live the rest of your life in a different place. I don’t like hot, humid weather, so for me, the first eight months are going to be in Biloxi, Mississippi. Now the deal is that the decisions you make during that first eight month stay determine where you will spend the rest of your life. If you make good decisions, you get to move to a location that is ideally suited to you—for me, that would be the Rocky Mountains. But if you make bad decisions, you will be moved to a place that is horrible in every way. I’m thinking of a prison in Colombia, or some such place.

That’s roughly our situation in this life. Does it make any sense at all to live those first eight months as though your life ended when they were over? You’d be a fool to do that. Wouldn’t it make a lot more sense to live those eight months in such a way that you could spend the rest of your life where you wanted? But that is exactly what many people today do. They act as though this life is all there is, and in the process, they are sealing their fate for eternity. You can’t buy your way out of hell, no matter how much money you have.

Earlier, we saw that no one can redeem the life of another person. No one can insure that we live forever. No one but God, that is.

This is an unusual verse for the Old Testament speaking about life after death. In most places in the Old Testament, the belief was that when people died—regardless of their relationship to God, whether they loved Him or opposed Him—everyone went to Sheol. Sheol was simply the underworld, the place of the dead. It was sort of a shadowy, hollow existence without any real substance. It was dark, people were limited in what they could do, and nobody praised God there. The NIV frequently just translates it, “the grave”.

This is a good example of what we call “progressive revelation.” That means that God has been progressively revealing more and more truth throughout the period when the Bible was being written. He didn’t tell the ancient Jews everything that He has told us. As the author to the book of Hebrews puts it, Hebrews 1:1-2, “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son,” – and by the apostles of Jesus who received further revelation.

We celebrated Easter last Sunday, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That event, and the inspired commentary we have on it in the New Testament, give us much greater hope than the Old Testament believers had. But verse 15 here in unusual in that it hints at that hope: “God will redeem my life from the grave; he will surely take me to himself.” No one can pay the ransom for their own life, or for anyone else’s life; but God can. That’s what Jesus meant when He said, Matthew 20:28, “the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."

Jesus Christ lived a perfect, sinless life. So His life was not forfeit; He did not have to die for His own sins. Therefore, He could offer His life as a ransom for someone else—a life for a life. But because Jesus was also divine, His life was worth that of every person who ever lived. So now, He could offer His life as a ransom for “many”—for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2).

You see, it is not just wealth that is dangerous—it is wealth without understanding. What is it that is so important to understand? What do we have to grasp so that we are not like an animal when we die? We need to understand that no one on earth can redeem your life from the grave, but that Jesus Christ can. You can’t save yourself, but God can. Your life is forfeit, and all the money in the world can’t buy it back. So a right relationship with God is far more important than any amount of money. As the Proverb says (9:10), “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.”

Are you there, folks? The psalm talks about the danger of trusting our wealth. Is it possible you are doing that? Or you may be trusting something else, like your good life, or your faithful attendance at church, or some such thing. But none of that is going to help you on the day you die. I urge you to put your trust in Jesus Christ—in His death on the cross, and His resurrection from the grave. Your life is forfeit, but He has paid your debt; accept that gift, and live forever.

Do you know someone who is pretty well off, but who doesn’t understand the basic message of this psalm? How could you share this psalm with that friend? How could you warn them of their impending danger? Buy the CD of this sermon and give it to them. Download the text of the sermon from the web site and give it to them. Pray for an opportunity to share with them what they must understand if they are to be redeemed from the pit and spend eternity in the glorious presence of God.

[1] Just as an aside, note that the author here is not David. This psalm is attributed to the Sons of Korah. Lots of people tend to just assume that David wrote all the psalms, but he didn’t. He wrote almost half of them, but by no means all. The sons of Korah were a guild of temple singers who wrote about ten of the psalms that we have today. See 1 Chron 6:31-38.

[2] Signposts, Derek Tidball (Nottingham: Inter-Varsity Press, 2009), Psalm 49.

[4] For an absolutely incredible contemporary retelling of this parable, see John Ortberg’s sermon, “It All Goes Back in the Box” at http://www.vbmb.org/uploads/stewardship/Sermons/Back%20in%20the%20Box.pdf.

[6] cf. Enoch: “God took him” (Gen 5:24). The same Hebrew word is used in both places.

[i] Conspicuous Consumption a Century After Veblen. http://www.grammarmudge.cityslide.com/articles/article/307084/21822.htm

In The Theory of the Leisure Class (1899), Thorsten Veblen coined the phrase "conspicuous consumption" to refer to the practice of acquiring goods beyond what one needs for sustenance. He referred to the acquisition of goods for purposes of show and status, a practice that was, at the time, affordable only by the wealthy, those whom he dubbed "the leisure class." It was an extension of the idea of noblemen living in luxurious palaces, while the masses toiled in the fields and at hard labor to maintain a precarious livelihood. (This is something of a simplification of Veblen's concept, but it captures the essence.)

After assigning my class an excerpt from Veblen's book, I presented them with the hypothesis that, in the century since it was written, conspicuous consumption has expanded to include many more people than those in Veblen's leisure class. In the discussion that followed, I became aware that my students are conspicuous consumers without realizing that they are, that they have redefined the term "luxury" upward so that they consider what may be defined as luxuries to be necessities, that – although they are not wealthy and many work hard to make ends meet while simultaneously attending a community college to increase their prospects for more lucrative employment – they are already part of an expanded leisure class such as Veblen never imagined.

When I asked these students to cite examples of conspicuous consumption in today's culture, many immediately mentioned designer clothes, Nike sneakers, and the like. However, even here they had reservations. Perhaps, they suggested, these things represented a need, especially among young people. They need to have designer clothes and Nike sneakers because they need to keep up with their peers who have these things.

As other examples emerged, so did other kinds of "need." When one student mentioned a particular item as a symbol of conspicuous consumption, another would respond that she "needed" that item. When the latter student was pressed to explain the "need," the response was always in terms of convenience or comfort, not in terms of something that was truly necessary for sustenance. And so it went for virtually every example cited – an SUV, leather or heated seats in an automobile, air conditioning, a full-featured cell phone with text messaging capability. Even a six-bedroom house for a four-person family was viewed as a need – the need for present comfort, for being prepared when and if the family expands to five, for an investment as security against the future. It was virtually impossible to get these students to equate "need" with "that which is necessary for sustenance."

In such a context, one finds oneself wondering to what extent one's own values and lifestyle reflect this expansion of the word "need" to include comfort and convenience, not just for the present but extending far into the unforeseeable future. A look around us will reveal how far we have gone toward translating what we don't really need into "needs." We have a stove. Do we "need" a microwave? We have a sink. Do we "need" a dishwasher and a washing machine? We have a clothesline. Do we "need" a dryer? We have a TV set. Do we "need" one with a 50-inch screen? We have transportation. Do we "need" an all-wheel-drive SUV capable of transporting our kids and some of their friends on an expedition into the wilderness and equipped with a DVD player and TV in the back seat to entertain them en route?

Our new definition of "need" demonstrates that many of us have indeed become members of the "leisure class" without being members of the most affluent and privileged stratum of society. Mass production and advances in technology have made many products that would have been considered luxuries in bygone days (indeed, many products that didn't even exist then) affordable by huge segments of the population. Many of us live in relative luxury without realizing it, going far beyond what we need for sustenance and including what we "need" for convenience and comfort – yet we consider these things to be necessities.

Is this conspicuous consumption? No, in the strictest sense it is not, if it does not mean wastefulness (buying things we don't use or discarding things that fulfill our needs, just to make room for the latest model of the same thing). Nor is it conspicuous consumption if our sole or primary reason for owning something is not ostentation (to show it off as a status symbol rather than to use it to fulfill some need).

However, it is worth recognizing that we are abusing our privileges as members of the new and expanded "leisure class" when we casually toss into the rubbish something that someone else could use, just so we can have the latest version of the same thing (which may or may not better fill our needs). We are definitely abusing our privileges when we buy goods far beyond even our needs for comfort, convenience, or security, just to show that we are equal to or better than someone else.

In an affluent society, it is wise to step back, at least occasionally, and recognize how fortunate most of us are. It is also wise to ponder the effect that our materialism (driven, in large part, by our marketing-oriented culture) has upon the way we live. Whatever promotes our comfort and convenience in the short term may not be good for us in the long run, and some day history may judge us as wastrels whose conspicuous consumption and self-serving drive for comfort, convenience, and instant gratification brought about the downfall of the very civilization that we sought to preserve.