Rich and Les were best of friends, back in their days of school,
Chasing girls, hot rod cars, playing football, shooting pool.
When you saw one you saw the other, inseparable as friends,
But time and circumstance brings all good things to end.
Rich he went to college; he was born with silver spoon,
His folks they had enough money, to stack up to the moon.
Les he was a poor boy from the wrong side of the tracks,
He had to scrape for every nickel with his hands and with his back.
Rich he joined a rock band in his fraternity,
Drugs and booze and pretty girls, it all was his for free.
Les became indebted to a shark named Beelzebub,
Those who didn’t pay on time he’d whack their fingers to a nub.
Rich he soon gained fame and money, the world was in his hand,
He lacked not for a single thing, he received his every demand.
Les he robbed a bank to pay back what he owed,
And while he made his getaway, he was shot down in the road.
Old Richard he grew wealthier every single day,
But it never crossed his mind to thank God and to pray.
Les had killed a cop, just before he was gunned down,
Now he sits there on death row in a wheelchair bound.
Sir Rich has every pleasure that is known to man,
But its joy is just as fleeting as the hourglass’s sand.
Lester sits in solitude inside a tiny cell,
Waiting for the hangman to drop him into hell.
Rich’s heart is empty though the world lies at his feet,
These worldly things won’t save him, when our God he has to meet.
But Lester got a Bible and he began to read,
The story of Lord Jesus and for all of us did bleed.
The more Rich gained, the more his pain this world can’t satisfy,
And what the world calls happiness turns out to be a lie.
Old Les got down on his knees inside that tiny cell,
And by the eyes of faith he knew he’d been delivered up from hell.
But Rich had found his hell indeed from a hunger in his soul,
And it could not be satisfied from all pleasure and not from gold.
Now Lester found great joy and peace, though one foot in the grave,
The Love and Blood of Jesus his broken life had saved.
Poor Rich had lost his soul, though the whole world he had gained,
The world it serves no purpose when all you know is pain.
Though Les he was a pauper by the standard of the world,
The highest pinnacle man can reach is God’s Love in us unfurled.
So lesson learned within this tale that worldly wealth can be deceiving,
The riches that come from God’s Spirit are the ones we’d want receiving.
Tertius
What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world,
yet forfeit their soul?
Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?
Matthew 16:26
A note about “When Less is More and Rich is Poor”: The world tells us that our circumstances determine our happiness. Jesus defied this notion with the beginning of His Sermon on the Mount which we all know as the beatitudes. He also said it is harder for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of heaven than a camel to go through the eye of a needle. I believe most people don’t look up until they find themselves at the bottom of the barrel. I know this certainly applies to me. Of course there are exceptions to this rule. Job was described as the “greatest man in all of the east.” Me thinks this refers to his earthly wealth in context of the verses before and after, but by the end of the first chapter Satan had taken everything he owned including his children and he declared, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb and naked I will depart, the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away, may the Name of the Lord, be praised.” Real faith is not swayed by circumstance, either good or bad, but the One who made us knows exactly what we need!