In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, we are given an illustration of what it means to serve wealth (not God).
This parable, about a rich man going to Hades and Lazarus hanging out on the other side of a chasm, is a rich and evocative parable. It is far more detailed than its more famous preceding parables of the Good Samaritan and the Lost Sons.
Those details make it a potent resource for discussing its most obvious characteristics: wealth and separation. But there are certainly a whole host of other directions one could take this passage.
The one thing we can’t do, however, is minimize just how much the details of this passage paint a picture of the man’s wealth as a central problem. Nor do we dare ignore the words Jesus spoke moments before regarding which master we serve: God or wealth.