Christian"s faith, hope and trust in God appear to be increasingly shaken by statements that run contrary to the mysteries of faith and are uttered by so-called intellectual people. Such skeptics reject God's revelation to man and, as Jeremiah writes, God who reads minds and hearts deals with them as they deserve.

In the Gospel parable, the rich man's lifestyle is apparently what he can afford but he is condemned to the depths of hell, presumably for his total insensitivity to the plight of the poor man. Not so Lazarus (the poor man) whose mind and heart were pleasing to God.

However, it is usually the last sentence of the parables narrated by Luke that he wishes to highlight, in this case it is "nor will they be convinced if one rises from the dead". This is the negative reaction to Christ's resurrection, the foundation of our Christian faith that our modern skeptics succumb to, and we must be on our guard against their unbelief.