Where do you (and others) get the idea that Rand is responding to the Bible? She's speaking to/of those who say that money is evil, love of money is evil, and related thoughts. This seems clear from the very first sentence of the speech: "So you think that money is the root of all evil?" Later, "But you say that money is made by the strong at the expense of the weak?", "Or did you say it's the love of money that's the root of all evil?", etc.

I would challenge you to cite the part of the speech or anything else Rand ever wrote arguing that money should be the most important thing in one's life. The statement "Money will not give you the unearned, neither in matter nor in spirit," indicates what's more explicit elsewhere in the book, namely Rand's conviction that the material and (secular) spiritual are both of great importance in life and that neither trumps the other. Rather, one should seek to integrate them.

Having read Rand extensively when I was younger, I can't imagine she'd consider your friend's approach to life, as described, anything but sad as well.