SHARE: “God and Wealth”

Prayer:   “May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of our hearts and minds here together be acceptable to you, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.  Amen.”

Just when you thought hellfire and damnation season was over, here come these three challenging scriptures.  Even though they preach against the rich, technically – and there’s always someone richer than we are – I thought the bad guys sounded a little too much like us.  I mean, just listen to the Prophet Amos: “Alas for those who are at ease …for those who feel secure …Alas for those who lounge on their couches.”  I don’t know about you, but I love lounging on the couch at the end of a long day at work.  But wait, there’s more:  Alas for those who eat the tender meat of young calves, who sing idle songs and play music, who drink wine, and rub fine oils on themselves.  I tell you, after working on this sermon, I was not tempted to spend my day off piled up on the couch watching TV or listening to music.  I could not imagine going out to eat and having a big plate of Veal Parmesan with a tall glass of wine.  And there’s no way I would have gone to the spa for a massage, even if I do have a perfectly good gift certificate! 

This is why I like to use the common lectionary – the same scriptures that are read at Christian churches around the world on any given Sunday – because they keep us honest.  We can’t just enjoy all those fluffy, kinder, gentler scriptures like the one about Jesus blessing the little children that we heard last week, and today at our baptism.  Sometimes we have to get down in the trenches, or maybe up on the soapbox, with the greatest prophets and preachers of the Bible – in this case, the Hebrew Prophet Amos, the writer of the First Letter of Timothy (who may or may not be Paul, the young pastor Timothy’s mentor), and of course, from today’s Gospel lesson, our own greatest teacher and mentor, Jesus.  Like you, I have to take a good long look at myself and at the choices I make about the wealth God has given me. How freely do we share?  And does that sharing really lead to joy?  Does it really lead to the fullness of life Christ promises?

Jesus leaves no doubt about where he stands on God and wealth.  You cannot serve two masters; he says.  “You cannot serve God and wealth.”  And with his parable of “Poor Man Lazarus and the Rich Man,” you can forget about “gentle Jesus, meek and mild,” right?  Jesus gets mad when the least of these, our brothers and sisters, go hungry. He sends the poor man to his reward in heaven, and the rich man straight to hell.  As Jesus condemns “the Pharisees, who were lovers of money,” he starts to sound very much like his ancestor Amos, the first Hebrew prophet to have a book named after him.  Amos’s tirade against “the revelry of the loungers” was preached some 700 years before Jesus, but it’s amazing how current it still sounds today – kind of like another verse from Amos that was famously quoted by the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.: “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.”  (That’s Amos 5:24)

The martyrdom of Martin Luther King seems to usually insulate him from personal attack in today’s world, but when he was very much alive and preaching his Bible-based “social Gospel” of justice for the poor – he was attacked by many people I knew who called themselves Christians.  The night he was assassinated he was working to support the garbage collectors who were on strike in Memphis, and there were plenty of good church people lined up against him – people who were calling him a “dangerous outside agitator” and accusing him of being a communist.  And how can we blame them, when preachers shy away from these “social justice” texts? We prefer to preach instead, as I did last week, on a pretty story like Jesus and the little children.

But this is where the rubber meets the road, isn’t it?  We are called to not just bless the children with our mouths, but also with our hands and hearts and wallets.  With an estimated 20 percent of our nation’s children living in poverty, we can’t just look the other way.  The Bible commands us, repeatedly, to SHARE the wealth God gives us. And if we refuse, we are warned – we have been fairly warned by scripture – that we risk dire consequences not just for our own souls, but for the future of our nation and our world.  Even though it took a while, I wanted Bill to read ALL three of those texts today, because we need to hear how THICK the Bible is with preaching against the accumulation of great personal fortune.  When we did our spring leadership retreat for the church leaders, I went to dig up a devotional about sharing – since we were focusing on this year’s SHARE priority from our new church vision statement: “Make Jesus Your Mentor: Pray, SHARE, Welcome.”  But I didn’t just find ONE scripture about sharing, I found 30 – just about one per chapter in the Gospel of Luke.  That surprised even me, and I read the Bible a lot more than most people! 

You know that’s significant when you realize Jesus talked about adultery only a couple of times and mentioned premarital sex, homosexuality, and abortion not even once – and those are probably the hottest topics that we hear Christians railing against.  But it’s “the love of money” that is the “root of all kinds of evil,” as Timothy’s letter reminds us.  He says: “Those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction…. .”  Whether or not we believe in a literal hell where greedy people go after death, surely we all know people whose lives have ended in ruin because of their love of money – money can fuel addictions to food or alcohol, or shopping; money motivates murder; and money inspires common thieves, even white-collar crooks like Bernie Madoff.

Jesus says that we are to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength – and to show that love by sharing the blessings we are given.  God says we are to look out for the Common Good, and for the welfare of the “widows and orphans” of the world.  And God warns us, most of all, to “watch the gap,” as the signs on the subway platforms say.  The gap between rich and poor in this country – like the hellish gulf between poor man Lazarus and the rich man before and after their deaths – is growing ever wider and harder to cross.  It’s embarrassing and it makes us uncomfortable, so we Americans prefer to pretend we have no real class differences.  But statistics tell a different story.

In a recent op-ed column for the New York Times (Sept. 14, 2010), Bob Herbert quotes a recent book by Robert Reich, called “Aftershock.”  He shares these staggering statistics:  In the 1970s, the richest 1 percent of Americans was taking in 8 or 9 percent of our national income; in the 1980s, it rose to 10 to 14 percent; by the late ‘90s, it was up around 15 to 19 percent; In 2005, it passed 21 percent; and in 2007 (the most recent statistics we have) the richest 1 percent were taking more than 23 percent of all income.   

In his column yesterday, he compared our ignorance about poverty in American to his own obliviousness on the high floor of his Upper West Side apartment when those terrific tree-splitting winds hit Queens Thursday night.  Most of us have very little idea what the poorest of the poor go through every day.  Most of us, especially in a peaceful town like Brookfield, have a wide gulf like that between ourselves and people who are reduced to eating whatever crumbs fall from our tables.  I know that when Lela and I delivered some leftover food from a funeral reception at our church to Dorothy Day House in Danbury, we were both surprised and shocked to see such poverty such a short drive away.  And the youth who go on our Mission Trips – like the ones who saw the extreme poverty among the Lakota Sioux in South Dakota – they know.  They have seen that gulf between rich and poor and they’re reaching across it, in Christ’s name.  If you are working on our Yankee Fair this year, you’re reaching across it with us in Christ’s name, because we give fully 50 percent of our proceeds away – this year to Dorothy Day.

Now more than ever, we need to give generously to the work and ministries that our church promotes and supports.  Now more than ever, we need to give freely and fearlessly to the mission of Christ’s church, as we continue to work for justice, and not just charity, in Jesus’s name.  We can be very grateful to be a part of a church like ours that does take God’s commandment to SHARE to heart. Your sharing, when you put your money in our offering plate, is what keeps the light burning at this crossroads on this particular hill in Brookfield.  May we continue to be a beacon of hope, sharing the Good News of God’s love with the world, because there truly are those who still are ignorant of Christ’s way of sacrificial living and giving.  We can feel sorry for them – people who, as it says in Timothy, “set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches” instead of “on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” It’s our call to show them another way, a way of sharing.  I know I am grateful to be a part of a congregation like ours that God has inspired ^“to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share.”

Thanks be to God for this Good News.  Amen.

 

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Amos 6:1a, 4-7

6Alas for those who are at ease in Zion, and for those who feel secure …4Alas for those who lie on beds of ivory, and lounge on their couches, and eat lambs from the flock, and calves from the stall; 5who sing idle songs to the sound of the harp, and like David improvise on instruments of music; 6who drink wine from bowls, and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the ruin of Joseph! 7Therefore they shall now be the first to go into exile, and the revelry of the loungers shall pass away.

1 Timothy 6:6-10, 17-19

6Of course, there is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; 7for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it; 8but if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these. 9But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains….17As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, 19thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life.

Luke 16:13-15, 19-31

13No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” 14The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed him.
15So he said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God….

19“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. 20And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. 22The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried.

23In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. 24He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.’ 25But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. 26Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’ 27He said, ‘Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house— 28for I have five brothers—that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.’ 29Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’ 30He said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”