LENT 3C 2010
Hole in Our Gospel #3
This morning we begin the third week of our study of the book The Hole in our Gospel. If you are visiting us, most of our church members are reading this book and those who can are in small groups discussing the contents,,, which content are very challenging!
Are some of you feeling a little challenged? Are some of you feeling a little un comfortable? I sure am. This is my second reading of the book and because we are preaching on some of the themes of the book, I have to interact with the material more closely than most. And an amazing element in this process is facing again, not just the thoughts of the author of this book… but reading and pondering what the Bible has to say about our responsibility to others around us. It is challenging. But you know what.. this is good.
Are there any people in this room who don’t need to grow in their Christian spiritual lives, and especially in their Christian response to the poor and needy of the world? Are there any of us who are living such a perfect life in our love and care of others that we don’t need to stretch a little? Are there any of us who are living our lives 100% striving against injustice in the world, showing mercy to everyone, and walking humbly with God?
When we are challenged, and we feel uncomfortable, and it is the Bible that is challenging us, it is a good thing. It is our heavenly parent calling us to live a better life, - for our sakes, and for the sake of the world around us.
When we feel challenged by God, we need to remind ourselves of the first foundation upon which we are approaching this topic, and this is the foundation of Grace. God loves us first. In the words of scripture, we are saved by grace, not by our own works. This gives us the courage to have our lives stretched and maybe even criticized. We are children being guided by a loving parent. Once we grasp and experience the love of God in Jesus, we respond to God’s call because we want to, not to earn anything. We strive to live Christian lives because we want to!! This is so important to understand!!
And the second foundation upon which we are approaching this topic is what we are calling the no judging rule. As I have read the last two weeks.
Compassion can never coexist with judgment because
judgment creates the distance, the distinction, which prevents us from really
being with the other. (Heri Nouwen)
Once we judge someone, we then don’t have to feel compassion for them let alone care for them. We are trying to fight against our normal propensity to judge others and thus hear what the Spirit is saying to us about our responsibility for others around us.
With these two truths in mind, we face the theme for this coming week, which is entitled, The Death of the American Dream. Now, if I was a smart pastor, I would just ignore this topic this week, because, it is clear that this statement will make some people a little angry. Now I am a smart pastor, but because I love our country, I am going to proceed with this theme. It seems to me that if we love our country, we who live in it would want to live more and more in harmony with God’s ways. And this is simply what the Bible is challenging us to do.
Let me very briefly try and place this topic in some historical context.
When Christianity was born, it immediately became a threat and a challenge to its mother religion as well as the culture around it. All one needs to do is to read the gospels once to see that Jesus pointed out the hypocrisy of some of his fellow Jews, especially the religious leaders. This was why he was killed.. because he did not go along with the norms and values of his own people. He pointed out to them where they were in error, and they did not like it.
As Christianity spread into the Greek and Roman world, it mightily challenged the existing cultures and their religions, so much so that they often viciously attacked the followers of Jesus. And the absolutely incredible historical fact is that many of the norms and values of Jesus began to overthrow the religions and norms and values of the culture around them. It is a fact of history that Christianity spread and thrived for three hundred years, not through war or political power, but simply through the life and witness of the followers of Jesus. These early Christians were often persecuted precisely because they did not live according to the ways of the cultures around them. They chose to try and follow a new way, and this way often conflicted with the culture around them.
I am reading a great book for the second time (Atheist Delusions.. The Christian Revolution and its Fashionable Enemies) and this book describes the triumph of many Christian norms and values over those of the societies into which it was born, which norms and values we often accept today as obvious, but with a little examination of history and human nature, are clearly not obvious at all! Let me read a quote from this book.
And these Christians brought something new into the
ancient world: a vision of good without precedent in pagan society, a creed
that prescribed charitable service to others as a religious obligation, a story
about a God of self-outpouring love. In long retrospect, the wonder of this new
nation within the empire is not that so manly of its citizens could not really
live by the ideals of their faith, nor even simply that so many could, but that
anyone could even have imagined such ideals in the first place. Even the
Emperor Julian, who was all too conscious of the hypocrisies of which
Christians were often capable, was forced to lament, in a letter to a pagan
priest, “It is a disgrace that these impious Galileans care not only for their
own poor but for ours as well.” Pg 45
From its inception, Christianity at its core, has been counter cultural. But as we know, once it became a part of the political power structure, or it compromised and adapted to the cultures around it, it became less faithful to its core values. We don’t have the time to go through two thousand years of history, not do I have the knowledge to lead us, but even in our own history, we know that we who have called ourselves Christians in this country often have not lived up to the values of our faith. It was in my life time that a person of color could not eat or use a bathroom in many parts of this country, and yet this part of the country was called the Bible belt. In our own state, in year past, the laws of the state would have made my marriage to Kathy illegal. And we need not go over the inglorious history of our country in the slave trade or our treatment of native Americans.
But the greatness of our country has been exhibited, I believe, in our ability, even if painful, to admit our wrongs and change. And that is why we can still be open to having, what is often called our American way of life challenged.
In our readings for this week we will be challenged specifically in our American approach to our things, to our wealth. We will see that the Bible teaches us:
Our gospel lesson for today is a pretty powerful parable that teaches us these three truths. The slaves in this story are us. The owner is God. And God is calling us to do something with the wealth that has been given to us.
It is a powerful, powerful, powerful… challenging, challenging, challenging truth to face -- that what we have is not ours. Of course this truth should be pretty obvious, since as the saying goes, “you can’t take it with you when you die.” Even in the natural sense, we are only borrowing what we have for a few years.
But boy does it change our view of “our” things if we begin to think of ourselves as managers of God’s money. And then if we realize that it is all a gift, and not earned – even if we have worked hard, etc. As we read in Deuteronomy, when we find ourselves with all sorts of wealth:
Deuteronomy 8:17-18 ( NRSV ) 17Do not say to
yourself, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.” 18But remember the LORD your God, for it is
he who gives you power to get wealth…..
Like the slaves in the
parable, we are given our money, not to
use only for our own needs, but we are also called to invest it for the
kingdom. We are called to use what we have for the building up of the
This parable, like so many other passages in the Bible, stretches us. It prods us. But in a good way, for it leads us to live more as Christians, even if this goes against the culture around us.
Our goal in this Lenten study is to have our eyes opened in new ways… to see the world more and more with the eyes of Jesus. Let me read a parable of Jesus that stresses this need to open our eyes to see with the eyes of Jesus.
Luke 16:19-30 ( NRSV ) 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.’
In this story, the sin of the rich man was not that he persecuted Lazarus, or made fun of him… his sin was simply that he ignored him.. he did not “SEE” him. Our hope in this Lenten series is that many of us will be open to seeing the world around us as it really is, and thus begin to respond in a deeper way.
In the reading this week, in the tale of the two churches, it is clear which one we are – the rich church in the west, not the poor one in a third would country. We cannot escape the truth that we, as a church, have a lot of wealth. Imagine the lives we can affect for good as we grow in our sharing of what we have. Imagine the children, the mothers, the fathers, the communities, the countries we could change for good as we share what we have.
As I have said before, this is Lenten study is not just a church program. What we hope will happen is that hearts, and thus lives, will be changed. We are called to living the rest of our lives for Jesus. This is never a simple, easy program, nor are there easy formulas for the religious life.
One of the advantages of being and older Christians is that I can impart some spiritual wisdom from experience. I have been struggling with money and my response to the poor and needy and investing in the Kingdom since I was 22. I know from first hand experience how powerful my selfish nature is, or as the KJV of the bible calls it, my “old man’ , or my “flesh”. Plus, I know the power of the culture around me, and how easy it is to simply fall into step and be led like a robot to do what the forces of the culture around me lead me to do, even when they are totally contrary to the Gospel.
The truth is, if we are going to grow in our faith ,we have to face the truth that it will be a struggle, and at times, even a war, both within ourselves and often against the norms and the values of the world around us.
So in closing, if you are struggling, maybe a little guilty, maybe even a little angry, try and relax, and simple try and hear and see in a new way. If we can do this, the Spirit of God will lead and guide us the rest of the way. AMEN!