1 August 2010

Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14; 2:18-23
Psalm 49:1-11
Colossians 3:1-11
Luke 12:13-21

Jesus rolls his eyes at the two siblings fighting over their inheritance. Yet. Another. Squabble. About . . . . . MONEY! “What do you want me to do about it and where does it ever end?” Jesus replies.

I have a Mennonite friend – a preacher’s kid and a professor. We’ll call him “Luke.” Luke doesn’t have a retirement fund of any sort, and to the irritation of his union he’s refused to take part in any sort of pension plan as well. “What will you do,” I once asked him, “when you retire?” His answer: “I’m not retiring.” And then he told me the parable we just heard in today’s Gospel reading. And he explained – as well as I can remember – saying: “Listen the guy in this parable was not only rich, he had more than he could ever use himself. And where did his wealth come from? He probably owned a whole lot of land, land that had perhaps been inherited or just as likely, gobbled up from poor farmers. And now those poor farmers have to work his land, not for themselves and their families, but for the wealthy landowner, and they never get back from their work what would have been theirs as owners of the fields they work. Their wages have to be low so that the landowner can benefit from their labor. And the laborers obviously did their work well – there’s a huge surplus – more than the landowner can ever use but he keeps it – all for himself. Now tell me, how is that different from a pension fund? I buy into a system whereby I benefit from someone else’s labor – at the expense of the laborers who will not get the full benefit of their work. And if there are any surpluses as the result of someone else’s work – it won’t go to those workers. It will be stored up – for me – so that come 65, I can relax. But who says we’re entitled to relax – at someone else’s expense? And this whole scheme will work as long as there is an oversupply of cheap labor, and as long as the laborers keep getting duped into buying, buying, buying to supply profits for the owners.” “Typical Mennonite,” I thought to myself. “They’re forever taking all this Jesus stuff too seriously. “Luke,” I said, “What do you do with all that money you don’t put into a retirement fund?” “It’s really not your business,” he replied. “But – I put it where it belongs. In the offering plate.”

And then there’s Yours Truly. Lately, I’ve been carping to anyone who’ll listen about last quarter’s statements from my pension fund and my Thrivent investments. I shrieked to my sister on the phone just the other night, “If things keep going like they have the last two years – things keep going like they did last quarter – I’ll have absolutely nothing left by the end of 2012!” “Oh relax,” she said. “It was never yours in the first place.” Jesus would likely agree.

Since in the lectionary, this is the year most Gospel readings come from Luke, let’s listen to what we hear in St. Luke’s two narratives – the Gospel bearing his name and the Acts of the Apostles. Right following this morning’s reading we hear Jesus tell us not to worry about what we’ll eat, drink, wear. God will provide what we need. (This is where most of us become total atheists, I think.) And because God will provide whatever is needed, says Jesus, sell all your possession and give to those in need. Same thing in Luke 18. Come to Luke 19, though – and Jesus seems to have a little pity on us and tells us to give only half of our possessions to those in need. (Boy, even that sure will screw up vacation plans. And here I thought 10% in the plate was being hugely generous.) But then we come to Luke 21 and it’s back to giving everything one has. And it’s here that Jesus contrasts the offerings of the affluent with the offering of the poor widow. The affluent give from what’s left over – from their so-called discretionary cash or disposable income. (Disposable – hmm – sort of like stale leftovers?) But the widow – in case we’ve forgotten – she gives absolutely everything she’s got. And then a sampling from Acts: we hear in chapters two through four that in the early faith community, all property was communally owned. And from that communal storehouse, there was an equal distribution of necessary goods, and the rest of the community’s resources went to take care of those who had need. We also hear in Luke that God provides abundantly – from five loaves and two fish, over five-thousand are fed – and to top it all off, there were twelve baskets of food left over. There was more than enough! “Yeah, that’s great,” we say – if you have a reserve fund. But if we don’t have money left, we really do need to worry. God’s not going to help us pay the bills, ya know.”  No wonder Jesus gets cranky with the disciples and says to them, “You faithless, untrusting people! How much longer must I be with you and put up with you?” And then we rise to justify ourselves: all that was fine in first-century Palestine, but the realities of twenty-first century USA are far, far different.

We in the United States are a part of what is being called in the 21^st century, the “first-third world.” We in the first-third world have all the wealth while the people of the remaining two-thirds of the world live on next to nothing. In the first-third world, even the poorest of the poor are far better off than the average person in the two-thirds world. Some of you have been on mission trips to the two-thirds world – not as tourists – but on mission trips where you’ve spent time living and working with people there, and you’ve remarked at the extra-ordinary generosity of your hosts. My last mission trip was to Nueva Rosita. At the end our ten days there, the people of the parish had a fiesta in our honor. And what a party it was: delicious, barbequed meats; fresh fruit and salads; mounds of tortillas; breads, cakes, and rich pastries; beer, tequila, sodas – and so many, many toasts of thanks for coming to them and experiencing their lives with them. One of the youth on the trip asked the parish-worker there, a nun from the States, how these terribly poor people could afford to put on such a grand spread for us. The good sister wondered if we had learned much of anything in our time there: “These people aren’t poor you know. Out of the little they have, they give everything. The truly poor are those who have everything yet give little. People here also live close to death, and so they truly do know that not even this day belongs to them; we from the States live in denial of death and we think we are entitled to long years of having it all. The people here live this day, and their lives are full; we live for some imagined future and our lives are empty.”

St. Paul tells the church at Colossae, a rich city now buried in sand – and the church there a fractious bunch apparently much like us in this twenty-first century, first-third world – Paul tells them and us – over and over that we are dead! Dead, dead, dead – already. Our preoccupation with money – which is idolatry – and all the anxieties and squabbling and scapegoating and other sorts of nastiness that come with our worrying after money – we’re dead to all of that. That old self was stripped off in baptism when we were joined to Christ’s death – and dying with Christ, we have been raised with Christ, clothed with our new self – to seek the things that are above in the clouds of God’s impracticality.

And that we lead resurrected, newly clothed lives this day (the only day we’ve got) for you and for me and for any and for all – the fullness of Christ right here, hidden in, with, and under bread and wine so that you be renewed in what you already are: already dead and already risen – risen in the very image of Christ who is all and in all. You are risen – with Christ – to proclaim to the whole universe that God is love. God is love, and so there is nothing ever for you to fear. And all shall be well; and all things shall be well; and every manner of thing shall be well.

This I believe. And so do you. AMEN