(prayer)
When people think about the
beatitudes, it is usually the version in Matthew that comes to mind:
Blessed are the poor
in spirit,
for theirs is the
kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who
mourn,
for they will be
comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit
the earth... etc.
Matthew's beatitudes are
part of a longer teaching section of the first gospel commonly called The Sermon on the Mount. Matthew chapter
five includes nine different blessings.
//
Less well known, Luke
chapter five includes a shorter four-part blessing as part of what is sometimes
called The Sermon on the Plain.
Matthew's version describes
the circumstances of the 'bless`ed' as poor in
spirit and hungry for righteousness
- the poverty and hunger in Matthew are metaphoric.
But in Luke, it simply says
'poor' and 'hungry' without a metaphoric descriptor, which speaks to a more
literal economic need interpretation.
What is also different
about Luke's version, the four blessings
are contrasted with for parallel woes.
Blessed are you who
are poor,
for yours is the
kingdom of God...
Woe to you who are
rich,
for you have received
your consolation.
Blessed are you who
are hungry now,
for you will be
filled...
Woe to you who are
full now,
for you will be
hungry.
Luke's beatitudes are in
the style Old Testament prophets and Psalmist who used lists of a blessings and curses to describe God's reactions to different groups of people.
It would not surprise me if
the Luke version is closer to Jesus' original teaching.
Very often when he
instructed the crowds Jesus spoke of practical day-to-day life with lessons of
hope and encouragement. And... Jesus did
not hold back words of challenge to those he thought needed to hear the
contrast between God's way and the way of selfishness and greed.
//
//
The parable we heard from
Luke chapter sixteen is basically an extended version of the chapter five
beatitudes:
Blessed are you who
are poor,
for yours is the
kingdom of God.
Woe to you who are
rich,
for you have received
your consolation.
//
A poor, ill man named
Lazarus (from Hebrew: meaning God is my
help) regularly begs outside the gate of an unnamed, well-fed rich man (who
in an ironic turn around is unnamed... and therefore less important in the
story). The rich man is said to
regularly wastes more food than Lazarus gets to eat.
The crux of Jesus' story is
tbat both men died and were transported to an afterlife experience.
Lazarus was carried by
angels to be with the patriarch of the faith, Abraham... and the rich man found
himself tormented in the underworld realm of Hades.
Hades was the greek god of
the underworld (the domain of the dead).
This use of Greek afterlife language would have made sense to the
gentile audiences reading the gospel who knew the greek theology: that the
underworld was where the souls of the dead journeyed at the end of life... the
souls of the dead could find themselves on the Isles of the Blessed in Elysium
where they endured no labours =or= in
the Fields of Punishment where they
were uniquely tormented by Hades himself.
The rich man - who expects
to live an entitled existence in death as he had in life, wants to be
served. Notice that, even in this
predicament, the rich man won't address Lazarus as an equal - the rich man
instead talks to Abraham and asks for the great prophet to order Lazarus (who
the rich man presumes is Father Abraham's servant) to bring him cool water to
ease his torment.
But Abraham makes it clear
that the one who was ignored into poverty and hunger on earth has been rewarded
with a fulfilling life in heaven. And...
that the one who (on earth) cared only about his own comfort and glutinous
desires has already had his fill.
Blessed are you who
are poor,
for yours is the
kingdom of God. Woe to you who are rich,
for you have received
your consolation.
We are all familiar with a
shorthand modern proverb that shares the same sentiment: you can take it with you.
//
Accepting that he will find
no relief for himself, the rich man then expresses compassion for others... No,
not for Lazarus (or others in real and despetate need) but for his surviving,
wealthy brothers.
Still expecting to be
served by a person of lower economic standing, the rich man asks Abraham to
raise Lazarus from the dead to go warn his brothers to repent.
Notice the continued
selfishness of the rich man.
Resurrection is not a reward for Lazarus (as - in Greek afterlife
theology - was granted to very, very important souls in Elysium), but a means
to a fulfill a servitude-duty desired by the rich man.
//
Jesus' message in the
parable seems to be that some miraculous
proof of God's power (like a ressurected dead person) should not be
expected to encourage people to live lives of righteousness - the sacred texts,
the scriptures, the torah and the prophets, have all the information people
need. They have that to guide them
already, Abraham says.
Again (as I said last
week), this story is echoing the pronouncement that the resurrected Jesus gave
to ‘doubting Thomas’ - blessed are those
who have not seen and yet have come to believe (John 20:29).
Faith, by definition, does
not rely on concrete proof. It requires
a step beyond what can be known for sure.
//
So, part of Jesus' clear
message in today’s lesson is... don’t live so selfishly that you miss on the
opportunities to be part of compassionate communities.
//
A balanced life of faith has... a focus
on the local immediate picture with a view to the future - even a legacy that
endures after our days are done.
//
During his lifetime, the rich man
thought only of his own needs of the moment.
He threw away his excess. If he
didn't need it, no one did.
He nourished an attitude of
entitlement. So, when Lazarus (the one
he had (by his own inactions) decided did not warrant any of his energy or
empathy) was treated better than him, his worldview was shaken.
He had not noticed the opportunities to
care past his own mirror - in spite of the guidance of the revered leaders of
the faith.
The rich man's eventual desires to
shown care for the well-being of his brothers came more as an act of
desperation to ease his own discomfort than any compassion for others.
//
Contrast that act of desperation with
the act of hope that we heard in the reading from Jeremiah.
At this point in the history of Judah,
the Babylonian Empire was expanding.
Given Judah's geographic locale - at the crossroads of three continents
- one can imagine why Babylon was interested in the power that came with
controlling those tracts of land.
Jeremiah was a realist.
He (along with other leaders and elites
of the people) had sought refuge behind the walls of Jerusalem.
They had watched as the countryside
systematically came under Empire control.
The capital was under siege.
Very few new supplies were able to get
into the city. The storage bins were
being depleted. Babylon was being patient...
willing to starve the Judean king into submission.
Jeremiah was a realist.
He tried to speak confidently that the
city could hold off the advance, but, deep down he must have knowm that total
Babylonian control of Judah and Jerusalem was inevitable.
Control of the Hebrew way of
independent living was destined to be lost.
It was a time when the natural response
would have been to be defensive: hang on to what you have, for as long as you
could.
So what does the prophet do: he invests
in land. Land that may have already
(practically) be controlled by the invaders.
He makes a deal.
He pays for the worthless land.
The official documents are signed and
witnessed and stored in such a way that they will be preserved into the future.
A future - that Jeremiah was confident
would once again include an independent Judah.
I doubt that Jeremiah had any delusions
of bring able to enjoy and work this land himself. This was an act of future hope and promise.
Houses
and field will [one day] be bought again in this land.
To use a modern proverb to describe
what Jeremiah did... he put his money where his mouth was.
//
//
Acts of desperation.
Acts of hope.
//
//
There are lessons in the past that can
advice us about our future:
·
Things
we might want to do differently in a new time.
·
And
hopes and promises that we want to make real.
//
//
Throughout many ages of human history,
people who have accumulated riches beyond their needs have expressed an
ideology that it was not only their efforts that provided them with greater-than-ample
resources, but that somehow they deserve this lifestyle as some kind of reward
for the strength of their character.
Translate that ideology into a theology
and we see a believe that God literally enriches the righteous.
When people hold a belief that economic
success is a direct parallel of religious righteousness, the rich begin to
justify selfishness as an act of faith.
And... a logical extention of this
ethos is that those without enough are victims of their own lack of faith.
If you believe that God blesses the
faithful with riches, then you might also believe that the poor must be
unfaithful.
This way of looking at God that
proclaims that God picks economic winners and lovers. You can tell how God likes by the amount of
gold in their pockets.
//
In the ancient world, it was common for
the wealthy elites to believe that they were entitled to their station of
life. The grew up believing in this
entitlement even though, almost without exception, they inherited their riches
or accumulated them through violent conquest.
The nobility of the ancient world did not contain many rags-to-riches
stories.
When religion entered the equation,
doctrines like the devine right of kings supported the society's economic
divides.
I've been saying ancient world, but I am sure we can all think of 21st century
examples of these entitled attitudes that seek to ignore that there are some
obscene problems between the extremes ends of the world's economies.
Now-a-days, you cannot turn on the news
from south of the border and and see the issues of poverty and race
intertwined. Just this past week in the US, a state election campaign chair in
Ohio, named Kathy Miller, proclaimed that "If you’re black and you haven’t
been successful in the last 50 years, it’s your own fault." She also claimed that she didn't think
"there was any racism until Obama got elected." She resigned her position a few hours after
her comments went viral and she tried to insulate her party's candidate from
her unique view that espoused a entitlement justification for the successful.
Of course only one day earlier that
candidate had claimed that "black communities are in the worst shape ever,
ever, ever." I guess (from that
billionaires perspective) slavery was
the good old days.
Modern examples of the rich blaming the
poor, or the healthy blaming the sick or the glutinous blaming the hungry, our
world is also filled with the generous and the empathetic and the tireless
workers for justice and equality and peace... who look beyond the circumstances
and see another worthy human whose path in this world so far has just been a
lot rockier than others... who do not try justify the divisions and
inequalities as the way God has destined things to be.
Jesus looked at people that way too.
The preacher-teacher who would go on to
literally turn the tables on those profiteering in the Temple, flipped around the societal presumptions with
a parable.
The ignored unfaithful one was given a
name... the blessed entitled one is nameless.
The one who always had more than he
could ever use is left wanting... the one who knew illness and suffering was
comforted with dignity and rest.
//
//
I want to be careful to not over simply
a message from these readings today to simply vilify the rich and absolve the
poor.
The rich man's sin was not his wealth
but his ignorance of his privilege and the opportunities for justice-making
that his entitled position provided him.
The rich man looked as his station in
life saw only a blessing he received and not the blessing he could bring to
others.
His wealth inhibited his compassion; it
isolated him from others in his midst; it recognized him from recognizing
Lazarus as his neighbour, not simply the annoying beggar at his gate.
Jesus' message (in the proclamation of
Father Abraham) was that it didn't have
to be this way. For ages, prophets
have pointed to another way.
Today, we looked in on the example of
Jeremiah who in a time of seige purchased a legacy for a future generations to
enjoy... a land that was worthless and occupied in the present, but held a
powerful future hope for a reversal of fortunes.
//
Whose example will we follow when we
are experiencing excess... the parable's insular rich man or forward thinking
Jeremiah?
Can we look for the blessing in our low
moments and a child of God in our own reflection - even when some want to deny
us our God-given worthiness?
//
We, each of us, is entitled to the
dignity that comes inherently with our status as creatures of God who is the
heart of the universe.
That has nothing to do with the numbers
of digits on a bank statement, or the strength of the hunger pangs in our gut,
or the concern on our doctor's face when she tells us the test results.
Don't let anyone try to convince you
that the spark of Christ is not ablaze within you.
//
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The followers of Jesus are to look into
the eyes of strangers and see friends and family.
May we - to the best of our abilities -
live as people of this promise and hope.
//
//
Let us pray:
Gracious God, you invite us to join
with you in ministry as we embrace the goodnews of your love. Amen.
#106MV “I Am the Dream”
