Rich With God

(Scriptures: Hosea 11:1-11, Psalm 107,
Colossians 3:1-11, Luke 12:13-21)

In our increasingly fast-paced world, demands on our time and money never seem to end. We may find ourselves feeling like we’re being pulled in a dozen different directions at once. Our family needs our time, our employer may want us to work late – especially if the company has downsized, and as one of the survivors you’re picking up half of what had been somebody else’s job, friends may remind us that it’s been just ages since you and your friends have had a guys’ night out or girls’ night out. Political or charitable organizations may want us to show up at fundraisers or charity events. Amid all of this, we all need a little “me” time now and then. We may feel like we’re just flailing at things, just slapping bandaids on a whole lot of festering situations because we don’t have time to deal with any of them in depth. How do you sort all this out? Steven Covey, author of books such as “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” has a saying to help people who feel overwhelmed by demands on their time or money – “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”

In our Gospel reading today, we learn that, not unnaturally, people made unreasonable demands on Jesus’ time. And, though we rarely see Jesus refuse a request for assistance, in today’s reading we see him gently setting some boundaries on his time and energy. Asked by a man in the crowd to help him and his brother sort out the family inheritance, Jesus responds, “Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?” Since when did Jesus hang out a shingle as an estate attorney. Hey, dude in the crowd, not my job! But then, as is often the case with Jesus, he doesn’t give the man what he asks for, but rather what the man needs. Jesus gets to the root of the reason for the man’s request, telling the whole crowd “Take care, be on guard against all kinds of greed, for life does not consist of an abundance of possessions.” He then tells the parable of a man whose land produced so abundantly he had nowhere to put everything. After puzzling for a moment what to do, the man decided to tear down his barn and build bigger ones that could hold all the surplus crops – I suppose today he’d rent a storage bin - and then take an early retirement, living off the proceeds. Sounds like a great plan, until God rains on his parade, telling him basically, “Today you die – and all that stuff you’ve stored up so carefully in your shiny new barn, whose will it be?” As the saying goes, you can’t take it with you. In conclusion, Jesus says, “So it will be for those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

We may think that Jesus is being a little hard on the man in his parable. After all, Jesus gives no indication that the guy was evil or dishonest. He’d worked perfectly hard to see that his fields produced, and was it his fault if he wound up with a bumper crop? What was he supposed to do with his surplus? Well, maybe giving some of it away wouldn’t have been such a bad thing – he had more than he knew what to do with, after all, and undoubtedly people around him were hungry. Jesus’ point, I believe, was that the man had no thought of expressing gratitude to God for his blessings, had no thought of sharing them with his less fortunate neighbors. The man’s main priority was his own security, his own comfort, his own enjoyment. And for Jesus, those things, while they are good things, are not the main thing.

It’s a timely parable in our society today. We live in a society where the gulf between rich and poor, between have and have-not, are as great as they were in the late 1800’s. This was the time which we now call the “gilded age”, the days of the great industrialists such as Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, J P Morgan, Andrew Mellon – called “robber barons” by some because their immense wealth, which they flaunted at every opportunity, came at great cost to their workers. These were the days before labor unions, when if a worker didn’t like his job because 12 hour days were too long or working conditions were too dangerous or the pay was too low – hey, tough situation, there were 10 guys lined up who’d be perfectly happy to take your job. And the more things change, the more they stay the same – with union membership down, companies downsizing, and regulatory agencies looking the other way – all too often we’re back to 12 hour days, increasingly dangerous working conditions, and a shrinking paycheck. If you don’t like it, there are 10 people lined up who’d be perfectly happy to take your job. At least back in the days of the robber barons, the industrialists actually made things – today we have investment bankers and CEO’s who are just as wealthy, who treat their workers – often overseas workers – just as badly as the robber barons did, and they don’t even manufacture things – all many of them do is move money around. But for those unfortunate among us who didn’t get an $80 million dollar bonus last year, hey, at least we can watch them on TV. 20 years ago, you could watch “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous”; today, if your cable package includes it, you can watch Wealth TV 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Where is the church in all this? I’ll be a little impolite this morning: all too often, many churches, many denominations, are just plain out to lunch. It is striking that while Jesus didn’t say all that much about sex, he was an absolute pain in the neck on the topic of money and possessions – meanwhile many churches, many denominations, go on and on and on about sex, but are strangely silent on the topic of money and possessions. And of the churches that do preach about money, many of them are of the prosperity gospel variety that tell their members that “God wants them rich.” Or, like some TV evangelists, they talk their elderly viewers into sending their last dollar to TV preachers who already have more dollars than they know what to do with. I will mention that the United Church of Christ, along with some of the other mainline Protestant Churches and the Roman Catholic church, has traditionally stood with labor, traditionally advocated for the rights of workers to organize, traditionally spoken against unfair labor practices and dangerous working conditions.

Remember early on, I spoke about “keeping the main thing the main thing.” The point is not that Jesus was a killjoy or that he wanted his followers to dress in rags or eat cat food or scrounge in dumpsters for their meals – but that all too often, money and possessions can be a form of idolatry. In our reading from Hosea, God speaks of the people of Israel as an exasperated parent would speak of a wayward but still beloved child. The more God called Israel, the more Israel sacrificed to idols such as the Baals – sort of like a child who asks for assistance from mom and dad, and then spends it on booze or drugs. God is ready to leave them to their fate, to let Assyria and Egypt have their way with Israel – sort of like letting an addict hit bottom. And yet, like a father or mother who detests a child’s addiction or self-destructive behavior, but cannot turn their back on their child, God cannot totally give up on God’s people – “how can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel?” While those in Hosea’s time sacrificed burnt offerings to idols made of wood or stone, all too often our society asks us to sacrifice time, effort, peace of mind, our relationships with family and friends, in an obsessive pursuit of wealth, power, prestige, status, security – either way, it’s a form of idolatry. It’s not that any of these things – wealth, power, prestige, status, security – are necessarily bad things. In fact, in and of themselves, they’re good things, gifts from God. They’re just not the main thing. To the extent that we express gratitude to God and use these good things to help others, our efforts are to God’s glory. To the extent that these things turn our attention away from God, they become idols.

Paul’s letter to the Colossians puts this into even stronger language: he speaks of our new life as believers as being raised in Christ. And like Christ, while he has been raised, and we with him, Christ’s glory is hidden, not fully evident, as it will be when Christ comes in glory. In the same way, our new life in Christ is hidden – the full working of Christ in our lives will not be seen until Christ comes in glory. That is to say, we live in an in-between time – while Jesus’ death and resurrection has created a new age of salvation and transformed lives through the work of the spirit – Christ’s kingdom or reign has not yet come in its full glory. So, in this in-between time, Paul calls on us to seek those things that are above – the things of the spirit. As regards the things of this earth, Paul says that we have died – those things are dead to us, and we to them – like childhood toys that once meant the world to us, but that as adults we’ve now long since discarded and forgotten. And Paul specifies those things that are earthly – and among them Paul lists greed, which he explicitly says is idolatry. Christ speaks of our new selves, which are being renewed in such a way that our labels – Jew, Greek, slave, free, male, female, barbarian, Scythian – no longer divide us, because Christ is all and in all.

Christ is all and in all. The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. When we’re feeling overwhelmed with demands on our time or effort or money, we need to focus on those things which are above, need to focus on Christ. To say “yes” to Jesus we may need to say “no” to competing priorities. There’s an item in the bulletin about a new section on the main United Church of Christ website – it’s called “Feed Your Spirit”, and if you’re feeling stressed or overwhelmed, I’d encourage you to check it out.

“So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” As we gather in a few minutes for communion, and as we depart this sanctuary to serve God in our daily lives, may we seek those things that are above. In our lives, and in this congregation, Emanuel United Church of Christ, may we keep the main thing the main thing. Amen.
*************
At Emanuel United Church of Christ, love of God and neighbor is the main thing. Join us on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street, just off Thompson. www.emanuelphila.org