Here’s a word of warning. Today’s sermon is likely to make you nervous. It makes me nervous. We’re going back to the Bible for one more sounding, an exploration on a topic that has made people nervous for centuries. We’re going to look at something that has occupied our dreams and possessed our souls. It’s something we never seem to have enough of and yet something that can be dangerous even when we only have a little. It is money and we still don’t know what to think about it after all these years, even here in America.
Ben Franklin said, "Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instrad of filling a vacuum, it makes one.” That’s one great American philosopher said. Another one, actress Bo Derek, said, "Whoever said money can't buy happiness simply didn't know where to go shopping."[i] So who are you gonna believe?
Well, let’s go to the Bible and see what it says. Like I say, it’s going to make you nervous, because it has a consistent message and it is this: money has some pretty dangerous side effects and should not be taken lightly. The principle danger is that it can make us forgetful – forgetful of who we are, of what our responsibilities to other are, and forgetful of God. Those are some pretty bad side effects.
Now it’s not that the Bible condemns money and wealth. If it were so easily dealt with it wouldn’t be mentioned so much, and it is mentioned a lot. In some places wealth is seen as a sign of blessing. In Genesis we read in chapter 13, verse 2 that “Abram [the inheritor of God’s promise] became very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold.” Isaac, his son, in chapter 26 verse 13 becomes rich. “He prospered more and more until he became very wealthy.” Jacob and Joseph, the next two in the line, were also very prosperous eventually.
But God knows how easily we confuse material wealth with divine blessing. I begin to think, “Well, if I am rich, that must mean that God is pleased. So what’s wrong with showing it off?” And that’s how bling was born. So the Bible also tells us some other things about money.
Psalm 49 verses 16 and 17 tell us “Don’t be afraid when some become rich, when the wealth of their houses increases. For when they die that will carry nothing away; their wealth will not go down after them.” You’ve probably heard this verse in its shortened form – “You can’t take it with you.” Ecclesiastes warns us that money will not make you sleep better at night. Chapter 5 verse 12 says, “Sweet is the sleep of laborers, whether they eat little or much, but the excess of the rich will not them sleep.” Isaiah the prophet says that money will also tempt us to go after things that are not good for us. Chapter 55 verse 2: “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?” There’s many a gambler in Vegas who needs to hear that voice in their head.
And then there’s Jesus. Jesus talked a LOT about money. He seemed to know about these dangerous side effects and he offered some pretty radical remedies for them. He did spend a lot of time among the poor, but Jesus also seemed to spend time among the wealthy. He ate at Zaccheus’ home, and even though little Zack was short of stature, he wasn’t short of cash. The Bible says he “was a chief tax collector and he was rich.” [Luke 19:2] Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy man, was a follower who provided the tomb that Jesus borrowed for a weekend. [Matt. 27:57-60] Rich people often came to him for advice and Jesus loved them.
A rich young man came to Jesus asking him what he must do to inherit eternal life. The gospel writer, Mark, tells us that when Jesus saw how sincere this young man was – he really wanted to know the answer – chapter 10 verse 21 says, “Jesus, looking at him, loved him.” But then Jesus goes on to tell him a very hard thing. He knew that the young man’s possessions were standing between him and the life he needed to live. So he tells him, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me."
It was this kind of talk that even made the disciples, who had left everything, nervous. After this episode, Jesus took them aside and said, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of heaven.” [Luke 10:23] This was too much for the disciples. They say, “Wait a minute. Then who can be saved?” That’s when Jesus reminds them what this whole salvation thing was based on. It’s ultimately not about what we have and what we can do that determines our relationship with God. It is what God has done and is doing through grace that gives us entry. In Jesus’ words: “For human beings this is impossible, but not for God. For God all things are possible.” [Luke 10:27]
There were other disturbing things that Jesus said. He pronounced woes on the rich “because you have received your consolation,” he said. [Luke 6:24] He warned that “no 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.” [Luke 16:13] As Bob Dylan might put it, “You’re gonna have to serve somebody” and it can’t be money.
Jesus also told disturbing stories, like the one we read this morning. Luke 16 verses 19 through 31 tells the story of a rich man and Lazarus. There couldn’t be a bigger contrast between these two figures. The rich man sits around in the best clothes and eats the best food -- it’s like take-out from the Exmore Diner every day. But outside the gate of his house there sits a poor man, Lazarus, who is covered with sores and who longs just to eat the crumbs that fall from the rich man’s table. But Lazarus doesn’t do things. Things are done to him. So he lies there as the dogs come and lick his wounds.
Then both of them die and the contrast continues, only this time Lazarus is carried off by angels to be with Father Abraham in the Jewish conception of heaven. The rich man, by contrast, goes to hell. We don’t know why they end up where they do. Jesus seems to suggest that it’s because of how the rich man ignored the poor, but all we really know is that the rich man hasn’t followed the law of Moses.
We also know that rich man hasn’t changed much in hell. Even though he’s in torment, he’s still trying to command people. “Father Abraham, send Lazarus over here to quench my thirst with a finger dipped in water. Send him to my brothers to warn them.” Do this. Do that. But it doesn’t work. Abraham tells him that “Between you and us a great ditch has been fixed.”
A ditch? A canyon? A chasm? Who put that there? If it was Abraham or God, surely God could find a loophole or an escape clause to extend mercy when the situation (or those being tortured) cried out for it. But then the story doesn’t say that God put that ditch there. Maybe it’s the same huge divide that existed in life between the rich man’s table and his outer gate where Lazarus lay…a divide that only the dogs could seem to cross. And who put that divide in place?
I think we’ve found one of those scary side effects of money. When we use our money, or our obsession with money, to insulate us from the world and from the poor and from others, then we start constructing barriers that persist in our souls and on into eternity. We can use our money to connect us to the world. Through our giving and offering up of all that we have to God’s use then we can overcome some of those divides. But we can also turn inward and forget that God is calling us out from our cocoons to the fields and villages where God can show us how to love.
This is why there are so many warnings in the letters of the early church about loving money too dearly. Hebrews 13 verse 5 says, “Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be content with what you have, for [God[ has said, ‘I will never leave you or forsake you.’” 2 Timothy 3 verse 2 says that in the last days one of the prevailing evils will be that “people will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money.” The book of James is shot through with warnings about the preferential treatment that the rich are receiving over the poor in the church.
Then there is the famous verse from 1 Timothy 6 that we also read in our readings this morning. 6 verses 9 and 10 warn about pursuing riches instead of God. “Those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by much senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For 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.” Our riches can establish a huge divide that affects our vision, our humility, our relationship with the world, our relationship with God, and ultimately even our salvation.
On a shelf in my office I have a picture of a Mexican teenager standing in the middle of her family’s small grocery in the front room of their house. The picture is just as I want to remember her. Her face is serious -- I think only Americans feel the need to smile in every picture -- but there is a hint of bemusement there. She is wearing a track suit because she is an athlete at her school, but at the same time there is a sense of calm about her. And the fruits and vegetables that surround her in the store are alive with the strong flavors and exotic textures that I have come to associate with Mexico.
I keep Berenice on my shelf partly because she gave me the small picture frame in which I have placed her picture, but also because she once paid me the extreme honor of not making me feel like a guest in her house. Her family is one of modest means. Her father is often away for months at a time, working in Dallas or Chicago or northern Mexico or wherever he knows there is work. Her mother runs the small grocery with the help of Berenice and her older brother. They don’t have much. But they are willing to share what they have.
In the fall of 2001 and again in the spring of 2002 I got to stay with them as part of mission trips I took to work with the Mexican Methodist church in Cortazar. But Berenice did not let me be a guest on either occasion. She asked me to help her with her English homework. She called me out of my room to watch the Arizona Diamondbacks and the New York Yankees in Game 6 and 7 of their World Series. We watched on the fuzzy screen of a small television set in the front room, nestled among the chayote squash and the avocados. There was a lot that made me stick out like a sore thumb in that family, but in the bottom of the ninth of game 7, I sure couldn’t have told you what those things were.
It seems to me that the best place to learn the lesson of money is in the classroom of the poor. That’s where the rich man in Jesus’ story needed to learn it: where all pretensions to greatness are shown up as high comedy and all the anxieties of the wealthy and revealed as internal tragedy. I’ve sat in the classroom once or twice in my life. It smells of avocados and cilantro and the chairs are not always comfortable. The picture on the screen is a little fuzzy. But as much as I’m sure the people passing in the street must have done a double take to see me sitting with Berenice and the rest of my Mexican family, for that night it was my Mexican family and I had no way to make that so. I had been accepted for reasons beyond my control.
There are some dangerous side effects to money. It can make us forgetful. It can make us start to believe we’re in control. But here’s the good news: God is in control. And with God all things are possible - including the salvation of the world, rich and poor alike. Thanks be to God.
Luke 16:19-31
There was a man who was rich and he would dress himself in expensive clothes and fine linen and feast sumptuously every day. A poor man named Lazarus was laid at his gate and he was covered with sores. He desired to feed from the table droppings of the rich man, but even the dogs came and licked his wounds.
In time, the poor man died and was carried off by angels to the bosom of Abraham. Then the rich man died and was buried. In Hades he raised up his head, being in torment, and he saw Abraham at a great distance and Lazarus enfolded in his care. He called out to him and said, “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 suffering in this flaming fire.”
But 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. Besides 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.”
He said, “Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house – for I have five brothers – that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.”
Abraham replied, “They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.”
He said, “No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.”
He 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.”
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