Seeing across the chasm

Pentecost 19

September 25, 2016

Luke 16:19-31

The chasm that separated the Rich Man and Lazarus didn’t just appear in the afterlife. It had been there all along. It had been created when the rich man hired Lazarus to be his servant. You see, the rich man was a man who wanted others to know that he was rich. He wore purple fabrics every day to show those in the community that he could afford to own clothing made from rare dyes. He had fancy banquets held on a daily basis so that those around him knew that he could afford fine foods. In other words, the rich man wanted others to know, without a doubt, that he was better than them, that if he wanted something, it would be his.

When he hired Lazarus, the rich man made it clear from the get go that he would never hold Lazarus in high esteem because he was part of the hired help. After all, Lazarus needed a job at the time that the rich man was hiring, and therefore, Lazarus wasn’t rich, he couldn’t afford the purple clothes and fine foods that the rich man could. So why would the rich man want to bother with him other than as a member of his staff.

When Lazarus became ill and began developing sores, he was fired by the rich man. After all, the rich man could not be seen with a leper on staff. Lazarus had no home, no family to speak of, and no money to pay for medical attention, and no energy left to move when the other servants laid Lazarus outside the gate of the rich man, whispering ‘we are so sorry,’ but knowing that if they did more than that, they, too would be out of work and on the street. To the rich man, Lazarus meant nothing. Was worth nothing. And each day that the rich man passed by Lazarus as he exited and entered his home, the chasm grew wider until it became fixed when Lazarus and then the rich man, died.  

One of the interesting things about parables is that they give us glimpses of the kingdom of God and of God’s own self, a God who is constantly surprising and often shocking in the way that God shows compassion and concern even, and especially for those whom we would rather not show compassion or concern for ourselves. If you go back to the time in which Luke’s version of the story of Jesus was written, there were no chapters and verses like we have in our bibles today. Those were added in about 300 years later to make it easier for monks to copy manuscripts of the bible. So what we have in the non chapter and versed version, the original version, are three stories in a row about people and relationships, relationships with each other and relationships with money.

Having an intimate relationship with money, we learn from the parables, often creates a strained relationship with the people around us. And I am not talking about taking care of your money and making sure you are making good sound investments with your money, or using your money as a tool to support yourself and your family, and it is worth noting that Jesus doesn’t scold folks for having wealth…what he does do, however, is to challenge us so that our relationship with our money and our possessions doesn’t get to the point that the things and the financial resources that we have begin to possess us and take the place of the relationships that we have with other people. As Paul wrote in our second reading this morning, “the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.”

The rich man had a love of money, a love of purple fabrics, and fine foods, and he wanted everyone to know it. It was that love of money which was at the root of the chasm between him and Lazarus, a chasm which grew larger and larger and was maintained even in the afterlife, where the rich man still viewed Lazarus as lower than him.

I realize that I am starting to sound like a broken record, but there are some pretty large chasms in our world and, particularly in this country. And not all of them have to do with money. But all of them do have to do with how we see each other.

Chasms between those on the political left and those on the political right.

Chasms between the very rich and the very poor.

Chasms between citizens and immigrants and refugees.

Chasms between white supremacists and people of color.

Chasms between the African American community and police.

The list goes on. And it is troubling.

A week and a half ago, a group of white supremacists showed up at Bethany College in Lindsborg, KS, an ELCA Lutheran college, and made threats against the students of color that attended Bethany, and against the adopted children of the president of Bethany, rallying under the banner “Make Lindsborg white again.” A few days later, Terence Crutcher was shot and killed by a police officer after his car broke down in North Tulsa. A few days after that Keith Scott was shot and killed in Charlotte. A few days after that, the KKK showed up on the campus of Eastern Michigan University with their hate filled graffiti. In the midst of all this, one of the best police officers that the city of Detroit has employed in recent history, died as a result of the complication of gunshot wound that he received while on duty. Captain Steil and his co-workers in the 9^th precinct of the city of Detroit were responsible for the dramatic decrease in gun violence in that community and he was well respected by his fellow officers as well as the people who he served.

We have a problem, friends, we have a sin problem which is causing these chasms between us. When unarmed and innocent black men die at the hands of police, we have a problem.

When police officers do not return home to their families because they have been wounded or killed, we have a problem.

When hate groups show up in our back yard or on the steps of our colleges, we have a problem… and if we say nothing, we have an even bigger problem.  

Our problem is that fear has become so woven into our ways of thinking that we don’t see each other fully any more. I think that is a major part of our sin problem. Fear. As the wise Yoda once said “fear turns to anger, anger turns to hate, hate leads to suffering.”

But it doesn’t have to be this way, my beloved friends.

Because the other great thing about parables is that the ones with not so great endings are the ones that give us the power to change the ending. Because as much as parables give us glimpses into the kingdom of God, they help us to realize that the kingdom of God is not just present in the next life, but it is present here, and now.

So we take on the role of the rich man’s brothers. For, unlike the rich man, we can change how this ends. We can choose to listen to Moses and the prophets who warn us about trampling the poor and worrying more about our bed sheets than we do the suffering of others. We can choose to listen to the laws which give clear instructions that gleanings of the harvest are to be left for the poor (Lev 23:22), and proverbs that say that if we mistreat the poor, we insult the creator (prov 14:31). We can choose to listen to the one who told us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, to said lepers’ lives matter, Samaritan lives matter, children’s lives matter,

who forgave the ones who nailed him to a cross, both literally and figuratively,

and who died and was raised from the dead so that we could get a chance to make things right,

to see each other more fully,

to do what we can to close the chasms between us, so that we can love each other the way that Jesus loved us and, in doing so, we can help bring justice and peace to all the earth.

On Being Faithful with What Belongs to Another, or, #NoDAPL

Pentecost 18

September 18, 2016

Luke 16:1-13

In the late 1400’s, with the blessing of the Pope, European monarchies began a conquest of the lands on the western side of the Atlantic Ocean under what became known as the Doctrine of Discovery. It was this doctrine that gave European explorers the right to claim lands which they had “discovered” but were not inhabited by Christians. As Portuguese, Spanish, French, and British explorers arrived in the lands that we now know as North, Central, and South America, they claimed those lands for the crowns that they represented, ignoring the fact that those lands were already inhabited by tribes who each had their own unique languages and cultures. In search of gold and silver and any other materials which could enrich the wealth of the explorers and the monarchs that they represented, some native tribes were killed off, others were enslaved, and still others were taken from their homes and back to Europe where they could be taught to become civilized people.

In 1792, Thomas Jefferson extended the doctrine of discovery to the newly formed United States of America and what ensued in the coming decades and centuries was a systematic oppression of Native Americans. Their sovereignty over the land they inhabited was stripped from them, many were forced from their lands completely as reservations were set up throughout the Midwest. Germ warfare was used against the native peoples to wipe out tribes, and boarding schools were set up throughout this country with the intention of “killing the Indian, saving the man.” The majority of these boarding schools were not shut down until the 1980’s and 1990’s (though a couple still exist), resulting in the loss of a rich culture and heritage of the Native peoples of this land.

But we considered them savages. We considered them to be less than human and thus it was seen that we were doing them a favor by teaching them our ways, our language, and our religions.

A few weeks ago, construction began on the Dakota Access Pipe Line in South Dakota, a pipe line which disturbed the ancient burial ground of the Standing Rock Sioux, a tribe which has slowly seen the size of their land diminished as a result of the American Government violating treaties with the Sioux tribe as a whole. Were the pipe line to be proposed to disturb Arlington National Cemetery or even our own local cemeteries, we would be appalled. But there seems to be something about this pipeline which has caused a much more subdued response from a good majority of the nation.  

As people who live 1 mile from the Pottawatomie ancient burial grounds and who sit on the ground of the former Macon Reservation, we would do well to consider the history of these lands that we inhabit and the culture of the people who retreated from this land in order to escape persecution at the hands of those who considered them to be savages and, therefore, not worthy to have free claim to the lands where they had lived for so long.

It is easier to look at folks different from us as less than human, or at least lesser than us, and therefore place ourselves in a seat of judgment over what they do and do not deserve, than it is to look in the eyes of our neighbors and see them as fully children of God deserving of the same shakes and the same opportunities that we are deserving of. If there is no other lesson that should be taken from the protests of the Standing Rock Sioux and this election cycle, it should be that.

It is easier for me to look at a stranger who supports a different political candidate than I do and to silently call them an unflattering name than it is for me to look in the eyes of my brother, who supports a different political candidate than I do and do the same thing. It is easier for me to read a whitewashed history of the treatment of the Native peoples and Africans who were brought to this country for the purpose of the slave trade, than it is for me to read actual accounts of what happened, to listen to the experiences of my siblings who are Native American, Latino, and African American, who have experienced racism. It is easier for me to look at a homeless person and judge them by what they wear or buy at the grocery store or the phone that they use than it is for me to be in relationship with them and learn that they are working 2 minimum wage jobs, their jeans were donated, their phone was purchased by a friend, and that they saved up for 6 months to purchase something special for their child for their birthday.

This is one of the basic sins of humanity. We fall victim to the idol which is called Mammon, an idol which is comprised of the money and possessions that we have that are in excess of what we need to support ourselves and our families. The idol Mammon tells us that we are never going to have everything that we need in order to be happy. When we believe this lie, we begin to believe that because others do not have what we have, it is because they are undeserving for one reason or another.

It’s nothing new, we hear about it in our reading from Amos and in our Gospel lesson. The reading from Amos issues a warning for those who would exploit the poor and needy for their own gain, for those who would, for example raise the price of a life saving medication and give themselves a 16 million dollar raise. “Surely I will never forget any of their deeds,” says the Lord.

Then we have our Gospel text which is, admittedly, complicated. What we don’t know that Jesus’ first hearers would have, is that the rich masters of the region and their managers all got rich on the backs of the poor. They would charge so much interest on the goods that the peasants owed them that, often times, the people would be forced to make the decision to either surrender their property to the master or to sell their children into slavery so that their debts could be settled. Think of it as the ancient form of the payday loan, in which the average interest rate charged is 400%. These rich masters were participating in a scheme in which they were systematically forcing folks off of land which their families had been passing down from generation to generation.

This parable could be the source of at least a half dozen sermons, depending on which way you want to go with it. But what sticks out for me this time around, in the context of the protest of the Dakota Access Pipe Line, in the context of this election cycle, and in the context of the nature of a sin in which it is easier to tear someone down and judge them as undeserving than it is to acknowledge that all people are children of God and all people are deserving of the same opportunities as everyone else…

…what sticks out is verse 12. “And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own?”

Neither the manager nor his master were faithful with what belonged to the people in their village. It just so happened that the manager also knew how to be unfaithful with what his master had entrusted him with. But what if they had been faithful to what belonged to the people of their village? What if their wealth wasn’t amassed on the backs of the poor?

And for us, then, how does this translate?

The 9^th and 10^th commandments and Luther’s explanation to them make it clear that we are to do everything in our power to support our neighbors to help them to maintain what is theirs, that we are to not attempt to trick them out of what is their own so that it can become ours, that we are to see our neighbors as children of God and respect that the things that are theirs come from God just as the things that are ours come from God. For God is generous, God gives good things to us even when we do not deserve them. In fact, the myth of the self-made man or woman is a myth purely and simply because everything that we are and everything that we have comes from God.

When God sent Jesus into the world, it wasn’t just for a select group of people, it was for all of humanity. Because God IS generous, because God is merciful and gracious, because God created us to be echoes of God’s mercy and grace and faithfulness for the entire world. Don’t believe the lies that mammon tells. Make mammon serve you so that you may be faithful and generous with what has been entrusted to you.