Here? Really?

Luke 17:20-21

October 9, 2016

Rev. William Carter

Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, “The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.”

A number of years ago, my wife and I discovered the exact location of the kingdom of God. Since you are religious people, I figure you would like to know where it is.

It’s on a lake in western Canada, 14.9 kilometers from the Bow River Parkway. It’s called Moraine Lake. You can get there by flying into Calgary and driving a rental car about two hours west. First you pass through Canmore, and then through the gates at Banff National Park. You take the exit for Lake Louise, curve around and go up the hill, but before you get to Lake Louise, you take a left. There is a small sign, easy to miss. Go down that winding two-lane road about nine miles and there it is, Moraine Lake.

It is difficult to explain how beautiful it is, but if you have a Canadian twenty dollar bill, turn it over and there is the scene. It’s a beautiful, pristine lake, untouched by chemicals or motor boats. Around the lake are ten mountain peaks, all of them over ten thousand feet high.

You can climb a large rock pile at the base of the lake. It will take about forty-five minutes, but the scene is spectacular. The lake is a surreal aquamarine color, created by the granite dust of glaciers which refract the light. My wife calls it the most peaceful spot on earth. From the top of the rock pile, with only an eagle soaring overhead, I felt extremely close to God.

We’ve been there twice. Three years ago, we stood in silence, held hands, and took in the extraordinary beauty. One of our dreams is to rent a log cabin someday on the shore of that lake and spend a few weeks there. I tell you, it is ground zero for the kingdom of God.

Well, you would think so. Then a bus load of tourists arrived and I began to wonder.

Not far from there is Lake Louise, the most photographed lake in the world. It’s another pretty one, but it’s overrun by tourists. Last time we were there, we couldn’t get within two miles of the parking lot. The Mounties on their horses were turning everybody away. So we escaped nine miles away to Moraine Lake. It’s harder to find and my wife likes it a whole lot more.

So we climbed to the top of the rock pile and took in the uncrowded view. It was beautiful. Pretty soon a ranger came by to say, “Watch out for the grizzly bear and her cubs.” Whoops, didn’t know about them. His warning made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. We thought about cutting the trip short.

But since we were there, I thought I’d check into the cost of one of those log cabin lodges. The cabin was beautiful, but the smallest one was $524 a night, plus taxes. Fourteen days would equal about four mortgage payments back home.

So we got into the rental car and drove away. As we were winding down the narrow road, she looked up from the travel guide and said, “This road is only open four months a year. They get hundreds of inches of snow, and the lake doesn’t thaw until the middle of June.” I can hear what some of the snow birds would say: “That lake is certainly not the kingdom of God.”

So where is the exact location of the kingdom of God? It’s not 14.9 kilometers from the Bow River Parkway. But a lot of us would like to find a place of complete beauty, a place of perfect peace, a place that lifts our souls and spirits, a place where we feel close to God.

Even if we don’t use religious language to name it, a lot of people look for rent a place in the mountains or at the shore. Sometimes they make a space of their own, like my friend in New Jersey. He built a shack in his backyard. “It’s my man cave,” he said. It has a flat-screen TV, a humidor full of expensive cigars, and soundproof walls. “All of that is intentional,” he said.

When people talk like this, perhaps they are confusing the kingdom of God with the Garden of Eden. What they want is to return to Eden, the beautiful garden where everything is perfect. However, even if we could find the place, we couldn’t go back. The book of Genesis says Eden now has a “No Trespassing” sign and is guarded by an angel with a flaming sword. We don’t live in paradise. It’s not the world we’re called to live in.

But we can live in the kingdom of God.

Now what is the exact location of the kingdom of God? Where is it? It’s not owning a condo on the side of a ski slope or beside the sea. It’s not all the other places people are looking for.

In the day of Jesus, some people wanted to know, “Where is it?” Some of them were the religious experts who asked Jesus. “Where is this kingdom going to be? How will we know it?”

His answer is curious. He says you won’t be able to see it or say ‘here it is’ or ‘there it is.’ And then Luke reports an even more curious answer. Jesus says the kingdom of God is ... and I’ll use the Greek preposition ... “The kingdom of God is entos you.”[1] Entos is an unusual preposition. If you try to translate it into English, it could go three different ways. Each one is grammatically correct. There is a divine ambiguity in this text.

The way I first heard it was from the King James Bible: “The kingdom of God is within you.” That is, it’s not “out there,” but “in here.” You can translate the verse that way, and many, many people will agree. To have a kingdom is to recognize a King, to give your allegiance in your heart. There’s a lot of truth to that. People can go looking all over creation for it, and it’s already inside us.

And if this is true, it means we can never afford to neglect the discipline of prayer, the reflection of study, or the work of worship. We must take responsibility to keep faith alive. If we don’t do this, we will fizzle out, especially when the tough times come.

In my own faith journey, there have been times when I have been grateful to have a clear sense that God rules over all, that I can trust my life and my world to God’s dominion. If you trust that in your heart, the kingdom is within you.

A few years ago, I spent my birthday on the cardiac floor of a local hospital. I wasn’t there to visit one of you, I was a patient in one of the beds. At noon, I ate a big greasy cheeseburger at Five Guys and said to my friend Virginia, “I have some pain in my chest.” So I went to the doctor, he put me in the hospital, they stuck the electrodes on my chest, and a nice nurse said there would be no chocolate cake with candles that night.

Turned out it was pleurisy, inflammation from a lung infection. I would be OK, but we didn’t know that for a couple of days. Since the event happened close to the weekend, my stay in the most expensive room in town was longer that I wanted it to be.

I don’t know if you’ve spent five nights on the cardiac floor, but it’s not a very restful place in February. Every time you are ready to drift off to sleep, a buzzer may sound, a voice announces somebody is coding down the hall. If you doesn’t drive you to prayer, nothing will.

The only way I could get through it was by casting myself into God’s hands and saying, “Catch me.” Then my prayers would picture all the truly sick people on the floor being held in God’s hands too. “God, be with all the people on this floor, God be with me.” Then a peace came over me, and I knew I would get through.

You’ve had those times, too. Maybe it was in the middle of fear, or confusion, or even exuberant joy, and unexpected peace came upon you. You know the exact location of the kingdom of God, and it wasn’t 14.9 kilometers from somewhere. It was deep within your soul.

But this is not the only translation of entos. Newer translations, like the New Revised Standard, say, “The Kingdom of God is among you.” It is a communal reality, something lived out in a group of people. That is, it’s not only something inside us, but something shared with others.

It’s like the early stories of the first Christian church, where everybody shared their possessions and looked out for one another.[2] It’s what the novelist Leo Tolstoy wrote about in a book that had to be smuggled out of Russia and published in another country. “Imagine a society,” he said, “built around the red-letter teachings of Jesus: non-violence, forgiveness, resisting revenge, and refusing to allow others to demean women or take advantage of those most vulnerable.”[3] Yes, indeed, imagine that.

We don’t have to look very far to see this, or know how it looks. Just two weeks ago, so many of us experienced that marvelous Worship Through Service Day. Did you see the photos or heard the stories? We painted a day care center, we fixed up a few properties, we delivered necessary supplies to a women’s shelter, we sorted and distributed books, we made music for a rehab clinic – and the best part, for my part, is that we did it together. That is the kingdom of God as a social reality, an expression of holy grace through the hands and hearts of a group of church people. It happened among us.

I know how good this made so many of you feel. You haven’t stopped talking about it. You have a shared understanding of what “church” really can be, and what we are when we are at our best. Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is among you.”

But there is a third way to translate the word entos. Not only is the kingdom of God within us, not only is the kingdom among us; the kingdom of God, says Jesus, is within your reach. That’s the other way to translate it. We reach for the kingdom of God. One footnote in a translation (ESV) says it’s “within your grasp,” but that means we have to stretch for it, reach for it, strive for it . . . because it takes some reaching.

Remember all the things we have reached for: in the cradle, we reach for a sunbeam; in the playground, we reach for the monkey bars; at the Thanksgiving table, we reach for the pumpkin pie. We reach for good grades, we reach for the car keys, we reach for a good school, we reach for a good job, we reach for a good mate, we reach for a sense of security. We never stop reaching. But what are we reaching for?

Maybe we keep reaching because we are never happy, never satisfied. That capacity for reaching seems to be part of the human DNA. As someone has said, “This incessant pursuit of an ever-fugitive satisfaction springs from troubled depths within the human soul.”

St. Augustine nailed it perfectly when he wrote in the first paragraph of his Confessions, “O God, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.” Of course, we are reaching, always reaching, until we trust we are always in God’s embrace.

Where is the kingdom of God? Within, among, slightly beyond our reach --- all the above. All of it.

·         The kingdom of God is within. Of course it’s within, but if it’s only within, it’s not big enough to be the kingdom of God.

·         The kingdom of God is among us. Yes, where there is justice, goodness, and peace, the kingdom is here. But to build justice, goodness, and peace is exhausting work. We need something deeper than external relationships.

·         The kingdom is within, it’s among, and it’s something we keep reaching for, because faith is never satisfied with the human status quo. Our deepest hunger is for God to rule in us, and among us, and beyond us.

So where is the kingdom? Is it beside the mountain lake, within the hospital room, among the fellowship of Christian co-workers, or is it something for which we reach, strive, and labor? Yes! 

And when we live within the merciful dominion of God that the Bible calls “the kingdom,” our restless human hearts will be at rest.

---

[1] I am grateful to Tom Troeger, who preached a sermon on this text that has guided my thinking and the structure of this sermon.

[2] See Acts 4:32-35

[3] Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God is Within You

Imagine That

Luke 17:5-6

World Communion / 27^th Ordinary Time

October 2, 2106

William G. Carter

The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” The Lord replied, “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”

It’s comforting to me that the very people around Jesus wanted more faith. Maybe we’d like to believe the first apostles were spiritual superstars, and according to some legends, they were. But that simply was not true. In a flash of true honesty, we hear the first followers of Jesus ask for more faith.

We don’t know what prompts the request, and we don’t really need to ask. Walking with Jesus could be really demanding. He told all those parables that sounded delightful, but made people mad. He placed high demands on those who were closest to him. And some days, he said things that pushed people to the limit.

Just listen to what he’s been saying right before this request. If someone hurts you, you must forgive them if they repent. If someone sins against you twice in the same day, and turns to make amends, you must forgive them. And if someone sins against you seven times in a single day, and turns back to you seven times, you have no choice: you must forgive. Any questions? Yes?"

"Lord, that’s impossible to do. Could you increase our faith?"

Perhaps it is a feeling of inadequacy. Travel with Jesus, watch what he does, listen to what he says, and you can begin to feel inadequate. "Be on your guard," he said. "Everyone stumbles when they follow me, but woe to you if you cause somebody who follows me to stumble. It would be better if a millstone were hung around your neck, and you were thrown into deep water."

Oh my goodness. I reflect on all the times that I led somebody astray or gave them bad advice, and I’ll be the first to cry out, "Lord, I need more faith."

It is difficult to be a Christian, to live like a Christian. It’s all too easy to give in to the cynicism of our surroundings. If there’s a dark cloud over your head, you might universalize the experience and declare the world is falling apart. Hope slips away. Anxiety becomes a habit. You are tempted to give up. The last act of defiance is a protest cry, “Lord, increase our faith.”

Anybody can make that request, especially those who were closest to Jesus. The Gospel writer calls them “apostles.” How interesting – that’s what the followers of Jesus were called after the resurrection. They were not merely disciples, because, technically speaking, disciples are students and tag-alongs.

Apostles, on the other hand, are those who are sent out on his behalf. Apostolos is a Greek term that comes from the flower garden; it's a hardy plant that sends out a runner. It extends itself outward, with strength and confidence. For Luke, the apostles are given the power to go out to preach and heal (9:1-6). And yet, these very same apostles come up short. Maybe it's too hard to heal, too difficult to preach. Maybe the world is doing everything it can to get them to stop. So they say, “Increase our faith.”

In a world like this, the fact that anybody believes in God is a gift. We take that for granted, but it's true. The apostle Paul once said, "Nobody can believe that Jesus is Lord, except by the gift of the Holy Spirit." Faith in Jesus is not a natural habit that we are born with. It's not like infant who was born already knowing how to suck her thumb. No, faith is something else. It is a gift, and we are always in the posture of receivers.

Henri Nouwen once wrote we get faith only when we unfold our clenched fists into open hands of trust. Faith is always a gift, given from the heart of God into our open hearts. That's why the apostles said, "Lord, give us more." Whatever the reason, they came up short. Their account at First Fidelity and Trust had been drained dry. They wanted the Lord to make a sizable deposit in their names. “We want more faith.”

What Jesus had to say, both to them and to us, is not a word that provides any immediate comfort. The apostles want faith, but it sounds like Jesus rubs their noses in their own inadequacy. "You know," he says, "if you had just a little bit of faith, you could work wonders. If your faith was about the size of a little bitty mustard seed, you could say, 'Jump!' And that mulberry tree over there with its extensive root system would leap into the air and land in the sea."

“If you had a little bit of faith,” Jesus says, "you could do that.” They wanted more faith, and Jesus says, "If you had any faith, you could transplant a tree to the Mediterranean."

Now, I don’t have to tell you that’s ridiculous. Who wants to plant a tree in the bottom of the ocean?  Elsewhere when Jesus talks like this, he talks of moving mountains. Take a second to let that sink in: who wants to move a mountain? I have been to the mountains of British Columbia; those mountains are so big, it might take 90 minutes to simply drive around one of them. To move it is an act beyond the limits of reason and a physical impossibility. And that is precisely the point Jesus is making.

You see, they are having a conversation here about what faith really is. Faith is not merely an anchor in distress or a feeling of security in times of change. It is not a shot of adrenalin when you're weak, nor an inoculation against doubt, nor even the comfortable assurance of a large crowd that agrees with you. In this text, faith is the ability to see something that the world regards as a fantasy.

Transplanting a deep-rooted tree? The world says you can’t do it. Moving a mountain? The world says that’s impossible. Yet as Jesus points us to the reality of God, he invites us to envision something new, to hear something unheard of, to discover a way out of darkness even when all the exit doors are locked. That’s the Gospel – it is possible to forgive and to keep forgiving. It is possible for the hungry to be fed. It is possible for the people who have been put down to be lifted up. These things are possible because true faith can see it.

Give us more faith? “You already have enough faith.” That’s what he is saying. Gospel faith is not something we store up and increase. It is a seed planted within us as we hear of a God who makes all things new. It’s a gift. And in this text Jesus says, "You have it." 

Let me explain. The Greek language has two different clauses that begin with the word "if." The first goes like this: "If I were you, and I'm not, then I would go to church more.” That kind of “if” expresses a condition contrary to fact (`if I were you` - and I'm not).

But the second kind of “if" is a phrase that expresses a condition according to fact. It goes like this: "If Jesus Christ is our Lord, and he is, then we had better join him in his work." The phrase in our text is the second type. You could translate it, "If you had faith (and you do), then you could transplant trees, move mountains, and raise the dead with a single word."[1]

You see, Jesus is not chastising the apostles for their shallow spirituality. Rather he affirms that they already have an ample supply of the very resource they seek. For whatever reasons, these apostles sense their spiritual inadequacy. Yet Jesus invites them to join in reciting the first creed spoken in the Gospel of Luke. It's the word that an angel said to his own mother: "With God, nothing will be impossible." (1:37) God has come to us in Jesus, and now the Gospel can continue to work the grace of God.

As Jesus said to the followers of John the Baptist, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the sightless can now see, the crippled can walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.” (Luke 7:22) Imagine that!

I have a friend who’s a poet. He says the human imagination is a muscle. It needs exercise to get it in shape. It needs to be utilized in order to be useful. And if our imagination can be rooted in our faith, then the work God does through us will only be limited by rule of God over us. If the society is mean-spirited, we can work for justice and compassion. We can raise our children in uncertain times. We can have hope for the world even if the people running for office act like nincompoops.

Because of God’s grace and power, we don’t have to be confined by the foolishness and cruelty of this age. Imagine that! We can live in the grace of Jesus Christ. And that seed of faith has already been planted in us.

So we come to a Table. Someone hands us a little piece of bread and we imagine it as a banquet. We glance around the room to see familiar faces, yet faith says all the saints of God are dining with us. We take the little cup of dark liquid, and we trust that in the blood of Jesus, all sin is forgiven and nothing shall keep us from the love of God, nothing at all. Just a little seed of faith is sufficient to welcome heaven here on earth, and that makes all the difference. And it’s enough to welcome the loving rule of God into every corner of our lives.

I know there have been times when I have prayed with the apostles, "Lord, increase my faith." But every time I do, I get the same answer. God says: "What are you going to do with the faith I've given you?"

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

---

[1] Fred B. Craddock, Interpretation:The Gospel of Luke (Westminster John Knox) p. 200

Commissioning for Worship Through Service

Luke 16:19-31

September 25, 2016

William G. Carter

“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried. 

In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, ‘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 in agony in these flames.’ 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.’”

It’s the story of two neighbors, one who had it all and one who was needy. In death, as in life, there was a world of difference between them. That is the source of the story’s tragedy. The tragedy for the needy man is the rich man ignored him. The tragedy for the rich man is that he ignored the Bible. You see, ignoring our neighbors is one of the ways we ignore the Bible.

Sometimes it happens with the neighbors closest to us, as on page three of the book of Genesis. There were two brothers, Cain and Abel. Cain grows jealous of his brother and strikes him down. When confronted by God, Cain responds with a question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). The obvious answer is “yes,” but the obvious answer is not always obvious to us.

Jesus has been talking about paying attention to our neighbors. According to the Gospel of Luke, that was a central message of his good news. We have heard the stories many times.

There was a man who fell among thieves, and two religious people passed him by. It was the Samaritan, the dreaded enemy, who took care of the wounded man, because that’s what neighbors do.

“When you throw a party,” he said, “don’t invite the people who will merely invite you in return to their next party. Go after the ones that everybody overlooks, the people who get left off the guest lists everywhere else.” That’s what a neighbor does, in a world shaped by the Gospel.

The shepherd who finds a lost sheep calls out to his neighbors, “Come and rejoice with me! I found what was lost.” The lady who finds the lost coin calls out to her neighbors, “We’re going to have a party. I found what was lost.” The father who gets his lost boy back throws a huge barbecue for the neighbors, and then he goes out to his other lost son and says, “Even though you’ve never left home, come home.”

It will not be a complete celebration unless all of us are able to enjoy God’s gift of life together.

That’s what makes the story of Lazarus and the rich man so tragic. They were neighbors. Poor Lazarus slept in a cardboard box on the rich man’s curb. The rich man knew him by name, but neither called him to his table nor took food to his side. There was a gulf between them in life, created entirely by the rich man. So there was also a gulf between them in death, created by the justice of God.

It’s a story, you understand – a story. And Jesus is the One who tells it, so it’s not only true in the deepest sense; it’s the truth that can transform our lives. All scripture calls us to live in fellowship with those around us, to pay attention to those in need, to address those needs, and to use our days here on earth to prepare for an eternity of getting along with God and all God’s children.

So that’s why we are doing this weekend of service: to bridge whatever invisible gulf separates us from our neighbors.  Serving others will knock down the walls that keep us from enjoying the communion that God makes possible.  

So my charge to you is simple: find some way to show the love of God to those you meet today. Take the cue from those who make quilts for the homeless here twice a month: they always pray for those who will receive the work of their hands. If you are cleaning up a playground, pray for the children who will play there. If you are sorting books and delivering them, pray for those who will read them. If you go to the Women’s Resource Center, pray for the end of emotional abuse and the healing of those scarred by violence.

We pray, but it’s not enough to pray. We also commit our energy, time, and money to improve the lives of those around us. Jesus has come into the world to make a difference. If we’re going to follow him, we must, too.

So let us stand for a time of prayer and commitment.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

Befriending Dishonest Wealth

Luke 16:1-13

September 18, 2016

William G. Carter

"For the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes. Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? 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."

Of all the parables Jesus told, that one is a real stinker. Maybe that’s why I talk about it whenever it comes up in the cycle of lectionary readings. Jesus tells about a wily crook that is cheating his boss. When the boss hears about it, he says, “You’ve got to go. Turn in your record.” So what does the fired employee? Before he goes out the door, he has a fire sale. He trims the prices on his boss’ products, thinking that after he’s gone, at least he will have some friends.

And when the boss hears about it, he doesn’t throw him in prison or hand him off to get roughed up. No, he says, “Congratulations! I’m impressed. What an excellent idea!” It’s the ending of that parable that gives good Presbyterians fits. They think a crook ought to be arrested, not be commended. Is that boss crazy? The thief has done the crime, he should do the time. But instead he’s congratulated by the very man who has let him go.

It’s a troubling story, the most slippery of all the stories that Jesus tells. And the only thing more troubling is one of the teachings that Jesus extracts from it: “Make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.” Now, what in the world is that about?

Make friends by dishonest wealth? We know about making friends . . . but to do it by dishonest wealth? Or to translate it another way, “filthy money” or “unrighteous mammon.” Who wants to make some friends by way of some dirty money?

A friend of mine is the pastor of a new church not far from here. The new church is the merger of some small country churches. They have a beautiful new facility. Right by the front door, there is a plaque to honor a local business man of, shall we say, dubious reputation. I don’t need to mention any names, simply to say he runs a big junk yard, and he may be the largest land owner in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It’s hard to say, he doesn’t do interviews. 

Apparently somebody knew somebody who knew somebody else, and they got this business person to arrange for the site preparation of the new church building. He’s not a church member there. It may be questionable to ask such a person for a favor, but they did. Now they have a large plaque honoring his generosity. Is that what Jesus means by “befriending dishonest wealth”?

Or I think of a new community center, a place not far from here that is dear to my own heart. The board is in the process of raising money to rehab the building and open the center. It was announced that there was a $100,000 grant. Well, that was wonderful! It’s not enough to do the whole project, but it’s a big help. And where did this grant come from? From the profits of Pennsylvania casinos.

Well, we’re grateful for the funding, but I confess some discomfort on where the money comes from. I know families that have been ripped apart because somebody spent too much money in a casino. This summer, I visited a local casino for the very first time. I didn’t spend a dime, just went to look. Do you know what I observed? Nobody is smiling. Not a single person. But some money from that den of addiction is helping to fund a very important project in the community. As Jesus says, “Befriend dishonest wealth.”

Or I remember the conversation with my dad. I went home one time from Princeton Seminary, full of biblical ideas about peace and justice. And I said, “You know, Dad, I am a little worried that you work for a company that makes high capacity weapons.” At the height of his career at IBM, my father managed the development of a computer guidance system for the B-1 bomber. My father looked at me, smiled slightly, and said, “It’s true that the Cold War has funded your higher education, to say nothing of a lot of other things that our family enjoys.”

“But Dad,” I protested, “don’t you think that’s wrong?” He replied, “People like me make a lot of money so we can send preachers like you off to school to learn the Bible, so you can come back and raise those kinds of questions.” Oh, I miss my dad.

Jesus said, “Make friends through filthy money.” I wonder about that.

I mean, I would never dare ask the source of that money that all of us are putting in the offering plate today? I’m not sure I want to know where it comes from. From the looks of it, this is a crowd of good-looking, church-going folk. You don’t seem like you’re caught up in shady deals or back room manipulations. But what about the people who touched the cash before you give it away today? Does our money have germs?

Once upon a time, there was a church that received a visit from the FBI. The Feds dropped by to visit the pastor and the Finance committee. It seems somebody in the pews was laundering marked bills from a robbery by putting the ill-gotten funds in the offering plate. The local bank discovered the cash, traced it to the church, and realized it has come in a number of times. The minister said, “We didn’t ask where it came from. What we can tell you is the money is buying church school curriculum, sending kids to camp, feeding the hungry, and providing hurricane relief.” But it was dirty.

When people hear the Bible passage for today, they get disturbed. Jesus holds up a common thief as the hero of one of his stories. He doesn’t make any comment on the man’s morality. It’s almost as if he assumes that the work of human commerce is always going to be contaminated somehow. Money is merely paper, metal, or numbers in a computer somewhere. But there’s no question that somehow or another it will get dirty. The problem is not what money is, but what it can do to people. It’s not money that is “the root of evil.” No, the Bible says “the love of money is the root of all evil.” (1 Timothy 6:10)

That’s why the Bible tells of terrible things that happen when people are twisted by greed and power. Judas Iscariot sold out Jesus for thirty pieces of silver. Ananias and Sapphira held back some of the profits of a land sale when the people of God had needs (Acts 4:32-5:10). A man named Simon Magus waved a fistful of fifty dollar bills at one of the apostles and said, “Can I buy some Holy Spirit for me?” (Acts 8:19) It didn’t turn out well for any of those people.

But there are other stories, too, stories of people who make a constructive difference with their money. They give, they share, and something good happens. I think of the apostle Paul making an appeal to the wealthy people of Corinth. There had been a famine and people were starving. He says to the Corinthians, “You have so much and they have so little. We know you are eager to give generously. So give me a reason to brag about your generosity.” Notice he doesn’t ask how they made their money, or whether their money had germs when they received it – his concern is to invite them to do something good with the money they have.

Like my friend Mike. A couple of weeks ago, I took my mom home from a visit, and stopped to see my brother and his family. They were working at a carnival in their town. Specifically, they were working a lottery booth for the high school band boosters. My brother said, “Buy some tickets and support my kids.” I looked both ways to make sure nobody was watching. So I gave him a buck, I’m such a big spender. He gives me four tickets to scratch off. I didn’t win anything, but hey, it’s for my nephew and niece, so I’ll give them a buck.

While I’m standing there, along comes my friend Mike. He lays down a twenty, buys a bunch of tickets, starts scratching them off. He’s not winning anything. And I ask, “What if you hit a lucky number?” He said, “I’ll just give the winnings to the band.” He lays down another twenty, gets more tickets, doesn’t win anything.

I said, “Why don’t you just give them the twenty dollar bills? He said, “Well, that’s no fun. Besides, it’s for the kids.” Then he quoted Garrison Keillor, “Nothing you ever spend on kids is wasted.”

Was the money dirty? No, not with what he was doing with it.

There is a certain kind of shrewdness that Jesus is calling for. He is not talking about investing money to make more of it here and now. He’s talking about being welcomed “into the eternal homes,” about being faithful to God with the “true riches.” He’s speaking about using our money here and now for God’s purposes, to express God’s values, to create relationships rather than financial wealth.

As the poet Wendell Berry says somewhere, there are two economies. Either we use capital to build social relations, or we sacrifice social relations to build capital. Berry says, “If we do not serve what coheres and endures, we serve what disintegrates and destroys.”[1]

To this, Jesus adds, “You can’t serve God and wealth.” It’s one or the other. “If you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?”

So here’s the question, the Gospel question: what are we going to do with our money? It is one of the profound questions of faith. If anybody takes a look at our checking account statements, they would see what we value. We spend money and give money to the things that matter most to us. Is it only for ourselves, or is it going to build relationships? Will it reflect the values of God’s eternity? Will it build God’s kingdom and extend the reach for God’s kingdom? Or is it merely going to build walls and install security systems?

Jesus says it makes a world of difference. Spend some time meditating on this 16^th chapter of Luke. It’s a collection of Jesus’ teachings – and warnings – about what we do with the money we have. The question is not whether money may be tainted. The question is whether our hearts are focused on God and generous toward others. Those are the “true riches.”

In Michigan, there is a fourth grader by the name of Cayden Taipulus. He was standing in the lunch line in the school cafeteria, and noticed the kid ahead of him was denied a hot lunch because there was no money in his lunch account. Instead the lady with the hairnet took two slices of white bread, put a single slice of American cheese between them, and handed it to the embarrassed kid. He was pretty upset, and so was Cayden.

Cayden went home and sulked. He asked his mom, “Isn’t there something we can do?” He collected bottles and cans for recycling, and turned them in for money. He asked his family members to help out. He collected enough money to pay off the lunch accounts for 300 kids.

His mom got into the spirit, and helped him to set up a fund raising page on the internet. As of yesterday, they have raised over $37,000, so that no kid in his school will ever have to go hungry.[2]

There are a lot of things we can do with our money. Rather than merely make money, how about if we make a difference . . . to the glory of God?

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

---

[1] Quoted by Ched Myers, “Discipleship as Defection from the Mammon System,” https://radicaldiscipleship.net/2016/09/15/discipleship-as-defection-from-the-mammon-system-jesus-parable-about-a-manager-of-injustice/

[2] See the website at https://fundrazr.com/7htY4 and consider making a donation.

Is This the Way It Is?

Luke 15:1-10

September 11, 2016

William G. Carter

Now all the tax-collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, ‘This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.’ So he told them this parable: ‘Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.” Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who need no repentance.'

So I’m going to tell you something today that could get me in a lot of trouble. I’ve given a lot of thought to this, so I don’t do it lightly. Ready? Here it is. The truth: whenever I talk about grace and mercy, someone always gets angry. Whenever I preach about forgiveness, someone always stomps out of the sanctuary. Whenever I say, “God is love,” somebody scowls.

Now, that’s the truth of it. In my baser moments, when somebody stomps or scowls at the kindness of God, I want to say, “Get over yourself.” And in my wiser moments, I don’t say anything. I simply remember that religious people killed Jesus because he preached and practiced kindness. It goes with the territory. This is the way it is.

One day, they dragged a woman in front of him.[1] They had caught her in the act of adultery. Apparently they didn’t catch the man, just her. One of them said, “Teacher, you know what our Bible says about this. Moses said we should stone her to death. What do you say?”

At that point, there is a long pause, a palpable silence. Jesus writes in the dirt with his finger. Then he says, “Let the one who is without sin throw the first stone.” Again, there is another painful silence. Then he hears “thud, thud, thud,” as one stone after another drops from their hands. There is a rustling, and when Jesus looks up, the angry crowd is gone. There’s just that woman who was dragged from her bed.

He says, “Lady, where are your accusers?” She said, “They are gone, sir.” And he said, “Neither do I accuse you. Go, and stop sinning.”

Now, what the Bible doesn’t tell us is that there was one guy who had a hard time letting go of his stone. He is hiding behind that palm tree over there and watching the scandal of it all. Jesus forgives this woman and then he talks with her! I bet he stomped out of there, went home, and wrote a letter to complain. Jesus forgave and did not condemn. He saved her life and she was a sinner.

It sounds like this was an ongoing issue for Jesus. The religious leaders grumbled and said, “This fellow welcomes sinners. He eats with them.” For them, that was a huge crisis of faith. If you welcome a sinner, you don’t separate yourself from them. The word “Pharisee” means “the separate ones.” They are the ones who do everything they can to live a holy life according to the Torah of God, even if that means separating themselves from the everyday spiritual slobs who aren’t so careful.

What’s more, to eat with somebody is to be at peace with them. It means you are in fellowship with them. If you eat with a sinner, it looks like you condone who they are and what they have done, and in some cases, what they are still doing. Jesus not only forgave the sinners. He welcomed them and ate with them. So the holy people murmured about him. This is the way it is.

Years ago, there was a couple in our congregation who separated. Before the divorce was finalized, he moved in with a girlfriend. That year, he was serving a term as an elder on the session. He was the chair of the stewardship committee. Some friends of his wife paid me a visit and declared that I needed to throw him off the session. They felt my job is to be the spiritual police officer of the congregation.

I listened as they made their case, and I listened carefully. I offered to meet the man for coffee and have a conversation, even though they didn’t know I had had many conversations with him already. Well, that wasn’t good enough. They expected more drastic action. So I said, “I suppose we could go through the membership roll and get rid of all the sinners. Let’s see: Acker, Ackerly, Armstong, Bailey…” With this, one of my visitors started getting huffy and declared we didn’t need a person like him in our church.

So I said, “Let me tell you the truth. I’m a pastor. I deal with people every day whose lives are in transition. Some of those lives are a real mess. But they are coming here because it is the only place in town where they are going to hear that in spite of what they’ve done, God loves them, that God is walking with them in the middle of their mess. This is the only place where they are going to hear that God gives them a second chance, and that even if they screw that up, ultimately God is going to save their lives and carry them home.” That’s the way it is.

“Besides,” I added, “if you want to run the stewardship campaign, go to it.” There was a long, long pause, and then a “thud” on the carpet as they dropped their stones and slipped away.

Please understand: I am sympathetic to their concern. I would love it if everybody was well-behaved. Yet I serve a wonderful congregation that has its flaws. This is a flock of imperfect people with an imperfect pastor. And I knew there were extenuating circumstances in that man’s former marriage. There always are. There are at least three different sides to every divorce. All I’ll say is it never fails to take my breath away to discover how cruel people can be to one another. That’s not how we are called to be or how we are to live. The call to be a follower of Christ is a call to grow in faithfulness and fruitful living.

But following Jesus includes becoming more and more like Jesus, the same Jesus who said, “Neither do I condemn you; go and stop sinning.”

I know, these are difficult matters. We really want everybody to be good, and to be good to one another. And sometimes we might think that we ourselves are on top of the world. Maybe our relationships are healthy, our children’s teeth are straight, and our investments are turning out well. If so, hallelujah, praise the Lord!

The truth, however, is that all of us have some hurts that we carry, some difficulties that we disguise, some fears and inadequacies that gnaw at us after dark. Some of us cobble a few things together just to get here on a Sunday morning. I realize you clean up pretty well, but I know better – because I know the truth about myself. I don’t need an annual personnel evaluation to point out my flaws; I already know what they are, and am generally surprised that more of them don’t show. The apostle Paul called himself “the foremost of sinners”? Well, call me “El Jefe”

Somebody asked me the other day what I thought about 9-11. We swapped stories of where we were, how a beautiful September day was demolished by hatred and senseless destruction. The conversation started to turn in the direction of “how terrible those terrorists are,” but I needed to hit the pause button. It’s fifteen years later, I said. The tragedy was bad, but we can’t respond to hatred with more hatred. That’s deadly.

My coffee partner said, “What would you suggest?” So I quoted a song lyric from the rock star Sting. His poetry may be a little obscure, but he’s talking about an alternative to perpetuating violence. He sang it on a concert on the night of September 11, 2001:

If blood will flow when flesh and steel are one

Drying in the color of the evening sun.

Tomorrow’s rain will wash the stains away

But sometime in our minds will always stay

Perhaps this final act was mean to clinch a lifetime’s argument

That nothing comes from violence and nothing ever could

For all those born beneath an angry star

Lest we forget how fragile we are

On and on the rain will fall

Like tears from a star, like tears from a star.

On and on the rain will say

How fragile we are, how fragile we are.[2]

All of us are fragile. That’s the point. None of us are better than anybody else. None of us. The Pharisees and scribes couldn’t see it, but Jesus could. That’s why Christianity is not the practice of superiority. Not now, not ever. For God’s sake, our leader was a condemned man, spat upon by religious superior-thinking people, and killed on a cross like a criminal. And he is the King of kings. He was misunderstood then, he is ignored now.

If Jesus is superior, it is in his graciousness. Ever notice, after his resurrection, he never goes back to say, “Hey Pontius Pilate, you want to take another swing at me?” He never returns to say to the high priest Caiaphas, “Hey, you dummy, you got it all wrong.” No, that’s not how Jesus was -- or is. He doesn’t blast down the wall. No, he knocks on the door and he waits us out.

And in a parable of astonishing self-definition, he is the foolish shepherd who leaves ninety-nine sheep in the wilderness to go after the one who is lost. Well, what if one of the other ones wanders off and gets lost? He will go after that one too.

So we have this parable from the lips of Jesus. The shepherd risks everything to go after the wayward sheep. He risks his reputation, he risks his own safety, he risks the rest of his flock – because he has to rescue that lost sheep. Notice he does he does not wait for the sheep to repent. No, he goes after that sheep, because grace always precedes the return. Grace is what carries us home. This is what gives the shepherd great joy: going after the one who has lost its way, lifting it in rescue, and giving it a whole new life. It’s slow work, it’s holy work.

Robert Capon was an Episcopalian priest who loved this parable. He says it is the essence of the Gospel, and it cannot be separated from the work that Jesus does in his death and resurrection. Here’s what he says:

When God pardons, he does not say he understands our weakness or makes allowances for our errors; rather he disposes of, he finishes with, the whole of our dead life and raises us up with a new one. He does not so much deal with our derelictions as he does drop them down the black hole of Jesus’ death. He forgets our sins in the darkness of (Christ’s) tomb. He remembers our iniquities no more in the oblivion of Jesus’ expiration. He finds us, in short, in the desert of death, not in the garden of improvement; and in the power of Jesus’ resurrection, he puts us on his shoulders rejoicing and brings us home.[3]

Is this the way it is? I hope so, I believe it to be so, and I trust it with all my heart. Because my life depends on the grace of God, and so does yours.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

---

[1] John 7:53-8:12. Some scholars, noting its odd location in the Fourth Gospel, believe this story really belongs in Luke.

[2] Sting (Gordon Sumner), “Fragile,” recorded on “Nothing Like the Sun”

[3] Robert Farrar Capon, The Parables of Grace, Eerdmann Publishing, p. 39.