Division and Other Signs of the Times

Luke 12:49-56
August 17, 2025
William G. Carter

Jesus said, "I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law."

 

He also said to the crowds, "When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, "It is going to rain'; and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, "There will be scorching heat'; and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?”

 

The sky looked threatening on Wednesday morning. Dark, murky. After a long stretch of hot, dry August days, we knew something was going to happen. I didn’t need to ask Alexa or Google, “What’s the weather today?” Neither did I need to tune in to Joe or Jeremy for a televised update. Sure enough, shortly after lunch we looked to the heavens – and those heavens opened up. There was a hard rain, with flash flooding in some places.

The mayor of Scranton said, “We’ve been working on our storm drainage in the city. On Wednesday, we discovered new places for our attention.” Anybody could have looked to the sky to predict it. What did they tell me in Boy Scouts? “Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Red sky in morning, sailors take warning.” Read the horizon, what do you see?

It reminds me of a moment from years ago. A few of us traveled to Haiti for a mission trip. One night, we were sitting on a flat roof in Port au Prince, learning about that Caribbean country. There was a pause in the conversation, then somebody said, “Have you had many hurricanes here?” Oh yes. Realizing there is not much of an infrastructure in Haiti, she said, “How do you know when a hurricane is coming?” Our host said, “The sky gets very dark. The chickens get very quiet. Then the wind begins to blow.”

Jesus said to the crowds, “You can interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?” He says this on the road to Jerusalem. It’s his last journey to Jerusalem. He will be greeted as a prophet. He will speak and act like a prophet. He will be killed like a prophet. Some will greet him. Some will reject him.

What does he see when he looks to the horizon? What is the weather report? Jesus says, “Cloudy with a 100 percent chance of division.” People will be divided against one another. It was a sign of the times.

It is still a sign of the times. There are Eagles fans and Steelers fans. They don’t see eye to eye. There are red states and blue states. If either senses power may slip away, they will gerrymander their territory to gain an advantage. This fierce competition seems to have been written into our DNA. It’s us against them, although it doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of “us” anymore.

One of our retired teachers remembers when the public school system was the great American melting pot. School was for everybody. They received the same education. Great democratic values were passed along to the next generation. The project was never unanimous, although it seemed that way. Then the splintering began. “I don’t like what they are teaching.” “Home is where health class ought to be taught, not the classroom.” “I don’t want my daughter reading Nathaniel Hawthorne.” “My kid doesn’t need algebra,” and so on.

Sorry to say, some church people were behind the splintering. The kids weren’t learning the Ten Commandments at home, and they weren’t going to Sunday School, so somebody had the bright idea, “Let’s print the Ten Commandments on the classroom wall.” In other words, “Thou shalt not commit adultery, but don’t let them read The Scarlet Letter.” So, here we are. Them against them, and precious little “us.”     

There is nothing new about that. Jesus said it will be “father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law." He takes that list from the prophet Micah.[1] It is a generational split, parents against children, children against parents. One generation against another. Your enemies shall live in your own house. That is sobering.

Jesus knew this. If you read the Bible stories, he rarely spoke to a unanimous house. Sure, the Gospel says, “Everyone heard him gladly,” but it wasn’t everyone. Look around the room. Somebody was offended.

It happened on the day of his very first sermon. Jesus went home to Nazareth, went into the hometown synagogue, opened the hometown scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Then he read, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me to preach good news to the poor.” Everybody said, “Oh, how we love Jesus!” Then he told them two stories out of their own Bible about how God loves everybody, and they wanted to kill him. And that was on his first day.

If they only knew what his mother was told a week after he was born. Mary and Joseph took baby Jesus to the Jerusalem temple according to the Jewish Torah. An old prophet named Simeon stumbled up, mumbling, “I’m looking for the salvation of God.” He peeked into their little blue blanket and said, “Here he is. I have seen God’s salvation!” Then he turned to Mary to say, “He is destined for the rise of some and the fall of others. He will be opposed. And a sword will piece your soul.”

Thirty years later, Jesus says to the crowd, “Do you think I’ve come to bring peace? No, I have come to create division.” That is what prophets do. They tell the truth. People don’t want to hear the truth.

One of the signs of our time is that people cannot agree on what the truth is. Somehing happens, and everybody starts to spin it. They spin it to the right; they spin it to the left. Now we have television stations that tell us what we want to hear. Once upon a time, most folks could agree on what happened. There was a broad consensus. And we could agree on who the radicals were and who were the nincompoops.

But these days, if you report the economic facts and somebody doesn’t like them, you could get fired for simply reporting the facts. You would be replaced by someone unqualified and unexperienced, who told the boss what he wanted to hear. It’s a sign of the times. The new rule is “If you are critiqued, attack the critic.” So spin it.

A few years back, our friend Brent Eelman worshipped with us for a while. One time he said, “I want to teach a class on the loss of truth in our society.” What do you mean? He said, “We are living in a post-truth culture.” That sounded ominous, like red skies in the morning. And he explained:

"Post-truth" is a culture where appeals to emotion and personal belief are more influential in shaping public opinion than objective facts. The distinction between truth and falsehoods becomes blurred, and emotional narratives often take precedence over factual accuracy. So, people start throwing around accusations of "fake news" and spread misinformation. 

That is, you can tell somebody what happened. And they will say, “That’s your opinion.” But it’s a fact. “No, that’s not one of my facts.” But didn’t you see it? “No, it wasn’t on my favorite television station.” But shouldn’t we speak up? And there’s silence. Like they told us down in Haiti, “When the hurricane is coming, the chickens get really quiet.”

Here’s the truth about Jesus: he told the truth. In the clarity of his resurrection authority, he still tells the truth. He stands in the tradition of the prophets who thundered against the abuses of his day. Remember what the prophet Isaiah said?

Hear the Word of the Lord:

When you stretch out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you;
even though you make many prayers, I will not listen; your hands are full of blood.
Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove your evil deeds from before my eyes;
cease to do evil; learn to do good;
seek justice; rescue the oppressed; defend the orphan; plead for the widow.[2] 

Any questions? And Jesus speaks with the clarity of the Psalmist. Remember what the Psalmist said?  

You love evil more than good and lying more than speaking the truth. 
But God will break you down forever; he will snatch you from your tent;
The righteous will see and fear (God) and will laugh at the evildoer, saying,
“See the one who would not take refuge in God

but trusted in abundant riches and sought refuge in wealth!”[3] 

There is moral clarity in the kingdom of God. There is a holy love for those who have been hurt. There is a holy fire that purges those who are evil. This is the fire Jesus ignites – and many who will not like what he says, as if their emotions and opinions can protect them from the truth. Yet ultimately it is the truth of Christ that sets us free – it is the truth about ourselves, and the truth about God’s cleansing, purging grace.

If there is to be a division, let it be a division between good and evil.

Let it be a division between right and wrong.

Let it be a division between life and death.

Let it be a division between loving neighbors and hating neighbors.

Let it be a division between justice and indifference.

Let it be a division between loving God and ignoring God.

Let it be a division between holiness and hellishness.

Let it be a division – ultimately the division - between the sheep and the goats.

As a preacher in the early church would say about Jesus, “The word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And before him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.”[4]

Can we read the signs of the times? On his way to Jerusalem, Jesus could read the weather. “Stormy, with a good chance of crucifixion.” But he was not a silent chicken in the face of storm. Jesus was baptized with water and Holy Spirit. And he came to cut us free from all the lies, all the nonsense, all the emotional spin, all the self-important hype, so that we could live in peace with him and one another.

For this is the message of the Gospel: truth is in order to goodness.[5] Honesty is spoken to facilitate peace. Clarity is given to live in mercy. Division can be Christ’s gift, if it is in the greater purpose of building unity.

 Or for those who might be empowered by the poets, here is a bit of T. S. Eliot:

 

The dove descending breaks the air / With flame of incandescent terror
Of which the tongues declare / The one discharge from sin and error.
The only hope, or else despair / Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre -
To be redeemed from fire by fire.

 

Who then devised the torment? Love. / Love is the unfamiliar Name
Behind the hands that wove / The intolerable shirt of flame
Which human power cannot remove. We only live, only suspire
Consumed by either fire or fire.[6]

 In this stormy season, let us live by the true fire of Love, which is the Love of Jesus Christ our Lord.

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

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[1] Micah 7:6.

[2] Isaiah 1:15-17.

[3] Psalm 52:3-7.

[4] Hebrews 4:12-13.

[5] PC(USA) Book of Order, Historic Principles of Church Order (F-3.0104) – “That truth is in order to goodness: and the great touchstone of truth, its tendency to promote holiness, according to our Savior’s rule, “By their fruits ye shall know them.” And that no opinion can either be more pernicious or more absurd than that which brings truth and falsehood upon a level, and represents it as of no consequence what a man’s opinions are. On the contrary, we are persuaded that there is an inseparable connection between faith and practice, truth, and duty. Otherwise it would be of no consequence either to discover truth or to embrace it.”

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[6] T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets, “Little Gidding,” https://www.columbia.edu/itc/history/winter/w3206/edit/tseliotlittlegidding.html

Indestructible Purses

Luke 12:32-34
August 10, 2025
William G. Carter

Jesus said, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Let me frame today’s sermon with a phrase you might have heard. The phrase is counter-intuitive. What does that mean? According to an old book called a dictionary, it means, “contrary to common sense, but often true.” Counter-intuitive.

For example, “sharp knives are safer than blunt knives.” That’s something you can test out at home, but I wouldn’t advise it.

Or here’s one. “Adding lanes to the highway creates more traffic congestion.” You wouldn’t think so, but I saw it when I lived in the Lehigh Valley. Route 22 was a congested road, short exit ramps, too much traffic. So, Penn Dot built I-78 to the south to alleviate traffic. It tripled the amount of cars passing through.

One more: “To add more free space in your life, you must have structure.” Chew on that. Routines can ground us. We won’t be prone to every whim.

Here’s one from the Zen Buddhists: “You should meditate for twenty minutes a day unless you are busy. Then you should meditate for an hour.”

Or from Steve Gilmore, the jazz bassist: “When the tempo is fast, it’s best to relax.” You wouldn’t think that, but it’s true.

Or this, from a painful moment in my life: “The more you try to control someone, the further they slip from your grasp.” If I ever see my college sophomore girlfriend again, I need to apologize.

The phrase today is counter-intuitive. Sometimes this emerges from an act of imagination. A man put a television on the curb with a sign, “Free TV.” There were no takers. After a while, he changed the sign to read, “$20 or best offer.” He got twenty dollars for it.

Or the dog breeder who announced, “Six free puppies.” Nobody called. So, she changed the ad to say, “Five good looking puppies, one ugly.” People lined up to take the ugly puppy. By the end of day all of the puppies were gone.

Are you getting a sense of what it means to be counter-intuitive? Sometimes it is a matter of science. “If you are retaining water, drink more water.” Or this one: “If you accelerate when your car is full of helium balloons, the balloons move forward.” Try it sometime.

So, are you ready to hear the counter-intuitive wisdom of Jesus? Here it is: the way to counter fear and anxiety is through generosity.

To some of us, that sounds crazy. If money is tight, we want to hold on to it. If we grew up in a family that went without, we learned to guard what we have. And we have seen the opposite. If you give your kids everything they want, they will not take care of it. So, a modest income can teach us to live modestly. Carefully. Conservatively.

But we hear Jesus say, “Sell what you have and give it to the poor. This will make you rich.” Now, is this true? It seems counter to logic. 

Now, we know why he said it that way. It’s memorable. It’s striking. And it offers some shock value. Like the story of the rich young ruler who said to Jesus, “What must I do to gain eternal life?” Jesus said, “Are you keeping the commandments of God?” The young man said, “I’m keeping every one.” To which Jesus replied, “There’s just one thing you are missing. Sell everything you have, give it to the poor, and come with me.” But  the man could not do it. It made him sad.[1]

And we understand the sadness, don’t we? I look around my home, all the things I’ve acquired, and I don’t want to give them up. I check my financial accounts online. They are mostly healthy, but I’m not ready to liquidate all of them. The day will come, of course, when I won’t need any of it anymore. When I’m gone, I’ve made provisions with my attorney to make sure all of it is given away. It’s tempting to think that’s what Jesus means when he speaks of “treasure in heaven,” both in our text and in the story of the rich young ruler. Give it away then and gain heaven then.

But he’s not talking about then. He’s talking about now. Here and now. His instruction is in the present tense, not the future. Sell possessions. Give alms, that is, make donations to the needy. And to sum it up, “Make purses for yourself that do not wear out.” So, I asked Google, “What is a purse that doesn’t wear out?” The answer came back: “Purses made from durable materials like full-grain leather, top-grain leather, and high-quality synthetics like nylon or polyester are known for their longevity and resistance to wear and tear.” And that is further evidence that artificial intelligence can be pretty stupid.

You know what he’s talking about. Jesus is not referring to leather or polyester. He’s talking about generosity. About fearless giving. About pushing through our own anxiety about money to give what we have to further the impact and reach of God’s dominion over us. Not then but now. Here’s what the Bible scholar N.T. Wright has to say.   

When (Jesus) speaks of 'treasure in heaven,' here and elsewhere, this doesn't mean treasure that you will only possess after death. 'Heaven' is God's sphere of created reality, which, as the Lord's Prayer suggests, will one day colonize 'earth', our sphere, completely. What matters is that the kingdom of God is bringing the values and priorities of God himself to bear on the greed and anxiety of the world. Those who welcome Jesus and his kingdom-message must learn to abandon the latter and live by the former.[2]

God is the ruler over all things. We invent a thousand ways to push against that rule, but God is the rightful ruler. That’s what the “kingdom” means. That’s where the kingdom is: wherever people live by God’s values rather than their own. The kingdom will come completely one day, just as we pray for it. Because of Jesus, the kingdom has already broken in. It’s wherever people give up their own fear and anxiety to live by the generosity of God. And there are signs around us.

My friend Donovan is a preacher in Tennessee. He says he heard about a woman who had to put up a tarp in her living room to keep the ceiling from leaking after a storm. It was a sermon illustration, he said, an attempt to make a point. When the service was over, a church member stopped him at the door to ask, “What can we do to help this woman?” Donovan was totally caught off guard. He wanted to say, “I don’t know, I was just preaching,” but he wisely deflected and said, “It’s a terrible thing, isn’t it?”

Not long after that, a check for the price of a new roof showed up in the mail. He was stunned. One of the Christ Followers in the church wanted to invest in the good will of God’s dominion. When that check came, I’ll bet Donovan went searching for that woman’s address. And now he asks, “How many more roofs could be fixed, mouths fed, wounds bandaged if we weren’t afraid of the cost?” [3]

Good will. Generosity. Contributing for the benefit of others. That is what Jesus means by “making purses that don’t wear out.” It’s the ongoing work of giving. It’s a regular practice. And it’s in the present tense. If we listen to the text, this text, it is not an invitation to give everything, once and for all. No, that’s the invitation he offered to the rich young ruler, not to us.

In fact, I have come to believe that other story was a one-time special case. The young man thought he had reached a spiritual plateau. He had kept the commandments and still felt empty. “What must I do?” For him, Jesus said the antidote was for the man to cut his ties with his own wealth, once and for all, and to do it for the benefit of other people – and then to walk with Jesus. At that point in history, he could have physically walked with the Lord. But he didn’t do it. He was sad and afraid. And probably a little greedy.

Jesus is not telling us to universalize that Bible character’s situation and make our own. Not everybody is called to give up all that we have – although the day is coming when each of us will do that. Jesus is not saying “cash it all in, right here, right now” – yet he is not letting us off the hook either. “Make purses for yourselves that don’t wear out.” Make a habit of generosity. Keep pushing yourself to give more and even more. Don’t settle for what you’ve always done before. Learn to be free – and set others free in the process.

It’s like climbing a ladder. That’s how the Jewish mystic Maimonides described it. “When you start giving to others, you are already on the first rung of the Golden Ladder.” And then he invented a spiritual ladder with eight steps.

• The first step is when you make a donation, but you are reluctant.
• The second step is when you give cheerfully, but not as much as you should.
• When you give to the needy because you are asked, you have climbed to the third rung.
• When you give to the needy before you are asked, you have stepped up to the fourth rung.
• The fifth step is when you do not know the name of the recipient, so you can’t fall into smugness or pride if you pass the recipient on the street.
• The sixth step is when we give anonymously, so the recipient will be free of shame or indebtedness to the donor.
• The seventh run is when the receiver and giver do not know one another, so there’s no emotional pull or burden by either one.
• And the eighth rung, the highest step, is when you create a generous paying job for the needy, so they can care for themselves and give donations to others.[4]

Maimonides was teaching about growth in giving, as a spiritual dimension of investing in the growth of God’s dominion. It’s about the creation of freedom: freedom for the giver, freedom for the receiver, freedom in which joy can increase. And when there is freedom, generous freedom, fear and greed will evaporate. The way to climb the ladder is through generosity. Through purses that do not wear out. 

Did I ever tell you about the rabbi who made a generous gift of charity to his poor neighbor? Each year, on the eve of Passover, he arranged to deliver a sum of money anonymously. So, one year, he gave a sack of gold coins to his son, pointed toward his neighbor, and said, “Please deliver this gift as silently as you can.”

A short time later, his son returned and threw down the sack of money. The rabbi said, “I thought I told you to take this money to our poor neighbor?” The son said, “Poor neighbor, indeed!”

What do you mean? The son said, “As I approached our neighbor’s home, I saw through the window that he was lighting candles on fine silver candlesticks.” Silver candlesticks? The son said, “Fine silver candlesticks.”

Oh my. “Not only that,” said the son, “as I looked through the window, I could see our poor neighbor placed those candlesticks on a very expensive lace tablecloth.” The rabbi said, “A lace tablecloth?” “Yes, a very expensive lace tablecloth.”

“Oy vey,” said the rabbi with a sigh. “That’s not all,” said the son. “As I looked through the window, our poor neighbor was opening a fine bottle of wine.” A bottle of wine? “Yes,” said the son, a very fine bottle of wine.”

The rabbi paused and said, “Well, that changes everything. It is clear that our poor neighbor is a man once accustomed to fine things. Quietly take this money back to him – and remind me next year to increase the gift.”[5]

How remarkable. How generous. How free. Not a hint of anxiety or greed, just an indestructible purse, created by a generous heart, in response to the God who keeps giving us every good and perfect gift.

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

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[1] Luke 18:18-23.

[2] N.T. Wright, New Testament for Everyone - New Testament for Everyone – Luke for Everyone, Luke 12:13-34, ‘The Parable of the Rich Fool.’

[3] Donovan Drake, Feasting on the Gospels: Luke, volume 2 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014) 12.

[4] For instance, see https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/45907/jewish/Eight-Levels-of-Charity.htm

[5] Thanks to the late Fred Craddock for this generous story.

What’s in the Storage Unit?

Luke 12:13-21
August 3, 2025
William G. Carter

Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me." But he said to him, "Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?" And he said to them, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions."

 

Then he told them a parable: "The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, "What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?' Then he said, "I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.' But God said to him, "You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?'

 

So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God."

For this stop on the road of discipleship, Jesus tells a bracing little story about a man who didn’t have enough storage space. Can anybody here relate to that? 

Last time this text showed up was three years ago. It was a transition time in our household. The kids were all officially gone. After taking a breath and changing all the locks, we surveyed all our storage space. The conclusion was clear: we have too much stuff. When I preached on the parable then, I offered a personal report on all the extras.

We have leftover building supplies that we’ve told ourselves we might need someday. Jazz CD’s that nobody is buying. Half-empty cans of paint from rooms that we’ve repainted. A dresser with a broken leg. Two wedding gifts from nineteen years ago, still in their boxes. And abandoned possessions from four adult children who left behind the things they did not want.

The good news is most of that has been cleared out. Maybe you know about a wonderful Facebook page called “Buy Nothing Clarks Summit.” Just in the past six months, we have given away a portable putting green, an unused crab trap, a dart board, and cell phone holder for the car. There are still a lot of extra canning jars, although I was reminded that we are currently canning pickles. And if you’re interested, there’s about a hundred square feet of used laminate flooring for the taking (see me at coffee hour).

The bad news is that if you have closets in your kids’ former bedrooms, you can fill them with craft supplies, unsold jazz CDs, and all that extra clothing that no longer fits or will ever come back in style.

All of this is my entry point to engage that little parable Jesus tells about the man who had too much stuff. He was wealthy. His wealth increased. He was a farmer and had a fertile season. His barns were too small to hold all that he had, so he decided to pull them down and create more storage space.

Take note of what he does not do. He does not create a community food bank. He does not give away the excess zucchini. (Side note to my favorite zucchini farmer: I locked my car doors. But thanks for thinking of me.)

The man in Jesus’ story is not thinking of anybody else. That is one of the curiosities of this parable. Did you notice that? He thinks by himself, talks to himself, convinces himself. He is isolated, self-contained. That’s all we know about his character, and it’s enough. He talks to himself.

This happens in other parables in the Gospel of Luke.

 

• The prodigal son talks to himself and says, “How many of my father’s servants have more food than me!” (15:17)
• The merchant who has been fired from his job says to himself, “I’m going to devise a plan to land in a better position.” (16:3)
• A corrupt judge says to himself, “I don’t care about that widow, but she’s wearing me out.” (18:4)
• The pharisee says to himself, “Thank God I’m not like that terrible tax collector over there.” (18:11)

Do you hear a common theme? If you are a character in the Gospel of Luke and you’re talking to yourself, you are in a whole lot of trouble. Just like the man who has so much stuff that he builds another storage unit. He says to himself, “Look how much I have! I can keep living in comfort for an exceptionally long time.” Then God speaks up and calls him a fool.

In that social context, it was clear. Jesus was a peasant in Palestine. He lived and worked among peasants. In his day, there weren’t many people who had a lot of things. No doubt most of them shook their heads when they heard, “Once upon a time there was a man who was so rich, he had to build more barns to store what he had.” To subsistence peasants, that was ridiculous. Who has that much stuff? Doesn’t he know life is short?

Now, I am in no position to pick on anybody, not when I struggle with an abundance of possessions. It is not a blessing to have too much; it is a continuing challenge. Every so often, I watch one of those cable shows about tiny houses. Know about those? 225 square feet, everything you need, live simply. “Look, honey,” I said, “isn’t that great?” She replied, “Not interested, not yet. But I would come and visit.”

And the core issue remains: how much do we need? When is enough enough? This is a matter of deep spiritual significance. Some may think it is a neutral matter, that we are free to grab as much as we want. But it’s not neutral at all.

The Gospel of Luke does not believe it’s neutral. I’m guessing that by the time he wrote down his book, Luke’s congregation had its share of nice things. There’s no other explanation why he includes so many stories about the trappings and temptations of wealth. Jesus taught about money and possessions more than he did about prayer.

So, today we have the rich farmer who talks only to himself. The tragedy of this tale is that the farmer assumes he will have it “forever.” That he will hang onto it to keep him comfortable – him alone, all by himself. There’s no mention of his family, or any neighbors. No regard for all those farm workers who picked his crops and stashed them the brand-new barns. No, it’s all about him. Only him. He is independent, self-contained, isolated, completely alone. No wonder he’s talking only to himself.

The inference is that he is selfish. Or greedy. Or we might call it as the New Testament calls it: idolatry, literally the worship of something that is not worthy of worship. The contrast is sharp. Either we worship what we have, or we worship God. Jesus says we can’t have it both ways. We cannot worship God and wealth (Luke 16:13). It is one or the other.

And there’s this story of a farmer with too much food. As Luke introduces the episode, someone asks Jesus to step into a family squabble about an inheritance. Attorneys and funeral directors will tell you this still happens. Momma dies and the kids can’t wait to get their hands on the investment accounts. Like that multi-millionaire in my first church. He died, just like every other mere mortal. His kids told me to keep the funeral as short as possible. They wanted to hear the reading of the will.

Jesus wisely steps out of that fray. He is neither judge nor arbitrator. Rather he tells the truth: life does not consist in the abundance of our possessions. More stuff does not make us happy. Read what the psychologists are now telling us. Affluence can destroy families. Wealth does not make us rich.

At the root of the trouble is something Jesus calls “pleonexia.” It’s a Greek word often translated as “covetousness” or “greed.” A better translation may be “hunger.” As in, I’m hungry for some new clothes, or a slicker car, or a bigger pile of cash, or seven new Vera Bradley purses. Now, would one purse ever do? I’m only asking because I don’t know.

What I do know is hunger is the opposite of contentment, just as greed is the antithesis of gratitude. In a time of accumulation, it’s so easy to be distracted. The evidence is in the parable. A wealthy farmer has a wonderful year. So wonderful that he forgets where the harvest came from. Sure, he planted the seed, but who provided the sunshine? Who sent the rain? Who established the abundant growing season? Not him.

The tragedy is that this farmer has disconnected the product from the process. He has become a functional atheist, believing it’s only about him. So, he talks to himself, schemes only for himself. Guess what: God is still waiting for him. The message is clear. Take care! Be on guard.

Meanwhile, three years after the last time I looked at this parable, my basement is getting cleaner, but I still have more dress shirts than I will ever wear. What shall I do? Shall I empty the closet so I can fill it up again? Or should I pass them along to somebody else who needs them far more than me? If you tell me what you’re going to do, together we might make a plan.

There’s something playful about lightening the load and giving away what we have. I get great enjoyment from giving something to somebody else. Anybody else feel that way? Abundant life does not consist of filling a barn with stuff I don’t need. Abundant life consists of freedom. Freedom from the burdens of accumulation. Freedom from the hunger to grab more. Freedom to share. Freedom to give. Freedom to offer what I have to build relationships with those around me.

So that’s what I’m working on today. Maybe you will work on some of it too. It’s going to take some continuing work because it’s part of our discipleship, and discipleship never lets up. We empty out the clutter to make more room for God. We unload the stuff we can never take to heaven so we can invest what remains in God’s heaven here on earth.

It’s a big task, and Luke will take it up again next week. See you then.

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

Distracted By Many Things

Luke 10:38-42
July 20, 2024
William G. Carter

Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me." But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her."

Here is one more travel story. Jesus and his entourage are back on the road. They walk into a well-known village, where Jesus is welcomed into a familiar home. We know the name of the two sisters who live there, Mary and Martha. We know the moment Luke captures in time: Martha is in the kitchen, Mary sits at the feet of Jesus. And we know the lesson that is easily extracted from the scene: don’t get caught up in so much doing that you don’t sit still and listen to Jesus. 

It is a familiar story. Since it is a story of two women, women will draw upon this story for Bible studies and retreats. The leader will ask them to divide themselves into two groups, the Mary’s over here, the Martha’s over there. They talk among themselves, “Which are you?” Are you quiet or noisy? Are you capable of sitting still or are you compelled to keep moving? Are you attentive to Jesus or are you too busy?

On the few occasions when I’ve observed such conversations, I’ve noticed a room full of Martha’s and precious few Marys. The recognition is often seasoned with guilt. “You ought to sit still more.” “Remember to breathe.” Or even, “Let your husband take care of the dishes.” That might be helpful advice if you have a husband; yet there is no husband, nor anybody else named in the story. Just Mary or Martha, either-or. One or the other.

It’s not a fair division. All of us, men and boys included, are a combination of Mary and Martha. It’s never either-or, but both-and. We are created with the capacity for complexity. Can an introvert be distracted? Of course. Is the busy bee able to sit and listen? Certainly.

Today, I’m not going to divide the house to say, “Mary it over here, Martha over there.” Oh no. But I do want to raise a couple of questions. The first is this. How is it that we have become so distracted? Distracted by many things?

On Tuesday morning, on my way here, the driver ahead of me was weaving in and out of his lane. I started to pull around him on the left, just as he decided to make the same move. There was nobody in front of him. He just did it. I tapped on the horn. He looked at me and gestured affectionately. Then he weaved back into his lane. It was then that I saw what you can probably guess – he was steering with left hand and holding his cell phone in his right.

Our windows were rolled up for air conditioning, so I couldn’t holler over there to say, “Hey, Pennsylvania now has a distracted driver law. Put down the device and drive.” He didn’t seem in the mood to listen anyway. No, he had made the commitment to being distracted. I say that because he had not made the commitment to refrain from distraction. And that’s what it takes. So, here’s my question: where does this come from?

To be fair, the cell phone I was never going to buy twenty-five years ago is always with me. I’ve had to learn the hard way to keep it out of this room when I come for worship. For an hour, at least, there are some things more important than taking a call.

Think of all the things that distract us. Some people are distracted by the internet (Guilty!). I will start writing my sermon on the computer. Within twenty minutes, I switch over to check my e-mail. That task takes more time than it should, even if I don’t have any e-mail, so it’s a struggle to reignite the sermon. Then, let’s look at the headlines. Or check out cat videos on Instagram. Or survey my investment portfolio. Or say hello to my 1600 closest friends on Facebook. There are a thousand ways to lose ourselves in distractions without ever sticking to the one thing that matters.

Some are distracted by the latest outrage. Lord knows, there are plenty of outrages currently simmering at any given moment. Some are on the news, some are shared by friends, some bubble up because of the times we are in. “Did you see this? Did you hear about that? Can you believe what they just heard?” And so on. It can be exhausting. So exhausting that we don’t notice we’ve been tugged into a fight we didn’t start and can never win.

One antidote is to turn down the outrage. Or change the channel. Or simply walk away. There’s so little we can do anyway. So, we give ourselves some space.

However, when we escape, sometimes we are distracted by the escape. Blame Martha all we want, but she had a good point. The meal wasn’t going to cook itself. The table needed to be set. It’s not every day that the Savior of the World is sitting in your living room. “Mary, get off your tail and help me out.” I can hear her say that. We can understand.

Truth is, there are a hundred ways to escape. When I was younger, I loved to lose myself in a James Bond movie marathon. They seemed so unrealistic. It was fun. Others lose themselves in other forms of fiction, sometimes for hours at a time. One of my cousins lives for the Hallmark Channel. She says, “All the stories turn out so well.” Her husband says, “There’s only one story and they just keep telling it.”

This week, as the Washington Post reminded us, it was the 40^th anniversary of Neil Postman’s book, Amusing Ourselves to Death. Postman traced how everything is now infected with entertainment. The senses are titillated. Emotions are piqued. Nobody can get elected if they don’t look good on TV. You can’t play pro ball if you don’t make commercials. The evening news has a warm puppy story. There are churches that now specialize in show biz. Everybody looks at the preacher up on the screen, who happens to also stand fifty feet away in the pulpit. Forty years ago, Postman said, “This obsession with entertainment affects our brains.” Boy, did he ever nail that!

And it is a matter of the brain. When Jesus says, “Martha, you are distracted by many things,” the Greek verb has to do with head space. There’s too much swirling around above the neck. Too much stimulation to allow us to focus. At heart, this is a spiritual matter. The emptiness in our souls prompts us to overload ourselves with things that will never satisfy.

I remember our friend, conveniently named Mary. She was a wonderful church educator. She could plan conferences for three hundred people and keep track of all the moving parts. One of the most maddening things about her is what she would do in a worship service. When the sermon would start, she would pull out her knitting. I couldn’t believe it. There would be a great preacher at the conference, and she’s back there, clicking her sticks. What in the world?

But she explained, “The slow, repetitive action helps me to focus. I can hear better with my head when my hands are doing their own ritual.” She smiled and added, “And I usually have a sweater to show for it, too.” Fascinating. She trained herself to slow down the other things so she could attend to the one thing.

It helped me understand my own history. I can be as distractable as a cat on coffee. On childhood Sundays, my folks would position us between them on the church pew just to keep us still. One day, I picked up one of those little pew pencils, took the worship bulletin, and started filling in all the zeros, the O’s, and the small e’s. Are any of you doing that today? And I heard the sermon in a way that I normally wouldn’t if my eyes were darting around the room. It had to do with focus, being present, and training myself to concentrate. We turn from the many things to the one thing. The one necessary thing.

This is the habit of some spiritual communities. Down in New Mexico, there’s a monastery in the high desert, among the beautiful red rocks. Does anybody remember the old Road Runner cartoons? This is where they filmed them. Then this monastery, call it the Acme Monastery, has an early morning mass with a short, little sermon. Know why it’s short? Because the scripture reading is short, maybe two or three verses. The point is to hear a brief text early in the morning – maybe a sentence or two directly from Jesus – and then the brothers chew on it all day. Just a small morsel of rich spiritual food. It’s enough. You mull it over. You take it to work; you sit with it at rest. The word of Jesus seeps in.

Like I said, this is basic spiritual food, food for the journey, road food. Nobody has to memorize the encyclopedia. Just take in a little bit. Work on it. Let it work on you. Like Jesus said to Martha, “Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.” Now, what is the better part? What is the better part for me, for today? How will this stay with me? If you chew that way, you won’t need to watch more than an hour of the Hallmark Channel.

Contrast this practice with all those places that attempt to juice us up with distractions. I think of my friend’s congregation. He doesn’t go any more. One Easter, he rousted himself off the couch, ironed a shirt, drove over there, and took a seat. Nobody in the church seemed very excited. Same old thing. Suddenly, there was a roar at the back and the preacher rode a motorcycle down the aisle. My friend said, “That’s the moment I said I was done. I guess the resurrection wasn’t wild enough. I was there to hear if God is alive.”

This is what feeds us, a living Word, a glimpse of the Holy. Over here on the wall is a pyramid that our Vacation Bible Children have marked for us. Each symbol represents a “God sighting.” Maybe it was big, maybe it was small – but it was real for someone here, so they shared it with the rest of us. Yes, God is alive. God still speaks. God is present and accounted for. And we cannot perceive that if we are distracted.

As I said, there are two questions for the sermon. The first was, “How have we become so distracted?” Everybody needs to spend some time with that, for then we can ask the second question, “How can we lean in and pay attention?” Especially to pay attention to God, to listen for Jesus.

All of us will have some answers for this. You’re probably working on a few answers for yourself. How will we screen out the unnecessaries? What are the practices for filtering out the nonsense? What will open my heart to what will open me up? What will animate my imagination to capture what is life-giving? Not deadly, nor dull, but life-giving? What is Jesus inviting me to trust, to hope, to do? There are many responses, all appropriate for a Sabbath day reflection. What they hold in common is the move from the “many things” to the “one thing.”

As Jesus said to Martha, “You are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her." How do we discover the one thing?

I’ll leave you with just one example, a story about Thomas Merton, the famous monk. He was an ultra-capable person and interested in so much. One time, a photojournalist visited him in the monastery and showed his prints. Merton was smitten and decided rather spontaneously to take up photography. Of course, in a Trappist monastery, the monks can’t own anything. So, Merton didn’t have a camera. That didn’t stop him. He asked the photographer if he could borrow a camera for a while. You know, five or ten years, or so.

Merton jumped into that as he jumped into everything else. But something happened. He started snapping shots unlike anything the photographer had ever seen – a battered fence, a rundown wooden shack, weeks growing out of a sidewalk, work gloves on a stool, a dead root, a broken wall. “It seemed,” said his friend, “that he approached each thing with attention.”

One day, he went walking in the woods with his young friend, Ron Seitz. Both carried cameras. Pretty soon, Merton yelled at Ron and told him to slow down. He said, “Stop looking and begin seeing.” Seitz looked at him curiously, so Merton explained,

 

“Because looking means that you already have something in mind for your eye to find: you’ve set out in search of your desired object and have closed off everything else presenting itself along the way. But seeing is being open and receptive to what comes to the eye: your vision total and not targeted.”[1]

Stop looking and begin seeing. Good advice for anybody whose attention wanders. From many things to the one thing. It’s the better portion. It will not be taken away.

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

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[1] Quoted in Esther De Waal, Lost in Wonder: Rediscovering the Spiritual Art of Attentiveness (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2003) 64.