I Timothy 6: 6-19 Psalm 146 Luke 16: 19-31

How to be Convincing September 29, 2019 Mary R. Brownlow

When my children were in elementary school and high school, I noticed something about the way they understood their place in school “society,” and I think it’s generally true, for both young and old. We have a tendency to measure our wealth, our possessions, our social standing by “looking up” rather than “looking down.” We notice that so-and-so has more stuff than we do, or more money, or more friends. If we do this, we are likely to focus on our own need – “I wish I had their house, or their opportunities, or their electronic gadgets.” We have 20-20 vision when it comes to those above us, but our vision is obscured when we look down. Or we don’t even bother to look down, because it seems to require more work.

Our scriptures remind us to look around, to get perspective: near and far, up and down, to see what is really going on, and to know what is fair and what is compassionate. Centuries before the time of Jesus, the Hebrew prophets spoke to those who lived on “the heights” and lived comfortable lives. Beware, they said. Why beware? They had made it, through hard work or luck. It looked like success. Beware because they have not noticed the poor, on just the other side of the city wall, or at the gate, or toiling away in the fields. There were gaps between rich and poor that would make the whole system crumble. The prophets (and sometimes the Psalmist, as we heard today) tied faithfulness to God closely with care of the poor and the alien. This is what the liberation theologians call “God’s preferential option for the poor.”

Jesus continued speaking this message, but he used storytelling as his format. Through all the ups and downs of history, people had not changed much. A rich man wore beautiful clothes and feasted every day. Outside his gate was a poor man, Lazarus, who was hungry and covered with sores. This parable was not Jesus’ creation. It was a kind of folktale: there were 7 different versions of it in Jewish rabbinic literature. Some people think it came from an Egyptian source about reversals after death. It is unusual because it gives us a name – Lazarus – for one of the characters, the only person named in any parable. And it is the poor man who gets the name! And his name means “the one God helps or cares for.” (By the way, we should not confuse this fictional Lazarus with the Lazarus found in the Gospel of John, Mary and Martha’s brother). So we might get a hint ahead of time that this poor man, along with his name, gets the notice of heaven.

The story set up contrasts, and shows up the gap between the lives of these two men. The rich man isn’t just rich: he has royal purple clothing of the finest materials. He doesn’t just have plenty of food: he feasts sumptuously every day. Lazarus is not just poor: he has been cast down – or dumped - at the gateway of this rich house, implying that he cannot move on his own. He is not only covered with ulcers: dogs, unclean and despised, lick the sores. He is not just hungry: he is hoping for crumbs, and there is no indication he got any.

But these earthly differences just set the stage for the real drama of contrasts. At death, Lazarus is lifted up by angels to Abraham’s lap, where he at last is comforted. The rich man goes down, is entombed, and then tormented in Hades. Now he has to lift his eyes to see an even wider gap between him and Lazarus. He lifts his eyes, looks up and finally notices that beggar who lived at his gate.

Some people think that in the afterlife, everyone gains perspective and sees their past mistakes clearly revealed. But you have to wonder about the rich man. He has been in the habit of ordering people around, and he can’t seem to stop now. He tells father Abraham to send Lazarus, like a servant, to get him some water and actually touch his tongue. Apparently Lazarus is no longer a disgusting untouchable. When Abraham points out that this is impossible, because of the great chasm between them, he issues another order: “Well, then send Lazarus to my five brothers with a warning about all this.” Really? Really, rich man? Don’t you get it that things have changed? You can’t just give orders like this anymore.

Abraham’s response is that the living have all the information that they need, all the warnings, all the instruction from the law and the prophets. Like Micah’s instruction on our stained glass window, it was easy to read. The first century rich had those same books of prophecy that we do. It’s not rocket science: notice the poor, treat them fairly, have compassion. The miracle of someone returning from the dead with the same message will be no more effective. Know your tradition, and take it to heart.

This story was not told to give us exact descriptions of heaven and hell, in terms of temperature or comfort. It was told to describe the here and now, and our present opportunities. I also don’t think that it was a story that gives us an easy formula: the rich deserve to go to Hades and the poor deserve to go to Abraham. Then we could simply say that money is bad, in the long run, and poverty is good. And we could all go home. But there is a deeper problem, a deeper divide here.

Maybe the issue isn't that the man is rich or that he shows no compassion toward Lazarus, though these things are true. Maybe his money prevents him from seeing or relating to Lazarus as a fellow child of God. Are we being warned about the potentially toxic nature of wealth – the side effects, so to speak? It can stunt our compassion by insulating us from the need of others, even when the others are just through the gate.

In other passages – the Magnificat, the Beatitudes – Luke speaks of reversals between rich and poor. It is one of his themes. So we are not exactly surprised to find the rich man in Hades. But perhaps his torment, undiagnosed, began earlier. Maybe he lived all his life in isolation from the downtrodden, and thus in isolation from human compassion. In spite of his wealth, he was missing something, he was living a kind of narrow, impoverished spiritual life.

This parable links our wellbeing and that of others. If we cannot see up and down and all around, and in so doing, find compassion for others, we have lost something of our humanity. Wealth can blind us and numb us to the need of our neighbor. Wealth can delude us into imagining that we ourselves are not needy, that our narrow circle is sufficient for a full life. The rich man didn't intentionally hurt Lazarus. He didn’t seem to notice him at all. Throughout the Bible, the danger of great wealth is the way it so takes over people’s lives that it makes them deaf to the teaching of the prophets and blind to the sufferings of neighbors. The truth of this parable is that the rich man needs Lazarus as much as Lazarus needs the rich man. The independence that riches seem to bring is only an illusion. That rich man thought he could afford not to see Lazarus lying outside his gate. That rich man lived under the illusion that his gate is a defensive shield, not an open possibility. That rich man lived with the illusion that we are intrinsically separate beings, that each belongs to him or herself, and that to be responsible only for ourselves is enough.

Jesus’ parable points to something better for us, something better and more real – we might echo the words from the Letter to Timothy and call it “the life that really is life.” It is the reality that we were created not to be alone, but to be loved; not to be users of one another, but to be partners in the world. We were created not to dig chasms and let gulfs separate us, but to build bridges.

Who are we in this story? This is an exercise that can be enlightening, though Jesus’ parables resist simple analogy. We are not Lazarus, although we may be poor and sick. We are not the rich man, although we may wear nice clothes and eat delicious food. I think that we are the five brothers, the brothers and sisters of the rich man. From the far side of the chasm, he wants to warn us, to save from the torment of separation, of insulation. He wants to save us from only being able to envision those above us, and ignoring the Lazaruses of the world. We are the five brothers, in danger of waiting for some miraculous sign from God before we can walk through the gate, or bridge the gap. In this role, the story gives both judgment and hope.

We are about to enter a time of pastoral transition, and I would like to think that we can enter it with hope and energy: with eyes wide open and perspectives sharpened. The truth is, all of us have someone sitting by our gates – someone who gives us the opportunity to fulfill the teachings of prophet and messiah. We can fulfill our calling to seek and serve Christ in all people, to respect the dignity of every person. We have a choice: to build bridges or dig chasms; to open the gate or to widen the gap.

I have always been very concerned that our young people get a view of the world outside of the idyllic bubble that is our upper valley. That is one of the reasons I used to put so much energy into the youth work trips; it is why I bring confirmation classes to cook and serve at the Listen Community Dinners. I can tell you about churches being destroyed, I can tell you about local folks who would go hungry without our help, but only by actually walking through the gate do you get to see what’s real. There is no substitute for getting down there and working side by side with people who had been strangers. And so often I find, paradoxically, that I am the one who receives. People who churches have burned or people who need a cooked meal have also walked through a gate to meet me. There are no “scraps from the table” for either side, but shared meals that are a foretaste of heaven.

After I leave as pastor, the church will begin the annual giving campaign, and I am very aware of an ambivalence about money and the church. There is a danger in preaching on scripture passages like those read today and saying "Accumulating wealth is bad, so give us yours." How is that OK? No, this is about being part of a community that reminds us of our place in God’s good world, in God’s economy of grace.

This Bible and this church are aids to my eyesight. They have helped me with the blinders that narrow my vision. They have helped my children when they see others from below and not from above. The Bible and this community has given me strength to open gates and walk through, pausing long enough to see who is there. The Bible and this church convince me every day to narrow the gaps and share the blessings of a God who loves us all. I am convinced.