Readings
for Proper 23B:
Amos 5:6-15; Mark 10:17-27
October 15, 2006
The Rev. Karen Siegfriedt
St. Jude the Apostle Episcopal Church, Cupertino,
CA
And the rich man asked Jesus: “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”…And Jesus answered: “Sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” [Mark 10] What I would like to talk about today is stewardship of the soul. In particular, I want to talk about what it means to really live in relationship to God and how that affects our relationship with money. I will use the readings from the gospel and Amos as my texts.
Whenever we approach the Scriptures as a means of learning how to become the people that God wills for us to be, we need to ask: What is the good news? Jesus came that we might have life and might have it more abundantly. So the good news of the gospel always leads us to abundant life. At the core of abundant life is communion with God, which is another way of describing eternal life. Eternal life is not something that just happens after we die. Eternal life is about being connected with God, here and now, in such a way that our life is blessed with the fruit of the Spirit: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. This abundant life, eternal life, is available to all who seek it; not by our own power but through the power of God’s spirit working in us. Today’s gospel is all about lining up our spirit (or soul) with God’s spirit so that we can come to experience the joy and abundance that God wills for us to have. Let’s take a closer look at Mark 10.
An inquirer seeks out Jesus because he knows deep down inside, his life is not complete. There is something missing in his life in spite of being a rich, respectable, and upright citizen. This man has an enormous amount of wealth and yet something is still lacking. So he goes to Jesus to find out how he can be in deeper communion with God. He asks: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus wants the man to understand that what he seeks, only God (not worldly riches) can give him. So he shocks the rich man by challenging him to give away his wealth and follow him.
Jesus is calling him to cast aside all other dependencies and place his radical trust in God, the giver of abundant life. He invites the rich man into radical discipleship. Radical discipleship is rarely preached in Christian Churches in America. It makes people uncomfortable and certainly doesn’t fill the pews. Instead, religion in American has succumbed to the values of society and has re-interpreted the Scriptures to support the pursuit of wealth. But we Episcopalians do not have the luxury of pretending that Mark 10:17-27 does not exist. Our lectionary assigns us this text today whether we like it or not. Our job is to not to be afraid of the hard sayings of Jesus, but rather to be open to God’s grace which can transform these words into good news.
In today’s gospel, Jesus is not praising the state of poverty. There is nothing praiseworthy about the despair and the challenges that poverty brings to its victims. Even the Franciscan friars who followed St. Francis were unable to continue to live under the strain of hunger and begging. However, an overabundance of material wealth can and does dull the soul. That is why Jesus advised the man to let go of his wealth. Wealth can distract our energies because it takes a lot of energy to make, protect, and preserve one’s wealth. It can distract us from reaching out to those in need, and can make our world very small; so small that we become too focused only on ourselves and families. Wealth can isolate us from the unpleasantness of the world around us because it can protect us. It can lead us to a place of self-sufficiency where we don’t need others and thus believe that others don’t need us. And when wealth does this to us, when wealth dulls our soul, Jesus says it is time to let go and let God.
The pursuit of wealth in America begins at a very young age as we spoil our children with an abundance of things and funnel them into the best schools, the best tutors, the best AP classes, the best colleges, the best neighborhoods, so that they will have a competitive edge in the world economy. Sometimes these goals are not economically based and we truly want the best for our children’s intellectual development and future. There is nothing wrong with wanting our children to have an abundant life. But a lot of the time, this pursuit for “the best” means we deny them time for playing, laughing, dreaming, developing friendships, and most important of all, strengthening their relationship with God. Do you ever wonder why so many of our children are unhappy in spite of having so much? Maybe our goals for them are out of whack and what they need most is a deeper relationship with God.
Why are so many Americans anxious and depressed when we have so much wealth in our possession? I think it is because we have filled up our lives with so many things, so many comforts, and so many to-do lists that there is no room for the spirit of God to work within us. Many of us can’t even spare an hour on Sunday mornings to worship God. Jesus said: “How hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” This gospel encourages us to make more room in our lives so that the spirit of God can delight our souls and make our hearts glad. This is what good stewardship of the soul is all about.
Recently, a young mother told me about her son’s lack of enthusiasm regarding the spiritual life. She asked him if he prayed on his own- at times other than when she insisted, such as at meal time. He said: “No mom. I don’t need to pray. I have everything I want. I don’t need God.” She went away very sad.
When we become narcissistic, when the world begins to revolve only around our own needs and desires, when we become too comfortable, we often forget about the plight of the poor, the hungry, and the oppressed. We end up in a state of spiritual poverty. We may think we have no need for God, but God still has need for us. God uses us to divvy up all the loot in the world in a way that provides for the dignity of every human being. It is not that the rich intentionally ignore the plight of the poor, but there is something about too much comfort that makes our soul dull and self-serving. Amos pointed to this dulling of the soul some 2700 years ago. In today’s reading, we hear Amos preaching to the well-to-do people of Northern Israel who had become obsessed with wealth. This was a time of relative peace and prosperity. Those who had much, wanted more. They were no longer satisfied with their simple houses and a simple life. No. They wanted more, bigger, and better. And in their pursuit of more, bigger, and better, they not only forgot about the poor, but they engaged in economic practices that favored the rich at the expense of the poor. Amos scolds them for their injustice and hardness of heart.
I am not going to stand up here and preach to you about the evils of money, because I think money can do great good in the world. Just take a look at Muhammad Yunus who received the Nobel peace prize. He does not live in poverty but rather uses his money for the good of the whole human family. His long-term vision is to eliminate poverty in the world. His bank offers interest-free loans to poor people who have no financial security to back up the loans. His bank has over six million clients, 96 per cent of whom are women. Is he worried that some of the loans will go sour? No. Is he trying to increase his wealth by charging interest? No. He has plenty of money already. And because he is aware of the abundance in his life, he lavishes his money on high risk poor people and offers them a glimpse of hope in a world of hardship. The joy he receives in offering these risky loans connects him to eternal life, an abundant life that the rich man in today’s gospel and the well-to-do folks in the time of Amos never experienced.
In God’s kingdom, money is to be shared generously and used for the building up of the whole human family, not just our own families. God expects those who have more money and more ability to be more generous and to take on a greater responsibility for the needs of those who have little. Being blessed with abundance carries the responsibility of greater stewardship.
So, who is hurting in the world today and why? These are the kind of questions generous Christians spend time in answering. If you want to live, if you want to experience eternal life, then you need to give generously. Give with a joyful heart, not out of obligation, but because God has blessed you with abundance. And the only way this abundance can bring joy to your life, is by sharing it with others. This is the good news in Christ.
| Updated 10/27/06 |
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