Gospel Text for Sunday 4 August 2019

Luke 12:13-21        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.

Reflection       I doubt that Jesus heard of “Earth Overshoot Day.” Have you?  This past Monday, July 29th  was the day we humans began using up nature 1.75 times faster than our planet's ecosystems can regenerate, according to the Global Footprint Network that has been making this calculation since 1987.  For the balance of this year, our current total usage of food, timber, fibers, carbon sequestration and our natural resources is equal to using up 1.75 earths.* 

Jesus warns, “Take care. Be on your guard.   Life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”  Here we trip over the question buried in the mountains of stuff stacked in our garages and storage units. “What does life consist of?”

According to the voice of God that breaks into Jesus’ parable and addresses the man who is  gloating over his ample store of riches, the hoarding man is a fool. What the greedy man has accumulated is not life. In fact, he is as good as dead because life consists of being in right relationship with God (rich with God) which is born on the shoulders of being in right relationship with one another. Nothing about ‘stuff.’

You see, being in right relationship with God we are blessed so that we will be a blessing. We hear this when the Lord says to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.” (Gen 12.1-2)

Abundance is pure gift, blessing.  All  that we have is gift, is blessing. This is foundational to who Jesus is and who we are. We are blessed to be a blessing not to build bigger and bigger houses in which to hoard our blessings, not to gloat over the “many retirement years we can eat, drink and be merry.”  “So beware.  Take guard.  Do not be deluded, deceived by clever words and shiny objects. One’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”

Here, in the so called civilized western world, we are encouraged to acquire lots of stuff. Bigger houses, flashier cars, name brand everythings, expensive vacations, elite educations, mountains of must haves for the kiddos, and don’t forget insurance, even policies for life to be redeemed when dead. 

How do these things stand us in right relationship with God and one another? Do we see that all we have and all that we are is blessing bequeathed to us, not because we earn or deserve it? not for us to collect and accrue? Rather, to enable us to be a blessing? I believe it  is time for us to take God’s counsel to Abram to heart, “I will bless you, and make your name great, (in other words, provide you with many blessings) so that you will be a blessing.”

As people who claim to follow the way of Jesus we are meant to be especially sympathetic to the needs of the poor, the vulnerable, the widow, the orphan, the suffering and the stranger. What if instead of continuing to accumulate stuff, instead of using up nature 1.75 times faster than our planet's ecosystems can regenerate, what if we took an honest inventory of all of our blessings and decided to keep what we actually need for a decent life and distribute the balance as blessing for those without?   What if we chose to ‘be rich toward God’ rather than stuffing our storehouses? I suppose that would mean putting our faith in God and God’s blessing, rather than our selves.

• https://www.huffpost.com/entry/earth-overshoot-day-natural-resources-july_n_5d39a020e4b004b6adbbd643?ncid=newsltushpmgnews__TheMorningEmail__072919  

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Gospel text for 2nd Advent - Sunday, 7 December 2014

Mark 1:1-8

The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,  "See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: `Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,'"

John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel's hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. He proclaimed, "The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Reflection    What does this have to say to us, many of whom were baptized as infants? Isn’t baptism a done deal? Not according to John. “This is the beginnning of the good news, ” news that always we begin again. There is no shortage of opportunities for each of us to pause, listen to the words of the prophet, examine our lives for vestigages of sin asking; To what am I clinging for my safety and security? How do I use alcohol, drugs, food, shopping, sex, work, video games, people or the internet for comfort or esteem? What means do I employ to acquire and exert power and control? What if I found my safety, security, affection, esteem, power and control in relationship with God instead?

Now let me be crystal clear. I am not suggesting that the things of earth or creation are evil. That would be a heresy.  It is our attachment to things as sources of that which is of God that is sin. Just another way of saying, we have a tendency to turn things into idols - golden calves, golden parachutes.  When we decide to repent, to change our minds, to let go of our idols, our habits, attachments and addictions, we are ready for something new. This is how we prepare the way for the one who is and is to come. This is our work for the Advent season; preparing the way for the Christ to be born again in each of us. 

Surely preparing the way for something new is as natural as new families making countless trips to Babies R Us as they prepare for the coming of a child ? Aunties buy cribs and friends cuddly blankets. Parents search the web for advice, install baby monitors and socket guards. With nothing but the best of intentions boatloads of things are gathered to welcome the child into a world of safety, security, affection, esteem, power and control. This is as it should be - and - immediately the writer of Mark’s gospel invites us to put that child in God’s hands, drenched in the water of baptism to die to a life constrained by things and rise into a life of safety, security, affection, esteem, power and control born in the hands of God. We prepare the way to give our children away to God in baptism.

At the other end of the spectrum linger those of us in later seasons of life faced with the burden of scores of physical stuff, habitual stuff,  stuff we no longer have the energy to sustain. Mountains of possessions possess us. Decades of habitual behaviors and reactions stand between us and freedom like barbed wire prision walls. Are we not like the people of the Judean countryside and Jerusalem compelled by a sense of desperation and desire for something more than old stuff and the empty promises of city, state, empire? How many of us long to walk into the wilderness, throw all the things that possess us into the Jordan river, watch them sink to the watery depths and experience the lightness of being born anew in the hands of God? “This is the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God….” Do you dare to prepare the way of the Lord?   

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