The Rev. Neale L. Miller

Sermon for September 23, 2007

Texts: Isaiah 55:1-3/Luke 12:13-21

Title: “Time to Diet”

             Out of all the hymns of the church I doubt you will find a verse that communicates so much so beautifully.  The words and the melodic grandeur of the verse contribute to stunning effect: “Riches I heed not, nor vain, empty praise, Thou mine inheritance, now and always: Thou and Thou only, first in my heart.”

              Friends, “Though and Thou only, first in my heart,” is the first and essential tenet of Christian piety.  Pressed to name the Jews’ fundamental obligation under God, Jesus gave this one sentence summary of the law: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.”

              “Riches I heed not…Thou mine inheritance…Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,”  Those words sing better than they are lived, or had you noticed?  What we call the Christian faith is but one lifelong struggle to get hold of and keep our life’s priorities straight.  But riches have a way of gumming up the works, don’t they?  They make demands we don’t feel at liberty to ignore, demands that in many cases co-opt our attention and consume our energies.  This, or course, is not a good thing from God’s standpoint.  God, you understand, is quite particular about the way we allocate our time and our energies.

              It was the misallocation of the peoples’ time and energies that provoked God time and time again.  Way back there when Israel was really in the formative stages of establishing her identity as the “Chosen” people of God, the Lord felt compelled to step in through his prophet Isaiah and call the people to account.  “Why, [Isaiah is heard to demand on God’s account] [why] do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?”  “You are acting as if God isn’t enough.  Have you forgotten everything God has done for you?  Have you forgotten how God brought you out of bondage in Egypt, how God got you out of one jam after another even though you were unfaithful?  Have you forgotten that God has taken up your cause in good times and in bad?  Yet you prefer trinkets to God.  Your energies are committed to making a name for yourself, to acquiring all the treasures that the world judges dear.” “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy.”

              Those words of Isaiah I just quoted represent one of the strongest indictments levied against acquisitive Israel.  The Jews were often in hot water with God for their failure to put God first, for placing personal and national privilege and prestige ahead of righteous aspirations.  “Thou and thou only first in [our] hearts.”  Oh, really?  The Jews had the words down, they recited them in their worship service, and they engraved them in the archways over the doors into their synagogues.  Their fervor in teaching the doctrine to their children was unmatched.  But how they struggled with application, they struggled with the demand of converting the words they recited with their mouths into their actions.

              Now when you arrive at the time of Jesus we find the Jews still struggling.  Mind you, they had the catechism down pat, the commandments and laws had been meticulously passed down generation to generation, had been memorized, but those contemporaries of Jesus had more than a little trouble setting priorities that Jesus could endorse.  The question that Isaiah posed.  “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?” had yet to be satisfactorily answered in Jesus’ day.  That being the case Jesus would address the question often in his teaching and preaching.  He did not equivocate.  “Your money can’t buy you satisfaction so long as the love of God has not taken hold of you, heart, mind and soul.”  That was the message.  Now, how to teach it?

              If you have been around good teaching you know that excellence in teaching consists in meeting students where they are, challenging them to broaden their capacity to see nuance and detail in the world they meet on the page in the textbook or in the lived experiences they have outside the classroom.  But how to teach effectively?  Don’t discount rote drill.  You must master the multiplication tables and basic algebra before you can move on to higher forms of math.  You must learn the principle parts of speech before you can compose thoughtful sentences.  You can’t really grasp contemporary events, until you understand the history that predates them. 

                   An accomplished teacher, Jesus committed much attention to teaching the basics of faith, but where Jesus really excelled was in that form of teaching where students were challenged to reach beyond an event in real time to grasp a principle that effectively transcended time.  I take for example the parable that Jesus recited in our second lesson.

              The lead up to the parable, the event in real time that introduced the parable you will recall was a request for help, a request for Jesus to adjudicate a family dispute. 
Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.”  Seeking leverage in his claim, the man appealed to Jesus.  The man, of course, got a little less, and a little more than he bargained for.  He got a little less---he got no action on his grievance.  But he also got a little more---a challenge to see reality from a brand new perspective.

              That challenge, of course, is really the nub of the parable.  In it Jesus recasts Isaiah’s question “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your labor for that which does not satisfy?” into a statement of priorities, relying on a parable to get it done.

In a moment we will consider the appropriateness of that title.  But first let us review the parable’s contents.

              The landowner stood surveying his prosperity, chest thrust out straining the buttons on his overalls.  He had had a bumper year, but he had worked for it.  Time spent in the Midwest has qualified me to report on just how hard a farmer has to work to tend and harvest a crop.  Likewise, I can understand the pressures a farmer faces to care for that crop once it has been harvested.  Proper storage of the harvest is a critical issue.  Left unprotected the newly harvested crop could be ruined.

              Rich, and reveling in even more riches piling up in the yard, the landowner did what any property owner might have done under similar circumstances.  He made plans to expand in order to protect his surplus.  It was the prudent thing to do.  Moreover, he judged that this harvest had put him over the top financially.  Why not retire, “eat, drink, and be merry”?

              Can the man be faulted for claiming his portion of the good life, for building bigger barns?  There being no MetLife, Cigna, or Blue Cross insurance, no mutual funds or T-Bills those bigger barns would protect his goods into his old age; it was the prudent thing to do.  Yet for his prudence, for planning ahead, the landowner in the parable earns condemnation “fool.”  Doesn’t really add up, does it?  Did the man really have any option other than to look out for himself and plan ahead?  Furthermore, should he be condemned merely for having a surplus upon which to draw, a nest egg to finance a golf club membership, a Florida vacation in the winter, or residence in a nice senior citizens complex?  After all, he had earned his leisure.  If one can be condemned for prudence in managing wealth then all retirees or aspiring retirees stand condemned.

              Condemned for planning ahead, for having a nest egg?  We could infer that, but the parable is really making another point, isn’t it?  Jesus, you see, wants us to hear echoes of Isaiah in the parable, “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and you labor for that which does not satisfy?”  You see, the parable isn’t condemning the landowner for his prudence, what it is doing is condemning the landowner’s misplaced preference for barns over God.  The landowner is faulted for so diverting his money and his attention to personal advancement that God is left as an afterthought.

              How very little circumstances have changed.  It has become almost an axiom of life that to the degree we rise economically and enjoy privilege, our attention to God diminishes almost to that same degree.  The more barns occupy us the less God occupies us.  How rich can we afford to become before God is displaced from our lives altogether?

              That is a question each Christian, but particularly privileged folk like us, must take seriously.  “Why do we spend our money on that which is not bread, our labor on that which does not satisfy?”  Perhaps it is because we, like the I and owner, are absorbed in all those things that have absorbed people just like us from the beginning, things like protecting our assets and extending our influence.

              While we are individually accountable for this self-absorption, it is as a nation that our self-absorption is even more evident.  Owing to the wealth and prestige we command as a nation we exist in a category uniquely our own, the assumptions we bring to life different from any other nation.  As the world’s major economic power, the eyes of the world look to us.  As the world’s center for innovation, the world looks to us.  As the world’s major cultural influence, we are the trendsetters in virtually every realm of cultural expression.  As the world’s major power we have a lot at stake, and like any wealthy person protecting what we have is a major issue.  Some examples.

              Ever since the Reagan presidency a comprehensive missile defense initiative, in some form or another, has been on the table.  We have committed billions of dollars to developing a defense system that if implemented would turn our nation into one large gated community.  Gated communities are, or course very popular among the well to do.

             In 1999 representatives from several governments gathered in Kyoto, Japan to discuss the dangers of global warming.  Though the vast majority of the scientific community deems global warming an imminent threat, our nation, responsible for fully one-quarter share of the pollutants that enter the atmosphere, have a vested economic interest in preserving the status quo.  If signed the Kyoto treaty would force us to make major initiatives to reduce pollution, which in turn would stress our economy.  Something our leaders would not risk.

              Immigration is another area where our power and privilege drives decision-making.  Though we have historically been reluctant to grant citizenship to persons immigrating from Mexico and Latin America, our appetite for cheap labor in larger and larger quantities is such that the government is proposing legislation that would extend “guest worker” privileges to the very classes of people were previously barred.  The richer you become, after all, the more help you require to do things you formally did yourself.

              Energy has been a major issue for us, the price of a barrel of oil on the world market closely watched. We are vulnerable to decisions made by Saudi princes, Venezuelan dictators, and Nigerian strongmen. How do we achieve energy independence?  What do we want to do about coal reserves in West Virginia and Montana, oil reserves off the coast of Florida and California, and in the Alaskan wilderness?  Economics dictates aggressive new policies.

              Affordable energy, of course, is the key to economic prosperity.  You remember the old line from the Clinton campaign, “It’s the economy, stupid!”  Well, Clinton’s gone.  But it’s still the economy.  Everything hinges on the economy, on production.  When the economy misses a beat and our barns take a hit, our prerogatives shrink and our outlook loses its rosy hue.  “It’s the economy, stupid?” was, and still is, the refrain.  You better believe it’s the economy.

              Missile defense schemes, yet millions of our citizens live without access to affordable health care.  Tax shelters and rebates for those in the highest tax brackets, while those at the bottom go without.  Multimillion-dollar salaries for the CEO, minimum wage for the Hispanic who cleans the corporate washroom.  The finest public and private schools in the world for those with income to afford them, thirty, forty students crammed into shabby, ill-equipped classrooms for the poor.  High priced lobbyists for those with a fat checkbook, legislative neglect for those at the margins.  Gated communities for the wealthy, tenements for the poor.

              Invest where return on investment will be greatest---great economic strategy.  But is economic success the sole basis upon which are lives are to be judged?  The rich landowner knew how to invest, leveraging his capital into a big estate.  But how did the ending to that parable go?  “You fool!”  This very night your life is being demanded of you.  And the things you have prepared for yourself…your perfected missile defense, your perfected telecommunication’s industry, your state of the art buildings, automobiles, airplanes, computers, Ipods—who will get all that stuff?

              The rich fool knew what he wanted and went for it.  Rich in material goods, but poor in soul. Not much of legacy to leave behind.

What is the legacy our generation will leave behind?  More and more, bigger and bigger may not be the answer. Perhaps the time has come to put O’ Uncle Sam on a diet.  Just one question.  Who among has the courage to tell him he needs one?  AMEN.

PRAYER

              O God, who placed it in our hearts to love you, who created us to serve you, and who baptized us that we might revel in the gift of salvation, we come to you with hands extended.  Take our hands, dear Lord, take our hands into your hands and bear us along, for large obstacles like in our path and we are prone to stumble.  Be our strength when our strength fails, our guide when the road leads over unfamiliar terrain, our comforter when fear overwhelms.  As you were for the prophets of old, be for us a confessor, consoler, and friend.

              Gracious God, bless our nation and those we have elected to lead us.  Where we have allowed false assumptions to reign and pride and arrogance to blind us to your will, we pray for restoration.  Where we have shunned neighbors, ignoring obligation to the worlds beleaguered and oppressed grant us mercy.  Where we have allowed economic considerations to pre-empt moral obligations, we pray your forbearance.

              O God, we slavishly seek material prosperity, even at the cost of a right relationship with you.  In indicting the rich fool, O God, we ourselves feel indicted, for we have not been rich toward you.  We have developed great aptitude for building bigger and bigger barns, but little aptitude in creating your kingdom here on earth.  Strengthen our wills grown weak through sloth and inattentativeness, that we might apply our gifts to your agenda and not our own.

              Lord, we praise you for this church and all who dedicate themselves in manifold ways to your service.  You have spoken to us, O God, in the voices of our mentors and teachers here, you have inspired us in music, stretched us in your holy word.  Continue to guide us, to inspire us, and to prod us for we are here that we might be formed into the

image of your son, our Lord, Jesus.

              Gracious Lord, the world’s issues claim us, issues bearing on this ministry and the future of your church here on earth claim us, but we also bring very personal concerns to this place.  We lift those concerns into your hands, praying that you will intercede in our lives to renew us where our energies have drained, where fears for the future, or guilt, or illness, or anxiety have cast a pall over our lives.  Awaken within us the faith you have bestowed.  Renew our desire to pray, to study, and to participate more consistently in the life of the faith community.  O God, move in and through and among us that we may rise to the full stature that is ours in Christ. 

              Enfold in your grace the child Helen---who will be baptized today.  Received into the loving embrace of her parents at birth, today we celebrate the reality that she lives in your embrace as a child of the church, her baptism sealing her membership in the community of grace Jesus formed when he rose victorious from the dead.  May her baptism mark the beginning of a journey that will lead her ever closer to you in thought, word, and deed as weeks succeed weeks, and months succeed months. In the nurture of the home and family may she encouraged to build her life from Christ’s cornerstone.

              O God, even as we entrust Helen to your care we lift of family, loved ones and friends we have special needs:  Empower Anna Christie to find new purpose in her life.  Abide with the infant Christian Noble Chancellor.  Abide with Shane, Pam, Rudy and Ken.