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St. James' Episcopal Church
Jackson, Mississippi
August
5, 2001
9th Sunday After Pentecost
MoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoney
The Rev. William
A. Kolb
1st Reading:
Ecclesiastes
1:12-14,2:(1-7,11) 18-23
Gospel:
Luke 12:13-21
When I was about
eight years old growing up in New York City, at the corner of 83rd and
Broadway, every block usually had a candy store on the corner. And in
front of the store there would be wooden crates on which would sit the
day’s supply of the various newspapers that were for sale –
The New York Daily News, The New York Daily Mirror, The
New York Post, the Herald Tribune, the World Telegram,
the New York Times, and so on. People in a hurry would rush by
the store, picking up a paper and dropping a coin or coins on the stack
as they moved by.
One day I was passing one of these stores and spied a group of coins atop
one of the stacks. "Self," I said to myself, "if those
people had wanted those coins they would not have left them just lying
there." And so I helped myself to the coins.
Well in those days it really did take a village, and pretty soon the storeowner
had called my mother and I had been taken to see Uncle Albert. My mother’s
brother was the "heavy" in the family – the one I was taken
to whenever I got out of line. After fussing at me about my transgression,
Uncle Albert offered me a deal: if I would promise not to repeat my theft,
he would let me put my hand in his coin-filled goldfish bowl and take
all the money I could hold in one hand.
You need to understand that my Uncle, a man of considerable means, would
come home from work each day and put all his "large" pocket
change in this goldfish bowl – silver dollars, half-dollars and perhaps
quarters.
Well, I gave my word and accepted the offer. And I learned a lesson about
greed. I found that if I grabbed as many coins as possible, I couldn’t
get my hand out of the goldfish bowl. I had to let go and give up a good
portion of what I had grabbed in order to get anything at all, and in
order to get my hand back! I learned that sometimes you gain more by going
for less.
As you may have guessed, our sermon this morning is about money. It is
based on our Gospel reading, about greed and big barns and storing up
treasure for ourselves. I must tell you that it was very easy for me to
preach against filling our barns when I was younger and not worried about
retirement and the eleven prescription drugs Sunny and I must take every
day. It was a whole lot easier for me to preach reliance on God and not
mammon, before my mother died and left me some mammon.
But Gospel is Gospel and there is always a message for us in it, a message
we need to hear, so this morning we try to hear what God is saying through
these words and this story.
The very first commandment that God gave to Moses was "I am the Lord
your God. You shall have no other gods before me." When people begin
to covet success, wealth, possessions, status, etc., those things tend
to become idols--gods with a little "g," --and we lose our focus
on God and we suffer spiritually because of it. Not only does our relationship
with God suffer, but our relationship with each other tends to get a little
out of whack as well.
That is to say: if we have God to hold us up, we won’t be afraid
of falling into nowhere should our barns and our money disappear; but
if do not have God to hold us up, we need barns and money as our foundation
in life. And that is called idolatry.
One of the key questions about our relationship with our money is how
we use it. Let’s look at some good uses and some bad ones:
Martin Luther was troubled about many practices of his Church, and one
of the major ones was the sale of indulgences. Indulgences were a form
of forgiveness or expunging of sins committed by the buyer. The buying
of indulgences was a use of money that we might call a poor use of one’s
resources. The hiring of an assassin to take a life would also be a pretty
bad use of one’s money.
Now, what could we classify as a good use, especially in God’s eyes,
a good use of our money? Well, "give all that you have and follow
me" would be pretty good. To sell all our possessions and then to
donate the proceeds to charity and then to "go on the road"
so to speak, and do God’s work wherever we could find it, now there’s
a "way good" use of our material treasure. Another good use
would be to fund a children’s home or to give a billion dollars to
the United Nations for a peace fund, or to build a hospital and pay for
its operation.
You and I, probably without exception, are ineligible for either of these
extremes. You would probably not find any of us at the "poor use"
end of the spectrum, due to the fact that they don’t sell indulgences
any more, and the improbability of our turning into killers. And you probably
wouldn’t find any of us at the extreme end of the "good use
category," just because few if any of us could afford such large
charitable giving.
But by and large we generate good incomes. We are able to do some good
things with our income. What is most important about doing good with what
we have, is living a balanced life in which we share and care about others.
God is not telling us we shouldn’t save for a rainy day; he is saying
that the rain rains on everyone and some are not able to save; therefore
we are to help others out of our surplus.
It has been said that the cure for covetousness is acquisition. But in
fact covetousness and greed are states of mind. "We must guard against
the possession of money, but also we must expel from our souls the desire
for it. For it will do no good not to possess money, if there exists in
us an insatiable desire for getting it." (John Cassian, Institutes)
"Avarice," said the columnist Henry Fairlie, "is not so
much the love of possessions, as the love merely of possessing."
In the love of having for its own sake, it is possible to lose everything.
It is the opposite pole of the Kingdom Way, where, Jesus says, in the
love of losing all for his sake, it is possible to find everything. (Philip
A.Apol., Synthesis Sermon Commentary, Sedgwick Publ., Boyds MD,8/5/01)
Greed is the disease, not money, just as whiskey is not a disease in and
of itself. Alcoholism is a disease that remains even after the whiskey
is taken away. Having money does not necessarily mean that I am greedy
or avaricious or covetous. And not having money does not necessarily mean
we are not greedy or that we do not covet. Being rich toward God is as
important to the poor as to the wealthy and can be just as problematic.
This story may be apocryphal but I read yesterday in commentary material
about this Gospel reading, that someone once asked Nelson Rockefeller
what it would take to make him happy, since he already had more money
than he could spend in three lifetimes. He answered sadly, a little more
money.
Some of you know that one of my resources in preparing sermons is to go
on the web and read on "The Desperate Preachers’ Site"
what other preachers throughout the U.S. and some even in other countries
are saying about the Gospel reading. Yesterday a lot of them were questioning,
in light of the reading, whether it is wrong for them to save for retirement.
I think that is taking things too far. Jesus was no fanatic about renunciation
of possessions, but nevertheless warned us that they could hinder our
being open to the Kingdom and that we have to use our possessions for
the welfare of others.
Should we get rid of savings, retirement plans and so on? No. But how
many of us have too much "stuff"? Too many clothes, too many
dishes, stuff we never even use. I read yesterday about a discussion on
TV in which a person was quoted as saying that for every new piece of
clothing we buy, we need to get rid of one piece of clothing. I will confess
here and now that my wife Sunny is always and forever asking me to unclutter
and give to others the clothing and other possessions that I do not use.
Comedian George Carlin does a wonderful routine about all our "stuff,"
about how we carry some of our stuff with us on vacation, and if we take
a side trip, we carry a smaller version of our stuff, so that our stuff
is spread all over the planet.
Questions that we might each ask ourselves coming away from this Gospel
reading include, "What do we have stored in our barn?" and,
"Is it time for a garage sale?" Perhaps it is not what we have
that is the issue, but our relationship to it, especially in the face
of those in need. Are we too attached to our stuff to let go of it to
benefit someone else? Could it be that that is the essence of greed?
You will recall that earlier we spoke of the sale of indulgences during
the middle ages. Indulgences were popular for those who feared hell and
that was most of the people, if not all of them. They believed that if
they were given indulgences for their various sins, they would be spared.
But if we do not fear hell, what is our motivation to give away much of
what we have? Or even 20% of what we have? Or even 10%?
The Gospel says, "be rich towards God." John Wesley comments
on being "rich towards God" with these words, "namely,
in faith and love and good works." Our very soul yearns to be rich
towards God--now, here, today. If we are not rich towards God we are indeed
poor. We do not help the poor to appease or please God; we help the poor
to help the poor. We love God and our neighbor because something very
basic in the depths of our soul is FED when we do these things--when we
care about others, when we give away at least part of that which is meaningful
to us.
And why? Why do we yearn to fill the void in our soul with that which
no riches, no fame, no earthly power can fill? Ecclesiastes gives us the
answer in our reading from that preacher this morning: The impermanence
of life makes all striving futile. As we go through this life storing
up all kinds of "stuff," we need all the more to store up a
relationship with God, so that God’s priorities become our own. Only
in that way are we filling our barns with what we really need – God
Himself. When God is first in our hearts, we are whole and we are rich,
truly rich, with God.
Amen.
Copyright
2001 The Rev. William A. Kolb
First
Reading:
Ecclesiastes 1:12-14,2:(1-7,11) 18-23
I, the Teacher, when king over Israel in Jerusalem, applied my mind to
seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven; it is
an unhappy business that God has given to human beings to be busy with.
I saw all the deeds that are done under the sun; and see, all is vanity
and a chasing after wind. I said to myself, "Come now, I will make a test
of pleasure; enjoy yourself." But again, this also was vanity. I said
of laughter, "It is mad," and of pleasure, "What use is it?" I searched
with my mind how to cheer my body with wineÑmy mind still guiding me with
wisdomÑand how to lay hold on folly, until I might see what was good for
mortals to do under heaven during the few days of their life. I made great
works; I built houses and planted vineyards for myself; I made myself
gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made
myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. I bought
male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house; I also
had great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been
before me in Jerusalem. Then I considered all that my hands had done and
the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was vanity and a chasing
after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun. I hated
all my toil in which I had toiled under the sun, seeing that I must leave
it to those who come after me Ñand who knows whether they will be wise
or foolish? Yet they will be master of all for which I toiled and used
my wisdom under the sun. This also is vanity. So I turned and gave my
heart up to despair concerning all the toil of my labors under the sun,
because sometimes one who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill
must leave all to be enjoyed by another who did not toil for it. This
also is vanity and a great evil. What do mortals get from all the toil
and strain with which they toil under the sun? For all their days are
full of pain, and their work is a vexation; even at night their minds
do not rest. This also is vanity.
Gospel:
Luke
12:13-21
Someone in the crowd said to him, "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 oneÕs 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."
NRSV
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