Sermons

February 15, 2009

John 5:39-47; Luke 24:13-32

We are beginning today a short, two sermon series, around how God speaks to us through the scriptures. Today, I want to focus on what the bible is and its purpose in our life as a Christian community.

Then, next Sunday I will talk about how we interpret the bible in the context of the church.

I want to do this series because so often biblical interpretation has polarized the church and taken us away from the mission and ministry of Jesus in the world. The bible has too often become a tool for dividing people rather than uniting us and empowering us as witnesses of God’s good news.

Most of us believe the bible is inspired by God and is a fully reliable and trustworthy standard for our Christian faith and life – and yet, it is so divisive among Christians.

I sometimes wish that when Jesus lived there had been someone with a video camera recording every word he had ever uttered. I wish someone had captured on video his actions and healings and the way he related to people.

And wouldn’t it be nice to have a video of his facial expressions? To know when he was sad or angry or loving?

If we had his whole life on video – wouldn’t it be easier to believe in Jesus? Wouldn’t it stop all of our infighting and debates over what he said or meant?

I wish it would, but I know that it wouldn’t!!

Just having all the correct facts about Jesus and knowing every word and movement he had ever made would not solve anything – because having all the facts about Jesus will never solve the issue of “faith” for us.

Even the disciples who were constantly with Jesus for three years did not always understand him. And those who saw him heal people disagreed about how he did it. Some thought his power came from the devil. Other people discounted that he ever healed anyone.

Just because someone heard Jesus or saw Jesus in person does not mean they believed Jesus was the Messiah or were ready to follow him in life.

So, having a live video of Jesus’ life and knowing everything he ever said would not increase our faith in him. It would not stop us from arguing over what he “really meant” when he said this or that.

Many people still think more information or facts about Jesus will help them believe, but facts alone will never answer the question of faith in Jesus.

Jesus once told a parable about a rich man and a poor man named Lazarus. Lazarus lay at the rich mans door every day but he never helped Lazarus.

When the rich man died he went to Hades and when the poor man died he was taken to be with Abraham. When the rich man couldn’t get Abraham to send the poor man to him – he pleaded with Abraham to send the poor man to his brothers to warn them so they wouldn’t end up with him in Hades.

Abraham told the rich man – if his brothers won’t listen to Moses and all the prophets then they won’t be convinced by someone coming back from the dead either.

Jesus reminds us in this parable that we too have the prophets and many stories from his eye witnesses. So, a live video or even someone coming back from the dead will not convince us more about who God is.

We have now what we need in Scripture to understand God and God’s purposes for us and the world – we just need to come with hearts that are humble, open, prayerful, and willing to obey.

If we want to understand the scriptures – we have to always approach them with the eyes of faith – not simply as reporters or scholars looking for facts and figures and data about God. Knowing God always requires a step of faith.

The bible then is really a story book. It is the story of God trying to get to us. It is a testimony of God’s all out effort to liberate humanity from bondage and to restore our relationship with God, each other, and all of creation.

The bible is not a scientific book or a philosophical construction or a system of knowledge. The bible contains stories of God seeking us and of God’s people responding to God’s actions.

And yet, just knowing what the bible’s purpose is, doesn’t make the bible easy to understand.

The bible is not a simple book. It is complex and can be difficult to interpret.

I know that some Christians think the bible came straight down from heaven. They think God spoke the words into the ears of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and the other biblical writers. But that is not how it happened.

What we know as the OT are Israel’s sacred scriptures and they came together over many centuries by many different authors.

By the time of Jesus the OT books had been collected into three parts – the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings.

In our scripture from Luke 14 Jesus, in his conversation with the Emmaus disciples refers to the “the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms.” Since the Psalms stood at the head of the Writings sometimes the whole section of The Writings are referred to as the Psalms.

These 39 books in the OT were accepted as scripture by the Jews and Jesus and his apostles also endorsed them. These scriptures were also their scriptures.

One of the interesting things about what we call the NT is that these books were not officially accepted as scripture until the fourth century – some 300 years after Jesus lived.

There were many books and writings circulating around in the different churches until eventually the church adopted the current 27 books that we have now.

But there were several other gospel accounts and letters that did not make it in. The gospel of Barnabas, the gospel of Thomas, the epistle to the Laodiceans, third Corinthians, and several others didn’t make it into our scirptures.

The books that made it into the NT were all written before the end of the first century and they were chosen because they had the authority of the apostles behind them.

Now, sometimes Christians are troubled when they learn that the NT canon came together over several centuries and emerged out of the life and testimony of the church.

For some people this kind of process undermines the authority of the bible for them.

And yet, for me, this discerning process within the church at that time– instead of a top-down decision dictated by those in authority – strengthens my view of the bible’s authority.

The church at that time, with the leading of the Holy Spirit, chose only those books and letters that best taught a holistic vision of Jesus’ life and teachings and that strengthened and unified the churches.

In a sense, the church produced the NT part of the bible, but now the church is sustained, challenged, and reformed by it. The whole bible is now a gift to the church because it is the primary witness of Jesus.

So, when we say the bible is the inspired word of God, we mean that the Holy Spirit was at work in the writing of scripture and in the process of discerning which books became part of our bible.

At the same time, to say the bible is inspired does not mean we “worship the bible”. The bible always points beyond itself to God.

Scripture is not the supreme authority – God is.

The purpose of scripture reading is not to learn a bunch of facts and figures and information about God, but to discover what God is saying and doing in the world. It is to help us nurture an authentic relationship with Jesus.

In our scripture from the Gospel of John chapter 5 Jesus says to the scribes and Pharisees in verse 39 – “you search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me and to have life.”

The Pharisees thought that if they memorized the scriptures and knew them from cover to cover that then they would be saved. For them salvation was in knowing the scriptures.

Yet Jesus says the scriptures point to him.

So, for us to take seriously the scriptures and to truly be known as a “people of the book” today we will have to make Christ the center of our life – not the bible.

The bible is central in that it will always point us toward Christ but it must never replace Jesus as the focus of our faith.

In our time again, as it has happened throughout church history, we have tended to make the bible our focus instead of Jesus.

There are a whole set of Christians today who have reduced biblical faith to believing in a set of doctrines or propositions. They have squeezed the biblical story into an intellectual package and salvation comes from believing the right things about Jesus and the bible instead of entering into a relationship with Jesus.

Since the Reformation in the 16^th century there has been an over emphasis on Paul’s letters.

Listen to what Martin Luther said in his preface to the NT.

In a section entitled – “Which are the true and noblest books of the NT? – Luther wrote, “John’s gospel is the one, fine, true, and chief gospel, and is far, far to be preferred over the other three and placed high above them. So, too, the epistles of St. Paul and St. Peter far surpass the other three gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke.”

Luther’s reasoning for this focus was that – anything in scripture that tells the “story of Jesus” was far less helpful than books describing explicit “doctrines about Jesus.”

The Gospel of John and Paul’s letters are more abstract and lengthy propositional discourses – while the three gospels contain more short stories and parables.

Now, prior to the Reformation and the printing press, the main focus in the church had been on the three gospels and the parables of Jesus. For people who were primarily illiterate – the gospel stories and parables were much easier to understand and remember.

Now, the renewed interest in Paul’s letters was good for the church in many ways, but it also led to more of a focus on moralisms and a rather legalistic approach to faith.

For those on the more conservative side of Christianity their concern has been with the “heart” and they have had a tendency to fear education. There has also been a tendency to emphasize Jesus’ divinity over his humanity.

On the other side of the spectrum is the more “liberal” approach to faith. Critical of the moralisms of the conservatives, the liberal theologians tried to uncover the historical Jesus.

But these theologians fell into the same trap they accused their more conservative sisters and brothers. They limited their study to the human figure of Jesus. They did away with things like Jesus’ incarnation, the miracles of Jesus, and his resurrection because those things were seen as unscientific.

If the conservatives focused on the heart – the liberals focused on the head and rationalistic thinking. They talked about God, but had little or no experience of God.

In many ways, both the liberals and conservatives have molded Jesus to fit their agendas – instead of letting Jesus set the agenda.

Now, no matter which of those two pitfalls we fall into – we are guilty of abandoning the bible as our guide for faith and practice.

Somehow, I think there must be a middle way – a way that faithfully practices what Paul taught in First Thessalonians 5:21. He wrote – “test everything and hold fast to what is good.”

This middle way is hard because it requires us to keep the scriptures central and at the same time to take a critical look at our culture and our church traditions.

That is no small challenge but it is very necessary and I think possible.

I think the place for us to begin today is by letting the bible read us. We need to capture again the Jewish way of reading scripture. The Jewish approach to reading scripture is that they don’t read the bible – it reads them.

Instead of the Jews interpreting scripture they see the Torah interpreting them. Since God is seeking us we come to the text in humility to listen for what God is saying to us.

In James 1:22-25 – James calls the scriptures a mirror in which we see our true selves.

Instead of mining the scriptures to obtain objective knowledge about God we let the bible read us. It becomes a mirror in that it helps us clarify our inner needs, our attitudes, and our hidden desires.

As we allow the scriptures to read us we learn to see the world with God’s eyes and to see God with new eyes of faith.

Many times in reading scripture we won’t see new things but the familiar things we already know will take on new meaning as we learn to see them from God’s perspective.

One of the practices that Christians are turning to help them overcome the distance between the written text and the living word is the ancient practice of Lectio Divina.

That is Latin for “divine reading”.

Lectio divina is a traditional way of combining prayer and reading scriptures so that the Holy Spirit may penetrate our hearts and we may grow in an intimate relationship with Jesus.

It is a more contemplative and meditative way of reading scripture.

Lectio divina was developed by the monks as a way of letting go of their agenda and opening themselves to what God wants to say to them.

It is a way of praying the scriptures that calls one to study, ponder, listen, and then finally to pray from God’s word. It is not so much a study of scripture as it is a personal reading of scripture and application to ones life.

Lectio divina involves reading a short text of scripture – out loud if possible. Then after meditating on the scripture, you are to focus on what word or phrase seems important to you.

After reading it a second time – you listen again for a further word God might have for you. You ask – what is God saying to me?

And then after reading it a third time you listen for how it might apply to your life. You ask – what difference will it make in my life?

There is nothing magical about this form of reading the scripture but it involves listening for God’s Spirit to speak to you and read you – more than study. It is humbly opening yourself to God’s Spirit and letting go of your agenda.

There will always be a place for rigorous study of scripture but people are once again being open to a more experiential and intuitive way of knowing God.

There is today a new appreciation for Eastern Orthodox practices that intentionally design worship services to include the five senses. For some people, a spiritual discipline is using icons for contemplation.

The Eastern Orthodox tradition has always had a preference for mystery and experience rather than reason and evidence.

In our scripture from Luke 24 we see this openness to listening to God and to experiencing God’s presence.

We have this story here of two disciples walking home after Jesus’ death, and then, the discovery by some women of his resurrection.

As they walk along, the risen Jesus joins them, but the text says that “their eyes were kept from recognizing him.

These two disciples tell Jesus everything that has happened in those three days and then when they are finished it says Jesus – “beginning with Moses and all the prophets interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.”

When they arrived at home Jesus was going to go on but they invited him to stay. As they ate together – Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.

And as soon as he gave them bread it says – “there eyes were opened and they recognized him and he vanished from their sight.”

Then they said to each other – “were not our hearts burning within us while Jesus was opening the scriptures to us?”

Jesus helped them understand the scriptures and how the scriptures all point to him as the Messiah – the one who comes to save and redeem them from sin and to give them new life in all its fullness.

As they listened to Jesus interpret the scriptures to them their hunger and desire for God grew. They came to new understandings, but it wasn’t until the breaking of bread that they finally recognized Jesus.

Many times we experience God through mystery and intuition – not only the written word.

We don’t only know God with our minds – but also with our hearts. We need both and we are learning this once again in our day.

I believe a middle way of reading scripture is one of letting the bible read us. We must be ready to give our hearts, our minds, and our souls once again to Jesus – the one around whom history turns and life is made new.

As we allow the scriptures to read us and as we open ourselves to God’s Spirit – may we experience our hearts burning within us and may our eyes be opened to see and experience Jesus in our midst.

God desires that kind of intimate relationship with us and wants to unite us together as the body of Christ.

Let us pray.

February 1, 2009

Luke 12:13-34; Acts 4:32-37; I Tim. 6:17-19

Today is the last sermon in our series on the “economy of God”. Because of our current economic downturn we are focusing on biblical themes of money and stewardship.

I think we often hear God in new ways in times of crisis or struggle and so we are looking at what God might be saying to us during this economic crisis which seems to get worse each day.

This week again thousands and thousands more people were laid off work and this is causing major hardships for many of them.

So, this is an important time for us, as Christians, to think about money and sharing resources as we try to be the hands and feet of God in the world.

One thing we have been learning over the past few weeks from our biblical study is that God cares deeply about the poor. God loves all people the same, but God identifies in a special way with the poor and the suffering.

The unequal distribution of wealth and power is deeply disturbing to God because there really is enough to go around – if people would only learn to share.

The thing that seems to raise God’s ire the most is greed. Greed – which is hoarding more resources than you need – grieves God because it always leads to oppression and tremendous suffering.

The problem of greed was so important to Jesus that he talked about money and wealth more than any other single issue.

Last week we learned this concern for the poor was so central to Jesus – that in his inaugural sermon from Luke 4 he said – “the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor, proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of jubilee.”

Jesus unleashed a new economy of jubilee – where debts were forgiven and wealth was redistributed – and he invited people from all walks of life to participate in this economy of enough for everyone.

Now, many people accepted the invitation and began to find a vibrant life, but many others resisted it.

In our scripture today from Luke 12 Jesus tells us about the legal dispute between two brothers. One brother wanted Jesus to be his lawyer and make sure he got his fair share of the family inheritance.

Jesus doesn’t really answer the man’s question but warns him about greed by saying – “watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”

Essentially, Jesus tells the man – however you work out your legal issues – don’t let your motivation be one of greed. Don’t let greed get lodged in your heart.

Jesus then goes on to make this same point in the parable of the rich farmer who had an “abundant harvest”.

His crop was so plentiful that his barns were not big enough, so he decided to tear down the old barns and build bigger ones.

And then the farmer said to himself – “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” In other words, he was telling himself – he could retire and live the good life.

Now, my guess is that most of us would have thought the same way. If you get some extra cash – you think about enjoying life and retiring a little early. It is called the American dream! What is the big deal – go for it!

The problem wasn’t that the man got wealthy. Neither the OT nor the NT is against wealth itself.

The problem was that this wealthy man was not “rich toward God”.

In Jewish thought “rich toward God” had to do with caring for the widow, the orphan, and fatherless.

This man was only thinking about himself and his own family and how they could benefit from this abundant harvest.

The rich farmer never considered how God wanted him to use his God-given wealth. He never considered the needs of others – it was only about his needs.

In contrast to the rich farmer, who cashed in on his good fortune entirely for himself, Jesus tells his disciples not to worry about what you will eat or wear.

Jesus says our one ambition in life is to “seek first the reign of God in the world and trust God to meet our needs – just the way animals and flowers do.”

You see the rich farmer’s mindset is the old Egyptian slave mentality that there isn’t enough to go around and so you have to get as much as you can for yourself.

Jesus, on the other hand, reminds his disciples that God knows what they need and just as God took care of the Israelites in the wilderness – God will provide for them now too.

So, these warnings about greed and the need to care for the poor permeates all of Jesus’ teachings.

The early church took Jesus’ teachings to heart and they began to practice jubilee economics.

In Acts 2 & 4 we see the church’s first experiment in practicing jubilee economics. In Acts 4:32 it says – “no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common…There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostle’s feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.”

Now, doesn’t this story of redistribution in the early church echo the story of God feeding the children of Israel manna in the wilderness? Everybody had enough. No one had too much and no one had too little.

We see this same kind of redistribution in Paul’s letter to the Corinthian church. In Second Corinthians we learn how Paul went around to different churches encouraging them to share their wealth with the church in Jerusalem.

There was a severe famine in Jerusalem and so Paul is asking the Gentile churches to help them out. Listen to what Paul writes in Second Corinthians 8:12-15:

“Give according to your means. For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has – not according to what one does not have. I do not mean that there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a question of a fair balance between your present abundance and their need, so that their abundance may be for your need, in order that there may be a fair balance. As it is written – the one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little.”

Paul’s whole theology of sharing and mutual aid within the church is based on the O.T. Manna story that there is enough to go around – it just needs to be shared.

So the early church follows Jesus’ teaching and begins to practice jubilee economics. However, it wasn’t as easy as it looks or as we would like to think.

If we go back to the book of Acts again – immediately after the story about some in the early church selling their belongings so that those in need have enough – we get another story of greed and dishonesty.

Ananias and Sapphira sell a piece of their property to help those in need. It was a wonderful act of mutual aid!

Yet, for some reason, they decided to keep back some of the proceeds for themselves – while acting as though they had given it all to help those in need.

Now, no one told them they had to sell their property and share the proceeds with those in need. It was something they discerned God leading them to do. It was their choice. They could do with the money as they pleased.

So why they lied about what they had done – we won’t ever know. My guess is – they thought if they gave it all away that they would not have enough in reserve. They were not yet ready to trust God and this new Christian community to share with them if they had a need.

So they told a lie to appear more generous than they really were.

And then in the next chapter of Acts – chapter six – we also learn that not everyone has enough – even though it said in chapter four “there was no needy person among them”.

Acts 6:1 says – “the Hellenists complained against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food.”

The apostles, in distributing the food, are showing partiality to the Jewish widows over the Greek widows. The Greek widows are being discriminated against by those who have the most power in the community.

So, almost immediately, we see in these two stories the challenges of living out this new economy of Jubilee that Jesus proclaimed.

And I think the challenges the early church faced are still the same challenges we face today. Our journey of becoming a jubilee people is not easy. Sometimes we are generous and sometimes we are just plain stingy. Like those early Christians –

• Most of us struggle with selfishness and greed.

• Many of us feel guilty for having more than we need.

• We like to look generous – even when we aren’t.

• We are not sure we can trust our sisters and brothers in Christ to share with us in our time of need.

• Most of us are afraid we won’t have enough.

• Many times we refuse to share with those in need for fear they will misuse the money given them – as if we never misuse our money.

• And most of us think we deserve our wealth because we worked hard for it – rather than seeing it as a gift from God to be shared for the good of all.

For the most part, the story of the early church is also our story. It is a story of extravagant generosity and of stinginess.

So how do we practice this jubilee economics that Jesus proclaimed and the early church tried to implement? Is it really possible to do or will we always fail?

The truth is we will fail over and over again, but the good news is that God is constantly working within us to form us into a generous and loving people.

In First Timothy 6:17-19 Paul tells Timothy to encourage the wealthy to never stop giving.

He writes – “tell those rich in this world’s wealth to quit being so full of themselves and so obsessed with money, which is here today and gone tomorrow. Tell them to go after God, who piles on all the riches we could ever manage – to do good, to be rich in helping others, and to be extravagantly generous. If they do that, they’ll build a treasury that will last, gaining life that is truly life.”

Paul’s suggestion to Timothy for developing a generous life is to “take your eyes off yourself and focus on others”. Paul says – the Christian life is all about sharing with others and being interdependent.

In closing, I want to share a few thoughts yet about practicing jubilee economics.

1. First of all, I think we do need to take seriously Jesus’ warnings about greed.

As hard as it is to hear, we need to be reminded that greed sucks the life out of us and it destroys community. We live in a consumerist culture and so we will constantly be seduced with the mantra – more is better and the more you have the happier you will be.

Tonight, when you watch the Super Bowl, all those expensive commercials are designed to convince you that you need what they have to offer. So laugh at them and enjoy them, but be wary of the lies they tell.

The truth is – there are many studies that show affluence has nothing to do with happiness.

The research shows that money buys happiness right up to having some basic needs met – like healthcare, shelter, and food.

But after the basic needs are met – one’s happiness index goes down as one’s income goes up. The research shows that the richest Americans are no happier than Masai tribesmen.

Jesus warns us about greed when he says – where our treasure is – there we will find our heart.

The danger of wealth is that one can easily begin to get life from it – instead of from God. There is an addictive quality to wealth that tends to make wealthy people hoard it and forget the poor.

Research also shows clearly that the more people have – the less percentage of their income they tend to give away.

So, to practice jubilee economics we need to always be mindful of Jesus’ warnings about wealth and greed and how our possessions can possess us.

These warnings are not meant to scare us but to remind us about the abundant living Jesus has to offer us in community with other believers. It is when we die to greed that we really begin to live the abundant life.

1. Secondly, I think we need to take seriously the spiritual discipline of proportionate giving.

Just like the practice of “honoring a Sabbath day of rest” is a constant reminder to us that God is the source of our life – the regular practice of giving to God as an act of worship is a constant reminder that our wealth is a gift from God – it is not ours.

Giving our first fruits or the first of our income to God helps us orient our life around God’s kingdom priorities.

In the OT, the Hebrews were taught to give a tithe to God as an act of worship. A tithe was 10% of their income or of their harvest.

In the NT, the tithe was still practiced but Jesus said it wasn’t radical enough. In Matthew 23:23 Jesus says: “Woe to you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law – justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others.”

Jesus, here, does not condemn tithing – he just says it doesn’t go far enough. He says they should have practiced justice and mercy alongside the tithing.

I want to suggest this morning that the NT goes beyond the tithe to teach that we are to give “as the Lord prospers us”.

To give as the Lord prospers us is sometimes called “proportionate giving”.

Proportionate giving means we increase our giving as our income rises and we ask hard questions about God’s justice and mercy and how we can be more faithful stewards of God’s resources.

Elizabeth O’Conner, from Church of the Savior in Washington DC, writes this about “proportionate giving” – “None of us has to be an accountant to know what 10% of our income is, but each of us has to be a person on his or her knees before God if we are to understand our commitment to proportionate giving.”

Proportionate giving requires us to do more than simply give 10% of our income. It requires us to constantly be seeking God’s face in prayer about our finances and to ask God what we are to give and to share with others.

One of the things Marilyn and I do each year is that we sit down together and look at our income for the next year. Then we try to determine, as best we can, what we need to live on and how much we can give away. We have tried to increase our giving each year as our income has risen.

You may do it differently, but we give at least our first 10% through the local church and then on top of that we try to support other things we feel God is calling us to be part of.

We also find it helpful to have a plan and to give our first fruits to God before we pay our bills. This discipline helps us stay focused on God’s priorities and keeps us from giving out of our leftovers or giving nothing at all.

I share our practice, not because it is the best way or the right way to do it, but what we have found helpful in our journey to practice jubilee economics.

So, I would encourage you to practice “proportionate giving” as an act of worship to God and as an act of jubilee economics.

1. Thirdly, though, I would add that your giving must be voluntarily and according to your means.

One thing we can learn from the book of Acts and the story of Ananias and Sapphira is that giving must always be voluntary. It has to be a person’s choice and it must come from a grateful heart to be acceptable to God.

In church history, giving has not always been voluntary. There have been periods of time when people gave a tax to church. In some churches there was a “pew tax” or “pew rental”. In some places this revenue system persisted into the 20^th century but now most giving is voluntary.

In writing about the Macedonian church in Second Corinthians Paul says this about them in chapter 8: 3.

Paul writes – “For, as I can testify, they voluntarily gave according to their means, and even beyond their means, begging us earnestly for the privilege of sharing in this ministry to the saints.”

Paul says they gave voluntarily and according to their means. As Christians we are not asked to give what we don’t have.

Giving according to our means is not meant to be burdensome or offered with resistance. It is to be done with joy and hilarity!

The Macedonians saw it as privilege to share and so they were even begging to give more. How many of us are begging to give more?

The bible, instead of commanding people to give, gives examples of generous people, who through the practice of giving, have conditioned their hearts to generosity.

The stories of Levi, Zaccheaus, Barnabas, the poor widow who gave her last two coins, and the Macedonian Church are all examples of generous giving that inspire us to give generously.

For most of us, learning to give is a gradual process of conditioning our hearts and hands to generosity.

At first, giving always hurts. But like stretching any muscle, as we reach out beyond ourselves and as we grow in our ability to trust God, by exercising the muscle of giving we condition our hearts to generosity and we overcome our greed

When we give according to our means, from a cheerful heart, then our gift is acceptable to God and it blesses others.

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So, let’s give generously according to our means and with a cheerful heart.

As our country, and really the whole world, goes through this economic crisis – this is our opportunity as Christians to once again demonstrate God’s love for others.

I don’t know how this crisis will affect our church or our communities but I pray that God will prepare us to be generous stewards of the resources entrusted to us.

Paul, in 2 Corinthians 8:7 encouraged the Corinthians to excel in the grace of giving by sharing with those believers struggling in Jerusalem.

He says, “now as you excel in everything – in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in utmost eagerness, and in our love for you – so we want you to excel also in this grace of giving.”

My prayer is that we would also learn to excel in the grace of giving – just as we excel in faith, love, and knowledge.

May God help us today to excel in this grace of giving as we learn to practice jubilee economics.

Amen.

January 25, 2009

Luke 4:16-21; Mark 10:17-31

Well, since last Sunday a lot has happened – right?

The Steelers won the AFC championship and are going to the Super Bowl again. Next Sunday they will be trying for their sixth super bowl championship. So, the Steeler Nation is happy!

And the other profound thing that happened this week was the inauguration of President Obama. As a Mennonite I am always cautious about embracing too much civil religion, but this inauguration made me proud to be American.

I think it says something to our nation and the world, after our country’s many years of slavery, that we have finally elected a Black person as president. Many of us, I think, thought it would never happen in our life time – and now it has. I think it is a very important step forward for us as a nation and we can celebrate it with joy.

I also thought his call for personal and corporate responsibility; his call for personal and corporate sacrifice; and his call for all of us to be engaged in service to our community sounded themes that are close to our hearts and how our church understands what it means to follow Jesus in the world.

So, let’s continue to pray for God to give President Obama wisdom and courage to make the difficult decisions he will be facing.

And let’s do our part in being a people who take seriously our calling to be agents of healing and reconciliation and to work for justice in our communities.

Well, those are some of the good things that happened this past week.

I want to continue our sermon series on “The economy of God” as we look at how to better organize our life to reflect Jesus’ way of justice and generosity.

One of the problems with this kind of sermon series is that each sermon builds on the previous ones. So if you missed one you may not see the connections. I will try to help by summarizing the past two sermons.

The first sermon was on God’s abundance of enough. I said that in Genesis God looked at the created world and proclaimed – it is very good! Creation was beautiful and there was enough to go around for everyone.

It didn’t take long for things to get off track, though, and so God had to call out a people to embody a new way of living in the world.

We looked at Exodus 16 and the story of how God fed the Israelites Manna in the wilderness after delivering them from slavery. During their sojourn in the wilderness God was trying to retrain a whole new generation of people to live in God’s abundance of enough – instead of living out of fear and anxiety.

We learned that first Sunday that God also instituted a Sabbath day of rest. After working for Pharaoh seven days a week and never getting any rest – the Sabbath day was a sign that God would provide for their needs.

The Israelites were to honor the Sabbath on a weekly basis so they would never forget that God delivered them from slavery and fed them Manna each day.

And then I showed how this weekly Sabbath rest got carried over into a “Sabbath year”. Every seventh year the land was to get a rest and the poor could gather freely from the fields so they would have food to eat.

Also, during this Sabbath year debts were forgiven so that power and wealth didn’t become concentrated in the hands of just a few people. Debt release gave people a chance to start over again.

And then we also learned that God instituted a Sabbath’s Sabbath. It was called the year of Jubilee. Every fifty years three things were to take place.

• All debts were to be forgiven.

• Land that had been lost was to be returned to the original owners.

• And all slaves were to be set free.

You see, God knew what had happened in Egypt – so the year of Jubilee was instituted to keep the gap between the rich and poor from getting too big.

All of these Sabbath practices were meant to teach the Israelites how to live in God’s economy of enough for.

Last Sunday, then, we looked at Solomon and what happens when God’s people forget God and become greedy. Their greed leads the children of Israel to become the new Egypt and Solomon to become the new Pharaoh.

When Israel forgets God and God’s abundance of enough – they take on slaves and they become the new oppressors.

This kind of greedy and oppressive living soon lands Israel in exile.

Exile in Babylon isn’t just a physical location – exile is when you forget your story. Exile is really a condition of your soul. Exile is when you fail to convert God’s blessings into blessings for others.

Because Israel had become the new Egypt – God took them into exile. Exile was another wilderness experience so they could relearn again what it means to live in God’s abundance of enough.

While in exile, prophets like Amos, Jeremiah and Isaiah begin to retell the story of how God had delivered them from Egypt and they call the people to reconnect with God again and to practice justice in their relationships.

They continually call Israel to care for the poor and the most vulnerable members of their community.

The prophets are very clear about Israel’s greed, but they also begin to describe a new exodus that is coming. Isaiah says God wants them to “forget the former things because God is doing a new thing.”

Isaiah even names this new leader the “prince of peace” who will uphold justice and righteousness. This new ruler will have no palace-building slaves; there will be no violence and no arms dealing like King Solomon.

This new ruler, who is to lead this new exodus, is identified in the NT as Jesus of Nazareth.

Now, when Jesus comes on the scene he doesn’t begin his ministry in a vacuum. Jesus’ basic message echoed many prophetic themes from the OT.

1. In fact, in Luke 4, Jesus gives us his mission statement for ministry and this comes directly from the prophet Isaiah in chapter 61.

Jesus quotes Isaiah saying – “the spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

The year of the Lord’s favor is the year of Jubilee described to us in Leviticus 25!

Jesus grounds his calling, his life, and his work in ushering in the new exodus based on the year of Jubilee.

• Jesus’ message of freedom from slavery is very good news for the poor who were living in bondage to the Roman Empire.

• His release of captives was very good news for those who had been taken captive in war or because of bad debts.

• And Jesus’ proclamation of the year of jubilee meant there was going to be a redistribution of resources so that everyone had enough live on.

Jesus’ way of ruling was based on God’s abundance of enough through the sharing of resources.

Jesus’ central message was to call people to repent of their pride and arrogance, their hatred toward others, and their selfishness and greed – and to turn toward humility, love, generosity, and sharing of resources with those in need.

Now, there are many scholars who don’t take Jesus’ proclamation of the “year of Jubilee” very seriously. They dismiss Jubilee because they say Israel didn’t practice it or they only practiced it inconsistently.

But if we use the logic of inconsistency to dismiss Jubilee, then we would have to also dismiss the Sermon on the Mount because Christians have rarely embodied Jesus’ instruction to love our enemies.

There might not be evidence that Israel practiced Jubilee but if you look for “jubilee footprints” in Jesus’ story and ministry they are everywhere.

These jubilee footprints are certainly in his mission statement in Luke 4.

1. I also see them in Jesus’ prayer that he taught his disciples. This prayer is so familiar to us that it hardly stimulates our imagination in new ways.

And yet, the opening words – “Our Father” are radical. This prayer to “Our Father” contrasts sharply with the popular “prayer of Jabez” which is all about me, me, me and God blessing me and enlarging my territory.

Jesus’ prayer is about “Our God” and being part of God’s work in the world which blesses all people.

Jesus teaches us to pray for “Our daily bread” and for “our forgiveness” and for “our deliverance”.

When Jesus teaches us to pray for our daily bread – he is referring back to God feeding Israel manna in the wilderness. This is a prayer of trusting God to provide for our daily needs.

And when Jesus teaches us to pray – “forgive us our debts, as we have forgiven our debtors” – this comes right from the year of Jubilee when debts were to be forgiven. Debts are an economic term and so we see in this prayer the economic dimensions of sin and an invitation for us to practice forgiving our debtors.

Jesus also teaches us to pray – “lead us not into temptation”. Remember how the Israelites wanted to go back to Egypt to a life of slavery, instead of living this risky life of trust in God? They also doubted God’s power and will to provide for them in the wilderness and so they collected more than what they needed.

Jesus says pray regularly that you won’t be led back into the ways of Egypt and that slave mentality – there is enough for everyone when we share.

So, we see here how Jesus’ prayer is deeply rooted in Jubilee practices.

1. We also see “jubilee footprints” in Jesus’ efforts to rebuild community between socio-economically alienated groups.

In Luke 14 we have this banquet story where Jesus undermines the old ways of doing things by inviting in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.

Jesus says in his new economy of jubilee we must not only invite in our friends for dinner, but we also are to invite those “who cannot repay us”.

Jesus’ new jubilee community rejects the back-slapping, prestige-posturing, and ladder-climbing approach to building community and opens its doors to include the poor and the outcasts who can’t repay you.

So, Jesus’ economy of jubilee is all about redistributing resources and promoting economic justice among God’s people.

We also see Jesus rebuilding community between socio-economic groups in how he relates to tax collectors.

Jesus’ outreach to tax collectors, who made their living exploiting others, was a big part of his jubilee message.

In Luke 19:1-10 we have the story of Zacchaeus the tax collector. When Zacchaeus encounters Jesus – it says he took half of his possessions and gave them to the poor. And to those he defrauded – he paid them four times as much as he took.

When he did this – Jesus said – “salvation has come to your house.”

By repaying those he defrauded and by redistributing his wealth to the poor Zacchaeus is practicing Jubilee economics. Jesus just expected his followers to enter into this new economy of jubilee and many did.

Levi left all to follow Jesus. There were many wealthy women who followed Jesus around and supported him out of their resources. (Luke 8:1-3)

But we also learn through the story of the “rich young ruler” in Mark 10 of one person who said no to Jesus’ economy of jubilee.

Here was a very wealthy young man who came asking Jesus what he must do to “inherit eternal life”. He wanted to be part of God’s new movement in the world.

This young man has kept all of God’s commandments, but Jesus tells him only one thing is keeping him out. Jesus tells him to – “sell what you own and give it to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven”.

When he heard Jesus’ response it says he “was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions.”

And Jesus’ disciples were just as shocked and perplexed at Jesus’ answer because their response was – “well, then, who can be saved?”

Now, my guess is that when we hear this story we are just as shocked and perplexed as the disciples were. We are not used to hearing how our money and possessions affect our spiritual life – other than we are taught to tithe.

We see our money as a private affair and how we make our money, how we spend our money, and how much money we have is no one’s business – not even God’s.

However, in some church circles – if God cares at all about our money – it is that God wants us to be rich. If anything, faithfulness to God and wealth are to go together.

I am sure that is the reason the disciples were shocked at Jesus’ answer – because they had always been taught that wealth was a blessing from God.

Now, I hope we don’t take from this story that rich folks are not welcome in the kingdom of God. They are welcome. Jesus loved this rich young man.

What this story is about is the nature of God’s reign here on earth and it reveals that God’s economy operates differently than the world’s economy. God’s economy is about sharing, not hoarding; it’s about generosity, not stinginess; it’s about economic justice, not just charity.

In God’s economy, prosperity is always tied in with the collective well-being of the whole people of God.

Wealth, as a blessing from God, is meant to be shared so all of God’s people have enough. Wealth is meant to help bridge the gap between the rich and the poor.

Zacchaeus caught this vision and practiced Jesus’ new economy of jubilee – the rich young ruler was possessed by his possessions and so he sadly turned away from Jesus.

Now, you might be asking – what does this ancient practice of jubilee have to do with your real world of paying bills, taking out loans, setting up savings accounts, and making a living?

1. One thing I learn from these biblical stories is that we are to use our wealth to help us move closer to those in need, rather than using our wealth to distance ourselves from the poor.

In my experience I have discovered that many rich Christians do care a lot about the poor, but most do not know people who are poor.

Mother Teresa said once, “Today it is very fashionable to talk about the poor. Unfortunately it is not as fashionable to talk to the poor.”

Our natural tendency is to use our wealth to improve our lives and to distance ourselves from those who are poorer. It is possible, because of highways and cars, to completely isolate ourselves from the poor so that we do not have to interact with them or see them in any way.

We can even donate food and clothing and supplies to charities without ever meeting anyone who is poor.

Our donations are used for good causes, but we remain at a safe distance from the poor. If we never open up our homes or our beds or our dinner tables or our lives to the poor we will never be transformed and our community will never be transformed.

Jesus’ new economy of Jubilee is about building relationships with the poor and sharing our resources in a way that builds up the whole community.

So, we need to ask ourselves – is our wealth moving us away from the poor or closer to them? Are we becoming more open to the poor or are we becoming more isolated from them?

1. Another thing these biblical stories teach me about Jesus’ new economy of jubilee is that wealth is meant to be shared for the good of the whole community.

Now, I don’t believe the bible teaches us that everyone will have the same amount of money. I don’t believe the bible teaches us that one economic system is better than another.

I do think, though, that the bible says a whole lot more about money than that Christians are to tithe 10% to God.

We may not be able to agree about what we buy or how much we should save for retirement.

But can we all agree this morning that God cares deeply about the poor and about injustice in our world? If we all agree that God cares about the poor and wants us to share our wealth with the poor – then the question is how do we do this in a healthy way?

Since most of us are not farmers we can’t offer our fields for gleaning or return land to the original owners. Generally, we can’t forgive debts because most people borrow from banks, not us.

So how can we practice jubilee? Maybe we can do it through our “wills” so that our money gets redistributed to people or institutions that help the poor. Maybe it is done by investing in community development projects that help people rebuild communities. Or maybe it is through organizations like Habitat for Humanity that help people get homes interest free. Or maybe it is done by advocating for a “living wage” so people can actually earn enough to live on.

I don’t know how to do it but I think there are many ways wealth can be shared – so let’s let our creative ideas flow and let’s dream together on ways to make old jubilee practices contemporary.

1. But lastly this morning – sharing our wealth is not just about us helping someone else. It is about our own spiritual freedom and salvation.

If we don’t share our wealth – the anxieties of this age, the love of riches, and the lust for more will choke out Christ’s life in us and we will be unfruitful.

Sharing our wealth is an integral part of what it means to follow Jesus and for us to grow in our capacity to be generous and compassionate.

I think many of us feel like living this jubilee kind of life is just too hard, if not next to impossible.

And yet, Jesus’ word to us – as they were to his disciples many years ago is – “I know it seems impossible to you, but for God all things are possible”.

The closer we stay to Jesus, the more God will bring a new economy of abundance to the world. As we stay close to Jesus none of us know what risks God’s Spirit may empower us to take.

Our faith, our ministry, and our hope are that God will empower us to trust God’s generosity – so that Jesus’ new economy of Jubilee will flourish and there will be enough for everyone. Amen.