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Jesus' Table Etiquette

8/31/2022

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Luke 14:1-14

 
All this talk about banquets and feasts reminds me of my recent family get-together last week in Ohio.  We had a grand picnic/BBQ, featuring: my brothers Mike and Mark grilling hotdogs and burgers supervised by Mader, Mark’s dog; my sister-in-law’s famous 5 bean casserole, cousin Nick’s favorite fruit salad, cousin Joe’s amazing beet and corn salads, cousin Sandy’s best brownies, and my niece Sarah’s  freakingly awesome bailey’s Irish cream cupcakes.  Someone managed to dredge up my mom’s traditional lemonade recipe which hit the spot. Some of us haven’t seen each other since before COVID, for some it has been 30 years.  Without doubt the BBQ was the highlight of the summer.

So much we do centers on food.  Business deals are seal with food. Wedding vows are usually followed by a reception.  Friendships are forged and cemented around lattes, brewskis, pizzas or ice cream.  What’s a birthday without a cake or something similar? Funerals and wakes traditionally are followed by a meal or repast. Most of life’s transitions, beginnings and endings and all the accomplishments in between, are marked with food – from the humble picnic to the grand banquets. Food brings people together.  Even here at church, Coffee Hour is actually an extension, a sealing of our commitment to service and care of each other and our community.  The Lord’s Supper is the one ritual Jesus asks us to remember him by.  Meals are one way we show love for each other, as Hebrews exhorts us.

That is why rules of table etiquette have endured down the centuries.  To preserve the status quo.  To cement relationships.  Did you pass the salt and pepper right?  Did you use the right utensil, in the right manner?   How did you sit? Did you use your napkin properly?  Following these rules indict if you are a bonafide insider.  Often it turns the banquet from being an inclusive feast, based on heavenly principles, to an exclusive feast where the majority of people are not welcome, considered unrefined, uncouth, not suitable for decent society.

Whether at a banquet or a picnic, where we sit is key.  It tells you the pecking order of community. Who are getting along; who aren’t.  People often vie for the seats closest to those highest in rank.  In many cultures the men and women are segregated.  In our own country and others, meal segregation also fell along racial lines.  The best seats are reserved for the most important people, as our gospel story indicates.

In the Gospel of Luke, meals provide central settings for Jesus’ mission. As our gospel text reveals, it was the custom to invite people for a meal on the Sabbath after the worship service.  The meal in our story is attended by leaders and doctors of the Law. At this Sabbath meal Jesus is among the invited guests.

 Jesus begins his teaching by healing a man in front of him of dropsy (or edema, a swelling of the limbs due to a buildup of fluids).  The leaders were watching closely, as Jesus performed this miracle on the Sabbath.  Jesus next began to observe them closely, as people began to scramble for places of honor at the table. The Jewish Scriptures gave clear rules about seating order, and so the guests were really not speaking out of turn as they argued about their rank.

Jesus’ criticism of other invited guests seems out of place and impolite. They were following tradition, sitting according to rank.  It is Jesus who breaks with tradition, whose table manners are out of place.

Even though Jesus shared several meals with Pharisees (cf. 7:36), they often complained about his choice of (other) table-fellowship companions (cf. 5:30) and about how his associates secured food on the Sabbath (cf. 6:1-4).  Jesus loved food (cf. 7:33) and his disciples followed suit (cf. 5:33).  So it is at this banquet that Jesus teaches us what right etiquette is.  It has nothing to do with where you are at the table. It’s where you are at in your heart.  What is the banquet God loves? A banquet where the poor, crippled and lame, blind are invited. A banquet where people who can never repay.  Because that’s what God’s banquet looks like. All are invited. And none of us can repay the blessings we receive from God.  All we can do is pay it forward -- Continue the blessing of the feast.

Many years ago, the Boston Globe told the story of an unusual wedding reception. A woman and her fiancée had arranged to have their wedding reception at the Hyatt Hotel in Boston, and as they had expensive tastes the final bill on the contract came to over $13,000. But on the day the invitations were to go out, the groom got cold feet and asked for more time to think about things. When the woman went to the Hyatt to cancel the reception she found that she could not, unless she was willing to forfeit the vast majority of what she had paid.

       It turned out that ten years before this same bride had been living in a homeless shelter. She had been fortunate enough to get a good job and get back on her feet. Now she had the idea of using her savings to treat the down and outs of Boston to a night on the town. So, the Hyatt Hotel hosted a party such as it had never seen before.  She and sent invitations to shelters and rescue missions throughout the city. That summer night, people who were used to eating out of garbage cans dined on chicken cordon bleu. Hyatt waiters in tuxedos served hors d’ouevres to elderly vagrants propped up by crutches and walkers. Bag ladies and drug addicts took a night off from the hard life on the sidewalks outside and sipped champagne, ate chocolate wedding cake, and danced to big band melodies late into the night.   For this jilted bride to be, this unusual dinner party turned a negative experience into a positive one. It sends to us a message:  what is our table etiquette? 

Jesus invites to embrace this attitude as a way of life. To practice a spiritual table etiquette.  An etiquette not based on utensils, china, flower arrangements and five course meals.  But table etiquette concerned with love for God and for our neighbor, an eagerness to serve, a willingness to exalt others – not lording our good luck or our status over someone else. Jesus says, when you give a banquet, remember him.  As we soon enter a new church season, let us remember how Jesus went to banquets and healed. How he went to banquets and forgave.  How he went to banquets to provide new wine.  How he went to banquets of sinners, tax collectors and prostitutes as well as renowned Pharisees. Jesus called a banquet where he broke bread, shared the cup, took on the role of servant as he washed his disciples’ feet.  Remember, Jesus says, every day we are to give a banquet.

​As we celebrate Welcome Back Sunday in two weeks, we are called to hospitality not just based in food, but in feeding the world that craves for love, kindness, creating hope and reconciliation.  That’s the banquet to which we are called to serve, the meal our world needs every day. That’s the meal Jesus sets.  All are invited.  So let us celebrate a new family gathering in our new church season as Jesus did – let us keep the feast.  Amen.
 

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Succeeding in the Race of Faith

8/31/2022

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​Hebrews 11:29-12:2
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Sermon in part borrowed from: https://www.lifeway.com/en/articles/sermon-run-the-race-faith-hebrews-12


Who here’s a runner?  (oh brother, our ancient ancestors are rolling in their graves that this abysmal show of hands)!  While some of us may now run for pleasure or fitness, scientists tell us human beings have evolved the way they have because of endurance running.  Our hunter-gatherer ancestors clocked in on average 8-20 miles a day to outfox those hyenas and other competitors for that antelope or ostrich dinner. Over a couple of million years, humans developed a body structure with 26 traits unique to the human body due to running. So, endurance running, and eventually long-distance walking, is hardwired into our very bodies. We are built to run, to be a people on the go.

Life is a race — a race against the clock and a race against others. It's a race to achieve goals. A race to build a future. A race to be our very best selves. It's a race to find love, a race to find purpose, and a race to find ourselves.  Hebrews exhorts us today: “let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”  As believers in Jesus Christ, we run a spiritual race. It, too, is the race of a lifetime.

This is no ordinary race. The Greek word for race is agon from which we get our word agony. That gives us a clue that the race we are on isn’t always pleasant, easy or fun.  The race reveals an internal struggle of the soul. Our natural bent is toward sinfulness and laziness. Furthermore, the race we are called to is full of obstacles, barriers, and hurdles. Winning this race will require great endurance, perseverance, patience, and resolve. Victory necessitates that we run with steadfast endurance until we arrive at the finish line victorious.

Do you realize the number of hours an Olympian trains? The average Olympian trains four hours per day, 310 days per year, for six years before succeeding. That translates into more than 7,000 hours of training for an event that may last less than sixty seconds. 

This need for training is not only for athletes; it is mandatory for any significant challenge in life - including becoming a spiritual champion. Runners do many things for optimum effort. Stretching and warming up, Exercises for cooling down. Learning to pace the race.  Knowing when to run fast or run slow. Cross training. Getting adequate rest and nutrition.  A lot of factors go into running well.
Races are not always won by the fastest. But rather by the one that keeps hanging on, who refuses to give up. Those who persist prevail. the great need for spiritual races is persistence. Time and time again The Scripture exhort us to persist and endure. The apostle Paul prayed for the Colossians "May you be strengthened with all power . . . for all endurance and patience" (Col. 1:11). In addition to persistence, the races we run, spiritually or physically call us to train wisely. The apostle Paul encouraged his young protégé Timothy to "train yourself in godliness" (1 Tim. 4:7).  So, to win our spiritual race we act with persistence, not giving up when the going gets tough; and train wisely.

Training wisely means we develop habits that help us gain power and strength to become more like Jesus each day, to live a life as Jesus taught and modeled.  Paul reminds us that “everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training” (1 Cor. 9:25a). Consider it all: the activities of prayer, reflection, meditation and self-examination; Bible Study, worship, service, developing the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit, stewardship, observing sabbaths, tithing and giving of our time, talents and treasurers creates a spiritual body able to endure the ups and downs of the race. If we want to win the prize, the imperishable crown, there are no two ways about it: we must train spiritually as strenuously as we would train for a marathon, invest as much time as we do to further our careers, put in the effort to deepen our relationships with loved ones.  We cannot expect something for nothing. If we want love we must go after it sacrificially.  If we want a work position, we must vigorously put ourselves forward. If we want to be Christians, we must step in the master’s shoes.  To do any less than this means we have become content to be pseudo-Christians, superficially spiritual. Pius on the outside, empty on the inside.

In even training regime, in every race, eventually comes a plateau. We’ve done well. We have made some accomplishments.  We’ve conquered the mountains; we have slogged through the valleys. Then we find ourselves spinning our wheels. Hitting a wall. Not progressing.  We experience plateaus in diets.  The scale won’t budge an ounce, no matter how faithful you’ve been. It’s physiological - Our body is bound and determined to maintain a homeostasis: a balance – it clings to the weight it has gotten accustomed to.
       We experience plateaus in relationships.  The crush of the daily grind has taken the spark out of the relationship with a friend loved one or a spouse. We end up taking each other for granted.  We start to bicker with each other.

We hit plateaus in our careers.  We aren’t progressing anymore; we fail to delight in learning new skills.  We don’t keep up with continuing education.

We hit plateaus in our spiritual lives.  The passion for the Lord has cooled.  We go through the motions but our hearts have cooled. Spiritual habits fall away or disappear on our daily to do list. We make excuses for ourselves. We fail to confess sin, we are unrepentant, or worse we think we are just fine and become blind to the errors of our ways. The bible tells us “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us (1 John 1:8).”  Without realizing it, we can stay stuck in a plateau.  The danger in this if we don’t intervene to change our ways is that we slowly, imperceptivity, decline. 

The people of Israel were stuck in the wilderness 40 years because of sin and disbelief. The same is seen in the life of the church, we are running in place; we have become content with plateau living. It’s comfortable. At times we become slightly uncomfortable, but not enough to make a change. The truth of the matter is that churches everywhere have plateaued. We’ve accomplished a lot but now we’re stuck.  It mirrors our individual plateaus. Our choices are stark: we can begin to decline. We stay comfortable where we are and refuse to budge an ounce.  Or we come to the awareness that action is needed to continue the race.  Drastic action.  Painful action.  Action that takes us out of complacency and moves us forward to our next best place.  We need action like taking stock of our situations; like repentance. The only way to change is to confess where we are at, and be willing to get uncomfortable, even hurt, to jolt us out of the plateau.

What will it take to get back on track?  Back in the race?  Is it the threat that our church may die? Our relationships fizzle and distant?   We gain back all the weight we lost and then some?  Our values become sinfully compromised?  Hebrews gives us example of plateaus overcome; not by human effort, but by God intervening and when people in faith obeyed. Hear again what Hebrews tells us:
It was by faith that the people crossed the Red Sea as if it were dry land. God intervened and got the people out of the plateau of living in slavery, even while they clamored for their fleshpots in Egypt.
 It was by faith that Rahab, the prostitute, welcomed the spies and was not killed with those who refused to obey God.  God intervened again and saved the lives of the scouts to help them gain a foothold in the Promised Land.

          It was by faith that the walls of Jericho fell after the people had marched around them for seven days.  God intervened and got the people of Israel out of the desert and into the Promised Land.
God intervened through Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets. When the people were content to live in a plateau of sin, cultural accommodations to pagan ways, God intervened to help them remember who they are, children of God, and because of this, to push them forward.    
Only God can get us through the plateau. God wants us to move forward, God wants our very best, more than we want it for ourselves.  God does these through extraordinary, unconventional means. Through a prostitute named Rahab. Not by traditional warfare, but just circling Jericho seven times with the ark of the covenant. God will do the same for us. What unconventional, extraordinary ways, what opportunity in the guise of a crisis, is God going to work in our lives to move us beyond the plateau?  

As we get ready for a new church season, as seek to be a vital congregation, we need to get uncomfortable with plateaus.  We need to yearn for better, hope for more, be willing to sacrifice to improve.  Whatever race we are in, are we willing to get uncomfortable to continue the race?  Are we willing to switch things up like a runner would?  Or embark on a new plan like someone committed to a healthier lifestyle?  Or put in the time and effort that it takes to save or improve a relationship? Can we have the painful and awkward conversations that are necessary to clear the air and create space for change?

 Let us commit to leave behind the plateau. Can we agree to help each other, to work together to do this? That’s how we succeed in running this race, by turning our eyes to the prize, our heart set on the crown that Jesus promises those who complete the marathon ahead of us.  Let us ask God to intervene and be prepared for the unexpected to happen to open the space, clear the way, remove all that hinders. Through the mercy of God, we can crush the plateau, cross the finish line, and say along with Paul: I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith (2 Timothy 4:7).


 
 
https://www.irinadubinski.com/450183624
  • .
https://www.coachmag.co.uk/exercises/1492/50-best-running-tips
https://www.goruvi.com/blogs/news/10-tips-to-make-running-a-better-experience?gclid=CjwKCAjw3K2XBhAzEiwAmmgrAtovoBqqjS31zrOCXzg2m_ICVgpQnq_j8R68RImYs1KAFnNYXyx4nxoCEaAQAvD_BwE
 
https://www.quora.com/How-many-miles-did-early-humans-walk-in-a-day
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/11/041123163757.htm
https://www.google.com/search?q=how+many+miles+did+ancient+humans+run+a+day&rlz=1C1AVFC_enUS864US864&oq=how+many+miles+did+ancient+humans+run+a+day&aqs=chrome..69i57j33i299l2.13114j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
 
https://www.google.com/search?q=life+is+a+race&rlz=1C1AVFC_enUS864US864&oq=life+is+a+race&aqs=chrome..69i57j0i67j0i512j0i67j0i20i263i512j0i512j46i512j0i512l3.2671j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8


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Our Heart's Treasure

8/10/2022

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Genesis 15:1-6, Luke 12:32-34

 
If you were to examine your checking account, your bank statement, your log of spending, or how you spend your time, what would it say about your values?   Some of us may have a mountain of receipts from Starbucks, eat outs like Dominos pizza, taco bell, or McDonalds.  Perhaps that would tell us you like prepared food in your diet.   Some of us have a cleaning service, spend hours a week straightening up the apartment or house.  You value tidiness and cleanliness.   Some of us rack up bills every month on clothing items, accessories, new shoes.  You like to have a great wardrobe.  Some of us pore over our investments and are on the phone or computer tweaking stocks and other financial products.  You value saving and increasing wealth.  Maybe your records show you tithe, contribute to charitable organizations, spend time watching over neighbors and others in need, go to church regularly and read the Bible and pray every day.  Church and giving back are at the top of your list. 

Conversely, churches that are seeking to revitalize  or initiate change are do a self-study, or called a plumb line study in our Presbytery, that includes among other things an examination of the budget and the annual reports from recent years.  Such a study reveals the values, strengths and weaknesses of the congregation.  We discover what percentage do we spend on Christian Education? Mission? Programming? Property and grounds?  Staff to carry out our vision and goals?  Such an analysis, done on a personal or church level, is a starting point to show ourselves our priorities.   The big question then becomes what do we make of our priorities?  Is God calling us to change, or set new priorities in order to become a more vital congregation, a more committed follower of Jesus?

Where your heart is, there is your treasure, Jesus declares.   That which we treasure we naturally invest our time and resources in.  A person’s heart is tied to what they value most in life.  Ideally our goal in life should be that our heart is in synch which that which gives the most value. Our balance statement, as Christ-followers, should reveal a preponderance of heavenly over earthy treasure.  There is nothing wrong with earthly treasure as long as we understand it is temporary. What we share and do on behalf of others and God’s kingdom endures.  Jesus tells us we do this when we seek treasure stored up in heaven, treasure that is of eternal value, that does rust, that can’t be stolen from us, that moths cannot come in and destroy.  Love, faith, service, caring for others, builds up lasting treasure. As Jesus tells the rich man:  “If you want to be perfect (whole, complete), go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me” (Matt. 19:21).   Jesus describes how we ought to prioritize the things in our lives with this parable, “Again the Kingdom of Heaven is likened to treasure that was hidden in a field which a man found and hid, and for his joy he went selling everything that he had and he bought that field. (Matthew 13:44).”

The first mention of treasure in the gospels is actually n the story of the wise men in Matthew’s infancy narrative.  The wise men from the east, probably Persia.   They belonged to most highly esteemed caste of their society, yet they personally leave their homes an arduous journey, to follow a star that would lead them to the King of the Jews.  They could have stayed home. They could have send their assistants on their behalf. But they took time out of their lives, at least 4-5 months.  When they found Jesus they were overjoyed, emptied their treasures of gold frankincense and myrrh.  Except for perhaps gold, this may not sound so treasurey. Yet it is their devotion to find the King of the Jews, their grasp of his mission that prompts them to give gifts that symbolize the kingship, priesthood and sacrificial death of Jesus.  This thoughtfulness is also a treasure.  The gift and application of their knowledge, their investment of time, their devotion to Jesus and expression of joy are also treasures that we can emulate in our lives.

What did Mary, the mother of Jesus, think of these exotic foreigners and their gifts?  Although Matthew doesn’t say it, I bet she treasured this experience because Mary is the one person we are told by bible translators as someone who treasures the events in Jesus’ life.  Luke tells us of the time when Mary hears the witness of the shepherds who tell of the angels giving glad tidings of the birth of Christ the Lord.  The gospels often translate Mary’s response to this as “Mary treasured and pondered this things in her heart (Luke 2;19).” Some verses later we hear of how Jesus, Mary and Joseph traveled to Jerusalem to the Temple and Jesus got lost.  On their return, they find Jesus sitting with other wise men, these wise men are not foreigners from Persia, but teachers of the Jewish faith.  Mary observes Jesus listening and answering their questions.  Mary sees how everyone is amazed at Jesus’s depth of understanding and answers.  The text tells us again that Mary treasured and pondered these things. (Luke 2:51)

  So, Mary is a model of how we treasure Jesus in our hearts, his example, his teachings, and like Mary, humbly follow Jesus.  To treasure like Mary, we protect, keep safe, and preserve the message we receive.   To treasure like Mary means Jesus is our primary focus, and his teachings are the foundation and guide of how we prioritize our time and resources. 
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As we continue our journey to become a vital congregation, to be vital followers of Jesus, let us take the time to examine our spiritual balance sheets.  How are our treasures adding up? How can we increase our heavenly treasure?  Look at Abraham and Sarah, who faithfully waited 90 years, for the treasure God promised, a son Isaac, from whom came descendants more numerous than the stars.  May we be as devoted as Abraham and Sarah, as the wise men, as Mary.  It is never too late to reprioritize. We can make Jesus the center of our lives. For he is truly meant to be our heart’s treasure. May we give up all that gets in the way to claim one as number one in our hearts. amen.
 

https://www.sermoncentral.com/sermons/treasure-in-heaven-jim-keegan-sermon-on-greed-256103?page=1&wc=800
 


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"Rich in Relationship with God"

8/3/2022

1 Comment

 
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 Luke 12:13-21

 
They say that everyone has a price.

        Judging by the recent skyrocketing Mega Millions jackpot this past week the dream of easy money has led to the sales of more than 6000 tickets a minute as of Thursday night.

A recent survey unearthed unsettling images of what people would do for fast money.  Perhaps people are exaggerating but the thoughts are disturbing:
  • For $10,000,000?  They would abandon their entire family, abandon their church; would give up their American citizenships or leave their spouses; would withhold testimony and let a murderer go free.
  • for $100,000? They would forge a signature or steal from a restaurant or hotel. And for that same amount,  they would enter into a sham marriage, perform a sexual act on a stranger, evade taxes or snatch a purse.
  • For $10,0000? They would flash a stranger or steal a street sign, or shoplift; would lie under oath, steal a bike or knowingly spend counterfeit cash for the same price.

For better or worse, money is one of the main motivators in life and not always for the good.  The truth is there are people who would do these acts, other sins or evil for even less money than reported.

Today Jesus is approached by a man motivated by money, he asks Jesus “Teacher tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.”   The man is making an ordinary request of a rabbi, who often intervened in family disputes.  The Hebrew Scriptures refer to inheritance over 200 times, and situations could get complex and family relationships turn sour or divisive.  We probably all know of a situation where an inheritance situation caused a family rift.  Even one of Jesus’ most famous parables, the prodigal son, is about inheritance laws and how they can drive family members apart.   
 
Yet Jesus is reluctant to be a judge or arbitrator in this case. Instead of addressing the case straight on, he takes a different tact.  Jesus instead wants to address the underlying problem that drives most cases like this: greed.  We need to be on guard against greed, wherever it crops up; in an inheritance situation or simply in the abundance of possessions we can accumulate in life.


To get this point across, Jesus tells the story about a fellow who becomes rich and whose crops produce abundantly.   What a lucky man! His lands are fruitful. There is little he has had to do personally. The crop is a gift.  He’s so rich he thinks he has to build even bigger barns to hold all excess grains and goods.  Isn’t he exactly the kind of guy we admire? He’s successful and is able to upgrade to a one of these new mini mansions, a fancier bigger ultra-SUV car, designer suits, luxury vacations, all the trappings of the good life.   Isn’t this what our culture teaches us - to make enough so we too can relax, eat, drink, be merry?

Yet the individual who is so admired, perhaps to a degree by us, if not by a lot of people is called a fool by God.   “You Fool!  God says.   This very night your life will be required of you.” The Greek word for “required” is a legal term that implies a loan that has come due.  Jesus implies here that life is a gift, a loan to us. God gave us this gift of life to invest ourselves in the world and each other. Life, in God’s eyes, is not about getting or consumerism.  Life is not for us to squander but for us to engage, to find and express God’s will. The loan of our life is to create a rich relationship with God and with each other not to surround ourselves with riches for our own exclusive benefit.

The absence of family and friends in the rich fool’s life is striking.  Whose life has the rich fool prepared and made better from all his work? There is no one. In his conversation, it’s all about me, myself and I.   When at last he has built his bigger barns to last him many years, he does not envision a better future for anyone but himself.  He has not used his excess grain to feed the hungry, or his goods to help the needy.  God asks the rich fool a piercing question, “These things you have prepared, whose will they be?”  There is no one.  It is all for naught. 

The rich fool’s focus on accumulation of wealth was the ultimate purpose of his life, just like what is pursued by millions of Americans with a dollar and a dream, as the lottery tells us.   Our lives, loaned to us are meant for activity that is redemptive and other focused.  This is the reason for the loan of our lives.  We are meant to use our resources, our money, our treasures, to make the world a better place to live, starting with our neighborhood.

        When I think of a life loan well invested, I can’t help but think of my mother. When I was baby, my mother ran for public office in order to bring some positive change into the community.  My mother had campaign literature printed with my baby mug on it that said, “Time for a new change.”    She ran up against a powerful incumbent, and rumors were even spread that there might be a Vatican infiltration in Strongsville, Ohio.  My mother lost that election, but she didn’t stop fighting to make her corner of the world a better place.

        Unlike the rich fool, my mother, barely had proverbial two coins to rub together.     Her barn was never full.  She understood her life was a loan from God and she was her to prepare something better.  Among the things she did she created a neighborhood watch group that provided loans and grants for home improvement to families of modest incomes.   She always found time to help home-bound people get their shopping done.  She made and delivered care packages to disabled veterans.   She could not pass by wounded animals: she would take the creature to the veterinarian and pay the expenses out of her own pocket.   She was not rich like the man in the parable, but she was rich in how Jesus wants us to be rich:  to help others. To better the world. That’s what it makes to be rich to with God.

        Sadly, our world has reversed these priorities and our culture teaches us to focus on ourselves.  Look at our Old Testament lesson from Exodus.  The Egyptians enslave the people of Israel to build up an empire for themselves. In this scenario, the enslaved Israelites are just a commodity.  Enslaved to their dreams of wealth, they impoverish others.  Sadly, that about sums up the current state of affairs in our world.  2,100 people control more wealth than the bottom 4.6 billion.

        For everything there is a price.  For us, Jesus paid that price on the cross.  As we seek to revitalize our lives and our churches, let us remember all we have is a loan from God to enable us to be givers, not getters. To help others. As Matthew 25 reminds us: to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, to clothe the naked, to visit the sick or imprisoned.  To put God first in all we do. As we put God first, our lives naturally overflow to embracing others, and we too are blessed as a result.  Let us ask ourselves: how’s our loan doing? What does our investment strategy have to say about us?  When that loan comes due, what will we have to show for it? The things we have prepared, whose will they be? Remember the saying, you’ll never see a U-Haul behind a hearse. Let us take that loan and transform our energy and resources to building a more just, righteous world. And that would be an inheritance worth sharing.  Amen.

​https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/10-americans-porn-1-million-article-1.2493861
  • James Patterson and Peter Kim, The Day America Told the Truth, 1991
  • https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-07/pandemic-is-golden-age-for-billionaire-wealth-piketty-lab-says#:~:text=The%20share%20of%20global%20wealth,said%20in%20a%20report%20Tuesday.
 

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    Moirajo is a minister, social worker, wife, mother, writer and animal lover. That's just for starters. Join the story, there's so much we can share together! 

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