Here's the audio link and manuscript for my sermon from Sunday, August 1st, 2010

"How to Manage a Miracle"--a sermon from Sunday, August 1st, 2010 at Park Avenue Presbyterian Church, Des Moines, Iowa. 

If you'd like to hear the sermon recorded during worship, click on the link below and download: 

http://www.box.net/shared/zb7kd9l8bk


The manuscript I used follows below: 


The Eighteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time; August 01, 2010

Park Avenue Presbyterian Church; Des Moines, Iowa
Texts: Hosea 11: 1-11
Psalm 107: 1-9, 43
Colossians 3: 1-11
Luke 12: 13-21 *

“How to Manage a Miracle”

--} When I was growing up, I really enjoyed watching “The Price is Right.” The best part was seeing someone play a game when the prize was… “a new car!” But the real joy was that if I was watching The Price is Right, either I was home from school, or it was summertime. Still, I managed two important lessons if I were ever to go on the show: First, the “retail price” was always “overpriced;” and then there was always my mother’s insistence that you “never wanted to really be a big winner.” That never sounded right to me, but mom understood that if you won, you had to pay extra income taxes—and you had to come up with that money somehow. You see, no one ever really “budgets” for unforeseen game show winnings, right? Just like the man in Jesus’ parable doesn’t “budget” storage space for the sudden and unforeseen super-abundant harvest.

Today’s reading from Luke’s gospel offers us two important lessons, too. First, there’s the meaning of Jesus’ parable in verses 16-21—as Jesus tells it; then, there’s the meaning Luke offers believers based on where Luke places the parable in its gospel context. And while on the surface, the plain reading seems to lend itself to the conclusion that Jesus advises his followers not to be greedy, I think both Jesus and Luke take us a step or two further.

Jesus’ parable is a story about an already wealthy man whose land has too much produce. And while that doesn’t sound right, the “big problem” is that he doesn’t have enough storage space for such an unusual, super-abundant harvest; so he’s got to figure out what to do. If you want a comparison reference, it’s like going on The Price is Right, and playing the Showcase Showdown, where your Showcase is, let’s say, a dozen Cadilacs—one from each decade that Cadilacs have been made. And, by stroke of fate or genius—you win. Now, what are you going to do with all those cars? Your garage isn’t big enough, right?

So, think for a moment. You can either be the already wealthy man in Jesus’ parable, or you can be the person who’s just won the dozen Cadilacs on The Price is Right (and you can forget about the tax implications for a moment). What are you going to do to either take care of the new-found produce? How might you solve the problem?

Then listen to the wealthy man’s solution in Jesus’ parable. He responds to the problem with drastic action, proposing not to simply build additional granaries or add on to his existing ones (which might make some sense); rather, he means to tear down the current ones and put up entirely new ones! It indicates not only his great wealth, but particularly, his ineptness. Having decided thusly, he presumes that the benefit of such a grand harvest is the completion of his work, and he can just sit back and be fat and happy. But what’s “wrong” with this picture isn’t just this man’s solution, but his inappropriate actions in response to God’s provision.

In Hebrew traditions there are a couple of stories that probably would have been in the mind of Jesus’ hearers. First is the story of Joseph in Egypt, where Joseph saved the Egyptians and the Israelites by “storing up a surplus from bountiful harvests.” But more than just building the storage space to accommodate this task, the observation Bernard Brandon Scott suggests would have been resident was that Jesus’ story of the rich fool turns on the idea that “a surplus implies a barren future.” What Jesus’ audience should have presumed was that such a super-abundant harvest was more than just good fortune. “…For those to whom much is given, much is required,” right? And the idea that this already wealthy man presumes to do nothing but sit back, fat and happy, would reveal his foolishness.

A second story Jesus’ hearers could have used to measure the parable by was the instruction about Sabbath preparations from Exodus. Again, Bernard Brandon Scott points out, “While the people were in the desert, on the sixth day they gathered twice as much manna, for on the Sabbath, a day of rest, they would find nothing in the field.” God had promised to feed the people, providing food that had to be gathered daily, but not at the expense of Sabbath requirements. So on the sixth day, there was a double-gift, intended to be used the following day—not for making one rich. In fact, for the Israelites who tried to gather “extra” beyond what God intended, the food spoiled or rotted—which seems akin to what happens to the man in Jesus’ parable who stores up riches only to have his life asked of him.

This particular story seems important to Luke’s context as well, where Jesus has been teaching the crowds about the fearlessness faith inspires by relying exclusively on God’s Holy Spirit! And beyond just the weekly Sabbath observance, the Deuteronomic and Levetical codes both explain that even every seventh year, God’s jubilee blessing mandates a repositioning of wealth—as loans are required to be forgiven, the “land” is required to have a fallow year, and God provides the means for living this different lifestyle that takes the welfare of the whole community into account.

By contrast, we note the actions of the already wealthy man in Jesus’ parable—presuming such a super-abundant harvest belongs only to him, with no other purpose aside from his own comfort. So that when God asks in verse 20, “And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?”, the only appropriate answer that should ring in the heads of Jesus’ audience would be, “those for whom they were originally intended.” The point being that wealth in and of itself is not particularly wrong, but that wealth always needs to be managed, understood, and used appropriately—in relationship to others. The parable seems to evidence that the bountiful harvest is God’s intention—meant for more than just one individual. But this man has suddenly presumed that it is “his wealth”—to his folly!

But when Luke tells this story about Jesus, he seems at first to plant Jesus’ story in the soil of “greediness.” In verse 15 Jesus says, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed. For one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Such “advice” seems true enough, matching well with other stories from the wisdom tradition about greed—one of the best known is a slightly different version of this parable in the Gospel of Thomas. But this isn’t Luke’s only point.

Luke creates the context where someone from the crowd is asking Jesus to weigh in on a family struggle—“tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me. But Jesus’ response to this person is key to getting Luke’s point right. Before that line warning us about greed, Jesus answers the question with another question, “who set me to be a judge or arbiter over you?”

I think this is an important question, especially for those of us who would follow Jesus. How might we answer Jesus? Because I think the answer for us—more so than those in the crowd—is really something like, “well, we make you judge and arbiter over us, Jesus.” We give Jesus titles like, “Lord” and “Savior,” or “Prophet, Priest, and King”—doesn’t “Judge” or “arbiter” fit the list, too? And it’s at this point that I believe Jesus gets cagey—as if there were a deep pause between verses 14 and 15.

Luke suddenly creates another point for believers. If we are intentional in giving Jesus such an important role in our lives and in how we conduct our daily business, then Jesus isn’t simply offering friendly advice about greediness. Instead, Jesus lays out the terms of the Kingdom of God—as if Jesus were saying, “IF you make me Lord, judge, arbiter, etc., THEN you must be on your guard against all kinds of greed because LIFE isn’t about possessions.” This isn’t “wise advice,” but rather, “kingdom requirements” for believers and followers.

So that the point of Luke’s telling of Jesus’ parable is as Bernard Brandon Scott sees it, that the parable’s metaphor for the kingdom [of God] is not simply the [super-abundant] harvest but the good life it is intended to produce for the community. As with all God’s gifts, super-abundance is the norm. But not so that our work is done and we can be fat and happy—it’s so that the community can rejoice and celebrate.

Because what’s the point of winning a dozen Cadilacs on The Price is Right? You can’t drive them all at once, and you’d have to pay all those taxes on the ones you weren’t using! Some prize, eh?!

--+ Friends, God sent his son, the Christ, to demonstrate for us the Kingdom Life. So that we can trust God’s provision and celebrate new life—NOT so we can enjoy possessions only. Thanks be to God. AMEN.