Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost: Constructing Meaning out of Suffering

Isaiah 58:9b-14

Psalm 103:1-8

Hebrews 12:18-29

Luke 13:10-17

In March of 1863, the Boston physician and abolitionist Dr. Henry Bowditch, received a terse telegram regarding his son Nathaniel serving in the Union army: “Potomac Creek, March 18, 1863.  Nat shot in jaw.  Wound in abdomen.  Dangerous.  Come at once.”  Upon arriving in Washington DC, he learned that his son had died.  He wrote these words in his private papers: “I scarcely know what to think or do.  I seem almost stunned by the news.  My whole nature yearns to see and hear him once again.  God has been very kind to me all my life long, and I have an abiding faith that this blow is only a disguised blessing.  Nevertheless, at times, I feel crushed.”  The following July would witness that which would prove be a watershed event in the war: Gettysburg – 51,000 casualties, 7,786 dead.  These two events – a personal one and a national one – both marked a turning point in the consciousness of the American people.  In learning about his son’s death from eyewitnesses, Dr Bowditch became convinced that it could have been avoided had adequate ambulance provision existed.  He immediately became an advocate for an ambulance service in the Union Army.  Writing from the standpoint of a grieving parent, and hoping this would give his argument credibility, he published, “A Brief Plea for an Ambulance System for the Army of the United States” and argued that “the government had a wider obligation to the soldiers it asked to fight and die in its name.”  At the same time, the sheer number of the dead and wounded in the Pennsylvania fields outside the small town of Gettysburg just a few months later overwhelmed the nation.  The burial of the dead was an arduous task, yet hardly considered the responsibility of the government.  The work fell on their surviving comrades and the citizens of the town itself.  Shortly after the battle, and with financial help from every state in the Union that had lost men in the engagement, a local lawyer named David Wills oversaw the purchase of 17 acres in the town.  These were soon taken over by the government, and dedicated in November by Abraham Lincoln as the new Soldiers’ National Cemetery.  This marked the beginning of the National Cemetery System, and helped to define the government’s commitment to those who gave “the last full measure of devotion.”  Both the military ambulance service and the national cemeteries have since then faithfully honored those who have served to defend the nation’s stability and well-being, as well as brought some measure of comfort to those who love them.

By now you may be asking, “Why all this about the Civil War?”.  Well, it is because I spoke about suffering last week, and my thinking about it extended well beyond last Sunday.  Moreover, on coming across some facts about the Civil War, I was reminded once again of the national suffering it caused, and on what a monumental scale.  It quite simply transformed the nation, and I was brought to thinking of the transforming nature and power of suffering itself;  how it challenges us with two options – railing in the dark or lighting a candle, while at the same time offering us the opportunity to grow in compassion, to widen our circle of concern, to make meaning out of its absolute meaninglessness by finding ways to redeem it, even if only partially.  We cannot escape suffering, what Shakespeare called in Hamlet “the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
that flesh is heir to.”  We can, however, choose our response and we can commit ourselves to enabling others to escape even some of its effects.  We either can make our suffering and that of others have some meaning, or we can continue the cycle of suffering and violence as we inflict it upon others.

In the ancient near-east suffering due to either poverty, illness or disability was an everyday reality; and the woman who approached Jesus would have been typical of the many sick, poor or disturbed who found themselves without resources and at the mercy of their fellow-citizens for even the most basic of necessities.  Moreover, her status as poor, disabled, and as a woman would have marked her as an outcast.  At the same time, the man she encountered in Jesus is one who would have well understood the life of the outcast – born in stable, raised by a single mother in a patriarchal world, and living the life of an itinerant would have marked him as “beyond the pale” too.  And we can only assume that it was his own lived experience that colored so distinctly his interactions with and care for the those who suffered most, whether due to illness or the social structures of their day.  His reputation would undoubtedly have preceded him, and so this woman found the courage to approach him.  Nevertheless, his compassionate act of solidarity and of liberation is challenged by the authorities who cite rules and regulations in order to stem the tide which they perceive to be eroding their power.  And their own communal memory of suffering as slaves in Egypt, as well as the contemporary reality of their vassaldom under the Romans seems forgotten, as they seek to enforce their own subjugation of others.  The story encapsulates the two reactions we as human beings have to suffering.  Either it opens us up into greater awareness of the suffering of others – seeking to make better the systems and situations that cause suffering itself, or it closes up as we look to  protect our little patch of whatever we deem as our own.  I don’t think I need to say to which of these the Good News of God in Jesus calls us. 

But still, we are each of us left with the question for ourselves.  Everyone, absolutely everyone suffers in one way or another.  It is, as I starkly said last week, part and parcel of life.  We can be sure of it, and can rarely control its entering into our lives.  But nevertheless we have latitude in our reaction to it.  Will it open us up, or shut us down?  In our suffering, will we seek solidarity with others who similarly suffer and do something to better their lot, or will we build a wall, cut ourselves off in the unattainable hope of keeping suffering perpetually at bay?  Certainly, the latter is tempting, because the pain can be so terrible, the blow so hurtful and disorientating that retreat seems the only action of which we find ourselves capable.  When Henry Bowditch heard of Nathaniel’s death he wrote that the news struck like a dagger in the heart.  His first reaction was retreat.  Desperate to do anything to keep his son’s memory alive, he had the young man’s body embalmed, brought home and buried beneath an elaborate monument.  Still he was left feeling that he must do more, and move beyond the immediate place of wounededness and grief.  It was then he conceived his idea for the army’s ambulance system.    His suffering shaped him, but it did not ultimately determine him.  And that is a subtle but crucial distinction.  What determined him was his tireless work to make provision for other fathers’ sons.  We are all of shaped by suffering, but do we allow suffering to determine us?  Or do we choose a determination which marks us out as people of courage, people of character, people of hope?  The work of constructing meaning out of meaningless suffering is a difficult one, but it is ultimately a work of hope which will not allow suffering to have the final word in deciding who we are, in determining our fundamental nature.  The work of constructing meaning out of suffering draws out in us the very image of the God, who brings light out of darkness, order out of chaos, and life out of death.

Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost: Commitment, Suffering and Love

Jeremiah 23:23-29

Psalm 82

Hebrews 11:29-12:32

Luke 12:49-56

You may have noticed that the Sunday lectionary is leading us through the letter to Hebrews.  Written sometime before AD 70 and the Roman destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, its author is unknown, and it is not so much a letter as a sermon; a sermon addressed to Jewish Christians who, as one commentator observes, “[having] committed themselves to Christ enthusiastically; now however [had] become disillusioned and miss[ed] the ceremonies of Judaism.”  Moreover, as I mentioned last week, their commitment to Christ had started to become seriously costly as they faced social ostracism and even persecution.  Remembering all this, and in praying over the readings, two verses from the Letter to the Hebrews almost instinctively came to mind – one from chapter ten and the other (which we will hear next week) from chapter twelve.  In the first, the writer reminds his hearers of the seriousness of the commitment they have made, saying, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God”. (Hebrews 10:31)  In the second, he draws on Temple imagery of sacrifice and exhorts them to “offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe, for indeed our God is a consuming fire.” (Hebrews 12:28b, 29)  At the same time, today the writer reminds them – and us – of the great figures of the tradition who in faith endured all sorts of sufferings and privations, and of Jesus himself “the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame.” (Hebrews 12:2)  Coming into the presence of God and taking up God’s call seems to entail hardship, and in the Gospel Jesus’ own words starkly highlight this: “I came to cast fire on the earth….Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth?  No, I tell you, but rather division.” (Luke 12:49a, 51)

Now, what I am going to say will surprise no one, but bear with me – “Suffering is part and parcel of life.”  Suffering is part and parcel of life, and doing the right thing is no guarantee of conventional reward, no safeguard against the vagaries of life or the cruelty of others; but rather quite often it seems just the opposite.  It seems the price we pay for behaving well, being faithful.  One of the most marvelous aspects of Christianity – and personally one of the reasons I am a Christian and remain a Christian – is that our faith does not shy away from that reality.  Indeed, suffering is foundational to the faith, as well as to the identity and self-understanding of Christians.  Suffering is so often and over again the consequence of making a faithful pledge to God, as the writer to the Hebrews details in his various examples, and as we witness in the life and death of Jesus.  In each case it is their faith – in the sense that we have been discussing it, in the sense of trusting commitment; it is their faith which brings them into the dangerous places in which they find themselves.  It is their faithful commitment to God, to justice, to their fellow human beings, to the cause of what is true or honest or beautiful which brings suffering into their lives.  If they had not cared, if they had not committed, if they had did not loved, they wouldn’t have suffered quite so much; and isn’t love just another word for “faithfulness”, another word for “commitment”?

I mentioned last week, that if we are to mature in the faith, mature in our prayer  life, then we must move beyond the image we so often have of God as simply a dispenser of gifts or favors.  However, we must also move beyond the notion that only good things happen to good people.  I am not sure, where we get this idea.  I don’t see it in the Scriptures.  I don’t see it in the tradition.  What I do see is the very costly nature of faithfulness, the costly nature of commitment, the costly nature of love; what I do see is the price – in the form of some kind of suffering – which faithful people pay for being faithful, taking a stand, making a commitment.  Again, I never know why this should surprise us when Jesus himself makes it clear: “Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14:27);  and when he reminds us, “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.  Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” (Matthew 5:11-12)  Jesus consistently highlights the cost of discipleship, of commitment, of loving God and loving the Good News of God’s kingdom.  And if we still don’t get it, he gives it to us point blank: “I came to cast fire on the earth….Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth?  No, I tell you, but rather division.” (Luke 12:49a, 51)  I am reminded of a short encounter in the television program the West Wing when the President’s personal aide was shot at.  A colleague reminded, him “If they’re shooting at you, you know you’re doing something right.”  So, if you want a quiet life, if you want conventional peace, don’t stand up, don’t join up.  Remain socially acceptable and respectable.  Remain lukewarm and “reasonable” in your loves and in your commitments.  Do what people expect and what people like.  However, if you want life, real life, abundant life, then you must enter into its fullness.  “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly,” (John 10:10) Jesus says in the Gospel of John.  And abundant life means committing to something real, taking a stand for something that matters, trusting in something that is more than just about me and my little world or concerns.  It means loving extravagantly and even recklessly.  And, I am sorry – well not really all that sorry – to tell you that, generally, the cost of all that is suffering in some form or another because people will hate and victimize you, you will get hurt, your heart will be broken and sometimes your body too.  This is what the lives of saints teach us, it is was Jesus’ life teaches us.  Why or why, would we think that our following him, would signify anything different?

We’ve talked about faith, commitment, discipleship, but the word we have been skirting around is love, because in the end that is what is about.  It is about love.  Our suffering is so often the consequence of our loving.  If we did not love, if we did not care, we wouldn’t suffer quite so much.  But if we did not love, we would be something less than what we were created to be, something less than human.  It is our love for God – and for others – expressed in our faithfulness, as well as in our commitments, that seems often enough to break us open in pain, but it does break us open and marvelously so.  God may not cause or even will our suffering, but in our being broken open by it, God can enter in to comfort – yes – but also to transform.  While so much suffering is utterly senseless, in the context of love, faithfulness, commitment, solidarity, in the context of these we can construct some meaning, still create something beautiful.  In opening ourselves up to suffering, we can glimpse the very depths of love, real love, love that is lasting and un-romanticized.  In opening ourselves up to suffering, we also open ourselves up to the breadth of the human experience; and, ironically enough, in opening ourselves up to suffering we also open ourselves up to being changed, redeemed into people of greater compassion, greater tolerance, kinder, more gentle.  It may well be true – as the writer of Hebrews observes – that our God is a consuming fire; but the image of fire in Scripture is not that of destroyer, but purifier, that which can configure us more closely into the image and likeness of God.  And so we needn’t fear it as much as we do.  In the company of the whole Church in heaven and on earth we know that fire, trials, sufferings are the all too common consequences of following the way of real peace, the way of genuine love.  When we are committed to these, then there is no escaping some difficult, uncomfortable, even devastating consequences.  Nevertheless, in confronting those trials in love and faithfulness therein lies our redemption, our wholeness, our salvation.

This has been little better expressed than by the Lebanese poet, writer and artist, Kahlil Gibran, in his book The Prophet – and I will end with his words.

When love beckons to you, follow him,

Though his ways are hard and steep.

And when his wings enfold you yield to him,

Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.

And when he speaks to you believe in him,

Though his voice may shatter your dreams

   as the north wind lays waste the garden….

All these things shall love do unto

      you that you may know the secrets of your heart,

   and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life’s heart.

But if in your fear

   you would seek only love’s peace and love’s pleasure,

Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness

   and pass out of love’s threshing-floor,

Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh,

   but not all of your laughter,

   and weep, but not all of your tears….

Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost: The Facts May Not be Enough

Genesis 15:1-6

Psalm 33:12-22

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Luke 12:32-40

Issues of faith and belief are not always easy to talk about, not least of which because even as mature Christians we have not yet learned to make the distinction between believing something to be true – the intellectual assertion of this or that – and believing in someone.  We can too often confuse believing something or someone, with believing in something or someone.  The former, is usually based on facts and analysis, it is about accepting something as true or false.  The latter has to do with faith.  When we believe in something, or especially when we believe in someone, we have entered into the realm of faith.  We are saying that we trust the person, that we trust their reliability, their dependability.  Faith in the Judaeo-Christian tradition does not have much to do with believing in the sense of simple, quantifiable facts we can examine then accept or reject.  Rather, faith takes us below the surface of things.  Quite simply, it has to do with trust and with relationship.

Biblical Hebrew has several words which can be rendered faith – about nine or so.  In its meaning, each of these conveys come nuance of trust or reliability.  In today’s lesson from the Hebrew Scriptures, most particularly, the word translated into English as faith is aman.  This word has various meanings, and while it can be translated as believe, its various contexts reveal its meaning to convey a sense of certainty about God and God’s character, a total trust in God, as well as a willingness to continue to rely on God no matter the problem or circumstance.  If we want to translate it as “believe”, we must think not in term of believing whether or not God exists or believing something to be true about God, but instead believing in God and in who God is, how God relates to us and to all of creation.  It is a much more holistic approach than we normally associate with the term “believe.”  The New Testament, on the other hand, uses the Greek word pistis to describe Christian faith.  Socially, this word was commonly used to describe the trust one may have in another person; but Pistis was also the name given to a minor deity of good faith, trust and reliability; and who, along with the other virtues and graces, was “associated with honesty and harmony among people.”  In later Christian theology, when Latin became the dominant language, the word used was fides.  This Latin word meant simply “ ‘reliability’, [the] sense of trust [necessary] between two parties if a relationship between them was to exist.”  As is so often the case, the early Christians took a common word of everyday use, a concept of everyday human activity and gave it a deeper nuance, as they tried make sense of the new reality and paradigm inaugurated by Christ.  Christian faith, then isn’t about believing or not believing.  It is about trust, the sort of trust which is fundamental to relationship; and after all is it not relationship to which God calls us, what God desires with us, and what we say we desire with God?

If God is to be more to us than simply a cosmic gift dispenser whom we pester as and when we find ourselves in need, then we must think more in terms of relationship, and there trust is essential.  Relationship – any relationship – will always at some point take us outside our comfort zone, and when that happens mere belief never serves us well.  Not least of which, because belief in the sense of intellectual conviction only happens when we have been able to process the facts and come to terms with what they represent.  It happens precisely when we have become comfortable; comfortable with the reality the facts show us and as we accommodate our reality to them.  Intellectual belief can be the safe option.  However, only faith will ever take us beyond ourselves.  Intellectual belief is a private affair, but faith never is.  Faith is always trust in another.  It requires knowledge of the other, even intimacy.  It requires relationship, and as such it can point us beyond ourselves to truths larger and deeper than we can discern on our own; truths beyond the surface facts.

Take Abraham, for example.  The facts privately and intellectually considered could never have held out to him the possibility of posterity, much less of a lasting name.  Thinking of God still merely as a dispenser of favors, Abraham says “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?”…Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.” (Genesis 15:2, 3)  Only when God showed him a reality he could previously never have intellectually contemplated – “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” (Genesis 15:5) – only then, and almost mysteriously, does faith come to Abraham and he believes, he trusts God.  He actually enters into a relationship which will take him to places he could not even yet imagine.  Nevertheless, his trust in God, in who God is, in God’s own faithfulness and reliability means that he can enter into that new reality – whatever that reality will mean or be – he can enter it confidently; and only faith makes this possible.

The Christians for whom the letter to the Hebrews is written are in a similar situation; a situation in which the purely intellectual assessment of their circumstances does not foster conventional security, but instead just the opposite.  As we read later in the letter, the decision to trust in God’s promises and follow Christ had cost many their social standing and made them objects of ridicule, hostility and violence.  It had cost some their financial security and even their liberty as they faced imprisonment. (cf. Hebrews 10:32-34)  Certainly, the letter hints that a number of them were wondering if this was all worth it and that perhaps some had already abandoned the profession made at their baptism.  So, the letter’s writer reminds them that this is not the whole story, and by way of encouragement recalls to them the fundamentally relational nature of the faith they profess.  He succinctly defines this faith for them, as “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”  The writer places the nature of faith squarely within the context of relationship, within the context of trust, reminding them of faith’s inherently risky nature.  He reminds them of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Sarah, and holds them up as shining examples of this kind of faith.  They voluntarily left behind all the respect, rootedness, security they enjoyed in Chaldea and accepted the lower status of rootless wanderers as they “looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” (Hebrews 11:10)  He reminds his fellow Christians that they too have entered into a relationship with God, and that that relationship requires trust, faithfulness.  It was not an intellectual exercise primarily, but one of the heart.  Like in any relationship, we do not abandon the other simply because things don’t turn out the way we expected, or because outside forces work to undermine our commitment.  Indeed, in the case of the latter particularly, we hold on tighter, seeking in our faithfulness to weather the storm.  Sometimes to those around us, and sometimes even to ourselves this may not seem reasonable, but real faith sometimes enables us to see what others cannot immediately discern, it enables us to see beyond the simple facts.   

Our Episcopal commitment to reason notwithstanding, it is important to grasp a firm hold on this biblical understanding of faith, because the call of the Gospel, the call of the entire Judeao-Christian tradition is to relationship – relationship with God, relationship with others; and for real relationship to flourish we need trust, we need faith.  Faith is not about ignoring the facts, but about trusting the promises made by someone we know to be reliable, and knowing that sometimes – even oftentimes – simple, easily discernible facts do not tell the whole story.  The facts do not tell the whole story of Abraham and Sarah, neither do they tell the whole story of those for whom the letter to the Hebrews was written.  Indeed, it is their faith, their trust, which makes any sense of the facts as they are, which makes any sense of conventional belief.  For Christians, faith allows us to go beyond conventional believing and by trust enables us to hold on to a promised reality, regardless of immediate appearances.  It teaches us to hope in the midst of seeming hopelessness, and allows us to learn a new criteria for making sense of the world and of our lives, as we move into closer relationship with God, and into the paradigm of God’s perspective.  The immediately discernible facts are never the whole story, and at some point, if our commitment to the Christian life and our relationship to God are to grow and deepen in maturity, we will simply have to trust, make the leap of faith.  And here I must stop, I think, because I can not definitively tell you how to do that, much less can I tell you what making that leap will look like or mean for you.  The only way to discern that is in prayer as we, like Abraham, go out into the open, risky spaces of our own lives – outside of ourselves and our neatly intellectualized facts – and listen to God’s vision for us.

Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost: Whoever Dies with the Most Toys, Still Dies

Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14, 2:18-23

Psalm 49:1-11

Colossians 3:1-11

Luke 12.13-21

While, of course, the Greek of the New Testament has no parenthesis – or punctuation for that matter – I was drawn to the parenthesis in the translation of Paul’s letter to the Colossians in which he equates greed with idolatry.  In our 21^st century mind-set we have at least some understanding of greed.  Idolatry, however, is no longer really part of our common currency; yet still, disguised, it is all around us.  It is all around us, because we human beings seem to be hard-wired for it, we must worship something.  When I was a small boy growing up in a Roman Catholic school, I imagined idols to be like the large heads on Easter Island; and I imagined idolaters as those who lay prostrate before them.  However, the idol and idolatry are much more subtle than that, and they make themselves present in the most covert of ways.  At its essence, the idol requires of its adherents everything they are and have, and in return promises everything they desire.  The problem is that ultimately the idol can’t or won’t deliver – at the very least.  At the worst, once you have given everything required, you don’t find yourself free to enjoy the benefits promised; but instead find yourself trapped by the idol, by its demands and responsibilities. 

We can perhaps begin to discern Paul’s correlation between idolatry and greed;  greed:  “acquisitive or selfish desire beyond reason”; and while, it certainly is easy to concur that greed is a bad thing, do we ever really try to understand its compelling attractiveness or its undermining destructive power?  Are we willing to go into the dark places where it lives to discern it multitudinous disguises?  Are we willing to examine ourselves and unmask our own and varied devotion to it, that is, our idolatry?  If we are not, then no matter how much we may decry greed, we will more than likely end up its slaves, because – like the need to worship – the desire to possess beyond reason is so a part of us, particularly since we convince ourselves that our money and possessions, and our devotion to them, will keep us beyond the grasp of the uncertainties inherent in the human condition.

There is in all this another word that comes into play: “avarice”.  Now, if greed is “acquisitive or selfish desire beyond reason”, avarice is actually “extreme greed for wealth or material gain”.  The medieval theologians rightly understood avarice as particularly pernicious because of its very insatiability.  In short, when is enough, enough?  This too is a question which we must ask ourselves: in any situation, in any enterprise, how much is enough?  Avarice always traps us into believing that there is never enough at the present, and that only when we have accumulated thus much or achieved X, then we will have enough and then we will be able to enjoy the fruits of our labours.  Yet, somehow enough never happens.  Isn’t that exactly the kind of thinking Jesus is warning against?  Isn’t it exactly what this fellow in the parable said to himself.  Seeing the abundance he had amassed, “he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’  Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.  And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ ” (Luke 12:18-19)  What are the chances, do you think, that after building his new barns he would have relaxed?  More than likely slim, because to the avaricious enough never is enough, and only in the end does he learn the truth that “whoever dies with the most toys, still dies.”  The end of idolatry is always death in one way or another, because only God can give us what it is we are really looking for as we run around trying to possess and control everything in sight.  Only in God can we find the validation we long for, only in God can we find our truest selves, only in God can we find lasting security, only in God can we find fullness of life and freedom.  Whenever we believe that something or someone else can provide those things for us, we have entered into the world of idols and idolatry, and no matter what they promise, no matter what we render to them, they will eventually disappoint and abandon us.

For us who live within a capitalist system, greed and avarice are especially dangerous because our devotion to them can easily be disguised as “fiscal responsibility”.  In a society whose the guiding mythos is the self-sufficient pioneer who pulls himself or herself up by their own bootstraps, we can often forget that in the end all things are really gift and all things are really God’s.  Worshipping at the altar of avarice, we can avoid facing the truth – at least for a time – that no amount of money, possessions or achievements will preserve one from the ravages of time, neither from the inevitability of death, and that ultimately we must let go of everything –absolutely everything – and that no matter what we do or how well we have prepared we cannot control that eventuality: “I  hated all my toil in which I had toiled under the sun,” says the preacher in Ecclesiastes, “seeing that I must leave it to those who come after me – and who knows whether they will be wise or foolish?” (Ecclesiastes 2:18-19)  Certainly, true wisdom lies in accepting – while we are still alive – that not even what we toil for is ultimately our own; indeed, that it is only ever a loan.  All those toys and trifles we amass and guard so carefully, will one day slip out our hands and out of our reach, and the stark reality will hit us that “whoever dies with the most toys, still dies”. 

This does not mean that we should avoid wealth altogether, that we should not make responsible and reasonable provision, but that wealth for wealth’s sake is nothing more than futile idolatry, not to mention just down right selfishness.  Andrew Carnegie, the industrial tycoon and philanthropist who gave to the us our own Carnegie Library here in Hanford, is quoted to the have said that “surplus wealth is a sacred trust which its possessor is bound to administer in his lifetime for the good of the community.”  In other words, all things are God’s and those who are blessed with them are called not to hold on to them, but to distribute them according to the needs of the greater community.  It seems here that while storing up treasure, Carnegie was still rich towards God and knew that dying with the most toys was far from winning, but indeed a kind of defeat, declaring as much when he also said that “the man who dies rich dies disgraced”.

Greed, avarice – they are just other forms of idolatry; ways of convincing ourselves that there are things more trustworthy, more secure than God, that we can be shielded from the uncertainties of the world by amassing enough, while at the same time never allowing ourselves to discern realistically what enough is, and keeping us on the treadmill of accumulation for accumulation’s sake.   Yet the idol always disappoints, and our devotion to it will only earn for us in the end the stark words in Luke’s Gospel: “You fool!  This very night your life is being demanded of you.  And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” (Luke 12:20); or, more succinctly, “whoever dies with the most toys, still dies”.