Aim high
Commentary
It comes with the territory of capitalism, for we are continually encouraged to want more, to get what's bigger, to buy what's better. It comes with the territory of America, for we have "the pursuit of happiness" woven into our very fabric. It comes with the territory of being fallen human beings, for our selfishness naturally drives us to want more and better. We do not necessarily want it for everyone else, or even anyone else. But we do instinctively want more and better for ourselves.
So ambition comes with the territory. We are not content to sit and stay where we are. We are habitually looking up at the next rung on the ladder, pondering and planning how to reach it, how to get there, and the very ambitious among us are even more far--sighted: we have the 'top' of the ladder in our sites, not merely the next rung, and we have a plan for reaching that top, whatever it may be.
Because ambition comes with the territory for most of us and for the people of our churches, We should be naturally receptive to the gospel message, for it challenges us to aim high. And this week particularly, we are encouraged to look beyond the place where we are and truly strive for the top.
Hosea 11:1--11
While some judgment prophets show us God's strong arm and clenched fist, Hosea shows us God's broken heart. And Hosea, of course, is uniquely qualified, for he himself is brokenhearted.
The prevailing image in the book of Hosea is that of Israel as God's unfaithful wife. The reality of that experience of God with Israel, in fact, becomes the reality of Hosea's own experience with his predictably unfaithful wife, Gomer. And so the book juxtaposes the persistent love and devotion of God with the unreliable love and fickle devotion of Israel.
While the guiding image of the book is Israel as God's wife, here in chapter 11 we find a different, though equally compelling, image: Israel as God's son. In both cases, imagery and language is relational. In both cases, God is constant while Israel ranges from oblivious to adulterous. And in both cases, the inescapable issue is God's love for his people. It is even inescapable for God himself ---- "How can I give you up, Ephraim?"
The passage is full of pathos as God recalls Israel's childhood. How poignant to see a parent, whose grown child has gone astray, poring over the old pictures in the photo album. Remember when we first brought him home from the hospital? Remember how her face lit up when I'd play peek--a--boo with her behind her favorite blanket? Remember how I ran behind his bike while he was learning to ride? This is the stuff of God's lament. He recalls how he has loved, cared, and provided for Israel since the nation was essentially a newborn. But what should be sweet memories are all soured by Israel's chronic unfaithfulness.
The tenderness of this passage needs to be shared with our congregations: first, because it is from the Old Testament; and, second, because it reveals God's heart for his people.
Perhaps the people in your congregation, like many others, have drawn a line that does not really exist ---- Marcion's line between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New. The God depicted in the Old Testament, many church folks have concluded, is angry and judgmental. He has a quick trigger finger, and he keeps his people at a distance. By contrast, the God of the New Testament is warm and inviting. Everyone is readily forgiven, and everyone is encouraged to come closer.
Hosea, however, belies the sloppy (and potentially heretical) generalization about God in the Old Testament. Here we see in God the same yearning, love, and tenderness that we imagine in the father in Jesus' parable of the prodigal son. Even better, though, for while Jesus shows us the Father's response when the son returns, Hosea shows us the Father's grief while the son is still away.
Which leads us to the second ---- and more important ---- reason why the tenderness of this passage needs to be shared with our congregations. You and I cannot overemphasize God's heart for his people. It is what they need to know if they have never heard it, and it is what they need to be continually reminded of even after they have heard it.
In our fallenness and shame, we so easily lose touch with the reality of God's love. Ever since Eden, we have been running away from the very God who calls to us and invites us rather to run to him (cf., Genesis 3:8--10; Hosea 11:2). The good news that "God loves you" must not be relegated to trite bumper stickers, but should rather be shared with the heartfelt proclamation of Hosea.
Hosea also provides in this passage an example of how to preach repentance. If the prevailing theme of the preaching is the foulness of my sin, then I am inclined to creep deeper into the shame bush where I flee with Adam and Eve. If, however, the prevailing theme of the message is the depth of God's love, then I may be encouraged to peek out from behind my guilty hiding place. The Good News of God's love will coax me out. Might the prodigal have come home even sooner if someone had showed him what Hosea shows us?
Colossians 3:1--11
The choice can be cast in different terms. For the writer of Proverbs, it is always a choice between wisdom and foolishness (e.g., Proverbs 9). For Paul elsewhere, the choice is between spirit and flesh (e.g., Galatians 5:16--26). For John, the choice is between light and darkness (e.g., 1 John 1:5--7). And here, as Paul writes to the Christians in Colossae, the choice is between "earth" and "above."
The old cartoon convention was to portray human choice in terms of a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other, each whispering in an ear. Here, the choice we face is depicted in terms of an aim or focus. We can aim high, or we can aim low. Paul's confidence is that we will hit what we aim for.
In two separate but equally vile lists, Paul identifies the things that characterize the low focus, the things of earth: "fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry)" (v. 5), and "anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth" (v. 8).
The strangely compelling feature of Paul's lists is what he sets side by side. He makes no effort to distinguish between sins of thought (e.g., evil desire), word (e.g., slander, abusive language), and deed (e.g., fornication). Rather, he lists them all together, as though all sins were created equal.
The truth of our culture ---- within the church, as well as outside of it ---- is that we do not regard all sins with equal seriousness. We operate with a kind of unspoken hierarchy of sins, and the average person in the pew thinks he is a "good Christian" precisely because he has steered clear of the sins that are really bad. So it may be unsettling for us to see greed equated with idolatry, or to see the act of fornication juxtaposed with mere evil desire.
The identification of greed with idolatry may be a particularly interesting theme to pursue in connection with the teaching of Jesus in the Gospel Lection (see the Alternative Application on the next page). The irony for twenty--first--century Americans is that we pride ourselves on being so advanced, so sophisticated, and so enlightened. Idolatry, meanwhile, smacks of a primitive and unenlightened people. Accordingly, to associate greed, which hits so very close to home, with idolatry, which seems so long ago and far away, is a cold slap in the face.
The list found in verse 8 seems to feature a kind of crescendo. Anger is, for most of us, a reasonably common experience. It does not automatically suggest something beyond the pale. Wrath, however, sounds a bit more severe: anger that has turned red hot and consuming. Then comes malice, which gives a hateful and personal purpose to wrath. Slander may be construed as the malice in action. And abusive language seems like an intensified version of slander: That is to say, now I am not content merely to say terrible and hurtful things about you, but I am eager instead to say terrible and hurtful things to you.
I don't know that the order of Paul's words is by design. I do know, however, that sin itself does tend to be progressive.
Luke 12:13--21
It may be that the man who approached Jesus had a legitimate case. It may be that he had been treated unfairly, that he was a victim of some injustice. But his request prompted Jesus to warn those around him, "Be on your guard against all kinds of greed."
That's quite a jump to make, isn't it? From wanting what is rightfully mine to being greedy? Jesus dismisses the responsibility of a judge, and it's a good thing. I would be troubled to have a judge pigeonhole my plea for justice as mere greediness. It seems like a hasty and unfair assessment of the man and his motivation.
But then the warning Jesus gives is not merely about "greed," but rather about "all kinds of greed." Perhaps the genus of greed has more species than we commonly recognize. Perhaps even wanting what is rightfully mine is an offspring of the greed family. More about that later.
Jesus' warning, we discover in the next breath, is not so much condemnation as it is concern. Jesus is not putting the man down, but rather endeavoring to lift him up. "One's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions," Jesus observes, which brings to mind so much of the larger corpus of Jesus' teachings on material needs (e.g., Matthew 6:19--21, 24--34; Mark 10:17--31; Luke 4:3--4; 16:19--25; 20:20--26). He does not dismiss material concerns as unimportant, but he reminds us again and again that they are not most important. To elevate material concerns to greatest importance is to belong to those things (see Matthew 6:21), and that proves in the end to be a shortsighted investment.
To illustrate the point, Jesus tells the story we know as the parable of the rich fool.
The rich man in the parable is not conspicuously wicked. There is no indication that he has cheated or stolen, nor does Jesus say that the man has hurt or oppressed anyone. He's just a well--to--do man whose fields yield more than he needs ---- indeed, more than he has room to store. And so he does a prudent thing: He builds bigger and better barns in order to accommodate his crops.
So what's wrong with the rich fool? He is not wasteful and reckless like the prodigal son (see Luke 15:12--14), nor cruelly negligent like the rich man who ignored the needs of Lazarus (see Luke 16:19--25), nor benignly negligent like the goats at the left hand (see Matthew 25:41--45). In truth, the rich fool looks pretty familiar, pretty close to home. Here is a man who has more than he needs. Indeed, if he has an apparent need at all, it is simply for more space to store all of his stuff.
We don't know how old the rich fool character is, but imagine him for a moment as a 65--year--old man. What's wrong with him? He doesn't have to work anymore. He has all that he needs for the foreseeable future. He is able now to relax and enjoy himself. If he is guilty of anything, it seems only to be that he is guilty of having planned effectively for retirement.
In the end ---- which came sooner than the rich fool anticipated ---- his failure seems to be one of emphasis. He had managed effectively to store up material riches, but he was tragically short of being "rich toward God." Of course, "emphasis" may be a euphemism for "priority." His failure was one of priorities. And one's "priority" may be a way of making something "master." When we conclude, therefore, that the rich fool's failure was one of emphasis, we remember that Jesus said, "No slave can serve two masters ... You cannot serve God and wealth" (Luke 16:13).
Application
Somewhere along the way, most of us have had to make a choice between two or more jobs. Will we accept this offer or the other one? Will we stay in our present position or accept the new invitation?
A lot of factors go into making such decisions. Occasionally, though, we find ourselves faced with a decision that is easy and obvious. When one situation is clearly and across--the--board preferable to the other, then the choice is a no--brainer.
One would think that the choice for serving God would be a choice like that: easy and obvious. A no--brainer. Ironically, however, we human beings are inclined to pass up the promotion.
Some jobs come with a greater sense of privilege than others. I think, for example, that I'm a pretty good boss, but I don't know that it qualifies as a privilege to work for me. If the church secretary who has so faithfully served me over the years were to have an opportunity to serve as one of the secretaries to the President of the United States, for example, I assume she would regard that as a greater privilege.
Serving God is the greatest privilege of all. Why is it, then, that we so often settle for less?
The selected passages for this Sunday give us an opportunity to challenge our people and ourselves ---- to stoke the fires of ambition and to encourage one another to aim high.
Israel aimed low, settling for the Baals. If the Colossians had aimed low, they would have found themselves wallowing again in impurity, idolatry, and wrath. And the rich fool, who might be most easily mistaken for ambitious, also aimed low, settling for bigger and better barns.
Why do we settle?
Perhaps it is that deep desire to be my own boss. Perhaps the great impediment to my devotion is that I think I would rather not have to serve anyone at all. But then I am like the impatient teenager who complains to his parents, "I can't wait till I'm an adult! Then I'll be able to do whatever I want without anyone telling me what I can and can't do!"
The teenage dream is a myth, and so is my fallen ambition not to serve anyone. For I will always serve or live for something or someone, even if only myself. Any master I may choose ---- from my appetites to my affections, from Baals to barns ---- any master I choose other than the Lord will be aiming too low. I will be settling for less.
George Matheson was right in his hymn: "Make me a captive, Lord, and then I shall be free." Every other service is bondage. Any other lord is an oppressor. And so we ought to cultivate within one another and ourselves a holy ambition to serve nothing less than God. It should be an obvious choice.
An Alternative Application
Luke 12:13--21. During our earlier discussion of this passage, we began to enlarge on Jesus' reference to "all kinds of greed." We suggested that perhaps even wanting what rightfully belongs to us is an offspring of the greed family.
That image may be a starting place for its own kind of parable. We might preach an extended metaphor about the "Greed Family."
Like most families, the Greeds are a mixed lot. There are the disreputable members of the family ---- the ones who have given the whole group a bad name. No one likes the notorious green--eyed son, Envy, and we are all appalled at the brothers Theft and Embezzlement. We are quick to condemn, too, the infamous cousins of the Greeds, Injustice and Oppression. And we shake our heads disapprovingly at the grandchildren, Spoiled and Self--Indulgent.
When we do a little genealogy research, we are surprised to discover that the Greed family tree grows out of Idolatry. We might not have guessed the relationship, for the Greeds are so explicitly about self. The Idolatry family, however, purports at least to be about something else ---- something greater and other than self. But perhaps Idolatry is more about the self than it seems at the surface.
Meanwhile, the Greeds also boast some respectable and accomplished offspring. These are the attractive family members ---- so attractive that we might not detect the ugly family features. Everyone likes to be around Opulence, for example, and no one seems to understand just what's so wrong with Coveting. He looks just like the rest of us, after all. Then, too, there is the successful executive in the family, Ambition. We applaud him. Finally, there is the family member who appears in the Gospel Lection ---- Wanting What's Rightfully Mine.
When he was just a little boy, we knew him by his nickname, "Mine!" and we could tell that he was a selfish little cuss. We kept encouraging him to learn how to share, not to be always grabbing and clutching. As he grew older, however, his manner changed. He's still fundamentally selfish, mind you, but he carries it off better as an adult. He seems to be concerned for justice, for fairness, and for what is right. His clutching seems now so very plausible and civilized. He doesn't whine anymore when he says "Mine" and "That's not fair," though those continue to be his refrain. He gets away with being wrong because he can make such a convincing case that he's right.
The Greed family is a mixed lot. Some of them are obviously ugly and undesirable. Others, however, come across as attractive and respectable. Jesus warns us, nonetheless, to be on guard against the whole lot of them.
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 107:1--9, 43
Consider for a moment the word "remember." Normally when we hear the word or are encouraged to "remember" something, we immediately begin trying to recall certain facts, names, numbers, dates, and so on. And of course, that is exactly what is intended. But the word "remember" takes on an added dimension when used in the context of worship. When, for instance, Jesus instructs his disciples during the Last Supper to "do this in remembrance of me," he did not have in mind that they would merely recall the night and its events. The "doing of remembering" is an act of "re--membering" and "re--connecting" ---- becoming a part of something again.
That is one facet of the biblical meaning of the word "remember." By an act of the will and the imagination, we put ourselves back into events or moments and re--experience their significance. We re--enact in ourselves some biblical truth and thereby allow the importance and the meaning of that truth to change us or heal us.
The first several verses of Psalm 107 are designed to accomplish this act of faithful imagination. They are intended by the writer as a way of helping worshipers remember the mighty acts of God on behalf of God's people. That is the significance of the psalmist's opening statement, "let the redeemed of the Lord say so" (v. 2). Let those who "re--member" what God has done make their remembering known to others.
The allusions that follow almost certainly have reference to the great escape from Egypt. Led by Moses, the people of Israel traveled into the wilderness, met God, lost God, but finally allowed God to lead them into the Promised Land. Theirs was a story of faith and failure and redemption. "Do you re--member?" the psalmist asks.
But the worship leader may have another purpose in mind. It is not just to celebrate the past that we are called to "re--member." Sometimes we need to re--connect to some sacred moment in the past in order to have hope in a difficult moment in the present. The call to "re--member" achieves a certain pastoral function.
For the people of Israel, re--connecting to wilderness wanderings (v. 4) could have multiple applications. Any momentary distress can be a wilderness wandering. The psalmist could be addressing a tragedy shared by his congregation. And of course, wilderness wandering can be literally so. The psalmist may be addressing the experience of the exile ---- going in, coming out, or living through.
Regardless of the nature of the wandering, the hope we need is found in re--membering. God finds us in the wilderness and cares for us. "They cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress" (v. 6). If we can re--connect to that experience of being delivered back then, we can face the wilderness of the present with every hope that we will be delivered now.
The psalmist recites several examples, which allows worshipers entry points to dip into the memories. As we are able to re--connect with these memories we find ourselves growing emotionally, spiritually, and even intellectually. The psalmist acknowledges this outcome as he closes the psalm with these words: "Let those who are wise give heed to these things, and consider the steadfast love of the Lord" (v. 43). Or in other words, "re--member ... the last word is always God's love."
So ambition comes with the territory. We are not content to sit and stay where we are. We are habitually looking up at the next rung on the ladder, pondering and planning how to reach it, how to get there, and the very ambitious among us are even more far--sighted: we have the 'top' of the ladder in our sites, not merely the next rung, and we have a plan for reaching that top, whatever it may be.
Because ambition comes with the territory for most of us and for the people of our churches, We should be naturally receptive to the gospel message, for it challenges us to aim high. And this week particularly, we are encouraged to look beyond the place where we are and truly strive for the top.
Hosea 11:1--11
While some judgment prophets show us God's strong arm and clenched fist, Hosea shows us God's broken heart. And Hosea, of course, is uniquely qualified, for he himself is brokenhearted.
The prevailing image in the book of Hosea is that of Israel as God's unfaithful wife. The reality of that experience of God with Israel, in fact, becomes the reality of Hosea's own experience with his predictably unfaithful wife, Gomer. And so the book juxtaposes the persistent love and devotion of God with the unreliable love and fickle devotion of Israel.
While the guiding image of the book is Israel as God's wife, here in chapter 11 we find a different, though equally compelling, image: Israel as God's son. In both cases, imagery and language is relational. In both cases, God is constant while Israel ranges from oblivious to adulterous. And in both cases, the inescapable issue is God's love for his people. It is even inescapable for God himself ---- "How can I give you up, Ephraim?"
The passage is full of pathos as God recalls Israel's childhood. How poignant to see a parent, whose grown child has gone astray, poring over the old pictures in the photo album. Remember when we first brought him home from the hospital? Remember how her face lit up when I'd play peek--a--boo with her behind her favorite blanket? Remember how I ran behind his bike while he was learning to ride? This is the stuff of God's lament. He recalls how he has loved, cared, and provided for Israel since the nation was essentially a newborn. But what should be sweet memories are all soured by Israel's chronic unfaithfulness.
The tenderness of this passage needs to be shared with our congregations: first, because it is from the Old Testament; and, second, because it reveals God's heart for his people.
Perhaps the people in your congregation, like many others, have drawn a line that does not really exist ---- Marcion's line between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New. The God depicted in the Old Testament, many church folks have concluded, is angry and judgmental. He has a quick trigger finger, and he keeps his people at a distance. By contrast, the God of the New Testament is warm and inviting. Everyone is readily forgiven, and everyone is encouraged to come closer.
Hosea, however, belies the sloppy (and potentially heretical) generalization about God in the Old Testament. Here we see in God the same yearning, love, and tenderness that we imagine in the father in Jesus' parable of the prodigal son. Even better, though, for while Jesus shows us the Father's response when the son returns, Hosea shows us the Father's grief while the son is still away.
Which leads us to the second ---- and more important ---- reason why the tenderness of this passage needs to be shared with our congregations. You and I cannot overemphasize God's heart for his people. It is what they need to know if they have never heard it, and it is what they need to be continually reminded of even after they have heard it.
In our fallenness and shame, we so easily lose touch with the reality of God's love. Ever since Eden, we have been running away from the very God who calls to us and invites us rather to run to him (cf., Genesis 3:8--10; Hosea 11:2). The good news that "God loves you" must not be relegated to trite bumper stickers, but should rather be shared with the heartfelt proclamation of Hosea.
Hosea also provides in this passage an example of how to preach repentance. If the prevailing theme of the preaching is the foulness of my sin, then I am inclined to creep deeper into the shame bush where I flee with Adam and Eve. If, however, the prevailing theme of the message is the depth of God's love, then I may be encouraged to peek out from behind my guilty hiding place. The Good News of God's love will coax me out. Might the prodigal have come home even sooner if someone had showed him what Hosea shows us?
Colossians 3:1--11
The choice can be cast in different terms. For the writer of Proverbs, it is always a choice between wisdom and foolishness (e.g., Proverbs 9). For Paul elsewhere, the choice is between spirit and flesh (e.g., Galatians 5:16--26). For John, the choice is between light and darkness (e.g., 1 John 1:5--7). And here, as Paul writes to the Christians in Colossae, the choice is between "earth" and "above."
The old cartoon convention was to portray human choice in terms of a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other, each whispering in an ear. Here, the choice we face is depicted in terms of an aim or focus. We can aim high, or we can aim low. Paul's confidence is that we will hit what we aim for.
In two separate but equally vile lists, Paul identifies the things that characterize the low focus, the things of earth: "fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry)" (v. 5), and "anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth" (v. 8).
The strangely compelling feature of Paul's lists is what he sets side by side. He makes no effort to distinguish between sins of thought (e.g., evil desire), word (e.g., slander, abusive language), and deed (e.g., fornication). Rather, he lists them all together, as though all sins were created equal.
The truth of our culture ---- within the church, as well as outside of it ---- is that we do not regard all sins with equal seriousness. We operate with a kind of unspoken hierarchy of sins, and the average person in the pew thinks he is a "good Christian" precisely because he has steered clear of the sins that are really bad. So it may be unsettling for us to see greed equated with idolatry, or to see the act of fornication juxtaposed with mere evil desire.
The identification of greed with idolatry may be a particularly interesting theme to pursue in connection with the teaching of Jesus in the Gospel Lection (see the Alternative Application on the next page). The irony for twenty--first--century Americans is that we pride ourselves on being so advanced, so sophisticated, and so enlightened. Idolatry, meanwhile, smacks of a primitive and unenlightened people. Accordingly, to associate greed, which hits so very close to home, with idolatry, which seems so long ago and far away, is a cold slap in the face.
The list found in verse 8 seems to feature a kind of crescendo. Anger is, for most of us, a reasonably common experience. It does not automatically suggest something beyond the pale. Wrath, however, sounds a bit more severe: anger that has turned red hot and consuming. Then comes malice, which gives a hateful and personal purpose to wrath. Slander may be construed as the malice in action. And abusive language seems like an intensified version of slander: That is to say, now I am not content merely to say terrible and hurtful things about you, but I am eager instead to say terrible and hurtful things to you.
I don't know that the order of Paul's words is by design. I do know, however, that sin itself does tend to be progressive.
Luke 12:13--21
It may be that the man who approached Jesus had a legitimate case. It may be that he had been treated unfairly, that he was a victim of some injustice. But his request prompted Jesus to warn those around him, "Be on your guard against all kinds of greed."
That's quite a jump to make, isn't it? From wanting what is rightfully mine to being greedy? Jesus dismisses the responsibility of a judge, and it's a good thing. I would be troubled to have a judge pigeonhole my plea for justice as mere greediness. It seems like a hasty and unfair assessment of the man and his motivation.
But then the warning Jesus gives is not merely about "greed," but rather about "all kinds of greed." Perhaps the genus of greed has more species than we commonly recognize. Perhaps even wanting what is rightfully mine is an offspring of the greed family. More about that later.
Jesus' warning, we discover in the next breath, is not so much condemnation as it is concern. Jesus is not putting the man down, but rather endeavoring to lift him up. "One's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions," Jesus observes, which brings to mind so much of the larger corpus of Jesus' teachings on material needs (e.g., Matthew 6:19--21, 24--34; Mark 10:17--31; Luke 4:3--4; 16:19--25; 20:20--26). He does not dismiss material concerns as unimportant, but he reminds us again and again that they are not most important. To elevate material concerns to greatest importance is to belong to those things (see Matthew 6:21), and that proves in the end to be a shortsighted investment.
To illustrate the point, Jesus tells the story we know as the parable of the rich fool.
The rich man in the parable is not conspicuously wicked. There is no indication that he has cheated or stolen, nor does Jesus say that the man has hurt or oppressed anyone. He's just a well--to--do man whose fields yield more than he needs ---- indeed, more than he has room to store. And so he does a prudent thing: He builds bigger and better barns in order to accommodate his crops.
So what's wrong with the rich fool? He is not wasteful and reckless like the prodigal son (see Luke 15:12--14), nor cruelly negligent like the rich man who ignored the needs of Lazarus (see Luke 16:19--25), nor benignly negligent like the goats at the left hand (see Matthew 25:41--45). In truth, the rich fool looks pretty familiar, pretty close to home. Here is a man who has more than he needs. Indeed, if he has an apparent need at all, it is simply for more space to store all of his stuff.
We don't know how old the rich fool character is, but imagine him for a moment as a 65--year--old man. What's wrong with him? He doesn't have to work anymore. He has all that he needs for the foreseeable future. He is able now to relax and enjoy himself. If he is guilty of anything, it seems only to be that he is guilty of having planned effectively for retirement.
In the end ---- which came sooner than the rich fool anticipated ---- his failure seems to be one of emphasis. He had managed effectively to store up material riches, but he was tragically short of being "rich toward God." Of course, "emphasis" may be a euphemism for "priority." His failure was one of priorities. And one's "priority" may be a way of making something "master." When we conclude, therefore, that the rich fool's failure was one of emphasis, we remember that Jesus said, "No slave can serve two masters ... You cannot serve God and wealth" (Luke 16:13).
Application
Somewhere along the way, most of us have had to make a choice between two or more jobs. Will we accept this offer or the other one? Will we stay in our present position or accept the new invitation?
A lot of factors go into making such decisions. Occasionally, though, we find ourselves faced with a decision that is easy and obvious. When one situation is clearly and across--the--board preferable to the other, then the choice is a no--brainer.
One would think that the choice for serving God would be a choice like that: easy and obvious. A no--brainer. Ironically, however, we human beings are inclined to pass up the promotion.
Some jobs come with a greater sense of privilege than others. I think, for example, that I'm a pretty good boss, but I don't know that it qualifies as a privilege to work for me. If the church secretary who has so faithfully served me over the years were to have an opportunity to serve as one of the secretaries to the President of the United States, for example, I assume she would regard that as a greater privilege.
Serving God is the greatest privilege of all. Why is it, then, that we so often settle for less?
The selected passages for this Sunday give us an opportunity to challenge our people and ourselves ---- to stoke the fires of ambition and to encourage one another to aim high.
Israel aimed low, settling for the Baals. If the Colossians had aimed low, they would have found themselves wallowing again in impurity, idolatry, and wrath. And the rich fool, who might be most easily mistaken for ambitious, also aimed low, settling for bigger and better barns.
Why do we settle?
Perhaps it is that deep desire to be my own boss. Perhaps the great impediment to my devotion is that I think I would rather not have to serve anyone at all. But then I am like the impatient teenager who complains to his parents, "I can't wait till I'm an adult! Then I'll be able to do whatever I want without anyone telling me what I can and can't do!"
The teenage dream is a myth, and so is my fallen ambition not to serve anyone. For I will always serve or live for something or someone, even if only myself. Any master I may choose ---- from my appetites to my affections, from Baals to barns ---- any master I choose other than the Lord will be aiming too low. I will be settling for less.
George Matheson was right in his hymn: "Make me a captive, Lord, and then I shall be free." Every other service is bondage. Any other lord is an oppressor. And so we ought to cultivate within one another and ourselves a holy ambition to serve nothing less than God. It should be an obvious choice.
An Alternative Application
Luke 12:13--21. During our earlier discussion of this passage, we began to enlarge on Jesus' reference to "all kinds of greed." We suggested that perhaps even wanting what rightfully belongs to us is an offspring of the greed family.
That image may be a starting place for its own kind of parable. We might preach an extended metaphor about the "Greed Family."
Like most families, the Greeds are a mixed lot. There are the disreputable members of the family ---- the ones who have given the whole group a bad name. No one likes the notorious green--eyed son, Envy, and we are all appalled at the brothers Theft and Embezzlement. We are quick to condemn, too, the infamous cousins of the Greeds, Injustice and Oppression. And we shake our heads disapprovingly at the grandchildren, Spoiled and Self--Indulgent.
When we do a little genealogy research, we are surprised to discover that the Greed family tree grows out of Idolatry. We might not have guessed the relationship, for the Greeds are so explicitly about self. The Idolatry family, however, purports at least to be about something else ---- something greater and other than self. But perhaps Idolatry is more about the self than it seems at the surface.
Meanwhile, the Greeds also boast some respectable and accomplished offspring. These are the attractive family members ---- so attractive that we might not detect the ugly family features. Everyone likes to be around Opulence, for example, and no one seems to understand just what's so wrong with Coveting. He looks just like the rest of us, after all. Then, too, there is the successful executive in the family, Ambition. We applaud him. Finally, there is the family member who appears in the Gospel Lection ---- Wanting What's Rightfully Mine.
When he was just a little boy, we knew him by his nickname, "Mine!" and we could tell that he was a selfish little cuss. We kept encouraging him to learn how to share, not to be always grabbing and clutching. As he grew older, however, his manner changed. He's still fundamentally selfish, mind you, but he carries it off better as an adult. He seems to be concerned for justice, for fairness, and for what is right. His clutching seems now so very plausible and civilized. He doesn't whine anymore when he says "Mine" and "That's not fair," though those continue to be his refrain. He gets away with being wrong because he can make such a convincing case that he's right.
The Greed family is a mixed lot. Some of them are obviously ugly and undesirable. Others, however, come across as attractive and respectable. Jesus warns us, nonetheless, to be on guard against the whole lot of them.
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 107:1--9, 43
Consider for a moment the word "remember." Normally when we hear the word or are encouraged to "remember" something, we immediately begin trying to recall certain facts, names, numbers, dates, and so on. And of course, that is exactly what is intended. But the word "remember" takes on an added dimension when used in the context of worship. When, for instance, Jesus instructs his disciples during the Last Supper to "do this in remembrance of me," he did not have in mind that they would merely recall the night and its events. The "doing of remembering" is an act of "re--membering" and "re--connecting" ---- becoming a part of something again.
That is one facet of the biblical meaning of the word "remember." By an act of the will and the imagination, we put ourselves back into events or moments and re--experience their significance. We re--enact in ourselves some biblical truth and thereby allow the importance and the meaning of that truth to change us or heal us.
The first several verses of Psalm 107 are designed to accomplish this act of faithful imagination. They are intended by the writer as a way of helping worshipers remember the mighty acts of God on behalf of God's people. That is the significance of the psalmist's opening statement, "let the redeemed of the Lord say so" (v. 2). Let those who "re--member" what God has done make their remembering known to others.
The allusions that follow almost certainly have reference to the great escape from Egypt. Led by Moses, the people of Israel traveled into the wilderness, met God, lost God, but finally allowed God to lead them into the Promised Land. Theirs was a story of faith and failure and redemption. "Do you re--member?" the psalmist asks.
But the worship leader may have another purpose in mind. It is not just to celebrate the past that we are called to "re--member." Sometimes we need to re--connect to some sacred moment in the past in order to have hope in a difficult moment in the present. The call to "re--member" achieves a certain pastoral function.
For the people of Israel, re--connecting to wilderness wanderings (v. 4) could have multiple applications. Any momentary distress can be a wilderness wandering. The psalmist could be addressing a tragedy shared by his congregation. And of course, wilderness wandering can be literally so. The psalmist may be addressing the experience of the exile ---- going in, coming out, or living through.
Regardless of the nature of the wandering, the hope we need is found in re--membering. God finds us in the wilderness and cares for us. "They cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress" (v. 6). If we can re--connect to that experience of being delivered back then, we can face the wilderness of the present with every hope that we will be delivered now.
The psalmist recites several examples, which allows worshipers entry points to dip into the memories. As we are able to re--connect with these memories we find ourselves growing emotionally, spiritually, and even intellectually. The psalmist acknowledges this outcome as he closes the psalm with these words: "Let those who are wise give heed to these things, and consider the steadfast love of the Lord" (v. 43). Or in other words, "re--member ... the last word is always God's love."
