Ecclesiastes 1:2,12-14, 2:18-23 Psalm 49:1-12 Colossians 3:1-11 Luke 12:13-21
Hearing this morning’s parable, about food and grain and greed, it is impossible not to think of the images in the media about the starving poor, particularly those we have seen coming out of Gaza. It is hard to process the vast numbers, when we hear from the United Nations that nearly 320 million people face acute hunger and almost 2 million face, what is called, catastrophic hunger primarily in Gaza and Sudan. Our minds don’t allow us to imagine what those numbers mean.
But last week, a UK newspaper printed a horrific photo on the front page of tiny Muhammed al-Matouq, weighing barely 6 kilos at 18 months of age, in his mother’s arms, bones poking through his paper-thin skin, sat outside their tent that resembles a tomb. The stark reality of the starvation and war that is all this child has ever known is complex, but it boils down to greed. Greed and the quest for ownership and power, which is also greed.
‘Take care’, Jesus says, ‘be on your guard against all kinds of greed’ and then he told them a parable. And this parable is an interesting one.
Usually, in parables we have characters representing someone else, and we might try to put ourselves or God into the story. Am I the prodigal? Is God the good Samaritan? Which of us is the seed on the path or among the thorns, and who is the sower? Is it God? Should it be me? And on it goes. But in this parable, like, I think, only one other, we have God, named as God’s self. There is no confusion. It is definitely God who appears to the rich man.
There is a rich man who produced a whole lot of grain; so much that he didn’t know what to do with it. He sits and considers his crops, but really all he considers is himself.
Listen again: What should I do? I have no place to store my crops. I will pull down my barns and store my grain and my goods and say to my soul you have ample.
And God calls him a fool. And he is a fool.
He’s alright, but he has only served himself.
And when he dies, all he has done will die too. He set his mind on earthly things only, with no care or concern for anyone else. And that is foolish. God is right. This man really is a fool.
St Augustine, one of the early church fathers, back in the third century, commented that the rich man was ‘planning to fill his soul with excessive and unnecessary feasting and was proudly disregarding the empty bellies of the poor’. He went on to make possibly the greatest comment about this parable when he said ‘[the rich man] did not realize that the bellies of the poor were much safer storerooms than his barns’.
This rich man could have made a huge difference with his huge stores of grain.
And instead, he was a self-centred fool.
So what about us? In the world’s terms we are among those who are the rich. And we have the privilege and ability of making change for those who are facing famine, hunger, poverty and death. We have the means to bring life and light to places of death and darkness. We can do that. We really can and we absolutely must. Because, as the parable says our life is being demanded of us today. Our life is demanded of us every day. God doesn’t just demand our life of us on the day we die. God demands our life of us every single day.
In Paul’s letter to the Colossians, that we heard just now, he reminds those who have chosen to follow Christ – us included – that we need to set our minds on bigger, greater things. Things that will outlive our own lifetimes. When we said yes to following Jesus, we gave up our rights, our own life died, and we committed to showing Christ wherever we went. We said yes to a new way of living – leaving behind greed, deceit and control, and trying to keep to a new path that reflects the ways of the one we tentatively try to follow.
That is what we promised when we said yes to Jesus; that our life was now his, not ‘mine’, and we will do what we can to live it, fully, in his ways. And that is a life’s work, our primary purpose, and everything else, as the writer of the proverbs reminded us, is ‘vanity of vanitys’.
The wealthy landowner had huge barns; the best anyone could hope for; but he filled them with things for him, so that HIS soul could rest, and HIS life could be relaxing and HE could eat, drink and be merry. He kept his barns for himself instead of taking the opportunity to store his grain in the bellies of those who were poorest and most hungry. He put himself first, and screw everyone else.
Isn’t that what we see modelled and magnified, again and again on the world stage, in horrific technicolour? Political landowners, rich barn owners, with barns the size of countries, filling and hoarding and grabbing and gloating, while millions of starving eyes and empty bellies watch on, as they die??? Isn’t this parable 21st century world news? Have we learned nothing?
As followers of Jesus, we have given up all rights to behave like that.
As followers of Jesus, our primary concern can no longer be me.
As followers of Jesus, we must live lives that give out to others.
We can no longer sit idly by and say nothing. This very day our life is being demanded of us; your life is being demanded of you.
Please God, may we take this seriously and may our lives be those of love, joy and peace. May our lives make the lives of others better. May our choices impact positively on others. May our lives even change the world and bring glory to God’s holy name. And may we store our grain, our wealth in the bellies and pockets of the poor. Amen.
Holy Adventures 