Why bother with Lazarus?

Why bother with Lazarus? The Dover Church
September 26, 2010 – Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Scripture: Psalm 146, Luke 16: 19-31

I grew up in a nice, quiet New England town where everyone was a lot like my family, which is to say, white, church going, law abiding, and at least reasonably prosperous. While some of us were rich, some of us were middle class, and some of us were working class, the differences were not that noticeable because houses, food, gasoline and seemingly all the necessities of life, even college, were inexpensive.
Because my parents were intensely interested in politics and world events, I realized early on that we lived on an island in the midst of a very turbulent world. This was the late sixties and early seventies, which means that there was Vietnam, civil rights and racial conflict, the Kennedy and King assassinations, the Cold War with the real threat of worldwide nuclear annihilation, repeated wars between the Arabs and Israel, the IRA blowing up bombs in London and the PLO hijacking planes in the Middle East, Patty Hearst of all people robbing banks with some liberation army, the first oil crisis, and Watergate. Because we lived on our island of tranquility and prosperity, these things did not have to touch us very much unless we wanted them to. Most of the people I knew did not want to be touched.
In church, I learned about Jesus. The Jesus I learned about was a lot like us, a nice man who even looked like us in the pictures. He did have long hair and a beard, which none of our fathers had, so he looked sort of like a hippie, but clearly a nice hippie. It seemed to me that our Jesus wanted me to be a good boy, nice, kind, polite, and respectful, sharing with others, not doing anything to others that I wouldn't want them to do to me, and so on. Church, the boy scouts, the YMCA, Little League baseball, public school, they all wanted the same thing for me: to be a good citizen.
Our church sponsored a missionary in India, so we heard about the work we were helping to pay for: building a school and clinic, donating clothing, digging wells, sending over a tractor. I learned about the poor children in Africa and elsewhere, how they were children of God just like us, and how we ought to share with them. Whenever I did not want to eat my spinach or something else my parents thought was both delicious and good for me, but looked gross and tasted worse from where I was sitting, my parents would always say, “there are starving children in Africa who don't have enough to eat. You finish your supper.” To which I wanted to answer, “Why don't we wrap this stuff up while it's still hot and ship it off to them. I am happy to share.” We got our UNICEF boxes and filled them with coins while we filled our Halloween bags with candy. I always thought those African kids would have preferred my Milky Ways to the dyptheria shots my UNICEF money was going to buy. They never did get my spinach or my candy and I think about that. I heard the stories about Jesus caring for the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the sick, the outcasts, the sinners, and so on, sort of like the way my parents cared for my sisters and me, but even nicer than my parents because the people Jesus cared for were strangers who would have been viewed with suspicion in our neighborhood. I clearly understood that I ought to do the same when I got bigger. Caring for these others seemed to be just another rule for me to follow: don't swear, don't hit, don't lie, don't steal, and care for the others.
By the grace of God, I began to want to know God at some point in my mid to late 20s. I say by the grace of God, because any and every inclination anyone ever has to get closer to God is really only God who is putting that inclination there in the first place. God in you desiring God. God in you seeking God. God in you loving God. So I began to feel this inclination and it seemed like a great idea so I acted on it. I started to rearrange my life so that I had time for all the desiring, seeking and loving I felt called to be part of. I started going to church every Sunday. I started reading my Bible every day. I joined an adult Bible study at church. I started learning how to pray in ways other than “Now I lay me down to sleep.” I started going on retreats with folks from church where we prayed and talked with each other about what that was like. And I felt like I was really getting to know God, feeling God in life. Not the distant God in heaven of my childhood. Not the nice, blond haired, blue eyed Jesus of my childhood. No, someone altogether different from those guys.
So there I was, getting into the whole personal holiness thing, but more Sundays than not the scripture lesson would be one of the prophets telling us that God loved the poor and sick; that God wanted peace; that God watched out for the powerless and outcasts; that God would cast the rich and powerful down from their thrones. And there would be Jesus, Sunday after Sunday, a homeless guy himself, healing the sick, feeding the multitudes, hanging out with the prostitutes, tax collectors, foreigners, and other down-and-outers. I don't know why it took so long for it to dawn on me, but I began to notice that all the praying, reading his Bible, or going on retreats Jesus did only got him ready and centered for all this other stuff he did. Clearly this whole caring for the poor, hungry, homeless, hopeless, sick and despised thing was a really big piece of the life with God thing, maybe half of the life with God thing, definitely something I was going to have to try out myself if I really wanted to know God.
So I tried and this is what I came to know about God and Jesus.
First, whenever I am sharing my life with the people Jesus shared his life with, almost the first thing I notice is how trivial my own concerns seem. Here are these people with nothing to eat, nowhere to live, no future to look forward to, and practically no one who cares, and I spend altogether too much of my life worrying about the push and pull of my job, about money for this or money for that, about time for this or time for that, and all the rest, the very things most of us spend most of our time thinking about. Sharing my life with the people Jesus shared his life with takes my mind off of ME. I stop obsessing about MY life and how I am the center of MY world, which, my friends, is exactly where a relationship with God begins: letting go of our own egos and their concerns and opening ourselves to God and what God is doing in and through us and everyone else. When I am in that place, I am open to God. Sharing my life with the people Jesus shared his life with is a great antidote for triviality and self absorption. Wow! Jesus was right!
Second, as my concerns and worries and frustrations and self absorption begin to fall away, the possibility that I can reorder my priorities begins to dawn on me. How many clothes do I need? How much stuff do I need? How much money should I spend on myself for things I don’t really need rather than giving it away to where it is really needed? How do I spend my time? What is important and what is diverting me from my call to be a disciple of Jesus? Once that door is opened even a crack, everything Jesus ever said about money and wealth as stumbling blocks to a life with God takes on a new meaning. He's talking about me and my life! The possibility of a different life begins to feel a lot like a necessity. Wow! Jesus was right again.
Third, whenever I am sharing my life with the people Jesus shared his life with, questions of blame, fault, personal responsibility, and all other kinds of finger pointing seem totally beside the point.
When I am sitting with a man who is shaking uncontrollably because he needs his heroin or alcohol, I could care less how he became addicted or why he can't recover. Right then and right there, the only thing I care about is what I might share of myself, which is often nothing more than a hand to hold.
When I am eating supper with a woman who literally stinks, not because she does not want to bathe but because she has neither a place to bathe nor the clean clothes to put on if she could bathe, I could care less why she is in the situation she is in or why she cannot get herself out of it. Right then and right there, I care about what I might share of myself, which is often nothing more than a little dignity and friendliness.
When I am having a cup of coffee with a man who has disgusting sores on his nose, cheeks and fingers from the cold and I know he will be going back out into that cold again as soon as the coffee is done, I could care less why he forgets to take his medication or seek psychiatric care. Right then and right there, I care about what I might share of myself, which is often nothing more than my interest in our conversation.
What I am trying to say is that sharing my life with the folks Jesus shared his life with blows up my “normal” point of view and priorities. Everything that Jesus ever said is suddenly not only completely true but also completely real. I am living it. The kingdom of God really is right here and right now. The kingdom of God really is in the smallest of things: a cup of coffee, some warm food, a quiet minute to chat, a place to sit down out of the cold, genuine interest. God really is most present in that space separating me from you, us from them. Jesus really is alive somehow in the place where my life meets the lives of these folks. All normal distinctions and divisions melt away as I realize that God really does love all of us more than we can even begin to appreciate. Jesus' images of the heavenly banquet and the shalom of breaking bread with others are real. Paul's talk about the body of Christ not only makes perfect sense, but it seems more desirable than all of the other alternatives most of us live most of the time. And all of it fills me with great joy, which is something else Jesus talks a lot about but which seems to be missing from a lot of religious folks. It's not that I feel good about myself because I am doing good. It's just joy, the movement of the Holy Spirit.
Fourth, I said a minute or so ago that I could care less about why these things happened to these people, but that is only while I am busy holding hands, sharing supper, having a cup of coffee, and chatting. Once I am back home, I cannot help but reflect on the hows and whys. In America we love to argue whether people have to take responsibility for themselves or if the government ought to take more responsibility for the least fortunate in our society. My friends, you won’t often hear me talk about the devil from the pulpit, but this ceaseless and fruitless arguing about government vs. individual responsibility is the devil at work. The devil loves to deflect God’s people from God’s purposes. Endless and inconclusive argument is just a way of avoiding doing what we know God wants done.
What I know, not think now, but know from the experience of sharing my life with the folks Jesus shared his life with, is this: First, like it or not, the main reason there is such misery in the world is because that is the way the world is set up to be. The world is set up by people like me to favor people like me: white, heterosexual, married, men whose parents could afford to give us the best healthcare, education, and opportunities. You may want to debate this, but I prefer to count the heads of the most miserable people in our country and in the world. Who are they? Mostly women and children, non-white, without access to healthcare, education, decent housing, gainful employment, justice or opportunity. This fact is no coincidence. Their parents were not like my parents, so they did not get the life I got and everything else unfolded from there. Like it or not, the deck of life is stacked heavily by folks like us in our favor. Wow! Everything the prophets and Jesus ever said about how God sees things, almost completely the opposite of how the world sees things, how God favors the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the hopeless, the outcasts, is true.
Which leads me to the second thing I know: this truth is a life worth devoting one's life to. Like it not, faith is ultimately political and activist, because you cannot find God in the lives of those whom Jesus shared his life with and not want to try to change the world that creates such misery.
And so, why bother with Lazarus? Quite simply, because that's where God is surely to be found, known and experienced. Prayer, retreats, worship and fellowship are all important, but they are the preparatory work of getting centered in God in Jesus Christ so that we are both willing and able to take the next step. If we really want to experience the love of God, we have to leap over from the gutter outside our gates, the chasm that separates us from Lazarus, who is lying there right now, with stinking sores that the dogs are licking. We know what to do. We just have to believe that Jesus meant what he said and did and go and do likewise. God is waiting for us to show up.