| The Rev. Catharine W. Montgomery | 18 Pentecost |
| Grace Memorial Episcopal Church | Year C, RCL |
| September 30, 2007 |
Who are the richest people in the world? Can you name a few? (Gates? Buffett, Winfrey?) In the old days, the names that just rolled off our tongues were the Astors, Vanderbilts and Biltmores. We know the names of the rich don’t we? What if I told you that you and I are right up there with them? This little tidbit of information came from a web site named globalrich.com. You type in your income, and it shows on a continuum where your income compares with what people all over the world make. I’m not sure how they figured that - so take it with a grain of salt and always be careful of sites that ask for donations, but for me it provided an interesting visual image for the huge gap between the rich and poor.
Jesus provides a stunning visual image of that gap in this parable of the rich man and the beggar. Let’s do some scripture study. Pull out your well-read floppy bible or your floppy bulletin and turn to the passage in Luke. The picture Jesus paints is in three scenes. First scene, we see a rich man – notice that he is not given a name. He is dressed in very nice clothes some of which are purple. It was a color that was hard to come by and only for the rich. His house had a gate – another sign of wealth and the need for privacy and keeping the riff-raff out. We are told he eats very well every day – lots of food. In this super-sized world in which we live, we can just picture him….can’t we? In those days, people that were at a feast often used hunks of bread to wipe the grease off of their hands. Then they would throw the soiled bread on the floor under the table….for the dogs….. or the servants …or the garbage.
In this tableau we also see Lazarus – isn’t it odd that Jesus would give the beggar a name? He is lying at the gate of the rich man’s house. We can assume he may have been crippled and left there by others, or he was too weak to sit or stand …or push away the dogs… we know he was diseased. He never asks for a thing or speaks a word in this parable, but Jesus says he was hungry and longing for even a scrap of that greasy bread from under the rich man’s table. Seeing this scene as a whole are you struck by the contrast between these two people? There is a huge gap between the rich and the poor.
Suddenly, the scene changes. The poor man dies and becomes rich, and the rich man dies and becomes poor. The name, Lazarus, means, “God helps.” Lazarus dies at the gate and is carried by the angels to be with father Abraham. In Jewish thought, this was the place of highest bliss. The rich man dies too and is buried and is tormented in Hades. This doesn’t make sense because in those days wealth was thought to be a sign of God’s blessing. Poverty and disease was a sign of God’s disfavor. This is the reverse of what the hearers of this parable would expect. And now we see painted for us, both heaven and hell.
The poor rich man looks up from the fires of hell and asks Abraham to “send Lazarus” – send that servant to me - I need water. What the rich nameless man finds out is that when all is said and done, the gap of greed, the great chasm of lack of compassion – the great divide of indifference - the fiery abyss of final judgment cannot be crossed.
I keep seeing that chart with me and all of us up there with Bill Gates. This pulpit is getting warm….Do you feel you are sitting in the hot seat? All of us who are in the top percent of the world’s rich should be sweating by now. (This is the perfect Sunday for a fire safety program!) Send in the fire extinguishers… the parable is not over. Scene three…As a last resort, the rich man cries out, “Father I beg you to send that servant Lazarus to my brothers. I need him to warn them of what might happen.”
Father Abraham points out that those who are left on earth have plenty of help. They have Moses and the prophets – the scripture to warn them and guide them. The poor rich man knew his brothers pretty well. He knew they were not listening to the words of Moses or the prophets - he knew they were just like him. They were enjoying the good life with plenty to eat and drink – nice clothes – nice houses. He knew his brothers were so busy trying to get ahead and provide for their families – they didn’t see the poor nameless people outside the gate or in the city streets looking through the dumpster.
They didn’t see the nameless emaciated – diseased children on the other side of the world. He knew his brothers….but he had an idea. Scare some sense into them…. If someone from the dead speaks to them - that will make them repent! Father Abraham was a bit skeptical by then. “Those brothers of yours…They’re not listening to anyone – someone rising from the dead isn’t likely to convince them.”
The parable ends there. Or does it? In this God’s eye view of the world, he is looking at the fundamental nature of our hearts and our attitudes about our neighbor and who is our neighbor, not about who is where on the scale of rich and poor. Even in hell the poor rich man still believed he was better than Lazarus
We who are living our lives in the gap between the richest and the poorest still have a chance to listen to the words of Moses and the prophets. They call us to repentance. They call us to wake up and open our eyes. Here is what the prophet Isaiah said about repentance. He said don’t bother to put on a big show of doing without: This is the kind of fast day that I am after: to break the chains of injustice, get rid of exploitation in the workplace, free the oppressed, cancel debts. What I am interested in seeing you do is: sharing your food with the hungry, inviting the homeless poor into your homes, putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad, and being available to your own families. Do this and the lights will turn on, and your lives will turn around at once. (Isaiah 58:6-8, The Message) The Word of the Lord….