For the confession, we wrote on slips of paper things that we put before God, things that we give more importance to than to God. We then put these 4x4 slips of paper on a nail in the center of the cross and burned them. As the papers burn they form a rose, which symbolizes that God takes things that can be ugly in our faith and turn them into something beautiful.
We then put the cross to the side.
After worship, we had a picnic on the church lawn with a variety of lawn games and some things from worship got left out, including the cross. At the end of the picnic, when just a few people were left, including one family who was late for worship and missed the confession, I went to go put the cross away.
When I go to grab the cross, I look at the burn mark left from the papers, and there in the center of this cross is a black heart.
So now onto the sermon. I referred to the confession in the sermon, in fact the sermon was why we wrote down things that we put before God instead of sins, which is how I normally have down this confession. I also focused on the gospel text for the week which is Luke 12:13-21.
Enjoy!
How much do you need?
It is an interesting question with many different answers depending on how to qualify it. Money? To retire, to live comfortably, to go out to dinner, to put away for a rainy day, to go shopping, for a new car, a new house, to send your kid to college, and the list goes on!
There is never enough, we always want more. Well if I had more money I could have the nicer car, the bigger house, the newer phone, the fancier computer, the larger barn. And the more we have the more we want. We are greedy!
Greed was the man’s problem in this parable. He had more crops so he wanted bigger barns and he was already rich to begin with.
And greed is the person in the crowd’s problem as well. He already received his share of the inheritance, but now he wanted more.
And isn’t greed our problem as well.
At the beginning of worship we wrote down things that we put before God, things that keep us in bondage to sin. I’m guessing that many of you wrote down physical, material things. Maybe it was the home that you can’t quiet afford and is too big for your family anyways. Or the car that you treasure, or the boat that you spend more time on than should. Maybe you wrote down things that are a little harder to put your finger on, sports that you follow religiously, or finances that help you achieve a certain level of status. Maybe you wrote down your job that keeps you working at all hours even when you are with your family. Maybe you even wrote down family and friends. Yes, we love them but we keep putting them higher than God on our priority list, allowing them to take advantage of us. Did anyone write down themselves? When we put our material goods ahead of God and others, really we are putting ourselves first.
See that is what all this greed boils down to, all these treasures, why the rich man was a fool. Greed is “I” focused. It is putting yourself first. In the 3 short verses where the rich man speaks in the parable he refers to himself 14 times! In fact he never mentions another person. Not a field hand to help him tend his crops, or a carpenter to help build the new barns, or friends and family to relax, eat, drink and be merry with. Was he just going to party by himself? Well that is awfully boring.
It doesn’t matter that we have stuff or that we accumulate stuff, it is human nature. What matters is who we are focused on. The rich man was only focused on the un-holy Trinity of me, myself, and I. The person who asked Jesus to tell his brother what to do, only cared about himself.
Those items that we wrote down earlier are fine in and of themselves. Jesus doesn’t end the parable by saying “so it is with those who store up treasures for themselves because they are not rich towards God.” No he says but! “So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves, but are not rich towards God.” Do you put your treasures, your possessions, your materials, your items first. Or is God first?
Jesus tells us to watch out for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions. Thank God! Because there will always be people who will have more than us. But we can always, regardless of how rich or poor we are put God first.
We put God first when we don’t have possessions for the sake of having them. When we are able to admit that we don’t put God first, we are putting God first. When we give our possessions, our wealth, our material goods and our time generously to others we are putting God first.
When we are “I” focused, we care about what others can do for us, including God. But when we focus on God, putting God and others first before us, we care about what we can do for others, how we can help others and be God’s hands in this world in order do God’s work. We see how God has blessed us in many ways in order to care for others.
And God blesses us abundantly! God has blessed us with our wealth, our homes, our cars, our savings accounts, our collections, our hobbies and much, much more. God blessed the rich man with land that produced abundantly. God blessed the person in the crowd with parents who left him an inheritance. God blesses us in everything and every way. But if we are “I” focused and greedy, we stop seeing the blessings that God has given us and instead just see how our blessings do not measure up to others.
So the question should not be “how much do you need?” for there will never be enough, but “how much have you been given?”
No comments:
Post a Comment