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"Stuff and Nonsense" | Luke 12:13-21 | August 1, 2004 |
Edna’s cupboards, bureaus, cabinets, garage, attic and spare bedrooms have been crammed full of things that define her. (“Oh, you know Edna Furbelow,” says her neighbor, “she collects Hummels.”) Of course she has a cabinet full of cottage cheese containers like all her neighbors who went through the depression. There is a drawer a third full of used twist ties because “you never know when you will need one.” Her daughters finally convinced her that she did not really need to wash and keep the plastic bags that bread came in. Edna does not see herself as a pack rat, just frugal. After, all the only thing she passionately collects are the beautiful Hummel figurines. Every once in a while, Edna took some of the clutter out to the front yard and had a garage sale, although no one stepping inside her house ever knew the difference. But now Edna has followed her husband in death. Their children are having an estate auction. Everything must go. There is something instructive, sad even, about an estate sale. With the owners gone, the items lose much of their meaning, so that even Ed and Edna’s kids and closest friends think, “Good Lord, there’s a sot of stuff here. What a lot of junk!” The agent who does not want to haul any of this stuff away has priced everything low: a stack of books for 50 cents, a big set of plates go for a few dollars.
Two young parents from down the road who live in a trailer and have the threat of financial ruin hanging over them constantly since she had to quit her job at Wal-Mart when the second baby arrived, pick through the tables, gleaning what they can. They stop by the table of children’s clothes with the sign over them that announces that “Absolutely everything must go.” The clothes date back to the 1970s amazingly preserved in tissue by Edna.
Over by the garage is a rusty bicycle from the Eisenhower era and a once prized lamp that now looks awful. Ed’s band saw and drill press, his pride and joy, are being eyed by a scrap metal scavenger.
Now the auctioneer calls out Lot 152, a collection of four hundred Hummels. Eyes roll and knowing smiles break out, but no one bids. The auctioneer looks at the estate agent; the estate agent looks at Edna’s oldest daughter. A lifetime’s hobby and an essential part of someone’s identity comes to this. You could almost hear Jesus asking, “And these Hummels, whose then will they be??”
Which brings us to the story Jesus tells about the man who stored up grain for many seasons in his barns, with such a surplus that he thought of building bigger barns and tells himself to eat, drink and be merry–and then he drops dead. Although not made explicit it was probably plain to Jesus’ hearers that this man had ignored his religious duty to leave grain for the gleaners, the widows and the orphans and the only tithe he had offered was a sigh of contentment.
I have always been ready to think that Jesus was speaking about someone else, not me. Surely he was talking about the wealthy like the rich young ruler, or the scribes and Pharisees. He must be aiming his remarks to those, like this man, who had so much laid up in his barns. Surely not me, not us. But Jesus is speaking to any of us who are possessed by our possessions. We all know how things, stuff, can dominate our attention and concern and get in the way of what we say is really important.
Kurt Vonnegut told a story of an author at a party given by a multi billionaire. Vonnegut asked the author whether it bothered him that his host had probably made more money the day before than the author's most popular novel had grossed in forty years. The author replied in the negative saying, "I have something he can never have--the knowledge that I have enough." The story of the builder of barns prompts us to ask ourselves, "How much is enough?" We hear the word of Jesus' gospel saying to us: Relax. You have enough. A bigger barn won't help. Trust God.
More often than I like to admit the scripture asks me "Is there a discrepancy between what you say is important and how you spend your time?" I imagine if you talked to the barn builder's wife after his death and asked her what was important to him she would respond that he loved his family--carried a billfold full of pictures; his church and community were very important although he wasn't as active lately as he used to be." And if you asked "How did he spend his time?" "Oh, working on the farm. And he was very successful. He was planning an expansion which was a huge task and demanded his full attention. As for other parts of his life, well they were put on hold for a while. He often promised me and himself that as soon as he finished his work and had plenty of goods laid up then we could go to the sea shore we loved so much when we were young and do all the things we used to talk about. But he was just so busy with the farm."
In our culture it is very hard to believe, truly believe Jesus when he says that "life does not consist in the abundance of possessions."
The passage just before today’s reading is the famous passage where Jesus reminds his listeners that God's eye is on the sparrows and humans are much more valuable than sparrows. But there is an anxious fellow in the crowd who is worried about his security, worried that he was not getting as much as his brother in the settlement of the family estate. We all know how ugly it can get when families slug it out over the inheritance. So this man yells out from the crowd. "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me."
What would Jesus have said if one of Edna’s daughters had complained that the 400 Hummels should have gone to her? I expect he would have told her the same story he told that questioner. It is foolish to focus on storing treasures while failing to be rich toward God.
Those who followed Jesus recognized that Jesus offered them a new quality of life; he offered an essential life, a life rich toward God.
There is an Hasidic tale about two brothers. The older is rich and unmarried, the younger poor with a passel of children. Their father dies and they divide the land, here amicably. But one night, they lie abed musing on their respective lots. The older reflects that he really has more than he needs as a single man, that his brother has all those mouths to feed, and rises to move the fresh surveyor's markers in his younger brother's favor. The younger brother, equally sleepless, thinks on the joy his family gives him and reflects that his older brother has nothing as an inheritance save the land. He too rises from his bed to move the markers in his brother's favor. They meet, recognize what each was up to, and fall into each other's arms. It is that concern for the other that marks a life rich toward God.
We have pledged today to see to Jacob, who was baptized, that we as a church would show this kind of giving love to him and his family. Further we vowed to teach him that life consists in more than possessions. And we promised that we would help him come to understand the essential life that Jesus teaches.
At the last meal Jesus would share with his disciples before he was crucified he took very ordinary elements of life--bread and wine and offered them as symbols of that essential life he offered to them. Today we have those same elements which we share with each other reminding each other that the essential life, the abundant life in God is available to us. Come again to our communion table to remember Jesus’ example of sharing. Come to recall again how he taught us to be rich toward God. Amen
Joe Dunham
| Copyright © 2004 by Joe Dunham. All rights reserved. |