Date: September 30, 2007
Text: Luke 16:19-31
There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man's table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.' But Abraham said, 'Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.' He said, 'Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father's house - for I have five brothers - that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.' Abraham replied, 'They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.' He said, 'No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' He said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.'"
Well, this is a great text, there is a lot going on—a lot to talk about. We probably could have a done sermon series on this text! We have Lazarus and the rich man. And they both die. Lazarus goes to Heaven and the rich man goes to Hell.
Pretty scary stuff, this Hell. Eternal damnation. It is a hard text because we don’t like to think about Hell—or speculate on the reasons why people go to Hell. And we are not sure why this rich man in the story is in Hell. We are told he is rich. But that’s no reason to be condemned to Hell. Father Abraham was very rich. We are told that he feasted and dressed pretty snazzy. Again, hopefully not sufficient reason for eternal damnation. We are told that the poor man Lazarus would have loved to just have the crumbs from his table. But, I’m not sure that if the rich man gave Lazarus crumbs that that would have been sufficient to go to Heaven. Do you think so? Offering crumbs? I don’t think so.
We have this clue in what Father Abraham says at the end, that the rich man’s brothers should listen to the prophets. If they listen to the prophets they won’t go to Hell. What does that mean? We need to pay attention to this advice.
Many scholars say that the rich man went to Hell because he didn’t see the poor—notice Lazarus. But that’s not true, the rich man calls Lazarus by name. He was oblivious to Lazarus’ need. Who, seeing such need, could not respond? But here I could be talking about myself. Or maybe about you. Everyday we see need and walk past, need on the street corner, a person with a cardboard sign, need on the TV, need in the papers and we walk by. And it is not just need we are oblivious to, it is pretty much everything NOT on our agenda that we ignore. If we didn’t plan for it, we rush past not seeing.
Let me tell you a true story, this is from an article in the Washington Post on April 8, 2007 by Gene Weingarten. How many of you know about Joshua Bell? He is perhaps the best violin player ever. A cheap ticket to his concerts is over $100. Interview magazine wrote that his playing “does nothing less than tell human beings why they bother to live.”
His violin is a Stradivarius called the Gibson ex Huberman. It was handcrafted in 1713 and reportedly cost Joshua Bell 3.6 million dollars at auction. Joshua Bell makes about $1,000 a minute for performances.
In January, 2007 Joshua Bell gave a free concert at a DC metro stop. He played some of the best music ever written on his Stradivarius for 43 minutes during the morning commute. This was an experiment arranged by the Washington Post. And it was secretly videotaped. They wondered how many people would stop and listen, or even pause. A famous musician, world class music, multi-million dollar violin. In that 43 minutes, 1,097 people went by. How many people do you think stopped for a minute to appreciate this concert? GUESS!
Seven people stopped. Only seven people out of 1,097 even paused to appreciate a world class concert. You can watch the video on the website for the Washington Post and see that people didn’t even look in his direction! Joshua Bell is quoted as saying "I'm surprised at the number of people who don't pay attention at all, as if I'm invisible. Because, you know what? I'm makin' a lot of noise!"
Actually, a couple of years ago, a homeless guy died at that same spot in the DC Metro. He just lay down there and died. The police came, an ambulance came, and no one even stopped to see or slowed down to look. He could have been the Lazarus from Jesus’ parable.
The philosopher Immanuel Kant argued that our ability to appreciate beauty is related to our ability to make moral judgments. Over 1,000 people failed the “appreciating beauty” test on that morning when they walked past Joshua Bell, and the rich man who walked by Lazarus failed that test, and everyone who walked past that homeless man who died at the train stop failed to appreciate beauty. Because we ALL are made in the image of God. And if we recognize something of God in everyone, we could not walk past a dying man. One of the best things I heard at seminary was when Prof. Don Luck said about everyone you meet, you can truthfully say, “Jesus died for this person.” And if we believe that, we can’t walk past human need.
Back to the Joshua Bell concert: There was one demographic, one group of people whose behavior was absolutely consistent. Everyone in this group noticed him and wanted to stop and listen to Joshua Bell. Who can tell me what group this was?
CHILDREN. Every child who was there tried to get their parent to stop and stand there! Pulling, twisting, tugging at the adult’s hand to get them to stop. Every CHILD. They do recognize beauty. And if you have children, you know they notice needy people. “What are they doing, Mommy?” “Asking for money, dear.” “Well let’s give them some.” Children. Their world is simple and they notice things, and they believe what we tell them and they take it literally.
That is what Jesus meant in Matthew 18:3 when he said, “Unless you become like little children you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”
The other day my 3-year old, Zander, was underfoot in the kitchen. His back was to me and he was moving around and mumbling. I wanted to say, “Get out of the kitchen! I have hot things on the stove; you know you are not supposed to play in here.” But instead I said, “Zander, what are you doing?” And he turned around and was smiling and dancing and singing, “God is awesome” with his thumbs up in the air. I thought, how sweet and how cute. It made my heart burst, but also I wondered Where does he get this stuff? Who is this creature? I mean, my husband and I don’t go dancing around the house giving a thumbs up to Jesus. And then I thought, Why don’t we? What’s wrong with us? Why do we believe in God, praise God, but not spontaneously dance and sing around the kitchen?
William Least Heat-Moon said, “A man becomes his attentions. His obser-vations and curiosity, they make and remake him.” Why are we so content with the everyday business that we let it overtake us? The rich man in the story was content with fine clothes and food; he didn’t devote himself to the Bible. Otherwise he might have seen Lazarus for what he was—a child of God. The people in DC were too intent on what they were about to notice an incredible concert or a dying child of God. I was busy cooking and almost yelled at my son who was busy dancing around, giving a thumbs up to Jesus.
But there is hope. We are, after all, here, worshipping God, giving God a big thumbs up. And we don’t have to be children to be like children in our faith. I think part of faith is a cultivation of holy discontent or holy restlessness. Finding some dissatisfaction with this life because we really believe in the Gospel promise of eternity with God. Bono from U2 has this. This guy is rich, a sex symbol, a rock star, has a pretty awesome life style. And he wrote a song, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.” He says in interviews, “I will not be at rest until I have life with God in Heaven.”
I hope and pray that none of you will be at rest until you have life with God in Heaven. This holy restlessness is what keeps us searching, keeps our eyes open so we hunger for the scriptures like Father Abraham said; so we can recognize beauty in music, in the face of the homeless. This restless excitement and longing is what may have you dancing around giving a thumbs up to Jesus.
Amen.