Sermon 111499

Sunday, November 14, 1999
Rev. James A. Todhunter

"Fear, Faith and Joy"
Zephaniah 1:7, 12-18
1 Thessalonians 5:1-11
Matthew 25:14-30

In our religious lives we like nothing better than to separate the spiritual from the material. This is particularly so in the relationship between matters of the spirit and matters of wealth. But Jesus is always showing us how inseparable the two are. He says that how you manage your spiritual life is best indicated by how you manage your money. And he uses money as a means of understanding spirit. Take the Parable of the Talents from Matthew in this morning’s scripture. In the first century, a Roman talent was a tidy sum, worth, let’s say, a thousand dollars. Yet the word talent endures in our language, not as a monetary term, but as something meaning an innate ability or gift. We might interpret this parable as another way of Jesus saying to us "Don’t keep your light under a bushel." Recognize and develop the gifts God has given you. So we could logically conclude that the story is really about talents as gifts, not talents as money.

But, on the other hand, why would Jesus tell it that way? Why does he use money in the story? He sees some connection. And isn’t it interesting that others have taught that the parable really is primarily about money. Conservative television evangelist Pat Robertson says that the Parable of the Talents proclaims a kind of baptism of capitalism. God blesses those who take risks and invest, and condemns those who hoard. It therefore follows that God wants us to be wealthy and enjoy riches as our just reward. So with him the spiritual per se would appear to get thrown out the window. It’s perhaps easy to be critical of Robertson. But we should remember that the Bible clearly talks about the rewards of faith. In the Old Testament those rewards are prosperity and progeny. The message of the very first Psalm is that if you delight in God’s law and meditate on it continually, all that you do will prosper. Jesus says, put God at the center of your life, and all else will come to you. Now, to be sure, the Bible argues with itself in this. Ecclesiastes asks why the wicked prosper. And Jesus is hard on the rich, even going so far as to tell the rich young ruler to give everything away and follow him, if he is to find the Kingdom of God. But there is no doubt that the biblical message is that faith reaps rewards, and that those rewards should not simply limited to the "spiritual."

Here’s what I think Jesus is saying. I think the story is really about our relationship to all that God gives us. Those gifts include our talents, our abilities, and our money. They are all in there together. And in a funny sort of way money, for better or for worse, comes to symbolize it all for us. We may say, of course, that there are some things more important than money, like health, for example. But personal health and money are connected. Isn’t the health care crisis in the United States somehow really about money, that is, who can afford good coverage, and who can’t? Of course it is. One of the things that the "haves" have and the "have nots" have not, is better health. If we are honest with ourselves, don’t we believe that there are plenty of problems in our lives, personal or family, that would disappear if we only had just a little bit more money coming in?

Think for a moment about what this parable is saying about what God has bestowed upon us? A number of things. First, all of these gifts are blessings that God has given us, from our talents to our wealth. And a blessing doesn’t belong to anybody. The purpose of a blessing is to be set free and to grow and to enrich, in every sense of the word. Second, these gifts always are in danger of becoming attachments. An attachment is something we believe we cannot be happy without. An attachment is something we believe is the source of happiness. We cling to attachments. The last thing we want to do is risk them. We come to feel that we are entitled to them. The only way to keep them safe is to bury them in the ground. Why do we do that? Because we are afraid. The man who buried his talent was afraid. In particular he was afraid of his master. He couldn’t believe that his master was generous, benevolent, forgiving, and wanted the best for him.

Jesus said "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and all else will be given to you." Seek God, not the blessings, and then the blessings will be yours. And Jesus said we must do this fearlessly. It is our fears that continually do us in.

I would like to share a story that the Rev. Jeremiah Wright of Trinity UCC in Chicago tells. He heard it from Dr. Charles Walker, a prominent African-American preacher, and for years pastor of the Nineteenth Street Baptist Church in Philadelphia. (From the book What Makes You So Strong? By Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright)

He was holding a revival in New England and the man who was assigned to take him back and forth every night to the hotel was a man who could not speak the king's English. He spoke good African American English, but he couldn't speak the king's English. He never did say "revival" the whole week. He said "vavibal." He said, "Rev., that 'vavibal' blessed me." The last night, as they headed to the airport Charles remarked that though the man didn't speak the king's English, he had "money's mammy." He was driving a Lincoln that was so high that Charles said he couldn't even read those roman numerals. He wore a three-carat diamond pinky ring, Brooks Brothers' shoes, and a three-hundred-dollar suit. The man said, "Rev., you don't understand how I got this. I got it by putting the Lord first in my life and praising God in spite of problems."

Charles looked at him and the man continued, "See, folks see a car, they want to go get a car. They see a suit and a house, they try to get that. You know the Word says, Rev., 'Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these here things will be added unto you.'" The man said, "Let me tell you how I know that's true. Me and my wife been married over forty years. And during the depression I lost my job and we spent all of our life savings." And he said, "One Saturday night (both of us wanted to go to church the next morning and our church were eight miles away from where we lived, the bus fare were ten cents, and we only had fifteen cents to our names), my wife said, 'Honey, tell you what you do. What you do is you walk to church in the morning, and when you get to church you put a nickel in, and when you leave, you'll have a dime to ride back, 'cause it only cost a dime to ride in those days.

"And I got up, and I walked to church. I were tired, but it were a beautiful day, and as I were walking, I just felt blessed because I thought about people who didn't have no legs to walk. When I got to church, as soon as I stepped inside the sanctuary, the Holy Ghost said, 'Put the whole fifteen cents in.' And I started arguing with the Lord. I said, 'No, no. No, no. "Seek ye first" don't mean that. I done walked all the way here.'"

The man continued, "The choir started singing the processional. They were singing, 'How I got over. My soul looks back and wonders . . . . ' But all I could hear them singing was, 'Put the whole fifteen cents in.' I stood there arguing with him. We read the responsive Scripture and the Word said, '0 give thanks unto the Lord for he is good.' But all I could see on that page was, 'Put the whole fifteen cents in.' When it came time for the offering, I lost the argument. I was rubbing my dime and my nickel together, and like a drum beating in my head, it kept beating over and over again, 'Put the whole fifteen cents in.' I put it in; I watched that offering plate take our last money in the world further and further away from me.

"But don't you know the Lord blessed me through the Word. The sermon that Sunday were, 'They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles? When I left church I felt like one of them eagles. I was feeling good. I were ready to walk that eight miles back home.

"I got one block from the church and a strange lady stopped me. She said, 'Mister, I don't know you, and I don't know if you need work or not, but, here, take this address, and if you do need work they're hiring there tomorrow.' And I said, 'Thank you, Jesus.' I walked another block, and the Spirit of the Lord said, 'Look down.' When I looked down I seen a dime, and I said, 'Thank you, Jesus.''

He concluded his story: "As soon as I picked the dime up, a bus were coming, and I said, 'Thank you, Jesus.' I got up on the bus, I put my dime in, and the bus driver give me back fifteen cents change. I said, 'Mister, I ain't give you no quarter; I give you a dime.' The bus driver said, 'Shut up, man, and sit down.' I said, 'Thank you, Jesus.'

"I got back home on the Lord's day, blessed by the Lord's Word, blessed by the Lord's work, blessed by the Lord with a job, blessed by the Lord with the same fifteen cents I left home with. And that job I went to the next day to interview, boy, I held that job for thirty-three years. Thank you, Jesus."

Don’t bury your talents in the ground. Don’t hide your light under a bushel. Put God at the center of your life. Meditate on the law of God continually. And all will be yours. Because God is good, you can be good. Because God is generous, you can be generous. Because God blesses, you can be blessed and you can be a blessing. Thank you, Jesus! Amen.