Our Money Story: Release

This has been another rough week. Something, it seems, that is to be expected in this year of years, 2020. This week we are witnessing devastation in our world due to weather events, including hurricanes and typhoons, and extreme temperatures and wildfires, here and in other parts of the world. We’ve also been witness this week to the tragedy in Wisconsin. And to the continuing pandemic that has taken over 180,000 lives in our country alone. This has been another rough week. And in the midst of it, today, we are talking about release. About letting go.

We read from the gospel of Luke, the 11th chapter. 

Jesus told them, “When you pray, say:

‘Father, uphold the holiness of your name.

Bring in your kingdom.

Give us the bread we need for today.

Forgive us our sins,

    for we also forgive everyone who has wronged us.

And don’t lead us into temptation.’” --Luke 11:2-4 (CEB)

The verse in Luke 11 that is central to our conversation this morning is verse 3. “Give us the bread we need for today.” So, how does this passage connect up with the idea of release?

The concept of release in scripture is closely connected to the Year of Jubilee, which is set forth for Israel as a command in the book of Deuteronomy.  Every seven years, all prisoners and slaves were to be released. All debts forgiven. All property returned to its original owners. Anyone bound by a labor contract was released from it. All labor was to cease for one year. So, during this Year of Jubilee, not only was the land able to rest and experience a Sabbath, but so, too, were the people. For an entire year.

Now, we might look at this and just shake our heads. How was this even possible? How could this even happen? And why was this even necessary? The idea is almost beyond our current cultural comprehension.

But, the idea of release is not all that we learn from Deuteronomy. In this fifth book of the Torah, sin is not connected with one’s own piety, about doing right and wrong. Instead, sin was an economic term. It was about how (or not) you cared for yourself and your neighbor. Because this is how you honored God. So, if you robbed someone of their wages, you sinned. If you failed to release someone from their debt, you sinned. If you made someone a slave, you sinned. If you had too much food and you didn’t give any to your hungry neighbor, you sinned. Sin was an economic term.

All of this was about leveling the playing field. Giving everyone the ability to take care of themselves and their families. And, also, ensuring that, if someone couldn’t, they would be cared for.

But, it was about something even more. It was about idolatry.

In Jesus’ day, much like our own, the underlying economic system encouraged faith and trust in the holding of possessions. Consider the man in Matthew 19. He comes to Jesus asks how he might gain eternal life. He has fulfilled all of the commandments, he tells Jesus. But, Jesus knows what is truly enslaving him. And so, Jesus tells him that, to gain eternal life, he must release all of his possessions and give them to the poor. He can’t. Because he has come to believe that it is his possessions that will save him.

Our every instinct as human beings is towards idolatry. To close in and protect ourselves and our possessions from others. I know this from my own money story.

I grew up on a ranch in the middle of nowhere. I never knew as a child that we were dirt poor. Because it always seemed as though there was enough. Enough food on our table. And enough clothing to wear. We had really no toys to speak of. Yet, there was always something for us to play with. Maybe it was an empty box that we could make a house out of. Maybe it was tall weeds that we could stomp down for a pretend village. Maybe it was simply the dirt in the grove of trees behind our house that my brother and I used to form and shape a little town for the few Matchbox cars we had. Whatever we had always seemed to be enough.

But, that changed as I became an adult and started to make money. It then became all about collecting stuff. Whatever it was. Clothing. Household stuff. Knick knacks. You name it, I probably had it. So much stuff. Stuff that I thought I needed. And along with the stuff came greed. Because I wasn’t buying stuff for anyone else. Only for myself. Until 2012 and my layoff. I learned pretty quickly how useless this stuff was. And how little I actually needed to live on. And what was really important. And what wasn’t.  

Yesterday, in our Saturday morning study, we were asked this question: What is essential in your life, and what is trivial? In other words, what can we release in our lives and what should we hold onto. I’m wondering whether this pandemic and the times in which we are living haven’t begun to reveal for us what is truly important. And what isn’t.  

Christianity has, honestly, become a twisted mess in our country. We have lost what is essential to our faith. That we simply be lovers of God and lovers of people. This is at the heart of who and what God calls us to. To release us from the things that keep us from God. To release us from the shame, the anxiety, the guilt, the greed, or anything else that keeps us from freedom and wholeness. To release us from the idea that our worth is tied to our productivity, or our activity or our business. To let go of these elements of our money story that prevent us from fully living in God’s abundance. And trusting God’s promise - that God will save us. That God will provide for our daily needs. All of this, so that we might then let go of our abundance in love, to serve our neighbor.   

It’s a stunning idea, isn’t it? A terrifying one, too! Yet maybe this is the invitation God is giving us. To simply let go and become part of the great festive banquet that God has prepared for all of God’s people. The banquet, the party, that is a sign that God is acting at last to rescue God’s people and wipe away all tears from all eyes. Or, as Tom Wright says, “Give us this day our daily bread” means simply, “Let the party continue.”

So, let go. Release yourself from whatever keeps you from trusting God's promise. Then, come! And join the party!  

Preached August 30, 2020, online at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY.

Pentecost 13

Readings: Luke 11:2-4; Psalm 145:10-18

Our Money Story: Remember

This morning we begin the first of three weeks looking at the Lord’s Prayer. We also begin four weeks thinking together about stewardship. Now, you may say that connecting these two things  makes no sense whatsoever. How in the world does money connect with prayer? 

Well, if you’re at all like me, this makes perfect sense. Because for many of us, I would imagine, at some time in our lives we have spoken a desperate prayer to God, asking for money. Maybe it was at the end of the month, when the money from our paycheck was no more. Wondering how we might make it to the end of the month. Put food on the table for our families. Pay our electricity bill to keep the lights on. I dare say that the connection of money and prayer makes perfect sense.

So, today, we read the Lord’s Prayer, not as we generally know it, from Matthew. But, from Luke. A shorter, more condensed prayer. To the point. Just like the direct conversation about money we will be having over these next weeks. 

For us to think and to speak directly of money is to automatically invite tension into this space. We quickly want to avoid the conversation. Yet, money and possessions are one of the most common topics in scripture. Jesus talked about money more than faith. Or prayer. So, our money story is a spiritual story. Over these next weeks, you will be invited to explore your money story. To compare it to God’s money story. And to consider making your own stewardship practices a fuller expression of God’s story. And of who you are. And what you believe. 

So, we begin today, reading three short verses that we will be using for each of these weeks. Today, I am reading from the Common English Bible translation. 

Jesus told them, “When you pray, say:
‘Father, uphold the holiness of your name.
Bring in your kingdom.
Give us the bread we need for today.
Forgive us our sins,
    for we also forgive everyone who has wronged us.
And don’t lead us into temptation.’” --Luke 11:2-4 (CEB)

We begin today by considering the first verse. “Father, uphold the holiness of your name. Bring in your kingdom.”

In our book club this month, we read a lovely book written for middle school children - One Crazy Summer, by Rita Garcia-Williams. It’s the story of 11-year-old Delphine and her two younger sisters. And of their experience in the summer of 1968 traveling from Brooklyn to Oakland, California, to spend a month with a mother they barely know. When they arrive in Oakland, they learn that their mother has taken on a new first name. They’ve only heard about her as Cecile. Yet, she has changed her first name to more fully reflect who she is. Nzila. A poet’s name, she says. “A poet who blows the dust off surfaces to make clear and true paths.”

This is not something appreciated by 11-year-old Delphine. Just a few pages later, Delphine notes that a “name is important. It isn’t something you drop in the litter basket or on the ground. Your name is how people know you. The very mention of your name makes a picture spring to mind, whether it’s a picture of clashing fists or a mighty mountain that can’t be knocked down. Your name is who you are and how you’re known even when you do something great or something dumb.”

Your name is who you are and how you’re known. Isn’t that why Jesus begins his prayer the way he does? With a name that tells us who he is and how he knows God? Father. Parent. In the Aramaic, Abba? This is how Jesus addresses God and how he invites his disciples to address God. Up to this point, it was unusual to name God in this way. The Hebrew scriptures sometimes compared God to a father, but it is rare that they referred to God as Father. Jesus uses this title to reshape the disciples’ thinking about who this God is. Shifting their understanding from the angry God that the Jewish people had come to know. And instead expanding their understanding and relationship with God as one of parent and child. Giving them permission to call God, Father. And to claim their protected position as God’s own children.

Now, for some of us, to call God, Father, can be difficult. Especially if we have not had good relationships with our fathers. Or have had negative experiences with patriarchy. Yet, it’s important for us to understand that as we are created in the image of God, so God is in the image of human beings, possessing both male and female attributes. Parental attributes. Loving, compassionate, nurturing. Yet firm, establishing necessary boundaries for their children and in their relationships with their children. To call God, Father, or Abba, is to simply view God as parent.

But, as young Delphine notes in the book we read, one’s name is not just who one is, but also how one is known. However we address God as parent, we are invited to regard God’s name as holy. As God is holy. The Hebrews believed that the name of God was so sacred, that they used the word Jehovah. A word that in Hebrew could be pronounced without any consonants. Like a breath moving through their lips. Yehovah. A name spoken with whispered awe. Awe appropriate for such a powerful and deeply loving heavenly Father. A Father whose reign is not just limited to the heavens. But, a powerful and loving Father who seeks to pour out God’s heavenly reign into this world. “Bring in your kingdom,” Jesus teaches the disciples to pray. Bring in your kingdom of peace and justice. Your kingdom of love. Bring it to this world, this earth, this planet, this ecology, to these animals, to these people, even to the industry of our world. So that you, Father, might be fully experienced here. Just as in heaven. This is the prayer Jesus teaches the disciples. And what Jesus was living out on earth, offering and living into an economy, as Walter Brueggemann writes, “that was sure to collide with established economic patterns and with those who presided over and benefited from these patterns.” Jesus’ term for this alternative economy was “kingdom of God.” A social practice. And a set of social relationships there were consistent with the God of the covenant. The God of Israel. To mention this “kingdom of God,” was to call on Jesus’ disciples to remember who this God - this Father - was. [1]

It’s the same God we remember every time we celebrate communion and hear the Great Thanksgiving - the words that precede our receiving the bread and wine, the body and blood. In this thanksgiving, we remember how God moved over the waters. How God led Israel with a pillar of fire from bondage to liberation. We remember that still, small voice and then the prophets, proclaiming a new way - a new Messiah. We remember Mary and Joseph and the angels. The blind man and the leper. And the crowds that Jesus healed. Him walking on water. The little children running to him. We remember the justice he preached. The hosannas and palm branches. The love that changed the world. We remember this each and every week so that we do not forget who this God is. And so that we remember who we are. And, what our money story is to be.

So much of our beliefs and our behaviors are rooted in stories. Narratives that are personal, familial, societal, cultural, and religious. We subconsciously absorb and construct many money stories. Perhaps our money stories are about scarcity. Coming from or living in stories of fear and shame. Of never having enough. Perhaps they are stories that the church is dying and no longer relevant. Or the stories that our actions in this world won’t have any impact. 

How might we begin to unpack and reconstruct these stories to make them a better reflection of who we know God to be? Who we remember God to be. The God of scripture. The God who meets Israel in the wilderness with manna. Who, even in the midst of desperate and fearful prayers, provides. Abundantly. An extravagantly loving God. Never content with just a heavenly kingdom. But who pours out that love into a Spirit-breathed creation. To bring life and freedom. This is the God we remember.

May we, over these weeks, begin to tease apart our own complicated money stories. To rewrite them if necessary. So that they more fully reflect what we believe. Who God is. And who we remember and know this God to be. Our Father, Lord of heaven and earth. Amen.

Preached August 23, 2020, online at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY.

12th Sunday after Pentecost

Readings: Luke 11:2-4; Psalm 103:1-5

[1] Brueggemann, Walter. Money and Possessions. (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2016). 23.

Treasure Hunting: Our Hearts and Worry

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

“No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

“So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.Grace and peace to you from God, our abundant Creator, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Matt. 6:19-34 (NRSV)

Money. That is central to what we are talking about for the next three weeks. Money. Does this subject make you as uncomfortable as it makes me?

Our focus during this time will center around this overall theme of “treasure in heaven.” And, then, each week, we will look at a different text from each of the three synoptic gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke. We’ll be looking at three different contexts, three different emphases, and then, in particular, three different challenges. Three different things that challenge us in our relationship with God and with money and, especially that challenge our generosity. These three things are worry, grief, and fear.

Does anyone here have a dollar bill on them? Or it can be a bill of any denomination? (In today’s cashless world, these is getting harder and harder to find, isn’t it?) When you look at the bill, what do you see? Amount of bill, former leader, words “In God We Trust.” 

In God We Trust. (Just a little bit of trivia here, but did you know that the requirement to use these words on every denomination of American currency was passed in 1956, not really that long ago.) Isn’t it a little ironic that, on the very thing that causes so much tension and conflict in our lives, in our relationships, in our work, and, yes, right here in our church--on the actual money we use day in and day out are these words: In God we trust. Because it is money and the power of money that is one of the things that we struggle with the most in our relationship with God. 

We worry about money constantly, don’t we? What worries you most about your money? We worry about how much we have. Or don’t have. We worry about the power it has in our lives. We worry about how much time we spend earning it. As we get older, we even worry about what we will do with it after we die. Money or our worry over money is one of the highest causes of anxiety and conflict in our relationships.

We worry constantly about money. It’s why Jesus talk about money ALL THE TIME. 

I really dislike preaching about money. Maybe it would be different if I had it all figured out. But, I don’t. And I worry about it. I come from a long line of worry-ers, in fact. And I have graciously passed my practice of worrying onto my son. It is just easy to worry over it, isn’t. This constant question of how much I should save. Or how much, especially for us in the church, I should give away.

And, then, as though the answer was easy, Jesus simply says, “Don’t worry!” Yeah, right!

And, yet, it really comes down to whether or not we believe the words we find on our own currency--the words, ”In God We Trust.”  Because to trust in God is to believe that there is enough in our world. That God cares abundantly for our world and has provided enough for each one of us. The word we often uses to talk about this is “providence,” God’s providence. To believe in God’s providence is to believe, no matter what, God will care for and protect us. That God will provide for us what we need. (Notice, I said need. Not want.) It’s what we pray for each time we say the Lord’s Prayer. “Give us this day our daily bread.” Notice that the focus in this prayer given to us by Jesus is on today. Not tomorrow, but today. Give us this day our daily bread.

Haven’t you experienced this? Haven’t you experienced God’s providence in your own life? I know I have. In my late 20’s, after my husband and I separated, I had physical custody of my son. It was expensive to pay for rent and utilities for us and for food and clothing for us all by myself. There were many times that my paycheck ran out days before my next payday and I had no idea where our next meal might come from. Where my next tank of gas might come from. Or how I might keep the lights on over our heads. And, yet, there was never a time that we didn’t have enough to survive. That somehow, something or someone would show up in our lives at just the right time with just what we needed. Coincidence? Maybe. But it happened so much then and throughout my life that it is way beyond coincidence. That I can attribute it only to God and God’s providence. That it is a God-thing.

God cares abundantly for our world. God has provided enough for everyone. What then, we might ask, about those who don’t have enough in their lives? About the poor? Or the disadvantaged? After all, we see them all the time here at Grace & Glory. Our food pantry clients. Others who come to us asking for money or for a tank of gas. If God provides enough for everyone, then, why are their people like this in our world.

The simple answer? Sin. Because sin tells us that there isn’t enough in our world. That there isn’t enough for everyone. Sin leads us to worry, to live in anxiety. Sin leads us to a mindset of scarcity. That we need to hold onto our stuff. Sin leads to hoarding. Sin separates us from right relationship with God.

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth…” Jesus says in our text today. “...[B]ut store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.”

Jesus tells us to “strive toward the kingdom.” To trust in God’s providence and to strive for the kingdom. To trust that God will care for us. That God has created enough for us and for everyone else. To stop worrying. And to move from a place of scarcity to a place of abundance. From an orientation of hoarding to an orientation of sharing.  To think, “If I have too much, it means that someone else probably doesn’t have enough.”  

At the beginning of our service today, you made a list of things that belong to you. Pick one now. Think about how you might use that one thing right now to help other people or to worship God. 

When we change our heart. Or our minds. When we change our orientation from one of scarcity to one of abundance and of trust in God’s providence, this creates a whole new appreciation of how we hold things in common with each other. It is a system of economics that we may not understand or that might not seem at all reasonable according to the ways of our world, but it is one that, as Walter Brueggemann writes, will eventually “blow our socks off.”  

Because God is abundant. God is gracious. And God loves us and proves that love for us on the cross. That, my friends, is our treasure. That is what are to seek and what we are to strive for--a deeper faith in a God who has given us everything. Everything. Including God’s very own life. For us and for all people.

Strive first for the kingdom of God and God’s righteousness. And all these things will be given to you as well. Amen.

Preached August 19, 2018, at Grace & Glory Lutheran Church, Goshen, KY
13th Sunday after Pentecost
Readings: Matthew 6:19-34 (Psalm 51:6-9)