25th Sunday of
Ordinary Time
Luke 16:19-31
Three nurses appear before St. Peter at the pearly
gates.
St Peter says to the first,
Tell me what you did on earth?
Nurse A replied “I was a labor and delivery nurse.
I helped bring hundreds of precious babies into the
world”
“Enter”, St. Peter said
Then he turned to Nurse B and asked the same question
“I was a trauma nurse.
I helped save hundreds of lives of people involved in horrible
accidents”
“Enter” cried St. Peter
He then turned to Nurse C with again the same
question.
“I worked for an HMO,” she admitted “Over the years I
saved my company hundreds of thousands of dollars by refusing extended care to
people who were trying to bilk the system.”
“You may enter!” said St Peter.
“You really mean it” she asked incredulously
“Yes…you have been pre-approved for three whole days.”
When each of our children
reached the appropriate age
Rob or I would have to have
those difficult
but important conversations
with each of them
About love and human
sexuality
This week I thought about those conversations
I would begin with the
negative
…with what
Love and human sexuality most
certainly ARE NOT
Well, for starters
It’s not an itch that you need to scratch
And it’s not recreation
Its not about cool
Its not about conquest
I was trying to erase
anything in his head
that I didn’t put there
I wanted a clean slate
The story of the Rich Man and
Lazarus
Is so vivid and striking and
rich
That lots of ideas about its meaning form quickly
As it is heard
But it is likewise important
to name
What this story is NOT
This is NOT a story about the
geography or architecture of Heaven or Hell
Jesus is using this popular
folktale motif
And turns it inside out...using it for his own purposes
Jesus, especially in the
Gospel of Luke
isn’t particularly concerned
With the architecture of
divine punishment
He is clearly more interested
in divine mercy
We can recall the Prodigal
Son Story of a few Sunday’s ago
The Father runs out to meet
the wayward son
his turban unraveling...his sandals falling off...
Remember how the wayward son
had practiced his contrition speech?
He’s all rehearsed…But this
Merciful Father won’t hear it
He goes straight to embracing
and straight to rejoicing.
Jesus is up to something else
in today’s parable…
To the ears of the first
century hearers
Jesus is
Sharply and surprisingly
Demanding that the people give up their images of divine
favor
A favor that, according to
the ethos of their cultural world,
manifested itself in wealth
and health.
The last place they would
think to look for Lazarus…
Is in the intimate and
comforting “Bosom of Abraham”
The joke I started with is a
distant relative to this parable
The imagery and contrast
Are meant to open our eyes
But compared to St. Peter and
the Pearly Gates
Today’s parable of the Rich
Man and Lazarus
Is much more sharp, and bold,
and exaggerated
(unless of course you work
for a health insurance company and are in the business of denying claims;)
The form of this parable is
apocalypse
An apocalypse text serves as
a wake-up call
It is like lifting a shade
that has been covering our eyes
Hiding something we’d rather
not see
And there is urgency
What do I need to see now before it is too late!!!
The contrasts are sharp and many
The rich man who is important
and high class
…doesn’t even have a name
Lazarus…un-noticed and barely
human…
is none-the-less dignified
with a name
The Rich man’s Clothes are
carefully described…
Royal purple and finely woven
Lazarus’ clothing…well it
isn’t really clothing…
His covering is sores
The Rich man eats sumptuously
every - single - night
Lazarus is being licked clean
every – single - night
At death Lazarus’ journey is
described in detail
…Carried away by angels
…Settled into the bosom of
Abraham
And the rich man…well…
Dead.
buried.
period.
And the most scandalous part
of all
Was their constant proximity
to one another
Day after day in this life
They were such close neighbors
that the rich man knew Lazarus by name
What a reversal for the Rich
Man
seeing Abraham and Lazarus…Far Off in the distance…
across an unbreachable chasm
The rich man remains obtuse
In the midst of his hell
he continues to be blind to
Lazarus
Going straight to the big guy---His
Father---Father Abraham
Talking right OVER Lazarus…
About what he wants Lazarus
to do for him
Talking about him without
talking to him
…As if Lazarus wasn’t there
In the bosom of Abraham
As if… Lazarus was a thing… not
a person
The Rich Man is
pathologically blind!
The gate or door that keeps
his world off limits
…that keeps others out
also locks himself in…it
seems even God can’t get in
It is a hell
And he doesn’t know it
At this point I am reminded
of Ebenezer Scrooge
in Dicken’s A Christmas Carol
Are we,
getting a glimpse of the
“Ghost of Christmas Future”?
(the ghost that forewarns
scrooge of the things to come if he doesn’t change his ways…)
But Dicken’s lets us off the
hook
Scrooge changes…he repents…he
experiences conversion
And so we have a happy
ending…
we sleep well knowing that we
would surely do the same.
But in the parable
It is not so neat and tidy
Father Abraham is out of hope
for the five brothers.
It is done.
No…not even if someone were
to rise from the dead!
There is a wake-up call for
all of us in this story
The Gospel is speaking to our
blindnesses
They may not be as obvious or
striking as The Rich Man’s
But they are there
I might think of Abraham
Holding Lazarus
Offering him a comfort he has
never known
Who am I reluctant to
comfort?
Why am I satisfied with
letting the next person tend to a need in front of me?
Do I think in terms of
worthiness?
And do I conveniently put
myself in the ‘worthy’ column?
I might think of the Rich
Man
Of how he was incapable of
seeing Lazarus as a person
…even if he had
dressed Lazarus’ sores
Or fed his hunger…
it was his blindness
That made his hell
He made a thing out of a
person…Am I capable of that?
I might think of the door
or the gate.
What are the barriers
That I erect around my life
So that I don’t have
to see
The inconvenient or the
un-lovely
I might think of those
brothers
I might think of The Law
and the Prophets and the Gospel
They are treasures given to
me as well
Do I put them on a shelf…to
collect dust?
Or Do I allow them to mold my
heart and mind and soul…
Are they alive in me?
While this may be a parable
Lazarus is real
Lazarus is…
A brother who I keep at arms
length because of past hurts
Lazarus is…
A father who is getting mean
as he fights the limitations of his failing physical body
Lazarus is…
Any person or group of persons
I am content to keep on the other side of my door.
And sometimes I am
Lazarus.
The name Lazarus means
“helped by God”
Lazarus moments are
resurrection moments
They happen when
We care and are cared for,
We feed and are fed,
We clothe and are clothed,
We free and are set free.
And in those encounters we
make visible the Kingdom of God
that is both already in our
midst
and longing to be realized
We believe in the
resurrection.
We believe in life from
death.
We believe in it NOW
In this life
…and in the life to come
The wake up call
Is a question
“What do we need to see…
“What do we need to see…
in order to live more fully
right now
in the light of the
resurrection?
May we see and believe
so that
in the words of 1 Timothy:
...We may take hold of the life that really is life.
