What parable would make a man with three doctoral degrees (one in medicine, one in
theology, one in philosophy) leave civilization with all of its culture and amenities and
depart for the jungles of darkest Africa? What parable could induce a man, who was
recognized as one of the best concert organists in all of Europe, go to a place where
there were no organs to play? What parable would so intensely motivate a man that he
would give up a teaching position in Vienna to go and deal with people who were so
deprived that they were still living in the superstitions of the dark ages?
The man who I am talking about, of course, is Dr. Albert Schweitzer. And the single
parable that so radically altered his life, according to him, was our text for this morning.
It’s the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus.
Has any one of us ever considered our role in social justice? Can we even describe
what it is?
The simple truth for many of us here in the modern West – and a lot of us Christians –
have not. Even when you try and look it up, you’ll find what social class is, what a social
climber is, social credit, social development, differentiation, disease, environment,
science, service, studies, welfare, work. And there, buried among all these other things,
you find that social justice is defined simply as ‘fairness in society”.
But…isn’t there more to it than this? Or is it maybe that we understand it so well that we
don’t need a more robust definition? Maybe we we just don’t think about it. Maybe we’re
just not interested enough to worry about what it means…
If you look up the words separately, you’ll find that “social” means “pertaining to,
devoted to or characterized by, friendly companionship or relations. And “justice” means
the quality of being just, being actuated by truth – righteousness, it is the moral principle
which determines just conduct.
So when you put the two together, it means living in a relationship with other people that
is shaped by righteousness. For Christians, that means living so that our relationships
with other people are shaped by our understanding of God’s righteousness, God’s
justice.
But, how do we determine exactly what God’s righteousness is? Well part of the answer
comes from the little story in Luke about the Rich Man and gives us a few clues about
how we should handle wealth in a world that needs more social justice.
So let’s have a deeper look at our reading from Luke.
The Rich Man and Lazarus were actually neighbors. They saw each other every day.
Oh, not socially you understand, but there was contact. Every day the Rich Man saw
this beggar at his front gate.
But who were these men?
The Rich Man, who the early church named Dives [pronounced ‘Dive-ees’: it’s Latin for
“Rich Man” as he has been called for centuries], would have felt very comfortable living
in our present time. He was a progressive, self-indulgent kind of a guy. He was a
connoisseur, a lover of the arts, one who knew and appreciated fine living and four-star
restaurants. We are told in vs. 19 that he habitually dressed in purple and that his
undergarments were made of fine linen – befitting the lifestyle of the rich and famous.
The other man in the story is Lazarus. How can we describe Lazarus? Lazarus is
homeless. We are told in vs. 20 that he was a cripple. Lazarus barely made it from day
to day, living off the leftovers thrown to him by Dives as he daily passed him. He is just a
survivor, that’s all you can say of him.
The contrasting life-styles of these two men is so obvious that you can’t miss it.
One day, both men died. Lazarus, said Jesus, was carried away by the angel of death
unto heaven, where he occupied the seat of honor next to Abraham. About Dives, all
that Jesus says is that he was buried.
Oh, Jesus did add one additional fact about Dives death that may be of interest to you.
His soul was sent to hell.
What?? WHY?
This is an unnerving story. No wonder it bothered Dr. Schweitzer so much.
For a few moments this morning I would like to share exactly why. It is bothersome
because….
First, it shows how God reverses the standards of the world. We call this the Parable of
the Rich Man and Lazarus. Notice that the rich man in Jesus’ story is never actually
named. That is exactly the opposite of how the world does it. We all know the names of
the rich. We know the Ron Joyces, Galen Westons, the Warren Buffets. We all know
about, and the names of many of the rich.
With the poor it is exactly the opposite.
For generations of slavery and deep class difference in the past, those who worked as
domestics or in the fields were known only by their first names. They were “Betty” or
“Sammy.” No one ever knew their last names. That is the standard of the world. Did you
know that in many places in this country there still are potters fields, grave yards where
the poor are buried for nothing? Only small numbers mark each grave – no names are
recorded. We refer to them collectively as “the poor”, “the homeless,” “the third world,”
“the welfare cases.” They are the neighbors we never meet.
Let me tell you friends, in heaven that will all be reversed. God will know the name of
every poor suffering person who ever walked this earth. There is a special place in his
heart for the poor. I hope he knows my name when I get there, but I know he will know
their name. You can be poor in the eyes of the world, but fabulously wealthy in the eyes
of God. That is what Jesus is suggesting here. In heaven everything will be reversed.
Maybe that is what troubled Albert Schweitzer. Or maybe there’s something more
here….
One thing we need to be sure of at the very beginning of this subject is that wealth is not
inherently wrong. Jesus’ parable is very clear: this story does not attack the man’s
riches; there’s nothing in this story that points to the Rich Man as being mean or stingy.
The problem is not that he is rich; the problem is that he doesn’t care. Here he is,
arrayed in the royal purple, feasting each day as if there will be no tomorrow. And here
is a beggar lying before his door, a beggar oozing ulcers, too weak to keep dogs from
licking his sores, so hungry that he wants only what falls from the rich man’s table, the
scraps, which normally go to the dogs. The point is, the rich man simply does not care
about Lazarus. It is a terrible warning that his sin was not that he did wrong things,
simply that he did nothing.
We could somehow understand his eternal outcome if he were. But he never mistreated
Lazarus. He never kicked him. He never chased him away. He never lectured him about
getting up and getting a job.
People in Jesus’ day would have found this story shocking because they equated
wealth with God’s blessing. The Rich Man acted as though it was all supposed to be
that way in life. He accepted it all without question. It never occurred to him that the fate
of Lazarus’ birth and the fate of his birth could be changed. Lazarus, therefore, became
not a part of suffering humanity but just a part of the landscape. Jesus was calling them
to a new way of seeing. So what did he do that was so horrible that he should deserve
such a terrible fate?
In a word the rich man was indifferent: Indifferent to his plight, indifferent to his hunger,
indifferent to his needs. They were the neighbors who never met.
Some years ago before the death of Mother Theresa, a television special depicted the
grim human conditions that were a part of her daily life. It showed all the horror of the
slums of Calcutta and her love for its destitute people. Later, when the interview was
aired, commercials interrupted the flow of the discussion. Here is the sequence of the
topics and commercials: lepers (bikinis for sale); mass starvation (designer jeans);
agonizing poverty (fur coats); abandoned babies (ice cream sundaes) the dying
(diamond watches).
The irony was so apparent. Two different worlds were on display – the world of the poor
and the world of the affluent. It seems that our very culture here in the modern West
has a great deal of commercialization to it, is teaching us to live as the Rich Man in the
story of Lazarus. We are occasionally presented with the images of Lazarus at our gate
but we are immediately reminded of the next car we ought to by and the next meal we
should eat. We are slowly and methodically told it is O.K. to live our lives of luxury while
others live in poverty.
Mother Teresa later put it this way, “the biggest disease in the world today is the feeling
of being unwanted like Lazarus at the gate. And the greatest evil in the world today is
the lack of love – the terrible indifference towards one’s neighbour which is so
widespread.”
Do you know Garfield the Cat? One cold winter night Garfield looks out the window and
sees Odie the Dog peering through the window. Garfield thinks to himself: This is
horrible. Here I am in the comfort of a warm house, well fed, and there is Odie outside
begging to get in, cold and hungry. I can’t stand it anymore. I just can’t stand it. So at
that he goes over to the window…and closes the curtains.
Friends, that is what you and I have done to the poor. Rather than dealing with them, we
have simply closed the curtains. We drive by people holding those signs: “Will work for
food,” and we have seen it so much we don t even give it a second thought any more.
In the end, we are told that the Rich Man begs to come back to earth to warn his five
brothers. He wanted to warn his family about their impending fate – but was denied.
Now why couldn’t Jesus have let the story end like Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas
Carol”? In that story Morley, Scrooge’s business partner, comes to him with a stern
warning of what will be if he continues his present path. And, in Scrooge’s case, it
worked. He is frightened into changing.
Friends, the Rich Man didn’t simply die and go to hell. The fact is that he created his
own hell on earth by closing his eyes to suffering humanity. What he experienced in the
afterlife was merely a continuation of what he started for himself in this life. Since he did
not respond to people in this life, then he was not allowed to respond to people in the
after life. Maybe that is a good definition of hell. Being unable to respond.
Oh, he lived sumptuously. He had the best of everything. He added to the economy in a
significant way. But he missed the Kingdom of God.
In the end, it’s not our badness that will send us to hell; it’s our lack of goodness. It is
how we close the curtains on those who represent suffering humanity. Maybe we do
suffer from compassion fatigue as some have suggested. I don’t know. But I do know
that this story is saying to us that in the end we will be judged from the viewpoint of love.
I will tell you something wise that makes me uncomfortable about this story. The church
is in the position of the Rich Man. Well, you say, we don’t run the poor off. We give to
missions and relief work. We reach into community and provide an inviting welcome
when they come to our door.
Too often, people’s worth is measured by their job, their status, their wealth. Too often
our possessions, position and power are seen as the source of strength which gives our
lives meaning. We can be so driven to possess things, however, that we end up being
owned by them. When that happens we can find ourselves sitting where the rich man in
Jesus’ story sits – indifferent to the needs of others. From a Christian perspective the
danger of having plenty – of being wealthy – is when preoccupation with material things
leads to indifference to the welfare of others.
So today’s text calls for repentance by all who seek to be so secure and comfortable
that they no longer want to be concerned about anyone or anything.
So, who do we see sitting outside our gate? Begging not necessarily for bread, but
maybe for a word of recognition, companionship, love, forgiveness, justice. Social
justice is shorthand for the community where true riches are understood as integrity,
love, faith, compassion. Who is sitting outside our gate?
It’s a neighbour we just haven’t met – yet.
May God be praised. AMEN