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Life is Good!

            I may regret sharing with you the not-so-pretty picture of today’s average American. It’s taken from the Statistical Abstract of the United States for 2007, recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau. First, I’ll unload a few ugly facts from this 1,300 page document and then I’ll let you know why it’s probably not a good idea that I told you what I’m going to tell you.

            For starters, we have the technology and the time to spend an average of 10 hours per day connected to some kind of media, whether that’s cell phone, e-mail, iPod, internet, or TV. And the more media mobility we enjoy, the less muscle mobility we enact. No wonder two-thirds of Americans are overweight, one-third of whom are clinically obese! We drink a gallon of soda a week, and a half-gallon each of milk, bottled water, coffee, and beer (unless you live in Wisconsin, where milk and beer consumption probably double that statistic). So we’re lazy and we’re fat. Oh, and we’re rich. The average American net worth in the year 2000 amounted to $144,000, more than ten times higher than the average Indonesian, whose assets totaled $1,400. Let’s put that in practical terms. In 2004 Americans bought 2.1 billion pairs of shoes. That’s seven new pairs per person. Wow! Life is Good!

Because I’m rich in greed

            Well, at least we think so. One church took a mission trip to a Cambodian orphanage and drank nothing but bottled water there because Cambodian water is very brown and very unfiltered. The Americans even brushed their teeth using bottled water and some dumped it on their heads when they needed a shower. Surprisingly, the Cambodian people refused to drink bottled water and you’ll never believe why – they consider it unsafe. They see all the American tourists drinking bottled water and Americans are fat, therefore, they think the bottled water will make them fat. So our water is as unsafe to them as theirs is to us. Who’s right?

            I guess it’s just a matter of perception. And that’s why I said at the beginning that I may regret sharing this information. We quote census reports and talk averages and shrug our shoulders and rarely see ourselves in the data. The more we see these sad statistics the more we all say to ourselves, “You know, I really don’t appreciate those lazy, fat, rich people in America tilting the scale for the rest of us.”

            Jesus had the same challenge. How did he get the greedy guy who came to him in the middle of a fiscal fight to understand that Jesus was aiming the parable of the fool at him? He probably thought like we do, “You know, there are some greedy people who need to hear what Jesus is saying.” Here’s the bottom line. We could go on all day flipping page after page of unflattering statistics in the U.S. census report. But our abundance of possessions is so culturally accepted subtle and our greed of accumulation is so subtle that we wouldn’t blink an eye. The biggest challenge of this parable isn’t understanding it but understanding that each of us is in it. The rich fool is not some kind of demented villain antagonist, ultra-rich Donald Trump figure unlike the average American. The rich fool is the average American. He’s every American. He’s every one of us. “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”

            Let’s not try to dodge the judgment of Jesus on our greedy accumulation of things when one of the fastest growing businesses in our country is the building of self-storage facilities (bigger barns). And when was the last time any of us couldn’t afford something we needed and not just wanted? Have you ever struggled to buy a meaningful gift for someone because they already have everything? And then we’re envious of the nicer car, nicer home or condo, nicer clothes, nicer retirement, nicer cell phone, or nicer job of someone else when we aren’t lacking any of those things. We’re rich in greed. So into it that we rob ourselves and God to pay for it. That’s what the Bible condemns in Colossians, “Because of … greed …the wrath of God is coming” (Colossians 3:5,6). The wrath of God basically lets people go our own way when we want to push God out of our lives. When we become richer in greed we become poorer in God. The more we invest our time, effort, income, and space on the accumulation of things the less time, effort, income and space we have for God in our lives. “You fool!”

Because I’m rich in God

            This is what Jesus calls in another parable “the deceitfulness of wealth” (Matthew 13:22). It’s what made Solomon cry, “Meaningless” (Ecclesiastes 1:20). We take luxury, privilege, and wealth as a sign of God’s pleasure on us personally and as a nation when actually our greed is shutting God out of our lives. And we don’t notice because everyone else is doing it. That’s why Jesus tells us this parable. To open our eyes before greed becomes our god. It’s time for greed itself to be robbed instead of God. It’s time for greed to destroy the devil instead of our families, our jobs, our faith and lives. It’s time for us to be rich in God. It’s time four our lives to consist not in the abundance of goods but the abundance of God.

            Christian author and speaker J. H. Jowett once said, “The real measure of our wealth is how much we would be worth if we lost our money.” When he lost all he’d accumulated the rich fool in the parable had nothing left but his self greed. That’s obvious by the preponderance of the first person pronouns he uses when he is deciding what to do with his wealth. The personal pronoun “I” occurs six times and the possessive pronoun “my” occurs five. And then there’s his internal monologue as we hear his inner thoughts. He came upon outrageous wealth and what did he do? He talked to “himself” and made plans for his own future.

            So the parable of the rich fool ends on a sad note. To find any encouragement in the story we need to go back to its happy beginning. “The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop.” This crop didn’t just pop up out of nowhere. God makes things grow and God blessed this man with crops. God made him rich. But God wanted the man’s crops back. And God also wanted this man’s heart. And he gave God neither. There was nothing lacking in this man’s life until he chose to throw it all away. Could you make the same mistake? Look what God has given you. He has made you rich with closets full of shoes, cupboards full of cereal and peanut butter and tuna, and computers full of gadgets – and that’s okay! It’s okay to be rich. It’s okay to be a wealthy American! As long as we’re rich in God. As long as we realize that God wants the shoes and tuna and soup and gadgets back, not by demanding them from you when you die but by you willingly giving ownership of them to God now. Use your wealth to serve God, don’t sit on your pile of gold like you’re king or queen of your kingdom. Let God direct you to use your earthly possessions to help you become more rich in God, closer to him, following his direction, sharing with others, providing for the poor, asking God what you can do with what you have because you have so much! Life is Good! “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things” (Colossians 3:2). What would you be worth if you lost all your money? Being rich in God, you’d still be worth millions.

            What does it really mean to be rich in God? Let me give you a few real examples. It’s earning income not just for money’s sake – like a friend of mine who is a professional athlete but he just retired in the middle of a lucrative career because he wanted to spend more time with his family. He’s rich in God. It’s planning your future with God in mind – like a thirty something member of Grace who died of cancer earlier this year bequeathed a large amount of money to our congregation as a witness to her family of what she believed was important in life. It takes God shopping – like this teenage girl and her mother in the checkout line at the mall, I think they had just hit the two-for-one sale and loaded up on school clothes; the mom was beaming and said, “Look at this gorgeous new wardrobe you have, and it’s all half price.” The teenage girl piped up, “But mom, I’m only keeping half of the stuff and giving the rest to the women’s shelter.” Being rich in God is giving with joyful generosity, like the over-and-above giving of the donors who contributed tens of thousands of dollars so that we could have air conditioning in the church, or the church council member who, after the church council denied my request for funding for a new ministry at Grace because we can’t afford it, took me aside and said, “Pastor, if you really need the money, give me a call and I’ll write you a check.”  Being rich in God means being willing to share with those less fortunate, like the people participating in our blood drive at Grace. That’s being rich in God.

            A millionaire businessmen with many waiting heirs to his wealth died. His children and grandchildren gathered at the hospital and after a quick and easy grief session asked each other, “How much did he leave us? ” The family pastor, on his way in the door, heard their great concern and said, “I’m pretty sure he left everything.” Jesus died, rose, and ascended into heaven. And how much has Jesus left us? Everything. We have a living Savior who gives us everything he did, everything he earned, everything he prepared, and can’t wait for us to make the time, effort, space, and interest for it in our lives. If we stored his spiritual blessings for us in barns, we’d have to build bigger ones!

            You have a rich God who gives you everything. Life is Good! Be rich in him. Amen.

Preached at Grace Lutheran Church, Milwaukee, WI (www.gracedowntown.org) on August 12, 2007

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