“God and Mammon” – Feb 27, 2011
February 27, 2011
Scripture Lesson: Matthew 6: 24-34
“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.
Sermon: God and Mammon
by Rev. Doreen Oughton
We continue today with Jesus’ sermon on the mount. For the last several weeks we have explored consecutive scripture passages from Matthew, but this week’s lesson jumps over a good bit of chapter 6. In the section just prior to today’s reading, Jesus cautions his listeners not to store up treasure for themselves on earth, where it can be consumed by rust or moths, or stolen, but to store up treasure in heaven. He says, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Today’s passage talks about what we should do instead of building up treasure on earth. Basically, he says, we should let go and let God. We should trust. Do not worry, he says. Not about what you will eat, what you will drink, what you will wear. Your Father knows that you need these things. Hmm. Tell me that doesn’t stir up some worry just hearing this idea. We’re not supposed to worry at all? I confess that I am uncomfortable with this advice. I know lots of people who got into real financial messes by not worrying about things, by just charging something on their credit cards figuring they can deal with it later. Could Jesus have anticipated such easy credit and the risks involved? And even though the Father knows what we need, there still are people who don’t have enough to eat, people who actually starve to death, people who don’t have clean water, and who freeze because they don’t have warm enough things to wear. I know that just sitting around worrying won’t do any good, but can’t it be a good motivator to take action to have at least a little worry about these things?
This might be great advice to the elite of their society, to the tax collectors and rich landowners, those who build bigger barns to store their worldly goods, but I believe that the majority of those following Jesus had very little, if anything. So what gives? He almost sounds callous to their very real fears, perhaps to our very real fears. I can try to imagine what it was like in first century Palestine, but I KNOW what it is like to live in 21st century USA, and it is a culture rife with worry. If our own neighborhoods are peaceful, the evening news will keep us well aware of the danger close by. We are bombarded with information about collapsing economies, skyrocketing prices, environmental disasters, and disease epidemics. The media wants to keep us worried so that we will tune in for more. And the advertising we see wants to keep us worried about ourselves so that we will purchase products to fix us, at least temporarily, at least in one area, before the alarm is sounded in the next.
You know, though I have some concern about Jesus’ message here, part of me longs for it to be true. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to not worry? Wouldn’t it be a tremendous relief to rest easy knowing we are safe in Abba’s arms? Is it possible? Could it be true rather than callous? Could we trust that God will provide all we need? I believe Jesus really wants us to face this question, to engage with it meaningfully, not just let it breeze by as a sweet bit of comfort in a desperate moment, nor dismiss it with cynicism.
He starts out by telling us that we cannot serve two masters. We cannot serve God and mammon, which can be translated as wealth or money, treasure or riches. I would clarify that he is referring to earthly treasure. He says we CAN’T serve both, not that we shouldn’t or mustn’t. It’s not a statement of moral judgment or moral encouragement, it is a statement of fact. It is not possible to serve both because they make competing demands and require contradictory world views. We are not able to do both. We must inevitably be serving one or the other. Now he is not necessarily saying that all economic striving should stop. He is not saying don’t gather food or drink, don’t make clothes, don’t work. He is not even saying don’t prosper or save or spend. Money can indeed be a useful tool for living. Food and drink and material goods not only allow us to survive, they allow us to live and grow and add beauty and value to the whole world.
But we cannot trust money as our ultimate bedrock foundation of well-being. It is not trustworthy that way. The thing about it is, that kind of wealth is limited. And we get that at some core place. So when it is the thing we ultimately trust for our well-being, we automatically start to worry that it will run out, that there won’t be enough for us. We automatically start to count and track and stockpile. We will always be worrying about holding on to what we have or getting more. It doesn’t matter whether you have a little or a lot. If money is what you put your trust in, if money is what you serve, you are bound to be worried.
The philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard, once defined worry or anxiety as “the next day.” We don’t know what will happen “the next day,” which creates anxiety this day. Therefore, we are consumed on this day with trying to anticipate future calamities and protect ourselves from them. Since there is no end to the calamities we can anticipate, we’re always uncertain and constantly chasing after something which, we hope, will make us feel safe and secure. It doesn’t work.
It occurs to me that trusting in money is really about trusting in ourselves. It is ultimately relying on our own efforts to collect enough money or possession, or be enough – strong enough, good looking enough, smart enough, to be safe. I suspect that again we know in our deepest selves that we are not a trustworthy source of our ultimate well-being. We are mortal and flawed and limited. It creates terrible anxiety. It causes isolation, exploitation, suspicion. We constantly compare ourselves, our efforts, our stuff, with that of others. In trying to ensure we have, and will have, enough, we give less, share less, and connect less.
Serving God instead of the worldly wealth of our own efforts offers us a completely different way. Claudio Oliver, a Brazilian pastor and theologian who has worked with the urban poor, says that poverty is not the lack of money, it is the lack of relationships. Think about this. This struck me as so true when a former colleague, concerned about her client who was moving into a homeless shelter, said, “You know, there are about ten layers between me and homelessness.” I knew just what she meant. With all the people I know who care for me, it is almost inconceivable that I would ever end up in a homeless shelter, no matter how bad things got for me financially. And there are too many people for whom that is not true. There are too many people who have absolutely no relational safety net. The reasons may be their own misguided focus on self-interest and self-efforts that isolated them, or a result of too many people with this worldly treasure focus. The same worldly treasure focus that Jesus cautioned us against. Living that way is NOT living in the kingdom, which Jesus tells us has arrived and is arriving.
So what would it mean to serve God as our master? What does Jesus mean when he says, “strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness?” I believe it means that we would focus primarily on relationship. We would welcome and grow the kingdom by giving and receiving love. Kingdom living ensures that no one would ever be uncared for. No one would ever have to live without at least the basic necessities. No one, essentially, would ever have to worry about tomorrow – even if they fell on hard times. The whole community recognizes their connectedness and their dependence on one another, and so supports, protects and provides for each other. This is a world of abundance rather than scarcity. There is a deep knowing that there is always enough in an economy of love and care. Just think of when you had your second child. It didn’t cut your love for your first one in half. Love and care are constantly replenished. You can’t count it and track it and stockpile it.
The birds and the flowers that Jesus points to as examples of how to be, they know their place in an interconnected eco-system. The flowers display a beauty which can only exist because of the soil which has been fertilized by other creatures and the pollen which they share freely with one another. You know, there really is no lack of wealth, food, resources, or even care in this world. There is only a lack of sharing and connectedness. In the world view of tracking and counting and stockpiling, in the world view of scarcity, some may have more than they need each day, some will have less, but they all will live with worry.
But God operates differently. God operates out of abundance. Jesus invites us to live this way, invites us to enter into the freedom offered by the God who knows what we need, who knows even the number of hairs on our heads. The thing is, it requires such a radical shift. It is not just another strategy for feeling safe and secure. We don’t just focus on relationships so we won’t be homeless, so that there will always be someone there to pick us up. We are asked to really give up this delusion that we can be safe in the sense of being invulnerable to hard times, to painful experiences. The last line of today’s scripture has Jesus saying, “Today’s troubles are enough for today.” Jesus knows we will have trouble,even if we are serving God, perhaps especially if we are serving God. Kingdom living requires that we tolerate feeling fragile and vulnerable. You see, God is always, always, always concerned for the whole, interested in salvation for all. Yes, he knows the number of hairs on our heads, but God’s vision and desire and will encompass every sentient being. And when God is our master, we take that on. But what Jesus promises us is that we will not be alone. We will not have to do it by ourselves. He promises that it is truly a kingdom of abundance, freedom, generosity, truly a new life. It is a life of resurrection, which is the ultimate act of abundance. With resurrection life is re-created out of death. Our ultimate vulnerability is the source of the eternal. Light is drawn from the darkness. This was God’s generous response to the crucifixion. This is what God did when the people were so frightened and defensive against Jesus’ message about how to live that they killed him.
No, Jesus’ teachings do not promise us invulnerability. They don’t offer safety and security. They are risky, extreme, and completely confident in the God he wants us to serve. It is a God who demands so, so much from us, so much vulnerability, so much trust. But it is a God who will give us everything if only we say yes, if only we were willing. Could it really be possible to live a worry-free life? Could we really rest easy in Abba’s loving hands? Can our faith and discipleship make it possible? Jesus believed it. But I guess we won’t know until we try it. May it be so.
