The Rev. Tricia de Beer

This week, I asked two friends what connections they made with this Gospel passage about Jesus’ telling us that we cannot serve God and wealth--telling us not to worry, that we were to rather consider the lilies of the field, how they neither toil nor spin, and yet Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. “Well I don’t think people are going to want to hear about that, especially not with the amount of anxiety people have right now,” she said. Perhaps this is precisely what we need to hear right now. Money always produces a certain amount of anxiety, either we have too little and we are obsessed with how to get it, or we have too much and we are worried about how we should spend it and how to keep it. With the economic downturn we are even more anxious—perhaps retirement funds have taken a nose dive, we look at our financial report to see yet more falling numbers. Perhaps we are slipping further and further in debt, or finding that it is getting harder and harder to fill up the gas tank, buy groceries and do the things we love to do. And many people have the idea deep down that money isn’t really spiritual, that it is dirty somehow, and yet we know we need money to live.

What if God wants us to have money? What if God wants us to have the things we actually need? What if God actually wants us to enjoy the things we can do with our money? What if God were to say to us, I have given you all this, so that you can live out my purpose for you with courage and joy? Because that is what God is saying to us. The problem is not money, it is the way in which money takes up more and more space in our thinking, it takes up more and more room in the way we spend our lives, and it moves us further from our God given purpose. That’s when money becomes mammon. Ann Lamott, a single mother who went from being very poor to being a nationally published author and speaker says this. “The Bible doesn’t say that money is the root of all evil; it says the love of money is the root of all evil. It’s just as easy to be craving and obsessed with money when you’re broke. It certainly was for me because of the fantasy I had that if I just got to a certain level of solvency I’d be okay. I’d stop thinking about it. Then I got to that level and discovered that the drug of choice is called “more”. I always think, “Oh, if I just had a certain amount of stocks. If I just had some real equity in this house. If I just had a trust fund. If I just had this or that, then I’d be okay.” But you know, it’s got to be an inside job. You can’t own it or amass it or capitalize on it and think that it’s going to fill up the God- shaped holes inside of you. I know people who have a lot of money and who are very stressed. I know people who don’t have money and I would trade places with them in a second. But the spiritually fit think “You know what? God is providing every single day exactly what this family needs.” I know that if I feel any deprivation or fear, the solution is to give. The solution is to go find some mothers on the streets of San Rafael and give them tens and twenties and mail off another $50 to Doctors Without Borders to use for the refugees. Because I know that giving is the way that we can feel abundant. Giving is the way that we fill ourselves up. I forgot who said, “We’re not hungry for what we’re not getting. We’re hungry for what we’re not giving. For me the way to fill up is through service and sharing and getting myself to give more than I feel comfortable giving.”

So what is the inside job she speaks of? What is it that has to change in us no matter what our resources? She has found that the solution to fear or any deprivation is to give. It sounds crazy. How can we give when we are not sure if we will have enough, or we are looking at what we have and we feel sure it isn’t enough? But it’s not crazy because this is the way God has made us. We are hard wired for needing to give of ourselves—our money, our time, our love. It is what connects us to others profoundly and in that connection we also find we are in touch with God.

Think about it. Think about a time when you went out of your way to meet someone else’s need, someone who really needed you, and what a joy it was, or what a sense of satisfaction it brought to you. Not that it made you better than the other. Rather it brought you closer to that person. I remember getting up to the hospital in Baltimore at 5 a.m. to meet a parishioner who was about to go through a massive surgery. Of course it was a little hard getting up, but the sense of purpose in being there to remind this person of God’s love for him, that was priceless. This was no great nobility, it was truly a privilege to be connected to this family at such a vulnerable time and there we brushed sides with God.

I asked a friend what has helped her become less anxious and she said “ I discovered that often something I would want to buy would provide a short term high. But when I made a choice to connect with people, I found I didn’t need some of the things I thought I did. I found that I didn’t need to entertain others with my clothes, and it was O.K. that I wasn’t a young and pretty woman any more and yet I felt in touch with my deeper beauty when I choose to give more of my time and money away. This is a little example, but when I get home from work, instead of spending an hour playing solitaire on the computer, I spend 20 minutes at it, and then the other 40 phoning a friend, or connecting with people by email. On another level, when I am trying to decide whether to buy something, I ask myself, ‘Is this purchase going to help me live my deeper purpose’, and I need to buy less. I am finding I actually do find pleasure in being able to give money away.”

There was no arrogance in her statement, no sense that she was doing it better than others, just a humility that was rooted in her sense of finally being shown something she hadn’t seen before and she was grateful.

Scripture says that perfect love casts out fear. Perfect love can only be God’s love. It is the love that God has that doesn’t give up on us. It is the love that was expressed in Jesus’ loving us—all of us , the tax collectors among us, who use our power simply to benefit ourselves, the prostitutes among us who have sold our lives for an elusive security, the Pharisees among us who are self satisfied, and unable to hear God’s word to us. God’s love is a generous love, which keeps offering us new life.

But centering ourselves in this love is not easy. All of us are caught in our frenetic world in some way. Loevi Deidel, Mennonite missionary in the Congo, returned to the States on his first furlough in 1955. He noticed that the new status symbols were then a black and white T.V and wall to wall carpeting. On the second furlough it was color TV and automatic washers and dryers. On the third dishwashers and stereo sound systems. On the fourth, recreation vehicles and backyard swimming pools. On the fifth, video cameras, satellite dishes and digital toys of all kinds. It is not that any of these things are bad, but expectations like flooding waters keep rising. To keep up, we work longer hours. Income gains were offset by harried lives and less time with family. The feeling of standing in place reflects constantly rising expectations. We are conditioned to be dissatisfied cravers rather than appreciators of the goods of the earth.

And behind this driving culture lies a widespread myth that God and life in God are nice but largely irrelevant—a bit of superstition, or morality that we tack onto the rest of life. Of course, most of us would be appalled to have this designated as our creed, yet in large decisions that may already provide the framework for our lives, such as where we reside and work, and in a host of smaller choices we make each day, we may find ourselves living by it.

Jesus offers us a different path, a path which brings our thirsty souls to the living water. To believe in Jesus is to trust him as Savior and follow him as Lord. Jesus wants to transform our purpose in life from one of getting to one of giving. When that happens, material possessions mean less and more at the same time. They mean less because they no longer have a possessive hold on us, and are no longer seen as necessary to satisfy our heart’s desire. But they also mean more, because seeing with the eyes of faith, we see them as blessings entrusted to us by their rightful owner, and who wants them to be used in ways that work for God’s purposes—that is what it means to strive first for the Kingdom of God.

So what might it look like for us as we practice striving first for the kingdom of God? Some of us may be called to give proportionally—which means to decide on what proportion of our income, we want to make available for the people and causes we care most about and intentionally set aside that proportion. Maybe its is 2 % to begin. Maybe we feel we can do more. Perhaps some of us need to go out and get some help with managing the debt we have acquired because it is taking up too much room in our hearts. Perhaps some of us may be called to look again at your will and how you want to dispose of your assets when we die. Someone else might want to look again at the needs of the people in Myanmar and instead of going out to dinner this week, send a check. Some one else might be called to actually enjoy the vacation you have planned with your family and leave your email behind. Perhaps some of us are being nudged to reach out to a friend in need. Perhaps someone here is being called to take time out to listen to God, to walk the labyrinth, or take a day for reflection to get back in touch with the deeper purpose of our lives.

God made us in God’s own image. God is infinitely generous in giving us this beautiful planet, in giving us people to love, and people who love us, in giving us so many gifts and talents with which to heal God’s world. God has hard wired us for living a generous life, freely giving ourselves to those things which matter. As we receive God’s generous love, we are free to follow with generous hearts. Thanks be to God!