Lectionary Readings: Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14; 2: 18-23 / Psalm 49:1-11 / Colossians 3:1-11 / Luke 12:13-21
In today’s four readings we’re repeatedly confronted by some of the worst human tendencies. They’re the thematic thread tying the lectionary together: the thread of overly valuing and clinging to possessions, and a list of bad behaviors. They’re the things for which the speaker in Ecclesiastes has toiled, the psalmist warns us of, Paul admonishes us against in Colossians, and Jesus shares a parable about in Luke.
But we find something else in this thread as well: a focus on self over other, or as Jesus says, “those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”[1] Wealth is built up but not put to work. Resources are accumulated but not shared. Bad behaviors are rooted in self-gratification, with no consideration of how to behave toward others. Humans often become trapped in a cycle of me to the exclusion of them, always setting that cycle on repeat.
The theme of repeated behavior is found through the language of the reading from Ecclesiastes. Vanity of vanities. All is vanity and a chasing after wind. The repeated use of that word – vanity – is an intentional choice made to show “that it is the very nature of reality for all things constantly to repeat themselves.”[2] I prefer a different translation of this, however, one by the scholar Robert Alter. Let me share a bit of that, a version closer to the original Hebrew:
Merest breath, said Qohelet, merest breath. All is mere breath … I have seen all the deeds that are done under the sun, and, look, all is mere breath, and herding the wind … And I hated all things got from my toil that I had toiled under the sun, that I should leave it to the man who will come after me. And who knows whether he will be wise or a fool, and he will have power over all that was got from my toil for which I toiled and grew wise under the sun. This, too, is mere breath … For what does a man have from all his toil and from his heart’s care that he toils under the sun? For all his days are pain, and worry is his business. At night, as well, his heart does not rest. This too, is mere breath.
Repeated behavior. Merest breath. All is mere breath. But that word – breath – has a different sort of power than vanity. The Hebrew word for spirit is ruach; hevel – breath – is the other side of that coin. Taken in, the Spirit fills us; it gives us life. Exhaled, breath is as Alter writes “utterly insubstantial and transient, and in this book suggests futility, ephemerality, and also … the absurdity of existence.”[3]
Thus far we have futility and repetition. We see a focus on self and hoarding up for and being concerned with tomorrow. But as the psalmist and Jesus remind us, no amount of trying the same things repeatedly, no amount of stocking up for tomorrow, makes a difference in the end. “For we see that the wise die also.”[4] “You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?”[5] So what are we supposed to do, not tomorrow but today? What does it mean for us to be rich toward God?
Quite simply, it means being rich toward others.
Let me tell you about my friend Amy Butler, an incredible pastor and preacher who has served in some of the most prestigious pulpits in the United States. She was the first female senior pastor at Riverside Church in Manhattan, and she served as senior pastor at Calvary Baptist Church and interim senior pastor of National City Christian Church, both in Washington, D.C. Six years ago she was inspired to found Invested Faith, an organization through which – and I’m quoting here from their website – “individuals and religious institutions … seek meaningful ways to redirect their assets” for “faith-rooted social entrepreneurs working to build businesses that become new models of faith, community and justice-making across the country.”[6]
In short, churches and faith communities that are in decline – and those with significant resources and no idea how or where to put them to use – work through Invested Faith to provide grants for individuals creating faith-based businesses in their cities and towns. Tiffany Terrell of Albany, Georgia, for example, received a grant for the purchase and renovation of a school bus that’s now used as “Better Way Grocers,” a traveling mini supermarket that makes healthy food available in local food deserts. Robert Rueda of Edinburg, Texas, opened a “pay what you can” coffee shop and deli for the 40% of students at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley facing food insecurity, giving them access to food, leadership training, and job skills. Katie Kenyon of Richmond, Virginia, works to provide healthy food and family support for her underserved community – primarily children in foster care and their families, single parents, and older adults – through “Village Green RVA.”
There are nearly 80 more Invested Faith Fellows who have received grants to work within and for their communities. Amy’s inspiration and the support of her staff and board have been instrumental, but none of this – not one investment – would have been possible without church leaders from across the country and across denominational lines discerning how to redirect their resources – how to share the grain in their barns – to be rich toward God.
Don’t get me wrong: planning is important; taking care of needs is important; ensuring as much stability and security as possible for our families and those who come after us is important. Nowhere in the readings today do we find they’re not. What humanity often does get wrong, however, is that we forget the work doesn’t stop with planning for ourselves and planning for tomorrow. It’s about following God’s call today to stabilize others who find life in this world off balance.
It’s not simply about leaving the results of our work for later but rather discerning what we can do with them now. It’s not simply about putting our trust in goods but rather trusting that we can put our goods to work. It’s not simply about building a bigger barn so we can have enough grain for tomorrow but rather opening the barn we have now to make sure there’s enough grain for everyone today. It’s about ensuring that the things of the world don’t disorient us so much that they take the place – and take our focus from – the family of God and, through them, God.
In their commentary on the Psalms, Water Brueggemann and William Bellinger wrote that those who trust in wealth and those who rely on their own discernment arrive at the same end – death – and that neither wealth nor wisdom can buy a different future.[7] As we hear and hopefully take away from the words of Jesus and, indeed, all of today’s readings, we’re not to focus just on ensuring the future for the person we see in the mirror. Instead, we’re to give equal attention to building up the present for those we see through the window.
We’re to be a living reminder to everyone – in every place and time – that Christ is all and in all.
Amen.
[1] Luke 12:21 (NRSV).
[2] Robert Alter. “Ecclesiastes,” fn. 2. The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary – The Writings, p. 679.
[3] Alter, p. 679.
[4] Psalm 49:9 (NRSV).
[5] Luke 12:20 (NRSV).
[6] Invested Faith website, www.investedfaith.org.
[7] Walter Brueggemann and William H. Bellinger, Jr. Psalms, p. 228.