Lectionary Year C
August 5, 2001
Luke 12:13-21

Contemporary Address

Step VI - Contemporary Address

A. Goals

(JFC) We might hope this text could produce in our day some of the significant learnings Jesus was trying to teach in his day.

B. Describing the Audience

(JFC) If I were preaching this week, I could hope to address folk who need such lessons as this lection teaches. Most Presbyterian Congregations, where I preach, rather exclusively, are affluent to a comfort level hardly imagined in previous generations. Our children convince us of that response to many of our stories of life in the 40's - the 60's.

C. Sermon, entitled, for this working draft, "Dealing with Affluence"

(JFC) Introduction
(Although the parable seems less significant to this lesson than the other parts, we better deal with it first, that's where tradition puts the emphasis, that's where the auditors hear the lesson first and that's a pretty catchy place to begin, after all.) So, what is a parable? We know them as stories Jesus told along his journeys, in the towns and villages, peoples' houses, wherever he went. They illustrated points he was making. George A, Buttrick reminds us of "the old definition, 'an earthly story with a heavenly meaning,'" while Joachim Jeremias calls them, "a piece of real life and from each of them we draw a single idea . . ." Parables add to appreciation of Jesus wisdom.

I. The Parable
A. The fictitious rich farmer. He was affluent. What a dream. Wouldn't it be nice to be wealthy? Well, aren't we? Well, I guess we are. Quote local statistics on earnings, etc.

B. His weak reasoning/logic, telling him what to do among all the other options he had from which to choose. He relied on only himself alone to decide what to do with his prosperity. Solo decision making is frequently short-sighted and unproductive. Group decision-making is more effective, especially if God's will is considered by the group.


II. Jesus' Part
A. He appears almost rude when he blows off the request of the crowd by-stander. He possibly wants to set the stage for broadening perspectives. Can you hear his irony? Perhaps this strategy is our Lord's way of refocusing the crowd's attention on symbolic wealth more than on even inheritances. See Ephesians 5:5, Colossians1:12 and 3:24, Hebrews 9:15 and I Peter 1:4. He addresses the whole question of greed and its lack of usefulness for life's fulfillments.

B. He has a greater mission for the sake of the whole crowd more than for the one man who had a family issue that probably could better be settled at home and/or in the local courts of the day there. Prosperity is a larger issue than one person's, it is a global one.


III. God's Function
A. God intervened. The crowd needed that intervention. Have you ever known of a necessary intervention into a family squabble, into an argument on a school ground that looked like it might turn into a fight, etc? Interventions are frequently necessary. God did the people there and then and us, too, a favor of intervening in this parable.

B. God gave the crowd a reality check on greed's dangers. God moves focuses from short time spans, like life expectancy, to larger panoramas like eternity, or, at least, onto generation after generation.


Conclusion
Prosperity can be used responsibly when we respond to God's will, God's desires, God's instructions for our using our wealth properly, with decency and order for others' needs as well as for our own.

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