LIVING OUR PROMISES - PART III
MONEY PROMISES

I Timothy 10:6-10
Luke 12:13-21

St. Andrew's-Wesley United Church

Rev. Gary Paterson

Nov. 16, 2008

After hearing the Gospel Choir belt out “Make a Joyful Noise,” and then having all of us sing “I’m Gonna Live So”, I’m not so sure we need a sermon on Stewardship… I mean, we’ve already sung the sermon … God-gratitude-action. However… well, maybe it would help if I started with a bit more music:

Money makes the world go around, the world go around,

The world go around;

Money makes the world go around,

The clinking, clanking sound

Of money, money, money, money,

Money, money, money, money,

Get a little, get a little

Money, money, money, money,

A mark, a yen, a buck or a pound

That clinking, clanking clunking sound

Is all that makes the world go around,

It makes the world go around.

Cynical? –sure! Funny? – you bet! True? –well, you be the judge! Does money make the world go around? Just think of how it slides into our everyday conversation… show me the money; money talks; put your money where your mouth is. When trying to discern the why’s and wherefore’s of, say, troubles with a particular Olympic Village development…. just follow the money. Or when the almighty dollars shouts out in pain, and threatens to go sliding into recession, watch how quickly a 700 billion dollar bailout happens; that’s 700 billion almighty dollar bills… wonder how long it would take to count ’em? Some people have suggested that the invasion of Iraq occurred in order to guarantee the endless flow of oil, black gold, money. And let’s not kid ourselves about the horror unfolding in the eastern provinces of the Congo -- it circles around diamonds, blood diamonds they’re called; portable cash. Or to make it more personal, what if I suddenly launched into a “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours”… our VISA bills and bank accounts, that is; would empty the church in no time flat. Let me ask you, “What’s your bottom line? Or what’s your net worth?” How would you answer?

Money is seductive. Not money in and of itself, but what it represents, what it can buy. Power and pleasure; things and experiences… forever and ever, amen. So many things; so many places to visit; so many new and exciting opportunities; the globe is the limit – oh, if you’re rich enough, you’ll soon be able to purchase a trip into space. Now that’s worth saving for, isn’t it? Money is seductive – how could it not be in a culture like ours, which feeds on the mirage of “more” – no matter what you have, you need more. And the more you get, well, it seems like the boundary of more is always on the horizon, and always lies ahead of you; you never get there. A few years ago someone calculated the world-wide advertising budget to be something like 435 billion dollars. Who would settle for “enough” when you can get more?

Maybe that’s what the writer of the letter to Timothy was on about when he said,

But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains. (I Timothy 6:9-10) It sure feels true to me. Money is seductive, and I am often seduced. Money wraps her arms around me, and we go dancing away. Not that there’s anything wrong with money. But sometimes… too often?... I end up where I don’t want to be, and I’m not even sure how I got there.

The world is too much with us; late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers…. (Wordsworth)

Reminds me of an article I read about frogs and warm water. Put a frog in a big pot of cold water, and watch him swim… vigourously, and with an eagerness to escape. But put the pot on the stove, and turn on the heat to low – “Ah,” says the frog, “that’s nice. Tropical waters, where you stop swimming because you’re tired, not because you’re cold. I like this. A heated swimming pool, built for one.” Turn the heat up a little – “Ah,” says the frog, “a hot tub. Let me kick back and relax. Maybe float on my back, for a long, long time.” Turn the heat up a little more… You’d think the frog would suddenly realize that there’s trouble in the water, and he’d better get out… fast. But no, the frog basks away until… well, until he dies..

I want a new relationship with money, more awareness of what happens. I want to talk about money – I think. But I do know that when you don’t talk about something, it gains more power. That’s how many of us grew up, I’m sure; in families where you didn’t talk a lot about money. It’s a private matter. I’ve heard that there are some churches that post the weekly givings… by name; I couldn’t imagine it; the very thought makes me squirm.

This idea of talking about money – well, we have a good model in Jesus. He talked a lot about money; you read the gospels, and over and over, there’s Jesus talking about riches – “It’s harder for a rich person to get into heaven than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.” About wages, inheritances, possessions, mammon, paying taxes. Half of his parables address money issues in one way or another. Like… A certain man, finding that he had enough of everything, decided to upgrade in a big way. Bigger and better everything. Only, just when he was ready to take early retirement and have the time of his life, with all the necessary toys – well, that’s when he dropped dead of a heart attack. “Life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Jesus knew that money, and all that it represents, that it can buy – he knew it would present one of the hardest challenges of our daily faith journey – “You can’t serve two masters, you can’t serve God and Mammon.” He knew you needed to talk about money.

I read an article about a young couple who were wanting to change their relationship with money. Too often, they said, they felt secretive, guilty, defensive about money; sometimes envious and even greedy; occasionally, self-righteous. So, since they were from California, they went to a workshop … just kidding. But seriously, they did attend a workshop entitled… and folk here might particularly relish the title… “Bringing Money Out of the Closet.” The session opened with the traditional circle of chairs, and the first question was “Do you have enough money?” And paired with it, a second question, “How will you know when you have enough?” How would you answer those questions? I remember that Mae West line, “Too much of a good thing is wonderful!” Can you ever have enough money? What is enough?

I need to change my relationship with money; I need to talk about it. If I were having a conversation about money, there are some things that I really would need to pay attention to. I would like to start with that question, “What’s enough?” How do I draw the distinction between my needs and my wants. Sometimes I worry that my wants are endless; but my needs, now… well, what do I really need. Basic survival stuff, sure; but then where do I draw the line? With what values? And how to know when I’m rationalizing, because I’m good at that. Where would Jesus draw the line? Is that a helpful question? Read another article… the author was pointing out that the typical Westerner is richer than 99.% of all humans who have ever existed. Do I feel rich? What’s enough? When have I crossed the line into self-indulgence. “Indulgence” – isn’t that a fine word, so rotund; you can almost feel that fatness in the sound…. Self-in-duuuuullllllgent.

As the conversation continued, I would also need to talk about my fear… of not having enough. I’m okay now, but what about when I retire, get older, maybe get sick. I worry about scarcity, hard times, not having options. With what’s happening these days with the economy – lots of us are afraid. RRSPS, RIFFS, pensions, investments, homes…. the bottom falling out of everything. We want to make sure we’re secure, safe, comfortable – Lord knows, that’s not unreasonable. But there are no guarantees, ever; “this day your life is required of you” – your life or something else. So how to live with less worry -- “Be not anxious about what you will eat, or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear?” How much of my fear is based in reality, how much in my own psyche?

But let’s be clear, not enough money can be destroying. Poverty is not glamorous; too often it brings misery and pain. And that’s when I would want to talk again about my being part of that richest 1% of humanity – because when I look around the world, I see a lot of poverty, where “not enough money” is killing children, and women and men. We all know those statistics. So I have to talk about my guilt. How I acquire and spend my money always affects others; I know that. But it’s harder to admit that my wants may be depriving others of their needs. And that includes the earth itself -- I worry whether I’m too much like that basking frog in his hot tub, as the globe gets ever warmer, and my carbon footprint grows ever larger.

Those of you who were here last week might remember that we talked about the movie, “Schindler’s List.” All week I have been haunted by that moment when Oscar Schindler is considering buying the freedom of a thousand imprisoned Jews – the question that is asked, and then hangs in the air long after the film has finished, is, “What’s a person worth? What’s a person worth – for you?” Surely that is a question that I have to live with too? How I choose to spend my money affects other people.

I need a new relationship with money – and so what to do about my greed and fear and guilt. Talking about it is a first step. Then I would need to do a lot of pondering and praying. What does it mean to be rich towards God? How to believe that there will always be enough – meaning, trusting that even in the bad times, when the money seems to be running out, it really will be okay; that my deepest joy isn’t wrapped up in things. Maybe it means learning to live in grace… knowing that there are no easy answers to these challenges. I will always need to live with the question of “What’s enough.”; I will always be taking a deep breath in the face of some new threat; I will keep working away, with small steps, at trying to make sure that money goes around and around, so that everyone’s needs get met. Maybe it means asking for the Spirit’s help with all this.

On the other hand, there are some things I can do, that will help change my relationship with money – I can practice giving it away. I think it was Andre Gide, the French writer, who said “Any possession you can’t give away, possesses you.” Down-sizing, as a way of life; the slow-work of freeing myself. As the preacher Barbara Brown Taylor once said, “The opposite of rich isn’t poor; the opposite of rich is free.”

I suspect that I will give more freely when I live in gratitude, when I count blessings instead of dollars. And when I name the Giver at the heart of life, who gave shape to the void, breath to the clay, names to the family, voices for our passions. (Lines from our opening Call to Worship, words written by Malcolm Sinclair.) Recognizing how much I have, no, how much I have been given, leads to a generosity of spirit, where I hold onto things more lightly, letting them pass more freely through my hands; recognizing that when I give in that spirit, I am saying thank you to God.

I need to give money away for my own sake; but I also need to give it away for the sake of other people. Money is a powerful tool – seductive, sure; dangerous, often; but capable of doing many good things. As Harry Emerson Fosdick said,

Money is an individual’s personal energy reduced to portable form. Money can go where you cannot go; speak languages that you cannot speak; lift burdens that you cannot touch; save lives with which you cannot relate directly.

I need to give money to people, to the church, to organizations and causes; I need to give in an intentional way, with a determination to make a difference. Consciously, conscientiously, concretely – making sure that what my money says is congruent with my core values, with my faith, with God’s visions for the earth and all who dwell therein.

Don’t worry… when your Stewardship Visitors arrive, they aren’t going to ask those kinds of questions. But maybe you are; maybe that’s the gift of this Stewardship Campaign for all of us – an invitation to have a conversation about money; a private one between you and God; and maybe one with a fellow traveler on the Way.