The past three weeks we have been exploring what it means to live as a disciple of Jesus Christ. Today we are going to wrap up this series with a focus on the power of possessions in our lives.
I find this to be a particularly personal subject because I like my stuff! I like that I own stuff and that I can call it mine. As I was thinking about this it occurred to me how childish this notion of “mine” is. I mean can’t you see a child you have known proclaim stubbornly that the object of their attention is “mine!”
Well, as it turns out, Jesus had a lot to say about possessions. For example, he asks his followers to leave everything behind to follow him; those who failed to do this were left behind. Then there was the rich young man who how he could an enter the kingdom of God. Jesus tells him that the only way to the kingdom of God is by giving up all his riches. The young man is distraught. Jesus, seeing this, comments that it is easier to pull a camel through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. And I love the sweet story about a poor widow who gives her last coin for the offering – all she had. Observing this, Jesus proclaims that she is rich beyond belief. Finally, in our scripture today Jesus tells of a wealthy man who tears down his barns and builds bigger, better ones for all his stuff. Then he suddenly and prematurely dies, leaving all his wealth behind. Jesus calls this man a fool.
I grew up in a flower shop. My dad was a small business man. We lived in a small 3-bedroom, 1 bath house. Two adults, 4 kids. My mom referred to this house as a cracker box. I don’t remember not having enough. It wasn’t until many years later that I understood that life was not always easy for my parents working to provide for their family. My mother worked full time as a key punch operator(early computers read cards punched with holes). My dad had two other jobs – he was a milk man – delivering milk in the mornings and on weekends he parked cars at the dog race track in Denver.
One of our favorite Sunday afternoon pastimes was to find a new housing development and go through the model houses. We would walk through these beautifully furnished model homes and marveled at their size – 2, 3 and 4 times the size of our cracker box house. And we would dream. What would it be like to live in this or that house? What would it be like if this were my own room?
Today we have HGTV where we can sit in the comfort of our own homes and watch other people’s fantasies unfold. It makes me wonder why are we never happy with what we have? Why are we always wanting more?
I found some statistics that I thought were interesting. In 1973 the average American house was 1600 square feet. In 2010 this had increased 1000 square feet to 2610. During this same period of time from 1973 to 2010, the average family size decreased by nearly one person, from 3.42 to 2.65. So we own bigger houses to hold more stuff. And we won’t even get started on the rising number of storage facilities that pepper our landscape.
Possessions have reached an epidemic level. Why? Fundamentally, our culture has bought into the life approach that materialism is the pathway to happiness. I think intellectually we know this is not true. Behaviorally, we continue to engage in this collection of property. We love our stuff. Peter Farb in his book Man’s Rise to Civilization speaks of the many native cultures who define “mental illness” as the accumulation of private property beyond your needs. This definition is amazingly close to Webster’s definition of greed: a selfish and excessive desire for more of something than is needed.
I want to be clear. Jesus had no objection to you providing for your needs – food, shelter, clothing, transportation, security, even some fun. It is the excess – the owning for the sake of owning – the blatant demonstration of wealth when we are surrounded by so many in need. Jesus calls this sinful; the sin of greed. Tom Shadyak, in the documentary film I AM, calls it insanity. I have put these two words together and come up with “insinity.”
So what do we do about this? How do we live as disciples in the midst of all this wealth and excess? Our scripture gives us a couple of clues. First, from Luke 12:21 “This is the way it will be for those who hoard things for themselves and aren’t rich toward God.” There it is – we must be rich toward God! Jesus taught us many ways to do this and one of those ways is called sharing. Sharing what we have with others. Giving our excess to those in need. There is no mystery or secret formula – it is simply to give and to share. We work hard as parents and teachers and pastors and influential adults to teach our children this fundamental life skill – to share what we have with others. It’s time that as adults we lead by example; practice what we preach; take our own advise.
Second, if we read on in Luke 12: 22, Jesus says “…don’t worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, or what you will wear.” In other words, this means trusting that God will actually provide everything we need. It may not be what we think we need, but our needs will be met. Sounds simple enough. But do we really trust God with our lives – our literal, physical lives? I say, probably not all the time. We are still busy at storing up our riches. And yet this is exactly what Jesus instructs.
The antidote for this insinity of possessions is to share and to trust. This is how we walk in this life of discipleship. We share what we have with others who need, and we trust that God will provide for our needs.
I leave you with a powerful video.
Let us take the message of this thought provoking video and do what it asks: appreciate what you have; do your best for a better world. Share what you have with others in need. Trust God to provide for your needs.
AMEN.