You Were Serious About That?

Brad Sullivan

3 Advent, Year C

December 13, 2015

Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church, Bay City, TX

Luke 3:7-18

You Were Serious About That?

Last Friday at a Lions meeting, we heard a presentation from Jason Coleman who has begun a new farm here in Bay City called Moonbow Farms.  In college, he got a degree in sustainable farming which seeks to combine best practices for financial, communal, and environmental sustainability.  He talked about making a living at farming to provide for his family and doing so in a way that also brought the most benefit to the surrounding community and to the surrounding environment.  One thing in particular he said about sustainable agriculture stuck with me.  He said a person could manage his farm in a way to earn 50 or $100,000 more, but that he didn’t really need it.  So instead, his model is to spend more on his workers and on his methods.  He won’t make as much money as he could, so that the community around him benefits more. 

Thinking back on that now, I see that is a man who has taken to heart John’s teaching about bearing fruits worthy of repentance.  I don’t know that John’s words were actually on his mind, but he embodied exactly what John was talking about:  nothing heroic, just a regular guy doing his best for his family and looking out for those around him at the same time.

Notice that in Luke’s Gospel, John was not talking to religious leaders; he was talking to everyone when he said, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?”  Everyone is called to bear fruit worthy of repentance.  Then, when the people ask what to do, John gives very simple tasks.

Don’t keep more than you need…whether food, money, clothing, whatever it is, give to others your excess.  Don’t cheat people.  Be honest in your business dealings, and don’t strive to get more than you need.  You may be able to earn tens of thousands more, but don’t do so.  Rather, give a better wage to your workers.  Be satisfied with what you have and don’t strive, at the expense of others, to get more than you need or have.

That’s kinda simple, and it leads to a joyful world and way of life.  I’d argue that if the highest paid people in our country chose to earn less and chose to have their lower paid employees earn more, we’d have less violence, anger, and division in our country than we do.  There would be more rejoicing.  That’s the Kingdom of God, the way of life which John the Baptist proclaimed would bear fruit worthy of repentance, the way of life which prepares the way for Jesus.

Unfortunately for most folks, it is also a way of life that is frightfully difficult.  If only John had demanded something herculean, some enormous quest or task.  Then we could have a goal and come up with ways of achieving that goal, and we could be proud of ourselves for having accomplished some awesome task.  That’s probably what his hearers were expecting.  Then, they heard they were simply supposed to live their lives, caring for others more and living with less.  That’s actually harder than a quest.

Giving up what we don’t need and being content with what we have makes us place our faith in God rather than our efforts and our stuff.  Giving up what we don’t need and being content with what we have makes us give up some of our power and control, not an easy task being that behind humanity’s fall in the Garden of Eden was a desire for power and control.  John calls us to one of the most difficult quests we could have:  “give up power and control and place your faith in God, oh and by the way,” John said, “this will be made apparent not in your religious life, but in your economic life.”

“Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” (James 1:27)  We can’t separate our economic life from our commitment to Jesus and his Gospel.  As Jesus taught in Luke 12, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Luke 12:34)  A good question we could ask ourselves is, “am I spending my money the way Jesus would want it spent?”

On the other side of this coin, of course, both John and Jesus are telling their listeners to live lives of great joy.  If you believe in what John said, if you believe in what Jesus taught, there is great joy in giving up our stuff for the sake of those who don’t have enough.  “Rejoice in the Lord always,” Paul wrote in his letter to the Philippians, “again I will say, rejoice!”  Following John’s way of preparing for Jesus is not intended to leave us sad, morose, or resentful.  John’s way is meant to leave us with great joy.

“Trust me,” Jesus tells us in Luke 9:24, “if you truly want to live a life of joy and peace, then you need to give up control of your life; give your life away, and you will find your life in me.”  That’s the paradox of the Gospel, but a paradox that deep down, I believe we all know to be true.  Give away what you have for the sake of those who don’t have enough.  This may not seem fair, some of our hearts would tell us, but Jesus didn’t care about fairness, he cared about people.  Remember the parable of the workers in the vineyard who all got paid for a full day’s work, even those who only worked an hour?  Regardless of only being able to work an hour, those workers still needed a full day’s wage to have enough to put food on the table.  That’s life in God’s kingdom, where we give up fairness and control for the sake of people having enough.

In the U.S. we have about 5% of the world’s population, yet we use about 1/3 of the world’s resources.  This hurts everyone, not only those without, but those who have in abundance.  Shane Claiborne wrote in Red Letter Revolution,

Surplus not only hurts the poor but also those who are rich.  In the Gospels, it’s interesting that the rich man starts by asking Jesus about how to find life.  If you look at the richest corners of the world, they have the highest rates of loneliness, suicide, and depression.

            Salvation, for many, comes by giving their stuff away.  This is not what they must do to earn salvation.  Giving away their stuff, bringing enough to others and being released from the hold their possessions have on them does not earn salvation; it is salvation.  It’s life in Jesus’ kingdom.  That’s why, when John was asked how people are supposed to prepare for Jesus’ coming, he told them to stop putting their trust in their money and their things.  Stop striving to get more than you need.  Give away what you don’t need so that others may have enough.

Realize also, we’re going to fall short of John’s command.  Our stuff, our notions of fairness, our desires for more, and our fears of not being able to do without, can have a tight hold on us.  We keep striving.  We take John seriously; we assume he really did mean it, that we really do prepare ourselves for Jesus by having less and giving more.

Then, we lay our lives at the feet of Jesus’ grace.  Keep striving, keep failing, and let not our failures turn us away from Jesus.  If we feel shamed by John’s words, then we definitely need to place ourselves square into Jesus’ grace.  Remember Jesus prays, “Father, forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.”  We place ourselves in Jesus’ grace and then we let Jesus’ grace transform our hearts.

Don’t keep more than you need…whether food, money, clothing, whatever it is, give to others your excess.  The grace of Jesus.  Don’t cheat people.  Be honest in your business dealings, and don’t strive to get more than you need.  The grace of Jesus.  You may be able to earn tens of thousands more, but don’t do so.  Rather, give a better wage to your workers.  Be satisfied with what you have and don’t strive, at the expense of others, to get more than you need or have.  The grace of Jesus.

As Lutheran pastor, Nadia Bolz-Weber wrote about the repentance and the grace of Jesus:

This is it.  This is the life we get here on earth.  We get to give away what we receive.  We get to believe in each other.  We get to forgive and be forgiven.  We get to love imperfectly. And we never know what effect it will have for years to come.  And all of it…all of it is completely worth it. – Nadia Bolz-Weber, Accidental Saints

Amen.