Luke 16:19-31

 

CONTENT - Jesus’ story about the rich guy and Lazarus pulls the curtain on the fate of those who serve avarice and self-aggrandizement at the expense of people in need. The first part of this parable develops the idea of judgment and reversal (vv. 14-15); the second part develops the affirmation of the law and the prophets even as it alludes to the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

QUOTES ON WEALTH

Jesus talked a great deal about money. Sixteen of the thirty-eight parables were concerned with how to handle money and with the subject of money. The Bible offers 500 verses on prayer, less than 500 verses on possessions. In the gospels, an amazing one out of ten verses (288 in all) deals directly faith, but more than 2,000 verses on money and possessions (Howard Dayton, Jr.).

Share everything with your brother. Don’t say, ‘It is private property.’ If you share what is everlasting, you should be even more willing to share what does not last (The Didache).

We are made loveless by our possessions (Elizabeth of Thuringa).

Mammon is the largest slaveholder in the world (Frederick Saunders).

If our goods are not available to the community, they are stolen goods (Martin Luther).

 

Connections

We have squandered the gift of life. The good life of some is built on the pain of many; the pleasure of a few on the agony of millions. To you we lift our outspread hands . . . We worship death in our quest to possess ever more things; we worship death in our hankering after our own security, our own survival, our own space, as if life were divisible, as if love were divisible, as if Christ had not died for all of us. To you we lift our outspread hands. [1]

 

Gambits

Portray the story of Lazarus and "Dives" (trans: "rich") as a three act play.

ACT 1: introduce the characters, describe their way of life, note the lack of interaction between Lazarus and the rich man (e.g. Lazarus has no voice, the rich man no name, etc.)

ACT II: The Great Reversal. In this act, the rich become poor and the poor become rich. The ancient chiastic structure which hints at the twin fates of the characters. Initially, the rich man in introduced first, but after death, Lazarus is the prominent and first-mentioned of the two. Perform an autopsy; suggest starvation, exposure to numbing weather, infectious illness, etc.

ACT III: this is the longest and most developed of the three acts. Shift into the diagloue between the rich man and Abraham. If the third act is the climax of the story, develop this more fully. In life Lazarus never says anything; Abraham now speaks for the beggar who has no voice. What do we know about the rich guy from the exchange of conversation?

Finally, move to the implications of this story for people of faith, for Christians. And suggest ways that we can change the script and alter the story through generous and faithful service.

ILL:

I was recently in Warsaw, Poland returning from a grocery store and walking down one of the main streets. On either side of this expansive boulevard towered beautifully renovated buildings mixed among striking glass-sided corporate offices and stores.

As I rounded a corner, I came face to face with a man. He had no fingers on one of his hands. Just a pink rounded paw. Maybe he had some fingers on the other hand, but I didn’t notice. I was immediately immobilized by the rotten stench and gruesome sight from this man. I had no time to react, to turn my head, to ignore the man. He was literally in my face. His feet were wrapped but I could see the toes were missing. I wondered if this man were a true leper or perhaps he had been mutilated by the Russian Mafia, or maimed by some other disease.

I could speak no Polish, but I knew instinctively what I was obliged to do, what I must do: I reached into my grocery bag to give some food to the man.

My wife and I walked to the hotel in silence; unsettled and interrupted from a morning of architecture sightseeing by a modern Lazarus who begged food of us. I wouldn’t want this person at the door of my house every day. He reminded me too much of that other part of the world that I am more comfortable in ignoring than in helping. I had run smack into Lazarus-the character for this Sunday’s lesson.

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[1] Prayer used at the 6th Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Vancouver, 1983.