Riches found living in poverty for Christ

Friends, unlike what we heard in the prophet Hosea’s prophesy last week—that harsh indictment, judgement and swift execution against the Israelites—we get a totally different portrait of YHWH.  We hear about how God loves us like an infant, holding us cheek to cheek, teaching us to walk, nurturing us with food, healing us when we don’t know it, wrapping us up in kindness and with bands of love.   Yet, the human tendency, failure, and sin in our relationship with God is to not recognize the persistent love of YWHW and honour that. 

Remember this nation was stubbornly set on trying to use a currency of sacrifices to persuade the Gods of Baal to ensure prosperity, power and primacy.  Yet, God, in this parent/child simile, continues to nurture and sustain their existence beyond all rational thinking—YHWH will not give up. That is why the child parent analogy is a beautiful image.

In a certain sense, we as parents will do whatever necessary for our children’s safety, development and future.  No matter the hurt, no matter the distrust, and no matter the pain a parent suffers due to the development and sometimes indiscretions of their child, most parents will love and nurture them beyond all reason.  That is the kind of love and compassion God gives us and even more, in fact, because there is no doubt in God’s mind of how important we are, and how much we are in need of his tenderness—God is waiting at every moment to share his tender moment with us.

The lesson is for us that it is never too late to turn to our God.  No matter how disoriented we are, like the doves flying from Assyria and the birds from Egypt, we can make our way home and we need not worry about God using his power to inflict a merciless wrath upon us.  The lion’s claws are retracted, and his fierceness is tamed because of God’s benevolence for us.  The simple call from the prophet Hosea is that we are to avoid the idols of this world and to continue to help each other by understanding the law of God and sharing our resources to help those who have been afflicted by war and left abandoned by their leaders.

That is the balancing act we are challenged to discover in our spiritual life with God—to put our trust fully in our Lord and believe that all things necessary and requisite has already been provided for so that we can provide for others in need.  Yet, the frailty and uncertainty of our limited life span tends to lead one away from the hope Jesus offers.

The plight of temporal need and concern is clearly illustrated in today’s gospel.  In Jesus’ encounter with the man who wants his brother’s inheritance, Jesus clearly reminds us that less is more.  To think that having wealth and an abundance of treasure will gain our souls satisfaction and a seat at the heavenly banquet is but a delusion.  What Jesus summates in his parable is that when life ends so does our possessions, thus, being a hoarder our of wealth is unnecessary.  Thus, a better use for these things is to sell it, give it to the poor and follow God unreservedly.  Truly these are uncomfortable words to hear since they are radically countercultural to today’s way of thinking.

Most certainly, God is inviting us to share in a certain kind of poverty which sets us free from the over emotionalized stresses and injustices of this world caused by storing up treasures.  St. Francis of Assisi when seeking direction from the Holy Scripture to develop his rule of life for the brothers, recognized this.  He was influenced to sell everything he owned, give it to the poor, so that he could truly follow Christ.  Francis found an abundance of grace in letting go of the stuff that distracted him from seeking God and seeing the world through the lens of the gospels.  St. Bonaventure captures the freedom and richness of following Christ’s poverty as he states about the early movement of the brothers:

 “Holy poverty, which was all they had to meet their expenses, made them prompt for obedience, robust for work and free for travel….They were safe everywhere, not held back by fear, nor distracted by care; they lived with untroubled minds, and without any anxiety….Their very poverty seemed to them overflowing abundance since, according to the advice of the wise man, they were content with a minimum as if it were much (211, 212)”.

Imagine being free to live without fear, holy and righteous in God’s sight, all the days of our life (Luke 1.68-79).  Francis understood that and lived it.  He encouraged others that we need to free ourselves of believing the lie that having more will gain you more purpose in this life and the life to come.  Rather, he encouraged prayer, hard labor and acts of penance—all without pay, for he knew that possessions would only create inequality among the brothers and sisters of penance, and, thus a potential for them to turn away from God for entitlements.  It was the struggle to gain entitlements that created a certain kind of elitism in the Church during Francis’ time.

As our Lord Jesus Christ reminds us sternly “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”

However, we sometimes in the church fail to learn this lesson.  There are many who get caught up in seeking prosperity over seeking the wealth found in the gospels themselves.  There are many who smooth out the sharp edges of the God’s Word to ease their conscience because they refuse to let go of their stuff and not have their minds duly focused on who came from above.  

As Paul reminds us, we must keep our hearts and minds on the things that are above, because that is where Christ dwells seated at the right hand of the Father whose glory and power is used to draw us back to the heart of God.  We can’t earn God’s love and favour because we have wealth or status, and nor will we find our purpose in life doing it without God.  We are given God’s love and grace because Christ choses all of us to be his people through compassion, mercy, forgiveness and everlasting life.  There are no riches that are greater than being loved by our God. Amen.

Sermon by Rev. Billy Isenor, OSF