Sufficient Evidence

Sermon manuscript for Green Lake Church of Seventh-day Adventists for Sabbath, August 29, 2015

Old Testament text:

Those who oppress the poor insult their Maker, but helping the poor honors him.

Those who mock the poor insult their Maker; those who rejoice at the misfortune of others will be punished.

If you help the poor, you are lending to the LORD--and he will repay you!

Those who shut their ears to the cries of the poor will be ignored in their own time of need.

Whoever gives to the poor will lack nothing, but those who close their eyes to poverty will be cursed.

The godly care about the rights of the poor; the wicked don't care at all.

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed. 9 Yes, speak up for the poor and helpless, and see that they get justice.

Proverbs 14:31; 17:5; 19:17; 21:13; 22:2, 9, 22; 28:27; 29:7; 31:8-9

New Testament (sermon) text: Luke 16:19-31

If I were going to make a movie of the second half of Luke 16, the opening scene would be based on the classic cartoon picture of hell. You would see the devil walking around with his pitchfork. Flames would be flickering up through the black grate that formed the floor. People would be wandering around in misery or sitting on fireproof benches. If you turned the sound up, you'd hear some moans and groans. You might hear flames crackling. But mostly you'd hear grumpy voices, people complaining.

“I can't believe I got sent here. It is NOT FAIR! I'm not half as bad as Andy and unless he's lived to a hundred ninety-three, it looks like he managed to snag a ticket to the other place. The system is so rigged.”

“Oh yeah.” his buddy retorts. “You think you got it bad? My fifth wife showed up down here. I wish she was in heaven. I think she dropped out of church just so she could be sure and end up here to torment me.”

As the camera zoomed in on conversations, you'd hear more complaints, protests, and endless comparisons. “I was reasonably happy here until they moved Jack Scary Face in next to me last week. If I had realized I'd have to live in the same neighborhood of hell as that guy I might have tried a little harder to make it to heaven. What were they thinking. I was a reasonably law-abiding guy. Well, at least I was WAY BETTER than Jack.”

As the camera wandered here and there catching snippets of conversation, hints of faces and body language, the only thing that would keep the weight of misery from crushing you would be the dark humor of it. Everyone in the place knew they deserved better than they got. Everybody was better than who ever was next to them. All of them could think of people who deserved torment more than they did. I might have been cruel to cats, but you were cruel to dogs. (Sorry about that, cat lovers.)

Then camera would pull back slowly and you could see that hell was located on an immense plateau bordered on all sides by cliffs that fell away for thousands of feet into smoky, unfathomable depths. Then startlingly, you would see that perhaps a hundred yards to the west, maybe even less, another mesa rose up from the smoky depths. The top of this mesa was a dazzling vision of cascading streams tumbling over white rocks, luxurious moss lined ledges. Giant redwoods and Doug firs stepped back from the stream on the left. Toward the right was a meadow carpeted with more wildflowers than you see in Grand Park in a good year. People were happy. As the camera zoomed in you heard laughter and banjos. You saw dancing and eating. People were handing each other treats and urging, “Ooh, you've got to try this. This is amazing!”

Your eye is drawn back to the dark plateau of hell. Standing at the very western edge as close to heaven as he can get you see a small figure. The camera zooms in. It's a dignified old man, dressed in fine clothes. His hands are cupped. He's calling toward heaven.

“Father Abraham. Father Abraham!”

Astonishingly, we see a response on the other side. At the visual and social focal point of mesa, there is a grand throne and seated on it a very impressive man with a long white beard. It's Father Abraham. (Abraham fills the same role in Jewish lore that St. Peter occupies in Catholic cartoons about heaven and hell.)

Father Abraham is engaged in happy, animated conversation with someone. They break off talking and together look over toward the lone figure standing at the very edge of hell.

Father Abraham cups his ear with his hand. “What was that?”

“Could you send Lazarus over here with a bit of water. It's really hot and dry over here. I'd really appreciate it if you could just have your good man Lazarus there bring me some water.”

Abraham looks at the man he's been talking with. The man, obviously Lazarus, shugs his shoulders.

Abraham starts laughing. “What was that?” he calls back.

“Please send Lazarus over here with a spot of water. I could really use a drink.”

“Tell what,” Abraham hollers back. “It appears you and Lazarus here must be old friends. Lazarus has just been telling me how hard life was for him back on earth, how he was destitute, what with his bum feet and his scoliosis. He was constantly dependent on other people. So I'll send him over with the same amount water you used to give him when he was sitting in the sun begging.”

As Father Abraham is hollering this message across the Grand Canyon that separates the two worlds, we watch the rich man's face. At Abraham's first words, “You must be old friends,” the rich man's face brightens. Lazarus did remember him! That was a good sign. But when he heard Abraham's suggestion that he would send over the same amount of water the rich man used to share with Lazarus, the rich man's face grew quizzical. He struggled to remember how many times he had arranged for the beggars at his gate to get water. Surely, there must have been occasions, really hot days, days when he wasn't fully engaged in other pressing business, surely there were some times when he had sent one of his servants out with a water jar. But as he searched his memory his face went dark.

Yes, there had been beggars at his gate. Every person of means had beggars at their gate. That's the way society worked. The poor people sucked off the rich. He remembered how annoying they were. Slowly he recalled how angry he used to get. Why didn't they go beg somewhere else? Why didn't they buy their own farms? He was especially repulsed by the beggars with deformities. They were so ugly with their twisted feet, their misshapen legs, their arms burned off at the elbow, their eye sockets reminding him of open graves. He hated them.

Father Abraham was talking again. “Actually, old man, I know that when Lazarus here was lying at your gate he got no water from you and no food. I know that back when the two of you were in close proximity, when it was possible for the two of you to share life, it didn't happen. The most Lazarus got from you was the friendly licks of some of the dogs that scrounged crumbs under your table. So really, it wouldn't be appropriate for me to send Lazarus to help you out. And besides, you can see the chasm between us is far to deep for anyone to cross. I'm sorry. But people don't go back and forth from your place to here. That's just the way it is. You understand.”

The rich man was quiet for a few minutes. Everything Abraham said was true.

Finally, he rallied himself. “Okay, I get it. I blew it. I own that. And I can see that Lazarus can't cross the canyon between us, but would you at least do me this favor? I have five brothers back home. They still have time. They are still in the land of the living. Would you be able to send Lazarus back to warn them? Let them know how things are so they won't end up here?”

Now, put yourself in Abraham's shoes, or rather in his seat. Imagine you are receiving this request. What would you say? Would you send Lazarus to warn the brothers?

Up to this point in the story, Jesus is following a classic theme in Jewish theology—the grand reversal. This is prominent in the words of several of the prophets and in the famous songs of Hannah and Mary. When God acts decisively at the end of the time, the high and mighty are going to be brought low. The lowly are going to be raised up. The entire pecking order of humanity is going to be upended.

Hannah's song.

4 The bow of the mighty is now broken, and those who stumbled are now strong. 5 Those who were well fed are now starving, and those who were starving are now full. The childless woman now has seven children, and the woman with many children wastes away. 6 The LORD gives both death and life; he brings some down to the grave but raises others up. 7 The LORD makes some poor and others rich; he brings some down and lifts others up. 8 He lifts the poor from the dust and the needy from the garbage dump. He sets them among princes, placing them in seats of honor. For all the earth is the LORD's, and he has set the world in order. (1Samuel 2:4-8, New Living Translation. Accessed through Blue Letter Bible.org)

Mary's song.

For the Mighty One is holy, and he has done great things for me. 50 He shows mercy from generation to generation to all who fear him. 51 His mighty arm has done tremendous things! He has scattered the proud and haughty ones. 52 He has brought down princes from their thrones and exalted the humble. 53 He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away with empty hands. (Luke 1:49-53, New Living Bible, accessed through Blue Letter Bible.org)

Mr. Rich Man had lived in luxury, and Lazarus lived in misery. Now their status has been reversed. Lazarus has exchanged his miserable life for bliss in paradise. Mr. Rich Man exchanged his luxury for misery in hell. Jesus' listeners would have expected this.

But now the Rich Man shows a bit of concern for someone other than himself. Surely this counts for something, right?

Well, maybe. But notice what happens even in these conversations from hell. The Rich Man continues to regard himself as privileged and the poor man as his natural servant. “Hey, Abraham, send Lazarus over here. Well, if he can't come here, send him to my brothers.” The rich man, in the very core of his being still sees Lazarus as the natural servant and himself as naturally deserving of whatever service Lazarus can provide.

Even in hell when everything has been stripped away, the rich man is still able to see beyond himself only with great difficulty and then only as far as other people in his own very limited circle. Even after the grand reversal he is completely unable to recognize the dignity, the nobility, the preciousness of the people who all this time have been invisible to him. He still cannot see them, even looking across the chasm into the exalted light of heaven.

So, should Abraham pay any attention to the rich man's request? Should Abraham send Lazarus back to warn the rich man's brothers?

Notice what happens next. Abraham does not address the worthiness of the man's request at all. Abraham doesn't discuss whether or not it would be fair to impose yet again on Lazarus.

Instead Abraham refuses to send Lazarus because it wouldn't do any good. Even if Lazarus rose from the dead, he would still be just Lazarus. Nobody. The brothers would not be able to hear a message from a nobody—even if that nobody had just risen from the dead.

“They have the voices of the prophets, the words of Scripture.” Abraham assured the rich man. “They have the instruction and wisdom they need.”

“No, no, no.” The rich man protested. “They won't read the Bible. They won't pay attention to that. But if someone rose from the dead . . . now, that would get their attention.”

Abraham shook his head. “It's no good. If they won't hear it from Moses, they won't hear from Lazarus.”

It's a sobering story.

Are there people in our lives that we just don't see? Are there human needs we could attend to . . . if we will just do it?

Don't wait. Don't develop a leather-hard heart.

All of us are rich in some way. We have something we can share. There are people whose lives can be touched with soothing water if we will pay attention. So pay attention.

There are people who will find new hope and maybe new life, if we share a bit of what we have—brains, money, social connections, the status of good looks, the power of influential friends. Let's ask God to help us see the Lazaruses in our lives, the people we can touch now with hope and help and healing.

This is what our holy book teaches. It is what Jesus modeled. It is God's plan for our lives and the lives of those around us.

Beautiful Rene

My head was thick and my eyes bleary with the effects of a bad cold. Urgent chores at home had kept me from breakfast. So when I walked into Aurora Commons* I was moderately miserable. Rene took one look and demanded with beguiling authority, “Did you have breakfast? Do you want me to make you some pancakes?”

“Sure, I'll have some pancakes. Thanks.”

“You want some eggs, too?”

“Yes, that would be nice.”

She added my order to her backlog and went back to the griddle. I greeted others. Chatted with Andy, the director for the day. Out of the corner of my eye I watched Rene at work. She filled a plate with pancakes, buttered them, added eggs and handed the plate to another hungry soul. I saw plates of pancakes here and there around the room. Rene greeted everyone that came within her circle. I laughed inwardly as I saw her patting the pancakes with her hand after flipping them on the griddle. I couldn't tell if she was showing affection to the pancakes or was checking their cooking progress.

She dished several other plates. Finally, she tapped me on the shoulder and handed me my plate. I poured Aunt Jemima, then walked across the room and sat with another of her customers, a hard- looking man that I thought I recognized. I tried to start a conversation. He refused to talk. Instead he simply shoved a container of syrup toward me. At least I guessed it was syrup. The container was a glass jar. The liquid was brown with mysterious specks in it. He handled it with a dry dish rag like it was hot. After some minutes of silence, he said, “It's seasoned with nutmeg.” And lapsed back into silence. I added some of the mystery juice to my pancakes and kept eating.

A little later Rene came back to check on me. She touched my shoulder. “Is it good?” I nodded and made happy noises. She, in turn, was obviously pleased with my pleasure in her cooking. She headed back to the griddle. Andy said she had been cooking pancakes for all comers all morning.

I had not met Rene before, but I'm at the Commons only an hour or two per week. She was obviously a regular and knew many of the folk that came in and out. She added sparkle and warmth to the place. For the time I was there last Tuesday, she was the matron, the mother of us all. The world of Aurora Commons was better because she was in it.

I thought of the stark contrast between Rene's identity inside Aurora Commons and outside on the sidewalks along the Avenue. There she is a street walker. A figure in Seattle's criminal underbelly, a visible testament to human brokenness. Here she is beautiful, admirable, noble.

So which is she? Matron or street walker? Care giver or parasite? Scrappy survivor or temptress? I don't know enough about the world of Aurora sidewalks to offer meaningful commentary on that . world. I don't understand prostitution, drug addiction, unemployment, human trafficking. But I do know that inside, within the walls of Aurora Commons, Rene is beautiful and nurturing. She is admirable and admired.

Maybe this is a model for church. Some of us have details in our lives that are sketchy at best, maybe even base and despicable. Our current lives are not our ideal lives. Still we come to the House of Prayer. For an hour or two inside these walls we bask in a different identity. In worship we know ourselves as beloved daughters and son. In community with one another we experience admiration and appreciation from our sisters and brothers. We kindle again our hope that God's promise of transformation and redemption reaches even to us. In the physical space, the rituals, and the humanity of church we taste, we know by direct experience, the Gospel.

*Aurora Commons is a drop-in center sponsored by the Awake Church. It offers sanctuary to the street walkers, homeless, addicts, mentally ill and everyone else in the vicinity of Aurora Avenue and 90^th Steet.

A Woman and her Money--a perfect picture of God

Sermon manuscript for Green Lake Church for Sabbath, August 1, 2015

So Thursday morning about 7:30, I'm sitting on a dock across the street at Green Lake. I'm there for prayer and meditation. The sky was blue. The temperature was in the upper sixties. The lake was still except for ripples raised by the white shells of the rowers. It was glorious, tranquil, charming. Contemplation was easy.

At the opposite end of the dock a couple of boys were setting up to fish. The older looked like he was maybe eleven or twelve. The younger eight or nine. It took a while, but finally they managed to get a hook in the water. A few minutes later, I heard the older brother say, “You watch the pole. I need to run home and get something.”

I returned to my contemplation. Five or ten minutes later a woman came onto the dock. She was dressed in running clothes, had a German wire-haired pointer on a leash. She greeted the boy.

“Hi Ean, where's Nate?”

“He went to get something.”

“Did he go home?” she asked incredulously.

Something about the interaction piqued my interest. Who was this woman? It seemed obvious she and the boys had not started their day together. They had not yet seen each other. Still, her interaction with the boy was warm and comfortable.

Here's how the conversation went:

“How long has Nate been gone?” She asked.

“I don't know.”

“He left you here all by yourself?”

“Yes.”

“When is he coming back?”

“I don't know.”

“I see your bike. Where's your helmet?”

“I forgot it.”

“What? You rode here without your helmet?”

“Yes.”

“Did you have breakfast?”

“Yes.”

“What did you have?”

“Cereal.”

“How long are you going to be here?”

“I don't know.”

“You're sure Nate is coming back?”

“He said he was.”

“You're okay here by yourself?”

“Yes.”

“You warm enough?”

“Yes.”

“Tell Nate to call me, okay?”

“Okay.”

She started to walk away. “Oh, by the way, good morning.”

Ean gave her a little wave.

I laughed. She had to be Mom.

I'm guessing the boys' parents are divorced. The boys spent the night at Dad's house. Maybe they're spending the week or the summer at Dad's house. The conversation gave no hint that the boys were headed back into Mom's world later that day. Still, Mom did what moms do. She interrogated Ean in the interest of making sure her boy was okay.

Where's your helmet? Are you warm enough? Are you okay here by yourself? Did you have breakfast? All those questions were mom-speak for I love you. I care about you. You are precious to me. That last bit, “Oh, by the way, good morning.” came from some book she had read. You're supposed to say good morning. So she said it. But the questions—they came straight from her heart.

Maybe she wasn't mom. Maybe she was Aunt Julie. In the world I grew up in the difference between Aunt and Mom was slight. Aunt Velma and Aunt Louise were as likely to interrogate me about my well-being as Mom was.

If Mom didn't see you eating, when she does see you, even if it's on the dock at Green Lake, she's going to ask, did you have breakfast? When she sees your bike lying there and no helmet, she's going to ask, where's your helmet? That's what moms do? At least most of them. Certain behaviors go with the territory. They are automatic.

It's the same in the story we heard in our Gospel reading today. Jesus began telling a story about a woman. She had ten coins. She lost one. What is going to happen next?

Maybe we need a little background to understand the story. The coins were not dimes or quarters. Each coin was worth a day's pay. How much do you make in a day? At $15 an hour, that's $120. Now, if you make a hundred or two hundred dollars an hour, that's not much. But for the person making $15 an hour, $120 dollars is a lot of money.

In the culture of first century Palestine, most peasants did not handle cash. They grew their own food, made their own clothes and bartered for what they couldn't make or grow. So, ten drachmas, ten silver coins was a significant amount of money. Losing one of those coins was a huge loss. This was disaster.

How did she lose it? When did she lose it? How long has it been missing?

Panic!

Let's call her Maria. Her husband was poor. Her dad had been poor. Her relatives were poor. The neighbors were poor. There are no closets in Maria's house. Maria had nothing to put in a closet. Her only clothes were on her back. Her only pot was on the stove. The entire family slept in a pile in the one room that comprised her house. We would probably call it a hut.

Maria had one treasure, these ten coins. Maybe they had been her wedding dowry. Maybe they were her life's savings? Whatever, they were irreplaceable. She can't just go work an extra day and replace it.

She was startled when she noticed it was missing. She immediately began searching, confident she would find it. She looked beside the stove. She looked under the bed. She looked outside next the log where she sat when she shelled peas yesterday. Panic began to build.

She managed to calm herself. Then started over.

She hauled the bed outside. And the cook pot. She carried out the stack of kindling she had beside the stove. She lit a lamp and then began sweeping, carefully studying the floor as she went. Finally she found it. She fixed the gold coin back to the necklace she wore. Hauled the bed back inside. Set the cook pot back on the stove. Replaced the kindling beside the stove.

Then she ran next door to tell Elizabeth and across the street to tell Naomi. Within minutes the yard was full of women chattering, recounting their own stories of losing and finding, of urgent searching. Of finding. They were happy together.

In the same way, Jesus said, there is joy in heaven over one sinner who turns toward righteousness, one rascal who begins to ask how his actions affect others, self-absorbed parent who begins paying close attention to her children, one self-important clergy or science professor who begins to regard persons as more valuable than ideas.

When a person repents God is delighted.

Jesus makes this same point three times in three stories in Luke 15. The common titles of the stories are “The Lost Sheep,” “The Lost Coin” and “The Lost Son.” But stories really about the Shepherd, The Woman and the Father. In this story of the Lost Coin, Jesus is telling us if you want to understand God, study this woman. We don't need the story to know that sometimes coins get lost. The story is not about the coin, but about the woman's search for the coin, her finding the coin, her happiness at finding the coin. Jesus point is that God is like that woman.

At the core of our faith is this conviction: human character matters to God. When a person turns toward goodness, the ripple of happiness created by that turning runs to the very heart of the universe. The happiness of God in response to a person's turning toward the light is as certain, as assured as the happiness of a woman who has found her lost treasure.

This is the essential core of the theology of Jesus. Jesus makes this point repeatedly. Shepherds respond to lost sheep by searching and finding them. Women respond to lost coins by searching for them anid finding them. Neighbors respond to emergencies by helping their neighbors. Dads take delight in providing good gifts for their children. Doctors do not scold their patients for getting sick. Auto mechanics do not act outraged when I bring them my car—AGAIN!

In worship we celebrate this conviction. God delights in our turning toward goodness. This truth is more important than outrage at the latest ideas of our political opponents. This truth is more important than balancing the scales of justice.

God delights in restoration and correction, not vengeance and punishment. We are invited to contemplate God's character and to cooperate with God in delighting goodness, especially the fragile, tentative goodness of someone who is just turning toward the light after having spent time in darkness.