Proper 23 B + the windows of heaven + 10.13.24

 

M. Campbell-Langdell

All Santos, Oxnard

(Job 23:1-9, 16-17; Psalm 22:1-15; Hebrews 4:12-16; Mark 10:17-31)

Good morning. Today’s scriptures remind me that there is more here than meets the eye. Job suffers greatly, and yet he actually gets to talk with God!

In addition, here is the rich young man. We see him interact with Jesus, asking how to inherit eternal life? He has followed the commandments from his youth. And Jesus, looking at him, loves him and says, sell everything, give it to the poor, have treasure in heaven, and follow me. I don’t know about you, but I think that the man and oftentimes many readers of this scripture get focused on the first part. Selling everything. It is a tall order. We begin to wonder- would we need to do that too? Or is this command only for the young man? I tend to think that Jesus would give each of us a different command based on whatever it is that separates us from God. Since the young man thought he was only blessed because of his stuff, he needs to separate from his stuff. But for some of us it may be that we need to let go of a concept, like the idea we can do everything on our own, or something else.
I suggest that today, we focus less on the giving up part of this passage, and more on the invitation. Do you think the young man caught the invitation that was being given to him? I mean, really understood? I think he could not have, or he would not have gone away so sad. Because Jesus was saying, sell the stuff that doesn’t matter, make it matter by helping someone who is in need, and then come back to me. And I will give you everything you ever needed, even if you didn’t know you needed it.

David Serrano wrote a beautiful stewardship letter, and I commend it to you. It reminds us that when we give to the church, and when we give to the poor via the church or another way, we are going to be blessed. We don’t know how it works, but it just does. That is why we encourage everyone to give some portion of their income – whatever it is, and give it to God. Before anything else.

When I asked Pastor Alene to reflect on the concept of tithing, a concept that means giving ten percent of your income to the church (or somehow to God), and is historically the model for giving in our tradition. She reminded me of a passage from Malachi, Chapter 3, verses 8-10: “Will anyone rob God? Yet you are robbing me! But you say, “How are we robbing you?” In your tithes and offerings!  You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me—the whole nation of you! Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in my house, and thus put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts; see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing.”

She says: “as a child, I took Malachi’s words about robbing God very seriously. If I didn’t put .05 of my 50-cent weekly allowance in the offering, I worried that I had robbed God. As I’ve grown older, I’ve come to appreciate this passage in a different way. I’ve learned to appreciate its practicality. This is a path toward justice that is sustainable. It doesn’t ask for me to sell everything [unlike the rich young man] and yet it calls me to do my part, to be consistent and faithful in what I can do to make the world a better place.”

I think about Pastor Alene’s words here, and notice – instead of hoarding his blessings, the rich young man is asked to share. Jesus is asking him to be a blessing to others. And Alene points out that when we give via the tithe, “it’s also good economics and psychology. Money experts will tell you that the ability to give, the ability to be generous, changes your relationship with money. However, it needs to be budgeted. A ten percent tithe does exactly that. It provides a margin in the budget for giving that doesn’t break the bank. Tithing also provides a space for gratitude. If my tithe check feels big, I’m reminded of how much more I’ve been given – how much I have to be thankful for.”

I love this, and I think about that rich young man. I hope he was able to process this a bit and try out Jesus’ challenge here, at least a bit. I suspect that in giving, he may have felt richer than when he was just guarding his earthly treasure.
But there is something more. In Malachi, God says that God will pour down for you an overflowing blessing. I think of the oil running down your head, or of the overflowing cup of new wine, the abundant table. This is the abundance God wants for you. God wants to bless you.

How does this blessing come about? It comes from being willing to give up everything, and for us it is usually symbolic in saying, before the year begins and we even know what our finances will really be like, God, I trust you. I will commit to giving this much, my tithe, to you, and I trust that you will bless me.

Jesus laments the young man’s lack of willingness to try to give up what he knows. What the young man seems unable to see is what Jesus can offer him. Later, Peter says that the disciples have also given up everything to follow him. And Jesus says, yes and no one who has given up anything- relatives or land- will not be given back a hundredfold of what they gave up – and eternal life. It is true that Jesus also talks about persecutions in Mark, but I want to focus on the blessing for today.
We don’t know exactly what this means. We know that not many of the disciples became fabulously wealthy following Jesus, or major land-owners. But most of them didn’t have fields to give up. But those who had begun as simple fishermen, found that they fished for people and that they were rich in such fish. People were there for them, provided for them and loved them. And they loved the people.
At the same time, we know that God will provide materially, as we need. But God’s promises and blessings, are so much bigger than that.

Martin Luther once said, “Faith does not require information, knowledge and certainty, but a free surrender and a joyful bet on [God’s] unfelt, untried and unknown goodness.”

Or as Pastor Alene reminds us of Malachi’s words from God: “Test me, see if I won’t open up the windows of heaven.”

Amen.