Giving Faithfully
In the Gospel of Matthew this morning, we meet Jesus in a string of stories, also called parables. He is using as many ways as he can to tell us about the Kingdom of Heaven. I would like to tell you this story from The Message, which is a poetic translation of our Bible. Listen for the word of God in Matthew 25: 14-30 Where a man his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave more than five thousand dollars, to another two thousand, and to another one thousand. He gave them the sum according to what he thought they could handle. Then he left, entrusting them with the fate of his treasure. The man who had received the most went at once and put his money to work and it paid him back five times. So also, the one with two thousand, doubled his money. But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money.
After a long time the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received the five talents brought the other five. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with five thousand dollars and see I have gained five more.'
His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'
The man with the two talents also came. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with two talents; see, I have doubled your money.
"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'
"Then the man who had received the smallest amount came. 'Master,' he said, 'I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.'
"His master replied, 'You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.
'Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten thousand. For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'
I feel like I am supposed to be afraid. It feels to me as if with every news report and editorial, with every financial report and stock analysis, I am supposed to be afraid. I feel like fear is on the menu, it is the special of the day and if you don’t order it, you are labeled as naïve or out of touch or unwilling to face reality. I am not foolish enough to ignore the fact that we are smack dab in the middle of the biggest financial crisis in a generation. And I am not unaffected by the reports that what we are experiencing now is just the beginning of the onslaught of layoffs and foreclosures and the pain that is to come. But fear, the posture of fear itself is something to be afraid of. Fear is the house on the other side of God. Fear is the place where we go when we turn inward, the place where our bodies close and we tighten up; fear is the never ending black hole that offers just one more thing from which we ought to hide. Fear makes it nearly impossible for God to get to us. And fear, it seems to me, leads us away from faith. Fear leads us away from faith.
Fear, grabs our hands and says trust your instincts, it is time to hunker down and hide. Fear, whispers silently to us, and calls us to hold on tight and close our eyes. Fear takes over like a sickness and makes breathing difficult and increases our heart rate and clogs our minds. We look to fear to lead us and guide us and show us the way. And suddenly, we awake to find that it is fear that we are worshiping. We discover that we have consulted fear on our decision making. We learn that fear has gotten so large that there is little space for God to speak; you see, fear leaves little room for God. And friends, with all of this praise of fear, God has been uninvited and God wants back in, God wants our hearts back. God calls to us and beckons us. God whispers and moves within us and over us and around us. God tries and tries and tries to get to us and it is not until we look fear in the eyes and say enough…enough…that God’s still small voice summons us home again.
That is what I want, I want to be at home in God. I want to live and move and have my being in God. I want my very breathing to be in the energy that is God. I want to leave fear behind. And I want to tell you what I know to be true about fear. It seems to me that the best way to sleigh fear, to let it go and to be at home in God is to surrender to God the very thing we fear being without. It seems so counterintuitive, but God seems to know exactly how to turn our hearts into God’s being again. The best way to let go of fear is to surrender to God the very thing we fear being without. For me, especially now, the thing I fear most is insecurity and an uncertain future. The very thing that draws me inward and tells me to hunker down, the very thing that I fear being with out, is money. Money for me has been a symbol of freedom and independence. Growing up, it stood for a way out, a way of hope, a way of education and possibility. So imagine my sheer panic when I first heard the earth shattering words of Jesus, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.” My treasure was stashed away in the cage of fear, which meant that my heart could only beat, my body and soul could only move in a world of fear. I thought these words of Jesus to be simply a radical gesture from a man who had the luxury of scoffing at money. He didn’t seem to have much so it was with ease that he could so easily tell the rest of us to let go of worrying about ours.
But it turns out that Jesus was right. My treasure was hidden away and so also was my heart. The very source of our anxiety is indeed the very way that God suggests we come out of the posture of panic and onto the mountain of pondering, the place of openness and vulnerability, the peak of new life. “Give your money, and your heart will follow.” For many years, I held on, reassuring myself that a day and a moment and a time would come when I would have enough saved to let go of fear. I told myself that with just one more month or paycheck, just another holiday where I could stash away my money, and there would be enough so I could start giving, so I could start believing that God would provide, so I could start growing faith that would make me strong enough to let go. But of course such thinking does work for those of us who long to be more like Jesus. He loves to turn things around on us. And so like much of the Christian life, we are invited to commit to growing even before we are ready. We are called beyond ourselves and we are invited to act our way into a new way of thinking rather than think our way into a new way of acting, or we are called to live our way into a new way of believing rather than to believe our way into a new way of living. That is why Jesus invites us to give first and then our heart will follow. I guess the truth is that I started giving for selfish reasons. I wanted to see if it really worked. I wanted to see if my faith in God would grow simply by my commitment to begin to give to God the hold that money had on me, the hold that fear had on me. So a few years ago, when I first became a pastor, I started to pledge. At first I panicked, I wanted so desperately to give in to the god of fear that I had known and loved for so long. I would pick up pennies off of the ground and hold tightly to each receipt like it was my ticket to heaven. But slowly, with each small act, I have taken steps away from fear and moved one step closer to a home in our living God.
But fear is bigger now, perhaps than ever. It rules all manner of life in this country. It calls to us from newspapers and magazines. It pulls us from television news and from conversations with anyone who wants to hold on tight. And it tries to rear its head even in here, even in this church. But I have made a promise to God that I am not letting it control my life. I no longer want to listen to fear as it tells me to hold on tight, to bury my treasure. I no longer want to be like the servant who is so afraid of losing a piece of his treasure that he can hardly live at all. I no longer want to be the one who can’t look God in the eye and hear the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” Jesus says to each of us, “Give your money, and your heart will follow.” I want my heart, my life to be in God, to be here in this quirky and grace filled place where we learn radical love and patience. I want my heart to be in God, which is why I am taking a leap of faith, knowing that I will grow in faith. This year, with my arms out and my heart open and my faith planted in God’s garden of abundant life, Jeremy and I are pledging 6% of my income, which is $2040. Our life is filled with uncertainties and unknowns. We have student loans and car payments. We have questions and yet these are the very times, the very moments when we are invited to let go and give our hearts to God. When I hear from the mouth of fear, that there won’t be enough, that I won’t have what I need, that I should hunker down and cling tight, I hear Jesus words again, “Give your money and your heart will follow.” But the truth is that God wants our money, our treasure, because God wants us, God wants our hearts. And I want my heart to be here with you all as we follow God together. I believe from the bottom of my heart that if we put our treasure in God’s work in this place, our heart will follow, fear loses; love wins. God invites us to let go of fear and to give out of faith and then the Spirit crashes into the very core of our being and fills us until we are overflowing. May it be so…