The Church of St.
Paul & Incarnation, Jersey City
August 4, 2019
Year C, Proper 13:
The Eighth Sunday after Pentecost
Hosea 11:1-11
Psalm 107: 1-9, 43
Colossians 3:1-11
Luke 12:13-21
Only God is Forever
Most
of you know that before I was a priest I was a teacher.
And,
although it’s been a while since I’ve been in the classroom, there’s a lot
about that special profession – that vocation – that I miss.
I
miss being surrounded by people nearly all the time.
I
miss watching kids learn about the world and themselves, growing up into young
adults.
I
miss having colleagues who are also friends, people to go out with on a Friday
afternoon, enjoying each other’s company as we decompress and laugh together
before heading our separate ways for the weekend.
And,
yes, I miss being off in the summer.
I
usually did some teaching during the summer to earn a little extra cash, but
looking back on it, I’m not totally sure exactly what I did with all of that
time off – except, that is, for my very first summer as a teacher – the summer
of 1990.
That
summer, some friends and friends of friends and I rented a house down the
Shore, in a town called Bradley Beach.
It
was a very memorable summer living in a house that was exactly one door in from
the beach.
My
friends and the friends of friends would come down each weekend and we’d all
hang out and have a good time together but then, since they all had to go to work, they
would head back north on Sunday night or early Monday morning.
But,
not me!
Once
my friends and friends of friends would clear out, for the most part I had the
house to myself.
I’ve
always been an early riser, so I’d get up early and go to the beach before the
crowds arrived, sometimes early enough to see the sunrise.
I
went to daily Mass at the local Roman Catholic church where I could tell that
the kind Irish priest wanted to ask me where I had come from and what I was
doing there and, probably, did I want to be a priest.
But,
since I didn’t want to talk about any of that, I managed to use evasive
maneuvers: shaking his hand and get by him without breaking my stride.
Or,
even better: if someone engaged the priest in a few words of conversation, I
would quickly just step around them and be on my way.
(I
sometimes see people here use those techniques to avoid me, too!)
Since
I was down there all summer, I became really familiar with the houses around
ours - and the people who sat out on their porches day after day.
It
felt kind of timeless – this is how it’s always been and how it will be
forever.
I
never rented a Shore house again, and though I’ve been back every once in a
while, it had been a few years – it had been a few years since I was in Bradley
Beach, until Monday when I took advantage of a day off with good weather and
took the train down the Shore and once again walked those same streets and the
boardwalk.
And,
looking around, I was amazed that there has been so much change since that lazy
summer I lived down there.
Many
houses, including the one we lived in, have either been demolished or
refurbished beyond recognition.
Most
of the little businesses along Main Street and the Boardwalk are either gone or
are operating under a different name.
And,
as I walked our old street I looked at the people sitting comfortably on their
porches – and didn’t see one person I recognized.
And,
it was as I was walking that I realized that the summer of 1990 was nearly
thirty years ago!
So, of course a lot has changed!
So, of course the faces were different.
I had a good day
down there on Monday but I admit to feeling a little melancholy, too – reminded
of how quickly time goes and how eventually everything passes.
Only God is
forever.
That’s why most,
if not all, of the great spiritual guides warn us against getting overly attached
to places and things.
And, that very
much includes Jesus of Nazareth who over and over – and especially in today’s
parable about “the Rich Fool” – Jesus warns us to get our priorities straight –
to not put our ultimate trust in wealth or in things or even in other people.
Only God is
forever.
Today’s gospel
lesson begins with someone telling Jesus to get involved in a family dispute –
kind of like a couple of weeks ago when we heard Martha ask Jesus to tell her
sister to get up and help with the hospitality.
But, just like in
the Martha and Mary story, Jesus wisely declines to get involved in these
family matters, but instead uses this opportunity to teach – to teach about the
danger of greed – the danger of materialism – the danger of putting any thing
in the place of God.
The rich man in
the parable is an extreme case, but we know the type.
He’s done very
well – so well that he’s run out of room to store his crops and his goods.
So, while today we
might consider renting a storage unit, he makes the decision to tear down his
barns and build bigger ones where he can stash everything away. And, then, then, he can finally be content and
happy and “relax, eat, drink, and be merry.”
Just like us,
ancient people would have probably known where this story was going: the rich
man’s plan was not going to work.
Sure enough, God
suddenly enters the picture and says to the rich man, “You fool! This very
night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared,
whose will they be?”
Only God is forever.
A couple of
thoughts about this story:
First, aside from
being foolish, and apparently greedy, the rich man is also apparently very
alone – alone with his wealth and his fantasy of security.
He never mentions
inviting family and friends to relax, eat, drink, and be merry with him.
And, he certainly
never considers sharing his abundance with those less fortunate.
He only talks to
himself.
It seems there’s
not even anyone to inherit his wealth.
And, so, if this
story had gone in a different direction and he had managed to build his new
barns and settled in for all of that pleasure and security, I think he quickly would
have discovered that in fact he wasn’t very merry at all.
Greed doesn’t make
us happy.
And, neither does
loneliness.
And, you know, this
week as I’ve thought about the summer of 1990, I’ve remembered it a little more
clearly.
I remember being
happy to get the house to myself, at least for a day or two, but I also
remember getting lonely and eager for other friends to come down and visit.
I remember seeing
all of those people on their porches but I also remember never really
acknowledging them and certainly never stopping to talk with them, to get to
know them and allow them to get to know me.
And, I wonder why
I was so determined to use evasive maneuvers to avoid that kind Irish priest –
to avoid the questions I could sense he wanted to ask – to avoid the questions
I probably wanted to ask myself.
Since nothing
lasts forever, those opportunities are forever lost to me.
The story of the
rich fool is a good reminder to not get attached to our stuff, to not think
that somehow our bank account or our full closet is somehow going to save us.
But, along with my
summer of ’90 memories, the story of the rich fool is also a reminder that we
can’t go it alone.
It’s a reminder to
be open to one another, to share what we have, to take the time to get to know each
other, because it’s right there, right here in the human heart, where we
meet the God who is forever.
Amen.
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