Our daily bread Our Lord taught us to pray like this: Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.
Then we are told the story of how there once was a man, a nameless ``rich'' man, who dressed himself in fine clothes of regal purple. Dressed in elegant clothes he indulged himself day after day at the table, eating sumptuously, eating extravagantly. The story goes on. There was once a very poor man. But not a nameless man. He is called Lazarus, or ``God helps.'' He lay at the gates. He was so helpless and poorly clothed that dogs would lick his sores. And he began to satisfy his hunger by accepting the daily crumbs from the rich man's table. Jesus prays,Give us this day our daily bread.
The simple starkness of the prayer. Enough bread for the day. Not too much, but enough. Enough tortillas for the family. Enough zwiebach for the journey. There is a plain-spoken justice in the daily bread. The prayer doesn't imply what we find in the story. One person, rich and bloated, with more bread than he knows what to do with. But another, bereft and alone, just hoping to quiet the hunger pangs which are sure to come.
It reminds me of the old folk song: a rich man eats when he wishes a poor man whenever he can
We listen to the parable and quickly sense that this may be aimed at us. Some of us can recount stories from our own family histories that speak of bare cupboards, very little flour in the pantry, parents denying themselves food for the sake of the children, a mother's fervent prayer. But here we are today, and in terms of our material well-being on this planet we are, for the most part, closer to the economic status of the man dressed in purple than to the gaunt man covered with open sores.
For the most part we imagine those who are poor and have little to eat, and sometimes we see pictures of them. I was listening to a Cspan discussion with two Congresspersons about refugees in Sudan. They described a refugee camp in western Sudan that did not exist six months ago that now has 80,000 people. Every day the women go out to look for wood. They gather wood to cook food for the day. Each day they have to walk a little farther.
A reversal of fortune This parable has a familiar, yet eternally compelling, ring to it. It contains a great reversal of fortune. The poor man, who has suffered so much, has it good in the end. The rich man, who had it so good, ends up in torment. It is not too hard to think of people who have reached the top. The Shah of Iran. Marcos in the Philippines. President Nixon. And then there are those great stories of individuals or groups that suffered mightily, until their great day came. During the Olympics we were reminded over and over again of the US Olympic hockey team that improbably won the gold medal in 1980. This reversal of fortune theme was surely familiar to Jesus. There is a similar Egyptian folk-tale that pre-dates Jesus that concludes with these words:He who has done on earth will be blessed in the kingdom of the dead; and he who has been evil on earth will suffer in the kingdom of the dead.(Jeremias,Rediscovering the Parables, p. 145)
Jewish people from Egypt living in Palestine at Jesus' time told a popular story of a poor scholar and a rich tax-collector named Bar Ma'jan. No one attended the poor scholar's funeral. But throngs came to the rich tax-collector's funeral. Then a friend of the deceased scholar had a dream in which he was allowed to see into the afterlife. He saw his old friend, the poor scholar, relaxing in beautiful gardens. And he saw the rich tax-collector standing near a stream, so close, yet he was not able to get to the water he so desperately wanted.
Jesus may well have had such stories in mind as he told his own parable which was made all the more striking by its vivid word-pictures. The lush purple robes. The open sores. The poor Lazarus departs earth to rest in Abraham's bosom. The rich man wants Lazarus to ``dip'' his finger in water to ``cool'' his tongue. It is a striking story
Jesus sets this colorful story on earth and in the heavenly realms. The point of the story is finally to impress upon us the importance of how we spend the days we are granted. Jesus calculates that we have all the information we need to live our lives as we ought. Incredible occurrences won't convince the hard-hearted. Of primary concern to Jesus is that we not live our lives with this spirit of unkindness and imperial arrogance towards others, but rather walk our days with a spirit of humility and kindness. A primary way in which this is demonstrated is the straight-forward message of the parable. God's deep, protective compassion towards the poor ought to be ours as well.
Jesus had little place for those who haughtily go on, indifferent to the poor. Yorifumi Yaguchi, a Japanese Mennonite, describes it like this in his poem, ``The Party:'' ``Seems some child is crying In a far, far place,'' they say with Smiles over the champagne, and their party Grows gay with the music of their band Raising its volume up to Try to kill that cry.
Then, well-shaped gentlemen begin to Dance with ladies with half-naked, Mounted breasts. Chandeliers shine Like many suns with the marble floor Flashing like a mirror
``Oh, how beautiful! Oh, How… They do not hear any more, they who dance, laugh and are intoxicated Hear no more the cry of a child in a far, Far land. They hear no more The explosions of Guns, grenades and bombs they made.
They are dancing, elegantly Smiling, gradually embracing each other More tightly and continue to Dance through the night.
I don't read this parable as saying that the rich are,ipso facto, destined to be indifferent to the poor. But we might imply from this, and from other sayings of Jesus, that it will be difficult. And we can conclude that, really, it's pretty simple, those who desire to follow Christ in life must demonstrate Christ-like compassion towards the poor. We have an obligation. And God may be worried that we won't have ears to hear. The parable has the powerful social point about our obligation to the poor. The parable is probably not meant as a teaching about life after death. There is a real concern about the brothers who seem to be merrily living their lives, apparently immune to any appeals to changing their ways. Maybe we ought to put ourselves in their shoes and ask, are we listening? Compassion for the poor I want to return to the challenge that is ours to respond with compassion to the needs of the poor. The other day a person from our congregation told me how she had performed what seemed to be a kind act for a needy person. But later she was challenged with the statement, ``all that served was to make you feel good.'' In other words, you need to do more. We are putting together school kits once again. You can buy a bag and put it together yourself at the back of the church, all for five dollars. Or you can send a blanket to Sudan for five dollars. These are all good things but maybe we ought to examine ourselves and ask, do I do this just to make myself feel good. I think it is important to make school kits, it has its place, but if this represents the limit of our compassion for the poor, then it is not enough. Jesus was not just moved to compassion for others, he entered into relationship with others. We have these pictures of talking together, eating together, spending time together. Compassionate acts were rooted in relationship.
That sounds good but if we think about it for very long, we know that it isn't easy. Relationships take effort and they quickly confront us of our differences. People like me tend to romanticize the pooryou know, the noble poor, courageously, heroically, bucking the forces of greed all while living with deep wells of joy in their hearts, with tremendous humility of spirit, and with graciousness to all around. While I believe there is truth in the idealistic picture I believe that relationships confronts us too with the raw and sometimes not very pleasant humanity of the poor. The open sores on Lazarus' body symbolize this. We who are rich also experience, in relationship, the significant social, cultural, political, and religious chasms that divide us. We may find that these cultural differences make us so uneasy that we sure wish we could just give some money.
Obviously in the parable the rich man's relationship to Lazarus was paternalistic and condescending. It is clear that we are not to be like that but it is a powerful temptation. And I am afraid that it is the first way by which we rich reach across economic and cultural differences. We do so with an air of superiority.
But our Lord calls us to a better way. We are to find those particular people and places in life where we can reach beyond the limits of gifts and donations to enter into relationship with the poor, people who are equally loved, and eternally cared for, by our Lord. --September 26, 2004 --First Mennonite Church, Reedley
