Last year I had the privilege of
serving in a group called “OK: NH”
It was a group of political,
business, and religious leaders that wanted to talk about the growing economic
gap in our country.
This group included people from both
political parties.
It included five people that ran for
governor.
The plan was to read a book by
sociologist Robert Putnam, a New Hampshire resident, and then talk to
presidential candidates about how this can be an issue that is discussed during
the election.
We read this great book called, “Our
Kids: The American Dream in Crisis”.
In the book Robert Putnam gives all
sorts of data about how the rich in our country are getting richer and the poor
poorer.
All the advantages in our society go
to those with money.
And it is affects every aspect of
American life.
Rich people have more time to devote
to their kids doing simple things like reading to them.
Rich people have more opportunity to
have their kids go to summer camp, play musical instruments, and because of
what is called pay for play, play sports.
Even Church is affected.
Statistically speaking rich people go
to church more than poor people.
Because they have time off from work
and resources to make it happen.
This is tearing away the American
dream.
The American dream is that if you
work hard, and do what is good and right anyone can make it in America.
It is making it harder and harder for
people born in poverty to rise above their station.
The most damming statistic in the
book is that a rich person with low grades and test scores has a better chance
to get a college degree than a poor person who has better grades and test
scores.
It was through this book and this
work with those people that I have come to see statistically what I have felt
in my gut.
That in our country there is a
growing chasm between the haves and the have-nots.
I want to say that all of us in our
congregation are rich.
We might not be super rich.
We might not have millions in the
bank.
But as far as I know we all have
jobs, a roof over our heads, and money in the bank.
In our world today that makes you
rich.
We have this world where there is a
chasm.
And we have Jesus this morning
telling us a parable of a rich man and Lazarus.
And the chasm that develops between
them.
The chasm happens because the rich
man does not see the suffering of another.
Martin Luther said about this text, “the
other sin that he forgets to exercise love toward his neighbor; for there he
lets poor Lazarus lie at his door, and offers him not the least assistance.
And
if he had not wished to help him personally, he should have commanded his
servants to take him in and care for him.
It
may have been, he knew nothing of God and had never experienced his goodness.
For
whoever feels the goodness of God, feels also for the misfortune of his
neighbor; but whoever is not conscious of the goodness of God, sympathizes not
in the misfortune of his neighbor.
Therefore
as he has no pleasure in God, he has no heart for his neighbor.”
I
realize that this sermon could turn into one where I go on and on about a
problem in our world, and everyone leaves feeling a guilty but then does
nothing about it.
As
Luther suggests, Jesus is not trying to get us to feel guilty, he is trying to
get us to have faith in God and love each other.
I
want to assure that my goal is not to have you feel guilty about what you have.
I
am sure that you have worked hard all your life to have the things you have.
I
am sure that you work hard to support your family.
Having
money is not the issue.
The
rich man is not condemned because he is rich.
He
is condemned because of the chasm that he created between himself and Lazarus.
And
that is what we must think about this morning, the chasm that we create in our
lives.
And
there are lots of them out there now.
There
are chasms of race, of nationality, of political party, of economics, of
religion, of sexual identity, of all sorts of things.
And
those chasms only seem to grow.
They
are made even clearer by our current political season.
And
our two political party system only stoke the fires to make them more
pronounced.
Our
two candidates for president are campaigning on fear telling us not how our
country could be better, but how bad it will be if we elected the other person.
We
are told by Hillary that half of people supporting Trump belong in a “basket of
deplorable”.
I
can’t get behind that idea, because even people who like Trump are God’s
children.
Some
of their ideas might be deplorable but not the people themselves.
Most
of them simply have created a chasm that seems too big to cross.
On
the other hand we have Trump.
What
can I say about Trump?
A
man who talks bad about anyone that disagrees with him.
A man who sees the world in stark terms of
good and bad, and tells us to fear each other because of religion or
nationality, gender, skin color, or whatever.
We
have a chasm.
We
have failed to see each other lying at the gate pleading for better treatment.
The
question is what are we going to do?
We
can’t leave it here.
We
can’t say this is the chasm and there is no closing it.
I
think we have to listen to Jesus on this one.
In
this parable you and I are not the rich man, and we are not Lazarus.
We
are the 5 siblings left behind.
We
are the ones who have to listen to Moses, the Prophets, and the one raised from
the dead.
We
are the ones who are left here and now and tasked with repairing the chasm.
And
I want to tell you that you can do it.
You
can cross that chasm.
Right
now today, if you choose, if you want to listen to Moses, the prophets, and
Jesus.
Here
is how.
Figure
out what the chasm is that needs to be crossed, and with all of your Christian
love and mercy go there.
Let
me give a few examples.
I
have a colleague she is a liberal person.
She
is going to vote for Hillary.
She
voted for her in the primary.
But
during the primary she didn’t go to a Hillary rally.
She
went to see Trump.
She
wanted to understand why people liked him.
She
went and she talked to people.
And
she came away with a new appreciation for him.
She
is not going to vote for him, but after seeing him live she understood better
his appeal to people.
In
my life I have been blessed to have been around people of different economic,
social, and racial backgrounds then myself.
I
had this experience once when I served in Boston in City Year.
More
recently, I got to cross the chasm while in seminary.
I
got to serve for two years in a Latino congregation, and for a year on
internship at an African American congregation.
What
I found in all of those occasions was that people are people.
Regardless
of skin color or how much money they have.
We
all come from the same creator.
We
all love our kids and want what is best for them.
We
all are a combination of good and bad.
We
all sin.
We
all are forgiven by a gracious God.
The
chasm is not what we think it is, because on the basic level we are all the
same.
Only
artificial things separate us, politics, gender, race, theology, economics, and
nationality.
If
we could see each other through those things then maybe we would have a little
more compassion towards one another.
And
we will be able to see each other at the gate before it is too late and the
chasm is to deep and wide.
So
this week cross the chasm, try to understand someone else point of view.
See
that we are all children of God, needing to rest in grace and mercy.
Amen.
