SunNov132011
Scripture: MATTHEW 25:14-30
The parables of Jesus are odd. And they’re odd in several ways. In the first place, they use language and images that are foreign to us. We no longer talk about masters and servants. And when we use the word “talents” we mean abilities and skills, not enormous amounts of money, which is what a talent was to Jesus.
A more significant oddity about the parables, though, is that they convey truth in a way that’s not at all self-evident. They’re more like riddles than clear, straightforward statements. Wouldn’t it just be so much easier to get a simple declarative sentence—“God is love”—than to try to figure out these peculiar stories?
The biggest oddity of the parables, though, is that they often say something about God that we find objectionable. If we know, as we said, that God is love, then why muck it up with strange and offensive statements about throwing people into outer darkness (25:30)? Why such a dramatic and punishing conclusion, such an air of excessive expectation? That’s not the God we know. Is it?
Well, yes and no says the Bible. No, it’s not the God we know because it really is true that the central distinguishing mark of the God we know in Jesus Christ is grace, love, forgiveness, a willingness to let us start over when we’ve failed. But also yes, this unnerving image really does reflect something of the nature of God because it’s never possible to domesticate the Holy One and to think we know every in and out of the divine force and spirit at the heart of the universe. God isn’t some predictable pet who always acts the same way. God is a live and unpredictable force who’s sometimes gentle, sometimes nudging; sometimes comforting, sometimes disgusted; sometimes hopeful, sometimes discouraged. The parables remind us that God can be wild and erratic. If we think we’ve got God figured out, it’s good to read the parables, because they keep us from being overly complacent.
So let’s look a little more closely at the parable we heard a few moments ago. I confess this is not a God I particularly thrill to. And maybe you don’t either. I mean, after these three servants are each given a huge amount of money, it’s not at all obvious why the third servant, the one who buried his money, is so badly punished. It’s not as though he stole the money, after all. It’s not as though he wasted it. He’s not Bernie Madoff. All he did was hide it in the ground and then return it to the master at the end. What in the world is wrong with that?!
Maybe the problem isn’t that he did something wrong, it’s that he didn’t take any risks. Maybe he just lived too safely. Maybe he didn’t take any chances. Maybe everything in his life was so circumscribed and predictable that all the vitality and character had been sucked right out of it. I suspect Jesus is asking us to risk something for love, risk something for the sake of someone else.
Love may sometimes seem safe and easy. It’s a piece of cake to love bunny rabbits and brand new babies—especially other people’s babies when we don’t have to endure their nighttime wailing. But real love is risky in ways we may not always notice. To love a partner demands a variety of risks. If Mary is really to know me, I can’t just show her what I want her to see. I have to show her my real self. There’s a kind of vulnerability that’s asked of me. If there’s tension between us, we have to be willing to express ourselves to each other. I may have to take a gamble on a gift that she may or may not like. I may have to stay up later than I’d really like so I can listen to something with which she’s struggling. If one of us has hurt or betrayed the other, one may have to take a chance on a difficult apology, and the other may have to take a chance on a difficult forgiveness. It’s risky, but it pays off.
Loving a child may ask something extra of us, too. The change that happens when our own baby is born is astounding. We lose a great deal of our independence, our ability to set our own agendas. We become slaves of a set of unbridled needs. And if we’re going to have a healthy and whole family, we have to go beyond what’s comfortable, go beyond what we’d like to do, to give ourselves fully to this new and precious life. It’s risky, but it, too, pays off.
The same may be true with friendship, and maybe especially male friendship. Many men say it’s harder to make friends as they get older. To develop closeness with others may require a certain risk in being vulnerable. I have found an opening to friendship when someone told me of something with which they struggled. When they say, “I was stymied and lost in my work,” or “I was a lousy father,” or “I lost my way when my mother died,” their vulnerability has a way of drawing me in. They take a chance in revealing what we think of as weaknesses, but when they do, they create spaces for a different sort of closeness. And again it’s risky, but it also pays off.
Sometimes the risks are more public. The downfall of Joe Paterno as coach of Penn State’s football team has dominated the news in the past week. There may be something instructive about that whole chapter. In many ways, Paterno is like the third servant in Jesus’ parable. He didn’t do anything particularly wrong—he’s not the one who allegedly committed child abuse, after all. And once he heard about the abuse, it’s not as though he kept it a secret. Years ago, he told Penn State’s athletic director what he’d heard about his assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky. Not only that, but he has, by all accounts been a model citizen, a deeply respected leader of a storied football program. What’s not to like?
The trouble, of course, is that we all need to be held to the highest standard when it comes to protecting and honoring little ones in our midst. “I told my athletic director” may seem like a perfectly adequate response on one level. It may even be a B+ answer. But on another level, it’s an egregious failure of the covenant we all have to keep children safe from violence and rape. Always and everywhere they deserve our A+ answer.
What Paterno would have to have done—and this is the risk he couldn’t muster—is to break the code of silence and complicity that too often characterizes the culture of major college football. Perhaps the toughness and violence of the game that we love seeps into the whole atmosphere of the tean’s players and coaches. Perhaps the hyper-competitiveness at that level pushes good people to turn a blind eye. Perhaps leaders wanted to protect their friends and colleagues. There’s no easy explanation for why it happened, only a deep sense, as we look back on it now, that it was a terrible wrong.
What Paterno needed to do was to take a risk—to upend the complacency and acquiescence that too often characterize our habits, and to pursue the matter to law-enforcement authorities who would have ensured that Sandusky never do what he did again. Paterno followed the letter of the law, but he didn’t go out on the limb that would have made the world safer for other little boys who crave guidance and support.
God asks us to take a risk. To do outlandishly generous things for each other. To care for those who are most fragile and vulnerable. To open the spigots of affection and blessing. And that’s what we’re invited to in every facet of our lives, and in particular today with our money. Not to play it safe but to take a risk with our pledging. Not to succumb to caution but to give a tad recklessly and extravagantly. Not to follow all the rules of a predictable and sometimes overly guarded society but to throw open the windows of a love that doesn’t count the cost.
We spend our money in a variety of ways. We all buy necessities, like food and fuel. Most of us have some luxuries like vacations and an occasional round of golf. We tend to have nice homes and more clothes than we need. And a fair number of us spend a good chunk of our income on college for our children. Some of these expenses are necessary, some are investments, some are satisfying in a variety of ways. But how many of them are deeply fulfilling? How many make a substantive difference in the lives of many people? How many of the ways we spend our money transform lives? How many of them embody God’s grace and spread it to others?
This is what we’re about here at Federated Church. I spoke to a group of Federated leaders this past week, and I quoted a Methodist bishop from England who, fifteen or twenty years ago, said that what the church needs most is not more salespersons for the gospel but more free samples (quoted in Christian Century, Nov. 1, 2011, p. 13). We need to keep giving away our love. That’s what makes us who we are. Not setting limits. Not playing it too safe. But recklessly giving away free samples.
So I asked these church leaders where they saw free samples being distributed here at Federated. The list was extensive and beautiful and compelling. Youth groups, Angel Ministries, missions, the Colorado trip, a long and close relationship with St. Paul’s Church, Elderlife, children’s ministries, Employment Connections, book study groups, the Christmas Eve offering, worship, music, friendship. The list went on and on. And finally someone said, “Dan DeWeese.” Great answer! A fabulous free sample!
These are some of the countless free samples Federated Church provides now. Your pledges and gifts will continue those free samples. And they will, by God’s grace extend those free samples into new and uncharted territory. Who knows what great new ventures await us? Who knows what fabulous risks we will take together as we seek to be faithful to the God of glad surprises? Who knows what new graces will transform us and remake the world? Let’s give generously. Let’s risk big. The sky’s the limit. Let’s be on our way! And let the people say, “Amen”!
I invite you now to bring both your pledges and your weekly offerings to the front of the church. The baptismal font is here for you to dip your fingers in and to touch your forehead, as a reminder of the great love with which God holds you now and always. Be reminded of your baptism, and then go to the baskets and put your pledges and offerings in them. As you go, we will sing together. We will be filled full of God’s grace. And we will offer ourselves in yet new ways as “good and faithful servants” (25:21) of God.