The Unwise Farmer
Preaching
Preaching the Parables
Series II, Cycle C
Object:
13Someone in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, tell my
brother to divide the family inheritance with me." 14But he said
to him, "Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over
you?" 15And he said to them, "Take care! Be on your guard
against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in
the abundance of possessions." 16Then he told them a parable:
"The land of a rich man produced abundantly. 17And he thought to
himself, 'What should I do, for I have no place to store my
crops?' 18Then he said, 'I will do this: I will pull down my
barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain
and my goods. 19And I will say to my soul, "Soul, you have ample
goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry." '
20But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life is
being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose
will they be?' 21So it is with those who store up treasures for
themselves but are not rich toward God."
The parable included for the Gospel reading today concerns a farmer who prospered. He let his possessions possess him. Certainly you can find parallels today, though it may be corporations who buy up farms and add acreage to acreage. The family farm is less and less a part of American life. Only about two per cent of the population now earns their livelihood full- time in farming.
The typical person who accumulates wealth today is more likely to do it in business and commerce. The parable would more likely be told now in terms of a person who adds stock purchases or who speculates in commodities. It might also be those who try to acquire wealth through playing the state-run lotteries or the increasing number of casinos.
On a smaller scale it might apply to those who seek bigger and more luxurious homes and cars, retirement benefits, and insurance policies. All may represent goals in life and attempts to provide security without relying on God's grace and mercy.
Context
Context of Luke 12
The parable is placed in the context of an address Jesus was making to a large, and apparently somewhat unruly, crowd, since Luke says that they trampled on one another. Prior to the telling of the parable Jesus speaks about persons not fearing those who can kill the body. After the parable he issues the call not to worry that is also found in Matthew in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6:19-21, 25-30.)
Context of the Lectionary
The First Lesson. (Hosea 11:1-11) Hosea speaks for the Lord as a father to a recalcitrant child. Though God brought Israel from Egypt and raised the nation as a father does a son, Israel no longer followed in God's ways. The consequences were severe. Israel would return to Egypt and the land would be ruled by Assyria. Though the Lord treated Israel gently and tried to lead them in the right way, they persisted in their rebellion against God. In their distress they cry to God and receive a ready response when they are repentant.
The Second Lesson. (Colossians 3:1-11) Paul admonishes the Colossians to seek the same goals as they find in Christ. The passage ties into the First Lesson in that it urges the people to be faithful in obedience to Christ's way. It relates to the Gospel reading in its urging that they give up the old life and be clothed with the new life in Christ. They are to put to death the vices of the old life and to take on the virtues of life in Christ.
Gospel. (Luke 12:13-21) The parable of the unwise farmer is told in response to a man who wanted Jesus to settle a quarrel about an inheritance. Jesus used the occasion to raise the basic question of what the goal of life is. He does so by telling of a rich man who thinks he can control his future by adding to his wealth.
Psalm. (Psalm 107:1-9, 43) The psalm begins with thanks to the Lord. The psalmist urges recognition that God is good and shows steadfast love. The Lord gathers those who wander in the desert and helps those who are in distress. In contrast to the foolish who think they are self-sufficient (such as the farmer in Jesus' parable), the wise person rests upon the steadfast love of the Lord.
Context of Related Scripture
Exodus 2:14 -- The Hebrew people ask Moses who made him a ruler and judge over them.
Exodus 18:13 ff. -- Moses sits as judge of the people. 1 Chronicles 29:14 -- David acknowledges that all things come from the Lord.
Psalm 49:6 -- The psalmist scoffs at those who trust in their wealth and boast of their riches.
Psalm 49:12, 49 -- Mortals do not live according to their pomp.
Psalm 49:16, 17 -- Riches and wealth cannot be carried away in death.
Jeremiah 17:11 -- Those who amass wealth unjustly end up as fools.
Matthew 6:24 -- You cannot serve God and wealth (mammon).
Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:11-17 -- Parables of the Talents and Pounds.
Luke 16:19-31 -- The Rich Man and Lazarus (Parable for Proper 21).
Luke 19:8-9 -- Zacchaeus finds salvation in distributing his wealth.
1 Timothy 6:10 -- The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.
Content
Content of the Pericope
The pericope begins with a man who approaches Jesus with the request that Jesus tell his brother to share the family inheritance with him. Jesus refuses to act as a judge and arbitrator, and then warns against the dangers of greed. That provides the occasion to tell the parable of the unwise farmer who also was motivated by greed.
Precis of the Parable
A farmer prospers. He has bumper crops year after year. He proceeds to tear down his storage facilities and build bigger and bigger ones. Finally he thinks that he has enough grain stored to assure him of a life of leisure. Just when he thinks he has arrived at a secure stage of life and can take it easy, he dies. Was it a heart attack from eating too well and the stress of raising large crops and building bigger buildings? Jesus found the man foolish even though by worldly standards the farmer might be considered wise and successful.
Thesis: Accumulating wealth is not the most important goal of life.
Theme: A proper relationship with God is wiser than the pursuit of riches.
Key Words in the Passage
1. "The Family Inheritance." (v. 13) In the east at the time of Jesus wills were not indisputably valid, either by law or custom. If the father had not distributed his property during his life, a dispute could easily develop over the inheritance. Normally it would go to the elder son and the younger son would get nothing.
2. "Judge or Arbitrator." (v. 14) In Palestine of Jesus' day, a person looked to an important teacher for resolution of secular problems. Jesus refused to accept that definition of his ministry. If he accepted that role, he could spend all his time making such judgments.
3. "Greed." (v. 15) Greed is sometimes translated as covetousness in other versions. Jesus does not directly attack greed, but instead attacks the foolishness of trusting one's own future to accumulated possessions.
4. "The Land ... Produced Abundantly." (v. 16) The rich man could not take full credit for the abundance of crops. God lets the sun shine and the rain fall upon the land. Abundance is not fully under the control of the landowner. It depends in large part on the gifts of God.
5. "Eat, Drink, be Merry." (v. 19) Among the Greeks the philosophy which saw the good of life as the pursuit of pleasure is called hedonism. It was one of the options well-known among the philosophers, and apparently not unknown among the Jews.
6. "You Fool." (v. 20) The man was foolish in two ways. The major reason was that he thought he could control the future by his great possessions. He thought they offered him security. The second was that he considered the fulfillment of life to be the satisfaction of his desires. He neglected to honor God who gave him life and riches.
7. "Your Life is Being Demanded." (v. 20) Life is a gift from God. We do not have final ownership of our bodies. The God who bestows life can demand its return at his own time.
8. "Not Rich Toward God." (v. 21) The wise person knows that both goods and life itself are not entrusted to be used without regard to stewardship. The acquisition of goods is for means of service to God and neighbor, not as ends in themselves. Life is also entrusted to persons to glorify God and serve the neighbor, not just for fulfillment of pleasures and desires.
Contemplation
Issues and Insights
1. Jesus as Judge. Jesus did not want to become encumbered with the problem of settling secular disputes. He had a sense of divine vocation. His calling was to proclaim the kingdom of God and to bring people to salvation. Thus he went about preaching, teaching, and healing. If he took upon himself to serve as a judge or arbitrator, he could, like Moses, find himself and his disciples engaged full-time in such activities.
Jesus by his choices underscores the importance of setting priorities about the goals of our lives. People need to determine their goals and loyalties so that they know where they should expend their energies and resources. It is very easy to let energies and life become consumed with trivialities. That is part of the lesson of the parable. The farmer was unwise because he let his possessions govern his life just because he was successful in managing them.
2. Christian Economics. Some would consider Christian economics to be an oxymoron, a contradiction of terms. Jesus does not condemn wealth or money as such. It is not wrong to have wealth. What is wrong is when acquiring or holding on to material goods becomes the primary goal of life. The New Testament is aware of how money can become the ultimate measure of a person's worth. The pursuit of profits as the main motivation of a business or a choice of occupation makes money an idol, which Jesus personifies in calling it mammon.
Christian economics will be primarily motivated by providing goods or services that meet human needs. It will not exploit unjustly either human labor or the limited resources of the world. It will not let competition destroy relationships with other people or the people themselves. It will not seek to hurt or destroy others for gain for oneself or for a business or corporation.
Christian economics will also be careful that the pursuit of profits or the growth of an enterprise does not lead to the neglect of other values, such as neglect of family, separation from needs of the community, and other activities that offer the wholeness and fulfillment of life.
3. Challenging Worldly Assumptions. Much of secular society makes assumptions which are contrary to Christian values. Is survival of the fittest inimical to Christian concern for the weak, the oppressed, the poor, and others who depend on support from other people for their survival?
Is the assumption that wages should be as low as one can get people to work and to maximize profits in accord with Christian values?
Should we purchase cheap goods that depend on use of labor that is not paid a living wage, that has to work unduly long hours and under conditions that are dangerous to health? Should we patronize those businesses which move to areas of the world where labor is cheapest and regulations about environmental abuse are lax?
Should we participate in benefiting from corporate raiders by buying stock that rises because of such persons taking over a company and then selling off the most profitable parts and leaving the corporation to face bankruptcy? Should we invest in companies that turn high profits but do not serve a socially useful purpose, such as tobacco, alcohol, military, and similar companies?
If we are selling goods and services, should the price be set as high as the market can bear? Should we produce luxury items that only the wealthy can afford and take away resources from the poorer parts of the population?
How many of the assumptions and values that are promoted by society are worldly wise but foolish in terms of God's riches?
4. Where is Our Security? According to psychologists, security is fairly high on the hierarchy of human needs. It comes soon after the need for food and drink in the hierarchy of human values.
The unwise farmer thought his security was found in plenty of goods. We hear a lot about national security, social security, owning securities. Some even find attraction in some eternal security based on the acceptance of some set of beliefs rather than in continued growth in attitudes and activities that accord with the life of Christ.
The Christian lives with some awareness that nothing in this world gives us the status of absolute security. We rest in trust that in the changes and vicissitudes of life, God upholds and sustains us. Even in the midst of dangers, persecution, illness, and whatever else we face, God is seeking our ultimate welfare.
We are foolish if we let our desire for security, our attempt to guarantee our life, our community, or our nation with absolute certainty become our consuming obsession, the most important goal of our life. The pursuit of such security may well reflect a lack of trust in the love and power of God to control the future. We try to take it in our own hands and then eventually find ourselves as powerless as the unwise farmer.
Homily Hints
1. What Inheritance? (v. 13) What kind of a family inheritance will you leave? A. A Proper Regard for Material Things
B. A Proper Regard for People Values
C. A Proper Regard for Spiritual Values
2. All Kinds of Greed. (v. 15) Are people in danger of the temptation to more than one kind of greed?
A. Greed for Money -- the obvious one which may be the easiest to identify and one of the most common forms of greed.
B. Greed for Possessions -- the desire to have luxurious cars, houses, furnishings, the latest fad in jewelry, clothes, gadgets; the seeking of land.
C. Greed for Power -- a subtle greed because it may appear as desired to use for good and God. It has often been the special temptation among religious people.
3. Who Owns Our Soul? (v. 20)
A. Corporate Demands -- our job?
B. Our Ego -- the attempt to control our own future according to our desires.
C. Jesus as Lord -- the best choice.
4. Building Bigger Barns. (v. 18) What is the modern equivalent of building bigger barns?
A. Acquiring Money -- bank accounts, stocks and bonds, real estate.
B. Building Institutions -- larger churches, larger schools, larger factories, other institutional expressions of power.
C. Acquiring Land -- if in a rural setting, adding farm to farm. If in an urban setting, controlling access to property.
5. Rich Toward God. (v. 21) How do you lay up treasures in heaven and become rich toward God?
A. A Life of Prayer
B. A Life of Study of Scripture
C. A Sharing of Life -- with the poor, the ill, those in distress.
D. A Life of Service
E. A Life of Giving, not Getting
Contact
Points of Contact
1. Money and Power. Money represents power. It can enable persons to control others. You can purchase their services and use them for your ends. Where goods or services are scarce, you can compete with others to satisfy your needs and desires as opposed to the needs of others.
The debate over health care demonstrates the power of money. Those with money can choose among the providers. Those without it have to use the most expensive facilities when necessity forces them to go for treatment, such as going to the emergency room instead of to a doctor's office or scheduling the use of regular hospital facilities.
People with money can get credit when they need to borrow for large purchases, such as for a house or car. Persons without money to give them credit must pay exorbitant rates or are unable to get credit for large purchases.
Persons with money can take advantage of bargains because they have the cash on hand. People without money may not be able to take advantage of such bargains because they are cash poor. Then later they have to pay higher prices even though they can least afford to do so.
Stewardship means the wise use of money. It also means that we need to place the power of our money not just to serve our egoistic desire, as the wealthy farmer intended to do. We should consider how we can put the power of money at the disposal to meet the needs of the less fortunate.
2. Insurance Poor. Insurance is a form of evening out the costs of catastrophes. It lowers the risk that we may not have access to medical services when we need them. Insurance may enable the elderly to provide for their needs after they can no longer care for themselves. Insurance can distribute the costs in event of fire, flood, hurricanes, or accidents.
The danger exists, however, that in trying to protect ourselves against every eventuality, we may make ourselves insurance poor in ways that are unwise. Unscrupulous insurance companies and their agents prey upon the fears and anxieties of people by selling more insurance than people need or can really afford.
The church by mutual aid can help to provide the support which commercial insurance does not. The insurance company has a strong drive for profits. It is not coincidental that West Hartford, Connecticut, is the home base for many insurance companies and has one of the highest per capita incomes in the country.
The church should help people be judicious in their reliance on insurance and help in major catastrophes, locally, nationally, and internationally, to even out the cost of such events.
3. Limiting Desires. The media assail us with attempts to increase our desires for the products of advertisers. Programming on television is driven more by the desire to entice people to buy products than to serve the needs of the society for education, information, and wholesome entertainments.
Children's programming in hours when children are most likely to be watching encourages them to pressure parents to purchase foods, toys, and other products that often are not the best values. Prime-time programming is not based on the highest quality programs but the ones that attract an audience with the highest purchasing power.
Good stewardship of wealth should guide Christians in their choice and support both of the programming and the buying of products advertised. The discipline of limiting desires is part of Christian practices. If we limit our desires to necessities, to that which is healthy, to what is wholesome, we will resist the power of advertising and the abuse of the public trust in what the media purvey.
4. Wealth and Spiritual Poverty. Though people resist talking about their income and financial holdings, discussion often reveals that the attitude toward their wealth reflects persons' central spiritual problems. The attitude toward money discloses a person's values and where trust is really vested. Though U.S. money has imprinted on it "In God We Trust," the reality is that many people put their trust in money.
A major cause of family disputes and divorce arises over the control of money because who controls it can also control other people.
If you want to know where people's values are and what priorities they have, examine their spending and saving habits. That is probably why people generally are so secretive about their finances. "It is none of your business" is the most frequent attitude when it comes to disclosure of income and holdings. Assurance of confidentiality about how much people give or pledge to the church or charitable institutions is very important to most people.
Is it because we are very vulnerable to disclosing our real spiritual condition when we show where our trust is placed that we are so secretive about our money and wealth?
Illustrative Materials
1. Illusory Wealth. J. V. Thompson was a coal baron in southwestern Pennsylvania in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He bought up the mineral rights of much of the land in the county where he lived. He built a fancy estate and seemed to be the wealthiest person around.
Then competitors demanded payment of debts. He had little cash since his holdings were in land and mineral rights. He could not get credit from banks. Eventually he went bankrupt, went through a divorce and remarriage, and ended up a poor man.
2. Conversions Needed. Martin Luther says that a person needs three conversions:
1. A conversion of the heart.
2. A conversion of the mind or intellect.
3. A conversion of the purse.
3. Corporate Pursuit of Wealth.
A. Nick Leesen engaged in speculation on commodities for the Barings Bank in Singapore. After some losses he tried to recoup by over-escalating speculative buying. Eventually his activities caught up with him and he had accumulated such a great debt that the old and well-established bank collapsed.
B. Toshihide Iguchi in eleven years lost more than a billion dollars for the Daiwa Bank by fraudulent trading of U.S. Treasury bonds. The bank is Japan's twelfth largest. On some days he was trading $100 million at a time. Losses averaged over $40,000 each working day. He forged statements to hide the sales of securities owned by the bank to cover his losses. The losses finally caught up with him and the bank.
4. Cryogenics. Persons have their bodies frozen in hopes that at some future time they can be resuscitated and have their lives on earth be restored. They put their trust in some miracle cure or some extension of life that will give them a kind of immortality.
5. Wise Investment of Money. In Bangladesh and some other developing countries, credit unions have helped women escape poverty. By making loans to enable them to get started in some enterprise where they can earn money for their family, these persons who normally cannot get credit or loans except at exorbitant prices are able to escape the trap of poverty. What has surprised conventional banking personnel is that very few of the borrowers have defaulted on their loans. The rate of repayment is higher than normally experienced by established banks.
In like manner, small loans to help people who are small entrepreneurs in developing countries have shown similar results. Usually these persons not only receive loans, but they also are paired with an experienced businessperson who advises them on getting going. The success rate of such persons is very high.
The parable included for the Gospel reading today concerns a farmer who prospered. He let his possessions possess him. Certainly you can find parallels today, though it may be corporations who buy up farms and add acreage to acreage. The family farm is less and less a part of American life. Only about two per cent of the population now earns their livelihood full- time in farming.
The typical person who accumulates wealth today is more likely to do it in business and commerce. The parable would more likely be told now in terms of a person who adds stock purchases or who speculates in commodities. It might also be those who try to acquire wealth through playing the state-run lotteries or the increasing number of casinos.
On a smaller scale it might apply to those who seek bigger and more luxurious homes and cars, retirement benefits, and insurance policies. All may represent goals in life and attempts to provide security without relying on God's grace and mercy.
Context
Context of Luke 12
The parable is placed in the context of an address Jesus was making to a large, and apparently somewhat unruly, crowd, since Luke says that they trampled on one another. Prior to the telling of the parable Jesus speaks about persons not fearing those who can kill the body. After the parable he issues the call not to worry that is also found in Matthew in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6:19-21, 25-30.)
Context of the Lectionary
The First Lesson. (Hosea 11:1-11) Hosea speaks for the Lord as a father to a recalcitrant child. Though God brought Israel from Egypt and raised the nation as a father does a son, Israel no longer followed in God's ways. The consequences were severe. Israel would return to Egypt and the land would be ruled by Assyria. Though the Lord treated Israel gently and tried to lead them in the right way, they persisted in their rebellion against God. In their distress they cry to God and receive a ready response when they are repentant.
The Second Lesson. (Colossians 3:1-11) Paul admonishes the Colossians to seek the same goals as they find in Christ. The passage ties into the First Lesson in that it urges the people to be faithful in obedience to Christ's way. It relates to the Gospel reading in its urging that they give up the old life and be clothed with the new life in Christ. They are to put to death the vices of the old life and to take on the virtues of life in Christ.
Gospel. (Luke 12:13-21) The parable of the unwise farmer is told in response to a man who wanted Jesus to settle a quarrel about an inheritance. Jesus used the occasion to raise the basic question of what the goal of life is. He does so by telling of a rich man who thinks he can control his future by adding to his wealth.
Psalm. (Psalm 107:1-9, 43) The psalm begins with thanks to the Lord. The psalmist urges recognition that God is good and shows steadfast love. The Lord gathers those who wander in the desert and helps those who are in distress. In contrast to the foolish who think they are self-sufficient (such as the farmer in Jesus' parable), the wise person rests upon the steadfast love of the Lord.
Context of Related Scripture
Exodus 2:14 -- The Hebrew people ask Moses who made him a ruler and judge over them.
Exodus 18:13 ff. -- Moses sits as judge of the people. 1 Chronicles 29:14 -- David acknowledges that all things come from the Lord.
Psalm 49:6 -- The psalmist scoffs at those who trust in their wealth and boast of their riches.
Psalm 49:12, 49 -- Mortals do not live according to their pomp.
Psalm 49:16, 17 -- Riches and wealth cannot be carried away in death.
Jeremiah 17:11 -- Those who amass wealth unjustly end up as fools.
Matthew 6:24 -- You cannot serve God and wealth (mammon).
Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:11-17 -- Parables of the Talents and Pounds.
Luke 16:19-31 -- The Rich Man and Lazarus (Parable for Proper 21).
Luke 19:8-9 -- Zacchaeus finds salvation in distributing his wealth.
1 Timothy 6:10 -- The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.
Content
Content of the Pericope
The pericope begins with a man who approaches Jesus with the request that Jesus tell his brother to share the family inheritance with him. Jesus refuses to act as a judge and arbitrator, and then warns against the dangers of greed. That provides the occasion to tell the parable of the unwise farmer who also was motivated by greed.
Precis of the Parable
A farmer prospers. He has bumper crops year after year. He proceeds to tear down his storage facilities and build bigger and bigger ones. Finally he thinks that he has enough grain stored to assure him of a life of leisure. Just when he thinks he has arrived at a secure stage of life and can take it easy, he dies. Was it a heart attack from eating too well and the stress of raising large crops and building bigger buildings? Jesus found the man foolish even though by worldly standards the farmer might be considered wise and successful.
Thesis: Accumulating wealth is not the most important goal of life.
Theme: A proper relationship with God is wiser than the pursuit of riches.
Key Words in the Passage
1. "The Family Inheritance." (v. 13) In the east at the time of Jesus wills were not indisputably valid, either by law or custom. If the father had not distributed his property during his life, a dispute could easily develop over the inheritance. Normally it would go to the elder son and the younger son would get nothing.
2. "Judge or Arbitrator." (v. 14) In Palestine of Jesus' day, a person looked to an important teacher for resolution of secular problems. Jesus refused to accept that definition of his ministry. If he accepted that role, he could spend all his time making such judgments.
3. "Greed." (v. 15) Greed is sometimes translated as covetousness in other versions. Jesus does not directly attack greed, but instead attacks the foolishness of trusting one's own future to accumulated possessions.
4. "The Land ... Produced Abundantly." (v. 16) The rich man could not take full credit for the abundance of crops. God lets the sun shine and the rain fall upon the land. Abundance is not fully under the control of the landowner. It depends in large part on the gifts of God.
5. "Eat, Drink, be Merry." (v. 19) Among the Greeks the philosophy which saw the good of life as the pursuit of pleasure is called hedonism. It was one of the options well-known among the philosophers, and apparently not unknown among the Jews.
6. "You Fool." (v. 20) The man was foolish in two ways. The major reason was that he thought he could control the future by his great possessions. He thought they offered him security. The second was that he considered the fulfillment of life to be the satisfaction of his desires. He neglected to honor God who gave him life and riches.
7. "Your Life is Being Demanded." (v. 20) Life is a gift from God. We do not have final ownership of our bodies. The God who bestows life can demand its return at his own time.
8. "Not Rich Toward God." (v. 21) The wise person knows that both goods and life itself are not entrusted to be used without regard to stewardship. The acquisition of goods is for means of service to God and neighbor, not as ends in themselves. Life is also entrusted to persons to glorify God and serve the neighbor, not just for fulfillment of pleasures and desires.
Contemplation
Issues and Insights
1. Jesus as Judge. Jesus did not want to become encumbered with the problem of settling secular disputes. He had a sense of divine vocation. His calling was to proclaim the kingdom of God and to bring people to salvation. Thus he went about preaching, teaching, and healing. If he took upon himself to serve as a judge or arbitrator, he could, like Moses, find himself and his disciples engaged full-time in such activities.
Jesus by his choices underscores the importance of setting priorities about the goals of our lives. People need to determine their goals and loyalties so that they know where they should expend their energies and resources. It is very easy to let energies and life become consumed with trivialities. That is part of the lesson of the parable. The farmer was unwise because he let his possessions govern his life just because he was successful in managing them.
2. Christian Economics. Some would consider Christian economics to be an oxymoron, a contradiction of terms. Jesus does not condemn wealth or money as such. It is not wrong to have wealth. What is wrong is when acquiring or holding on to material goods becomes the primary goal of life. The New Testament is aware of how money can become the ultimate measure of a person's worth. The pursuit of profits as the main motivation of a business or a choice of occupation makes money an idol, which Jesus personifies in calling it mammon.
Christian economics will be primarily motivated by providing goods or services that meet human needs. It will not exploit unjustly either human labor or the limited resources of the world. It will not let competition destroy relationships with other people or the people themselves. It will not seek to hurt or destroy others for gain for oneself or for a business or corporation.
Christian economics will also be careful that the pursuit of profits or the growth of an enterprise does not lead to the neglect of other values, such as neglect of family, separation from needs of the community, and other activities that offer the wholeness and fulfillment of life.
3. Challenging Worldly Assumptions. Much of secular society makes assumptions which are contrary to Christian values. Is survival of the fittest inimical to Christian concern for the weak, the oppressed, the poor, and others who depend on support from other people for their survival?
Is the assumption that wages should be as low as one can get people to work and to maximize profits in accord with Christian values?
Should we purchase cheap goods that depend on use of labor that is not paid a living wage, that has to work unduly long hours and under conditions that are dangerous to health? Should we patronize those businesses which move to areas of the world where labor is cheapest and regulations about environmental abuse are lax?
Should we participate in benefiting from corporate raiders by buying stock that rises because of such persons taking over a company and then selling off the most profitable parts and leaving the corporation to face bankruptcy? Should we invest in companies that turn high profits but do not serve a socially useful purpose, such as tobacco, alcohol, military, and similar companies?
If we are selling goods and services, should the price be set as high as the market can bear? Should we produce luxury items that only the wealthy can afford and take away resources from the poorer parts of the population?
How many of the assumptions and values that are promoted by society are worldly wise but foolish in terms of God's riches?
4. Where is Our Security? According to psychologists, security is fairly high on the hierarchy of human needs. It comes soon after the need for food and drink in the hierarchy of human values.
The unwise farmer thought his security was found in plenty of goods. We hear a lot about national security, social security, owning securities. Some even find attraction in some eternal security based on the acceptance of some set of beliefs rather than in continued growth in attitudes and activities that accord with the life of Christ.
The Christian lives with some awareness that nothing in this world gives us the status of absolute security. We rest in trust that in the changes and vicissitudes of life, God upholds and sustains us. Even in the midst of dangers, persecution, illness, and whatever else we face, God is seeking our ultimate welfare.
We are foolish if we let our desire for security, our attempt to guarantee our life, our community, or our nation with absolute certainty become our consuming obsession, the most important goal of our life. The pursuit of such security may well reflect a lack of trust in the love and power of God to control the future. We try to take it in our own hands and then eventually find ourselves as powerless as the unwise farmer.
Homily Hints
1. What Inheritance? (v. 13) What kind of a family inheritance will you leave? A. A Proper Regard for Material Things
B. A Proper Regard for People Values
C. A Proper Regard for Spiritual Values
2. All Kinds of Greed. (v. 15) Are people in danger of the temptation to more than one kind of greed?
A. Greed for Money -- the obvious one which may be the easiest to identify and one of the most common forms of greed.
B. Greed for Possessions -- the desire to have luxurious cars, houses, furnishings, the latest fad in jewelry, clothes, gadgets; the seeking of land.
C. Greed for Power -- a subtle greed because it may appear as desired to use for good and God. It has often been the special temptation among religious people.
3. Who Owns Our Soul? (v. 20)
A. Corporate Demands -- our job?
B. Our Ego -- the attempt to control our own future according to our desires.
C. Jesus as Lord -- the best choice.
4. Building Bigger Barns. (v. 18) What is the modern equivalent of building bigger barns?
A. Acquiring Money -- bank accounts, stocks and bonds, real estate.
B. Building Institutions -- larger churches, larger schools, larger factories, other institutional expressions of power.
C. Acquiring Land -- if in a rural setting, adding farm to farm. If in an urban setting, controlling access to property.
5. Rich Toward God. (v. 21) How do you lay up treasures in heaven and become rich toward God?
A. A Life of Prayer
B. A Life of Study of Scripture
C. A Sharing of Life -- with the poor, the ill, those in distress.
D. A Life of Service
E. A Life of Giving, not Getting
Contact
Points of Contact
1. Money and Power. Money represents power. It can enable persons to control others. You can purchase their services and use them for your ends. Where goods or services are scarce, you can compete with others to satisfy your needs and desires as opposed to the needs of others.
The debate over health care demonstrates the power of money. Those with money can choose among the providers. Those without it have to use the most expensive facilities when necessity forces them to go for treatment, such as going to the emergency room instead of to a doctor's office or scheduling the use of regular hospital facilities.
People with money can get credit when they need to borrow for large purchases, such as for a house or car. Persons without money to give them credit must pay exorbitant rates or are unable to get credit for large purchases.
Persons with money can take advantage of bargains because they have the cash on hand. People without money may not be able to take advantage of such bargains because they are cash poor. Then later they have to pay higher prices even though they can least afford to do so.
Stewardship means the wise use of money. It also means that we need to place the power of our money not just to serve our egoistic desire, as the wealthy farmer intended to do. We should consider how we can put the power of money at the disposal to meet the needs of the less fortunate.
2. Insurance Poor. Insurance is a form of evening out the costs of catastrophes. It lowers the risk that we may not have access to medical services when we need them. Insurance may enable the elderly to provide for their needs after they can no longer care for themselves. Insurance can distribute the costs in event of fire, flood, hurricanes, or accidents.
The danger exists, however, that in trying to protect ourselves against every eventuality, we may make ourselves insurance poor in ways that are unwise. Unscrupulous insurance companies and their agents prey upon the fears and anxieties of people by selling more insurance than people need or can really afford.
The church by mutual aid can help to provide the support which commercial insurance does not. The insurance company has a strong drive for profits. It is not coincidental that West Hartford, Connecticut, is the home base for many insurance companies and has one of the highest per capita incomes in the country.
The church should help people be judicious in their reliance on insurance and help in major catastrophes, locally, nationally, and internationally, to even out the cost of such events.
3. Limiting Desires. The media assail us with attempts to increase our desires for the products of advertisers. Programming on television is driven more by the desire to entice people to buy products than to serve the needs of the society for education, information, and wholesome entertainments.
Children's programming in hours when children are most likely to be watching encourages them to pressure parents to purchase foods, toys, and other products that often are not the best values. Prime-time programming is not based on the highest quality programs but the ones that attract an audience with the highest purchasing power.
Good stewardship of wealth should guide Christians in their choice and support both of the programming and the buying of products advertised. The discipline of limiting desires is part of Christian practices. If we limit our desires to necessities, to that which is healthy, to what is wholesome, we will resist the power of advertising and the abuse of the public trust in what the media purvey.
4. Wealth and Spiritual Poverty. Though people resist talking about their income and financial holdings, discussion often reveals that the attitude toward their wealth reflects persons' central spiritual problems. The attitude toward money discloses a person's values and where trust is really vested. Though U.S. money has imprinted on it "In God We Trust," the reality is that many people put their trust in money.
A major cause of family disputes and divorce arises over the control of money because who controls it can also control other people.
If you want to know where people's values are and what priorities they have, examine their spending and saving habits. That is probably why people generally are so secretive about their finances. "It is none of your business" is the most frequent attitude when it comes to disclosure of income and holdings. Assurance of confidentiality about how much people give or pledge to the church or charitable institutions is very important to most people.
Is it because we are very vulnerable to disclosing our real spiritual condition when we show where our trust is placed that we are so secretive about our money and wealth?
Illustrative Materials
1. Illusory Wealth. J. V. Thompson was a coal baron in southwestern Pennsylvania in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He bought up the mineral rights of much of the land in the county where he lived. He built a fancy estate and seemed to be the wealthiest person around.
Then competitors demanded payment of debts. He had little cash since his holdings were in land and mineral rights. He could not get credit from banks. Eventually he went bankrupt, went through a divorce and remarriage, and ended up a poor man.
2. Conversions Needed. Martin Luther says that a person needs three conversions:
1. A conversion of the heart.
2. A conversion of the mind or intellect.
3. A conversion of the purse.
3. Corporate Pursuit of Wealth.
A. Nick Leesen engaged in speculation on commodities for the Barings Bank in Singapore. After some losses he tried to recoup by over-escalating speculative buying. Eventually his activities caught up with him and he had accumulated such a great debt that the old and well-established bank collapsed.
B. Toshihide Iguchi in eleven years lost more than a billion dollars for the Daiwa Bank by fraudulent trading of U.S. Treasury bonds. The bank is Japan's twelfth largest. On some days he was trading $100 million at a time. Losses averaged over $40,000 each working day. He forged statements to hide the sales of securities owned by the bank to cover his losses. The losses finally caught up with him and the bank.
4. Cryogenics. Persons have their bodies frozen in hopes that at some future time they can be resuscitated and have their lives on earth be restored. They put their trust in some miracle cure or some extension of life that will give them a kind of immortality.
5. Wise Investment of Money. In Bangladesh and some other developing countries, credit unions have helped women escape poverty. By making loans to enable them to get started in some enterprise where they can earn money for their family, these persons who normally cannot get credit or loans except at exorbitant prices are able to escape the trap of poverty. What has surprised conventional banking personnel is that very few of the borrowers have defaulted on their loans. The rate of repayment is higher than normally experienced by established banks.
In like manner, small loans to help people who are small entrepreneurs in developing countries have shown similar results. Usually these persons not only receive loans, but they also are paired with an experienced businessperson who advises them on getting going. The success rate of such persons is very high.
