Presented to: St. Andrews Presbyterian Church
Luke 12: 32-40
ISAIAH 1:1, 10-20 [MSG]
The vision that Isaiah son of Amoz saw regarding Judah and Jerusalem during the times of the kings of Judah: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah.
That’s right. God says so.
LUKE 12:32-40 [MSG]
“What I’m trying to do here is get you to relax, not be so preoccupied with getting so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep yourself in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Don’t be afraid of missing out. You’re my dearest friends! The Father wants to give you the very kingdom itself.
“Be generous. Give to the poor. Get yourselves a bank that can’t go bankrupt, a bank in heaven far from bank robbers, safe from embezzlers, a bank you can bank on. It’s obvious, isn’t it? The place where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being.
“Keep your shirts on; keep the lights on! Be like house servants waiting for their master to come back from his honeymoon, awake and ready to open the door when he arrives and knocks. Lucky the servants whom the master finds on watch! He’ll put on an apron, sit them at the table, and serve them a meal, sharing his wedding feast with them. It doesn’t matter what time of the night he arrives; they’re awake—and so blessed!
“You know that if the house owner had known what night the burglar was coming, he wouldn’t have stayed out late and left the place unlocked. So don’t you be lazy and careless. Just when you don’t expect him, the Son of Man will show up.”
“FEAST LIKE KINGS OR DIE LIKE DOGS. SIMPLE!”
INTRODUCTION:
Presbyterian College encourages us to be sensitive, understanding, and compassionate when preparing a sermon; to prepare a message that is positive and encouraging. In our Old Testament reading this morning you’ll hear, along with many similar phrases, God saying “‘If you’ll willingly obey, you’ll feast like kings. But if you’re willful and stubborn, you’ll die like dogs.’ That’s right. God says so, (Is 1:20 MSG)” from which I took our sermon title. That’s not quite the kind of message they were talking about, from which you can gather that I’m not the most compliant student.
Although we could dismiss this as Old Testament culture rhetoric, this same message is reflected in Jesus’ words in our Gospel reading this morning. Jesus, like God’s word through the prophet Isaiah, presents a coin with two sides and a choice you need to make. To feast like Kings or die like dogs; it’s simple.
SERMON:
We tend to avoid reading the Old Testament except when there’s a good story like Daniel in the lion’s den or Joseph rising to the heights of power in Egypt. The rest is a little hard to understand, and sometimes, like Isaiah 1, a bit less sympathetic and empathetic than we like to present as Christianity to the rest of the world. Is this really the God who sent his Son to heal the sick, give sight to the blind, and give his life as a ransom for the whole world?
The Book of the Prophet Isaiah is called “The fifth Gospel.” It is a library of prophecy concerning the life and work of Jesus Christ. It begins with “The vision that Isaiah son of Amoz saw regarding Judah and Jerusalem during the times of the kings of Judah: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah,” the last kings of Judah before God’s judgement of Jerusalem and the 70-year exile to Babylon. The message is a scathing indictment of religious practices full of form and void of substance.
It is what we would call “Sunday Christians.” Those who flocked in droves to church on Sunday morning, or even only on Christmas and Easter, but during the week went about life without justice, integrity, and honesty in all their practices. The well-dressed and upright in the pews who, without hesitation, oppress others for their own gain. Not truly evil people, they know how to care for their own. But self-sacrifice for the needs of others is not even on their radar, let alone in their hearts.
God calls it, “trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly Sabbaths, special meetings—meetings, meetings, meetings—I can’t stand one more!” I hear that! There is no mistaking the tone in God’s words through Isaiah. Fed up is a mild way of expressing it. Listen again to what God is saying:
people to pieces, and your hands are bloody.
The indictment is not against their faithfulness in worship, as he says, “Don’t you think I’ve had my fill of burnt sacrifices, rams and plump grain-fed calves?” God is judging them for their treatment of His creation; how they have ignored the needy and helpless for the sake of their own welfare, comfort and prosperity.
The cure is to “Go home and wash up. … Say no to wrong. [and] Learn to do good.” You may first suppose that this leaves the door wide open for interpretation. “What is good?” Well, God leaves no room for dissemination. Good is:
Go to bat for the defenceless.
Not a word about church doctrine, moral purity, social respectability or any other admirable qualities we clothe ourselves with in our Christian virtue. “I’m sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning,” God declares through Isaiah.
The sinning is likened to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, which God destroyed by fire along with all their inhabitants.
you Gomorrah-schooled people.
And please don’t mistake or limit their depravity to sexual immorality. These cities were judged for their complete self-absorption and concern for nothing but their own comfort at the expense of all and anyone else.
That’s a pretty stark condemnation and one we wouldn’t readily apply to ourselves; indeed, we are not Sodom or Gomorrah. Yet, this is one of those passages that should bring to mind the description in James 1:23-24 of the person who looks in the mirror, sees their true self with all their flaws, and then turns away and forgets what they’ve seen. We want to avoid the kind of harsh condemnation God levels at His people through Isaiah,
Quit your worship charades.
God desires mercy, not sacrifice, as stated by the prophet Hosea (6:6) and quoted by Jesus in Matthew (9:13). God “can’t stand … trivial religious games.”
In the introduction, I did say this was a two-sided coin, but I don’t want you to think the Old Testament is the negative side and the New Testament is the positive, all’s well side that we live in. Although Jesus’ message that Luke presents in our Gospel reading has a lighter tone, it reflects the same message as Isaiah: “Be generous. Give to the poor” (Lk 12:33). Jesus presents to His disciples and us four very good reasons to be generous and fulfill God’s concern for justice rather than religious fervour.
First, He wants us to “not be so preoccupied with getting so [we] can respond to God’s giving” (Lk 12:29). That is undoubtedly a most counter-cultural intention. The very foundations of First World civilization, like ours, are the getting of wealth. But Jesus replies, “People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things” (Lk 12:30). Do you fuss over these things? Jesus encourages us to “Steep [ourselves] in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions,” because “You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met” (Lk12:31).
Jesus isn’t asking you to lavishly give away everything you have and live an ascetic life. He’s reminding you that, unlike your counterparts in the world who don’t trust God, you have every good reason to be lavishly generous because God is faithful to ensure that “all your everyday human concerns will be met” (ibid). That’s a profound promise and one you need to contemplate seriously.
God created you, and has experienced as a person all the “everyday human concerns” (ibid), emotional, physical, and spiritual. As it says in Hebrews 4:15, “We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin.” You may be freely generous with all you have, time, wealth, resources, and emotions, because God is faithful and generous to fill again all your human needs, which he knows and understands you have. Jesus' unspoken question to us is, “Do you believe this?”
Jesus' second reason for you to be generous is the eternal return on investment. The well-known and always true, “where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being” (Lk 12:34). Jesus isn’t appealing to your ‘get something for yourself’ side, but to the sure and unassailable confidence you can have in God the Father to provide for you, even for eternity. It is the assurance that whatever sacrifice you make because your heart is close to God, seeking His justice and kingdom in this world, will never be lost or discounted in the world to come.
Jesus offers his third teaching in the form of the parable of a servant waiting for his master’s return from a wedding feast. “Lucky the servants whom the master finds on watch” (Lk 12:36)! This implies a different outcome for the servants who fell asleep, reminding us of the harsh judgments of Isaiah. We are cautioned to be attentive and ready for whatever service God has for us to do, at any time. We may remember that some have entertained angels unaware (Heb 13:2) and that kindness and hospitality reflect as being done to Jesus Himself (Matt 7:21-23; 25:31-46). What is truly surprising is what God will do for those found ready.
You might suppose He would say, “Good job, carry on!” He is God, the Master after all, and we have done only what is required (Lk 17:7-10). However, Jesus tells us, “He’ll put on an apron, sit them at the table, and serve them a meal, sharing his wedding feast with them.” We may recall the 23rd Psalm and David poetically exclaiming, “You serve me a six-course dinner right in front of my enemies” (Lk 12:37). These faithful who were on watch, ready to serve God, are called by Jesus, “so blessed” (Lk 12:38) May we always be among them.
Jesus' last parable is of the householder who is robbed because he was “lazy and careless,” staying out late and leaving his place unlocked. The codicil being that if he’d known when the robber was coming, he would have been prepared. Jesus is calling us to anticipate His coming at any time. We tend to look at the future as endless. Our tour of duty on this earth will end long before Jesus comes again. But that attitude doesn’t foster the kind of preparedness, urgency, and activity that will make us “so blessed.”
Jesus, in the Holy Spirit, comes many times and in many forms to us in our lifetime. An injustice we think we cannot correct, a person whose need we think we cannot address, a loved one we believe to be hopeless and lost. But Jesus calls us to be generous and give because God is unfailingly and boundlessly generous to us.
Stay awake, be ready to do good for others and for justice around you, because God is and will always be faithful and good to you. He already knows your needs, and no matter how generous he asks you to be, you lack nothing you need. The other side of the coin for Jesus is the implication that if you don’t trust God for your needs, if you make your bank account here on earth out of temporal treasures, rather than caring for what is important to God, you’ll find yourself robbed, embezzled and bankrupt. And what about the other side of the coin in Isaiah? Well, God says,
you’ll die like dogs.
That’s right. God says so.” (Is 1:18-20)
Amen
