Episodes
Sunday Nov 16, 2014
Make, Save, Give
Sunday Nov 16, 2014
Sunday Nov 16, 2014
Make, Save, Give
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger E. Gaines-Cirelli at Foundry UMC November 16, 2014, the twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost.
Matthew 25:14-30
At the center of the beautiful covenant prayer written by United Methodism’s founder, John Wesley, are these words, “Let me be full, let me be empty. Let me have all things, let me have nothing. I freely and heartily yield all things to thy pleasure and disposal.”[i] This is simply Wesley’s version of the ancient Christian call: to offer all that we are and all that we have to the service of God. This call is grounded in the Judeo-Christian claim that God is the creator of all that is—including you and me—and that all that exists is God’s own possession.
A year ago, Anthony and I were blessed by the generosity of some friends who lent the use of their cabin on the Chesapeake Bay for retreat and renewal—they even let us bring our dog, Harvey! Everything in the place was available for our use and enjoyment, including the vegetables in their garden. The owners lent it to us, trusting that we would use and enjoy the place, that we would care for and honor it, and then would return the keys to the rightful owner. We were stewards for a little while of something that belonged to someone else. Wesley says the same thing about our lives and all that we have. All things belong to God and we are simply stewards for a little while.
The servants in our parable today are given stewardship of the possessions of their master. The “talent” is an unusually large amount of money with which two of the three servants trade in order to double the money entrusted to them. The third servant is chastised for failing to do anything but hoard and hide his money—and being asked why he didn’t at least put it in the bank where it could earn some interest. Other than the idea of a savings account actually yielding any interest, we can relate to the activity of trading and banking. We might also relate to the fear and anxiety that the third servant feels with regard to stewardship of the money that he is given. Pastor Theresa, in her stewardship reflection found on our website, highlights the ways that fear can hinder our faithful stewardship and our letting go to greater trust in God. Our parable today invites us to think about what it looks like to be trusting and trustworthy stewards of our financial resources such that we might “enter into the joy of our master.” (Mt. 25.21, 23)
Here I will draw heavily from a very helpful little book written by Rev. James Harnish, recently retired Senior Pastor of Hyde Park UMC in Tampa, Florida. The book is entitled Simple Rules for Money: John Wesley on Earning, Saving, & Giving. I commend this book to you for your personal reflection as well as for use with your Bible study or small groups. The book is an explication of John Wesley’s sermon called “The Use of Money” in which Wesley says, “An excellent branch of Christian wisdom is…namely, the right use of money—a subject largely spoken of by [people] of the world; but not sufficiently considered by those whom God hath chosen out of the world…Neither do they understand how to employ it to the greatest advantage.”[ii] Among the reasons that people in the church perhaps have insufficiently considered the use of money is that we generally don’t want to talk about money in church!
And this is in large part due to the extremes presented so often within Christian communities. The first extreme is the “prosperity gospel” preachers who say that God wants people to be rich, who make the “abundant life” Jesus offers equal to an abundant bank account. The other extreme is the “preachers who approach the subject of money as if they were afraid of being infected with a fatal disease. Reacting against the abuses of the ‘prosperity’ preachers and in response to people who (sometimes for good reason) complain that all the church wants is their money, they act as if the gospel has nothing to say on the subject, in spite of the fact that Jesus talked more about money and possessions than any other subject except the [Kin-dom] of God.”[iii] From Jesus to John Wesley and right up until this moment, wise Christian leaders understand that we all wrestle with money matters day in and day out. Money and possessions are among the main causes of stress in life and in relationships. John Wesley knew that our faith has something to say—beyond the extremes. Wesley’s practical spirituality offers “three plain rules” for the wise use of money: Make all you can. Save all you can. Give all you can.
While there are those who are called to voluntary poverty as an expression of their faith, most of us are (or seek to be) gainfully employed. Wesley’s first rule on the wise use of money is to make it! “Gain all you can by honest industry. Use all possible diligence in your calling.”[iv] It is safe to say that Wesley supported the so-called “Protestant work ethic!” And he believed that the more money you have, the more good you can do! But he also wrote “We ought to gain all we can …without paying more for it than it is worth.”[v] Wesley understood that there was a “dark side” to accumulation of wealth. In addition to the temptation to greed, it is also possible to “pay more” for our salaries than those salaries are worth. Some guidelines for making all you can without crossing over to the dark side include:
· “Gain all you can without hurting your health. That’s a good word in a culture where too many of us are working ourselves to death for money.
· “Gain all you can without hurting your mind. Wesley warned against any business that would involve cheating, lying, or engaging in behavior that is not consistent with a good conscience…
· “Gain all you can without hurting your neighbor. Loving others as we love ourselves requires that we consider the way our economic practices will impact others.”[vi] This becomes more challenging as we consider that it applies not just to our neighbors next door, but also our neighbors around the world. And remember that your neighbor includes your spouse and your children…
With careful cautions in place, Wesley was very clear that we should work hard, seek always to improve our work, and to “make the best of all that is in your hands.” Make all you can. Rule number one.
Wesley says, “Having gained all you can, by honest wisdom and unwearied diligence, the second rule of Christian prudence is, ‘Save all you can.’ Do not throw it away in idle expenses, which is just the same as throwing it into the sea.”[vii] Anyone here remember Stanley Johnson? “He was the humorous character in a television commercial for a lending agency. With a self-satisfied smile, Stanley introduced himself and his family, complete with two children and a dog. He showed us his four-bedroom home in a great neighborhood, his swimming pool, and his new car. With obvious pride he let us know that he was a member of the local golf club. Grinning into the camera while he turned steaks on the backyard grill he asked, ‘How do I do it?’ Still wearing a silly grin, he confided in the audience as he answered his own question: ‘I’m in debt up to my eyeballs. I can barely pay my finance charges.’ At the end of the commercial he pleaded, ‘Somebody help me.’”[viii]
Clearly, Stanley Johnson was spending money he didn’t have—and I’m sure we could all name reasons that he (and so many Americans!) would do this. When John Wesley preached that Christians should save all that they could, he wasn’t suggesting that we act like the third servant in our parable today and fearfully hoard our money. He was talking about being the anti-Stanley Johnson, about being “frugal.” To be frugal is not to be stingy or cheap, but to be temperate, to live without waste. “Wesley told his followers not to waste their money on superfluous, overly expensive, or needless purchases…He warned them about what we would call ‘compulsive’ shopping—an addiction that pervades our culture today.”[ix] In other words, Wesley’s call to “save all you can” is spending money only on what you really NEED. It’s not that you can never splurge, but the more you live within your means, prioritize your spending, and learn to forego the temptation to “keep up with the Joneses,” the more you may discover the contentment that can’t be purchased.
Finally, Wesley says, “All this is nothing, if… [a person] does not point all this at a farther end. Nor, indeed, can [someone] properly be said to save anything, if he only lays it up. You may as well …bury it in the earth…Not to use, is effectually to throw it away. Therefore…add the third rule… Having, first, gained all you can, and secondly saved all you can, then ‘give all you can.’”[x] This principle is reflected in the Broadway show Hello, Dolly! when the lead character says, “Money is like manure; it’s not worth a thing unless it’s spread around encouraging things to grow.”[xi] Give all you can. In reflecting on Wesley’s “third rule,” James Harnish admits that he was surprised, expecting to hear about giving to the church, about tithing, and so on. But Wesley begins with our own needs! Wesley teaches to “provide things needful for yourself; food to eat, raiment to put on, whatever nature moderately requires for preserving the body in health and strength.” And then he says to provide these things for your family. And then he says to give to “them that are of the household of faith.” And finally he says, “If there be an overplus still, ‘as you have opportunity, do good unto all’...” Wesley modeled this in his own life, determining the amount of money that he needed to live and then, literally, giving the rest away. He continued to live on the same amount even as his income increased, so that by the end of his life he was giving away most of his income. But Wesley doesn’t suggest that we should starve ourselves or deny our family’s needs or go into debt to support the church or other charities. Through working hard so that we make as much as we can and then spending carefully and modestly on those things that are needful for ourselves and our families, we may find that we have some money to give away. Wesley believed this was how to give all you can--and even all you have, “For all that is laid out in this manner is really given to God.”[xii]
And that brings us back to the lines of the covenant prayer in which we offer the whole of our lives to God’s “pleasure and disposal.” There is much more that could be said on these matters, of course. But the point of the three simple rules to make, save, and give all we can is for our lives to more fully resemble the extravagant generosity of our God. After all, the God whom we know is not a tyrant or a hoarder—the third servant got it wrong! God has given us everything—our lives and relationships, our talents and skills, and the desire to lovingly employ all for the good of the Kin-dom.
When we use our money in ways consistent with Biblical wisdom, it too becomes “an excellent gift of God, answering the noblest ends.” I will close by sharing one final quote from John Wesley: “In the hands of [God’s] children, [money] is food for the hungry, drink for the thirsty, raiment for the naked…By it we may be a defence for the oppressed, a means of health to the sick, of ease to them that are in pain. It may be as eyes to the blind, as feet to the lame; yea, a lifter up from the gates of death!”[xiii] Today the invitation is to “yield all things to [God’s] pleasure and disposal,” including your use of money. Doing so might mean lifting someone up from the gates of death! It might even be YOU who is lifted.
[i] The United Methodist Hymnal, p. 607.
[ii] James A. Harnish, Simple Rules for Money: John Wesley on Earning, Saving, & Giving, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2009, p. 7.
[iii] Ibid., p. 9.
[iv] Ibid., p. 22.
[v] Ibid., p. 21.
[vi] James A. Harnish, A Disciple’s Path: Deepening Your Relationship with Christ and the Church, Companion Reader, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2012, p. 49.
[vii] James A. Harnish, Simple Rules for Money: John Wesley on Earning, Saving, & Giving, p. 37.
[viii] Ibid.
[ix] James A. Harnish, A Disciple’s Path: Deepening Your Relationship with Christ and the Church, Companion Reader,p. 50.
[x] James A. Harnish, Simple Rules for Money: John Wesley on Earning, Saving, & Giving, p. 54-55.
[xi] Ibid., p. 66.
[xii] Ibid., p. 63.
[xiii] Ibid., p. 13.
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