26th October 2008 The Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 6: 24-34
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You can't get away from it. Bad news about the world economy. The so-called credit crunch. So it is fitting that today, purely by chance, we have got to that part in the Sermon on the Mount, which includes Jesus’ teaching about the dangers of accumulating wealth and his invitation not to be afraid, not to worry about material things.
The so-called Sermon on the Mount would be better called the Teaching or Wisdom from the Mount, because it contains a virtual compendium of all the usual topics touched on by Jewish sages. All Jesus taught upheld the Torah, the Jewish law, as he said it would in Matthew 5: 17, ' I have not come to abolish the law and the prophets.' No, Jesus goes on to say, I have come to fulfil them. But in fulfilling the law Jesus’ teaching went further, much, much further, then traditional Jewish wisdom. Traditional Jewish wisdom sought to show people how to live practically, so that they could be healthy, wealthy and wise. Jesus’ teaching does not simply baptised these ideas and call them good, he substitutes a very different sort of wisdom. All of Jesus' teaching is served up with the idea that God's reign is breaking through, and bringing with it a new, radical teaching. We have already looked in other sermons at some of this new material. Jesus' teaching on our attitude to material goods is part of this new teaching.
I wonder how many of you know, the film, ' It's a wonderful life.' It's about a very kind and decent man called George Bailey, who runs what the Americans call a ' Savings and Loan, ' a sort of old-fashioned building society and bank. One Christmas season, a large deposit of cash is mislaid, and there is a run on the bank. George faces ruin. He is saved from suicide by an Angel, called Clarence, who shows George what the town would have been like had George never lived. George has made a huge difference to the people of the town through his quiet, ordinary life, because although he's never achieved the glamorous things he dreamt of, he has taken care of his clients, he has persevered with courage and honesty. He has stood up for the little man against the powerful, ruthless local magnate. George’s bank is saved by the generosity of the townsfolk, most of whom he helped in the first place. The film teaches us that friends are more important than money.
The point to me about the film is that George thinks his treasure is the dreams he had, dreams he never achieved. But actually his real treasure is shown by the choices he has made. He so cares for his family, he so cares for the poor, that over and over again he puts their needs before his own.
Let us look at the text at the end of last week's reading, Matthew 6:19 - 21. These few verses are a bridge between two sections on false treasure, the section we studied last week, where we saw how easy it is to make treasure out of what the world thinks of us: eye service, as
It is important to note that Jesus doesn't say, ' Don't have treasure.' Treasuring things is part of being human. The most destitute person may have an old photograph or something that is worthless in monetary terms, but full of sentimental value. Our Eucharist starts with the commandment every week, 'To love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, and with all your strength.' To love, to treasure God. Is God your treasure? Like George Bailey, sometimes we don't know what real treasure is until we are on beam ends, until everything we thought was essential to us, has been taken away. Then we see, what really counts.
'In God we trust, ' is the motto of the and it is written on their currency. There's real irony here, because we all know, perhaps particularly at the moment, that
Treasuring material things is not a smart strategy, says Jesus. They get stolen, they get rusty and they don't bring security. But investing, investing in the things of heaven: that is very worth while. This means that we will invest in our relationship with Jesus himself and through him, with God. And this may be a good time to ask yourself, ' how much do I invest in my relationship with Jesus?' Is it just this one hour once a week; perhaps not even once a week, but once or twice a month? How does that compare with how much time I give to other things in my life? Do I want to grow in my relationship with God through Jesus or am I content just to keep things ticking over? Am I a consumer Christian who treats the faith and my church, just like another commodity in my life, or am I trying to become a disciple? Am I making progress? ' Where your heart is, there will you're treasure be. ' Where is your heart?
If we invest in our relationship with Jesus, we will also find ourselves investing in the things he cares about. We'll devote ourselves to the good of other people (as George Bailey did in the film) because these people are God's treasures, and as we learn to love God, we will learn to love them, too.
And we will could also care for this astonishingly rich and beautiful physical realm, the earth itself. God created this earth and loves it dearly. He never takes his hands off it. So because he loves it and we love him, we will seek to honour it and treat it as well as we can. Do you see how we are changed by being apprentices of our Master, learning from him, being guided by him? But how can we learn, if we don't spend time with him?
We organise our lives around our hearts and that's why we have to be careful of what we choose to treasure. Some people think you can have it all, love of success and money and love of God, but there will come a time when one side of our lives must be subordinated to the other because we are chasing different and opposing things. You cannot love god and money.
It is very interesting that whilst I was writing this Sermon this week. I/we were challenged in this very area. A television company wanted to come and film a series of comedy sketches in the church. We could have received up to £1000 a day in location fees, and this church needs the money, we really do. But after the standing committee and I had read the scripts we said, no. We felt the writing dishonoured God and the church. So we said no thank you to the money and we will continue to trust God to provide.
Don't worry, Jesus says in verse 25 and he took an illustration from nature. Look at the birds: they don't lay up treasure on earth but God provides for their needs. Jesus is not saying the birds don't have to work. Anyone who has ever seen, ' Springwatch,' knows that birds have to work very hard at certain times of the year. But they receive from their world under God, daily food for daily needs. God's care is not a recipe for laziness. It's a recipe for trust.
At another point in Matthew's Gospel, Jesus tells us we should have the faith of little children who have no capacity to make and store wealth but simply trust that they will be provided for by loving parents. In the Old Testament when the Israelites were with Moses in the desert, God provides manna for them to eat each day. They couldn’t store it for the next day: it went bad. But there it was, fresh, every morning.
Is Jesus saying, ' It is wrong to have savings.’ Is he preaching against pension plans? No, I don't think so. What he is saying is, don't put your trust in money; put your trust in God. Build your life on the rock that is our Father in heaven, and you will be able to withstand the shifting sands of life. Work at becoming a disciple of Jesus and your values will become those of Jesus. You won't desire false treasure, and you will find real treasure: human love and compassion, the beauty of nature freely given, the desire to share justly the wealth that God has given to all humankind.
If we seek first the
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