“Trust In God”
St. Luke 16:19-31
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
St. Luke 16:31 But [Jesus] said to him, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.”
Dear fellow redeemed in Christ our Lord… On Monday June 10, 2001 a man was put to an early death. And just before he was put to death, he chose the following words as his final thoughts. They are from the William Ernest Henley poem of 1875 entitled “Invictus.”
It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll. I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul.
Those words were included in the final written statement of Timothy McVeigh, the man convicted of and put to death for bombing the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995, an event which senselessly ended 168 lives including 19 daycare children. His final message to the world demonstrated a sin even worse than the horribly unthinkable crime he committed. For even worse than murder is the sin against the First Commandment, a sin which says, “I am in charge of my own life and death. I determine my own destiny. I am the master; I am my own god.” This attitude is worse than human murder because ultimately it is an attempt to murder God, to get Him out of your life and out of your way – a belief that ultimately leads to eternal death and damnation.
McVeigh was an agnostic. An agnostic is a person who doubts the existence of God or an afterlife. In an interview McVeigh was asked what he would do if it turned out there was a heaven and a hell, to which he replied by saying that he would “improvise, adapt, and overcome.” Even in the face of eternity, he trusted in himself. He presumed to think that he could “overcome,” even overcome his Creator.
Of course, it is very easy to condemn Timothy McVeigh. He was, in every sense of the term, a mass murderer, someone who was defiant and unrepentant to the end, a man who died looking into the faces of the witnesses with an icy cold stare. It is just as easy to condemn the rich man in today’s Gospel, a man who lived in luxury while apparently ignoring a poor, needy beggar right outside his own gate. But we need to be careful in handing out condemnations; for soon we discover that we are also condemning ourselves. The fact of the matter is that Timothy McVeigh and the rich man and you and me by nature all belong in the same category.
We would like to think that the rich man’s problem was simply that he was rich. And along with that, we assume that he was mean and nasty, too. But St. Luke does not say that he was mean and nasty. He may have been a very nice guy. In fact, because of his earthly riches, he was probably looked up to as someone blessed by God, unlike Lazarus who would have been scorned and shunned as someone cursed by God because of his earthly poverty. The rich man might have been a pillar of the community, a civic leader, one whose business fueled the local economy. His problem, therefore, was not simply his wealth.
But we like to think of it that way because then we can feel better about ourselves. “Those greedy CEO’s and money-grubbing corporate business folks and wall street types; all they care about is money and power. I’m glad I’m not like them.” Oh, really!? Then why are we tempted to play the lottery or visit the Casino or gamble in other ways? Why are we eager to enter and try to win those contests and drawings with the big prizes or cash? Why is it that we focus so intently on that perfect stock or investment or financial move that will bring bigger returns and a better retirement? The truth is that, according to our flesh, we would love to be the rich man, with the exception, of course, that we would help the poor beggar at our gate and give more to charity. Greed, you see, is not a matter of economic class. Greed is a matter of the desires and the dreams of the sinful heart.
The real problem with the rich man, the real problem with McVeigh, and the real problem with all of us fallen human beings is the condemnation of the First Commandment; we do not fear, love, and trust in God above all things as we should. The rich man trusted in himself; he trusted in all the things he had gotten for himself; he trusted in his social standing and reputation among his friends and neighbors. We need to beware, therefore, of such proud self-reliance. We need to be wary of thinking that we can face eternity on the basis of our own merits and achievements and strength. We need to beware of saying “I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul.” For the destiny of all such is nothing but fiery torment and eternal separation from God.
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What made Lazarus’ destiny different from the rich man was not that he was physically poor, but that he was poor in spirit. Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3). To be poor in spirit means to be humble and penitent before God. To be poor in spirit means not to trust in ourselves but in Christ alone, to rely not on our own goodness but on His goodness. It means to look to the Lord for all that we need and to run to Him for help and comfort.
Notice that, of the two main characters in this parable, only one has a name. The man bound for hell has no name because God will not remember the nameless in hell, as He says in Matthew 25:41, “Depart from Me, I never knew you.” But the Good Shepherd knows His sheep and calls them each by name. Only the heaven-bound sheep are given a name. God has given you a name in Holy Baptism. He inscribed His own name on and in you by water and the Spirit. He claimed you for His own. He knows you by name. You are not nameless before God. You bear the saving name of the Holy Trinity.
The name “Lazarus” is one of the keys to understanding the real difference between the rich man and the poor man. “Lazarus” means, “The one whom God helps,” or “God is my helper.” He was sick, he was hungry, he was covered with sores, and the dogs licked his wounds. But in spite of all that, he still trusted in God. He was a true son of Abraham, who “believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness” (Gen 15:6). He still was able to say in faith what his name meant, “God is my helper.”
In the Gospel, Abraham said to the rich man, “They,” meaning his brothers, “have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.” That reminds us of what Jesus did while he walked with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:27): “And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning Himself.” What do Moses and the Prophets do? They ALL point to Jesus. The poor man went to heaven because he believed Moses and the prophets; that is to say, he believed in the Messiah of whom they spoke, the Messiah who would take the sins of the world upon Himself and earn for him God’s favor and a place in heaven.
That is what the Messiah, Jesus Christ, has done also for you and me. As Isaiah prophesied (Is. 53:4), “Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows. . . He was pierced for our transgressions, . . .and by his wounds, we are healed.” You see, in order to rescue and deliver us, Jesus made Himself like Lazarus. He put Himself at the mercy of the rich and powerful so that He might take away the judgment of God from us on the cross. In Psalm 22 (v. 16) Yahweh says, “Dogs have surrounded me; a band of evil men has encircled me, they have pierced my hands and my feet.” These dogs licked the sores of Jesus’ scourging, that is, they mocked His suffering. But the blood that flowed from His holy wounds bought your forgiveness and cleansed you from your sin.
See then who is the truly rich man in this account. Of course, it is Lazarus! The rich man laid up treasures for himself on earth, “where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.” But Lazarus laid up for himself treasures in heaven, “where moth and rust do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal” – everlasting treasures. Lazarus did not desire to be clothed in purple and fine linen. Rather, it says that he desired to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table.
And to what do those crumbs point us? Consider what sits on the Holy Altar of the church: crumbs and morsels, a small and seemingly unimpressive Sacrament. But faith knows how great and rich this Sacrament is. For in these crumbs are the riches of Christ’s life and salvation! Those who are self-sustained in this life – those who are their own gods – are always casting off these crumbs in favor of something more immediately gratifying. But the faithful continually beg for the holy crumbs, as we say before the Supper, “O Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, have mercy on us.” In the end a great, uncrossable gulf will be fixed between the one side, where the beggars dwell forever in the comfort of God’s presence in Abraham’s bosom, and the other side, where the self-sufficient dwell forever in unquenchable fire.
Let the gulf be fixed today, then, between the riches and pleasures that are seen, and the heavenly riches which are hidden and grasped only by faith. Let the trust of your heart ever dwell on the heavenly side, even in the midst of afflictions, troubles, and worries. Do not despise bodily suffering, but receive it as a gift of God which turns our hearts away from what is perishable to what is imperishable.
Take your place with Lazarus. In doing so you are taking your place with Christ, who suffered anguish of soul for you in order that your soul may be received into the peace and solace of heaven at death. And in that, we have Christ who suffered in the flesh for us in order that we may be raised in the flesh with Him on the Last Day.
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
