Getting and giving

A Sermon for Pentecost XX (Proper 23)
All Saints’ Church, Southern Shores, N.C.
October 14, 2012
Thomas E. Wilson, Rector
Job 23:1-9, 16-17 Psalm 22:1-15 Hebrews 4:12-16 Mark 10:17-31
I think I may have done you a disservice for the past several weeks when I departed from the usual Sunday lectionary and did the Blessings of the Animals with the lessons for St. Francis Day and the Stewardship breakfast service when we focused in on stewardship readings. What you would have had for the past several weeks was the beginning of the book of Job which sets up the lesson for today where we hear Job’s complaint.

Let me fill in what you have missed in the extended parable and meditation about theodicy, why God allows evil to happen to those following God, which is the book of Job. Think of it as a play which begins with Satan and God having a discussion about Job who is a faithful follower of God. Satan suggests that Job is only following God because it is in his self-interest; after all, Job gets lots of benefits from God. This charge is similar to a recent political observation made by a candidate who says that 47% of people will vote for his opponent since they benefit from government bounty. Satan suggests that they play a game with Job and take all of what Job has away from him and then see who he would vote for - would he still vote for God? Job loses everything, and he has a series of “friends” who try to tell him that he must have deserved what happened to him. It must be all his fault because God would never allow any good follower to know discomfort. Job’s response to God for what has befallen him is essentially “No wonder you have so many enemies since this is the way you treat your friends!” His complaint echoes the first line of the Psalm for today, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? and are so far from my cry and from the words of my distress?” This is the same line that Jesus will say from the cross.

Our Lenten series in the spring will deal with how we get through times of loss, when it seems hard to find any advantage in following God when we’re not getting what we want. We will look at different kinds of losses as parishioners share what it is like to lose a job, a spouse, a child, a childhood, a parent, a friend, a house, one’s health and other losses and where they find the strength to go on. Job’s complaint for today, the Psalmist cry, the words from the cross, are part of the natural process through which a person struggles to heal a shattered faith and find a firmer ground of faith.

The book of Job challenges the popular idea that there is a contract between God and humans which, in effect, says, “You be nice to me and in return I’ll be nice to you.” The deeper understanding of the Hebrew faith is that God does not make contracts; rather, God enters into covenants. The theme of a contract is mutual gain - what does the party of the first part get in exchange for what the party of the second part gets. A covenant, on the other hand, is a mutual offering of self. The covenant between God and Abraham is that God gives God’s very self and Abraham gives all of himself. As the covenant is renewed, the person of Jesus is an icon of God’s covenant of pouring out God’s self for all of humanity, as the God made flesh pours himself out. God is the giver of all gifts, and we live into the image of God when we give ourselves to God and others.


Let me use marriage as an example of the difference between a covenant and a contract. The State of North Carolina takes a legal view of marriage in which two people enter into a contract to get something of value from each other. You get a wife, you get a husband - you both get something. When the “getting” mode is interrupted, then failure to keep promises is grounds for the voiding of the contract. On the other hand, the church has a covenant idea of marriage in which two people give all of themselves and where failure to keep promises calls for a further commitment to give and forgive. Contracts are about what you get, and covenants are about what you give.

In the Gospel lesson for today, the man asks Jesus, “"Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" The Greek word Mark uses for “inherit” is a legal term for the transfer of property based on a promise. He is kneeling before Jesus, a sign that he is asking for healing, so we can assume that, while he is rich, there is something missing in his life. The man seems to be asking, “What are the terms of the contract with God? What is the property I will get because I have kept my part of the contract by following all the commandments?” For the man “eternal life” means one of two things (a) a life full of blessings, and apparently he has plenty of money so there is another kind of blessing he is looking for, such as love or belonging to something greater than himself, or (b) the contractual reward of a “get out of hell free card” and admission to a cloud in the sky. Both ideas were popular at the time in the 1st century - and in the 21st century.

What Jesus does is to change the conversation from contract - “What do I get?” – to covenant - “Are you ready to give yourself as God has given all of God’s self?” Jesus’ definition of “eternal life” is a gift from God, living in the light of the Holy Eternal One, in this life, right here and now and continuing forever, or, as he says in the prayer he taught us, “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” Living a life as if God were here in the midst of us, “eternal life”, is not what you get out of a contract but what you give in your life in covenant.

Jesus offers his open healing hand in love, but the man is clutching with his hands that which is of great cost but of no value to give him meaning; he will not open his hands to accept that which he says he wants. The option of giving to the poor is not about social welfare but of giving value to the poor who are so easy to ignore. Jesus does not condemn the man for missing the point; he is just filled with sadness of a gift refused. I don’t think Jesus is giving a lesson in economics in the cost of things within a world of contracts, but he is reinforcing the value of lives lived in the light of the Eternal One with others in a universe of gifts.

A suggestion for today: stop looking for the cost and benefit of contracts and explore the value of covenants.