3/17/68

Scripture: Luke 16: 19-31.

The parable, read as the morning’s New Testament scripture lesson, may have been the spark that touched off a revolution in Albert Schweitzer’s life. Schweitzer had become an eminently successful man in several fields. He was a highly trained theologian. He was an accomplished organist and a recognized authority on the music of Bach. But he couldn’t enjoy himself in the security of these accomplishments, and on the certain income which he could have commanded as a university professor in these fields. For he was also acutely aware of some human needs that were not being met. To him, it seemed that much of Africa was the helpless beggar lying at Europe’s doorstep, full of needs and sores and hunger. So Schweitzer took a university course in preparation for medicine and surgery and then went off to a place in Africa where he founded a hospital at Lamborene. There he spent his vigorous years of maturity, and the years of age and waning strength, until his splendid life burned out in service to black people whose chief importance was, in Schweitzer’s conviction, that they too are children of God --- and Schweitzer cared about them.

Harold Bosley has remarked that “God expects us to be immediately and completely compassionate in the presence of human need.” This is an ancient religious truth about which we never tire in the telling. Now and then it surprises us as we realize how complacent we can be in our attitude toward, and awareness of, the needs of people --- many of them near at hand. All of this is the point of Jesus’ vivid parable about the rich man and the beggar.

People who consider themselves “ordinary” folk have often longed, and loved to see, a proud man get his due --- as he surely does in this parable. And so we should be careful, as we read and hear the tale, not to mistake the point of the story. This is no blanket condemnation of the rich; and it is no exaltation of poor beggars. It is a condemnation of the kind of self-centered love that makes one blind to the needs and the desperation in another. And this condemnation is etched in every line of the story. It still stands as a warning to men and women who live that way.

There are two acts in the story: one is located on earth; the other is in the twin scenes of bliss and torment after death. The earthly scene was quite familiar to those who heard the parable. Beggars were posted at every vantage point in city and country --- some near a city gate where people came and went; some near a temple entrance; some at the gateway to royal palaces and to homes of prosperity and wealth; some at various points on a road where people passed by and could be entreated to give. It was taken for granted that the hopelessly crippled, some with incurable disease, and so on, could only hope to survive on what pittance others could give them.

If a beggar could walk, or hobble, or even crawl, he usually went to a place where he hoped to receive alms under his own power. If he were completely helpless, his friends might carry him to a place that seemed favorable, and leave him there while they went about their own daily work. Nobody got paid over-much, and each had to be about his own job in order to keep provisions for his own family. The beggar would be left at his place of begging until the others had finished their day’s work. Then they might return at the end of the day and carry him home to whatever shack he occupied.

As this beggar in the parable, Lazarus by name, lay there, he was the epitome of helplessness, of need, of human hopelessness -- unable to defend himself from burning sunlight, from the cruelties or neglect of man, or from insects or beasts. If the flies or ants swarmed over him, he had to endure it. If dogs snooped around him and licked his sores, he could not prevent it. If someone gave him a small coin, OK; or a few morsels of food, heaven knows he needed it. If no one noticed, it was just too bad.

Now there was little doubt that the rich man at whose gate Lazarus was left during the day did give some kind of alms to the beggar. After all, it was Jewish law that one must do so; and there is reason to believe that this rich man was a law-abiding Jew. Probably he also gave more than a few crumbs of food from his table to the poor fellow. But this is hardly the point of the story. The real point of Scene One in the story is that the rich man, whom Jesus mentioned, never really saw Lazarus as a human being. Lazarus was just a beggar. “Give him a little something and let us be about our pleasures.”

One could comment on the nature of a society that left individuals in desperate need to beg from individuals who might help a little if they felt like it. Some of our contemporary society is far advanced beyond that kind of personal humiliation and arrogant pride. But we still have a long way to go before reaching any imagined utopia. We have not arrived until there is some feeling for the one in need as a person and as a brother in the spirit; and until there is some feeling for the one who does help as a concerned and understanding brother in the spirit.

The rich man of this story appeared to do what little he did for Lazarus out of what he had left when he had had all he wanted --- food, money, or time. There were some rich men who gave in the same way to the temple --- out of their plenty. The gifts probably did not hurt them one bit in that they involved no sacrifice of food, pleasure, time or comfort. The rich man took care -- good care -- of himself first; and undoubtedly he provided well also for his own family, for he had five brothers living with, or near, him.

And if anyone had reproached this rich man for his behavior toward the beggar, he would have been astounded, and offended. Was he not giving Lazarus some food? Was he not a law-abiding man, even in the giving of alms? Didn’t he do just as much for the beggar at his gate as other people of means did for the beggars at their gates? Was not his money truly his to spend or give away as he pleased -- where it would give him the greatest pleasure and comfort? So long as he fulfilled the law governing such matters, did he not have the moral and religious right to do as he pleased with his time and possessions?

Of course, all this questioning about, and implied condemnation of, the rich man in the parable is no condemnation of a man just because he was rich in worldly goods. It has, rather, to do with the sin of self-centeredness and of callous indifference to the less fortunate which besets most people of affluence. At least it is more of a testing temptation to them than it is to those who have little to keep them comfortable.

This man, “Dives” (that is his name according to tradition -- the Luke story does not name him), was not a bad man in the sense that he might have been a horse thief, a philanderer, a drunkard, a traitor, or any other kind of conventional “badness.” He was only heedless, neglectful, if not actually blinded, before the need of others to be recognized, and dealt with as persons.

Now the parable shifts to the second setting, with dramatic reversals in fortunes. The beggar, Lazarus, died and was taken by angels to the “bosom of Abraham.” I guess that would be the symbol of bliss for the conscientious Jew of that time. And the rich man (Dives) died and was buried, and went to the place of torment called “Hades.” In the folklore of Judaism, the places of bliss and torment, while close enough each to the other so that one could see across to the other side, were nonetheless separated by some sort of gulf that no one could cross. Dives, the rich man, can see Abraham tenderly caring for Lazarus. Lazarus is still “the beggar” to Dives. Apparently Dives accepts the justice of this reversal; but he begs Abraham to send Lazarus with just a couple of drops of water for his fevered tongue in the place of anguish. He is now begging for a few drops of water just as Lazarus had had to beg for crumbs or morsels of food on their mortal earth.

But there is this difference. Lazarus got some bits of bread, but now the drops of water are denied. There are two explanations for this: (1) Dives had his comfort in life, and Lazarus his misery; now each is experiencing what he missed in life. (2) Secondly, the great gulf between them cannot now be crossed; the time for penitence is passed and judgment is now inexorably fixed. Neither Lazarus nor Abraham can help Dives, should they desire to do so.

The third act comes unexpectedly: Dives, having accepted the justice of this hard explanation without curse or cavil, thinks of his five brothers on earth. And he asks that they be warned of their awful fate if they do not do better than he while living on earth. Couldn’t Father Abraham send Lazarus to warn those five brothers of what may lie ahead for them? “No,” says Abraham, “they have Moses and the prophets to warn them; let them hear them!” But the man in torment had had Moses and the prophets, too, and look where he was! He knew how casually he and his brothers had treated the sayings and precepts of Moses and the prophets. So he pleaded that one who came from the dead might shock his brothers into listening and heeding. “No,” said Abraham. “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone should rise from the dead to warn them.”

It isn’t hard to see why the early church treasured this parable. That church was composed of people -- Jew and Gentile alike -- who believed, passionately, in Jesus Christ; in his resurrection and his saving power. They could not understand how anyone who had heard Jesus preach, who had actually known him, could fail or neglect to accept him as the Messiah and Lord of their lives. They were convinced that his coming had been anticipated and foretold by Moses and the prophets. Yet the ones who knew most about Moses and the prophets --- the students of the sacred writings, scribes and Pharisees --- were the very ones who not only rejected Jesus, but who had engineered his death. And these same people had scoffed at the disciples’ witness to his resurrection.

Probably this parable explained much to the early church: how the very ones who had Moses and the prophets paid no attention to them -- hence the scribes and Pharisees were not really expecting the Messiah, and therefore rejected Jesus. These early Christians could not understand how one could be so blind that he will not be guided by Moses and the prophets, will not listen to one who rose from the dead as Christ had done. And so the early Christians treasured this parable of Jesus; for it seemed to them to be based squarely on the world view of the Jews in that time. The places of bliss and torment; the realignment of fortune in the afterlife reversing the unjust fortunes of this life; the possibility of seeing and talking across the gulf fixed between bliss and torment; the inalterability of the divine decree as to where man should go; the adequacy of Moses and the prophets --- these emphases seemed to have been accepted with little or no question by Jesus and his hearers. They were accepted by Christians of the early church.

Jesus wove these assumptions into the parable with genius and realism. By the turn of a word he opens a window on our recesses of motive and deed. The parable is another document in support of the claim that Jesus “knew what was in man;” that he knew us from inside out, in motive, in desire, in deed. Here we see our blindness to the divine meaning of ordinary things. We live and move among people and things, people and cars, people and buildings, so continuously, so thoughtlessly, that our awareness of people as persons fades out. Except by an act of the will, we no longer separate people from things; in fact people become things to us. Labor is a commodity --- not workers who are people; management is likewise a thing -- not managers -- people. “Industry,” “commerce,” “agriculture,” “government,” --- these become “something” rather than persons. The “suburbs;” the “ghetto” aren’t truly people with hopes and frustrations, accomplishments and desperations. It is terribly, tragically human to become so accustomed to the sight of the beggar at the door that the awareness of his need no longer goes through us like some shock. It is not until our eyes are freed of our blindness by some sufferings of our own that we actually feel the sufferings of others who have been around us all the time and in need of the help and encouragement we could have given.

Not until pain had purified his vision had the rich man of the parable been able to see and feel the pain that had lain on his doorstep day after day for a long time. Our inhumanity to each other -- not from malice but out of callousness and insensitivity -- receives an eloquent statement in this parable. Here we see how the power and the goodness of God are frustrated in the presence of choices we may make. If God loves both Dives and Lazarus, he has yet been unable to bring them into a relationship of loving helpfulness either here or hereafter. He can not open the eyes of Dives to the real needs of Lazarus in time to allay the sufferings of the beggar. Neither can he permit Lazarus to ease the sufferings of Dives later on. Which may be a way of saying that we are dealing with God and He is trying to break through to us, in all our dealings with each other.

What, to the casual observer, seemed a daily affair in which a rich man passed unfeelingly by a suffering beggar was actually occurring against the backdrop of the compassionate love and judgment of God. Both the rich man and the beggar later could have cried out with Jacob of old: “Surely the Lord was in this place and I knew it not.”

It is risky business to think that God can be blocked out of any phase of life. It is wisdom to be guided by the wisdom of others that God is everywhere as Judge and Father. To say this is not to compromise our freedom and responsibility. We can continue to walk by the sufferings of others with veiled eyes and insulated spirits. But if we choose to walk that way, God does not force us to change -- until it is too late to change.

Not even some special messenger will turn the trick -- though Dives thought it might! He pleaded that his brethren would not pay any more attention to Moses and the prophets than he had done, and therefore he pleaded that Lazarus be sent back from the dead to warn them. But, in Jesus’ story, Abraham says it would do no good to send Lazarus back, for “if they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if some one would rise from the dead.”

The parable takes a dim view of the value of special messengers. Yet the request for something special continue to be a kind of staple in religion, even in our own time. The Pharisees, listening to Jesus’ teaching, had said: “Show us a sign. Do something special and spectacular. Perform a miracle that we can see. Don’t just talk about love and brotherhood -- we’ve heard all that before. Give us a miracle; then we may believe that you are the Messiah.” And the New Testament records that they continued to disbelieve even after the miracles. It takes more than a miracle to cure insensitivity and to nurture faith.

And this was a problem not alone for the Pharisees. Some of the disciples wanted special reassurance also. According to John’s gospel, near the end of Jesus’ ministry Thomas and Philip said: “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” Jesus answered: “Have I been with you so long, and yet you do not know me, Philip? He who has seen me (understood me) has seen the Father. How can you say ‘show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me?” [John 14: 8-10]. If we can not see the divine truth in ordinary events, we are not likely to see it in other events, no matter how extraordinary they might be. This parable of Jesus could be taken as a firm warning to Christians not to rely on miracles and special messengers in the preaching of the gospel.

When I was a youth, I recall that some of the officers of the church to which I belonged thought that the best thing for the church and community would be to get in an evangelist from Florida to conduct revival meetings for about three weeks. An evangelist named Bromley was imported. And he did stir up a lot of temporary enthusiasm. But it was mostly about “getting saved” with very little awareness of what salvation really is. For salvation was then, and is now, chiefly a result of day-to-day devotion to God’s truth, day-by-day sensitivity to the needs of all His children, day-after-day losing of one’s selfishness in service and concern for others.

The more steadily we consider this parable, the clearer becomes its central point. God expects us to cultivate qualities of sensitivity and compassion in our attitudes and dealings with all sorts of people. To put it negatively, it is a fearful thing to go through life blinded by self-love --- to have eyes that don’t see, ears that don’t hear, a heart that knows no understanding or compassion, a capacity and an ability to help but no will to do it. It is a fearful thing to insulate our Christian conscience in rationalizations that are seldom moved to deeds of real love and concern for others. And perhaps the most fearful thing of all is to be in a state of mind wherein we measure out our compassion crumb by crumb with no effort at self giving of loving to the uttermost --- as God loves us.

To put it positively, the road to Christian maturity lies in the subordination of self to others, in losing one’s self for the gospel’s sake. A Princeton University teacher, Dr. Gregory Vlastos, has put it this way: “To give one’s life away to what one knows to be of highest worth, not only for one’s self, but for all mankind, is the most mature experience open to man.”

The Church is never more Christian than when she sets before us opportunities for exhibiting, in concrete terms, our compassion for others. Christian compassion is not just a word; it is an attitude, a relationship between two persons involved and the God who loves them both.

When we help others, we serve God. And there is no other way of serving God than through ordinary obedience to His will in the service of human need. A cup of cold water given to the least of his brethren is a service to Christ himself. [Matthew 25: 40].

Prayer:

The light of God is falling

Upon life’s common way;

The master’s voice, still calling,

“Come, walk with Me today.”

No duty can seem lowly

To him who lives in Thee,

And all of life grows holy,

O Christ of Galilee.

Amen.

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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, March 17, 1968.

Also at Kalahikiola Church, March 16, 1969.

And also at Waioli Hui’ia Church, April 1, 1973.