Pentecost 4

Pentecost 4 BALANCING OUR ABUNDANCE 6/29 & 7/2/06

It was about 48 A.D. and the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem had split with the Gentile Christians, requiring that non-Jews had to become Jews before they could become Christians…the topic of discussion in our current adult S.S. class on Galatians. Yet, the Jewish Christians had received generous gifts from the Gentile Christians living in Antioch, as Paul describes in (2 Cor. 8:3): “For I testify that they gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability.” The “key” to their generosity is revealed in (2 Cor. 8:5) “…they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us.” Not one of us will give to our highest potential until we have first given ourselves over to God!

Paul is writing this letter to the Christians in the Greek port city of Corinth…a wealthy city, one of the chief ports on the ancient Mediterranean Sea---imploring them to follow the faithful, generous example of the far-less wealthy Christians in Macedonia. Paul asks the Corinthians, and each of us: “If the less fortunate can give so generously, why can’t you, the richly blessed, do the same?” How do you, do we, answer?

Paul’s request is made out of what he termed “a question of fair balance between your present abundance and their need…in order that there may be a fair balance.”(2 Cor. 8:14) Some translations substitute the term “equality” for the phrase “fair balance”. Paul’s argument is founded upon the belief that we live and move in this Christian life together. We are all one body in and of Jesus Christ. Paul reminds us that we are all “givers” and “receivers”, sharing what we have and receiving what we need. This is the “fair balance” the Church calls “stewardship”---our calling from God to care for the earth and all human resources in a way that enables all to have what each one needs. It is action, personally and as a congregation, that demonstrates in deeds what we say in Creeds; what we mean when we talk about loving our neighbor as ourselves.

17 of us experienced, witnessed, and sought to address the clear absence of “a fair balance” in the blighted community of Cairo, Illinois. Living there, with and among those desperate but delightful people for 5 days and nights, the God-intended “fair balance” among His people was momentarily created. Those of us who have been given so much worked daily to give to those who have so much--less. But, only an hour outside of Cairo, Illinois I began to fiercely and sadly experience how “unfair” and out-of-balance our world actually is. As our group of 17 sought consensus regarding where we would stop to eat, the day before we fed the hungry. On our journey home, we stopped & eagerly shopped the Union Station in St. Louis, as I remembered the 10 or so children of Cairo who told me they had not even heard of St. Louis…3 hours north. On Friday evening our group divided up in order to go to some favorite restaurants, while the children of Cairo were thrilled with a brown-bag lunch. We had given from what we have to those who have so little! We had, for a few days, given our very selves---literally blood, sweat, and tears---toward a “fair balance.” You and I flush our toilets with the quality of pure water thousands are dying to drink. In our kitchens we use disposals for leftovers when we are no longer hungry, while the hungry face the disposal of loved ones who have died from weeks of nothing to eat. “Fair balance”?

It may seem to us that stewardship in Paul’s time was simple compared to our 21^st century challenges. We are not the first generation to raise such questions as “If I give too much to others, will I have enough left for myself?,” and “Who is going to take care of me if I don’t take care of myself?” In Holy Baptism we are called to be stewards and vehicles of God’s love and grace. As with the Christians in Macedonia, God calls us to give our hearts to Him and open our hands to His. When we give ourselves to the Lord, we realize we are not owners, but merely managers and stewards and caretakers of what belongs to Another… “the earth is the Lords and all that is in it.” (Ps. 24:1)

Consider Paul’s guidance as you ponder your tithes and offerings this morning:

1- Paul coins the beautiful phrase the “grace of giving” (vs. 7)

2- Paul invites us to compare our level of giving to God’s level of giving (vs. 8-9)

3- Paul distinguishes between “the desire to” give and our actual giving (vs. 10)

4- Our personal giving is to be proportionate to what God has given us (vs. 12)

5- The instruction is not that the wealthy be “hard pressed” while others are “relieved…but that there might be equality...a fair balance.” (vs. 13)

6- Clearly God’s intention, written in Exodus 16:18 and quoted by Paul, is that “He who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little.”

It is a matter of balancing our worldly abundance in this out-of-balance world! Amen.