Be the vulnerable

Amos 8: 4-7; Psalm 113: 7-8
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
September 22, 2019

Rich and Poor, or War and Peace, 17th c., unidentified Flemish painter

 

We worship the rich. Our American culture worships, gives worth to, rich people: how they live, their homes, what they eat and drink, what they wear, what car they drive, where they travel, their education, their influence, their technology. Actually it’s more of a love/hate relationship. We love the rich in movies and television like Downton Abbey and Crazy Rich Asians and in places like Longwood Gardens and Winterthur and tech like the latest iPhone. We hate the rich in their influence on politics and public policy, like the Koch brothers; in their escape from paying taxes and their treatment of workers like Jeff Bezos and Amazon and Whole Foods, and the Walton family and Walmart.



And yet we like discounted books and goods and two day delivery at our fingertips. We like the availability of a wide variety of organic food and the bargain of inexpensive clothing and household items and groceries, but we also value independent local businesses and artisans, community supported agriculture, using up what we have and donating what we no longer need. (See newsletter about the upcoming tag sale on October 26.)

Our relationship to money and wealth and possessions is a complicated one. We abhor the prosperity gospel in which wealth and health are viewed as God’s will for those who have faith, those who engage in positive speaking and thinking, and who donate to religious causes. Most of us have probably felt the pressure and heard shame messages about giving in church. Even though there are more than 2000 scriptures on poverty and justice, money is often a taboo subject in most churches. At the least it’s an awkward and clumsy conversation. At the worst we are self-serving and complicit in the exploitation of the poor and vulnerable.

Meanwhile God not only worships, gives worth, but preference to the poor, the orphan, the widow, the stranger. Fr. Gustavo Gutierrez, the author of A Theology of Liberation, asserts that when the poor and vulnerable are free, we all will be free. Throughout the Hebrew and Christian scriptures as well as the Qur’an, God instructs us and commands the physical and spiritual well-being of the poor, which is the well-being of everyone. From the Qur’an: “Righteousness is not that you turn your faces toward the east or the west, but [true] righteousness is [in] one who believes in Allah , the Last Day, the angels, the Book, and the prophets and gives wealth, in spite of love for it, to relatives, orphans, the needy, the traveler, those who ask [for help], and for freeing slaves; [and who] establishes prayer and gives zakat or offerings.”



We are to give wealth in spite of our love for it. God’s prophets have a way of seeing through our generosity to our fear of scarcity, our desire to keep what we have, our need for security, our belief in individual responsibility over communal care.

I recently came across a very insightful tweet by singer and actor Tay Zonday. He said something pretty prophetic about what it means to be poor and vulnerable in this country: “Being poor now leads to being poor later. Can’t pay to clean your teeth? Next year pay for a root canal. Can’t pay for a new mattress? Next year pay for back surgery. Can’t pay to get that lump checked out? Next year pay for stage three cancer. Poverty charges interest.”

We know this is true when we talk about climate change. Changes in the environment will affect everyone but more so those who are already struggling to survive as it is. This past week I attended a constituent coffee with state senator David Sokola. One of our guests was Dr. Willett Kempton from the Center for Research in Wind at the University of Delaware. Dr. Kempton spoke of how wind turbine technology makes even more sense now that the cost has come down. Important decisions and policies that affect everyone are based on how they affect those who have money rather than those who do not have such privilege. We tend to think of money and wealth as something we earn rather than a privilege but more often than not, wealth is a direct result of privilege, affording us even more privilege because we have wealth.

We need prophetic voices to not only keep us honest but to challenge the way we think about poverty and justice. Writer and activist Bree Newsome put it this way: “The wealthy and powerful are engaging in widescale crimes from human sex trafficking to rigging college admissions to fleecing tax payers while most of the court system’s focus is on policing and jailing people for the crime of being poor.” Our job as people of privilege is to disrupt that, to call it out, vote it out, not for ourselves but for those who suffer the most, who are the most vulnerable to economic abuses, climate change, exploitation and greed.

Pastor and author Carlos Rodriguez tweeted: “Here’s what Jesus did NOT say: Welcome the stranger, if he has money. Feed the hungry, who earned the food. Love your neighbor, when it’s good for the economy. Give water to the thirsty, once they pay their dues. Rule. Be first. Take and keep taking.” From our finances to the local church to the association to the conference to the denomination, our budget is not only a moral document, it is how we make visible the discomforting gospel of Jesus, how we make visible justice for the poor, how we make visible the vulnerable in our communities. Bishop Desmond Tutu said “Every church should be able to get a letter of recommendation from the poor in their community.

Whenever we make a decision, a choice, a donation that will affect lives, we must do it as though the most vulnerable people are in the room with us. And not only people but the earth and all life on this planet.

They are in the voting booth.

They are in the grocery aisle.

They are in our energy sources.

They are in the car with us.

They are in every piece of single-use plastic and polystyrene.

They are on the tags of our clothing.

They are in the circuit boards of our cell phones.

They are wrapped around our credit card.

They are in our investment portfolio and our retirement savings and our bank account.

They are in the language of our worship and the words of our songs and prayers.

They are the first casualties of war and the last to know peace.

The most vulnerable do not have a choice; the choice is forced upon them.

And yet in the gospel made visible in human lives,
those who choose to be brave are just as frightened as we are.

Those who choose to give to others the very thing they need themselves are just as unsure as we are.

Those who love without question are just as human as we are.

Those who raise their voices that justice might be done have just as much to lose as we do.

Those who turned from the way things have always been and went another way had no idea what might happen any more than we do.

Those who choose risk and vulnerability over power and security have to choose it every day just like we do.

To be the Church means to be the vulnerable, to make the gospel visible in our lives. Amen.




Benediction

Because the world is poor and starving,
Go with bread.

Because the world is filled with fear,
Go with courage.

Because the world is in despair,
Go with hope.

Because the world is living lies,
Go with truth.

Because the world is sick with sorrow,
Go with joy.

Because the world is weary of wars,
Go with peace.

Because the world is seldom fair,
Go with justice.

Because the world is under judgment,
Go with mercy.

Because the world will die without it,
Go with love.”

by Harold Warheim