A couple of our senior high youth just returned from Summer Camp at
Camp McDowell this past week, and I was prompted to think about my own
experience at Senior Camp. Even though
it has been fifteen years, I still remember the camp well.
We began the session like you usually do. We had pizza and corn for dinner. We sang a few songs and played a few
games. The program director broke us up
into our small groups and then the typical first night of camp script was
broken when we were all asked to play the classic board game Monopoly.
After a couple of hours of playing, the program director stopped the
game abruptly and told everyone to cash in their assets (or pay their
debts). He then said, “The money you
have in your pockets will be used to participate in different camp activities
including meals, activities, etc.”
So for almost three days, Camp McDowell became a capitalistic society
and to add a bit of irony to the whole scene the capital building for this
society was located in a building on camp property that is named the Kremlin...
Society shaped up like you might imagine. There was a country club where members had
access to air conditioning. The club
included free access to the swimming pool and to the Frisbee golf course. It was a semi-private club as non-members
could pay to swim and play Frisbee golf for a fee. Some people were hired as staff who waited
tables or caddied at the golf course.
The dining hall was separated into sections where some used real silver
and china while others used regular camp plates and utensils. Located next to the pool bathrooms, there was
a place to receive food stamps and apply for supplemental income.
As you might imagine, things started to get pretty hairy by the second
day. For many people, this was no longer
a fun game. Some even threatened to call
their parents to come get them. On the
second evening, a few were spotted carrying around signs that said, “Hugs for
$5.” The next morning the program director
called an emergency community meeting.
At that meeting, the program director announced that the game was over
and camp would resume without the use of monopoly money. One of the campers, who still had a lot of
money, jumped up and exclaimed, “you mean my money isn’t any good anymore!” The program director replied, “exactly!”
This camper had saved up ample goods for the rest of the camp session
so that he could relax, eat, drink, and be merry. But when the program director announced the
game was over, the camper’s whole plan was shattered. His money was no good anymore.
The program director might as well have said to the young camper, “You
fool! Your happy dream life at camp is
over. Of course your money is no good
anymore, we are at Camp McDowell—a place that reflects in the kingdom of
God. Camp isn’t about trying to acquire
the most stuff like you do back home.
Camp is here so you can learn how to be rich toward God.”
The older I get the more I have come to appreciate the places where I
can go to learn how to be rich toward God.
We live in a world that too often distracts us from the fundamental
purpose of our lives – to be rich toward God.
As Robert Capon puts it, “Our world runs on avarice. Wealthy, poor, or in-between, we are all of
us, in Jesus’ eyes, unreconstructed rich people.” In other words, our world runs off the
pursuit of money and power and notoriety.
If you pressed me to answer the question, “what is the biggest problem
in the world today?” At this point, I
would have to respond by saying, “the biggest problem is that our world is
experiencing a deep spiritual poverty.”
And this spiritual poverty makes a significant impact on every facet of
our common life together.
This spiritual poverty is responsible for war, terrorism, racism,
religious fanaticism, physical poverty, economic collapses, and the list goes
on. This world is hungry for more places
where people can learn to be rich toward God.
So I want to say thank you St. Paul’s because you are investing in
places that promote spiritual health through Bethany Village and through your
commitment to the upcoming Building on our Foundation campaign.
Learning to be rich toward first calls us to confront our unruly wills
and affections that convince us to pursue the riches of this world. Like we see in today’s parable and the image
I gave you from senior camp, our pursuit of worldly treasurers is rendered
meaningless set in contrast to our death.
The basic problem with pursing the riches of this world is that, in the
end, we are all left with the same things – nothing. Regardless of race, religion, socio-economic
status, we are all dust and to dust we shall return. In the end, rich or poor, there is only One
who can give us the riches we really need.
Capon says, “Jesus is the only rich man in the world; we, who spend our
whole lives in the pursuit of wealth, come in the end only to the poverty of
death…In Jesus, all the pointless pursuing and all our sad incomprehension is
turned to our good. He waits for us in
our death. Quite literally, there is
nothing we need to do except die.”
Surely Capon isn’t saying that we literally need to die, right? Well, yes and no. Yes, as we reflect on this passage, our true
purpose in life is crystalized when we consider the moment of our death—the
great equalizer.
When we come near the time of death, it is only natural that we begin
to reflect on our lives. We reflect on
the good times, the bad times. We
reflect on how things might have been different. We reflect on the things that really matter –
the richness of our relationships with God and neighbor.
Through this parable, Jesus is trying to get us to come to terms with
our death now so we can come to terms to what it really means to live in Christ
today. And to hammer the point home
Jesus says, “You fool! This very night
your life is being demanded of you. And
the things you have prepared, whose will they be?”
We all know the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, for example. Only when he is confronted with his death,
does he fully come to terms with how his pursuit of wealth left him empty
inside. And as the story goes, the
confronting of his death inspires him to start being generous in his living
while he still has a chance.
All of this begs us to ask, what is really important in this life? In the end, what good is my wealth, what good
are all my titles, what good is any of this if it isn’t used to bless and
enrich the lives of those around me especially the poor and those who live in
physical poverty?
The good news of Jesus tells us that
that the more we grow in the richness of God the less concerned we become about
acquiring wealth in a vain attempt to relax, eat, drink, and be merry.
The more we grow in the vision of God’s heavenly kingdom, a kingdom
where the poor are exalted and not exploited the less concerned we become with
our socio-economic status and the more we understand Jesus when he says, “the
poor are your masters.”
The richer we become in God the freer we are to give away all of our
excess because, in the end, our stuff isn’t any good to us anymore. Our spiritual poverty begins to lessen when
we ourselves are willing to join Jesus in his poverty, in his death.
And in Jesus’ poverty, we are raised to a life where Jesus’ primary
concern is to heal a broken and sinful world, we are raised to a life where we
can experience even the riches of heaven on earth – a place where giving is
receiving.
Beloved, I invite you to consider the vain things this world is telling
you to pursue – popularity, wealth, fame, etc.
I invite you to die to the illusion that these things can fill your
emptiness because they won’t fill you up – they will only leave you empty. Instead, do yourself a favor and accept your
death today so that you may start living a life through the One who makes all
rich toward God. Amen.
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