Epiphany 6 Year C

Blessed are the poor in Spirit. . . Now that’s rich!

Luke 6:17-26

A pastor tells of a time when he hunted fox with a pack of hounds.  At one point, I went looking for the hounds, he recalled, I heard them barking and howling without cessation. It was an incredible sight. There, on the side of the cliff, licking his paw, was a beautiful, red fox.  The hounds were jumping and yelling and trying with all their might to climb that cliff to reach that fox, but the fox was in his den . . . he was in the place of protection, he was in his refuge.

Even with all the noise, chaos and judgement coming from below, he was nonetheless bathing in the sunlight of security.

St. Luke tells us in our Gospel this week that Jesus went down and stood on a level place, and a large crowd of his disciples was there, and a great number of people from all over Judea, from Jerusalem, and from the coast of Tyre and Sidon.

Knowing a little more about the geography of Israel these days, I can tell you that this means that people traveled from as far away as 100 miles to listen to Jesus preach. 

Some years ago, my wife, Kathy, and I had the privilege of standing on the Mount of Beatitudes, and as the Sun peeked through and shone on the Sea of Galilee, I looked down at the level place that Luke speaks of. It was pleasantly green down there, and I swear I could see those people crowding around Jesus; I could see them leaving the noise, the chaos and the judgement of their uncertain lives in search of a refuge, a ledge, a place where they could sprawl in security and trust and lick their wounds and leave behind their worry.

And Jesus says, Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God.

I am always amazed at how quick we are to turn the Beatitudes into commandments. Thou shalt NOT be rich . . . Thou shall become poor and destitute. You know, sometimes I think we see Jesus as some kind of a grand Robin Hood Messiah. He makes the wealthy poor by taking all they own and giving it to the poor which in turn makes them wealthy, and it starts all over again.

This is, of course, absurd. Nowhere in the Bible is abject poverty considered virtuous. Jesus gives us all those commands to feed the hungry because poverty in and of itself isn’t a blessing, it’s the enemy that should be fought on all fronts.

No. There has to be more to these beatitudes than at first meets the eye.  

The Beatitudes are more descriptive than prescriptive. I sometimes think we forget that Jesus had good friends who were not economically poor: Joseph of Aramathea, Nicodemus, Martha, Mary and Lazarus, and don’t forget the woman who anointed Jesus’ feet with expensive ointment. These folks were hardly destitute.

There is a Hebrew word for poor that also means to be humble, to be unpretentious. There is unfortunately no Greek equivalent for this Hebrew word, and so we get the simple word poor. In Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount Jesus says, Blessed are the poor in Spirit, and I think that captures the original flavor of what Jesus is really trying to say here.

Being poor in Spirit means being humble enough to admit your need. Being poor in this sense means knowing full and well that we CANNOT pull ourselves up by our own spiritual bootstraps. Blessed are the poor, for the Kingdom of God is going to be full of these folks. Blessed are the poor, for they know that they need a refuge, a saving ledge, a Messiah. Blessed are the poor, because they TRUST.

There’s an axiom of Haitian Christians that says, The full stomach has no need of God.  Woe to we who are so rich that we only think to trust in God when the money runs out or when it’s convenient. I am reminded of the wonderful poem entitled the Gate of the Year:

I said to the man who stood at the gate: ‘Give me light that I may tread safely into the unknown.’ And he replied, ‘Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God. That shall be for you better than light, and safer than a known way.’

One of the most beautiful passages in all of scripture comes from our first reading from the Prophet Jeremiah: Blessed are they who trust in the Lord. For they shall be like a tree planted by the waters, that spreads out its roots by the stream, and it shall not be afraid when the heat comes, but its leaves shall be green and shall not be afraid in the year of drought, neither shall it cease from yielding fruit.

At the foot of Mt. Hermon, in the north of Israel, there is a gushing spring that is one of the main arteries for the Jordan River. In the Jewish religion, water that came from a spring was considered sacred because it was living water. In the ritual baths of the Jews, there had to be a certain amount of this living water in the bath by ceremonial law. I collected some of this water and brought it back with me. I put a few drops in the water each time I celebrated a Baptism.

The interesting thing about this wonderful living water, is that as it flows into the Sea of Galilee and further southward, it becomes saltier and more stagnant.  Until it reaches the dead sea where nothing lives.  

Oh, the Dead Sea has a beauty that is attractive and calls to you, but it cannot support life.  It is DEAD. You see, the further you travel from that which is your source, the closer you come to death and dying.

Blessed are the poor . . . Blessed are those who know they are NOT the source. Blessed are those who yearn to be near the spring of living water and for whom that alone is sufficient.

The world calls to us every minute of every day, and our minds wander as we sit in church on Sundays, and we blame it on the music, or the sermon or the repetition of prayer. But in reality, it comes from an ingrained desire to control our own destinies. Blessed are the poor who remain connected in trust to the Savior of the world.

Each time we celebrate a baptism, each of us has an opportunity to share in the vows.  It’s our chance to reconnect with living water; it’s our chance to swim upstream to the source. But will we remain there, or will we drift downstream again?  There are no more important vows than baptismal vows, and yet I’m amazed how easily we forget that we made them.

In the same way when the Celebrant holds up the bread of Communion and breaks it, it is a moment that says to us that we have to be broken in order to really give our lives over to Jesus, and when we drink from a common cup, where we are all connected with the brokenness of Christ, it’s our chance to really experience what it is like to be poor in spirit.

The Beatitudes are radical teachings. Most of the world will never agree with them. 

Most of the world will never agree that the greatest treasure is to become poor in spirit. Most of the world will never agree that it is a gift from God to learn how to become dependent. Most of the world will never agree that it is a true blessing to give up control and take the lead from another.

I’d like to close with this story.  It’s a story about an ex-cop named Larry Miller.  I say ex-cop because Larry was arrested and convicted of the crime of assaulting two teenagers.  He was sentenced to 32 years in the state prison. The problem is, Larry didn’t commit the crimes.  But there he was in a prison where he feared for his life every day, where his freedoms were stripped from him.

He had grown up in a church, but never really cared much, and eventually drifted away.  Now, in desperate need, he began to pray.  He began to trust that somehow God was still there. He studied the scriptures and worked in the prison chapel.  He helped other prisoners with their GED’s and even taught catechism. He even learned to pray for the man who really committed the crimes for which he was accused.

He spent 12 years behind bars before his look-alike finally confessed to the crime.  Larry was released at last. As he left the prison, a reporter asked him if he was bitter because of his lost years.  And Larry said, with a smile on his face, Are you kidding? It was in that prison that I learned to trust God with my life, and that’s the greatest blessing of all.

Do you need a ledge away from the chaos and noise of the world?  Do you need a saving refuge?  Well, as the great old hymn tells us, Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus.

Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God.