Sermon for November 18th, 2018

Matthew 6:24-33

24 “No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

26 Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?

28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ 32 For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

Simple Gifts: What Do We Require?

Today's sermon is about the essential things we require to live and be happy.

I'm reminded of the story about the Scotsman who was shipwrecked and, after several days, washed ashore on a small island. As he regained consciousness on the beach, he saw a beautiful, scantily-clad woman standing over him. She asked, "Would you like some food?" The Scotsman hoarsely croaked, "Och, lassie, I havna' ittin a bite in a week noo and I am verra hungry!"

So the woman disappeared into the woods and quickly came back with a heaping plate of steaming haggis, which the hungry Scotsman quickly devoured. Then the beautiful woman asked him, "Would you like something to drink?" "Och, aye! That haggis has made me verra thirsty." She went off into the woods again and returned with a bottle of 75-year-old single-malt Scotch whiskey.

The Scotsman is now beginning to think that he's in heaven when the beautiful, scantily-clad woman leans closer and whispers, "Would you like to play around?" A great smile breaks over the Scotsman's face, and he says, "Och, lassie, don't tell me ye've got a golf course here too!"

So food, drink, and...golf. Actually, the list according to Jesus in today's scripture passage may be slightly different on that last one...but that's probably only because golf hadn't been invented yet.

This month we are talking about Simple Gifts, or cultivating a life of simplicity in our life, our faith, and our giving. Last week we explored what God requires of us: According to the prophet Micah, it is simply to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with God.

Today, we're asking the question "What do we require?" Or, to put it a different way, what do we as human beings, really need in order to be happy?

This Thursday is Thanksgiving--my absolute favorite holiday of the year. It's a day where we are encouraged to pause and give thanks for simple things: Food on the table, friends and family, our faith, maybe some football.

And then the very next day is Black Friday, followed by "Small Business Saturday" and "Cyber Monday." We go straight from being thankful for what we already have, to being bombarded with commercials, advertisements and sales trying to tell us all that we NEED but don't HAVE in order to truly be happy.

Truthfully, there is no shortage of voices all year round trying to answer that question for us--what do you really need to be happy? And most of those voices come with a price tag.

So what DO we really need?

In 1943, a psychologist named Abraham Maslow published a paper in which he described a hierarchy of human needs. The idea is that our motivations progress from basic needs to complex ones. When we are struggling or experiencing difficulty at a lower stage, it makes it difficult (or impossible) to focus on higher stages--the ones that lead us to happiness (or as the pyramid puts it, self-actualization).

I find that Maslow's attempt to answer the question "What do we really need" maps nicely onto Jesus' answers to the same question in Matthew 6 (which is incidentally part of his famous "Sermon on the Mount" along with the beatitudes and the Lord's prayer). I'd like to quickly walk you through that.

The first level of Maslow's pyramid is physiological needs--things like food, water, shelter. In Matthew this is verse 25:

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?"

Later, in verse 31 and 32, Jesus repeats this:

"Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things."

Food, drink, and clothing (which is a type of shelter). God, through Jesus, acknowledges these are real needs, which God has provided for us through the resources of creation...but that we shouldn't spend too much time at this level, worrying about these things.

The Greek word for worry, μεριμνάω (merimnao) literally means to be divided, pulled in two opposing directions. In that light, I don't think Jesus is ignoring the very real issues of poverty, hunger, homelessness, and the struggles people face to meet these basic needs--elsewhere he commands his disciples to feed the hungry, and clothe the naked. I think he's saying don't get stuck (or let others get stuck) at this level. If you are adequately fed, adequately clothed and adequately sheltered, don't keep increasing these things (more food, more drink, fancier clothes, bigger house). Don't let these desires pull you away from progressing to the next level.

The next two levels are safety and belonging. Safety is knowing that no one can forcibly and unfairly take away those things you gained at the first level, and belonging is being part of a larger community, where bonds of intimacy can develop. These two things are related, and I think they are both addressed in verse 33:

"But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things (the lower level needs) will be given to you as well."

Strive for righteousness, also translated sometimes as justice or fairness. These things form the basis of safety and security, and they are practiced best in community with others, where we also find belonging and acceptance. Whenever Jesus speaks of this kind of ideal community, he has a code-name for it: He calls it the "kingdom of God."

So instead of striving after our most basic needs (what other people do--the Greek word for Gentiles is ethne, literally "other nations) we are to strive first to be part of God's Kingdom, God's community, which in turn provides us with acceptance, belonging, safety, justice... and also has the capacity to help us with those most basic needs: Food, clothing, shelter.

So. What does any of this have to do with giving? Simple. If you don't figure out the money thing, you're not going to figure out the God thing, or the happiness thing. And when I say "figure out the money thing," I don't mean "figure out how to get more of it." I mean figure out how to put it in the proper place in your life, so that your money serves you, and you serve God, and not the other way around (God serves you, you serve money).

worry = μεριμνάω - to be divided, pulled in two different directions

toil = κοπιάω = work to the point of exhaustion

eat = φάγω = to consume, to use

drink = πίνω = to imbibe, to take into one's self

feeds = τρέφω = to provide for, nourish, take care of

food = τροφή = food, nourishment, maintenance

clothing = ἔνδυμα = garment, raiment, clothing, put on, sink into

περιβάλλω = to wear = to be covered by, surrounded ourselves with

to clothe = ἀμφιέννυμι = to

Needs acknowledged by God: Eat, Drink, and be Clothed (sheltered).