A Community that is Rich Toward God

August 3, 2025 - The Eighth Sunday after Pentecost

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be always faithful and acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength and our Redeemer. Amen.

I love the way that sometimes art can reveal a truth about the human experience. And I have been struck ever since I first saw this clip from the movie Shenandoah in 1965. Jimmy Stewart as the hard-scrabble farmer, Charlie Anderson, is gathered with his children around the table and realizes he has to offer a prayer of thanksgiving.

So here it goes, and you really, I'm not going to try and do Jimmy Stewart, but hear that voice.

"Lord, we cleared this land. We plowed it, sowed it, and harvested it. We cooked the harvest. It wouldn't be here. We wouldn't be eaten if we hadn't done it all ourselves. We worked dog-bone hard for every crumb and morsel. But we thank you just the same anyway, Lord, for the food we're about to eat. Amen."

We at times will use words to thank God, but what we too often know in our mind is, "We did it!" We might have bounty and riches, but it's because we, and by that I mean me, in each situation, "I did it."

Ever since I heard it, I've also been impressed... so, I grew up in the days of the height of the then San Diego Charger, Dan Fouts, Hall of Fame quarterback. And I heard the story that every week, if he did not get sacked during the game, he took the whole offensive line out to dinner. Because he recognized, 'yes, I may be the star quarterback, but I am only able to do what I do, both in the game and the longevity of my career, if the offensive line is protecting me.'

There was within him a recognition of the mutuality of being part of a team that one may be gifted, one may work hard, but one is still dependent upon others.

With that background, I am going to invite you to hear this gospel text again. I am going to be a little overdramatic, so I am glad Father John didn't read it quite this way. But here it goes. Ready?

Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me." But he said to him, "Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?" And he said to them, "Take care, be on your guard against all kinds of greed, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." Then Jesus told them this parable. "The land of a rich man produced abundantly, and he thought to himself, What should I do? For I have no place for my crops. Then he said, I will do this. I will pull down my barns and build larger ones. And then I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, soul, you have been ample good laid up for many years. Let's eat, drink, be merry." But God said to him, "You fool, this very night your life is being demanded of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?" So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves, but are not rich towards God.

"I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I. "

There's David Lohse, the professor and biblical scholar, and Lutheran pastor says he became victim of the unholy Trinity: "Me, myself, and I."

It's what we do as people... Yes, we are individuals with gifts and experiences and capabilities, but we always do it in relationship with others.

Let's just take this Sunday.

I would like to, well, we often, when we think about how good church may or may not be, we start with, truly not right but wrong, we start with the clergy, so will the priests please stand up?

John? Stand up, Jim, Jeff... I know you do stuff here too.

We always see the acolytes sitting next to them. So if you're an acolyte, not just Sunday, this Sunday, but any Sunday, please stand up.

We have the musicians, please stand up. We have the ushers who greet people in the beginning, please stand up. Of course, woe to particularly us clergy who realize this doesn't start on Sunday. We are deeply grateful for the Altar Guild, please stand up. And we have folks who read the lessons and prayers of the people, please stand up. And because in the Episcopal Church, as a rabbi once told me about life at the synagogue, we don't meet unless we eat... If you're involved in brunch and potluck afterwards, please stand up. The reality is also we know that in church growth, the single most common reason that anyone ever comes to a church is not location, it's not advertising, it's not programming, it is a personal invitation. So if you've invited someone to come to church, whether they're here this day or not, but if you've invited someone to come to church, come here to Epiphany or some other church in the last, we'll just say year, stand up. (90% of the room is standing.)

So tell me, who makes Sunday a good day? It's not just the clergy. That much is for sure. Please sit down.

But the fact of the matter is, and by the way, I want to just say it is so great to be back with you. Sometimes we don't recognize what's going on, but outsiders can reflect back. So when I was last here, when I was regional canon for the southern region, the Canon Missioner for the southern region of the legacy West, anybody want to guess in the summer of 2021, how many were in church that day?

It was 24, I looked in the book.

You all, this is exciting. I know all the church numbers. I've sold church buildings. In fact, I'm about ready to get one back that we might have to sell a second time. But you all are proof that the gospel is life-transforming, that God's grace is real, and it makes a difference.

And in this hungry and divided world, we need to share this message because the world needs to hear it, that there is another way.

Now, as much as things are comparatively going well right now, and it could be really easy to congratulate yourselves and think about what you've done, you're only here because of the people that have gone before.

Janet, how many clergy do you think you called during the three-plus years of the transition? How many priests came through here? "A lot." Jim came out of retirement for what, the third, fourth time?

"Fifth or sixth time?"

I worked with the vestry and the transition committee for the whole two years that I was here. And Canon Bill Spade, of blessed memory, spent a year working with you all before that time. Plus, I don't even know which Canon stepped in after I left. I know you had at least Travis Wilson from the Lutheran Church helping out, and I think some others from what I saw in the book. You had Lisa and the vestry at that time, buckling down as leaders to figure out how to hold things together. The search committee that met faithfully for four years.

And even that, you all were only able to go through those four years because, I don't know how many of you are left here now, but a handful plus of you stayed faithful to God's gospel and the Episcopal Church and grace as we understand it in the split in 2007.

Of that group of you who are here, how many of you were here then? Please stand up. If you were here in 2007 as a member... and Rosie? These (four) people and however many were with them gave this congregation the opportunity to be who you are today.

We are indebted to one another in real time for what each of us is doing, and we're indebted to those who have gone before.

Jesus says at the end of the parable that this man was a fool, but because he was not rich towards God. It's important to understand, this guy we have no reason to believe from the way Jesus tells the story, he wasn't a bad person. He wasn't evil, he wasn't conniving, he was not underhanded, he was not malicious. He was a little self-focused.

When you think about the summary of the law, right? What are the two great laws? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. Love God, neighbor, and self. This guy only did one of the three.

When we focus on God, when we are aware of God, when we are thinking all these things, not only are all these people here, but the fact of the matter is, you all have only been able to do what you've been able to do, not simply because of what you contributed personally, but because God's Spirit has always been in this place.

And you all leaned heavily into that. And you all reflected it back. Can I say that? Because I was one who was here to see it. And even in that day when there were only 24 of you in the pews, I would tell folks, there is a spirit of joy in this place.

And as I've said to a couple other congregations I've worked with, I'm like, yeah, I can't promise and say how you're going to get through all this, but what I can say is God is not done with you yet. And so in our doing, we need to again, to remember to lean into and give thanks to God.

We need to be rich towards God and generous towards God. Now, you might think, how do we do that? Last time I checked, there is no PO box for God. This is not about writing a check, pay to the order of God by 10% and put it in the mail, put a stamp on it and drop it in the mailbox.

How is it that we are rich towards God? It's how we treat one another.

It's how we are generous towards each other because each of you, each of the people who come through these doors for worship, for meal, for yoga, for classes, for silence, everyone who comes in this space, everyone who you interact with out on the street is a child of God, beloved by God, created in God's image.

And I know it's jumping Gospels, but when we go to the Gospel of Matthew 25, right, in the parable of the sheep and the goats, the judgment of the nations, which is interesting. That's a collective judgment, not an individual judgment. There's that whole thing about, you know, God separating the sheep and the goats, and one side you did really good, and the other side not so good. They're like, well, when did we, when did we treat you that way, God?

When you, the way you treated the least of these, when you gave one who was hungry food, when you gave someone who was thirsty a drink, when you visited someone who was sick and in prison, when you gave someone who was naked of clothes, what you did to them, you did to me. The way we are rich towards God is we'd be rich towards one another.

So I love and I count to this day one of my greatest blessings in 30 years of ministry was gathering with a handful of you for bearing eight souls, their cremains in your memorial garden.

Because you did that, you never literally saw the person. They never offered anything to Epiphany. You saw their memory and who they were in their cremains as a child of God. And you gave them respect and dignity as you have every individual, every cremain before and since then. Not simply by giving them a place, but gathering to say, the same burial office that you do for a spouse, a child, a loved one, a member of this congregation.

There were more of us who gathered to pray for those people who had died than the actual people. Because you as a congregation value these who everyone else has no longer made visible. And in that moment, you were being rich towards God by being rich towards them.

We live in a time of great individuality where we want to say, I see everyone else going to gather the best that they can, so I guess it is a dog-eat-dog world. And I need to white-knuckle it, and I need to gather everything for myself.

What Jesus tells us is this is foolish.

Even if you're nice and gentle and a good suburban Episcopalian, nice doesn't cut it. You're not supposed to be generally good. What God asks us is that we love abundantly and radically and fully, that we be rich towards God who has blessed us abundantly.

When we operate from that stance as an individual, as a congregation, as a city, as a nation, as a diocese, then we make God visible, God's love and God's grace to people who are still searching and hurting and in need. When we provide an experience of God's love, they see God in their own life reaching out to them.

Final story. One of my professors at Seminary used to take individuals to India on pilgrimage to Mother Teresa's convent and the hospice home that she and the sisters operated. There was a group of evangelicals one day that were in this journey, in this pilgrimage, and they asked Mother Teresa, "Why do you do this? These aren't Christians. These aren't folks who are born again and saved."

Mother Teresa, who is not known for being mystical at all, was very much down to earth, simply, let's get the task done, said, "Because I know that one day these people will die and they will meet our Lord Jesus."

And when they do, they will say, I know who you are because I saw you in the woman who fed me as I lay dying. I met you in the woman who was caring for me as I was losing my life. You all have been and are a community of great faith and joy and spirit.

I commend you for that, and I challenge you as individuals and as a congregation to continue to grow in that way, to grow rich towards God in your work with one another, in your ministry to this community, in your partnership with the churches and the diocese, as we seek to make visible the grace of God, the love of God, and God's presence in this world.

Because in so doing, God will bring through us that kingdom of God that we pray for every time we say the Lord's prayer, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

You are blessed with an abundance. Choose to be rich, and you will be a blessing to the world.