LIVING A LIFE THAT IS REAL 19th Sunday after Pentecost October 10, 2004
I Timothy 6:6-19 But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses. In the sight of God, who gives life to everything, and of Christ Jesus, who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep this commandment without spot or blame until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which God will bring about in his own time—God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen. Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they might take hold of life that is truly life.
Dear Brothers & Sisters in Christ;
People long for meaning in their life. No one wants to live a life that seems to have no value or purpose. In the final verse of the text, Paul says, "Take hold of life that is truly life." Or, as I would prefer to say it, "Take hold of a life that is real." So how do we live a life like that? What is real life all about?
Before Paul gives the answer to these questions, he makes it clear what kind of people are not living a life that is real. Paul talks about "People who want to get rich" and people who are filled with a "love of money." The root of these people’s problems is greed. They’ve become so obsessed with money, as Paul tells us earlier in the chapter, that they even viewed their Christianity as a means for financial gain. It is clear that they have completely lost perspective. Their lives are consumed by a desire for more wealth.
And this desire has lead them into all kinds of problems. Listen to the life that has resulted from money-love: "People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction." Once greed got a hold of their life, they started down a slippery slope of sin after sin. Soon it was as though they were on sinking ship with no way to get off. And the ultimate destination of that ship was ruin and destruction. Paul also describes the life that results from greed as this: "Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs." What worse description for a person’s life could there be? Not only have they wandered away from the faith and the joy that is found there, they have pierced their own hearts with many griefs. What a miserable life this describes! This isn’t a life that anyone would hope for. It certainly wasn’t the life that those people whom Paul is describing wished for. Paul does not write that they were eager for misery. He writes that they were eager for money. What they found was misery. Perhaps you are reminded of old Ebenezer Scrooge who lived his sad, miserable existence because his love of money had pushed all his friends and family out of his life.
But is Paul writing these words only for the Ebenezer Scrooges of the world? I doubt that any of us would put ourselves in that category. And maybe it’s true that none of us are hard-core lovers of money. It’s not as though any of us wake up in the morning and say, "I sure love money more than God." But who hasn’t thought to themselves: "If only I had a few thousand more dollars I could pay back debts, fill in the cracks and my life would be happier." But the truth is, we wouldn’t be satisfied even if we had those extra thousands of dollars. We’d find reasons that we need still more money. Maybe you are not a lover of money, but perhaps you have at least become pretty good friends with it. And this is a friendship that only grows deeper as we feed it with our own greed. Before we know it, we find ourselves on that same slippery slope that we heard about earlier. And the devil is there with his traps waiting for us. These traps can be seen as sacrifices. Not sacrifices that we want to make, but sacrifices that we make because of our friendship with money. Sacrifices such as sacrificing time with our family for the sake of wealth, or sacrificing the amount of money that could be put in the offering plate because we think it could be invested better elsewhere. Sometimes our friendship with money causes us to sacrifice our own happiness, because our joy is tied up in how well high or low the crop market is doing or whether or not we get a big enough raise in our paychecks.
This is not living a life that is real. This is a life that is headed in the wrong direction. A life that ultimately leads to ruin and destruction. Paul has some very strong words against such a lifestyle. He says, "Flee from all this!" Paul tells us that when we see ourselves becoming too fond of money, run away! The problem is that we do not always realize that there is something for us to be fleeing from. It is good for us sometimes to stop and examine ourselves and ask the question, "How far have I fallen down the slipper slope of money-love?" I’m guessing for most of us it is farther than we would like to admit. And this is not a good thing. In fact this is something that we should flee from. We should flee because it is sinful in itself and the root of all kinds of evils. We should flee because the results of being fond of money are miserable. We should flee because this is not really living. This is not what real life is all about.
Paul tells those people who might be tempted with a love for money that they need to shift their focus—they need to take their focus off of what they can get, and, instead, focus on what they have been given. Paul writes, "Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment." Those who were placing their hope in wealth were standing on some pretty shaky ground. But Paul points them to the solid foundation that God provided for them. This was ground that could not be shaken. This was ground soaked with the blood of Christ and made solid by his resurrection from the death. This was the solid ground of God’s love and his providence. This ground was wealth beyond their imagination.
And it was wealth they could share with others. They could share their spiritual wealth by telling others of God’s love in Christ. But Paul also wanted them to share their material wealth. He writes, "Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share." They had been given so much. Now Paul encouraged them to take every opportunity to give back some of what they had been given.
We, too are recipients of God’s wealth. The sure hope that Paul wrote about thousands of years ago is the same hope we cling to today. Over the summer our choir sang at the many funerals we had and one of the hymns they sang spoke about our greatest riches. “Jesus Thy Blood and Righteousness." What great riches we find in these words. Through Jesus’ death on the cross and shedding of innocent blood, all our sins were paid in full. All of our greed, all of our love of money, all of our selfishness has been forgiven. In their place, we have been covered with Jesus’ own righteousness. With a gift like this, we can never consider ourselves poor no matter how much or little of worldly wealth we possess. We have been given all that we really need in Christ. As the cross is held before our eyes once again, we begin to see what real life is all about.
Just as those believers in Paul’s day, we are also able to give to others the wealth that God has given to us. We are also able to do good, be generous and be willing to share. It’s really amazing to think that when we give money to church or to missions, we are actually participating in the work that God has prepared in advance for us to do. We have opportunities to give money towards disaster relief to help our churches that were damaged by the hurricanes in Florida.
This church along with our entire synod is involved in the work of saving souls from the greatest tragedy of all—unbelief. Donating money to a worthwhile cause such as this is one way to enjoy real life. We can also live real life by showing generosity and a willingness to share.
There is one more point I would like to make with respect to living a life that is real. It is the same point that Paul concludes our text with this morning. It has to do with where our real treasure lies. St Paul says, “Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they might take hold of life that is truly life.” Or as Jesus put it, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” (Matthew 6:19-20)
In other words don’t look at this earth as our permanent home. If we were to focus all of our attention on our wealth and possessions in this life, we would be spending our time trying to store up things that eventually have no value at all. But when we lift our eyes heavenward we are able to see things with the right perspective. We see our possessions as gifts from God and we want to use them to further his kingdom and to serve his people. It’s not about what we have but how we can use what we have to glorify God. And that, dear friends, is what life is all about—real life! Amen.
