An Apparent Contradiction

 

1^st Sunday after Trinity 2021

St. Paul’s Anglican, Church

Rev. Stephen E. Stults

June 6, 2021

 

We bid you God’s Grace today on this, the First Sunday after Trinity.  As we enter this restful season of the Church, I pray that all of us may experience great spiritual rest, but also significant spiritual growth. May our individual faith grow as green as the flourishing summer grass!

 

Trinity 1 provides us with a seemingly apparent contradiction.  How, you may ask? It appears to us in the juxtaposition of the wonderful, warm treatise by St. John versus the rather stern reminder of eternal judgment as told in today’s Gospel from St. Luke.

 

First, we are told about the wonders of God’s love for us. St. John tells us, “..For love is of God.” Also, he that loves God should love his brother also; and we are told of God’s overwhelming love for us, that, while we didn’t love God, He loved us and sent his only Son to “be a propitiation for our sins.” Again, as restated by St. John, God loved us so much that Jesus was made the mediator and saviour for the whole world.

 

Perhaps the crowning statement of the passage is that by living in God’s love, we may have “boldness” in the day of judgment! We are not to fear, because fear has a tormenting quality to it. Perfect love casts out fear. He who fears is not made perfect in love. Isn’t this wonderful?  We have love; we have no fear of what is to come, for we trust in Jesus for our salvation. It is warm and lovely.

 

Then, we have the parable, told by Christ Himself, about Lazarus and the rich man. It is, no doubt familiar to all of us. Here is the rich man, faring “sumptuously” every day, clothed in beautiful clothes and experiencing all the creature comforts. He has it made in every respect, it seems. 

Contrast that with Lazarus, full of sores, who “is laid” at his gate, starving, barely alive.  Note the language here.  Lazarus did not sit at the rich man’s gate, nor did he actively beg.  Someone laid him there, presumably in hopes that he might receive care. He desired to be fed with the “crumbs” which fell from the rich man’s table.  These were actually pieces of bread that the rich used to wipe their hands and discard, in lieu of napkins.  How precious that bread would have been to a starving man!

 

The story continues with the rich man’s subsequent death and also that of Lazarus, who evidently received no care or help. Both die; yet their destinations vary greatly.  The rich man looks up in Hell; the beggar looks down from Abraham’s bosom, which was thought to be some sort of paradisial state.  He is in bliss, the rich man in hellish torment.

 

Yet, is there repentance in the rich man, now damned?  It seems not, for he begs Father Abraham to “send Lazarus” to bring him comfort, a little water to cool his tongue. Even in damnation and hellfire, the man thinks he has pre-eminence over Lazarus.  Send Lazarus? How presumptuous this is!  Abraham reminds him that his state is just, for as he was comforted in life, Lazarus was denied good things; now he, the rich man, is tormented and Lazarus comforted. Abraham also reminds the condemned that it is impossible to cross from paradise to hell, or hell to paradise.  This being the case, the rich man, either in a state of extreme hubris or utter desperation, begs that Lazarus return to life on earth to warn his brothers of their fiery fate ahead.  This also is denied because they have the testimony of Moses and the prophets. One last protest comes from the despairing rich man, that one coming back from the dead would cause repentance.  This too Abraham denies, saying if they will not heed Moses and the prophets, neither will they repent if one returned from the dead.

 

This is a stark, tough story.  It tells us several things: there is judgment; there is consequence for our deeds; this consequence is eternal and non-reversible. All of these can be gleaned rather easily from the parable.  What is not told us is why the rich man was damned.

Was it because he was rich? Not necessarily. It is possible to be rich and virtuous, although it is difficult and perhaps rare.

 

We must return to St. John for the answer: “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God and every that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.” Are we on to something?  At the end of the passage, we have the answer: “That he who loveth God love his brother also.”

 

Consider the rich man in this light.  Did he love God?  Did he love his brother? The answer is obvious…no, all he loved was himself.  He did not love God.  He did not love his neighbor as himself.  He literally rode past or rode over a pitiful member of the human race whom he could have helped, maybe even saved.  This complete lack of love, this unwillingness to let God’s love in so that he could send it back out, was the reason for his damnation. His complete absorption with self to the exclusion of everything else, especially the abundant love of God, was the reason for his undoing.

 

Love must be dynamic.  It cannot be a passive force in our lives, merely filling us with a warm feeling of affection.  Unlike the rich man, if we claim to love God, we must love our brother also.

 

How difficult this is today!  Hateful ideologies abound, which pit race against race and class against class, all with the aim of division. Love is preached, without acknowledgement of the source of love. Law is viewed as paramount, while grace and faith are ignored as the underpinning of that law. No appeal to the Almighty is made to solve our woes, because to do so would undermine our arrogance that man is the measure of all things.  Real love is absent, replaced by victimhood and the call for vengeance.  Everyone is offended by something.  There is little charity among us.

 

Yet, all is not lost. St. John told us so: “In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because God sent his only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.”  True life is possible, when we accept the magnificent love of God into ourselves and show it forth by our love of others.

 

St John and St. Luke are not at variance with each other.  Rather, the theme is the same in both: let us love God with all of our heart and with all of our soul and with all of our mind; and let us love our neighbor as ourself.  Truly, on these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets. AMEN.

 

1 John 4:21 - 5:1  ^“And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.”