Community Christian Church
Roger Ray, pastor
Luke 3:7-14For most of human history, poverty was caused by scarcity. There simply was not enough food, water, housing, and there were not enough seats in classrooms for everyone to receive an education, be comfortably housed, and adequately fed. The past half century was the first time in the history of civilization when the world has had more than enough to provide these things to everyone but what we have now is not a lack of resources but a lack of morality, a lack of will, a lack of common decency. Our poverty is uniquely created by those who hoard both wealth and power.
7John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. 9Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." 10And the crowds asked him, "What then should we do?" 11In reply he said to them, "Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise." 12Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, "Teacher, what should we do?" 13He said to them, "Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you." 14Soldiers also asked him, "And we, what should we do?" He said to them, "Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages."
By the mid-90's this fact was being broadly discussed among both economists and agricultural specialists. There was no longer a need to focus on how to produce more food. We were already producing more than was being eaten and, in fact, more than could be eaten. We were subsidizing turning food into gasoline to try to get rid of it while still surrounded by starvation.
I have been involved in poverty and hunger related charities for most of my adult life. I've helped to build feeding centers in rural Nicaragua, cooked for our local homeless and still, every week, I'm on the serving line helping to feed as many hungry, homeless guys as we can find. But I know that charity is not the answer.
I don't want to diminish charity. I sent a gift to Nicaragua this week because I still very much believe in the work that the Rainbow Network does there. I'll be back serving lunch to the homeless this Thursday, as I am every Thursday. But I know that these gestures are symbolic.... It is like trying to put out a forest fire with a squirt gun. The problem is not that food is not available, the problem is that so many people cannot buy it... they can't get into the economic flow of people who get a regular pension or paycheck, that let's them go the market, buy what they want to eat, and take it home and cook it.
As Dorothy Day was fond of saying, the problem is our rotten stinking system, and our acceptance of it.
Our ancient scriptures, our hymns, our cultural myths and stories, all evolved in a world where there was a shortage of goods and so we have derived images of generosity, of sharing, of showing charitable concern for those who are less fortunate... but all of those tender hearted, well intended images are not accurate descriptions of current day.
I get it... I get it more than most of you.... I have seen Dickens' A Christmas Carol a hundred times, I've played the Ghost of Christmas Present at least three times on stage myself, and I still cry every time Scrooge has his epiphany at the end.... Even when I watch the Mr. McGoo version of the Christmas Carol! But I'm telling you, charity is a kind of feel good tipping in the face of the real problem which is an economic system that keeps nearly a half of the population locked into poverty when we have more than enough to take care of them.
There are more empty repossessed houses in the United States than there are homeless people! There is more food going to the landfill every day than is needed to feed every hungry person in the world. Our problem is not scarcity... unless what you mean by scarcity is a dearth of conscience.
My favorite historian, forgive me Dr. Adams.... You are a close second, my favorite historian, Howard Zinn, said, The rule of law does not do away with the unequal distribution of wealth and power, but reinforces that inequality with the authority of law. It allocates wealth and poverty. . . in such complicated and indirect ways as to leave the victim bewildered.
One of the smartest, most multi-talented people I know is on public assistance and has been, off and on, for 20 years. She can do carpentry, plumbing, electrical work, and she can fix nearly anything on almost any car. She can cook any form of game and manage to make food stamps feed the homeless and dispossessed kids on her street, but she can't break into the universe of employment, insurance, retirement, and homeownership. She is hardworking and talented but she has some health issues, some complicated family hurdles, and absolutely cannot break out of the cycle of poverty.
And if she were the only person in town in this predicament, I would solve her problems myself.... If her situation was a stand alone circumstance, I would just take it on my own shoulders and solve it.
But my phone rings every day with calls from people with very legitimate needs, asking for assistance.... Yesterday, a woman called who had fled a violent spouse and was staying in a local cheap hotel and she needed someone to help her stay there.... The spouse abuse shelter is full and has a waiting list that may be months long..... should he subject herself and her children to violence and possibly murder and just wait for an open room?
I'm telling you, the system is a dirty, rotten, stinking, system that is not fit for humans. And it isn't like Dorothy Day, Gandhi, Cesar Chavez, Martin Luther King, and I just discovered this fact in the past century.
We have a biblical text before us today.... I know that some of you may have almost given up on me every referencing the Bible again but today we actually have a gospel lesson from the third chapter of Luke. If we were a church that was very aware of the lectionary and the Christian calendar, we would know that today is the 3rd Sunday of Advent, that season of precursor lessons before Christmas.
And every year, the prescribed gospel lesson for the 3rd Sunday of Advent features a reference to John the Baptist. But this year, what is called "year c" featuring readings from the gospel according to Luke, is the only year that we get even a fragment of what John is reported to have preached.
John actually enjoyed a good deal more fame in the first century than Jesus ever did. There was a religious sect that remained faithful to him long after he died... a quasi Jewish-sect that gathered in the name of John until his memory was finally eclipsed by the Jesus movement.
So the four canonical gospels all have to at least tip their hat to John... they had to somehow polemically make the claim that John personally acknowledged that Jesus was more important than he was. The gospels even insist that John was beheaded and only then Jesus became a public preacher but other historical sources suggest that Jesus was killed before John was executed.... The gospel writers may have played a bit fast and loose with the details here and if they did, it wouldn't be the only time they did....
Only Luke even attempts to preserve any substantive part of the preaching of John. John was very popular, he was very influential but if you want to know why, you have to look at these seven verses in the 3rd chapter of Luke because that's the only hint that you will get.
But there is nothing there about a coming messiah.... Nothing about going to hell or being rewarded with heaven..... his advice is much more down to earth.... Sort of an economics 101.
When I was in seminary, one of the professors dared to offer a course entitled, "Practical Theology," which set the rest of the faculty in an uproar because if you can offer a course in practical theology that implies that all of the other courses in theology were impractical and sometimes, in a prestigious university, the simple fact that the shoe fits doesn't mean that you have the slightest interest in wearing it!
I don't know if these 7 verses are a historical reflection of what John really stood for, what he actually said and was all about, or if this is a creation of Luke's imagination. There is no historical evidence either way so your opinion is just as good as any learned scholar on the matter.
For may own part, and I have a microphone and none of you do right now so I will pretend that means something, I like to believe that this is an echo of John's real preaching. It pleases me to think so. It pleases me and it is consistent of what I see in the basic historical record of Moses, Buddha, Zoroaster, the Maccabees, Jesus, Mohamed, Francis and maybe even Martin Luther.
That is, it seems that almost every meaningful religious reform movement begins when someone manages to stand up for the poor, the marginalized, the enslaved, the landless, the hopeless, the poor, and say: Look, you buttholes, if you have two coats, give one to someone who doesn't have one.... If you have more than enough to eat, share your bread with someone who is going hungry.
No one could be much more cynical than I am about organized religion and yet here I am. I am a pastor of a church. I am the voice on a religious podcast, the image on a YouTube religion channel, and even though when someone on the plane next to me asks me what I do, I tell them that I am a philosophy professor, my tax return's W-2 says that I am a pastor......
I am an ordained, tax-exempt, institution of organized religion and yet I what I hold onto is that I am not a part of the guilt-ridden, manipulative, self-serving purveyors of misinformation and magic.....
I want to lay claim to being a part of the history of prophets who fought to free slaves, liberate the oppressed, who spoke up for the poor, and demanded that people open their closets and send their extra shoes to Nicaragua, their coats and hats to Bill's Place, and to vote in a way that brings the poor into the economy rather than keeping the laws and banking rules in place that awards the few with wealth and the many with suffering.
No one here is in realistic danger of hunger but we are all in danger of being on the wrong side of history if we do not work, sacrifice, prophecy, and actively seek to change the dirty, rotten, system, that leaves hundreds in danger of freezing to death tonight while many of the rest of us argue over what we will watch on HBO. John said that the ax was laid at the root ready to throw the useless into the fire.... He have been guilty of overstatement, but not by much. Merry Christmas y'all.
