November 13, 2005

Risky Religion

Judges 4:1-7
1 Thessalonians 5:1-11
Matthew 25:14-30

The parable of the talents, our Gospel lesson for today, is probably one of the most well-known parables, and it's usually associated with stewardship, which I'll bet is why it's in the lectionary at this time of the year. (By the way, if you haven't turned in your pledge card yet, please do so. The Trustees are planning to make some deep cuts in budget items because many have not yet stepped up to the plate. It's important in our faith-based budgeting process that all do their fair share.) To continue with the familiar parable of the talents, as is often the case with Jesus' parables, the true meaning lurks somewhere below the surface.

An owner entrusts to three slaves a large sum of money. A talent was worth more than 15 years' wages of a laborer, a substantial amount of money. Two of them invest the talents given to them, earn a tidy return, and are praised by the master. But the third slave buries his talent in the ground, and for this he is severely criticized. The message seems to be that industry and hard labor are rewarded, so, we are to get out there and use the talents given to us, (i) and that applies to both our gifts (talents) and our material possessions - not a bad message, actually.

But when we start taking a deeper look into this story, we notice a number of strange things. Isn't it interesting that this rich man turns over to his slaves such huge sums of money? There are no carefully worded, legally binding contracts negotiated with another established entrepreneur like himself - just an enormous responsibility bestowed upon three slaves. And he gives no instructions to them as to how to invest his money. He assumes they'll know what to do! He knows them so well, apparently, that he gives differing amounts "to each according to his ability." Two of the slaves strike pay dirt. They wheel and deal, take risks in the market, and double their investment. What are they doing as slaves? They should be stock brokers! But the third slave strikes dirt in another way - he buries his talent - which seems like a strange thing to do. Actually, this was a perfectly acceptable method of safeguarding valuables in those days. Further, there was a long-standing rabbinical teaching that those who bury money put into their care are no longer liable for its safety. The guy's taking a safe, risk-free, prudent course of action on his master's behalf. (ii)

The final strange things about this parable are the master's emotional responses. He seems to be too effusive in praising the first two slaves, and too angry with the third. After all, didn't he give the larger sums to the first two because he knew of their abilities and sense of responsibility? And didn't he give only one talent to the third because he knew that he wasn't equipped with the same skills as the other two? Wouldn't he have expected the first two to do well? And why would his judgment for the other one be so harsh and quick? If you're like me, these questions have a personal ring to them, because rather than identifying with the five or even the two talent slaves, many of us identify with the one talent one. Let's give him a closer look.

Is this slave really as commendable as he makes himself out to be? Are prudence and safety the main reasons for his behavior? No. His primary motivation is fear. "I knew you were a harsh man, O master, and I was afraid, so I hid your talent in the ground." He doesn't bury the money to keep it safe, but rather to save his own neck. By his own words he condemns himself as cowardly and self-serving. Fear distorts his vision of the wonderful opportunity he's been given. He's given complete freedom, as are the other two, to be creative in his stewardship, but he looks upon this freedom as a snare waiting to catch him in failure, and fueled by fear, he opts for faithless inactivity. (iii) It's not that he does anything bad; he just does nothing good.

There is something to be said for being willing to risk, for not always taking the way that's completely safe. Too many of us are unwilling to go off on an excursion of any length without taking the best AAA map or a download from Map Quest along with us, so we won't get lost. But think about some of the great world explorers - Columbus, Magellan, Drake, Lewis and Clark. For sure, they had maps and charts and other aids to help them, but they still took enormous risks in what they did. In hindsight we now know that they based their journeys on maps and charts that were hopelessly flawed. They must have known that these maps were unreliable, for no one before them had done what they were about to do. Yet each of them ventured forth, accepted the risks, plunged into unknown territories, and though they didn't always end up where they'd planned, because of their risk-taking, they changed the face of the world. (iv)

Life is incredibly bland if we are not willing to take risks. Risking enables us to do those things that would be impossible otherwise. There is an expression from baseball that comes to mind: "you can't steal second base and keep your foot on first." Sitting on a park bench, a man observes a squirrel jumping from one high tree to another. The squirrel appears to be aiming for a limb so far out of reach, the man doesn't see how it would ever make it. Sure enough, the squirrel misses - but lands, safe and unconcerned, on a branch several feet lower. Then it climbs to its goal, and all is well. A woman sitting nearby comments: "I've seen hundreds of 'em jump like that, especially when there are dogs around and they can't come down to the ground. A lot of 'em miss, but I've never seen any get hurt in trying." Then she chuckles, "I guess they've got to risk it, if they don't want to spend their whole lives in one tree." Whenever we have to choose between risking a new venture or hanging back, let's remember those squirrels. (v)

In Christianity we are called to a risky religion, to a faith that asks us to take risks. Indeed, faith by definition is a risk. And our faith story is full of people who ventured out taking risks - Abraham, who set out for unknown lands, not knowing where he was going, but who had faith that God would be with him; Moses, who led the people out of Egypt and into the wilderness for forty years, risking all to establish a new community; the prophets, such as Isaiah and Jeremiah, who with great personal risk spoke out against the culture and politics of their day, and who spoke for God, who was calling the people to justice and peace; certainly Jesus himself, who took great personal risks to bring the good news to people, eventually paying the ultimate price; and Christians who followed Jesus, from the Apostle Paul to the martyrs of the first centuries to those who have witnessed to their faith right up to the present day - all took the risks of faith.

But nowadays, many of us get hung up on risks that really are quite insignificant. A magazine article gave a different slant on risk-taking. Consider the following statistics: Many people fear dying in a plane crash, yet the odds against that are 100,000 to 1. Statistically, a person is more likely to be kicked to death by a donkey than to die in a plane crash. Another great fear is that of surgery - of dying on the operating table. But the chances of death there are also small (1 in 40,000), compared with the risk of driving a car on a daily basis - much greater. When it comes to taking risks, most of us are curiously irrational. Millions of people buy lottery tickets, though we are 3 times more likely to be struck by lightning than to strike it rich. Truth is, society has an idolatrous dependence on lotteries, called by some, the "false gods of fortune." As with all false gods, lotteries are totally unreliable, and they hit the poor and the working class disproportionately.

It's ironic that we spend money on extremely long and improbable odds, and blithely ignore the relatively short odds that concern our health and well-being. For instance, insurance companies predict with startling accuracy that being 30% overweight knocks 3 1/2 years off a person's life expectancy. Sometimes it seems we can't tell the difference between big risks and small ones. When it comes to discerning risks, often we are not the sharpest knives in the drawer. (vi)

Undoubtedly, the biggest risk people take is that of living without a firm faith foundation. Getting back to the lottery for a minute again, this actually encourages and is based on faithlessness. The lottery is like the slave who buries his talent in the ground. Trusting in games of chance means we have no faith in ourselves, no faith in God's ability to work through us, and no faith in the power of discipleship itself. We are called to a risky religion, to a discipleship that does not promise a safe harbor, but rather calls us to take real risks, and to venture beyond the known and secure.

There's a poignant story that the late preacher, Peter Marshall, tells, appropriate on this Sunday nearest Veterans' Day, about a young soldier on the front lines in World War II, who, during a lull in the fighting sees a butterfly floating in the air nearby ... "a strange visitor to the battleground - so out of place - so out of keeping with the grim setting, rifles and bayonets, barbed wire and parapets, shell holes and twisted bodies. But there it was, a gorgeous creature, the wings like gold leaf splashed with carmine, swaying in the warm breath of spring." The war-weary young man begins to recall the joys of his boyhood, temporarily forgetting the horrors of war and the enemy a few hundred yards across no man's land. Marshall continues, "With all the hunger in his heart, with the resurrection of dreams and visions that he thought were gone, he reached out his hand toward that butterfly. His fingers moved slowly, cautiously, lest he frighten away this visitor to the battlefield. In showing one kind of caution, he forgot another. The butterfly was just beyond his reach - so he stretched, forgetting that watchful eyes were waiting for a target... A sniper's bullet found its mark. ... For the private soldier in field-gray, the war was over." Marshall concludes: "There is always a risk when you reach for the beautiful. When you reach out for the lovelier, finer, more fragrant things of life, there is always a risk, and you can't escape it. The risk is what makes the Christian life so exciting. It is thrilling - make no mistake about it. It is an adventure. As long as we live in this world, there will always be a risk in [reaching out]." (vii)

I believe that the risks God would have us take are the same kind of risks Jesus Christ took on our behalf. We are called to risk ourselves for the sake of others, to reach out to those who need our love and care. Other people should be the focus of our risk-taking. Being in relationships with others is risky. We risk when we love and serve others, we risk rejection and ridicule, we risk despair and heartbreak for the promise of fulfillment - but these are risks God wants us to take. (viii) May we have the faith to risk. Amen.

The Pilgrim Church of Duxbury
Rev. Kenneth C. Landall

i Anthony B. Robinson, "The Wages of Fear," The Christian Century, 10/27/93, p. 1047.
ii Homiletics, October/November 1993, 11/14/93.
iii Ibid.
iv Ibid.
v Oscar Schisgall, Autoillustrator #3237.
vi Joe Bray, Autoillustrator #4432.
vii Peter Marshall, "The Best of Peter Marshall," Autoillustrator #4442.
viii Homiletics, op. cit.