Amos 6:1a, 4-7
1 Timothy 6:6-19
Luke 16:19-end
On Monday I went to the “Sunken Cities” exhibition at the
British Museum. Underwater archaeology has brought to light two ancient
Egyptian cities which sank beneath the waves more than a thousand years ago.
The finds are fascinating and remarkably well preserved.
These were important religious centres, particularly for
the cult of Osiris, the Egyptian god of the dead. Elaborate annual rituals
marked the passage of this god into the underworld, where he was believed to
preside over the dead.
Belief in the underworld, the world of the dead, was
common across the pre-Christian world. The dead, it was supposed, descended to
dark caverns beneath the earth where they lived out a ghostly existence. The
best you could hope for was an imitation of this life, with possessions and
food and slaves and so on, but only if you were someone really important like
the Pharaoh. The world of the dead was not really something to look forward to.
Now, why is this relevant to today’s gospel reading? Well,
look at where the rich man ends up after he dies: he is in Hades. That is, the
world of the dead, the underworld. We might read this through the lens of mediaeval theology and subconsciously think,
aha, he’s gone to Hell. But that’s not what the text says: he is in the world
of the dead.
Like the ancient Egyptians, the imagination of this rich
man was bounded by death. During his lifetime, he lived as though death were
the final reality. So he does nothing except eat enormous banquets of rich
food, lounging around in pantomime robes and stuffing himself with delicacies
every day.
But he ignored the poor. After all, if death ends
everything, if we all go down to the gloomy underworld and life is just a zero
sum game, what is the point of helping anyone? What good will it do, in the
end? “Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die!”
So, now the rich man is dead, he is simply inhabiting the
reality that has defined his entire life. He finds himself in the world of the
dead, because he has never imagined anything else.
But Lazarus, on the other hand, has entered a reality that
the rich man had never even suspected. He is being comforted with the angels
and with Abraham – a figure from the distant past who ought to be completely
dead, but is mysteriously very much alive.
Lazarus has entered the world of the Resurrection, which
is what this parable is all about. The clue comes at the end, when Abraham
says, “if they will not listen either to Moses or to the prophets, they will
not be convinced even if someone should rise from the dead.”
Lazarus, in this story, is a figure for Jesus himself –
the rejected outcast who died, forgotten by the world, but was raised in glory
by his Father.
The resurrection of Jesus is more than just an event in
history, though of course it is that. The Bible speaks of the resurrection as a
moment of revelation. Through the resurrection of Jesus the ultimate truth
behind the universe is made known to us: and it is not death, but life. God is the creator of all things, and in him
is no death at all.
As the second letter to Timothy puts it, “God called us… not
according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace. This grace
was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, but it has now been
revealed through the appearing of our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death
and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.”
The resurrection, simply, is entering into the life that
God lives, which Jesus Christ has revealed. The second Eucharistic prayer,
which we use on Sundays and is about 1800 years old, expresses the same belief:
“he put an end to death by dying for us; and revealed the resurrection by
rising to new life”[1].
This is sheer gift. “God called us not according to our
works but according to his grace.” Overflowing generosity, love, and life, go
together. We face a choice: we can stay in the world of the dead, without hope,
in which we can close our hearts and ignore the poor. Or we can enter the
resurrection, revealed by Jesus Christ, who has risen from the dead to call us
to repentance.
Repentance means taking a new direction, crossing over
from one side to another. In this parable, the rich man wants to do that, but
can’t. But this story closes a series of parables in which change can and does
happen: the prodigal son, the dishonest manager whom we encountered last
week.
It’s as though this parable wants to end by underlining
that it is all about choice: you can choose to stay in the old imagination
bounded by death if you really want to; but Jesus Christ has revealed the new
reality, the life of God in the resurrection, which we are called to enter.
This is something that the parables repeat again and
again. Those who seek to hang on to what they’ve got, as though this was the
secret of their life, miss out on true life, which is God’s gift. Riches and
possessions close our hearts to mercy, to the possibility of change and
redemption. On the other hand, if we own our poverty, our nakedness and our
need, then God will give us his kingdom.
Repentance then is all about living in the new reality in
which death is not. The ultimate reality behind the universe is life and love,
the God who gives himself without limit and without being diminished. This is
sheer gift and grace, we don’t earn it. But if we enter that reality then we
are going to start living like that. We will care for the poor, the
marginalized and the outcast. We will live out God’s love in our lives.
We are called to respond to Jesus Christ, in
whatever guise he may meet us as we journey through life – he may very well be
the Lazarus lying at the gates of our modern city. If we allow room in our
hearts for him, if we allow room for the Father’s life and love and compassion,
then we will start to live according to the resurrection.
And when at length death finally rends the veil, and we
step through into God’s eternity, then we will not be strangers to the dazzling
light that will be revealed to us, but will be welcomed into the kingdom of the
resurrection that has been prepared for us from the foundation of the world.
[1]
That prayer, the so-called Canon of Hippolytus, is now thought to be Egyptian
in origin. Compare it with the cult of Osiris for an insight into the
conversion of culture by the Gospel.
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