Sermon Tone Analysis

Scripture: Luke 16:19-31

At Risk

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2 Cities

There are two worlds that co-exist in every city.

There is a world above for those who have comfort and provision and a world below for those who live in strife.

They are not always literally uptown and downtown, but there are often clear geographic boundaries around these locations.

But there are also churches that exist in between neighborhoods, on the borders of uptown and downtown.

There are some beautiful things that can happen when all the different tribes of God’s people come together.

It is like being the Temple of God, where His presence dwelt, with all His people together.

There is nothing automatic about this kind of fellowship.

It takes time and life together, and it takes trust in something greater than ourselves.

It gives our world and our community just a glimpse of the reality that we all need Jesus and that those who have much are at much at risk of hell as those who have little or nothing.

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Lazarus

This parable follows soon after the parable of the dishonest manager and the series of parables about lost and found things that demonstrate God’s Kingdom.

Even though Jesus was addressing some of the Pharisees, I think Jesus was still focused on giving his disciples an important lesson for later.

The prodigal son parable left us with two sons and a father together again, wondering what will happen next.

The Dishonest manager, like the younger son, squandered his master’s wealth but found a measure of mercy and grace by repenting and sharing that mercy and grace with others (albeit in a dishonest way).

Today, we have two characters again, like the two brothers, living life together, yet separated, and an ultimate judgment for both of them.

Lazarus was a very poor and very sick man.

He was probably not a very old man, either.

Poverty and homelessness took the lives of people quite early back in those days.

The description of the sores on his body might give us the impression that he was a leper, but lepers, by law, were not allowed to be in public.

They could not be beggars in town.

No, he was very sick but somehow still allowed to cross into town and languish in the backyard of this wealthy homeowner.

The name Lazarus is a Greek version of the Hebrew name Eleazar - one of the sons of Aaron in the tribe of Levi, meaning “God has helped.”

It’s both fitting and ironic because no one helps him in his life, but God helps and blesses him after his death.

We know, from the Gospel of John, of another Lazarus who God helped after his death when he received no help in life.

The early Christians would likely have heard of this Lazarus as well.

It is a powerful thing in these parables for the characters to be named.

Jesus wants us to pay attention to this character.

But why?

What does this Lazarus do?

He suffered, publicly humiliated, living off whatever scraps of this household he could wrestle away from the dogs, and then eventually died.

The rich man probably hired someone to cart the body off like a wild animal and dispose of it.

Lazarus had no family to help or to mourn him.

In this parable, Lazarus barely lives, and the few moments that we see show us what we don’t want life to be like for us.

Then, in the afterlife, Lazarus receives his reward: Carried by the angels into rest, peace, care, comfort, and home.

Abraham, the father figure in this parable, explained that Lazarus received evil in life, so now he is comforted in death.

God had indeed helped him.

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The Rich Man

Jesus also gives us the character of the rich man to contrast with Lazarus.

Unlike Lazarus, the rich man is never named.

We know little of his life, even less than Lazarus because he stayed safe behind the doors of his home.

We only know that he lived a life of comfort.

It does not say whether he is a good or bad person.

Everything about the rich man seems to intentionally point out that he is a neutral character - neither good nor bad.

His life and passing seem to have little effect on the world around him.

Not so in his death.

In death, the rich man experienced torment.

Raging flames drained the life from him and left him in pain and agony.

Perhaps worst of all, there in Hell, he could see Lazarus in some kind of heaven.

The tables are turned, and now it is the nameless rich man who is on the outside looking in at the beggar who died in his yard.

The rich man cried out to Father Abraham, asking for just a drop of mercy from Lazarus, and Abraham responded that it cannot be done.

It is too late.

It is too late.

Our culture hates to hear that message that it is too late and will claim that that’s Old Testament religion, not the gospel, but those of you who have read through the whole bible know that some of the hardest, harshest teachings about judgment come from Jesus in the gospels.

There will come a day, a moment in time, when it is too late, when we’ve lived our lives, made our choices, and are stuck with the consequences.

It is tempting for us to try to put ourselves in the place of Lazarus, but Jesus doesn’t let us do it for this parable.

Lazarus is not the main character.

We don’t know what he felt or thought.

Instead, Jesus puts us as readers right behind the eyes of the rich man.

We see what he sees and feel what he feels.

And we don’t think about the poor.

We think about our families who have followed our example, inherited our livelihoods and lifestyles, who we see following down a similar road that we have walked.

We have to warn them.

And yet Jesus tells us that there is a point where it is too late even for that.

Even if we sent an eyewitness back from the dead, who would listen to him?

Who would believe, even if they saw someone come out of the tomb?

We think of Jesus rising from the dead, and rightly so, but this parable invites us to take a different turn at the end.

Sitting in the sadness and hopelessness and too-late-ness of this parable, where even Father Abraham questions how effective a resurrected witness might be, we have a wild card:

Lazarus.

The one God has helped.

The one who got his reward at last.

And the name of one who would indeed come back from the dead and bear witness to the truth of God’s judgment and life after death.

Would this poor beggar in the parable give up his comfort to come back and warn the man’s family members who ignored him in his time of need?

That is a question posed to the disciples as Jesus told them this parable.

Would you?

It makes me wonder if Jesus told this parable to the real Lazarus.

It makes me wonder if he asked Lazarus if he was willing to die so that God might be glorified and everyone would know that Jesus was the Resurrection and the Life.

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The first sermon revisited

In the first sermon I preached here just over a year ago, I shared that Jesus bridged two worlds with two healings and one word.

Do you remember it?

On his way to heal a powerful man’s daughter, Jesus was stopped by a poor woman with an uncontrollable bleeding issue.

He showed how he loved them both when he called her “daughter.”

Abraham, in this parable, shows love for both the rich man and Lazarus when he calls the rich man “child.”

And then I hear the Father’s voice from Luke 15 saying to his older son,

“‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.

But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’”

- Luke 15:31-32

Jesus has put me in the place of the rich man.

Jesus has put me in the place of the Older brother.

Jesus has asked me if I am my brother’s keeper.

Will I make a place for Lazarus in my home so that He will make a place for me in his heavenly home?

Or will I be so distracted by worldly things that I won’t even recognize my own spiritual hunger?

What does it feel like for you to be spiritually hungry?

Are you so stuffed with worldly food that you no longer know what it means to be spiritually hungry?

I’ve listened over the past two weeks to stories you all have shared of the lost becoming found, and it has been spiritual nourishment and encouragement for me, hearing what God has been up to around us.

If we have forgotten our spiritual hunger and failed to fellowship together, sharing those kinds of testimonies, we may die spiritually of starvation and not know it until it is too late.

How do we ignite or reignite that spiritual hunger in ourselves and others we are sharing with?

We share those same testimonies.