Fresh Eyes, Fresh Perspective

Luke 16:19-31

“One of the prime dangers of wealth is that it causes blindness.”

One of the coolest things that I tell people about myself is that I have a motorcycle. Let me tell you, motorcycles are awesome. Even just the fact that I’m able to tell people that I have a motorcycle is worth it. I am not really the type of person that you would think has a motorcycle, so it makes people think, “Wow, that’s cool, I wonder what other dangerous and mysterious secrets this guy has.” However, I haven’t gotten to ride it lately because I’ve been at school. It’s great, though. I can’t really explain the freedom that you feel on a bike, And the gas mileage is great! The really small bikes get up to 100 mpg! And they’re kind of like a status symbol. But not everything is so great about motorcycles. I was only 17 when I started to ride, and probably the one thing I’ve heard more than anything about riding a motorcycle is “Be careful.” Almost every time that I have gone out to ride, someone has told me that. And for good reason. It’s because it is actually really dangerous! I’ve been told that bikers are basically organ doners on wheels. Everything is dangerous on the road, and you’ve got to be protected. First thing’s first, you need to wear a helmet. You have a much better chance of surviving an accident if you wear a helmet. You need long sleeves and pants to protect your bare skin. And if you don’t wear long pants, you’re just asking to get your legs burnt on the hot pipes. And boots, you’ve gotta wear the boots to protect your ankles. Oh, and of course, there’s gloves to protect your hands and give you a grip. Also, it’s always at least 15 degrees colder on a motorcycle. If it’s 60 degrees outside, then it’s more like 45 degrees on the bike. You need to layer up if you want to not become a human popsicle.

But by far, the most dangerous thing about riding a motorcycle are the other cars themselves. There are those look out for motorcycle stickers at the DMV for a reason! Because people don’t look out for motorcycles! The issue is that people are so used to looking out for other cars, that they aren’t used to seeing a vehicle that’s less than half the size coming up. It’s an unconscious thing. People don’t intentionally decide, “I’m not going to watch for motorcycles today, I’m going to run into them if I see one.” No, they are just going about their day, just driving, trying to get to work or the grocery store or the gas station or the movie theater or dinner with their friends and family. And as they’re driving around, they forget that not every vehicle is as large as theirs. Unconsciously, they pull out in front of motorcycles and run into them. And because there’s no roll cage on a motorcycle, the bikers get seriously injured most of the time. When I ride, I am paranoid as I watch out for every single car in sight. It’s exhausting, but its necessary. Did you know that motorcycles have to have their headlights on? There is not switch to turn them off because it is supposed to help people see motorcycles. And lots of the time, motorcycles are really loud. Now of course, some of them are obscenely loud, but they are loud to try to get people to hear them. Normal people driving cars often just don’t see motorcycles. That’s just how it is. Of course, the motorcycle is still there, but to them, it has become invisible.

Similarly, for us, sometimes things become invisible when we get so used to them. Sometimes, people become invisible to us. How many of us have ever been driving and we see off the exit ramp of the highway or on the corner of a busy road a person holding a sign that reads, “Need help, God bless” or “Anything Helps, Lost home” or even someone not holding a sign but just sitting there, maybe in a chair. We have all probably seen someone like this. They may have a backpack with them with stuff in it or possibly an old bike or maybe a jacket or a few grocery bags. One time, I was in Akron, and I was about to get onto Route 8, the main road that leads to I-77 South. There was a man, and he looked like that. He had on a jacket and pants that were too baggy on him. He was wearing a beanie and a Cleveland Cavaliers shirt. He was holding one of those signs, but I can’t remember what it said. He waved at me, so as naïve as I was, I waved back, wishing him well and I thought that that was that. But little did I know that when I waved at him, that meant that I was telling him I had something for him. He walked off the curb and towards my car. What was I going to do? The light turned green, and I didn’t know what to do, so I got scared, shook my head, and I felt bad as I drove away. And here’s the worst part: I had literally just put a few spare dollars I had in my door panel earlier that day. I had it right there, but I didn’t help. What was wrong with me? I know that the guy probably could have gotten a job, that he probably chose to be a beggar, that I didn’t owe him anything. But I still felt terrible. What if he actually needed help? After that, most of the time that I drive by these people, I feel convicted, like I should do something. But instead, I often choose to ignore them. They become invisible to me. It’s easier to not really give it another thought. Perhaps you have a similar story. And it’s not just with the poor, it’s also the outcasts, the marginalized, even just annoying people, all these people are so easy to turn invisible, as though they were never there. It’s easy to walk into these people and never actually notice them. And yet they are also people, just like us. We should see people the way God sees them, and yet only sometimes do we. Today’s scripture comes from Luke 16:19-31. It’s the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Like last week on the Shrewd Manager, this passage similarly has a focus on the love of money and what it causes. If you’d like to follow along, turn with me to Luke 16 starting with verse 19. Luke writes,

There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. 20 At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores 21 and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.

22 “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. 24 So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’

25 “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. 26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’

27 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, 28 for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’

29 “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’

30 “ ‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’

31 “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ ”

First off, we need to realize something. This is not a passage for what happens 5 minutes after death. It’s a passage about living righteously, about living the right way. This passage talks a lot about Hades and life after death and what it is like. We shouldn’t be viewing this parable as mainly a parable about what life is like after death, but we should rather talk about what got Lazarus to be with Abraham and what got the rich man in Hades. Basically, we need to think about why did Lazarus go to the good place and the rich man go to the bad place?

So we see the rich man, and he is living the high life. He is wearing purple, he lived in luxury and he feasts every day. Purple was the symbol of royalty because it was such a scarce color. Most people could not afford purple ever in their life. It was only the rich who could buy purple clothes. He also feasted every day. In order to eat anything back then, most people had to work hard all day just to survive. There was no extra, they just got what they needed for themselves and their family for that day. That is not this man. This man was rich and privileged. He was a king in every way except actually having the title king. And then we see Lazarus, the complete opposite. You see, this was a class-based society. The rich were born rich. There were no self-made men back then, they were only rich people who inherited wealth. Then there were the merchants and artisans, who were a little better off than most other workers. And then there were the peasants, the people who worked all day just to survive. But they weren’t the bottom, there were also the outcast, poor, sick, and unclean. They were the people who were deemed unworthy to be a part of society. This was where Lazarus was. He was covered with sores and he laid at the rich man’s gate. Even the dogs came and licked what was oozing out of him. Since he was laying at the rich man’s gate, it is probable that the rich man saw him, but he probably didn’t notice him. Lazarus was there, but to the rich man, he was invisible. The rich man would pass Lazarus by, all the while Lazarus just wanted to eat even just the crumbs from a dirty napkin thrown out by the rich man. But not once did the rich man give him eve a scrap of food. This only takes place over a few verses, but this actually happened over a long time.

Because eventually, they both die. The rich man is buried, while Lazarus is not buried but is taken by angels to Abraham. And then things start to get moving. The rich man is in Hades, a place of torment, while Lazarus is across the chasm, hanging out with Abraham. The rich man sees Abraham and Lazarus, and he begs for Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water to cool his tongue. Yeah right. Like that’s going to help. The guy is in flames for crying out loud. A drop of water from Lazarus would probably evaporate before it can even get to him. But there’s something more interesting here. We see that the man actually does know Lazarus by name. We never see them interact in life, but he apparently knows that Lazarus was the poor man who sat there begging outside his gates. And yet still, he doesn’t ask Lazarus for help. He asks Abraham to send Lazarus for help. Even past life, this man still doesn’t see Lazarus as a person, but as a servant, a nobody. Abraham tells him gently that you received good things while Lazarus did not and now Lazarus receives good things while you do not. It’s backwards from how it was. Things have completely reversed.

The man knows that he can’t help himself, so he asks for his family to get help. He doesn’t want his brothers to come to the terrible place he is, so he asks Abraham, once again, to send Lazarus. Again, he doesn’t ask Lazarus, he asks Abraham to send Lazarus. Hopefully, if someone from the dead comes to them they will believe. Worth a shot, right? But Abraham tells him that the people already have what they need, and that is Moses and the Prophets. Everything they need they already have. But even if someone rises from the dead, they will not believe if they do not already believe Moses and the Prophets. People will either listen or they won’t. Its as simple as that. Basically, even if Lazarus went to them, they would not listen if their heart wasn’t right.

Throughout this whole parable, Lazarus and the rich man reverse lives. The rich man has expensive clothes, while Lazarus has nothing. The rich man feasts and lives in luxury, Lazarus lives a broken life at the gate. The rich man is buried, Lazarus it forgotten by all except God and the angels. The rich man had good things, Lazarus had bad things. That was the earthly life. But in the second life, everything changed. We read about rags to riches stories right? People getting lucky and going from nobody to somebody. Well, this was a spiritual rags to riches story. Lazarus is with Abraham, the rich man is not. Lazarus is in paradise, the rich man is in torment. Lazarus was at the gates before, now the rich man was at the gates of hades. Lazarus has a name, the rich man is never named. Notice too, that we never hear that the rich man or Lazarus was righteous and loved God. We only see their actions. We see that their actions revealed what they believed. As Jesus says, where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. The rich man could have done the right thing and helped Lazarus. But he didn’t.

This parable personalizes the rich and the poor. The rich are like the rich man and the poor are like Lazarus. The Pharisees here are the rich man. The Pharisees were supposed to be the elite members of society. In the Jewish class structure, there was the ruling class, represented by the religious leaders, government officials, and tax collectors. They have all the money, and that meant that everyone else had very little money. Below them are the working class, and then the peasants, and then the unclean. Jesus wrote this speaking to the Pharisees. The issue was that the Pharisees, the ones who knew Moses and the Prophets, actually didn’t understand the heart of what they were trying to get at. How could they claim to serve God and yet pass by people like Lazarus as though they were nothing? We see this also in the passage about the Good Samaritan that the Pharisees passed a hurting man by on the side of the road. They saw people who were lower on the totem pole as lesser than them, and they even didn’t notice some people at all. If they really followed Moses and the Prophets, then they would have realized that they had a responsibility to use their resources for good.

According to everything that people believed back then, the rich man should have been blessed. They equated having stuff and living a good life with being blessed and righteous. And they equated a bad life with being wicked and evil. To the hearers, it would have been a shock to hear that it was the rich man, not Lazarus, who was in Hades. We see this elsewhere too. In John 9, Jesus and his disciples go walking by the temple, and they see a man who was blind from birth, and the disciples first question that they want to ask Jesus is whose fault it was. Was it this man or his parents who caused this man to be blind? Who sinned and caused this terrible thing to happen. But Jesus corrects them, saying that it was no one’s fault. Rather, it happened, and God’s glory was going to be revealed through this tough situation. Even for us, we assume that in America, people who have money have done something useful with their life and therefore are good, while people who don’t have much weren’t wise with their life and therefore are bad. But that’s not how it is at all. Jesus didn’t say blessed are the rich, he said blessed are the poor. This was a radical idea in Jesus day, because no one ever saw the poor as blessed.

On first reading this passage, it can be confusing what Jesus means. These men are not shown to be pious, God-fearing, righteous Jews. Instead, they are shown in terms of money. Lazarus is poor and the rich man is, well, rich. But this parable does not mean that the rich go to hell and the poor go to heaven. No, that would make this parable about money. It’s not money itself that is bad, but the love of money that is bad. This parable is not about money, but rather about the roots of our hearts. When we read the parable this way, then we really begin to understand what Jesus was teaching. The moral of the story is that it’s people that matter, not stuff. People who have the image of God stamped on them, just like we do. People deserve our respect just because they are human. When we view people this way, money looks different. Money suddenly becomes not a reward, but a resource. Those who have wealth are no better off than those who don’t have wealth. But they do have a responsibility to use that wealth for good. Rich and poor, both equally need God and his saving grace in their lives. Having money is a blessing, but the best part about money is that it can bring blessing on others. To us in America, wealth is seen as good. It means you’re a valuable member of society and that you are productive and that you are just better and more successful. But to us as Christians, money makes no difference. What counts is your character. I know it sounds cliché, but it’s about what’s on the inside that counts.

It's clear that the Pharisees didn’t care for the poor. But Jesus did care for the poor. Because in a world where everything was determined by wealth, Jesus showed that it was instead determined by love. Jesus didn’t see the poor and think how unclean and outcast they were, he saw the poor and he saw someone who was human, someone who was created in the image of God. Both the rich and the poor were created in the image of God. It wasn’t wealth the mattered, it was people. No one is invisible to God. We need to cultivate, to harvest this godly vision, where we see the world through a new lens. What if rather than giving our attention to everything that the world wants us to, we give our attention to loving God and loving people? How does our vision change? Will we see the motorcycles on the road, or will we not? Can the invisible become visible to us?

We are a part of the Church of the Nazarene. And you know what? The Nazarenes have a rich heritage of helping and serving the poor. The Church of the Nazarene itself was born out of the commitment to holiness, to becoming more and more like Jesus Christ. But Holiness isn’t just something about us. Holiness takes place in a sense of community. Apart from community, there is no real, lasting holiness. Phineas F. Breese was one of the most important people in starting the church of the Nazarene. Back in 1898 in L.A. California, Breese saw all the hurting in the world. There were poor people, addicted people, people who had no hope for future. So you know what he did? He started to find likeminded people and he actually did something about it. He went and helped out the poor, offering them not just salvation in Jesus, but also some relief to their pain, offering them food, recovery, shelter. This is where the Church of the Nazarene was born. We were born out of the conviction that people were hurting and that they needed someone, and that someone was Jesus. There are people who are outcasts, losers, poor, and we say that they have a home in the Church of the Nazarene. This is our heritage. And we are a part of this church. It’s just who we are to be people who don’t walk outside the gate and pass by Lazarus. We aren’t those who just pass him by. No, we do something. And we don’t just offer him crumbs, we offer him a meal. We don’t just give him new clothes, we bandage him up. We don’t just give him physical help, we connect him to spiritual help.

There are people who are unseen in our world. They have become invisible to the majority of society. But today, we recognize that they are there. They aren’t invisible to us anymore. We need to learn to open our eyes, to see with godly vision. We need to not just see the poor, but the suffering in the world altogether. There are those who are suffering in all kinds of different ways besides not having money. They are sick, dying, hurting, broken. They have mental problems and spiritual problems. Suffering is real in our world. Jesus put a name to it, calling him Lazarus. When we pass by those on the highway who are hurting, what will we do? True, they probably could be getting a job, they probably asked for this on themselves, they might be taking advantage, but what if they aren’t? What if they are actually hurting and need help? Will we be willing to help that Lazarus? Or will we pass him by like the rich man? I’m not saying that we need to get rid of everything to help these people, but I’m saying that we need to see them. It is unhealthy for our lives to not see them. To not see the suffering in the world is to miss something. We miss seeing the world as Jesus saw it. Imagine what it is to see that world as Jesus sees it, imagine what a blessing that is. Jesus invites us to have fresh eyes, to see from a new perspective, from his perspective. Think about how awesome that is!

The truth is that at one point, we were all Lazarus in some way or another. Maybe we were actually broke, but we were all certainly spiritually broke at some point, lost and wandering, apart from God. And we remember what that was like. But our God came in the flesh and he made a way to fix the brokenness and hurting in our lives. Jesus came not as a conquering king, but as a suffering servant. He knows what it is to suffer and to hurt. And to think that someone else, someone who, just like us, also bears the image of God, may be suffering too? We know what Jesus would do, but what about us? We need to see the suffering in the world, all the nasty parts included, and we need to respond as God would. Paul says that we are his ambassadors, the ones who go forward for him in the world, so what else can we do? Jesus tells in us in Matthew that he is that one sitting, begging, hurting, broken. He is that one that we can so easily pass by. Even when we offer a cup of water in his name, we do it as though it were for him. To truly understand what Jesus is saying, we need to move beyond money. Because it’s not about money. It’s about people. Let’s leave here today, with eyes wide open. It’s not an issue of just helping someone out because it’s the right thing to do, it’s an issue of learning to see the world as God sees it. It’s about seeing all the suffering in the world, but also about seeing the hope that there is in Jesus. It’s about having new eyes, fresh eyes that can see the full picture. It’s about learning to see what used to be invisible. Let’s pray.