We heard today in the Gospel, the parable of the Rich man and Lazarus. It is the story of two men who lived their lives on this earth as complete opposites. The rich man spent his entire life being judged by the world as a success story. People knew who he was. He was an important man whom others went and sought for advice! The world knew his name!
On the other hand, we have Lazarus, who spent his entire life in utter misery, having in himself a combination of sorrows that none of us have ever experienced in this life. He was judged by those who passed by to be a failure…a nameless nothing…a nobody.
You will notice, however, that in the gospel, it was Lazarus who was given a name by our Lord, while the Rich Man remained nameless! It was Lazarus who was known by Jesus! The man who was walked over and ignored his entire earthly life was known by name in the blessedness of the kingdom! In the parable, it is Lazarus who lives forever in eternal joy, while the rich man becomes nameless…living in misery.
What happened?!
In the Orthodox Funeral Service, there is a stunning verse that answers this question for us. It is one that is enough to make anyone who is “of the world” squirm. The priest says during the singing of the Beatitudes:
“Let us go forth and gaze into the tombs. Man is naked bones…food for worms and stench. Only then shall we come to understand the TRUTH about riches, comeliness, beauty, and strength.”
The Church is asking us a simple question, as we gaze into the tomb that we are about to put our loved one into: Do all of the things that the Rich Man spent his entire life trying to obtain matter? What good is power to those in the tomb? What benefit is there to being rich? Where does having an obsession with beauty and strength get us?
Just like the Rich Man, only when we face death do we get the answer. The parable our Lord offers us today reminds us, that while the love of money, wealth, and power may give us respect and a name in this world, it is also that which denies us our name for all eternity.
Now, before everyone goes and sells their houses and retirement plans this morning, and before everyone starts to think that living in the richest country in the world is a one way ticket to eternal damnation, let us not forget about the example of the third character in our parable this morning! Abraham had more riches and possessions than many of us could imagine, but the difference between him and the Rich man was that Abraham wasn’t constantly oriented towards what he had and how he could get more…but rather what he could do with the wealth that our Lord had given him.
St. Paisios, in his series of books called “The Spiritual Counsels”, offers us a small test we can take to see if we in our lives more closely resemble the Rich Man or if we are given a name like Abraham:
“If a man is to understand whether or not he is making spiritual progress, he must first look within himself to see if he rejoices when he gives, but not when he receives…”
The first part is one that we are all familiar with, in that it is better to give than it is to receive.
“On top of that,” St. Paisios continues, “one who is making spiritual progress will rarely ever remember the good he has done…but will never forget the smallest good done to him. He may have given an entire vineyard to someone and forgotten about it. But if the other person gives him just one bunch of grapes from that same vineyard, he would never forget that generosity!
The correct spiritual approach is to forget the good you do to others, and to remember the good others do to you. When someone reaches this state of spiritual being, then he is indeed human…and a man of God”
When we look at our lives in their entirety, we are able to see just how blessed we all truly are. Today, we have been given the breath of life in order to come to the Church and Worship God together. Today, we have been given a beautiful day with which to bask in the glow of God’s creation. We are living in a country that has the means to assure that not one man, woman, or child goes hungry…a country where even the poor would be considered rich in many places throughout the world. We find ourselves in the middle of a loving parish community, who supports, cares, and lifts each other up. We have been given so much from God who loves each and every one of us, yet I think this is something that many of us tend to take for granted. We forget about the Divine Generosity of God.
When we take a moment this morning, or in daily prayer, or even in the car ride on the way to work to think about the debt that we owe to our Lord for what he has given us, how can we possibly give a second thought to freely giving to the Church, to Charities, to the Poor, or to others? This was the attitude of Abraham. This was the way in which wealthy saints like St. Nicholas lived his life. This is the disposition of a human being…a man of God…and it is how we gain a name in the eternal kingdom.