Having The Faith to Have A Vision

Having The Faith to Have A Vision

Sermon by Rev. Dr. Stuart Broberg
Westminster Presbyterian Church, Alexandria, VA
HAVING THE FAITH TO HAVE A VISION
Luke 12: 13-31
November 3, 2000
PEER Network Conference

I. Introduction:

Fort Street Presbyterian Church, set in the heart of decayed inner city Detroit, in close proximity to many churches with once fine ministries now out-of-business, has a large endowment. It also feeds the poor street people of Detroit through its Open Door program. Its endowment was largely a gift from the family of Joy Manufacturing who in their wisdom put a provision in their gift that the church must always have a Sunday School or the money will revert back to the family. The then pastor confided to me once that this one provision was probably the saving grace of that church. They were always forced to have a Sunday School, reach out to their community, even as it changed, in order to meet the terms of the gift. They were never able to spend it all on themselves. Along the way they had to have a larger vision, a vision for their community. They had to have the Faith to have a Vision and their endowment aided in that vision and so they prospered as a church even when many other churches with similarly large endowments did not…

To use the metaphor of the scripture story we just read from the gospel of Luke it is just fine to have a large “barn” of an endowment; its what you do with it that is the real issue. It is how it is linked to a larger vision of what can be that is really at stake. It is whether that sizeable barn of beneficence is used for self and selfishness…or whether it is used for selfless-ness and to the glory of God…

For this PEER Network Conference, then, I suppose the issue is well-framed by Jesus’ cautionary tale, when Jesus concludes his story with caution, caution, and more caution, for anyone who “stores up treasures for (themselves) and is not rich toward God.” (Luke 12:21)

It is an error a church can make as well as an individual…

So…why do you seek to build a bigger barn of an endowment????

II. The Rich and Visionary Fool:

I suspect I would have liked the person Jesus described in his story. I mean this is a man with a vision; this is a driven man, a successful person of substance. This is a risk taker. I don’t know if you have ever served a more rural congregation as I have but I can tell you I never met a farmer who would have gladly torn down their barn for any reason, let alone to build a bigger one. No, they, with patch and glue, would have striven to slap together their existing barn at all costs. The man in Jesus’ story was no penny-pinching farmer, no fool by worldly standards. We would have wanted him on the stewardship committee of our church. We would have counted on him for a large donation during a capital campaign. He would have made a marvelous elder. He had prospered. He was successful. He was creative. He was to be admired, even envied. Dare I say it, he was undoubtably one of the first Presbyterians ever mentioned in the Bible!

He had a vision, a larger vision of what could be…and he accomplished his vision…Impressive!

Yet it is Jesus who calls him a FOOL!

III. The Rich Fool:

There is no fool like a rich fool. And this rich fool was doubly foolish…

First, he was foolish because he was blinded by his own ego, made foolish by his lack of spiritual understanding, had forgotten that it was God who had given the increase and the Lord who had provided and so “plentifully”. He was all about “I” and not about “Thou”; rich to himself, he was impoverished to the Almighty. Listen to the way Jesus tells the story:

“What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops? I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build bigger ones. I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods…” (Luke 12: 17-19)

Do you hear the overwhelming emphasis on “I” and “my”? There is too much “I” and not enough “Thou” here; too much “me” and “my” and not enough “ours” and “the Lord’s” here. So it ever is with a fool. Only a fool could be wildly successful and give credit only to himself and not to God. “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.” --Only a fool would forget this truth.

Second, his second foolishness is like unto the first. And it speaks profoundly to our modern world. It is the rich fool’s obsessiveness, his compulsivity, his drivenness. His existing barns really were sufficient; sufficient all his life through. But he was driven to build bigger ones. Not because he needed them. Not because they were of any value to him. He tore down his old barns simply because he could. That sort of disgusting drivenness, where we possess things we do not need, replace things that do not need replacement, buy and buy and buy, and acquire and acquire and acquire, endlessly, ceaselessly, obtaining in our grasp more and more things we could never hope to wear out in a multiple of lifetimes. Obsession. Drivenness. Compulsion. Call it our forever lusting after bigger and bigger barns. Never having a moment’s rest in life because we are driven by a sick inner compulsion to possess more. Never having a moment of ease, never enjoying what God has provided, because we are always planning our future bigger and better barns…

That is exactly what happens when our own ego sits on the throne of our life; when we displace God from God’s rightful place on the throne of our life; when the “I” of self rules the life and not the “Thou” of God…

May I ask, may I ask, what IS your motivation for building a bigger barn of an endowment?

More money…security…being viewed as a success…preserve the institution of the church…not to have to work as hard during the stewardship campaign…or is there a larger faith and a larger vision????

To knock down his barns took a lot of courage. To build bigger barns took a lot of vision. Ah, but to build a bigger barn for yourself and not for God that was the mistake. That was the fatal flaw. That was the fatal flaw of the fool. That was the fatal flaw of the fool without faith…

Says the scripture story of Jesus: “So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.” (Luke 12:21)

IV. Endowments Demand a High Purpose:

May I say, there are far too many endowments severed from their purpose, cut off from their sense of ministry and mission. Too many endowments are there for the “bottom line”, for preserving the corpus, for passing around a balance sheet and thinking you are done, managing money for money’s sake. Oh, let’s just pour the income into the Session operating budget becomes the death knell, precedes hearing the voice of Jesus, say,“Fool, this night your church’s life is demanded of it!” Oh Lord, save me from that big, spiritually empty barn!

What is the mission and the purpose of your endowment? What are your hopes and dreams? Can you articulate that? What vast and mighty plan for the love of God could you, would you, undertake if you had the provision of God to do it? What is God calling you to do? To be? How could you be “rich for God” not just buy some lightbulbs for fellowship hall???

What change could you effect in your community? What part of the Kingdom could you personally bring in? What is the difference you can make? What is the size and kind of large vision for God that would compel you and propel you to renewed faith?

Is it just building endowments for their size…or is it building them for the renewal of the church of Jesus Christ? Is it building a bigger barn for the sake of building a bigger barn…or is it for a larger vision of the mission and the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ??????
The rich fool now knows the answer. Do you?

V. Conclusion:

With this I conclude…One of my favorite poems is by Percy Bysshe Shelley, entitled, Ozymandias. It tells a tale of a “traveler from an antique land” who comes across a curiosity of an archeological ruin in the shifting sands of the desert. This traveler discovers a broken statue of a once great king standing amidst the ruins at the remains of the day. On the pedestal of the broken statue are these words…and now I turn the story over to the poet…

My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

O beloved, look upon thy own works and despair. Look upon thine own bigger and bigger barns and see them torn down in the light of eternity. Solomon, where is thy temple? Babylon, where are thy mighty towers? Greece, where is thy splendor? Where is thy glory, Rome? What shall stand the test of time? What shall remain? What shall endure?

Which of any endowed church shall be here in the next millennia? And which shall be but broken pedestals in the shifting sands of time?

Those churches who have a FAITH sufficient to have a VISION large enough, compelling enough, a vision that shall seize the human heart, these shall be the churches that shall endure…

So…who will stand with me? Who is willing to have the vision and the courage and the conviction to tear down whatever barn of an endowment exists at your church? Who is willing to endow it with far more than money? Who is willing to endow it with faith large enough to have a vision big enough to propel their church into greatness and faithfulness? Who is willing to build a new barn, bigger, yes, but better and far more faithful? Who is willing to take the steps needful and necessary to build their bigger barns for the glory of God and the renewal of the church?

It is nothing less than the renewal of the church of Jesus Christ that is at stake today. Take home with you more than ideas. Take home with you the inner resolve to act and to be and to do something great for God. Use endowments to do the exciting, empowering ministry and mission of Jesus Christ. Be rich to God!

O ye mighty, look upon the works of Jesus Christ, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, for they alone shall endure!!!!! That is the faith. That is the vision. That is what shall stand the test of time!!!! Amen.