St. Paul Lutheran Church, Minden, Nebraska
Sunday Sermon – 18th Sunday after Pentecost – Sept.26, 2010
“The Poor At Your Door!”
Text: Luke 16:27,28

What went wrong?
What was the sin of the rich man who was clothed in purple and
fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day, but after the rich
man died and was buried, he found himself in Hades, being in torment?
What went wrong?
What was the sin of the rich man that he pleaded with Father
Abraham to send poor man, Lazarus, who was at Abraham’s side back
to the rich man’s brothers that Lazarus, come back from the dead,
might warn the brothers lest they too come to that place of torment?
What was the sin of the rich man that he was condemned to eternal

torment?

In order to answer the question what went wrong; what was the sin
of the rich man who was comfortable & well off, we need to ask our-
selves a broader, more basic, more fundamental question & that’s the
question: what more is there to life than what most people are used
to seeing or what most people expect & want out of life?
The late George Arthur Buttrick, pastor, theologian, teacher,
highly regarded as one of the preeminent preachers in the 20th century
once cautioned in light of this story that important as it is to
share food & give to charities, this rich man/poor man story is about
a deeper, more pervasive, attitude of neighborliness toward others.
“True charity is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not
spasmodic or superficial. . True charity, “fundamental neighborliness”
is an inner awakening, the barometer of the soul, a servant-like
attitude, an indication of the attitude of one’s heart that is
pleasing in the sight of God.” (NIB,320)
According to this rich man/poor man story Jesus that tells, what
more there is to life than what most people see or what most people
want out of life, is the reality of hungry people, poor people, peo-
ple destitute and in great need thru no fault of their own. Do you &
I have a heart for the poor? Do you and I care; do you and I see the
poor at OUR door?
Some years ago before the death of Mother Theresa, a television
special depicted the grim conditions that were a part of Mother Theresa’s
daily life. The special showed the slums of Calcutta & Mother Theresa
with her incredible love & closeness to the poor, (what Dr. Buttrick
would call “fundamental neighborliness”,) Mother Theresa making the
rounds, visiting helping, embracing impoverished, dying people who
were helpless to change their condition or situation.
This TV special also included interviews by the producer with
Mother Theresa as she made her rounds.
But what was not a part of this TV special and maybe not carefully

thought through were the commercials that helped sponsor the special.
After the special had “aired”, someone noted the following back &
forth sequence of the program and the commercials: leper colony
(bikinis for sale); mass starvation (designer jeans); agonizing
poverty (fur coats); abandoned babies (ice cream sundaes), dying
people (diamond watches.)
In other words, it turned out two very different worlds were on
display: the world of the poor and the world of the affluent which
is what Jesus pictures in the first part of this story he tells, the
world of the affluent (the rich man, comfortable & well off) and the
world of the poor (Lazarus hungry & sick at the gate of the rich
man’s house.)
Whether we realize it or not, it seems that here in our
country, even here in the mid-west where there is a great deal
of commercializing & marketing of products of foods, drinks,
electronics, sports, clothes, cars, pick-ups, investments, with such
a flood of things to buy, things to have, it’s not hard to live as
the rich man lived. We do occasionally get pictures & stories of
Lazarus at our door and pictures of people hungry & homeless on a
church bulletin board or the Lutheran Witness or in magazines like
that of Rotary International but then we quickly remind ourselves of

the next vehicle we ought to buy or the monthly payments we have to make or
that special night out we were planning for ourselves.

This is not to say we are guilty of the sin of selfishness or self-
indulgence, but the way Jesus tells it, this rich man/poor man story
points to a greater sin, a more dangerous but subtle sin, and that’s
the sin of indifference, apathy.
Was the rich man greedy, selfish, hard-hearted, mean toward the
poor man. The story doesn’t say that. Was the rich man indifferent?

Was he inattentive, unconcerned, unresponsive, not neighborly?

The British critic and dramatist, George Bernard Shaw, who lived
1850 to 1950 once said, “The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is
not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them.” (TNBOCQ, p. 128)
Does the marketing & commercializing of all the things we think we
owe it to ourselves to have; does that slowly condition us and harden
us to believe it’s OK to live the way we live while others live lives
of poverty & hunger & quiet desperation?
What’s a familiar hymn verse say? “Many spend their life in
fretting, over trifles and in getting, things that have no solid
ground. I shall strive to win a treasure, that will bring me last-
ing pleasure and that now is seldom found?”
Jesus makes it pretty clear in this story that there was no last-
ing pleasure for the rich man when he died and was buried and was in
torment. But that’s not the real point of the story.
For Jesus the real point of the rich man/poor man story is the
second part, the part where the rich man pleads with Father Abraham

to send Lazarus back from the dead to warn his brothers, warn them
not about the dangers of being rich & well off, but about danger of
being inattentive, unconcerned, indifferent to the needs of the poor,
the sick, the lame, the disenfranchised as if they did not exist.
It’s not that having “more of everything” is necessarily bad or
sinful, but that having “more of everything” makes it harder & harder
to see & to identify with neighbors who have nothing.
And this is not something that someone has to rise from the dead
& come back from the dead to point out to us. Radical is it may
sound, “Fundamental neighborliness” is clearly revealed in both the
Old & New Testament.
It’s what Moses said. Deuteronomy 15:7 “If among you one of your
brothers should become poor in any of your towns within your land
that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart
or shut your hand against your poor brother, but you shall open your
hand to him and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it be.”
In the Gospel of Matthew are not most of us familiar with what
Jesus said concerning the end of time when the Son of Man comes in
his glory and all the angels with him. Jesus said the Son of Man will
sit on His glorious throne, with all the nations gathered before Him
and He will separate the people as a shepherd separates the sheep
from the goats; the sheep on His right, but the goats on His left.
When Jesus says to those on his left, “Depart from me, you cursed,
into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels, for I
was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no
drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did
not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me,” what
those on the left headed for eternal torment want to know is:
“Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or
naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?”
The answer given is one we have heard before, “Truly, I say to
you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not
do it to me.” (Matt. 25:45)
What was the warning the rich man wanted to have Lazarus deliver
to his five brothers? We’re not told, but I suspect it might have
gone something like this: Oh dear brothers, may you find peace with
God in your hearts through faith in His Son. May you repent of your
carelessness, your busyness, your indifference, your blindness and be
SAVED by GRACE, justified & cleansed of all unrighteousness & world-
liness thru FAITH! And may you see the poor at your door! Don’t be
wrapped up in yourselves; don’t be blind, don’t ignore; don’t be
indifferent to the poor at your door.
This is not a message we need delivered to us by someone come
back from the dead. We have this message before us in the life &
ministry, in the words & promises of Jesus who through His suffering,
death, and resurrection is the fulfillment of Moses and the Prophets.

Jesus who is the same Jesus yesterday, today, and forever is not
blind to the poor & needy. Jesus does not ignore them. Jesus is not
indifferent to them. And Jesus who suffered & died for all our sins
of indifference & apathy and rose again for our salvation, Jesus does

not leave us in the dark about the dangers of indifference & apathy.

Jesus has given us a story to bother us, to wake us up that we
not miss out on or take for granted a “fundamental neighborliness”,
a “fundamental neighborliness” that goes the distance in helping
others less fortunate than we are.
World Vision, Kids Against Hunger, Water for Haiti, Orphan Grain
Train, layettes, quilts, School kits, Health kits, Habitat for Human-
ity, Bread for the World, Lutheran World Relief. It all helps.
What is there that’s more to life than what most people see or look
for?
According to Jesus it is a fundamental, basic, spirit-inspired,
Christ-centered opening up & unwrapping of ourselves, giving of our-
selves to God and not forgetting to love our neighbors as ourselves.
“Fundamental neighborliness” is being saved by God’s grace through
faith alone and growing in that faith to have a more attentive, more
active, more pervasive attitude of neighborliness toward others.
There’s nothing, nothing wrong with that! God grant it for Jesus’
sake. Amen