CAMINANDO WITH JESUS: The Deeper Need

Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.” But he said to him, “Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?” And he said to them, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.” Then he told them a parable: “The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”

- Luke 12:13-21

What is Jesus doing?

I often think this when I read of the encounters people have with Jesus. He does not respond in the usual manner, certainly not the way that people expect him to react. A great crowd comes to Jesus expecting a word from God, and he feeds them. All of them. A man is brought to Jesus to be healed, and Jesus forgives his sins. Jesus heals the man from Gerasene, who was possessed by many demons, a legion of them. When the man says he wishes to follow Jesus, Jesus tells him to go home and tell his friends what the Lord has done for him. In each instance, Jesus looks beyond the thing people say they want to the thing they truly need. And he gives them that.

In this week’s lesson from the gospel of Luke, a man urgently asks Jesus to step into a family argument. “Tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me,” the man demands. So what does Jesus do? It is easier to see what Jesus does not do. He does not enter the family conflict. He does not take sides. He does not give this man what he wants. Instead, Jesus looks beneath the conflict and perceives the disturbance in this man’s soul. And he speaks to the deeper need.

Jesus acknowledges what he hears in the man’s request: a sense of greed. Or is it greed? Maybe the expression of the person’s face leads him to clarify the insight. Is it fear of not having enough? Or the status of having abundance? It reminds Jesus of a parable of a person who has an abundant crop and decides to build a bigger barn to store it all. He imagines living off of the abundance, but has this dream punctured by God (yes, God!), who invites him to imagine how much that abundance is worth if he is not around to enjoy it or rely upon it. The lesson for all to hear is not to store up treasures for ourselves, but to ‘be rich toward God.’

We are not told by the gospel recorder how the man responds to Jesus. Does he take offense? Does he go off to find a more amenable judge for his family dispute? Or does he stop and look at his own life, examine his own heart? Is he transformed by the truth in this encounter with Jesus, or does he walk away unmoved? By not saying what he did, his story becomes a parable for us. What would we do?

The passage challenges me to be honest. How many times do I approach Jesus with a prayer, an urgent request just like the person in the story? Do I expect Jesus to give me what I ask? Today, I am not as surprised when Jesus, in prayer or through the guidance of a spiritual friend, or a calmer voice, directs me stop and to search my own heart. That seems to be what Jesus does. The real question is, am I open to the deeper truth that may be revealed in prayer? Am I willing to be transformed by the encounter with a loving God?

The Rev. Canon Earnest Graham is a regional canon for the Diocese of North Carolina.