November 1, 2009:  THE KING WHO GIVES LIFE: GOD’S PLAN OF ABUNDANCE

Isaiah 25:6-9, Revelation 21:1-6a, Psalm 24

Eileen Parfrey --- Springwater Presbyterian Church

 

            It sounds like a cheap Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy joke, but the texts for today, in both Isaiah and Revelation, give a Christian view of the Restaurant at the End of the World.  The banquet of Isaiah and the bride-like New Jerusalem in Revelation depict the Culmination of God’s plan.  They are images to tell us that God’s goal for all of creation is abundance.  Hebrew scholarship holds that God’s work of creation was finished on the sixth day, so that “all that would be” already exists in God.  Right now.  In other words, the abundant feast described in Isaiah already is—in God.  The restaurant is open.  Which means that the Christian view of the Restaurant at the End of the World, what happens at the End of Time, isn’t about the party we’re going to have.  The End of Time means we meet a Person.  God’s culmination is about Who, not What.

 

            In its role as congregational leaders in stewardship, session has asked me to preach about abundance this month.  Wouldn’t you rather hear about Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy?  I told the children what I’d learned about abundance while beachcombing last week, but we’re back in Springwater, and this time of year we aim toward Reign of Christ Sunday.  Even on All Saint’s Day (today), we wonder of Jesus, “What sort of king?”  Today’s scripture texts answer:  life-giver king.  Which makes sense, when it comes to abundance.  God is the Source of all life, and abundance is the content of that life.  But it has very little to do with inter-galactic travel.

 

            So I have to go back to the lessons in abundance while trying to find those elusive sand dollars last week.  Rather than feeling skunked and resentful that I found only two fragments of sea anemone and not a single sand dollar, I needed to learn to see abundance in what already is.  When I could feel blessed in all things, I could see possibilities for what was already there.  Beads for the ones that had holes worn into them?  The amazing thing about going out at low tide every day was learning anew that the abundance of shells on the beach did not depend on me.  I could do nothing to make the ocean bring up a single shell—mussel or sea anemone, common or rare.  I was totally dependent on the ocean for not only what was on the beach, but what was hidden from my sight.  The sooner we accept that the source of abundance is outside ourselves, that we get to use the abundance and are the beneficiaries of it, that we don’t get to keep it, the sooner we can get on to the business of enjoying it.  There is no “pay back” for God’s abundance, just as there is no way I can compensate the ocean for its gift of shells.  Abundance is all about the Giver, not about us.  We do not “owe” God anything.  Except our lives.  And for that we can only say “thanks” and use them well.

  

            But here’s the catch.  It will never be “abundance” to us unless and until we understand and believe that it’s not about “enough.”  Abundance means “more than enough—and to share.”  If it’s “abundance” there is a shift in the sense of ownership.  When Rick and I were in California, we visited my sabbatical teachers, Nancy and Harriet.  Nancy’s health is less than wonderful these days, and what that has triggered in her is a desire to divest herself of her books—giving them away, selling them, but shifting the ownership as she spreads around the abundance.  The treasures that had once been so essential—to use and teach from—are no longer “abundance” but are burdens. 

 

Abundance doesn’t just change our understanding of ownership; it changes our sense of what is valuable.  When Melanie leads creativity and faith events, she knows that when people are turned loose to start making things, most of us make a beeline for “The Magic Scrap Box.”  To some, the contents of the Magic Scrap Box may look remarkably like rubbish—bits of pictures and colored paper, maps, ribbons, shiny things—but to others, it’s the abundant source of creativity.  Broken shells or beads?

 

God’s love is the Source, expressed as abundance. That love is extravagant, just like the Giver.  We are called to exercise a discipline in receiving that love, however.  As beneficiaries of God’s abundance, that discipline is to share it.  To hoard abundance is greed, an expression of lack of trust in the One Who Gives.  The message of hoarders is, “I’ve got mine, and I’ve gotta hang on, because if others get any, there won’t be enough for me.”  Can you imagine God saying that?  “I’ve got mine, if I give it away there won’t be enough for me.”  Abundance is God’s plan.  It is God’s goal for the created world.  Proof positive of that abundance is life.  May you live as persons who have life—and who have it in abundance.