We are starting off our Stewardship Campaign this week. For our newcomers who are not familiar with the term “Stewardship Campaign,” it’s a time in our program year when we ask people to pledge their gifts of ministry and money so that St. Paul’s church can live out its mission of loving God and loving our neighbors. I know what you are thinking. Of all the days to come to a church on Sunday morning, why did I have to come today? Unlike the fundraising appeals on public radio, you can’t turn me off. And if you leave now, everyone will know why. I understand. But give me 10 minutes to explain. Why give time and money to St. Paul’s church? What are we building here that makes it worth our energy and financial giving?

When I was an undergraduate, I attended an evangelical Bible college. We were required to read the Bible every day and attend chapel four times a week. We loved the Bible. We obsessed over it. In fact, I remember the President of the school standing up one morning in chapel. He was talking about how this world compares to heaven. I’ll never forget: he said, “Remember: at best, this earth is just a clean bus stop.”

Even then, that didn’t sit right with me.

The opening words from the lesson from the prophet Jeremiah are words that echo so much of what so many people are experiencing today – in our nation, and in the world. We hear and feel this anguish in our own lives: “My joy is gone, grief is upon me, my heart is sick. Hark, the cry of my poor people from far and wide in the land: ‘Is the LORD not with us?”

The parable Jesus tells here is not really an exchange about family dynamics, or dividing an inheritance. Jesus uses this exchange to make a universal point about how we relate to God, to one another, and to our stuff- money, possessions, all of our resources.

With trust and confidence as strong as the psalmist’s, Abraham questioned and challenged God.  Trust that God’s desire is always to have mercy, that God’s grace will preserve us through our troubles, and that love is God’s sustaining gift.   

Can we hear the Gospel and not believe in Jesus as Abraham believed in God?  Can we hear the Gospel stories and not understand what they have to teach us?  Is our faith our sure foundation?  We are learning to answer “yes!” 

A former seminary professor of mine was fond of saying when we pick up the Bible, it does stuff to us and through us. That was his lighthearted way of saying that the Bible is a living document, one which teaches us, convicts us, and often surprises us.