God's Fair Balance
A Sermon by Stacy Carlson Kelly, Seminarian on the Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (Year B), June 27, 2021.
2 Corinthians 8: 7 -15
One of the lessons we learn at an early age is that it is better to give than to receive. It is rewarding and lovely to give, no doubt about it, but I have to say, I love receiving, too. There’s nothing like compassion or kindness wrapped as a gift.
Today’s reading from Second Corinthians helps me understand that that’s okay. At a glance, these verses may be one of the first examples of a stewardship appeal. They have the right mix of flattery, encouragement, theology and scripture.
But Paul offers a bigger and more timely lesson here about charity and reciprocity. In ancient as in modern times, we depend on one another and should help one another. Paul reaches out to us from the First Century to tell us we should help, and especially help, those who are in more difficult circumstances than we are in, for the tables may be turned someday.
Paul is encouraging the Corinthians to support the Christians in Jerusalem. Through war, famine and persecution the Jerusalem Christians had become poor. Or, we should say they have become even poorer – because many of them were poor when they first embraced Christianity.
Such a fundraising appeal might not seem like a big deal, except that the Corinthians were Gentiles, which strictly defined means “not Jewish.” There was also tension between Paul and the authorities in Jerusalem, including the Apostle Peter who was still alive, about Paul’s ministry to the Gentiles. As Paul tried to meld traditional Jewish and Gentile practices, he was accused of preaching a “truncated gospel,” because he didn’t believe the Gentiles needed to follow all aspects of Jewish law, including circumcision, to be converted and welcomed as Christians.
It seems a little crazy now in hindsight, when we see how Paul’s letters have shaped our faith, that Paul was so often criticized, beaten and shunned. It’s humbling when we remember who Paul was when we first met him in the book of Acts. He was Saul, a ferocious Jewish leader on his way to Damascus to imprison anyone who was a disciple of the Lord. On the road to Damascus, a blinding light from heaven flashed, knocked him to the ground and blinded him. In a voice from out of that sky, Jesus asked him, “Why do you persecute me?”
Jesus specifically chose Saul, the prosecutor, to become the public defender, to bring the good news “to the Gentiles, and to kings and the people of Israel.”
As Frederick Buechner describes it:
Paul never in his life forgot the sheer lunatic joy and astonishment of that moment. He was blind . . . for three days afterward, but he made it to Damascus anyway and was baptized on the spot. He was never the same again, and neither, in a way, was the world. Everything he ever said or wrote or did from that day forward was an attempt to bowl over the human race as he'd been bowled over himself while he lay there . . . with dust in his mouth.
So, Paul knows what it means to receive God’s grace. This grace which flows within and through us is central to his appeal to the Corinthians and makes him press on, even when the powers of Jerusalem resist what he’s doing.
But let’s pause for a second and put Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians in context. It’s a letter to a congregation Paul founded some years earlier in Corinth. Corinth was now a major seaport in the Roman empire with a mixed population of Romans, Greeks and Jews. There was no “church” as we understand it today, but about 20 different groups who met in homes throughout the city. We are called the household of God because people, literally, met in houses.
There were often difficulties within the Corinth congregations, so, Paul sent letters to cajole, convince and instruct them. In this letter to the Corinthians, Paul defends himself against his many critics. The problems at Corinth also lead him to write an extended discussion of ministry. He gives an expansive view of the duties of the people of God in the world.
Our duties include, as he explains in today’s verses, caring for our Christian sisters and brothers, even those who are different from us. To Paul, Corinthian charity to Jerusalem is a significant work of gospel solidarity, a tangible gesture of love between Gentiles and Jews.
Paul doesn’t feel like it’s a stretch to ask the Corinthians to help. They have already shared in the spiritual blessings of the Jews. And now, since they are able, the Corinthians should share their material blessings with Jerusalem.
But like any fundraiser, Paul still must make his case, and, in these verses, he relies on several arguments to encourage their charity. Even more, he gives us deeper reasons for charity than just to say it’s expected of us, or you should give because it makes you feel good.
To begin his appeal, Paul commends the Corinthians’ strengths. Notice that he puts faith first, because as Paul works out for them and for Christians of all time how to put Jesus’s words into practice, faith alone is sufficient for salvation. And faith, then, leads to good works.
Paul doesn’t command their charity but offers them the opportunity to show their genuine love as disciples of Christ. It’s more flattery, a bit of a strategic ploy, but hey, he is trying to raise money.
We can forgive him that because then, in verse nine, we reach the heart of Paul’s argument and theology, his belief about the nature of God.
Paul says that Christ, as God, was rich. He was equal in power and glory with the Father. Yet, he not only became a man for us, he also became a poor man. Jesus was born in poor circumstances, lived a poor life, and died in poverty. This was for our sake, so that we might be made rich in the love and favor of God. Paul is saying that we should be charitable to the poor because we ourselves live upon the charity of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul closes his appeal with two concepts that are relevant and timely to us today – abundance and fair balance. And we may not all agree with his conclusions.
Paul says that gifts are acceptable according to what one has, not what one does not have. He seems to accept that life, that circumstance, gives more material things to some, and less to others. In this argument, there’s no guarantee of material equality -- and the purpose of charity is not to achieve that equality. That also means that those who have greater abundance must make room for charity.
But it’s not the same gospel message we heard from Jesus at times – like when Jesus told the rich man to sell his every possession and give the money to the poor, or when he said it would be easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get to heaven.
Paul says charity is voluntary. So, if you’re rich and stingy and selfish, well, that’s your bargain and you will have to square that up with God someday.
Paul isn’t calling for the Corinthians to drastically reduce their circumstances to relieve the poverty of Jerusalem. Rather, he is calling for “fair balance.” God’s overflowing grace gives us the possibility of giving and receiving, of reconciliation and reciprocity. We share our blessings now because we pray that when we are in need others will share their blessings with us.
After all, isn’t that what fellowship is -- sharing pain and joy, sharing poverty and wealth? It’s not shaming or taking or commandeering. It’s sharing abundance with a cheerful heart. It’s working towards the fair balance that God intends.
Paul illustrates this in the final verse, which is a reference to the Book of Exodus. Recall that God sent manna from heaven to feed the Israelites as they wandered in the wilderness. The Lord told them to gather only as much manna as each need. But as humans do, they disobeyed. Some gathered more than they needed, and some gathered less. Yet, those who gathered much had nothing left over, and those who gathered little had no shortage. God provided a fair balance.
There is no shortage of charity, grace or abundance in the economy of the Divine. In the human economy, we have shortages of all three. That means we must strive harder for fair balance.
Just as Paul asked the Corinthians, we can certainly ask ourselves, who needs a blessing? Who needs a gift that I can give today?
Amen.