C, Post-Pentecost 9, Proper 14 - Luke 12:32-46 "Forgetting the Faith"

Fear and anxiety are markers of faithlessness.  Faithlessness comes about when we forget God and his promises, seeking to work our own way through the wilderness.  Like someone whose car has broken down in the desert, they try to walk to safety, get lost, and die having been overcome by a hopeless situation.

Do you daily remember God as you travel through the wilderness of this existence?  Our modern society blindly blunders into the unknown having put aside the transcendence of God and all the gifts he promises.  Humanity forgets the gifts of God, because it has firstly, turned its back on God, and forgotten him. 

We Christians are no different.  If someone measured how much you remember God the Father in heaven, in every moment of your day, you may or may not be surprised just how much time you spend forgetting God to be absorbed in mesmerising and memorising yourself!

Imagine if after Jesus was crucified, raised, and ascended into heaven, that was the end of the matter.  Two thousand years after the fact, would you or I remember Jesus Christ? 

I put it to you that most of us struggle to remember what happened a week ago.  Can you remember all the names of your ancestors beyond your grandparents?  So why don’t we forget the holy figure of Jesus Christ, hidden from humanity’s sight two thousand years ago?

We receive faith so we do not forget.  The faith we receive is the faithful witness and work of the Holy Spirit.  God the Holy Spirit was sent, to help us be holy, after God the Son ascended into the hidden realm to the right hand of God the Father.  The Spirit was sent and still comes so we remember our humanity has been hampered and he helps us recall and receive the holiness of God’s heavenly kingdom.

While Jesus was resolutely working his way to the cross for us, he reminds us to, “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” (Luke 12:32–34 ESV)

We, the little flock of God, are gathered by the Holy Spirit into church, to where we are called as God carries us in his kingdom towards eternity.  Jesus is our prize purse that does not fail, that not even the thief of all thieves , the devil, can steal.  Nor can moth destroy Jesus’ many gifts!  Jesus promises it’s your Heavenly Father’s pleasure to give you, his kingdom.  Indeed, even so it’s Jesus’ pleasure too.  As we hear, he is “the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:2 ESV)

 So then why do we fall into fear and anxiety?  Why do we forget this promise of God?  What happens to faith when we forget God?  What happens when I forget the faith given to me? 

Jesus tells us to be ready for his return saying, “Stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning, and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast, so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes.” (Luke 12:35–37a ESV)

Peter asks, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?” (Luke 12:41 ESV) We might ask the same thing too, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?”

Jesus follows on with a parable teaching every hearer what happens when we forget God and are not ready for the return of our transcendent master.  He says, “Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom his master will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed in coming,’ and begins to beat the male and female servants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will cut him in pieces and put him with the unfaithful.”  (Luke 12:42–46 ESV)

When we forget God, we forget he is master of all things.  Just like the servant in the parable, we forget the true master of our domain and pinch his place.  The servant who forgets God, tries to become God, powerfully abusing God’s other faithful servants.  A foolish servant forgets it’s God’s pleasure to give the kingdom and replace the gift of God with earthy debauched pleasures, like eating and drinking.

It’s here faith has moved from God to the self!  Jesus Christ, the founder, and perfecter, of our faith gets forgotten!  Although we might call on God for an hour a week in worship, maybe a bit more, we burden God with our actions that work against him, making our own kingdoms come.

But making oneself master is fraught with fear and anxiety.  One is constantly looking over the shoulder, in suspicion.  When one forgets God, they suspect every other servant is seeking the same, causing competitive fear and dread! 

Also, deep down there’s knowledge that the true master is returning and will put his household right and remove those who are unrepentantly wrong.  The servant who turns God’s house of holiness into a house of happiness for one’s own ego, rules with fear and anxiety making God’s house a house of horrors for every other servant.  As the old adage goes, “When the cat’s away—or forgotten—the mice will play!”

What makes it even messier is when all forget God is the transcendent master.  The results of this are easily seen everywhere today inside and outside the church.  The mice are at play, playing up in plague proportions.  If you’ve ever experienced the chaos of a mouse plague on a grain farm, you know how devastating it is when the plague is out of control in fear of famine.  The plague can destroy everything!  Humanity is much the same when faith in God is forgotten in favour of fear and human failure at being the master of their own dominion.

The Holy Spirit never strays away to play.  He calls, gathers, enlightens and makes us holy with the written word of God in Jesus Christ, the Word of God made flesh.  As we travel through the wilderness of this world, the Holy Spirit mobilises the church to move in Christ.  Just as Moses and the Israelites moved in the wilderness only when the holy pillars of cloud and fire moved, we move and stop in faith given by the Holy Spirit, keeping us in the holy protective confines and convocations of Christ, so we are constantly remembering and returning to the means of grace. 

Allowing the Holy Spirit to work his work of making us holy, removes fear and anxiety for the future. He keeps us in the faith, so we stay dressed ready for action and keep our lamps burning. 

These actions are like the Israelites who ate the Passover, ready to roll into the wilderness at a moment’s notice, towards the land of milk and honey.  We remain ready for action,  ready to repent, forgive, and live—trusting in God as we are moved by the will of God.

The Holy Spirit also keeps the lamp burning, with the good oil of God’s word.  Without his word the Holy Spirit has nothing with which to keep us in Christ.  The church without the word—each of us without the word—forgets God, gets lost, and flounders in hopelessness. 

But abiding under the word of God, keeps us burning as the body of Christ.  The Holy Spirit keeps us moving through the wilderness of this world.  The Holy Spirit throughout history has done the same with many others, who in faith, did not forget God.  With them the Spirit gives us understanding to stand under him who is unseen, remembering the promise of God with determined Christ-like hope despite the hopelessness of all other things.  Amen.