“YOU HEAR MOSES AND THE PROPHETS---YOU HEAR CHRIST”
Saint Luke 16. 19-31
The First Sunday after Trinity: 18 June Anno Domini 2006
Fr Watson
You know the familiar story of Lazarus and the rich man well. It is true. Whether it is Christ’s recollection of an actual historical event, or whether it is Christ’s teaching parable, it is true.
You may think it has some moralistic teaching but not much direct relevance. After all, you are not a rich man (at least not to the extent of the rich man clothed in purple) and you are not a beggar.
But you are as sinful as the rich man every time you do what the rich man did. He wasn’t sinful because he “had” money; he was damnable because he worshipped his wealth. If he had believed in God, if he had been a lamb of the Shepherd, he would have helped Lazarus. A tree is known by its fruit. Faith shows forth in good works. Those that love God will love their neighbor. Were you to treat others as the rich man treated the beggar, one would have reason to doubt your confession of faith.
You are to be perfect, but you are not. You know this by God’s Word. That is the point; God’s Word. You know that you act like the rich man more than you want and should. By God’s Word you are sorry for these sins of both omission and commission. You have been given faith to believe that your Lord, the Christ, came to save you. The Lord, though infinitely richer than any “rich man,” gave up His heavenly wealth and became one with His beggarly creatures. Whereas the rich man wouldn’t share his clothing or his table with the sickly poor man, Christ shares, indeed, gives you everything He has. Jesus clothes you not with fine purple apparel but with shining transfigured robes of perfect righteousness. Jesus feeds you not with sumptuous meats and wines from a temporary table but feeds you His very Body and gives you to drink of His precious Blood; from an eternal banquet table. You can’t, by nature, be the beneficent, generous, giving rich man dispensing your abundance to those in need; but Jesus can, did, is. By faith in Him, by being “in” Him, you are now credited with all His virtue, charity and love.
By nature, you are the beggar; though not in the gutter but rather already in the morgue. Likewise, to rescue you from the logical consequences of your fallen state, your Lord again switched places with you. He becomes Lazarus so you won’t remain poor, festered, impotent and blind. Jesus hungered and thirsted on the cross; not just for food and water but for your forgiveness and salvation. Jesus was stripped of his clothes and treated with the shame and contempt of a street urchin so that you might become the children of the Heavenly King.
You also know the doctrinal teaching about heaven that is contained in this story. The rich man is in hell because he did not fear, love and trust in God above all things; i.e. he did not believe in the Lord; he was a pagan believing only in mammon. Lazarus goes to be with Abraham, i.e. to heaven, because though poor, he had stored up riches for himself which moth could neither fret nor rust corrode. Lazarus was a believer in Messiah and God’s great love and mercy.
But the key to this whole story of our Lord’s is not in the outward character of the two protagonists, nor in their eternal resting places. The real point is most assuredly not in any definitive teaching about who can see and communicate and who can’t from the great beyonds.
The purpose of this episode is to instruct and comfort all of you on how your invisible but present Lord comes to you to make you rich; to clothe you; to feed and nourish you; to carry you on angel’s wings to His bosom. He does it by the Word. The Word, only the Word, and all of the Word gives you Jesus, which is everything. You have the Lord as surely in 2nd Chronicles and Lamentations as you do in Romans or Saint Luke.
The final sin of the rich man was to, again, doubt the power of God’s efficacious Word. The rich man wanted a miracle, a visual spectacular, a verifiable proof. He wanted Lazarus to rise from the dead and warn his equally wayward brothers of their own damning unbelief.
Abraham gives the only truthful answer to the rich man’s pleas: “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.” The Patriarch here is speaking for Christ Himself. The way one is given faith, given life, given salvation, given Christ, is through Moses and the prophets, i.e. through the Word of God. Of course, now, post first century A.D. the church is blessed to have the Greek Bible, the New Testament of our Lord as well. But these words of Jesus as recorded by Saint Luke make abundantly clear that the Old Testament of the Hebrews, summarized here as “Moses and the prophets” are equally God’s saving Word. No one is saved apart from the whole Word, the full counsel of God. No one can claim faith through the Evangels who rejects the Law and Gospel flowing abundantly in the Pentateuch. Everything about God and His Christ is contained in Moses. The rich man had no excuse; neither did his brothers. Neither does anyone.
John the Baptizer’s message is for you as well as the Judeans. John’s message, which is Jesus’ message, is of course the message of Moses and the prophets: “Repent and believe the Good News!”
In the Lord’s perfect life and sacrificial death the Richest Man became the Poorest Man just for you. And now, you are seated with Him, through Him, through His Body and Blood, and through His Word, on the right hand of majesty. Through His Word you have repented and you do believe. You have Moses and the prophets, and that means you have the Christ.
In the Name of The Father and of The Son + and of The Holy Ghost