lenten journey, day 7 — a prayer for the affluent

We all know someone with a fat wallet but an empty life, don't we? Someone whose answer to the question "How much is enough?" would invariably be "Just a little bit more."

Jesus spoke so often about the perils of wealth, that it is virtually impossible to turn a page in the gospels without finding a warning or a rebuke or a parable concerning the impossibility of serving two masters. Jesus’s encounter with the rich young ruler in Luke 18 is the one that I find the most troubling, because I see way too much of myself in it.

You know the story…a rich young man asks Jesus what to do to deserve eternal life, but the answer—“sell everything you own and give it to the poor”—wasn’t quite what young Mr. Trust Fund expected. I love the way the passage is translated in The Message:

This was the last thing the official expected to hear. He was very rich and became terribly sad. He was holding on tight to a lot of things and not about to let them go.

Seeing his reaction, Jesus said, "Do you have any idea how difficult it is for people who have it all to enter God's kingdom? I'd say it's easier to thread a camel through a needle's eye than get a rich person into God's kingdom."

"Then who has any chance at all?" the others asked.

"No chance at all," Jesus said, "if you think you can pull it off by yourself. Every chance in the world if you trust God to do it."

God created us with hearts that long for the type of satisfaction that only He can give. But what God intended for good, the fallen world has corrupted. When we do not fill our hearts with Him, something else will rush in. Something that becomes very hard to let go, even if our very souls are at stake.

Merciful God, in this world where poverty and hunger are so prevalent, I find it hard to ask you to consider the plight of the wealthy. Yet so many with plentiful lives experience a “poverty of riches” in which their deepest longings—longings for you—remain unmet. Lord, in your mercy would you pursue the hearts of those who value the things of this world more than they value you? And Lord, since I am certainly wealthy in comparison to most of the world, would you help me not to be one of those rich, fat camels trying to squeeze through the eye of a needle? Help me to mean it when I say, “Jesus, have it all.” Yes, and amen.

"No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money." — Matthew 6:24

"Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment." — 1 Timothy 6:17