Proper 20 C Godly Creativity

 Proper 20 C Godly Creativity
September 24, 1995
By Rev. Ernest F. Campbell

I wonder how often it has been said that “If convicts put as much creative energy towards legitimate ends as they do towards selfish and criminal ends, they would win the admiration of society.” If they turned their (what feels like) 36-hour days, 12-day weeks, and 18-month years from thoughts of how to mess with the system to how to earn an honest living, they would be millionaires and we would be working for them.

I have a theory. If it’s true that we are created in God’s image then we share God’s creativity. Everyone is by nature creative…. and we are all going to use our creativity either constructively or destructively. 

In today’s Gospel, Our Lord tells a story that in effect says, you have to admire the creativity of the dishonest steward for dealing with his desperate situation so creatively. Our Lord is a master storyteller. And here He teaches a basic truth by using a bad example. If we hope to promote the good news of God’s love, we will have to be as creative as the dishonest steward was in trying to save his skin. 

Example) There is a story of a man who made it his goal to be a millionaire before reaching the age of 35. To accomplish this, he:

• Stole a million dollars and hid the money.
• For his crime he spent ten years in prison.
• While in prison the stolen money was invested at 7% interest.
• When he was released, he led authorities to the “hidden” million.

• After turning over the million, he then lived the rest of his days on the interest of the interest the stolen money had earned.

How cleaver can you get?

It’s interesting to me that when we see this kind of story in the movies or read it in a book, we find ourselves kind of hoping that it will succeed. Why? Because I think we love the creative energy that someone was willing to invest to make it happen.

Our Lord might look at this story and say, look at the risk and sacrifice the dishonest steward was willing to take to accomplish an evil deed! To reach his goal he risked his life and was wiling to sacrifice ten years of freedom. 

We have to admit that he was “good” in a diabolical, destructive sort of way. He was not good in doing Godly things. Would you be surprised if he did not tithe his $70,000-dollar annual income? The truth that Our Lord is conveying is that the sons-of-this-world are wiser and more creative than the sons-of-the-light. 

William Barclay writes: “If only we Christians were as eager and ingenious in our attempts to attain goodness as the man-of-the-world is in his attempt to attain money and comfort, we would be a much better people. If only we Christians would give as much attention to the things which concern our souls as we do to the things which concern our business. We would be a people much more at peace. Over and over again (Barclay is still talking here), a man or woman will expend twenty times the amount of time and money and effort on his pleasure, his hobby, his garden, his sport, as he does on his church.”

How many of us could honestly say that our part in the promotion of the Gospel has resulted in something looked or felt like a sacrifice?

Today’s Gospel is telling us that we can take a lesson from the scoundrels like the ones Amos addressed: Merchants so eager to trample on the poor they could hardly wait for the sunrise. Could anyone accuse us of being that eager to proclaim their love of Christ? 

In some ways it is much easier to deal with an out and out selfish cheat, than it is to comprehend and commit to a person who is trying to follow two masters. I think that we all know the horns of this dilemma well. We want the Gospel to move into the neighborhood because we believe that is a force for good, but…. we find it difficult to come up with the means to make it happen. 

People can not serve two masters. Either we will love the one and hate the other, or they will cling to one and despise the other. If money is our means of security, it will be difficult to give it away. If God is our means of security, then promoting God’s will and purpose will be a positive joy! God loves a cheerful giver because a cheerful giver has grounded his being on the love and promises of God. Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. 

What then is our motivation to be as eager to serve God as the world is eager to serve themselves?

Listen again to 1st Timothy, “God desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. There is one God, and there is one mediator between God and human kind, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself as a ransom for all.”

When Jesus came to earth, he had nothing…. material.

When Jesus left the earth, he had nothing…. material.

What worked was that Jesus lived life. He said, “Follow me.” And people did.

He said there is no peace like the peace of knowing that you are in God’s everlasting love. In the ways of the world, we can know the peace of good health…having the house paid for…good friends…but all of these (as wonderful as they are) can be very fleeting.

The peace we claim and the peace we proclaim is the peace that goes beyond all human understanding. The peace of knowing God’s love for eternity. 

The challenge for us is how dedicated and creative we can be in letting people in on the good news of God.