RICH AND POOR: Two Worlds or One Family? by J.Snodgrass April 7, 2008
RICH AND POOR: TWO WORLDS OR ONE FAMILY
Presentation given by J.Snodgrass for the Marble Collegiate Church Young Adults 20s/30s
Every year, the gap between rich and poor gets wider. The title I was given for this presentation - “Rich and poor, two worlds…” reminded me that in economic terms we actually have three worlds on this Earth – the first world, capitalism, the second world, communism, and the third world, “other,” which has become synonymous with whole nations of people living in abject poverty. The recent disaster in New Orleans was yet another reminder that, although America is a first-world country, there’s a third world in here, too, a small nation’s worth of people that our own government left behind and forgot once the first-class citizens had been rescued.
Every year the chasm gets wider, and every year I’m reminded of a story Jesus told in the Gospel according to Luke chapter sixteen, about an un-breach-able chasm.
Luke 16:19-26
“There was a rich man…dressed in purple and fine linen who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried.
In Hell, where he was being tormented, [the rich man] looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.’
But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus [got nothing]; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’
So here we’ve got this rich man, dead, suffering, and what does he say to Abraham? ‘Send that boy down here, that poor boy that used to lie outside my gates, tell him to fetch me some water.’ Even dead, burning in Hell, this rich man has not learned his lesson. But the chasm cannot be traveled, even if Lazarus had wanted to. This rich man could have spared himself all that suffering, if he had bridged the chasm in life, but never had he reached out to invite this poor man to his table. The story continues…