Sunday Worship
Welcome to Sunday Worship in Leesfield Parish. Our Church services today are at the usual times of 9.15 am at St Agnes', and 11.00 am at St Thomas'. If you're not able to be with us in person, you can find the Gospel, reflection and prayers below.
Our first hymn this morning is "God Forgave my Sin (Freely, Freely)"
Today's Gospel
Luke 12:13-21 The Parable of the Rich Fool
Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me." But he said to him, "Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?" And he said to them, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." Then he told them a parable: "The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, `What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?' Then he said, `I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, `Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.' But God said to him, `You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God."
Reflection
If you look at the lectionary for this Sunday, you will see that the related Old Testament text passages are taken from Ecclesiastes chapters 1 & 2. The text is about man’s vanity and how we stress and worry about the work and effort we put into life to achieve personal gain. Then we worry about what will happen to whatever we have accumulated when ultimately we die. Will it be passed on to someone who hasn’t worked hard or put any real effort into making anything of their own life, or will my inheritance just be squandered. The lesson here is as much about greed as it is about vanity. Greed not necessarily in accumulating as much as possible, but greed in not being willing to share with anyone else.
I recently heard a phrase that I haven’t heard in quite a while; “it’s no good being the richest person in the graveyard”. This is often interpreted as meaning - if you’ve earned it, make sure you spend it and enjoy your life to the full, because whatever you have is useless to you when you’re dead. However, in this instance the conversation was about John Dawson, a young man who lived in the parish soon after it was created back in 1846. He was a highly respected scholar from the North East and was appointed as the first headteacher of Leesfield school ,which was built with the aims of educating the poor persons of the new parish and teaching them the principles of the Church. Although he had a full time role and a good lifestyle, he also wanted to ensure that those who couldn’t afford to go to school could benefit from his knowledge. The Rev. Whittaker, (first vicar of Lees), immediately asked him to form and run a young men’s Sunday class, which he gladly did, and which was hugely successful. Furthermore, he spearheaded the formation of an association for the purpose of acquiring and diffusing knowledge and education and taking part in political agitation to achieve their goals. Ultimately, this political movement influenced the election of William Gladstone as Prime Minister.
Despite being relatively comfortable, John Dawson chose not to live an easy life and indulge just in himself, he chose to use his time, money and experience to help others. He was not interested in dying a rich man.
Like John Dawson, we can see many similar examples today where volunteers, (some old and some less so), give their time and skills to support charity shops, foodbanks, refugees, the church, and other good causes. People who may give huge amounts of personal time to be trustees, governors, treasurers and the like - making use of the skills which, like wealth, have been accumulated over a lifetime.
In doing so, these folk are investing in others in much the same ways that Jesus invested himself; through love, mercy, compassion, hope, acceptance, and last but not least, generosity. Jesus tells us to be rich towards God, and these are some of the ways that we can be rich towards God, just as God shares and invests in us through Jesus Christ. We can’t take our wealth, skills and knowledge with us, but we can use what we have for the benefit of others as well as ourselves. Jesus tells us there is no point worrying about tomorrow because we don’t know what lies ahead. However, like the example of John Dawson, if we are rich toward others and thereby rich towards God, the future for others can be better than if we greedily waste our time vainly worrying about only ourselves.
If we focus too much on the here-and-now, we might forget that there is a there-and-then. Paul
