Erl Purnell Sermon

b23Pentecost 19 ~ October 15, 2006 ~ A sermon preached by The Rev’d Erl G. Purnell at Old St. Andrew’s Church, Bloomfield, CT

Amos 5.6-7, 10-15; Psalm 90; Hebrews 3.1-6; Mark 10.17-31

“Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” The way I depict the scene of the rich man in Through Mark’s Eyes is sadly comic. Jesus and his friends are heading south, up to Jerusalem. The frantic man dashes past Jesus, pivots in front of him suddenly, and drops to his knees on the rocky road. “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” he asks.

The encounter unfolds and Jesus finally tells the rich man that he’ll need to change his ways so that he’s no longer under the spell of his great wealth. When he heard this news, this is what I write: “The once hopeful man was crestfallen. His face turned pale. He stared at Jesus but not for long. His eyes dropped, followed by his head. He got up slowly, stiffly, as if his body was hurting. He stepped around Jesus and walked straight through the disciples, back to his home.” It’s a sad scene.

This week, Bangladeshi economist Muhammad Yunus and his Grameen Bank won the Nobel Peace Prize. Muhammad Yunus’ bank is among a few pioneer banks that look at the economics of the poor at the micro-level. Their approach to poverty and the problems of underdeveloped societies in the third world focuses on the individual in the community, as opposed to NGO relief efforts or national governmental schemes aimed at large groups of people.

In the early 1980s, I had the opportunity to work as a consultant with an organization called the Maine Idea. The Maine Idea was an offshoot of Accion International, an organization, like Grameen Bank, that provides tiny loans and advice to small and micro-businesses. At that time they were concentrating their efforts in South America. They have now spread their efforts to India, parts of Africa, eastern Europe, and central Asia. They also work in the United States.

The concept of mico-lending is revolutionary and simple. There are several models. One plan is to make a loan directly to an individual who pays it back with interest on a regular schedule, often weekly. The interest rates are very low and used to fund future loans to other people. Another model, one used by Grameen, is that a small group of people, say five or six, band together to guarantee a loan to two members of the group. Once the original two loans are repaid, money is available for two others in the group.

What is remarkable about these micro-loans is that they are often for $100 or less. There was a woman from Brazil, I can’t remember her name, who wanted to be a seamstress. She borrowed $100 for a sewing machine and paid back the loan over two years at a rate of a dollar or so a week. Having the machine and enough capital to buy thread, pins, and scissors put her in business.

Then there’s Leonardo García Moraga who worked restocking fruits and vegetables at a grocery store in Managua, Nicaragua. He wondered what it would take to be a wholesaler and sell oranges to the market where he worked.

Leonardo joined a solidarity group, where members guarantee each other’s loans in lieu of collateral. But still, his problem was that he couldn’t build a good customer base because he didn’t have the up-front cash to fill large orders. Finally, he received his loan, for $70, which he used to increase his inventory of oranges. After that, he could sell to larger customers. Today Leonardo has twelve steady clients, including the grocery store he used to work in.

You might be wondering “What’s important here?” Well, I am amazed and impressed by people who support the dignity of every human being. Mico-economics disperses wealth to the people who need it most. The Grameen Bank and Muhammad Yunus, whose average loan is $200, have had a major impact on the people of Bangladesh. Since 1974, they have made $5.72 billion in loans to more than six million people … and their loan repayment rate is 99%! Moreover, 97% of the borrowers in Bangladesh are women.

Jesus tells the poor-rich man in Mark’s Gospel, “You lack one thing; go sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”

Now this may shock some of you, but I don’t always agree with Jesus. For example, his ideas about sheep farming are kind of strange—leaving the flock to find a single lost lamb. But when I look closely, I understand that the story is most powerful as metaphor. Likewise with this tale.

The bottom line in Jesus’ admonition is for the poor-rich man to follow him. But, I think this is presented backwards. Perhaps Jesus should have said, ‘Follow me and then do what you can with your great wealth to help the poor.’ Be that as it may, Mark’s community would have understood exactly what Jesus was saying: ‘You’ve got to take up The Way of life Jesus demonstrated.’ The point was not to become impoverished for poverty’s sake. Quite the contrary. Jesus saw the oppression of the domination systems of his day just as the Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank do today. Jesus’ radical social and economic program stood for the redistribution of wealth so that nobody would be hungry.

But the poor-rich man really was lacking, lacking in a spirit of generosity and unable to recognize the great good his wealth could do. He was blinded to all but his own concerns and needs. Sure, he did everything by the book. What he never did, though, was to move beyond the Self and consider the greater good of the community.

It’s a funny thing, generosity. When I worked in the ghettos of Pittsburgh for two years in the mid-1960s, I was shocked at the generosity of poor people. Although from a privileged white family, I had never experienced people sharing what they had out of such genuine concern and love for others. Any sense of independence and self-reliance in those Pittsburgh neighborhoods was overshadowed by a sense of community and interdependence. People caring for each other. These many years later, I now associate that experience with what Jesus expected of his friends and followers.

To make a difference—in a family, in a community, in a parish—we are called upon to invest in the greater good first, not in Self. That’s Jesus’ message. If we are the Body of Christ—the church—do we invest firstly and primarily in ourselves, or dare we begin by giving for the good of ALL?

“People knew this disappointed man—this rich man who owned many things—would never get rid of his precious possessions.” Again, my question is “What’s important here?” What’s important is an attitude of building from the bottom up, using the gifts we’ve been given by God for the work of Christ in the world, of investing in what may seem small but is actually huge. How much do you want your church to be the light of Christ? How important is it that your church grows and so reaches out to you and to others in the spirit of Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank and Jesus Christ?

Amen.