Blessed Investment Returns

Isaiah 43:16-21; Matthew 25:31-40; John 12:1-8

Central Baptist Church, Lowesville, VA

25 March 2007

As individuals, groups, and members of institutions, we are called upon to pursue various aims in life. We are tasked to maintain structures that we have held as meaningful. We are challenged to prepare for our comfort and well-being. We are charged to maintain our traditions, heritage, and sense of place in history. Are we willing to set aside all these varied expectations to fulfill God’s mission for our lives as the Body of Christ? Will we invest our life resources in expanding God’s reign, or waste them on lesser priorities? What kind of return do we expect on our life investment?

Isaiah heralded the coming of a completely new day. Yahweh, the God most powerful and uncontested in the execution of his will, was ushering in a completely new reality. Isaiah records God as urging us to completely forget the old way of anticipating and understanding life. This new thing Yahweh would bring about was to shatter the old ways of thinking. Isaiah takes us back to the Exodus image of God’s provision in the wilderness—springs in the dessert and provision amid an atmosphere of need and difficulty.

His was a call to faith. He called the people to trust beyond what they could see and foresee. They were to trust Yahweh to bless them for faithfulness, meeting their needs as they submitted to God’s will in confident obedience. The people had been unfaithful, but God was willing and prepared to blot out their sins and failings. God called them to repentance and obedience, trusting in God’s forgiving character of grace. Rather than living to meet their own needs and establish a security for their fears, they were to serve Yahweh in faithfulness, trusting their Creator’s provision. Can we trust God with all our concerns and anxieties, living as instruments of His will rather than our own?

In the world’s eyes, resources are limited. Our national oil and gas industry sets the stage of our human greed and insecurity. After Katrina, our oil industry had its greatest profit in history. The companies did not invest their excess resources in alternate sources of energy that would benefit the environment. We simply hear that alternative energy sources are not profitable. There are not enough resources to meet our energy demands without further endangering our environment. We are simply too greedy to worry about the responsible use of our resources. We are too insecure over our future profits. Aren’t God’s resources more than enough to meet both our responsibilities and our needs?

John records a strange story of Jesus’ anointing. It is strange, for it appears contrary to Jesus’ teaching about meeting the needs of the poor, hungry, sick, and otherwise needy. Judas’ words do not really seem off target as he questions why the resources represented in Mary’s pound of nard were not put to better use in caring for the poor. Judas seems to have an honest grasp of limited resources. When resources are limited, we must use them to the greatest advantage. We meet our more desperate or basic needs before seeking extravagance and pleasure. Despite the purpose behind his words, we understand the message they convey completely. Just so, he cannot comprehend the will of Christ Jesus.

Jesus does not understand resources as limited. From Jesus’ perspective, there is always enough to meet the demands of God’s will. From one perspective, Mary’s action was wasteful, yet Mary did not waste the nard on herself. She acted in anticipation of the death Jesus looked toward. Others did not accept the reality of Jesus’ death as imminent; she acted in trust, doing her part to honor Jesus. Hers was an act of faith and acceptance of Jesus’ words. It was an acknowledgement before the world of Jesus’ death and willingness to fulfill God’s will at all costs. In anointing Jesus, she honored his person, will, and the truth of his proclamation.

When Passo D’Areia Baptist Church recognized that its decrepit facilities were a bad witness to their proclamation of an all-powerful God they struggled. They did not have the resources to build. Getting a bank loan in Brasil was impossible. The membership struggled to make ends meet. They embarked upon the risky prospect of trusting God to meet their own needs and provide for a new facility at the same time. In order for their neighborhood to trust God with their basic needs, they had to take the initiative to publicly do the same. They merged the message preached by their facilities, actions, and words into one coherent reality. Do our lives, actions, and words honor Christ as they should? Do they display the concerns of Christ Jesus as the primary character of our lives?

Jesus’ words in Matthew 25 remind us how it is easy to ignore how our daily efforts may serve Christ or work against His will. Jesus presents us with a judgment scene in which all are taken by surprise. We would think that at least the faithful would not be surprised on this day of accounting! This is not the picture Jesus presents, however. Here all are taken aback at God’s judgment. We fail one and all to understand how our daily lives may serve God’s will or ignore God’s desires completely.

The hinge pin of this judgment is our response to the needs of others as ministers of Christ’s presence. Jesus calls us to reflect on how we act as his hands, feet, and voice, accepting our resources as tools of God’s provision for the needs of the world. Our resources are not our own. They are not provided for our own selfish ambitions. Rather, they are entrusted that we might join God in providing for the needs of all God’s creatures. This is the new life of confidence in God that Jesus introduced. Have we given our lives over to the character Jesus’ of trust in God’s provision?

I am proud of CBF of Virginia’s adoption of the Millennium Development Goals.^[1] This states our willingness to make concerted efforts to share responsibility for the needs of others. I am proud of the emphasis made by CBF Global Missions on ministering to the world’s most neglected peoples.^[1] This focus assumes a worthy application of the words of Christ Jesus in our lives. It matches our missionary efforts with the mission of Christ Jesus at its fullest expression. Rather than seeking to meet our own needs and build institutions for ourselves, these efforts focus on building a return for the reign of Christ Jesus. Are the foci of our energy, resources, and ambitions worthy of the eternal reign of Christ?

Isaiah spoke of a wholly new reality. Jesus spoke of the same. We still struggle to make sense of this new way of living today. Though God’s new way of living was announced some two thousand years ago, we often live as though we have never heard. When will we begin living as though the gospel we claim is the highest priority in our lives? It is too easy to live for the investment returns the world touts as so important. We look to preserving institutions, history, and traditions above living for the gospel’s aims. We hold onto dreams of comfort, wealth, and well-being as the definition of blessed living. Jesus spoke of living according to a wholly new reality. He calls us to invest for eternal returns of God’s fullest blessings the world can never take away. What kind of return do we anticipate on the investment of our lives? Will we live for the day God calls us to inherit His kingdom?

—©2007 Christopher B. Harbin

¹ Whitesides, Kristin Adkins. http://www.cbfv.org/news_articles/millenniumGoals.html.

² CBF Global Missions. http://www.thefellowship.info/inside%20cbf/global_missions.icm.