LIVING IN DENIAL…Luke 16:19-31

An elderly retired Episcopalian priest died last month who was a good friend of mine.  About 10 years ago he published in a magazine an amazing story about the events in his life from over 60 years earlier which led him to become a pastor. The events were so traumatic that, for decades he didn’t really share with his parishioners, or almost any other people why he was led to become a pastor. Hal and I became close friends when we served congregations together in Danville, VA back in the 80’s, so I knew the story well.  It happened when he was a soldier in World War II and, near the end of the war, participated in the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp in Dachau, Germany.

He told the story this way. “A buddy and I were assigned to a boxcar. Inside were the human corpses stacked in neat rows, exactly like firewood. The Germans, ever meticulous, had planned out the rows, alternating the heads and the feet, accommodating different sizes and shapes of bodies. Our job was like moving furniture. We picked up each body and moved it to a designated area. Some men couldn’t do it. They stood by the barbed wire fences retching. Then it happened! We came across the first of several people in the pile who were still alive! Some of the corpses, it turned out, weren’t corpses! They were human beings. We yelled for doctors and they went to work on these survivors right away.

I spent 2 hours in that boxcar; two hours that for me included every known emotion: rage, shame, pity, revulsion; every negative emotion. They came in waves – except for the rage. That stayed. It became our energy to keep working. After we had taken the few survivors to a makeshift clinic, we turned our attention to the Nazis; the SS officers in charge of Dachau. Our captain asked for a volunteer to escort a dozen officers at a time to the interrogation center. A guy named Chuck – his hand shot right up. Chuck claimed to have worked for Al Capone before the war and we all believed him. Well, Chuck grabbed his machine gun and ordered the group of officers down the trail. They walked ahead with hands locked behind their heads and elbows sticking out. A few minutes after they disappeared in the trees we heard the rattling cadence of a machine gun, with 3 long bursts of fire. A minute later Chuck came strolling out, his gun still smoking. He said with a smirk, “THEY ALL TRIED TO RUN AWAY.”

That was the day I felt called to become a pastor. Why? Well, there was the horror in that boxcar. I didn’t even know evil like that existed! But when I saw it, I knew I would somehow dedicate myself and my life to making sure I’d serve whatever opposed that kind of evil. But then came the Chuck incident. I had a horrible fear that the Captain would call on me to escort the next group of those SS officers. Because I knew in my heart that if he did I was going to do the same thing that Chuck had done. I realized at that moment the beast that was in those guards at Dachau was also now in me. I realized the struggle between good and evil is serious. And it deserved serious attention.

There is a monster called evil in the world and it is fueled by the disease of sin. Sin is real and it is formidable and it is capable of bringing any of us down. Sin is what ultimately left the rich man in the story Jesus tells condemned to eternal damnation. It was the unrepentant sin, and specifically the unrepentant sin of believing that he was his own God, that he was NOT his brother’s keeper, and that he was entitled to all the benefits of his wealth.

The rich man in the story finds himself cast into darkness in eternity because of his sins of omission. Maybe you remember the description of those sins in confirmation class. We can fail God by not doing anything! Furthermore, we can place our very salvation in jeopardy by insisting we are innocent. Notice, this rich guy, even cast into hell, still doesn’t get it. He tells Abraham to “send Lazarus the errand boy down to hell to bring water to cool my tongue.” The guy still thinks he should be waited on and lowly folks like Lazarus were placed on this earth for just that purpose.

So we need to take sin seriously, acknowledge the monster, and never ever be surprised or amazed at what people are capable of in this world. To pretend this monster doesn’t exist and, in fact, DOESN’T lurk in the dark recesses of all of us is to live in denial. We all know people living in denial. We see the woman in love with a scoundrel, or a control freak. Can’t she see where this relationship is headed? Well, we are living in denial when we believe that a very casual Christianity is an acceptable choice. A casual Christianity can fit whatever our choice of lifestyle. And it seems more comfortable than having our lifestyle honor our faith. But it’s an illusion. And the biggest illusion of all is that we will be more comfortable. That if we keep God at a distance by refusing to acknowledge our need for forgiveness and faith, we can keep control and balance in our lives. It’s an illusion! In fact, it is the imbalance that comes with inviting Jesus to manage your life that allows for real growth and understanding.

There’s an old story about some GIs who were on leave. The Major was furious when 7 of them didn’t show up for morning roll call. The first one straggled back at noon. “SORRY, SIR, BUT I HAD A DATE AND LOST TRACK OF THE TIME. I MISSED THE BUS BACK. SO I HIRED A CAB. BUT THEN THE CAB BROKE DOWN SO I WENT TO A FARMHOUSE A BOUGHT AN OLD HORSE. I WAS RIDING HERE WHEN THE HORSE COLLAPSED AND DIED. SO I WALKED THE LAST 10 MILES.” The Major let him off with a reprimand after a story like that. But then the others staggered in throughout the afternoon, and they all had the exact same story. Cab broke down, talked a farmer into selling me a horse. The horse died. By the time the 7^th soldier reported in the major was furious! “LET’S HEAR IT.” And the soldier began. When he said, “I missed the bus and I hired a cab” the Major interrupted. Don’t tell me. The cab broke down! “Oh, no sir. The cab was fine. But there were so many dead horses in the road we had trouble getting through!”

As they say, one excuse is as good as another for allowing our faith to fall into that trap of being just a casual Christianity.  It’s easy to do, and again, comfortable…at first.   But sometimes our casual behavior has consequences and sometimes those consequences are far out of proportion to the actions themselves.  For instance, some of us here this morning have lost dear loved ones, even children, because someone got behind the wheel of car after indulging in the relaxing benefits of alcohol. No harm was meant. But tragedy was invited to come calling through those actions.

In Martin Luther’s well known hymn A MIGHTY FORTRESS IS OUR GOD, which we’ll be singing next month on Reformation Sunday, he called the devil “the old evil foe”. And Luther tells us, HE INTENDS DEADLY WOE FOR US. ON EARTH THERE IS NO EQUAL. Yes, this is serious business. We have no guarantees of protection from loss, or from tragedy. But this beautiful hymn also proclaims: we cannot be defeated. One little word defends us. One little word, when faithfully confessed protects us from casual Christianity and determines that – yes, our faith and our hope will survive the consequences of our actions. One little word…the Savior…Jesus. AMEN