#THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS HOW TO#

So I must face the challenging question: How am I doing sharing the blessings God has gifted to me? How are you doing? How is the wealth in Canada shared? What I have, what we have – are gifts from God. The story of the rich man has implications for everyone. I need to pay attention to the message in Luke’s Gospel. When I think about how I live compared to many Canadians and for that matter, the vast majority of people in the world, I am wealthy. Maybe the message is not just about rich and powerful people. In death, Lazarus was a means to a self-serving end.

In life, Lazarus was invisible to the rich man. He was not a person, a beloved child of God. The rich man failed to see the humanity in Lazarus. Remove someone’s name and give them a number strips the person of their humanity. One of the Canadians who was tortured, referred to the number on his cell door. There was a documentary on the CBC’s The National in September 2016 about three Canadians who were tortured in Syria with the complicity of officials at CSIS, the RCMP and the Government of Canada. When he was moved to Pollsmoor Prison in 1982, he was given the number 220/82. Nelson Mandela’s prison number on Robben Island from 1964 to 1982 was 466/64. Or like the children who attended residential school and were given either numbers or Western European names. They may be given a number like the millions of Jews who perished in the Holocaust, and those who survived the concentration camps. Generally, the poor, the marginalized, the persecuted are unnamed or have their names taken away from them. It is derived from the Hebrew El’azar meaning God is my help. The poor man has a name – he is called Lazarus. Abraham replies that no intervention on behalf of his brothers would make a difference. The rich man also wants his brothers, still living, to be warned, lest they suffer the same gruesome fate as him. He calls to Abraham seeking mercy and asks that he send Lazarus to him to dip his finger in water and cool the rich man’s tongue. If the rich man had known what awaited him, would it have made a difference?įrom Hades, the rich man looked up and saw Abraham with Lazarus by his side. He was blind to Lazarus’ suffering and to his need.

While the rich man feasted every day, Lazarus lay at the rich man’s gate hoping for a few crumbs. The rich man, now being tormented in Hades, has forgotten how he ignored Lazarus. When Lazarus died, he was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. We then read that he was in Hades and suffering. Things did not end well for the rich man.

The passage from Luke about the parable of Lazarus and the rich man is a familiar one. So even though the phrase isn't in the OT, naming Abraham would show everyone that the poor man was a believer in the Messiah, while the rich man wasn't.Phil Ochs at the Vancouver Gardens Arena in 1969. 'Today, you will be WITH ME in Paradise'. Since EVERY Jew would have been very familiar with the name of Abraham, describing where Lazarus was would have indicated to the Jews that Lazarus was in Paradise, where Jesus told the one thief he would be when he died. He was giving us a glimpse of the afterlife before the resurrection. Jesus was telling a real account of 3 real people who were already dead and in the afterlife in Hades. That they still make their claim only demonstrates that they aren't as scholarly as some think.

#THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS HOW TO#

Those who are called 'theologians and scholars' certainly know HOW to check that rumor out. Why don't you check with the manuscripts that have been found that date back to the SECOND Century. Why don't you tell that to Jesus, who DID use that phrase.ĭo you think Jesus just made that up on the fly, something that would be totally unfamiliar with the people He was teaching? Really?

The rich man and lazarus