August 3, 2025
Pentecost 8 Lectionary 18
Genesis 18:20-32; Luke 11:1-13
Epiphany, Winnipeg
A few stories about people and barns:
You’ve heard of Little Free Libraries? Do you have one in your neighbourhood? On a morning walk Val and I will pass three of them, and if we extend the walk a few blocks past our house on the way back there’s a fourth. Simple or fancy, just a small little cupboard with a few shelves. Anybody at all can come by and pick up a book. A child learning to read, someone living alone who wants the company of a good story, someone who can’t afford to buy a book, even a middle aged pastor who probably has a few too many books already….There are just all these books that someone puts there, and anyone at all can take one home.
In my neighbourhood, and maybe in yours, there’s a Facebook Group called Gifting with Integrity. Anyone at all who lives in the neighbourhood can give away anything they don’t need to anyone who might be interested. I once gave away fourteen two by fours. I’ve seen people post baby formula, lamps, good clothes, musical instruments, snow shovels, daisies and hostas, bike trailers and cookies. One of the rules is that there can be no selling, trading, bartering, or strings attached. It’s just for giving away. And anybody from the neighbourhood can check and see if there’s anything they might need, or just simply post a message that says, “I’m looking for the top section of an artificial Christmas Tree.” We did that. Now we have a small extra tree to put in the sunroom.
The only credential you need is that you live in the neighbourhood, and that’s not always checked so carefully. Nobody needs a visa card or bank account or any kind of proof that they need something. It’s just gifts from people who decided that building more shelves or adding another shed aren’t their only options.
These neighbourhood initiatives are not perfect. Who knows what the motives are of the people who haul their books down to the Little Free Library or take the time to take a few pictures and post on a neighbourhood Facebook Group? But that Little Free Library, and that Facebook group, they seem to say that life is always about more than just me. It’s as though all along the way somebody somewhere says, “I’ve got all this stuff. It’s more than I need. I wonder who else might need it?”
I’ve got all of this, and my life isn’t just about me.
Jesus tells this story about someone who has a great crop that year, so they wonder what to do with all that harvest. And just notice who the rich one in the story talks to about all his wealth. Did you notice? He just talks to himself. He’s the only character in the story.
He has nobody but himself to talk to, so he says, “What should I do? I know. I’ll tear down my old barns. I’ll build myself bigger ones. I’ll say to my soul, I’ll say to myself, “Self, we’ve got it all and we’re good now for all the years we’ve got left.” Or the few hours we’ve got left….
It’s a sad picture of someone alone, with all their goods, a bank statement, a username and a password, and a handful of bigger barns.
Now it’s not always like this, and we’ve probably heard of people and some of us have known people - wealthy wealthy people - who care more about sharing the wealth they have than they do about about building bigger barns.
But there’s something about wealth that can just cause isolation. Those who have wealth – and in comparison to some across the parking lot from here or to lives lived in any number of neighbourhoods in the city, I have to include myself in that category, and a lot of us probably do – those who have wealth can become so concerned about gathering more. Or about protecting what we have. You’ve got to hang on to what you have, because we think it’s scarce, or fragile. We need a bigger barn.
The ones with an empty barn? Mine hasn’t been empty yet, but maybe some day it will. And I’ll see another way that wealth, or not having it, can leave so many people out on the edges and not really a part of things.
The first line of the story Jesus tells is this: “The land of a rich man produced abundantly.” That’s a sneaky and simple reminder that it’s all gift. A rich man’s land produced abundantly, and he didn’t make it happen all by himself. The land produced abundantly. The creator gave abundantly. There’s the seed that came from whatever crop there was the year before. There’s soil with nutrients and earthworms and things that make plants grow. There’s rain, there’s sunshine. There are people who worked to plant the seeds, and people who harvested them; people who loaded it into barns, big people and little people, little barns and big barns.
The land of a rich one produced abundantly. It didn’t belong to him in the first place; he didn’t make it himself. Soon it won’t belong to him again. So why build bigger barns?
Two friends of ours, ten years after graduating from university, paid off their student loans and their car loans all in the same month. One day soon they’d start thinking more about saving for retirement, but the first thing they did was throw a big old dinner party for their friends. They spent I don’t know how much to hire a caterer who brought in all kinds of great food and drink, and on a cold February Friday night thirteen of us sat around a big table for hours and we laughed and laughed and enjoyed each other’s company so much and twenty eight years later some of us are still talking about it.
Doesn’t that all sound like more fun than building a barn? Although the stories I’ve heard of good old barn building involved all the neighbours coming together and being super-generous with their time, their skills, and their stuff. And it sounds like a lot of fun.
Here’s a story about someone who doesn’t need a bigger barn. On the night in which he’s being betrayed, Jesus takes bread and gives thanks, breaks it and gives it to his disciples. Then he takes a cup, and gives thanks for the fruit of the vine, given to refresh weary bodies, to gladden the heart (Psalm 104, if you want to look it up), to forgive us our sin and bind us together. He names it his body and blood, his life given for them….and it’s only a few hours until a crowd and the powerful ones will demand his life from him, this very night. He names it his body and blood, his life given for us so there will always be more life to come. Life that just keeps on being given.
A gift, a barn emptied, for all the people.
That’s how God’s economy works. Jesus takes the fruit of the earth and the vine, gifts of wealth the hand God, and he shares it with the ones around him. That’s how God’s economy works. It’s not just for the ones who have worked hard to earn; it’s for the ones who work so hard trying to make ends meet. It’s not just for the ones with jobs or savings; it’s for us all. Jesus gathers gifts, empties the barn, gives all this for whoever comes to receive it. This bread, fruit of the land, is my body, and it’s all given for you. God just gathers the gifts, and gives them for all to share.
It's never about bigger barns. The way that God deals with us looks more like gifts given to strangers, a little free library; or gifts given to neighbours, Gifting with Integrity; or gifts given to friends, a dinner party.
No bigger barns, just a gift of life, just a gift of love that cannot be contained by any walls. Just the good gifts of God, given for us all.