Risking Love

Sunday November 16, 2008 Rev. Robert L. Clark II Matthew 25:14-30

David and Bathsheba, Paris and Helen of Troy, Romeo and Juliet, Mark Anthony and Cleopatra, Tristan and Isolde, Abelard and Heloise, these names are nearly synonymous with romance. These are the great lovers whose stories have come down to us from history. In each of these couples passion burned an inextinguishable flame, consuming custom, consuming opposition, consuming common sense. Each of these affairs is marked by great risk and greater tragedy. Take for example the story of Abelard and Heloise. Peter Abelard, a French Philosopher from the 12th century, is still considered to be one of the greatest minds of his day. Heloise was the beloved niece of Cannon Fulbert, an extraordinarily well educated woman, graced with uncommon intelligence and striking beauty. They were brought together when Fulbert hired Abelard as tutor to Heloise. As might be expected the couple fell in love. They were secretly married and they conceived a child. When all of this came to light Heloise’s uncle Fulbert was furious. Believing that Abelard had brought shame on Heloise, Fulbet hired some thugs to take revenge on Abelard. I will leave to your imagination the terrible punishment these thugs exacted on poor Abelard. In his own words it was “…a most cruel and most shameful punishment, such as astounded the whole world…” In his shame Abelard stole away to a monastery where he became a monk. Heloise for her part left their child with Abelard’s sister and joined a convent. One might think this the end of the story but it is not. Although Fulbert’s cruelty had robbed them of the normal love shared by husband and wife and had driven each to life within the cloister still the love they had for one another was not quenched and they continued to correspond for the rest of their lives. As example of their continued love take these words from Heloise’s own pen, "But if I lose you, what have I left to hope for? Why continue on life's pilgrimage, for which I have no support but you, and none in you save the knowledge that you are alive, now that I am forbidden all other pleasures in you and denied even the joy of your presence which from time to time could restore me to myself?..."While I am denied your presence, give me at least through your words--of which you have enough and to spare--some sweet semblance of yourself…I beg you, think what you owe

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me, give ear to my pleas, and I will finish a long letter with a brief ending: farewell, my only love." Great love carries with it great risk, risk that as often as not leads to tragedy. No one wants to experience tragedy. No one seeks sorrow. Therefore, it seems the wisest choice is to avoid ‘Great Love’. Yet isn’t that what at some point in life we all seek? We all treasure the stories of the great and tragic love affairs from across history and that we do tells us as much about ourselves as about the nature of love. We are creatures who are designed to live passionately. We are designed with a desire for true love and we are, or should be, willing to risk everything to obtain it.

This morning we read a story, a parable, which is very much concerned with taking risks. In this parable the Master calls together three of his servants. He is going on a journey and doesn’t know when he will return. So he has decided to entrust each servant with a portion of his wealth and appointed each as steward over that portion. To one he gives five talents, to another two, and to a third one. A ‘talent’ as you likely know is an ancient measure of weight and in this parable it refers to a certain amount of silver usually thought of as having the value of one ox. Jesus use of talents in this parable is, I think somewhat unhelpful to modern hearers. We all carry with us a set of attitudes and understandings or more importantly misunderstandings about the role of money in our lives that color the way we hear Jesus’ parable. One result is that this parable is frequently used by the Church as a bit of propaganda for fund raising. This is in my opinion a terrible misuse of the sacred text. Therefore, I want to invite you to replace the word ‘talent’ in this parable with the words ‘degrees of passion’. The master gathered the servants together; to one he gave five degrees of passion, to another two degrees and to a third only one. The one who received five degrees of passion immediately went out and invested that passion. To do so was risky. Investing our passion is risky. For example God gave Mother Teresa a passion for the poor. She invested that passion in the people of Delhi. By doing so she risked everything. To help the poor she became poor. To serve the dying she gave up her life. She threw all of her passion, five times the normal amount of passion, into her work and the result

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could have been that her work consumed her passion. That as we know is not what happened. Instead Mother Teresa’s passion was multiplied a thousand times over as she was joined by others in her thankless work. The servant who received two degrees of passion also wasted no time in investing that passion. No doubt to do so was risky. Investing our passion is always risky. I think about Dr. Martin Luther King. Dr. King had a passion, perhaps a double share of passion. Dr. King had a passion for freedom, a passion for the liberation of all people and he invested that passion in the struggle for civil rights. That investment cost him his life. It cost him his life but it did not cost him his passion. The passion Dr. King invested was multiplied exponentially eventually growing into a movement that paved the way for Barak Obama to become the first black man to be elected president of the United States of America. The servant who received the one degree of passion took that passion and buried it. This servant chooses the safest route; this servant is prudent, careful, and deliberate. If I put my passion out there where everyone can see it, someone is likely to steal it away from me. If not that then they will find a way to use up my passion and I will be left empty. I will be left with nothing. Better a passionate dream unshared than no passion at all. What this servant doesn’t understand is that passion is like manna. What God gives us is always sufficient for today and only for today. Passion like manna cannot be stored up for tomorrow. Any manna the Israelites tried to store overnight rotted and was filled with worms before the sun could rise. Passion hoarded is passion lost, passion destroyed. It is an offense to God. Another way in which this parable is misunderstood is that people think it has something to do with numbers. We tend to think that the more talents one receives and the greater the eventual return on the investment of those talents is, the greater the reward. This is a misunderstanding, When the master returns, the servant who doubled the two talents he was given to invest received the same reward as the servant who doubled the five talents he was given. When each presented their accumulated talents to the master each received the same response. 'Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your Master.' Therefore, one is led to assume that the same would have been true for the servant who received only one talent had that servant presented the Master with two talents upon the Master’s return.

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To return to our metaphor, it is not a question of who has the greater passion or what kind of return one realizes on the investment of that passion. The faithful servant whose passion it is to ready the sanctuary for worship each Sunday and does so, will receive the same reward as the one whose passion is visiting folks in prison, or ministering to the sick, or feeding the poor, or fighting for civil rights, or preaching the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. To all who invest the passion God has given them will come the same response, “'Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your Master.' Amen.

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