Spend Life
A series of billboards on I-35 going north are on the theme, “Spend Life [blank],” where the final word is an adverb in italics. “Spend life courageously,” for instance. “Spend life wisely”; “Spend life resourcefully”—these are the sort of thing that has stuck in my mind. (I write from fallible memory, since of course my primary concern was to stay on the road!)
I’ve seen these ads for months and thought they were rather clever messages from Methodists. Driving past at 75 mph I wasn’t able to read the small print down in the corner, but it looked like a “First United” was behind them—like, you know, the First United Methodists. This got the theological juices flowing.
When Jesus said that if you try to save your life you will lose it, he meant that trying to hoard your wealth is a game that will not end well. There was the man who got rich and built new barns to hold all his riches. When the barns were finished and full of all his money and things, he heard a voice that said “You fool”: He was going to die that night, and all the work he put into his barns would be for naught. What we have in life is to be used for good purposes. So I saw these ads through a Christian lens, seeing in them a fresh take on a good old theme. Our lives are to be “spent,” not kept safe, and what matters is the way that we “spend” our lives: with wisdom, with courage, with creativity. None of the ads said “Spend life one teaspoon at a time.” None said “Spend life begrudgingly.”
But you know the occupational hazard. If to a hammer every problem is a nail, to a theologian every billboard is a take on the Gospel. And so it came to pass that one day I was able to read the small print on one of these billboards,whereupon I found that, rather than a message from a church, the billboard was a message from a bank. But who knows, maybe the bank folks wanted to slip a Good Message into banking: that a bank isn’t just a safe barn to hold your money, but rather a tool that you could use to “spend” your life in surprising ways.
Gospel ways, perhaps.
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(Indeed, as I googled around for this column, I found it is a bank which doesn’t leave its faith principles at the door.)
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Out & About. This Sunday, Oct. 4, I am to preach at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Dallas, at the 9 and 11:15am Eucharists.
The fall theology lecture is set for this Sunday evening, Oct. 4, in the Great Hall of St. Matthew’s at 5 pm. My topic is: "What's Salvation Have to Do with It? Reflections after the Camino." This is a diocesan event which anyone interested is welcome to attend. Earlier this year I walked the Camino Frances for the third time. From the beginning of my pilgrimage, I was seeing evidence of the importance of salvation to the camino. Salvation of course goes back before the camino came to be: Saint James (Santiago) brought the Good News to (what we now call) Spain, and was buried there. Salvation, in other words, is the reason James found his way (camino) to Spain. But salvation is also a present-moment question for a number of pilgrims. The lecture will be followed by responses from Dean Tom Smith and the Rev. Kate Smith, who also have walked the camino.
Good Books & Good Talk: At St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Dallas, the second session of our fall discussion of Dostoyevsky’s Brothers Karamazov will be Sun. Oct. 11, at 5pm, to discuss Part Two (Books 4, 5, and 6). Newcomers are welcome, and many people testify that the book is awesome: so take courage and be not dismayed at its length!