100 Days of HopeSample

Lazarus Is At The Gate

I did not see the abundant life in Haiti. I once watched a woman fill a bucket with water from the river. The black miasma that is the river is teeming with fetid sewage. But she will use it to cook with, to clean with, to bathe her children in.

Haiti became to me a stark reminder of how much sin has marred God’s creation.

The parable of the rich man and Lazarus floats to the forefront of my mind. Lazarus begged at the rich man’s gate for the crumbs that fell from his table. After they both died, the rich man was in torment, placed in hell.

“Father Abraham,” he cried, “send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame.”

“Son,” Abraham replied, “in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things. Now he is comforted and you are in torment.”

I am bothered by this parable. I never thought the rich man was evil and selfish to the core: instead of begging Abraham for mercy for himself, he asks that Lazarus be sent to warn his brothers so they too may not end up in this place of torment. He accepted his fate, but asked that those he loved be spared.

Lord, what has this to do with me? I can’t possibly be the rich man. I understand I am immensely wealthy compared to the people I see here in Haiti, in many of the war-torn or forgotten nations of our world. But I am not rich, not by American standards.

As the prophet Nathan spoke to King David, so my Lord is speaking to me. My heart hears over and over the same lament, you are that man! I can no longer deny what my God is showing me. I am the rich man, and Lazarus is at my gate.

But, in grace, Jesus tells us again and again, “Come, follow me.”

Prayer: Father, thank you for your continual call to follow you. Show us what a radical life given over to you looks like.