Look At Me

SEDL Prayer Points • 15 March 2006

Grace:
My Lord Jesus, I beg for the grace of a heart like yours – compassionate and loving to all those who call on you. With a heart like yours, I hope to be able to look on others too with love and compassion.

Jesus said to the Pharisees: “There was a rich man who dressed in purple garments and fine linen and dined sumptuously each day. And lying at his door was a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who would gladly have eaten his fill of the scraps that fell from the rich man’s table. Dogs even used to come and lick his sores. When the poor man died, he was carried away by angels to the bosom of Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried, and from the netherworld, where he was in torment, he raised his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. And he cried out, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me. Send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am suffering torment in these flames.’ Abraham replied, ‘My child, remember that you received what was good during your lifetime while Lazarus likewise received what was bad; but now he is comforted here, whereas you are tormented. Moreover, between us and you a great chasm is established to prevent anyone from crossing who might wish to go from our side to yours or from your side to ours.’ He said, ‘Then I beg you, father, send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they too come to this place of torment.’ But Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them.’ He said, ‘Oh no, father Abraham, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ Then Abraham said, ‘If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead’” (Lk 16:19-31).

Points:

1. The rich young man was usually called Dives – Latin word for rich. Every phrase adds something to the luxury in which he lived. He was clothed in purple and fine linen, that is the description of the robes of the High Priests (it would probably amount to one leather jacket from Zara). He feasted in luxury every day. The word used for feasting is the word that is used for a gourmet feeding on exotic and costly dishes. He did this every day. In so doing, he definitely and positively broke the fourth commandment – no work on a Sabbath.

In a country where the common tao were fortunate if they eat meat once in the week and where they toiled for six days of the week, Dives is a figure of indolent self-indulgence. Lazarus was waiting for the crumbs that fell from Dives’ table. In that time, there were no knives, forks or napkins. Food was eaten with the hands, and, in very wealthy houses, the hands were cleansed by wiping them on hunks of bread, which were then thrown away. That was what Lazarus was waiting for.

2. Strangely enough, Lazarus is the only character in any of the parables who is given a name. The name is Latinized form of Eleazar (meaning God is my help). He was a beggar. He was covered with ulcerated sores. And, he was so helpless, he could not even ward off the street dogs which pestered him.

3. Such is the scene in this world; then abruptly it changes to the next and there Lazarus is in glory and Dives is in torment. What was the sin of Dives? He had not ordered Lazarus to be removed from his gate. He had made no objections to his receiving the bread that was flung away from his table. He did not kick him in the passing. He was not deliberately cruel to him. The sin of Dives was that he never noticed Lazarus, that he accepted him as part of the landscape and simply thought it perfectly natural and inevitable that Lazarus should lie in pain and hunger while he wallowed in luxury.

The sin of Dives was that he could look on the world’s suffering and need and feel no answering sword or grief and pity pierce his heart; he looked at a fellow-man, hungry and in pain, and did nothing about it. His was the punishment of a man who never noticed. It seems hard that his request that his brothers should be warned was refused. But is the plain fact that if men possess the truth of God’s word, and if, wherever they look, there is sorrow to be comforted, need to be supplied, pain to be relieved, and it moves them to no feeling and to no action, nothing will change them.
It is a terrible warning that the sin of Dives was not that he did wrong things, but that he did nothing.

4. For the coming days, you might want to know the names of your company’s security guard, the janitor, the elevator operator, the porter. You do not have to know them all. You might at least would want to get three or five names. Include them in your prayer.

5. With your colleagues at work, how have you been sensitive to them? Do you greet them or at least smile at them? In what ways have you been insensitive to them? How can you be a better co-worker in the days to come? Include them too in your prayer.

6. Who were the Dives’ of your life? In what ways have they been insensitive to you? Pray for them, bless them and forgive them. And, learn from the things that they did to you so that you may no longer do the same to others.

7. End this prayer with the Prayer for Generosity.