Holy Wealth Management

Sermon for Sept. 28, 2025
1 Timothy 6:6-19

There are those weeks when something happens out there in the world, and the preacher has to decide whether and how to address it.  This week, President Trump made a comment about loving enemies, or not – a core Christian teaching, as well as a call many of us are having trouble following these days.  Well, because it’s a core Christian teaching, and because we all could use some help loving our enemies, and because church should be a place where we can learn and share our struggles together – we’re going to approach this topic not with a one-way, “here’s what the rector thinks” sermon but with a class on Thursday nights, beginning Oct. 23.  It will be a chance to see what Scripture, theology, and Christian ethics have to say about loving our enemies – and, just as important, a chance to practice the art of civil discourse among ourselves.  Stay tuned for more details.

So, instead of talking about loving our enemies today, we find a much easier topic in that reading from 2 Timothy, something people love to hear about in church – money.  <Sigh.>

You know, in my strange line of work, I find myself having conversations that probably would never happen without wearing a clerical collar.  Recently, I met a young man, about 30 – so, about the same age as my kids.  This young man comes from a background of affluence.  The perks of wealth have always been his “normal,” and his mind has been set on gaining as many of them as he can.  But now, he’s wrestling with big questions about what he’s striving for.  He’s come to one of those pivot points where we ask ourselves, “What’s my life really about?”  He told me he’s made some bad decisions in the past, and he’s trying to find a way forward to the life he believes is waiting for him.

So, I asked him, “What is that?  As you see yourself out in the future, what does your best life look like?”

He said, “I guess I’m not sure.  I can tell you what I’ve always thought it looks like.  It looks like success.”

“And what’s that?” I asked.

“Well,” he said, apologetically, “I’ve never wanted to be virtuous.  I’ve always thought being good was lame.  What I’ve always wanted is power,” he said.  “I’ve figured the goal of my life is to get all the power I can on earth, to feel like God – you know, to be able to do anything you want, whenever you want.”

I was a little taken aback by his directness, but actually I was grateful for it.  So, I asked what he thinks about this God he wanted to imitate.

He smiled and said, “God is the consolation prize for people who are too scared to take power.  Following God is the way people rationalize their fear to take chances and get what they want.  After all,” he said, “the goal in life is to have as much power as possible.”

The conversation sticks with me because this young man is so clear in naming what he truly values.  Think what you will about his point of view, but he’s an articulate spokesperson for the gospel of worldly power.  And based on his upbringing, and his circle, and the values he learned while coming of age in this complicated world of ours, his devotion to the gospel of worldly power makes, well, all the sense in the world.

In our world, I think the most common currency of our drive for power is wealth – same as it ever was.  And in that reading today from 1 Timothy, the writer takes a look at wealth with his eyes wide open.  (By the way, I say “the writer” of 1 Timothy because most scholars think it was written by a later follower of Paul, not the apostle himself.)

The reading begins with some conventional wisdom about wealth.  The writer isn’t really plowing any new ground here; these are proverbs found both in the Old Testament and from ancient Greek and Roman authors.  The writer is saying, here are some things we can all agree on:  Everybody knows we bring nothing into this world, so we’ll take nothing out.  Everybody knows that having food and clothing is really all it takes to be content.  Everybody knows that “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil” (6:10).

Well, we may know it, says the writer of 1 Timothy.  But what do we do about it?

Now, hit the “pause” button for a minute.  You may remember, a few Sundays ago, hearing Jesus say that “none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions” (Luke 14:33).  So, maybe we’d expect a demand for that kind of radical self-giving here in 1 Timothy, too.

Well, this letter has a different audience and a different setting than the gospels.  1 Timothy was written to a pastoral leader in one of the early churches that Paul and others had established.  The letter is concerned with church order and structure – three chapters earlier, it describes what makes a good bishop.  Scholars think the writer is dealing with Timothy’s reality on the ground, that people outside these early churches viewed followers of Jesus with suspicion at best.  So, 1 Timothy is written to teach Christians how to “enhance [the church’s] mission and image in the larger world.”¹  In other words, the letter is dealing with a complexity we know well:  How do you lead people to follow the way of love in a world that looks for every reason to reject it?

So, this letter doesn’t say Christians should give up all their possessions.  Instead, it tells the people in these early churches how they can thrive, and catch other fish, in the murky waters in which they swim.

And what does that look like?  It means being just as clear about our use of wealth as my young conversation partner was about his, but coming at it realizing that God is God, as we are not.  In fact, it means representing God’s reign and rule in this world directly through the ways we choose to use our wealth.  And that is no passive activity.  Hear the verbs the writer of 1 Timothy uses to name how we’re called to take this stand:  “Shun” wealth’s temptation to power (6:11).  “Pursue” – like, chase down – “righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, [and] gentleness” (6:11).  “Fight the good fight of the faith” (6:12).  “Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called…” (6:12).  It turns out, using wealth as a citizen of God’s kingdom is some of the most strenuous work there is.

And what does that work look like, in lived experience?  What do we do to use wealth as ambassadors of the way of love?  The letter’s answers are as simple as they are challenging.  Don’t be haughty.  Don’t set your hopes on the uncertainty of riches but “on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment” (6:17).  “Do good … be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share” (6:18).  Using wealth this way, the letter says, we’ll store up “the treasure of a good foundation for the future” so we can “take hold of the life that really is life” (6:19).

I think the writer’s saying that it’s not about knowing what’s right; it’s about practicing holy wealth management day by day.  That’s how we “shun” and “pursue” and “fight” and “take hold” as we await the coming of our sovereign King and Lord, who will usher us into the eternity that awaits us.

Now, maybe this vigorous, rigorous call seems over the top related to something as mundane as our use of money.  But money is the ever-present token of our personal theology of power.  Our use of money is an outward and visible sign of whom we truly believe holds “dominion” (6:16) in this era between Jesus’ resurrection and his return at the end of the age.  The Christian life is not an exercise in marking time while we wait for the boss to come back.  And even less is it an opportunity to take what we can, pursuing the power that our culture and our own brokenness tell us we’re crazy not to chase.  Instead, the Christian life is following a way of love, one step after another, each one leading us closer to the Source of that love – both in the warm-up round that is this life and in the fullness of love that God wants to share with us forever.

So, back to my conversation the other day.  How would this young man respond to the argument I’ve made?  Here’s what he said:  “I wish I did believe in God.  It would give my life more meaning.  But I guess I’m not desperate enough.  People who dedicate themselves to religion are just wasting their lives.”

Who’s right?  Well, it’s all about the truth or falsehood of the fundamental proposition underlying your argument.  If there is no God, the young man is right:  We are the gods our choices make us to be, and everything you see around us here this morning is a 2,000-year-old confidence game.  But if God actually is God, then eternity is a long time to spend realizing you were wrong.

Ironically enough, how we manage wealth comes down to making a bet.  It’s called Paschal’s wager, named for Blaise Pascal, a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, philosopher, and follower of Jesus from the 1600s.  Pascal’s wager goes like this:  When we die, if we’ve been wrong to trust that God is God and eternity is real, what’s the worst possible outcome?  Well, the worst possible outcome is that we will have worshiped an invisible friend, and loved the people around us, and missed the opportunity to grab as much as we could.  But – when we die, what if we’ve been right that God is God and eternity is real?  Well, then we will have spent our decades here just getting started on “tak[ing] hold of the life that really is life” (6:19).

1.      New International Study Bible, 2129 (note).