And this is part of the point of the parable. God gives us everything, and much of that is up front. Our very life is the first gift. We did not create ourselves, yet here we are -- living, breathing beings.

Most of us enjoy pretty good circumstances. But let's not fool ourselves about how we got here. We did not choose the families into which we were born. We did not ask for the intellect we may possess. Our natural talents are part of the package that God has delivered unto us. At an essential level, like the servants in the story, what we have charge of has been given to us by our master. Without that gracious start, and the ongoing influx of divine capital, we would have nothing.

Let me be perfectly clear. I am stating that everything that shows up on our household inventory or our personal balance sheet is at its root, a gift from God. Let me further state that I believe that whatever wealth we possess has value only to the extent it is used for the purpose of leveraging God's work in this world. Does this mean that we should do without what we need? No. It means we should be thoughtful about what we want, and conscious of whose wealth we are managing.

We are stewards of the wealth that comes from the One who made us. We can choose to use it well or decide instead to simply bury it our own back yard, park it in our driveway or fill our homes with way more than we, or our families, actually need.

We have to admit that we make the choices, but the wealth we are managing is part of God's treasury not our own. This may be a hard idea to swallow, I know that it has been for me. But I began to grow in my understanding, and my gratitude, as I have increased my giving. When I became an Episcopalian, at age 26, I started from zero, so I had nowhere to go but up.

Years ago, I ran my own business. When Debra would suggest that all we had was a gift from God, I would become furious. "What do you mean," I would growl, feeling that my efforts were being diminished. "I negotiated the contracts, hired the employees, oversaw the work and determined the salaries and bonuses. This business is the work of my hands. Where we live and what we have are the fruits of my labor," I would insist.

Debra would listen to my response, but she didn't change her mind. She has been a thoughtful, faithful and giving person since she was a teenager.

I was a recent convert to faith, full of myself, and more confident of my own ability than of God's sovereignty. I was more prone to believe that I had discovered God than that God had created me.

Years later, looking back, I noticed a number of things about the "work of my hands". I had twenty-five employees. Most days most of them came to work and worked hard all day long. That's a lot of hands, and most of those hands were not attached to my wrists. Whether I deserved what I made or not is another question, but I certainly did not earn it by myself. Even if I excluded the theological issues I could not escape the reality of collective math.

Nor could I take personal responsibility for a number of preexisting factors. Long before I started my company, I was born into a talented family who taught me many valuable life skills. In spite of my own weaknesses and distractions, I have received a good education. I have some natural abilities that have served me well. I was privileged to grow up in various countries around the world. I did not create any of these opportunities.

I have been the recipient of grace, the consumer of the kindness of strangers, and the unconscious steward of treasure God was willing to risk in my ignorant hands.

When I was in my twenties, I was the president of my own company and the one who decided what each employee would make. My partner and I negotiated and agreed upon our own annual salary. Our company was run and managed well enough that I also made a large bonus almost every year.

I knew how to earn money, and I was certainly good at discovering ways to spend it. I paid the bills in our household so I was also the one who determined what we would give to God.

I had been going to church for a few years so it seemed fitting to find something to spare after we had bought the things we wanted and had done what we wanted to do. The trouble was there wasn't much left. I put God in last position, treating Him, and His church, like a beggar at my doorway. I knew I had to be charitable, it was the Christian thing to do.

But I had earned the money I told myself. It was mine. I got to choose. After great deliberation I decided to give five dollars a week. I was proud of myself because this was five times what I used to put in the plate, if I remembered to bring anything at all.

But I still didn't pledge because such a commitment would limit my options. I might need the money for something else. I might want the money for something else. The truth was that God was last on my list of discretionary expenses, way below things I now consider frivolous and unimportant. I did not see myself as returning back to God the earnings I had made from His generosity. I imagined instead that I was the generous one when I put in five dollars a week.

It was a small sacrifice, and it yielded predictably small results for God's kingdom. I could have done almost as well for the church by burying my money in the ground as by putting it in the plate.

I was young. I was new in the faith. My misguided understanding of wealth and its use did not allow me to do much good for others. I was too busy buying things, including a house at the outer limits of my earning abilities. I was enchanted by the power to obtain things of higher and higher quality, even if I didn't actually need them. I did not put God at the top of the list so I had little support to give to the work of the church after I was done buying whatever struck my fancy.

But Debra was right all along and I can see the gracious hand of God much more clearly now. I am much more aware of my interdependence with others in a community, and of my desire to support the work of the church as an expression of my gratitude to God.

I have seen the power of God as I have let things go. I sold my business when its path began to diverge from where I thought God was calling me. The proceeds of the sale supported us while I went through a year and a half of underemployment and a time of discernment to determine whether I was called to the priesthood. All that money is gone now. But I found my life.

Then we sold our house to help pay for seminary, and even so we left Sewanee in debt. We have traded all our former assets for an opportunity to serve and debts that will take me several more years to pay off. I sold my house, but I have found my home. My old life is gone, but I have been raised from a dead vision to a new hope in Christ.

I make much less now than I made in my twenties. And I pledge far more to the church than I would have ever imagined myself putting in the plate. I risked my life as it was for the life that God promises to each of us. I put everything I had on the line. Why am I telling you this?

I am not telling you this because I want you to think well of me. I am telling this story because you know me well enough to know that I try to tell you the truth. I want to report that trying to put God first has made everything else make sense. I am telling you this story to assure you that risking big for God is a worthy adventure. The more I have given away, the more valuable my life has become. Every day is a gift. Neither you nor I know how many days we have been given to spend on this earth. We need to make each one count. It needs to count for others.

We can do so much more good together than we can individually. Part of the power of the church is to transmute money into ministry. We cannot buy ministry as though it were a sack of flour, but when we have people poised to move forward we can surely bury their ministries if we chose not to fund the work.

Last year we cut 90% of the budget for the Social Ministry Community because were unwilling to fund what they were willing to do. This year we are facing more cuts in other programs and are still 45 thousand dollars short of a budget based on the projected results of pledges. Is this truly what we desire? Is this truly what we choose?

We share the joy, the gift, and the responsibility for ministry in this place.
Most of us are blessed with an abundance of wealth that extends well beyond our needs.
But the present reality is that the average household income and the average pledge at Saint James are way out of sync. This is certainly a financial issue for the Vestry of Saint James because they will have to choose which ministries cannot be funded.

But there is a far larger issue.

Our choices are hampering the growth of the body and the spiritual growth of its members. I know because I stand as one self-accused who has journeyed some distance from a very poor beginning. I started badly in my twenties but have continued to stretch to do more each year. It has been good for me to give. It is has been increasing good for the church. And I can, and I will, strive to do even better.

Let's be concrete. The average pledge at Saint James is about $2000 a year. That would be a tithe on a $20,000 a year household income. But it is just1% of a $200,000 annual household income. We can all do our own math and search our own souls. But I remained convinced that we can do better. I remain convinced that we are called to do better with the wealth God has put into our care.

Together, and with God's help, we can take inert stuff and fuel the growth of a living community. We can choose to convert more of the wealth God has given us into the promise of hope for others, or we can let the buds wither on the vine before the blossoms are even fully open.

We have many people and programs dedicated to increasing our understanding, deepening our faith, guiding our children, and providing for the needs of others far beyond these walls. We do not exist for ourselves, but we need to maintain the physical plant and existing staff if we want to be effective in making disciples and sending them out into the world prepared. We may differ about the kinds of programs we should have and the level of each one's funding. If we do, we need to discuss it and sharpen our vision. But we are all called to give at a meaningful level. That is part of the work of faithful people.

We have three examples in the parable. Each one was gifted with opportunity, as we are now. They were trusted with responsibility, as we are today. The Master risked giving them the capital and the authority to determine its use. Two of the stewards were fruitful and they doubled what the master had invested in them. One took a vital opportunity and buried it alive.

The God we serve does not bury the living. He raises the dead.
This is the gift we have been given. How shall we respond?