Show Me the Money

In the previous millennium (1996) there was a romantic comedy/sports film called “Jerry Maguire”. It starred Tom Cruise, Cuba Gooding Jr., and Renée Zellweger. The most remembered phrase from the film is “Show me the money.” The catchphrase emerges during a lively phone call between Maguire, a professional sports agent, and his client, Rod Tidwell, a pro football wide receiver. Tidwell is coaching his agent on how to assertively use the demanding phrase in negotiations for him.  Money, not love, makes the world go round in professional sports: Surprise! In the Jerry Maguire drama, personal integrity and love do get swirled into the mix, but without doubt, money is major.

We are not that cynical in saying that money plays grandly in all things. In the scramble for money, people go a little crazy. There is an adapted saying that goes: “Where there’s a will, there are relatives.” Inheritance claims are sometimes fiercely contested, which does not seem odd to most of us. In the scriptures, this Sunday, worldly possessions, personal happiness, and spiritual values are under examination. The passage from Ecclesiastes and Luke’s Gospel each put these realities on the table for evaluation. They consider the shortness and uncertainty of life on the one hand and the toiling for worldly goods on the other. In life, it is wise to ask, “What should be prized?”. A sardonic voice, likely that of King Solomon, gives a raspy message:

I hated all my toil in which I had toiled under the sun, seeing that I must leave it to those who come after me -- and who knows whether they will be wise or foolish? Yet they will be master of all for which I toiled and used my wisdom under the sun. (Eccl. 2:18-20)

We only have so many days in this life, we know not the number. Should our sense of glee be placed so heavily in the commodity we know we’re not taking with us? Jesus used a parable to show just how drastically we lose ourselves in the things that are passing away (Luke 12:13-21):

Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me." But he said to him, "Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?" And he said to them, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." Then he told them a parable: "The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, `What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?' Then he said, `I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, `Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.' But God said to him, `You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.

Don’t show me the money, please. Show me the way better to live every day rejoicing in God, so that on the day my soul is demanded of me I will gladly and confidently let it go.