16th Sunday after Pentecost

Is a sin something that we do wrong?  In the Bible passage this week, Jesus tells the story of Lazarus and the rich man.  What had the rich man done wrong?  There is no indication that he was violent; no indication that he was a thief or dishonest.  He did not even try to forcibly remove Lazarus from the gate to his house but, rather, seemed happy for Lazarus to receive the scraps from his table.  Yet the rich man ends up in hell.  Why?  The problem with the rich man was not so much what he did, but rather what he didn’t do.  He lived in the lap of luxury while the world around him was in poverty.  People were starving and were in pain and yet he did nothing about it.  He didn’t even seem to notice that Lazarus existed.  Surely, on a few occasions at least, he could have invited Lazarus and others to dine with him.  After all, he ate exotic foods every day of his life while Lazarus couldn’t even fend off the dogs who licked his sores.  As always, we need to engage with this story and put ourselves into it.  In this country we live an opulent lifestyle compared with most in the world.  We are all probably behaving more like the rich man than we care to admit.  Our sin is not that we have done wrong in the eyes of the law but rather that we have not done enough in the light of this passage.