What Will It Take For Us?
Rev. Erik Swanson
September 28, 2025
You can watch the entire sermon here.
I know that sometimes people get a little frustrated that I talk about the rich and the poor so often, but the truth is that Jesus talked about them all the time. If it bothers us, we should probably take it up with Him.
The Huge Divide
The reality is that both in his time and in ours, there has been a huge divide between those who have power and means and those who struggle just to survive. Humanity has never really figured out how to live equitably, and even when we get glimpses of it, we don’t live into it very consistently. So the question becomes: what will it take for us to wake up to a deeper, more loving, and more just way of being?
Thinking Differently About How We Live
Today’s parable is the story of the rich man and Lazarus, the poor beggar who suffered outside the rich man’s gate. When both died, Lazarus was embraced and comforted while the rich man found himself in torment. The point is not that rich people go to hell and poor people go to heaven—this is a teaching story. It is meant to get us to think differently about how we live. When I look around today, I see the same dynamics playing out. We live in a country with a massive and growing wealth gap. Some are living with more than enough while others work tirelessly just to survive. Economists may call this the consequence of capitalism, but I believe Jesus would challenge us to see it differently. He calls us to think from a spiritual and human perspective, not one of greed and excess.
The Deeper Call of Compassion and Justice
What stands out is the rich man’s arrogance. He ignored Lazarus in life, but when he suffered, he asked for Lazarus to relieve him. Even then, he was still focused only on himself. Later he asked Abraham to send Lazarus to warn his brothers—not to help them live differently, but just so they could avoid suffering. His mindset never changed. He never awakened to the deeper call of compassion and justice. Abraham’s answer was clear: they already had Moses and the prophets. They had everything they needed to live differently. The same is true for us. We know the teachings of Jesus. We know what it means to love God, love ourselves, and love others. Yet we resist fully living it out.
What Will It Take?
I once spoke with a woman who deeply longed to know God, but she hadn’t yet made prayer a priority in her life. My question to her was the same one I keep asking myself and all of us: what will it take? What will it take for us to pray, to live out the gospel, to care for those who suffer, to truly be compassionate and just human beings?
This parable isn’t about heaven or hell as destinations—it’s about how we live now. It’s about making changes in this lifetime. Every spiritual tradition at its heart calls us to holiness, unity, and love. So the invitation remains: what will it take for us to begin, today, to live into that calling?