Your Son proclaimed good news to the poor

I wonder where you would put yourself if I asked you whether you were rich, poor, or in between. The chances are you would do the same as me, and say, “in between”. We know that in a global context our access to clean water, sanitation, food, healthcare — and especially the computer you’re reading this on — puts us firmly into the wealthier segment of the world population. But we all know someone richer than us, probably lots of people.

So what exactly does it mean for us to celebrate our relationship with Jesus, the one who announced his presence as “good news to the poor” (Luke 4:18)? If we’re not poor, how can we discover for ourselves — and share with others — the gospel which is good news to the poor?

I recognize that there is a spiritual dimension in this. Whatever my material wealth, I can only receive Christ when I recognise my spiritual poverty. Think of those words from the hymn, “Rock of Ages”: “Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to your cross I cling”. This suggests a truth we too often fail to recognise — it’s hard for the rich to enter the Kingdom partly because the more we have the harder it gets to admit that our wealth has its limitations: money can’t buy me love, and that includes God’s love.

So our beatitude of choice is Matthew’s “Blessed are the poor in spirit” (Matthew 5:3) because we can see how we might qualify for blessing; Luke’s “Blessed are you who are poor” (Luke 6:20) seems to leave us out in the cold.

A theological explanation for this apparent disparity — that seems so glaring to us in our society, in which poverty is usually interpreted purely as an economic matter — probably lies in the consistent biblical understanding that poverty is the result of sin: “There will, however, be no one in need among you, because the Lord is sure to bless you” (Deuteronomy 15:4).

People who are poor are oppressed; they are sinned against as much as they are sinners. That’s why the gospel is good news — it sets them free (“let the oppressed go free” Luke 4:18). Even more strikingly, one of the ways the gospel becomes good news to the poor is because it sets the rich free from sin and they cease to be oppressors.

So that’s the challenge. Is the gospel we present — by our words and actions — one that is good news to the poor because it changes our attitudes to wealth and poverty? Are we willing to be good news to those in our locality that we find it most difficult to relate to because they’re not ‘people like us’?

Perhaps you can cope with one more rhetorical question: do we prefer to adapt the gospel to our culture to make it more acceptable, or ensure that it is as true and counter-cultural in a world obsessed with wealth and celebrity as it was two thousand years ago?

Let’s face it; we’re in a minority. The global church is now predominantly made up of people who are poor, as will heaven be: the gospel really is good news to the poor!

God of all mercy,
your Son proclaimed good news to the poor,
release to the captives,
and freedom to the oppressed:
anoint us with your Holy Spirit
and set all your people free
to praise you in Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect for The Third Sunday of Epiphany
is Copyright © The Archbishops Council