It is autumn; it is Cook County. People are looking for a hint of gold…golden leaves, golden tamarack, golden hues along hillsides, golden pumpkins, noticing autumn’s slant of the sun that gives gold hues, a variation from the high sun of summer.
Maybe you’ve begun commenting that hints of gold will soon be here, maybe you’ve begun hoping to come across them, working to find out where they are already displaying the beauty of God’s earth. Summer’s long days and warmer temperatures and multiple greens are enjoyed; still a later sunrise, cooling temperatures, and the variety of golden hues can seem a relief.
And it can seem a relief to have the word gold indicate a magnificent array of colorings, rather than simply money.
We spend a lot of time talking about “money-gold,” don’t we? Talking and hoping to come across it, working for it. Money seems to drive election campaigns, drive how success is measured, drive what we think is practical, drive what we think is worth effort. The measure of how good a long weekend is, according to national statistics, is how much money was spent, how the economy fared. For many television and radio news reports, the measure of success for opening weekend of fishing or deer hunting—how regional dollars flowed. What could be measured in time spent outof doors, time with family and friends, food for the table, is instead measured by the “money meaning” of the word gold.
We get caught in the human dilemma. We need to provide for our families, receive education, enjoy recreation. These things and a host of other aspects of life require money. Yet, before long, as we look and work for money, we begin to treasure the money more than the time with family, more than the education for learning, more than recreation for enjoyment. We slide into figuring out a value by looking at the value of the money required.
And then we come to Jesus, who was approached by a man who reports he’d kept all the commandments since his youth. No murder, adultery, slander about another, defrauding. No dishonoring of mother and father. And Jesus, looking on the man with love, said, “You lack one thing. Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor.”
The invitation to follow Jesus may have been heard as well, but the man went away “shocked and grieving, for he had many possessions” (Mark 10).
It makes me squirm, as I figure it is intended to do. Looking around our homes, our land, our cabins, our cars, our lives, no matter how simple… we too can feel shock and grief at realizing deep within ourselves what we really already know—that money and possessions that cost gold coin are not where value lies.
So what are we to do? Squirm. Reassess. Place value differently. Give.
And find a quiet porch corner, boat dock, or window. Find one of thousands and thousands of spots in Cook County—and look at the golden hues of leaves, tamarack needles, pumpkins, golden seeds from squash, golden rays of sun. There is no comparison. Our use of money for things: not a hint of deepest satisfaction; the golden hints of God’s creation in autumn, satisfying to our eyes, in our memories, among friends: beyond measure.
Thanks be to God, who forgives us our trespasses and bestows on us the beauty of this season.
Each month a member of the Cook County Ministerium will offer Spiritual Reflections. This week our contributor is Pastor Kris Garey of Trinity Lutheran, Hovland.
Leave a Reply