Sermons
July 27, 2025 (Proper 12)
Filthy Lucre
1 Timothy 6:2b-12
Once upon a time, there was a king. Like most kings, he was wealthy—but also like a lot of kings, he wanted to be more wealthy. So he asked the gods to give him a gift. This was King Midas, and we all know what gift he asked for: the ability to turn everything he touched into gold. (Be careful what you ask for—you might get it!)
Midas received this gift, but the gods knew more than he did about what it would mean.
At first, the “Midas touch” was a wonderful thing: Someone brought him a rock, and in his hand it turned into a nugget of gold. He picked up a brick and it became a gold bar. A simple walking stick turned into a golden scepter—a staff fit for a king.
Rejoicing over the gift, Midas called for a celebration. His best throne was brought out. A sumptuous feast was laid. Midas sat down in his throne, and it turned to gold—cushions and all. And when everything was ready, Midas took the plate passed to him—and the plate and everything on it turned to gold. He tried to take food from a serving bowl, and it turned to gold. As all the guests stuffed himself, he sat hungry—you can’t eat gold!
Disappointed, Midas went to bed—and his bed turned to gold. He tossed and turned all night on what used to be a soft featherbed, but now was a cold block of unyielding metal.
But the worst was to come in the morning. As the sun came up, and Midas arose from his sleepless night, in came his daughter. More even than to his wealth, Midas was devoted to this girl—and she to him. She always ran to him each morning to greet him with a hug and a kiss.
Today it had to be different. Midas tried to warn her, but it was too late. And as she flew into his arms, she became a lifeless golden statue.
Our text for today contains one of the most often-misquoted verses in the Bible. We often hear people say, “Money is the root of all evil.” I remember years ago seeing a plaque hanging on someone’s wall that said, “Lack of money is the root of all evil.” But neither of these is true to the text, not to the actual words nor to the spirit of the text.
What it says is, “The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” It’s important to hear it correctly, because it doesn’t say what we often think it says.
It doesn’t say money is dirty. Even some preachers assume it is: I remember once being part of a discussion in which a colleague wondered if it was appropriate, as it’s done in some churches, to place the offering plates on the communion table. Many of them would have liked them to be put somewhere else, I suppose to avoid “contaminating” the table.
This led to an argument about whether or not it’s even appropriate to receive an offering during a Christian worship service, or whether it disrupts the holiness of worship. I was surprised at just how many pastors said they wished we didn’t have to receive an offering at all, viewing it as nothing more than something we have to do to pay the bills, a necessary evil clothed in pious language. I was surprised how many of them seemed to believe that money and spirituality don’t mix.
This text also doesn’t say that being wealthy is a sin. Money isn’t in itself bad, or dirty, or sinful; neither being rich nor being poor is a character flaw—but we can have a righteous or a sinful attitude toward money, no matter how much of it we have.
The text talks about the “love of money.” The story of King Midas is a portrait of the love of money. There was once a very wealthy man who, when asked how much money was enough, replied, “Just a little bit more.” That’s the love of money—always trying to get more, never content with what we have.
It’s not just a problem of the rich. A commentator on this text told a story about a little boy who grew up poor. His parents could not buy him the things the other kids had—they couldn’t afford anything beyond basic necessities, and sometimes even that was a struggle. This little fellah came to believe that he could never be happy until he had the things the others had, the things his parents could not provide for him. He wasn’t old enough to work, to earn money to get things for himself—but his fingers were quick and his pockets deep. The things he stole he sold, and then he was able to buy better clothes, toys, whatever he wanted.
By the time he was sixteen, he already had a juvenile record—and it all came from the love of money.
But these stories paint with a really broad brush: they’re caricatures that show us the problems at either extreme. What about those of us in the middle—who usually get by, but sometimes things are a little tight? Surely this text doesn’t have anything to say to us: we’re not King Midas, and we certainly wouldn’t steal to get what we want.
I want you to try a little experiment with me. In your pews you’ll find some coins scattered around. Take a coin, and hold it in front of you at arm’s length. Look at the cross on the Communion table. Which is big, and which is small?
Now take your coin, place it up against your eye, and look again at the cross. What’s the difference? What can you see, and what’s been blocked out?
The text says, “The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” The love of money is a sinful attitude that comes from an improper perspective. If money is the center of your vision, you can’t see much else. But hold it a little further away from the center, and things look different.
The love of money, in the stories of Midas and the poor little boy, led to trouble. In Midas’ case, he wound up with physical discomfort and the loss of his beloved daughter. In the little boy’s case, he ended up being a criminal.
For those of us in the middle, the love of money can also lead to trouble.
It can lead to idolatry. This is when we place something in the center of our lives that doesn’t belong there. God is supposed to be the center of our lives; remember that the first of the Ten Commandments is “You shall have no other gods before me.” We’re not off the hook just because we don’t follow the Ba’als, or worship Mithras or Odin, or pray to Zeus. Money can become like a god to us—and our culture encourages it. Everything is judged by the bottom line: how much will it cost? what will the return be on my investment? A person’s “net worth” doesn’t have to do with how much they love or are loved, it doesn’t have to do with how many friends they have, or whether they have made a difference in the world through their actions, it doesn’t have to do with what God thinks of them—it has to do with how much money they have, how many assets as compared to how many liabilities or expenses.
The love of money can lead us to forget to be thankful. When we always assume that happiness, satisfaction, contentment, a comfortable life are always just out of our reach, we forget how much we are blessed right here and now. When we believe that we are responsible for our own well-being, when we act as though everything we have comes from ourselves, we forget that it is God who has made it possible; it is God who provides for our needs; it is God who has blessed us.
It can also lead us to apathy, to a lack of feeling, an inability or unwillingness to have compassion for others.
The problem with the love of money is that when we love money before anything else, that love fills up every nook and cranny of our hearts until there isn’t any room to love anyone or anything else. But if we put love of God first—as the text says, “pursue righteousness,” which doesn’t mean following a long list of rules but being in a healthy and loving relationship with our God—we find that our capacity to love is enlarged.
Whether we have a lot of money or a little, if we put God first, love and serve God, not our money, first, we find that we have more than enough. We find that we can be generous, and compassionate, and our money becomes a means by which we can offer glimpses of the reign of God to this world.
The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil; but the love of God is the root of every kind of blessing.