Scripture can be found here…
One day when I was young, my mother read a McDonald’s ad in the newspaper, fell in love with it, tore it out and pinned it to the wall. And there it stayed until the day that house was put on the market. It was an unusual McDonald’s ad: no Ronald McDonald or hamburgers. Instead, it was a long quote attributed to Calvin Coolidge. It read,
Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.
In this graduation season, these are the kind of words we might commend to our young people—to Nathan and Bri, for example, as they set out for college this fall, and the wide world that awaits them beyond. And I have no quarrel with the sentiment—I know that talent, education, even genius, wonderful as they are, are not the secret sauce. But these words, which end with the word, “omnipotent,” a word I generally reserve for God, come perilously close to a saying that does trouble me: “The Lord helps those who help themselves.”
Let’s parse that sentence, with the help of scripture. Our first passage this morning recalls a well-known event in Jesus’ ministry, the calming of the storm. The story takes place immediately after Jesus’ preaching the parables about growth and the kingdom: the sower, the mustard seed. Just a tiny thing can make such a big difference. Jesus is sitting in a boat and tells the disciples to row across the Sea of Galilee. That body of water is known for violent storms that come up quickly and dissipate just as fast. Jesus, tired from his long day of being with the crowds, lies down at the back of the boat on a cushion and falls asleep.
In the course of one verse, a violent storm comes up and the boat is all but swamped. Jesus remains calm on the cushion, which is to say, he remains fast asleep. Maybe he is that filled with a peace that cannot be shaken. Maybe he is bone tired. The indignant disciples wake him by yelling some resentful and fear-filled words: Don’t you even care we’re all going to die?
You know how the story ends, but what is happening, exactly? The disciples ask Jesus for help, knowing enough about him to suspect he may be able to make the difference between life and death. This is a situation in which, aside from doing their best to navigate and row like the dickens, there’s not a lot they can do to “help themselves.”
I couldn’t help remembering a passage from “Circe,” by Madeline Miller. This novel delves into Greek mythology, telling the story of an enchantress who is described in Homer’s Odyssey. In one passage, Circe is seeking to help a human to navigate the straits between the Scylla and the Charybdis. (At this point, a brief aside about the fact that, until I read this book last month, I knew of these two chiefly from the Police song, “Wrapped Around Your Finger,” and the Steely Dan song, “Home.” Let us praise well-educated songwriters.) The Scylla was a six-headed sea-monster who really liked gobbling up sailors. The Charybdis was a whirlpool known to pull ships down to destruction. Circe, daughter of Helios, the sun god, does her best to assist, but sailors are lost, nonetheless.
Just like the disciples in the storm, the sailors in the myth row as hard as they can, do all in their power to save their own lives. But they have something against them—something a modern reader like me had to read that novel to be reminded of: The Greek gods hate human beings. They disdain them. They want them to suffer, because that means the humans will pray to them and honor them and bring them offerings. And anyway, as the ancient Greek saying goes, “The gods help those who help themselves.”
That is the origin of this saying. It’s not in the Bible, though I saw a list of verses on Wikipedia described as “passages [that] suggest an ethic of personal agency, and taking initiative.” (One of the verses was [Matthew 5:3] “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” I’m going to that is not an accurate understanding of that verse.) “The Lord helps those who help themselves.” Though in one sense it can be heard as a word of encouragement, its origin lies in myths of gods who hate humans so much, they prescribe eternal punishment for Prometheus, the one god who feels sorry for humans and helps them in a way that is not self-serving. (If you’re not squeamish, ask me after church, and I’ll tell you what the punishment was.)
To reiterate: The saying, “The Lord helps those who help themselves,” arises from adherents to the Greek pantheon, a system of small-g gods who are narcissistic, toxic, and mean to the core. Except for Prometheus.
The God of Jesus, on the other hand—the God of Abraham and Sarah—is a God of whom scripture says, over and over again, “The Lord is kind and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.” And that same God urges us to the same kind of care for one another.
Our passage from Deuteronomy sparked a lively conversation in Bible Study this week. This is because it sets an extraordinarily high bar for us, as to how generous we ought to be with one another. To summarize, more generous—by far—than most of us can imagine. If there is anyone in need, open your hand (and your pocketbook) to meet the need, whatever that might be. And don’t forget, every seventh year all debts are erased! And the last verse of that passage, the verse Jesus is quoting when he says, “You always have the poor with you”: ‘Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.”’ It is a high bar. None of us can do it alone. It may be, though, that we can do it together.
Here’s another thing we find in scripture, over and over again: God’s ongoing commandment that we care for one another, as a community. You might think of it as love calling, giving us an opportunity to open up our doors. Sure, “those who help themselves” might be innocently understood as people who simply work hard, and of course that’s a good thing. But as a friend reminded me this week: “Do you know what the Bible almost never does? Blame the poor for their own poverty. Do you know what the Bible overwhelmingly condemns? The oppressive practices of the rich.”[i]
A Biblical ethic of caring for one another is something that could use our persistence and determination. That looks like giving and helping, of course. But it also looks a faith-filled efforts to not allow people to be crushed by debt. It looks like faith-filled efforts to advocate for greater fairness and protections for workers, for things like affordable childcare and a living wage. It looks like doing unto others as we would have them do unto us. All of that is straight out of the Bible, and it’s as simple as “Love one another.” Thanks be to God. Amen.
[i] Thomas Horrocks, Tweet, June 26, 2021, 9:06 PM. Thomas Horrocks on Twitter: "Do you what the Bible almost never does? Blame the poor for their own poverty. Do you what the Bible overwhelmingly condemns? The oppressive practices of the rich. Bible so woke." / Twitter.