Woe to the Rich

September 28, 2025, Saint Barnabas Lutheran Church, Howard Beach, N.Y. 

In 1990, I accompanied John Sundquist, the head of the American Baptist foreign mission society to South Africa. Our aim was to mediate a dispute between the nation’s white and black Baptists.

This was a challenging mission because South Africa was still an apartheid state. Nelson Mandela had just been released from prison but the future was far from certain. John and I decided to decline the invitation of white Baptists to stay in plush Johannesburg hotels and instead stayed in modest homes in the black township of Soweto.

In one Soweto home our very gracious guests put us up in a tiny bedroom where we were to share a tiny bed only slightly larger than a twin. John and I looked at each other warily as we climbed beneath the blanket and I doubted we would be able to sleep.

But we did sleep. And after an hour or so, John turned in his sleep and his long comb-over fell on my face. I thought I was being attacked by a hairy African beast and I bolted awake. John continued to snore peacefully.

Despite this adventure, our mission of mediation was successful and after  few says I decided to fly back home to write it up for The American Baptist magazine. I had a very early flight so I booked a room at a Holiday Inn the night before. I called a cab and the driver, a black South African, offered to carry my bag up to the room.

The room was luxurious even by U.S. standards. Two double beds, a recliner, a fully appointed bathroom, a television, and a minibar.

The driver’s mouth dropped open and he glanced around in astonishment. For a while he was unable to release his hold in the bag. Finally, he placed the bag on one of the beds and – to my embarrassment – said, “Here, Boss.”

I thanked him and, of course, gave him a generous tip, and he slowly left the room.

It was a fitting conclusion to a trip that forced two white American bureaucrats to face the enormous gulf between the rich and the poor. In South Africa in 1990, the gap between the haves and have-nots was massive. And, to a great extent, it still is.

In Luke 16:19-31, this vast disparity between the very rich and the very poor is made clear

The rich man is a pig of Elon Muskian proportions. He’s dressed in fine purple linen, eats and drinks to excess, sleeps in luxury, and – worst of all – is oblivious of the suffering of the poor man at his feet.

The poor man is named Lazarus, which is a form of the name Eliezer, which – appropriately – means, “God is my help.”

As the story unfolds, the poor man dies and is carried up to the bosom of Abraham, or heaven. The rich man dies and goes to Haydes, or hell.

In hell the rich man is tormented, “in agony in these flames,” and we can only imagine the extent of his suffering.

Of all the descriptions of hell we can find in literature, one of the most vivid is from Stella Gibbons’ 1932 novel, Cold Comfort Farm.

In the novel, Amos Starkadder is a lay preacher who threatens his congregation with hell every Sunday. And the congregation, in a strange ecclesial version of Stockholm Syndrome, seems to love it. They sway and moan as Amos tells them what hell means.

“It means endless, horrifying torment! It means your poor, sinful bodies stretched out on red-hot gridirons, in the nethermost, fiery pit of Hell and those demons mocking ye while they waves cooling jellies in front of ye. You know what it's like when you burn your hand, taking a cake out of the oven, or lighting one of them godless cigarettes? And it stings with a fearful pain, aye? And you run to clap a bit of butter on it to take the pain away, aye? Well, I'll tell ye, there'll be no butter in Hell!”

This is not easy to hear, even in an age when modern theologians question whether hell exists.

But it exists for the rich man who knows there is no butter to soothe him, and never will be.

Pathetically, he begs Father Abraham for mercy but he gets no sympathy. Instead, Father Abraham points out the justice of his suffering.

“Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things and Lazarus in like manner evil things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony.” (Lk 16:25)

And that’s the way it will be.

“Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.” (Lk 16:26)

In one final and futile expression of empathy, the rich man thinks of his five rich brothers and asks if there is some way to warn them of the fate they, too, will face.

That sounds okay to us. Even the obdurate reprobate Ebeneezer Scrooge was rescued by ghosts who came to save him. If he could, the rich man would drape himself in chains and appear to each of his brothers to tell them to stop their wicked ways.

But no. Father Abraham replies that those evil brothers will have to figure it out for themselves.

“If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.” (Lk 16:31)

That’s all, folks. That’s all she wrote. 

A few verses earlier, Jesus told the story of the dishonest manager who was commended by his master “because he had acted shrewdly.” (Lk 16:8) This is a puzzling story and is not easy to interpret.

But the story of the rich man and Lazarus is all too clear. It is, in fact, a warning to the rich.

“Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation,” Jesus said earlier in Luke. “Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep.” (Lk 6:24-25)

Does this mean that the rich are condemned to hell? All the rich? What about those of us who, compared to the poor of Soweto or the hungry of America, are rich?

John T. Carroll, a Presbyterian professor of New Testament, thinks it is not merely riches that condemns the rich man. 

“It is not wealth alone that causes his demise, but his failure to act generously toward the man he encountered outside his home every day. With wealth comes great responsibility.”

What does that say to the rich of our era?

Well, we could name names, but we won’t.

Because we all now rich oligarchs who build hugely profitable corporations but refuse to allow their employees to unionize. We know executives whose bonuses are literally millions of dollars higher than their beleaguered employees. There are health care executives who maximize profits by limiting the benefits they allow for sick people. There are the super rich who welcome tax cuts that force the reduction of Medicaid, food assistance, and other allowances for people in need.

Well, woe to all these people.

Happily, there are also super rich people – we could name the Rockefellers, the Gates, the Buffets, the Soros, the Bloombergs – who set aside large portions of their vast wealth for philantrophic programs. There is Oprah Winfrey. There is Robert F. Smith, an African American billionaire who paid the student loan debt for the entire 2019 graduating class of Morehouse College, approximately $34 million.

Is it impossible for the rich to get into heaven? We need to remember that, for God, all things are possible.

But this parable of the rich man and Lazarus has important lessons for us all.

Professor Carroll writes:

“It is too late for the rich man, and there appears to be no hope for the rest of his family. But what about us? In this fictional narrative, Jesus invites listeners to examine their own life choices and actions in light of the reality that we have limited time in which to live well. 

“We will have only so many opportunities to do the right thing. It is not too late for us: Not too late to pay attention to the needs around us. Not too late to share what we have to help others flourish. Not too late to challenge business practices and economic systems that allow a few to enjoy massive wealth while others experience unrelieved, crushing poverty. 

“The work of this parable isn’t finished until we answer the question: How will we respond?”