Luke 12:13-21
Eighth Sunday after Pentecost
August 3, 2025
A gift economy
In her luminous book Braiding Sweetgrass, Native American botanist and philosopher Robin Wall Kimmerer shares a dream about visiting her local market on an unusual day. With a basket over her arm, she tries to pay for fresh cilantro, but the vendor pats her arm and waves off Kimmerer’s attempt to pay. “A gift,” the vendor says.
As Kimmerer moves further through the market, she sees bread rolls at a stall and opens her purse, but again, the vendor refuses to accept her money, as if it were impolite to pay. Kimmerer looks around in confusion, thinking, “This is a familiar market, yet everything has changed.” In this dream, no shopper is paying.
The author drifts through the market with a feeling of euphoria. Gratitude is the only currency accepted here. It’s all a gift — the merchants, it seems, are passing on gifts from the earth. Kimmerer examines her basket, and although it’s half empty, it feels full. Then, noticing a cheese stall, she considers getting some. But after realizing it would be given as a gift, she exercises restraint. She has all she needs in her basket.
Kimmerer shares this dream to show that moving from a market economy to a gift economy — from private goods to shared goods — changes everything. When we see the earth’s resources as abundant gifts shared by all, rather than as consumer goods to hoard and sell at market price, our view shifts. As we often say at the communion table: “These are the gifts of God for the people of God.”
The parable of the rich fool
This story from Braiding Sweetgrass provides an essential context and counterweight for understanding our gospel passage from Luke 12:13-21, the parable of the rich fool. Jesus tells the parable in response to a question about dividing family inheritance. In a preamble, Jesus warns against greed, emphasizing that one’s life cannot be reduced to one’s possessions. Then he tells the parable about a man whose land produces an abundance of crops and who responds to his fortune without considering anyone else. The rich man decides to hoard his crops and build larger barns. He hopes to live happily ever after—albeit alone! The parable concludes with divine judgment: “You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’”
A modern American might feel a bit discouraged by this story because, if any of us had been fortunate enough to come into unexpected wealth, saved carefully, or had a retirement plan with the hope of reaching our mature years with enough to live on, we probably would have done something similar to the rich fool in the story. In fact, it is widely considered wise to store our money in an investment fund for our future. While we are likely less narrow-minded than the fool in Jesus’ story — and hopefully more generous! — we might still feel sympathy for him. And that’s not surprising. It’s the American way. It’s how many of us have been raised since childhood. And, at its core, this type of thinking encourages an inward focus. That’s the honest but tough truth!
What does it mean to be “rich toward God”?
So why is the rich man in Jesus’ story considered a fool? It’s not just because of greed, although Jesus does warn us against greed in this story. The man is a fool because he is “not rich toward God” (Luke 12:21). But what does it mean to be rich toward God? In the following verses in Luke, Jesus explains that being “rich toward God” means striving for the commonwealth of God. Jesus models this life of hospitality.
In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus is always depicted as coming from or going to a meal, which highlights the importance of sharing and reciprocity in his way of life. You can say that Jesus in Luke’s Gospel models a gift economy due to this constant sharing and reciprocity, along with a lack of insularity. The story of the feeding of the 5,000 (Luke 9:10-17) is a paradigmatic case of sharing and reciprocity. It’s the kind of life described in Kimmerer’s dream with which we began.
Less is more
In his book Less is More, Jason Hickel argues that a gift economy — the kind embodied in Jesus’ life and described in Kimmerer’s dream — can help us expose and challenge an insular world where almost everything is turned into a commodity for profit or wealth. It’s our modern obsession. Moreover, Hickel notes how “we keep buying more stuff in order to feel better about ourselves, but it never works…We find ourselves spinning in place on an exhausting treadmill of needless over-consumption.”
However, Hickel points out that it doesn’t have to be this way. Societies with generous welfare systems, universal healthcare, unemployment benefits, pensions, paid holidays and sick leave, affordable housing, daycare, and strong minimum wages have repeatedly shown their ability to foster happiness. In such societies, social well-being improves by reducing the commodification of public goods and lowering inequality. In other words, generous societies are healthier, happier, and more just. They embody what it means to be a gift economy and to be rich toward God.
Sharing and receiving each other’s gifts instead of hoarding them truly reflects what it means to be rich toward God.
Sharing and receiving each other’s gifts instead of hoarding them truly reflects what it means to be rich toward God. Expressing gratitude for each other’s gifts can be the first step toward a gift economy, one based on reciprocity and genuine relationships.
Perhaps this is why the sacrament of communion is called the Eucharist, which means “thanksgiving” or “gratitude” for the gifts. The table at the center of our worship reminds us that we don’t need to consume to be happy. Instead, we are called to be relational people who understand how to share and receive each other’s gifts and, by doing so, become eucharistic people.
Questions for reflection on Luke 12:13-21
- What is your impression of the rich fool in Jesus’ story? How was he a fool?
- How does your church embody what it means to be a generous community? And how is that reflected in your ministry within your community?
- How can the communion table at the center of your worship help foster a gift economy in your community?
View the corresponding Order of Worship for the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost.
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