Recently I finished a book that has changed the way I view my life.
It is called “Die With Zero” by Bill Perkins.
While I do not agree with everything he says,
there are some powerful insights I want to share with you tonight.
The goal of the book is to challenge every one of us
to live a most-fulfilled life in accordance with our values.
Perkins does push his values on us
but challenges us to live according to our own values.
To do that he maintains we have to get out of autopilot mode.
Isn’t that what Lent is all about,
getting out of autopilot mode and living according to Christ’s values.
The main idea of the book is that we die with zero money.
The concept is that any extra money we have left over
is money we worked hard for and spent valuable time earning it
but we could have done something else with that time.
Here is an example the author gives:
Let’s say when you die, the net worth is just your house.
Let’s just say that you have nothing else but the house you have left;
and your house is worth, let’s say, $1,000,000.
That is all you have when you die.
If you were earning $100 an hour, which is a lot of money.
Not everyone is doing that but let’s be generous with our assumption.
That house represents 10,000 hours of work,
which represents 5 years of work.
You worked 5 more years than you needed to make it to the end.
What could you have done with those extra 5 years of time?
Could you have spent more time with family?
Could you have spent more time doing the stuff that you love to do?
It is more complicated than that.
I get it. It is not just that simple.
That is one of my critiques of the book
but it is still thought provoking.
The point is to knock us out of autopilot
and to get us to think
maybe we do not work that many hours extra
and could we spend more time with our children or others
or spend time serving others in the ways Jesus calls us to.
That brings me to two concepts he uses
that are particularly powerful for us in our journey of Lent:
memory dividends and time bucketing.
Memory dividends:
If we invest money in stock or bonds or in the bank,
we expect some form of return on our investments
and those are called dividends.
Perkins suggests that we ought to invest our time in the same manner
and seek to have a return on our investment, memory dividends.
For example, instead of giving our kids
some gifts or money as a Christmas gift,
we give them an experience to remember,
such a trip with them to Disneyland.
That will produce memory dividends for years to come.
They will remember all the rides, the long lines, the food, the hotel;
they will remember you being with them.
If you do that trip every two years and make that your gift
then long after you are gone from this world,
your children will remember with affection the bi-annual Disneyland trips.
That will be true for every memory formed
whether to Disneyland, Hawaii, or the desert
or to our grandparents house like Sr. Rosalia shared this morning.
Now going back to scripture, Isaiah tells us
what the Lord will remember is not fasting in sackcloth and ashes
but rather sharing your bread with the hungry,
sheltering the oppressed and the homeless,
clothing the naked when you see them
and not turning your back on your own.
This, Isaiah says, the Lord will remember.
These are divine memory dividends.
This is a fulfilled life according to scripture.
Another great example of this is Bishop Dave O’Connell.
He shared his bread with the hungry, sheltered the oppressed
and fought for justice for all in need.
He spent his time investing in the immigrants and needy,
Bishop Dave invested in divine memory dividends
and we now share in those memory dividends.
Those memories will live forever
because they are divine memory dividends.
The question for us is “Where do we invest our time?”
It is my firm conviction that if we invest in others
then there is a divine dividend that keeps paying out.
But we have to be thoughtful and conscious about our investment.
For this Lent, can we invest more time
in giving to others in need?
When we stop and talk to a person who is experiencing homelessness,
we are giving ourselves and them a divine memory dividend
that will keep on paying?
The same is true when we fight for justice
for those who have little or no voice
whether that be the unborn, the divorced, the elderly
whether it be for women in our church or the LBGTQ+ person.
We are called to invest our time in divine memory dividends.
That brings me to the second concept: time bucketing.
This is the concept that there is a time for everything.
Perkin’s example in the book is one I share myself.
When I was 19 years old, I took a 60lb backpack
and traveled all over Europe for a month on a Euro-rail pass,
sleeping in youth hostels in different cities.
It was an epic trip I will never forget.
But if you asked me to take a 60lb backpack now
and sleep in hostels with 30 other smelly un-showered men
I might give it a pass!
There is a time for everything!
There is a proper time for everything.
There are certain things that are better done in our younger years,
and if we miss them, we miss them.
What we can do in our 20’s we will not do in our 50’s or 60’s.
What we can do in our 50’s we might not do in our 70’s or 80’s.
Now, going back to the gospel,
the disciples of John question Jesus
about why his disciples are not fasting as they do.
Jesus basically tells them that there is a time for that
but now is not the time to fast but it is a time to feast.
When the bridegroom is gone then they will fast.
How do we discern what is appropriate to our time today?
We need to enter into the journey of Lent
and realize that the world needs witnesses to Jesus Christ.
We are in a time that needs forgiveness, kindness,
gentleness, peace, and love.
Every year the Church offers us these 40 days of Lent.
It is a time of metanoia,
a time of renewal,
a time of reflection,
a time to do justice
and time of conversion.
Yes, it is a time to pray, a time to fast and time to give alms.
It is a time to recommit to our Christian values.
It is a time we need to act now for justice.
We need to do it today and seize this moment of time
to become like Bishop Dave and so many others;
creators of divine memory dividends
that God and all who we leave behind will remember us for.
Now is the time for a contrite and humble heart,
now is the time to turn back to God.
Or as Tricia O’Mahony-Hoyt asked this morning in the opening:
This is our time,
is it You?
