Proper 13C’25
3 August 2025
Ecc.1-2; Ps49;
Col.3.1-11, Lk.12.13-21
St. Luke’s Episcopal Church
North Little Rock, Arkansas
The Rev. Carey Stone <+>
If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Amen. -from Colossians, chapter 3
Before I left for vacation if someone had come up to me and asked me what I thought I would be preaching about on my first Sunday back – my answer would not have been “Why Ozzy Osbourne, of course, the Prince of Darkness and the father of Heavy Metal. Yet here I stand today with his name on my lips.
For those of you who don’t know who Ozzy Osbourne was, he came to fame five decades ago as a co-founder of the heavy metal rock band, Black Sabbath. He was known for his dark lyrics, strange exploits on stage such as biting the heads off of vampire bats, heavy drug use, and in later years, as a reality tv star along with his family members. The news of his death made the headlines while my family and I were on vacation in Chicago. I ended up calling my daughter’s godfather, an episcopal priest in Houston but before that was a radio DJ and had met Ozzy in person on a number of occasions. Ozzy died at the age of 76 with Parkinsons.
Much of my information is drawn from a news article on-line: DailyusNews1
He had born into a family that was both Catholic and Anglican and had been baptized as a baby in the Church of England. Although his life had taken him far away from the church at the end his family, friends and close associates gathered to remember him in a church. This turned out to be particularly fitting based upon a surprise letter written by Ozzy back in 1994 that was read during the service by his wife Sharon Osbourne. The letter was to be opened at the time of his death. The letter began with: “If you’re reading this, then the time has come.” It contained a private confession that gave a glimpse into the soul of a man who, beneath the fame, earthly glory, and chaos, carried a deep sense of guilt, and as the journalist covering the story wrote, a deep desire to make peace before his final curtain call.” The letter, written and sealed by Ozzy three decades earlier had been written during a period of intense personal reflection. His wife explained this period of reflection and soul searching had followed a near fatal overdose that had shaken him to his core. In the letter he named he named his fears that by age 75 he thought his health might begin to fail and that he wanted to “right the wrongs of the past.” He wrote, “I won’t let life take me until I’ve paid my debt. But if my time comes, it won’t be because I gave up. It’ll be because I finally gave back.” What did he mean by this? Unknown to the public, and even some of his family members, Ozzy had been funding a private foundation for over twenty years, helping rehabilitate former addicts who had once been inspired by his music…only to fall into the same darkness he once knew all too well. Many of them never even knew the source of their financial support. “He told me,” His wife continued softly, “that if even one soul could escape what he barely survived, then maybe his pain had meaning.”
In the last paragraph of the letter, Ozzy explained that when my body can no longer handle the toll of my past, I won’t fight death, I won’t run from it – I will welcome it, if – and only if – I have fulfilled my last encore.” In the end as treatment options failed, he embraced his pain and as his daughter Kelly said at the funeral, “He wasn’t giving up, he was letting go.” With the reading of the letter, the somber tones of the service shifted from farewell to revelation to a story of redemption that had been quietly but resolutely lived, hidden from the public.
With this revelation of the inner reflections of Ozzy’s soul it’s almost like he read all of today’s readings from Ecclesiastes, the Psalm, Colossians, and the gospel of Luke before writing his letter. He knew that his fame and fortune had come at a price, a heavy price to his own health, as well as the lives of those who tried to follow in his footsteps who fell victim to the same demons, he had the scourge of heavy, illicit drug use, abuse, and addiction.
Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity…We can never ransom ourselves, or deliver to God the price of our life… Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So, it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.” – Excerpts from the readings for the Sunday of Proper 13C
Through a near death experience Ozzy was literally brought to his knees; he knew that although he was rich with untold millions in his bank account, he knew that he was not rich toward God.
Each of us also must search our souls, and ask ourselves the question – “Am I rich toward God?”
May the Holy Spirit speak to us all and show us the way to where True Riches are found and shared with others. Amen.
X
1 https://dailyus.cafex.biz/posts/osbourne-knew-letter-changed-everything-nh-nguyenhuynh123?new&fbclid=IwQ0xDSwL1t8FleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHmPJZ1Mnp0FeEIT8vJHzcm3CxngykO_2rXdgzz3nROajEbeUq6ty_w3DpEqV_aem_Fqt_cIV4w_yMr91uLHBiZg#google_vignette