I had a dream that I was eating at an outdoor café in Mexico City. I watched a man going from table to table, presumably asking for handouts. He had a young girl with him. I knew this girl was his 9-year-old daughter, as one seems to know these things in dreams. I had just given all my change for a tip. The only money I had left was a US $10 bill. I hope he doesn’t come to my table, I thought anxiously. But no luck. The man and his daughter stepped up to my table.
They were very tidy and dressed rather simply; no torn or dilapidated clothing, no disheveled hair, no odor of the street.
“I have no food,” he said, looking at me with an expression that was neither pleading nor demanding. He didn’t ask for money or for food. He just issued a statement matter-of-factly.
I was flustered and too focused on the reality that I had no pocket change. In my panic, I was faced with a choice – give him everything or give him nothing.
I could have invited him and his daughter to sit down and share a meal. I could have just handed him the $10 bill since I knew that I could get more. Instead, I stuttered out something like, “Uhm … ahh, so sorry. I just gave all my change for a tip.”
The man didn’t reply. He and his daughter simply turned to walk away. But before he left, I saw that he was holding a book. The title of the book read Evangelical.
The Price of Good News
I had this dream 10 or more years ago, yet it haunts me to this day. My stingy, self-protecting, poverty-mindset was laid bare in that brief exchange. I was well-fed. I didn’t need that $10 bill.
But more than exposing my tight-fisted grip on money, it was the title of the book that stands as a testament to my emaciated spirituality.
The word evangelical is an anglicized transliteration of the Greek word for good news. While it has come to describe a subset of Protestants, the Greek word euangelion was used by the New Testament writers to affirm that the in-breaking Kingdom of God would be good news to those socially and economically marginalized by the Empire. To those considered social rejects, those who are disabled, and those who are poor, the good news is that they are given priority in a completely different kind of empire. For people like me sitting around with an extra $10 bill that I didn’t really need, the Kingdom of God might not feel like good news. My fidelity to and dependence upon God might be measured by my willingness to give it away.
The Prophets
The prophets of old had warned the people of God about their addiction to money and possessions obtained through exploitation, saying, “the plunder from the poor is in your houses.” (Isa. 3:14). God did not measure their faithfulness by their sacrifices at the Temple or attendance at sacred events, nor by their worship. He measured it by their advocacy of the marginalized;
Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations —
I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.
Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals
I hate with all my being.Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow. (Isa. 1: 13, 14, 17)
The prophet Amos had some strong words about their musical worship;
Away with the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.
But let justice roll on like a river,
righteousness like a never-failing stream! (Amos 5:23-24)
These prophetic denouncements were not just about individual greed. They were about systems of greed that kept the poor poor. The Jubilee, which reset land boundaries every 50 years (the main way people accumulated wealth) and the forgiveness of debts every seven years, was meant to keep wealth disparity to a minimum. But historians don’t believe those economic laws were ever obeyed. The system in place made sure the rich got richer and the poor got poorer. The prophets could see that this system was spiritually devastating to the people of Israel.
The more I’ve immersed myself in scripture, the more I have become convinced that faithfulness to God, piety, holiness, and the sanctified life is really about our posture toward the poor and our grip on money …. or rather …. the grip money has upon us.
John the Baptist, and Jesus
John the Baptist railed against those who had come to be baptized.
“Show me the fruit of your repentance, don’t just give it lip service!” (Luke 3:8 – my paraphrase).
The crowds, along with some tax collectors and soldiers, asked him for specifics on this “fruit of repentance” that he was looking for. In each case, John replied with an economic response—share your possessions, don’t extort money, and be content with your pay (Luke 3:10-14).
The fruit of repentance is in our pocketbooks.
Jesus, like John, said plenty to connect our fidelity to God with our money and possessions. This was bad news for the rich young ruler who was unable to break his obsession with wealth (Mark 10:17-22), but it was good news for Zaccheus who was willing to spin his wealth out to those on the margins (Luke 19:1-10). Jesus even connects Zaccheus’ salvation to this act of divestment.
I once counted Jesus’ warnings against greed and compared it to his warnings against sexual immorality. I found his warnings about the toxicity of wealth outweighed his warnings about sexual sin five to one.[1]
Considering the wealth disparity of our world, I’d guess that most of us reading this fall into Jesus’ category of rich. Therefore, it would be a good idea to take Jesus’ words about the rich personally.
“Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt. 19:23)
For the rich, like me, this can feel like bad news. The concentration of wealth into a few hands is broken up by kingdom economics. This is actually good news for the rich who have gotten spiritually sick by their obsession with and dependence upon their bank accounts. Like a diet of sugar and carbs, financial obesity can be deadly to the spirit.
Evaluating Our Relationship to Wealth
I have not found a formula to determine a spiritually healthy amount of money to live on or a rule of thumb regarding savings, retirement, or what kind of car to drive. I do know that working these specifics out in our lives should be handled with the same care as if diffusing a bomb.
A place to begin is by examining a couple of months of spending history. Since most of us in the US are nearly cashless, it can be as simple as listing our electronic expenditures. Scrutinize your relationship with each item. Are there items which you feel may have a hold on you? Give that thing up, at least for a season. Don’t let it occupy your affections. For those things like your car or home, offer them up freely for others to use.
Savings? I believe saving for future known needs is a good idea, but going beyond saving for known needs slips easily into hoarding, like the guy in the parable who decided to build bigger barns to hold his excess (Luke 12:16-21). There should, of course, be something set aside for emergencies, and while the specifics of retirement may not be known, there is a time coming when you won’t be able to work, and it is right to prepare for that.
In short, scrutinize your relationship to the things you spend money on (What does it profit you to gain the world but lose your soul? Mark 8:36), be generous with the things you own (lend without expecting anything in return – Luke 6:35), and save only for those things you know you will need later on (consider Joseph who stored up Egyptian grain for a famine he knew was coming).
Assume you are “the rich” spoken of in the Gospels or in the letter from James. Decide to be more like Zaccheus in Luke 19 and less like the rich young ruler of Mark 10. It may be hard for us to enter the Kingdom of God, but when we do, it will be good news for those on the economic margins, like the man and his daughter in my dream. And, ultimately, it is good news for the rich who are spiritually malnourished by our dependence upon wealth.
Endnote
[1] So far as I can see, there are seven Gospel passages warning us of sexual sin (Matt. 5:27-32, 15:18-20, 19:3-9, Mark 7:20-23, 10:2-12, Luke 16:18, John 8:3-11). On the contrary, there are 37 passages, five times as many, where Jesus warns us against the spiritual corrosiveness of money and possessions. This includes verses like “Do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth” (Matt. 6:19), “You cannot serve both God and wealth” (Matt 6:24), “Be on your guard against all kinds of greed” (Luke 12:1), and “… none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions” (Luke 14:33).
Scott Bessenecker is Director of Global Engagement and Justice for InterVarsity. Look for his forthcoming book, Bad Religion, Good News: An Honest Guide for the Spiritually Disappointed, from Herald Press.
