Does God want you to be rich?
In last week's Time magazine, the front page posed a question, posted in big yellow and white print, "Does God want you to be rich?" Incredulous and with furrowed brow, I slowly made my way toward the article, flipping and rustling through the crisp colorful pages until I finally arrived at the headline article. I read and read, the mystery growing in my mind, and the knot tightening in my belly. I thought quietly to myself as I closed the magazine and tried to catch the flitting pieces of half-truth and lay them down on the observation table of the mind.
Now, I am no great scholar of all things Jesus, but I am pretty sure he talked about it being harder for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. I suppose the health and wealthers feel like anorexic dromedaries to make such claims. I tend to think that the tight squeeze for the rich might be attributed to the fact that they have made more room for gold in their pockets than for God in their hearts. I'm pretty sure Jesus also said that where your treasure is, that is also where you can find your heart. So with all that golden treasure in the pockets of the rich, where do you think we might find their hearts? But beyond all my trite mockery of the more fortunate, I think Jesus really meant to just let us all know that the things we own eventually begin to own us.
It sounds to me as though millions of "christians" are being duped by a few wealthy reverends who want to justify the extravagance of their lifestyles. Now, before I say any more, I think Jesus also said that before I tell my brother to take the speck out of his eye, I need to take the log out of mine. So let me say that while I am not wealthy by any stretch of the imagination, I still find myself possessed by my possessions, or at least the idea that I need more of them. But I'm pretty sure Jesus also said that anyone who leads any of his little children astray should have a millstone thrown over his neck and be thrown in the sea. This to me sounds like Jesus is pretty serious about the people who follow him, and anyone who would be their leader better lead to Jesus or there are some pretty heavy consequences.
Amidst these frantic ruminations that bombard my inside places, I know that I need to pray for my home, this American continent, and my countrymen who slide down the slick slopes of materialism, even among those who call themselves followers of Christ. Does God want you to be rich? He may not be decided one way or the other, and it may depend entirely on who you are or where you are, but I'm pretty sure Jesus made it clear that those who lead the bumbling sheep of the christian flock better be pointing toward the good shepherd. And for those who don't, there is no part of the kingdom of heaven, because when all is said and done, they are only wolves in sheep's clothing.
Now, I am no great scholar of all things Jesus, but I am pretty sure he talked about it being harder for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. I suppose the health and wealthers feel like anorexic dromedaries to make such claims. I tend to think that the tight squeeze for the rich might be attributed to the fact that they have made more room for gold in their pockets than for God in their hearts. I'm pretty sure Jesus also said that where your treasure is, that is also where you can find your heart. So with all that golden treasure in the pockets of the rich, where do you think we might find their hearts? But beyond all my trite mockery of the more fortunate, I think Jesus really meant to just let us all know that the things we own eventually begin to own us.
It sounds to me as though millions of "christians" are being duped by a few wealthy reverends who want to justify the extravagance of their lifestyles. Now, before I say any more, I think Jesus also said that before I tell my brother to take the speck out of his eye, I need to take the log out of mine. So let me say that while I am not wealthy by any stretch of the imagination, I still find myself possessed by my possessions, or at least the idea that I need more of them. But I'm pretty sure Jesus also said that anyone who leads any of his little children astray should have a millstone thrown over his neck and be thrown in the sea. This to me sounds like Jesus is pretty serious about the people who follow him, and anyone who would be their leader better lead to Jesus or there are some pretty heavy consequences.
Amidst these frantic ruminations that bombard my inside places, I know that I need to pray for my home, this American continent, and my countrymen who slide down the slick slopes of materialism, even among those who call themselves followers of Christ. Does God want you to be rich? He may not be decided one way or the other, and it may depend entirely on who you are or where you are, but I'm pretty sure Jesus made it clear that those who lead the bumbling sheep of the christian flock better be pointing toward the good shepherd. And for those who don't, there is no part of the kingdom of heaven, because when all is said and done, they are only wolves in sheep's clothing.
posted by Emily Young | 5:31 PM
3 Comments:
Hello Dave and Em and all,
Be aware that what I say is intended to make people uncomfortable with the status quo so we can finally forge that long promised new path to the future.
RE: "Does God want you to be rich?"
How about, does the Creator want some people to suffer and starve while some wallow in luxury and ignore the plight of others? What about "serving mammon" (money and materialism) instead of truth, justice, and your fellow souls? How about the rich man and the eye of a needle? Talking about the blind leading the blind...
To take this a step further, what would the Creator say about forming organizations (corporations, religions, governments, political parties, etc.) that accumulate vast wealth and resources while living people and other lifeforms suffer as the direct result? What does this say about the complete hypocrisy of all religions?
Here's some pivotal knowledge (wisdom) so people can stop focusing on symptoms and obfuscatory details and home in like a laser on the root causes of and solutions to humanity's seemingly never-ending struggles.
Money is the lifeblood of the powerful and the chains and key to human enslavement
There is a radical and highly effective solution to all of our economic problems that will dramatically simplify, streamline, and revitalize human civilization. It will eliminate all poverty, debt, and the vast majority of crime, material inequality, deception, and injustice. It will also eliminate the underlying causes of most conflicts, while preventing evil scoundrels and their cabals from deceiving, deluding, and bedeviling humanity, ever again. It will likewise eliminate the primary barriers to solving global warming, pollution, and the many evils that result from corporate greed and their control of natural and societal resources. That solution is to simply eliminate money from the human equation, thereby replacing the current system of greed, exploitation, and institutionalized coercion with freewill cooperation, just laws based on verifiable wisdom, and societal goals targeted at benefiting all, not just a self-chosen and abominably greedy few.
We can now thank millennia of political, monetary, and religious leaders for proving, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that top-down, hierarchical governance is absolute folly and foolishness. Even representative democracy, that great promise of the past, was easily and readily subverted to enslave us all, thanks to money and those that secretly control and deceptively manipulate all currencies and economies. Is there any doubt anymore that entrusting politics and money to solve humanity's problems is delusion of the highest order? Is there any doubt that permitting political and corporate leaders to control the lives of billions has resulted in great evil?
Here's a real hot potato! Eat it up, digest it, and then feed it's bones to the hungry...
Most people have no idea that the common-denominator math of all the world's currencies forms an endless loop that generates debt faster than we can ever generate the value to pay for it. This obscured and purposeful math-logic trap at the center of all banking, currencies, and economies is the root cause of poverty. Those who rule this world through fear and deception strive constantly to hide this fact, while pretending to seek solutions to poverty and human struggle. Any who would scoff at this analysis have simply failed to do the math, even though it is based on a simple common-denominator ratio.
Here is Wisdom
Doctrine of Two Spirits...
Peace...
I think, in a CS Lewis way, that as we become more christ-like, we become smaller and smaller, until there's nothing left. We leave, and what is left stays. Similarly, the more attached we become to the material, the more attached we become to anything borne of this world, the larger we become and Christ shrinks. Anyone, without Christ, is a camel with delusions of thread. Anyone that thinks they have Christ, with delusions that they are a thread, is still a camel. Christ shows us that we are one, or maybe two humped, we spit when we are thirsty, and we are too damn big for that needle. So, all this to say, Yeshua shows us that we are just stupid animals, with no ability to get through, and then in that moment of understanding, we begin to disappear, and when it comes to threading the needle, we are absorbed into Christ, no need for the impossible.
Whether our pockets or hearts are filled with gold, we are pack animals. Joel O. is to be questioned in his assumption that wealth matters. Nothing matters. We are smelly, sandy, and stupid.
I recommend "Rich Young Ruler" by Derek Webb... great song along these lines.
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