MONEY

Jesus v the World

MONEY

Before I launch into this week's diatribe, I shall return to a week ago, and to Hebrews 11.1: "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

My friend Dr. Stan DeKoven of Vision International University responded to my using the King James translation. He informed me that a more accurate translation reads ". . . faith is the assurance . . ." I trust his correction and confess that I prefer the definition of faith as substance because it feels right. Call me a poet (or whatever you please). Still, in agreement with both Dr. Stan and the King James translator, I will consider faith as both an assurance and a substance.

Now, moving along ...

Athanasius, a deacon in the early Christian church of Alexandria, wrote: “For the son of God became like us so that we could become like him.”

Dr. Cherith Nordling quoted that wise fellow when she visited Journey Church. Then she proposed that Christ lived as he did because he declined to be influenced by the narratives of the world. Because he chose instead to live in contact with God's spirit. Likewise, she observed, for us to live in connection with God's spirit, we need to decline to be the guided by the world’s dominant narratives.

The world's dominant narratives are: quest for fame, power, riches, sensual delights, and ego gratification.

Now, all those things being quite attractive, many people question why should they decline to pursue them.

Mohammed's common answer involved hell-fire; Gautama Buddha's answer featured the preference of a blissful eternity to the trials of reincarnation. In our times, bumper stickers appeal to our innate compassion with phrases like "Live simply so that others can simply live", and some Christian churches stick to the historically favorite answer Woody Guthrie famously called  “Pie in the sky when you die.”

Not only does that “when you die” promise fail to convince everybody but many folks in this scientific age find it laughable. Others think about it occasionally but then shrug it off and choose against opting for what teachers call delayed gratification, at least until they discover some miserable consequences of living as what Christians call the world favors.

At that point, in misery or terror, they may be open to persuasion should the church effectively present to them the benefits living in connection with the Spirit,

Connection with the Spirit, which stands in perfect opposition to the world's dominant narratives, offers freedom: from excessive worry; from haunting guilt; and from the poisonous need for ego fulfillment. But such intangible freedoms don't convince as many as the churches hope to convince. So churches often compromise by building their persuasion arsenal with elements of the world's dominant narratives.

The most obvious of these compromises concerns MONEY (which of course can help us buy or achieve the other worldly goodies).

Not only in churches noted for preaching prosperity gospels, but in many, perhaps most denominations and local churches, the love of money is blatantly or subtly promoted. Praise is  lavished on those who bestow large gifts. Preachers pass along stories about how someone started tithing at the risk of becoming destitute and soon was granted a financial miracle. The most prosperous congregants may well be closest to, and most influential with,  church leaders.

Rarely do churches in any way elevate those rare souls such as Olga Savitsky who did her best to live like Jesus by devoting her time and energies to prayer and to helping people rather than to seeking material prosperity.

From my angle, the expressed or implied message that following Christ will lead to material blessings is a lure, a recruiting tool, and awfully dangerous. Its effects can be tragic.  

A dear friend of mine grew up with a father who attended a seminary and then served as the minister in several small churches until he believed God called him to give up that occupation and become a full-time writer. Fine so far. I'm in favor of people following what they feel called to do. But all through my friend's childhood, she  heard her dad promise that next year the plays he wrote were going to make the family prosperous. None of those promises came true. Imagine the result of all that on my friend's ability to, as an adult, believe in a benevolent God.

I consider prosperity gospels in blatant or subtler forms both wrong and destructive to adherents and perfectly opposed to what should be the church's most critical admonition and challenge to us: QUIT BEING SO SELFISH and instead take care of others.

Sure, churches promote missions and charity, but I don't see them asking us to make any sort of sacrifice our priority even at the risk of losing fame, power, or wealth.  It’s no likely you will ever hear a sermon advising people to consider setting aside their occupation as a venture capitalist to follow a path they love feel called to, say becoming a history teacher. Cynics among us might suspect that churches don't commonly place a value on sacrificial living because doing so might cost them money.

I wonder what church Janis Joplin grew up attending.

Please keep in mind that my honoring Olga isn't meant to imply that we should all try to live like her. One of my mom's favorite cliches was "It takes all kinds to make a world." I'm thankful that Steve Jobs didn't forgo his or ambitions or whatever prompted him to make this good  computer. When I watch the Padres, I'm glad Manny Machado didn't give up baseball to pursue a vow of poverty that would keep him from playing third base.

What counts to me, what we can learn from, isn't the lifestyle Olga or Jesus followed, but their values.

On a slightly tangential note, should you be patient enough to read a long and detailed account of the contemporary evangelical culture wars, here's a link to one I find interesting. Read between the lines and you may come away believing that the war between the progressives and the conservatives among us, like far too much of our lives, is mostly about money.

On the subject of money, Perelandra College could surely use some. Please consider a paid subscription.

By the way, if you are elated, disturbed, or apprehensive on account of the probable undoing of Roe v Wade, here's a link to an article that includes the required reading for a unit on abortion from a history class at Calvin College.