Pastor Iggi's sermon a few Sundays ago hit home for me.
Joy.  Love.  Contentment.
These really are three worthy principles to live by.  And maybe each stems from the others.  He also made reference to this song:

"I Got Plenty O' Nothing" from "Porgy & Bess"


Obviously, I can't completely identify with this song since I can't sing, I do have a lock on my door, I don't got a gal, etc.  The song does seem a tad extreme, but it reminded me of various pieces I've heard and read on how Christians should approach wealth and poverty.  Here's a summary:

There are two main dangers that wealth exposes people to:

1. Pride.
Boasting, becoming a snob, looking down on the poor.

2. Materialism.
Not the mere possession of material things, but an unhealthy obsession with them.  An attachment to money that trumps generosity.  Putting our trust and security in wealth.  Ultimately, enjoying the gift and forgetting the Giver.

Therefore, the chief effect of wealth is to spoil our two noblest relationships.  It can make us forget God and despise our fellow human beings.  Acknowledging the dangers in wealth, there are three possible courses of action:

1. Stay rich (i.e. no modification of economic lifestyle).
Wealth is a sign of God's blessing and it is right to claim and enjoy it, right?  Wrong.  Wealth isn't necessarily a sign of God's blessing (many obvious examples of this).  And while there is a difference between "creative hobbies and empty status symbols" and between "occasional celebrations and normal routine," our right to the enjoyment of God-given wealth must be balanced and, in some cases, even precluded by the Biblical mandate (found in both the OT and the NT) for the rich to take care of the poor.  "The Bible says much about defending other people's rights, but little about defending our own.  On the contrary, when it addresses us, it emphasizes our responsibilities, not our rights... It emphasizes that our responsibility is to secure the other person's rights.  We must even forgo our own rights in order to do so."  Thus for Christians, giving is voluntary, but it is not optional.  And so in the light of this and of the millions worldwide living in poverty, it is impossible for us to simply stay rich with a clear conscience.  "You cannot serve both God and Mammon."  And finally, Christ says that "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God." All things are possible with God, but this means exactly what it says.

2. Become poor.
Should we then all become complete ascetics?  No.  While Christ does call some people to total voluntary poverty (like the young ruler), it's not a universal calling.  Joseph of Arimathea is described as simultaneously being both a rich man and a disciple of Jesus.  While the Acts church shared everything they had and "gave to anyone as he had need," this is mostly descriptive, not prescriptive.  Christian selling and sharing of property is neither universal nor compulsory (plenty of examples, e.g. Mary and Martha owned a house).  God has created in humanity a rainbow of personalities and cultures.  Similarly, He probably does not intend for all of us to have the exact same house, car, or bank account.  In that sense, equality is not egalitarianism, just as unity does not require uniformity.  What fiscal equality in an equal society does mean, however, is that, at the very least, there should be no extreme economic disparities between the "rich" and the "poor."

3. To live simply, to give generously, and to be content.
This isn't the only "third" alternative, but it's a good one.




I think that the principles behind all of this are best summarized in these two quotes:

"[This declaration] is a commitment to the belief that there are more important things in life than the amassing of riches, and that if the pursuit of wealth clashes with things like human dignity and social equality, then the latter will be given priority.” - The Arusha Declaration

"If we are embarrassed either to visit other people in their home, or to invite them into ours, because of the disparity of our economic lifestyles, something is wrong. The inequality is too great. It has broken the fellowship." - John Stott

Well… that was much longer than I had originally intended.  Anyway, I have to go to sleep.

I think I said something about a hiatus.  (I lied =( )
I haven’t really used xanga in over a year.  Call me a curmudgeon, but I don’t like the new module/theme/skin system (mostly because I can’t figure it out).  So I got rid of everything I could.  Now I’m left with this depressing black/white theme =(.  Oh well, I will work on it later (maybe).

There was a time in my life when I used xanga regularly, but these days, school leaves me with barely enough time to attend church/small groups/large groups/accountability.  In college, I wondered where all the young adults in med school went.  Now I know – buried behind piles of books somewhere, studying furiously in solitude with an occasional string of expletives puncturing the otherwise pervasive silence.

So I’m not a very reflective person in general, but the past few weeks have lent themselves to soul-searching.  I realize that what I miss most about the pre-grad school years is familiarity.  Really knowing people and having people really know me.  It’s pretty easy to take that for granted.  Knowing names, number of siblings, and college major is one thing.  But there’s an intangible something in shared memories, spending the night laughing and talking about everything and nothing, from faith and careers to girls and politics.  What is it that was so significant about midnight Kong runs.  Or the late night talks in Winthrop dining hall.  Or someone’s awful idea to make a Bloody Mary from Ragu pesto tomato paste and Tabasco sauce.

It’s time, sheer and simple time spent together.  It’s irreplaceable.  And it’s the only way you come to really know someone.  To know how someone will respond even before they react.  To know what someone is thinking by the way they blink rapidly.  To be able to make an offensive comment for its simple hilarity and not be thought racist.  To be able to give an unqualified recommendation, be it for a movie, entrée, or potential girlfriend, because you know exactly what their preferences are.  It all requires time.

And therein lays the rub of it all.  If there’s anything I lack right now, it’s time.  I guess that’s why I place so much value on those people whom I already know and who know me.

Oh well, what to do.  It is what it is.  Anyway, I have no idea why I’m not sleeping and I have no idea what I just wrote.  I haven’t been up this late in ages.  Good night!

My brother is back in America! He should be home early next week .  Praise God.

Update:  My brother should be home sometime tomorrow (Saturday, 9/8/2007).

P.S. I have no idea what this "xanga modules" is about.  Everything looks weird now.  Anyway, maybe I'll figure it out when I have time.  But maybe not.

Up and down, up and down.  The little children go up and down, laughing, screaming, faces glowing in the neon breeze of the ferris wheel.  They're having fun, but the wheel...  well, it doesn't really care.

There's a draft coming through the window.  Spring.  It always smells of change.

*edit*

I want a Nabaztag.  Don't you?  They're ridiculously cute... and practical too! 

From Theirs Is The Kingdom

A passion for excellence.  Diligence.  Drive.  Efficiency.  The competitive edge.  These are the values of achievers, the essence of upward mobility and the stuff of which success is made.

Enter Jesus, the Christ.  Mighty God.  The Everlasting Father.  Emptied.  Weak.  Dependent.  Here to show us the way to greatness, heavenly greatness, by becoming least.  King turned servant.  Downwardly mobile.  What sort of ethic is this?

There are those who will find it exceedingly difficult to understand, the Teacher said.  Like the wealthy, successful, educated ones.  But there will be a few renegades and other out-of-step people who will be given eyes to perceive the kingdom.  They will listen to the homeless leader who owned one change of clothes, didn’t budget to pay his taxes, and was an affront to self-respecting, responsible believers.

“Take no thought for tomorrow… don’t worry about what you will eat or wear… don’t lay up treasures here… give your coat… share your bread… lend without expecting a return.”  Wonderful rhetoric but highly impractical.  Suicidal if taken literally – and so the reasonable folks did not take it that way.

Indeed, his teachings are suicidal for the successful.  The downward mobility of the kingdom strikes at the very heart of our earthly strivings.  It feels like death to let go of our diligent preparations for the next step up and the investments that insure our tomorrows.  Who in their right mind would gamble away a reasonably predictable and secure future on a high-risk intangible faith venture like the kingdom of God?  A balanced portfolio makes more sense.  A good mix of earthly investments with enough heavenly stock to carry us if the bottom falls out of the economy.  The best of both worlds, we might say.

Jesus the Christ.  Mighty God.  Destitute.  He says we can’t have it both ways, that our security is either in God or mammon.  He tells us that the servant is not greater than his master, that greatness – his and ours – is found only in servanthood, in choosing the lesser positions while yielding the better places to others.  It is only in laying down our privilege, our control, our comfort for the sake of others, he says, that we can know life as he created it to be.

Heavenly hosts burst forth in hallelujahs (not tears) at the sight of their naked, helpless Creator in the straw.  Heaven’s best lavished on the least of earth.  Glory to God, they exclaimed.  The first fruits of a new world order have come, and he has revealed the values of his kingdom:  vulnerability, obedience with abandon, lavish giving, faith that defies reason, volitional downward mobility.

Foolishness.  God has chosen the weak to lead the strong and the foolish to confound the wise.  His end?  That all may know his utter dependability to care for those who will risk trusting him.