After Pentecost Devotional - Day 51

“If Yahweh makes you wealthy, but you don’t joyfully worship and honor him, he will send enemies to attack you and make you their slaves. Then you will live in poverty with nothing to eat, drink, or wear, and your owners will work you to death.” Deuteronomy 28:47-48

I grew up with texts like this one sounding an awful lot like either a prosperity theology or a theology of retribution. My tradition did not know very well what to do with verses like this as the book of Job is so clear that God does not pay people to behave. The life and ministry of Jesus show us clearly that being good, moral, and ethical does not mean that one will be wealthy and comfortable. All too often the Bible displays for us examples of the faithful who were anything but comfortable.

What then, to do with passages like this one in Deuteronomy? For starters, we should recognize that what this text is teaching is something different from prosperity theology. It equates Yahweh's potential blessings as including wealth, but that is a wealth burdened by responsibility. It is a conditional wealth that recognizes that we are stewards of God's bounty. Such blessing comes with so many of the commandments we have already seen in Deuteronomy that indicate our responsibility to care for the poor, widows, orphans, Levites, priests, and foreigners.

Worshipping and honoring Yahweh included those very aspects of caring for others. It was all part and parcel of one same structure of life. To worship and honor Yahweh meant living differently from the nations round about, specifically in the way Yahweh demanded to be honored in caring for what Jesus would term “the least of these.” That message was woven into all sorts of commandments regarding caring for society's unprotected classes, as well as making sure that tithes, offerings, and sacrifices offered in the Temple were used to care for their needs.

The feast days were days set apart to refresh the teaching regarding Yahweh's provision for the needs of one and all. The poor came with empty bellies to receive, while the rich laid out a feast for the rest of the community. These were the only opportunities most of the poor had to eat meat. This provision was centered on the worship of Yahweh.

Honoring, worshipping, and respecting Yahweh could not be divorced from taking care of the poor. Should that happen, Deuteronomy stresses that Yahweh would see to it that the source of the nation's wealth would dry up. Wealth and provision were given in order to be shared. They were given under the responsibilities of responsible stewardship

The economic structures laid out for the nation departing Egyptian oppression were to make sure that no one suffered as they had experienced back in Egypt. Yahweh would bring agricultural bounty to the land. It was up to the landholders to be sure those blessings were made available to all.

This is a very different economic system than the one we know. These words call for wealth, but not an individualized wealth. They call for communal or societal wealth. They call for a distribution of God's blessings such that the needs of all are met.

How do your economic attitudes need shaping by these stewardship principles?


"Lord, clarify my responsibilities to use your blessings to care for others."

—©Copyright 2016, Christopher B. Harbin
http://www.sermonsearch.com/contributors/104427/ 
My latest books can be found here on amazon

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Gospel Is Not Conservative

Image
Fundamentalism and conservativism are intrinsically averse to change. They are tied with conserving a status quo or moving back to a former era. They seek a safe place, a respite from change and transformation in the world around them. They are threatened by new ideas. They fear that the foundations on which they base their lives will be uprooted, causing their view of reality to fall apart. Growth depends on change. Life requires change. Survival depends on responding to changes in our environment. It requires new ideas. It requires new answers to old questions, as well as new questions with even newer answers. Jesus was by no means conservative. Jesus challenged the status quo. He fought against the groundwork of much of the religious thought around him, as well as the structures erected to empower its values. He called out those who benefited from social, religious, and political power. He demonstrated God's love, forgiveness and grace to those deemed una...
Read more

God in the Hands of Angry Sinners

Image
Jonathan Edwards’ famous sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” set a very poor direction for much of Christianity in the Colonies. His Puritan tradition presented God as an essentially angry deity whose desire was to condemn and torture. Grace or mercy existed simply in regard to how long God waited until calling down judgment upon sinners. That is not good news. It never was. Such is not the message of Jesus whom the gospel writers claim as good news. They echo the words of the celestial messengers declaring Jesus’ birth as good news of great joy to all peoples. Rather than look to Jesus as the clearest example of God’s identity, character, and will, that tradition surrounding Edwards began with an altogether different understanding that could not account for what Jesus actually taught. The Puritan perspective began with angry sinners and projected that upon God. Anger begins with fear, uncertainty, discomfort, and the inability to control one’s environment, ot...
Read more

Our Language of Choice

Image
I woke up this morning and decided to be a woman. I really like the idea of earning less money on the job. I like the idea of being passed over for promotions. I like that I will be held more accountable for the care of my home and familial responsibilities than any of the men around me. I’m looking forward to having my expertise ignored. I like that I’ll more likely be treated as a lower-level assistant to male colleagues than an actual colleague. It should be a good experience to live as more of a target for domestic violence and abuse. It will be so freeing to let go of my bodily autonomy and place it in the hands of men who will not understand me. With so many voices in our society shifting back toward the attitudes of 70 years ago, I am really looking forward to setting aside all trappings of male privilege and power to live as a second class citizen whose voice and opinions are essentially irrelevant. Just look at all the advantages women have! They get t...
Read more