‘Welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God’ Romans 15:7

Paul’s words were written to stimulate the Roman congregation to mutual acceptance. His intention was to bring to an end the division that had characterised the way the ‘weak’ and the ‘strong’ were behaving. His argument was that believers should accept one another for God’s glory just as Christ has accepted them for God’s glory. And therefore the reason Christians should accept one another is that Christ has accepted us. It’s unthinkable therefore that we should spurn anyone whom Christ has received.

Few of us would treat one another as badly as these Italian Christians obviously were. And we should praise God for that. But any time at which all the church gathers provides an opportunity to express our mutual acceptance and offer genuine welcome to one another. At least onece a week, on a Sunday, we get a chance to go to our welcoming work. And God would have us welcome people in the same way that He’s welcomed us.

One vivid depiction of the way in which God accepts us is provided by Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15. In that parable the father sees his wayward son whilst he’s still a long way off. Filled with compassion he runs towards him, embraces him and kisses him. Whilst that event gives us the godly principle it doesn’t necessarily nail the precise manner in which we’re to welcome others! Think about it. Even if you were a long time church absentee would you want to see the old men of the congregation sprinting across the car park, giving you a man hug and planting a kiss on your cheek?

So what is involved in godly welcoming? Here are my three suggestions.

God took the initiative to welcome us. It wasn’t our idea to come back to Him. We’re sinners and our heart’s desire was to be anywhere but back with God as our Lord and Saviour. He decided to work in us by His Spirit so that we’d turn in repentance and faith from our sinful rejection. So, being welcoming means taking the initiative to seek out the outsider. We make the running; we don’t expect them to. That’s not always as easy as it sounds. Some of us are bashful, diffident and reserved. And the last thing we want to do is approach someone uninvited. But that’s what God did. And that’s what we need to do. It’s not as hard as it sounds, especially if we’re armed with a few key questions to help us get in our stride. Questions about how they heard about church, whether this is a regular habit or a one off, what they’re looking for gets the conversation up and running! So let’s put our natural reticence to one side and let’s not leave the welcoming to the extroverts. Sometimes their welcoming can be so effusive that it’s suffocating! Often the more introverted make the best welcomers because they understand the awkwardness and self consciousness that many feel when they walk into a church gathering for the first time.

There’s a danger of thinking that we’ve welcomed someone to church when we’ve shown them which room we’re meeting in, shaken their hand and directed them to the coffee. But these people matter to God and if that’s all we do then we’ve not communicated that in any discernible way. It’s when we take a genuine interest in who they are and what they do that they’ll get the message that we think they’re significant. And so we need to turn aside from whatever we were doing or had planned to do and take some time to have a conversation. It will also mean that we seek them out the next time, remember something about them and pick up where we left off last time. I’m hopeless at this and there are people at church who’ve been welcoemd by me for the first time at least a couple of times! They usually tell me that we’ve met before and I die a thousand excrutiating painful deaths. But serves me right!

The word ‘incorporation’ means ‘to include something with something already formed’. Obviously the thing that’s already formed is the church community. And so we really welcome someone when they feel that they’re a part of their new church. It’ll mean that they’re included in the invitations that fly around and the social events that take place. It’ll mean that we’ll get newcomers into our homes. It’ll mean that we sit with people that are unfamiliar. Someone will feel welcomed when they feel that they’re an integral part of Christ’s people at church.

Conclusion

Of course, welcoming can be hard with small children screaming out for attention, with church responsibilities and when there are regulars that we need to catch before they shoot off. But we need to do all that we can to participate in this crucial ministry activity. We ought to ‘put ourselves around a bit’ so that there aren’t people we don’t know. That’s more easily done in a smaller congregation than a large one. But we need to do all that we can to take opportunities to welcome one another, as God would have us do. But above all let’s remember that God in Christ has welcomed us and seek to imitate that as we have opportunity, to the glory of God.

Just finished reading this book. Really enjoyed it. It’s like a ‘Rough Guide’ to American Calvinism. Made me want to go to the places it describes and savour the ministry on offer there.

As a result of the interweb thingy I’m greatly indebted to a number of the men mentioned in this book. The sermons of Driscoll, Keller and Sproul have been used by God to feed my soul at times when I’ve felt spiritually dry or discouraged in ministry. The writing of Piper, Ware and Carson has kept me on the straight and narrow, as well as providing useful fodder for college essays! I’m a card carrying five pointer and so these are my guys. God is growing their ministries and so I found it immensely encouraging. As with all these biographically shaped books it’s worth keeping 1 Corinthians 3:7 in mind, ‘neither he who plants nor he who wanters is anything, but only God who gives the growth’.

Collin Hansen’s book grew out of an article first published in Christianity Today. His book reads like an extended article and it’s no less enjoyable for that. It’s like reading a Sunday Times colour supplement piece on American Reformed Evangelicalism. It’s only 150 pages; you’ll get through it in a few hours.

I can’t comment on the American scene and profess anything but the slightest familiarity. But this book maps out some of the terrain, charts the growth of Calvinism in the Evangelical scene and interviews not only the key church leaders but also those who are attracted to their ministry. It highlights some of the fault lines within the Reformed movement and yet also explains how key leaders on both sides of the Charismatic debate are working together and co-operating for the gospel. Two key groups are Together for the Gospel and the Gospel Coalition.

Two reviews I found interesting can be found here, which is positive and here which sounds a few sobering and cautionary notes. He’s probably right but I’m not going to panic. We’ll work hard, we’ll pray but ultimately we’ll sleep at night because we’re Calvinists!

I’ve written on this elsewhere. I’m guessing it’ll provoke a response. Some have suggested that with this distinction we’re creating a problem that doesn’t need to be there. But I think that’s naive. We live with competing calls on our time. We can’t do everything. We can only do some things. And the things that we do we don’t do for the same amount of time and with the same degree of commitment. When it comes to social activism and gospel proclamation it operates in the same way. In other words, what am I going to do every Saturday? Do I play sport and combine my love of exercise and competition with opportunties to speak of Christ, or do I sign up for a Friday night stint with the Balham Street Pastors and rule out any activity on Saturday except sleeping?The answer to that’ll depend on who we are and what we’re suited for. If you’re pants at rugby, steer well clear of rugby clubs. All you’ll do is bring Christians into disrepute!

The relationship between social activism and gospel proclamation is an important one but my rule of thumb is to try and remember the following four things

1.They are two necessary activities

God’s word instructs us to be involved in both evangelstic proclamation and practical demonstarations of compassionate care. Social activism is urged upon us in Galatians 6:10, 1 Thessalonians 3:12, Luke 10:25-37. They’re both part and parcel of being holy. And so God will recognise and commend us at the future judgement for our engagement in both. This is not to say that we’re saved by our works. We’re saved by faith in Christ crucified. But though our works will not save us they will accompany us as evidence of true saving faith. Some object that social action is a waste of time because this world and all that’s in it will be destroyed. So to invest energy in social action is like polishing the brass on the Titanic. But to think like that is to ignore the plain teaching of God in His word. Others say that it’s a misuse of resources because we’re facing a never ending black hole of need. Why pour money that could be used to support gospel ministry down the drain? It’s true that social activism will drain us of our resources both personally and corporately as we engage in it. But that’s true of most things that we do. How much we commit to this activity is a matter of wisdom. To devote all our resources to social activism would be to neglect evangelistic priorities but to give all our resources to gospel ministry would also be to neglect God’s clear command. If those extremes are at either end of the spectrum, we’ll need to be soemwhere in the middle! Don’t ask me where because that’ll depend on who we are and the gifts and opportunities that God has given us. But God commands us to be engaged in gospel proclamation but also social compassion, cultural engagement and political involvement as we have opportunity.

2.They are two distinct activities

Explaining the gospel and engaging in social activism are different things. They’re both good and worthwhile activities but they’re not the same thing. Social action is not our gospel, believe it or not we have something much more significant to offer than the temporal improvement of living conditions; we have the eternal salvation that the gospel proclaims. Our social action is not conditional on the engagement with the gospel. In other words we don’t do it simply if it will opportunity to talk about the gospel. Nevertheless it can be motivated by gospel intentionality. In other words it’s not wrong to want one to lead to the other. 

3.They are two unequal activities

Gospel proclamation has eternal significance and social action has temporal significance. I am not yet convinced that the Bible gives support to the idea that what we do know will persist into the New Creation. The attitude and motives that led to our social activism willl be rewarded but the soup kitchen, social housing project or health care provision we established won’t. Therefore there’s urgency and a centrality to gospel proclamation. Both social action and gospel proclamation matter but gospel proclamation is more important because the consequences of not doing it are so much more serious. But some object that social action is a distraction from gospel ministry because preserving people’s bodies won’t save them from the wrath of God in hell. That’s true. But we find time to do all sorts of other things that are not directly evangelistic. We watched the rugby this afternoon as a family but evangelism remains my priority but that doesn’t mean that I have to be doing it all the time otherwise I’d never eat, sleep or rest.

4.They are two complementary activities

They strengthen and interpret one another. And so, though they may be distinguished from each other they should never be separated from one another. Our godly deeds without accompanying words will be misunderstood and our words without accompanying deeds of love will appear insincere. Therefore, loving social action is the context and motive for our loving gospel proclamation. Our deeds are never a softening up tactic. They may have that effect but that’s not why we do them. They’re worthwhile activities in themselves because they bring glory to God.

In the early 1990s a survey of expenditure revealed that Americans spent twice as much on cut flowers as on overseas ministry, twice as much on women’s tights, one and a half as much on video games, five times as much on pets, one and a half times as much on skin care, seven times as much on sweets, seventeen times as much on diet related products, twenty times as much on sports activities, twenty six times as much on soft drinks and 140 times as much on legalised gambling [C.L. Blomberg, Neither Poverty Nor Riches, Apollos, Leicester, 1999, p19].

It’s unbelievable isn’t it? Who’d have thought they spend that much on diets! I may also have found new ammunition for my argument that Christians shouldn’t own dogs! But I’m aware that I probably come undone on the sports category.

But I wonder what an analysis of our spending patterns would reveal. What do we do with our wealth? And what should we do with it? Given the current financial position of the church and the current economic climate you can understand why we need to address the issue of what we do with our wealth.

There are, I think, three broad principles to bear in mind.

1. We need to learn to be content

On the whole scripture has a positive view of wealth. It’s a covenant blessing that comes from God, often through the means of human effort (Deut 29:9, Job 1:21, Prov 10:4). The Apostle Paul reckons that if we’ve got food and clothing then we’re sorted (1 Tim 6). He doesn’t quite put it in those terms, but that’s his drift. What he does say is that ‘there’s great gain in godliness with contentment’. And he’s right on the money! If only we believed it. We’d then be liberated from our relentless pursuit of acquisitions that so often drives our working ambitions. The Bible also puts it the other way round when in the Ten Commandments God says ‘Do not covet’. Coveting things or experiences is the opposite of being content with what we have. We’ll never know what it is to be happy until we learn to be content with what we have. God would rather we live within our means than spend our time dissatisfied with what He’s given us. He’s given us what we need. If He thinks we need more then He’ll give us more. He isn’t sovereign for nothing! And so we ought to pray like the writer of Prov 30:8 who said, ‘give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me, lest I be full and deny you and say, “Who is the Lord?” or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God’. That sort of contentment is a rare and precious thing. And we need to learn it.

2. We need to learn to be thankful

Wealth is a gift from God and because of it we’re able to do so many things that our predecessors on this earth could only dream of. We have a more comfortable sofa, a better TV, a softer bed, a more permanent house, better transport, more interesting places to visit and so on. Compare our standard of living compared to that of our parents’ generation, and it’s astounding. It’s not simply that we’ve financed a life on easy credit and that they were more frugal than us, though there may be something in that. We live in wealthy times. And for that we ought to thank God. We’re immensely wealthy compared to people in former times and compared to people in other parts of the world. We have much to be thankful for. We ought to be overflowing in thankfulness for all the things that God has given us in this life. We should thank God for all the material blessings that we enjoy. We must never be ascetic. Scripture doesn’t condemn the use of our money for relaxation, entertainment or the consumption of luxuries. The denial of physical pleasures is demonic and so should be resisted at all costs.

3. We need to learn to be generous

One of the remarkable things that characterised the early church was their radical generosity and extravagant compassion (Acts 4). Paul tells us that one of the fruits of repentance is willingness to contribute to the needs of others (Eph 4). The wage we earn, the savings we’ve amassed, or the property that we own is simply part of God’s creation that He’s entrusted to us. It’s under our control but He expects us to use it responsibly. And one of the things He wants us to do with our wealth is give it away; to others, for their benefit. Phillip Jensen once told his congregation, ‘it’s about time we saw our abundant wealth as a resource for addressing needs rather than for increasingly enslaving our lives to the meaninglessness of materialism’ [P.D. Jensen, ‘A Reason to Work’, By God’s Word, (Kingsford, Matthias Media, 2007)] But how generous should we be? At one level it’s a crass question but for people new to the Christian faith it’s a reasonable question to ask. Churches sometimes encourage people to think in terms of the Old Testament tithe. Though it’s nowhere mandated by the New Testament it seems a sensible place to start. In the Law of Moses, God placed on His people the obligation of a 10% tithe. It’s not repeated in the New Testament though there’s loads of material on the subject of financial contribution. In passages like 2 Cor 9:7&8 the emphasis is on generous, voluntary and cheerful giving. It’s hard to believe that God had in mind that we’d lessen the response to His redemptive grace shown in Christ and so the tithe is the starting point. So what’s a good ball park figure to start off with? Let’s say 10% of our gross income [the one they promised to pay you when they hired you!].

Wouldn’t it be a terrific thing if, with the wealth that God has given us, we were genuinely content, really thankful and sacrificially generous?

Other Credit Crunch articles here, here and here.

I quoted this last night in our session on Biblical Evangelism as part of our Ministry Training Course. They’re taken from Richard Coekin’s book, ‘A Few Good Men’. I’ve found them hugely challenging,

‘Imagine arriving in heaven, just resurrected into the New Creation at the end of the world, as the crowds of God’s people are gathering. You can hear them all, from every nation and culture, breathless with excitement, exhausted from the work of evangelism, constantly swapping stories of those who’ve been saved, embracing the team involved in their own salvation and being embraced by all whom they’d helped. Everywhere there is the joy of battle endured and won. And most exciting of all, the warm, welcoming embrace of Jesus himself for all his weary, and in many cases bloodied servants. What a shameful tragedy to arrive comparatively fresh and untroubled! To have been someone who’d lived as a spectator watching from the sidelines, hiding from God’s great evangelistic enterprise. We need to seize the opportunity to get involved’.

How I wish I’d thought of this; it’s a brilliant talk and a brilliant idea. I’ll wait 12 months, use it and everyone’ll think it’s the most original idea they’ve ever come across!

A few years ago I did a kids’ slot on fireworks day. It’s taken me a while to get over the mockery that it generated! It’d be fair to say that I came in for a fair deal of good natured banter. It wasn’t only my handling of British History that bordered on revisionism that aroused such mirth. It wasn’t only the lack of nuance in my summary of Roman Catholic teaching; they were expecting that. It was mainly the stupidity of trying to get from fireworks to Christianity. For what it’s worth, it went something like this. [I don’t think it’s all bad!

Who can tell me what this is? [picture of Guy Fawkes]

Who can tell me why we have fireworks?

Four hundred years ago this man tried to put a bomb under the Houses of Parliament because he and his friends wanted to kill all the people who ruled the country. That was a very nasty thing to do. But why did he do it? Because he, his friends and the church he belonged to didn’t like what the Bible taught. The people who ruled the country said that the Bible taught that we had to believe God to get to heaven. The people who wanted to rule the country said that the Bible taught that we had to be good to get to heaven. Which one is right? The first one. Why? Because Jesus died for us

I love fireworks and we had a few last night. We have fireworks in this country to remember what happened in what’s known as the Gunpowder Plot. I think that as followers of Jesus, fireworks remind us of three more things

1. Fireworks remind us that God looked after our country

The gunpowder under the House of Lords didn’t go off because Guy Fawkes and his friends were found beforehand. God made sure that the Gunpowder Plot didn’t work. He looked after our country and made sure that our rulers weren’t killed. He did that so that the Bible could be taught throughout the land.

2. Fireworks remind us that the Bible is full of power

Fireworks contain lots of power so that when we light them they rise up into the sky and explode with amazing colours and noise. The Bible is also powerful because when people read it, believe it and do what it says it changes them into better people.

3. Fireworks remind us Christians should be noticed

Fireworks are lovely, they’re bright and they’re noisy. Jesus’ followers should be just like fireworks [I know, what was I thinking. It was hear that audible titters could be heard from the adults!]. We must be noisy so that people hear the truth about God, Jesus and the Bible. We must be bright so that people see that we’re different. We must be lovely so that people realise how good it is to be a Christian.

I think we did that back in 2005. It’s awesome isn’t it?! I think 2009 would be a good time to set the record straight! I might just brush it up but in all likelihood I’ll just run with an abridgement of Meynell’s!

There can’t be many novels that make you want to hit one of the main characters. But this one did. It wasn’t caused by mild irritation; it arose from deep-seated personal animosity for a vile contemptible abusive man. It’s perhaps the one occasion where you feel that a bit of domestic violence might actually be justified, which is perverse because it’s the occurrence of that despicable lack of self control that provoked such a strong reaction. But we’ll come to that.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is Khaled Hosseini’s follow up novel to The Kite Runner. It’s a really good read, though because of the subject matter I can’t quite bring myself to say that I enjoyed it. But I’m glad I took it on holiday even though it was a hardback, it weighed too much and took up too much room. This is a book to ‘enjoy’ in paperback.

As with The Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns is set in Kabul, Afghanistan though the geographical and historical context is much more integral to the second novel than it was to the first. Whereas The Kite Runner told the story of two young men, A Thousand Splendid Suns tells the story of two young women. They come from very different backgrounds. One is the abandoned illegitimate uneducated daughter of a spineless man from rural Herat whose mother commits suicide when she is young. The other is the daughter of an educated teacher who grows up in a stable liberated middle class urban home. They are thrust together by their common marriage to Rasheed, an unpleasant shoemaker from Kabul. Initially hostile to one another the novel charts the development of their affection and loyalty to one another, their courage in the face of an abusive husband and their devoted loyalty to their family.

As you’d expect, it’s a favourite with Richard and Judy. WH Smith has been promoting the paperback relentlessly. And the book clubs of middle England will be awash with opinions of the relative merits of this novel. What follows are my thoughts.

1. It’s a depressing story

What do you expect when religious extremism, domestic violence and military occupation are three presenting issues? The novel makes no attempt to hide the abuses inflicted upon women during the turbulent time between the withdrawal of the Soviet forces and the recent attempts at liberation by the NATO Alliance. The majority of the novel is set during the chaotic period of the 1990s when the Mujahadeen turned from fighting the Soviet insurgency and turned to fighting one another. This novel gives a view of Afghanistan from a woman’s perspective. It takes the iconic image of the burqa clad Afghan women and lets us view life from inside the veil.

In an interview posted on his own website, Hosseini gives his analysis of the conditions endured by women during those years of tribal war and the subsequent oppression caused by the religious extremism of the Taliban. He says,

‘It is undeniable that the treatment of women in some Muslim countries – including my own - has been dismal. The evidence is simply overwhelming. In Afghanistan under the Taliban, women were denied an education, the right to work, the right to move freely, access to adequate healthcare etc’.

Later he says, 

‘With the outbreak of civil war, women in Afghanistan were subjected to gender based human rights abuses, such as rape and forced marriage. They were used as spoils of war. They were abducted and sold into prostitution. When the Taliban came, they imposed inhumane restrictions on women, limiting their freedom of movement, expression, barring them from work and education, harassing them, humiliating them, beating them’.

In the same interview he reveals his motivation for writing the novel when he says,

‘As an Afghan, I would like readers to walk away with a sense of empathy for Afghans, and more specifically for Afghan women, on whom the effects of war and extremism have been devastating. I hope this novel brings depth, nuance, and emotional subtext to the familiar image of the burqa clad woman walking down a dusty street’.

But it wasn’t just empathy I felt; it was outrage. The plight of the women in this novel is outrageous. It left me seething. It’s an utterly depressing situation and for much of the novel I craved some sort of redemption, yet feared it would never be forthcoming. Presumably that is but the merest inkling of the unimaginable misery experienced by women suffering under similar regimes.

2. It’s a moving story

Because it’s so depressing it’s also especially moving. Laila and Mariam are helpless victims caught up in a situation beyond their control. And yet, in the midst of this dismal account of war torn Kabul there is nevertheless the depiction of love, friendship, loyalty and courage. And that’s what Hosseini was after. He says,

‘What intrigued me about this new book were the hopes and dreams and disillusions of these two women, their inner lives, the specific circumstances that bring them together, their resolve to survive, and the fact that their relationship evolves into something meaningful and powerful, even as the world around them unravels and slips into chaos‘.

And so, it put my own struggles and frustrations in some sort of perspective. I have yet to endure anything that comes remotely close to anything equivalent to the plight of many Afghan women. But it also made me think about my own family relationships. It made me wonder what it’d feel like to lose my two sons in a war. It made me wonder whether I’ve taken for granted the equal rights that men and women share. It made me wonder whether I’m guilty of mistreating my wife. It made me check I was valuing my girls.

3. It’s a redemptive story

Wonderfully the book moves towards a redemptive ending. Though the story of how Afghanistan will end is still an open book, Hosseini’s novel concludes with shafts of light hinting at the end of a tunnel. But the focus is not so much on national transformation but on personal transformation. It’s the redemption of Laila and her family that captivates the reader. For all our concern about the plight of this war torn country, it’s the plight of her inhabitants that arouses our sympathy. I won’t spoil the experience of reading by giving away the resolution.

Conclusion

If you’re wondering whether to read this book read Hosseini’s own ambitions for his novel,

‘I hope that readers discover in this novel the same things that I look for when I read fiction: a story that transports, characters who engage, and a sense of illumination, of having been transformed somehow by the experiences of the characters. I hope that readers respond to the emotions of this story, that despite vast cultural differences, they identify with Mariam and Laila and their dreams and ordinary hopes and day-to-day struggle to survive’.

To my mind, it did all that and more. Not bad for a paperback.

For a brief video interview with the author, Khaled Hosseini, see here and for the interview on his website go here.

What’s a wise use of money in these cash strapped times? Jesus’ advice in Luke 16 goes against the grain!

We mustn’t imagine that Jesus is telling people who are not yet his followers that they should use their money to buy their salvation. It doesn’t work like that. If it did then Jesus didn’t need to die painfully as our substitute on the cross! No, Jesus is telling those who are already his followers that they must demonstrate that they belong to him in the way they use money. He’s telling Christians how to use the financial resources they have been entrusted with, not instructing unbelievers how to enter the Kingdom of God.And he has two surprising things to say.

First, Jesus commended the shrewdness of the dishonest manager

Jesus’ fictitious tale unfolds in three stages.

The first event is that the dishonest manager was sacked. Jesus’ story concerns a rich man and a manager in charge of administering his affairs. His work seems to be that of debt collection. The rumour begins that he’s squandered his master’s resources and this soon turns into a full-blown accusation. The rich man believes what he hears, summons his manager, shows him the door and hands him his P45 on the way out.

The second event is that the dishonest manager was shrewd. Faced with unexpected redundancy the manager set about securing his long-term future. He didn’t fancy manual labour because he thought physical activity was beyond him and begging was beneath him. So he developed a plan in which his intention was to ingratiate himself to his master’s debtors. In time they’d then come to his aid. He cut the first bill by 50% and the second by 20%. It’s underhand but it’s clever in an unethical worldly sort of a way! We may be uncomfortable with Jesus using this man as a role model. But Jesus really does tell a story in which a crook is his hero. But the debtors couldn’t have cared less! They were quids in and minded to show this man some hospitality. What we see exemplified in his shrewdness is short-term financial activity to secure long term favour.

The third event was that the dishonest manager was praised. I take it that Jesus really wants to get under our skin. He does that by shocking us with the unexpected response from the employer. Reluctantly he admitted that though he’d been stitched up there was a certain shrewdness about the manager’s course of action. Jesus is not sanctioning repeat performances of this morally dubious activity he just thinks that there was a certain guile and cunning to what he did.

As soon as someone starts to talk about wealth, money, finance and giving we assume that this is something that everyone else needs to hear! Perhaps especially the wealthy! But Jesus meant to alert every single one of us, whatever our income to an important spiritual principle. Jesus wants us to think what we’re like with our cash. His take is that Christians are a little naïve in comparison to their unbelieving neighbours in the area of financial acumen. He thinks that the secular world has a thing or two to teach the spiritual world about short-term financial decision making for the sake of long term gain. So regardless of how much we earn we need to ask whether we’re careless, thoughtless and reckless or whether we’re we shrewd in teh use of our wealth? Are we prepared to make short term financial decisions for the sake of long term gain? I assume that many of us aren’t as shrewd as we should be. And that’s the admission that Jesus is after because he wants to instruct us about the wise way to use money.

Secondly, Jesus encouraged the shrewd use of worldly wealth

Luke records the implications of the parable. Jesus expands on what he means by shrewdness in three directions.

First, we need to be generous with wealth. Jesus said, ‘I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings’. He commands us to use our wealth in such a way that it’ll be of use to us in the far future. He envisages a situation where, after our death, we will one day be welcomed into our eternal dwellings. The welcoming committee in the New Creation will be the friends we’ve made through our generous use of money. Those friends will be Christian people who’ve benefited from our sacrificial generosity either in alleviating their poverty or from our contribution to gospel ministry. Jesus is not for a moment suggesting that we can buy our way into heaven. It’s not like restaurants where wealth ingratiates us and we can secure ourselves a seat at a fine table! But he is saying that there will be people in heaven grateful for the way in which we’ve used our cash. It’s thrilling to think that our regular financial contributions to our local church will be used to fund ministry and therefore serve God and others. Some of the money God has entrusted us with is wasted because we spend it on things of temporary and passing value. We mustn’t be ascetic because, as Paul warns in 1 Timothy 4, to deny the goodness of material things is the devil’s doctrine and teaching like that comes straight out of the theological colleges of hell. But though some of our spending is reckless nothing we ever contribute to the gospel is wasted. We need to ask one another what would we rather have? A house full of IKEA furniture and electronic gadgetry or a handful of people grateful for our generosity for all eternity. It’s a no-brainer, isn’t it?

Secondly, we need to be trustworthy with wealth. Jesus said, ‘Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?’ Jesus raises the stakes. He says that our use of worldly wealth is linked with our spiritual blessings. If we show that we can’t be trusted with a little bit of cash then the Lord’s not going to put us in charge of significant things. How we use the wealth he gives us is a test of character. It indicates what we’ll be like with things of ultimate value. Presumably this means that our usefulness to the Lord in the future kingdom will be limited by the faithfulness of our stewardship here and now.

Thirdly, we need to be wary of wealth. Jesus said, ‘No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money’. Jesus gives us a fundamental choice. There’s not a servant in the world that can serve two masters. It can’t be done. We can’t wholeheartedly give ourselves to two competing things. A moment will come when one master asks us to do one thing and the other master asks us to do something else. That moment will show up the impossibility of trying to give our allegiance in two directions. We’ll have to choose who we serve. So where does our allegiance lie? Jesus asks us to use our wealth in such a way that we demonstrate our love for Him and our love for others. Money, aided and abetted by our selfish desires, asks us to use our wealth in such a way to satisfy our own appetites. Much as we’d like to, we cannot have foot in the world and a foot in the Kingdom of God. We have to decide whose side we’re on. Since we’re Christians we serve the Lord not money. And so our use of money must be subject to his direction as he incorporates our money into his plans.

Conclusion

Jesus raises the issue of the shrewd use of finances. What constitutes shrewdness in Jesus’ interpretation is using worldly finances in this world with eternal benefits in mind. One obvious and immediate implication of this would be to use the money with which God has entrusted us to support gospel ministry in our local church. There are many things that churches could with a little more money. We may find that harder in the current economic climate. But Jesus’ words are therefore timely. Perhaps never more so than in times when cash is in short supply we need to heed Jesus’ words to invest in the far future. I’m not intending to ‘shake the tin’. I just want to remind people that it’s there and needs filling! We need to soften our hearts to the requests of our churches, our mission agencies and the other Christian organisations needing our money. And we need to respond in repentance and faith to Jesus’ wise advice.

What would Jesus say about the current economic meltdown?

It’s an important question for any Christian. But it’s hard to answer with any great degree of certainty. But one thing’s for certain, he’d warn us about greed. At least that’s what he did when he was confronted by a man in Luke 12.

Jesus’ warning seems to come out of left field. But it was triggered by an incident involving an angry man who had issues! Luke tells us, ‘Someone in the crowd said to him, ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me'’. The man thought he was the victim of injustice. And it got under his skin. He was convinced that his brother had robbed him of his rightful inheritance. Mercifully Luke spares us the finer details of what would undoubtly become a bitter legal battle. But what started out as an appeal for justice ended up in a discussion about covetousness. Because Jesus responded, ‘But he said to him, “Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?” 15 And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”’ Jesus knew better than to get embroiled in a family argument. Anyway it doesn’t appear that the man is looking for wise counsel, just a lawyer! He’d already decided what was right and just wanted someone to argue his case. Who better than Jesus! But with extraordinary perception Jesus nailed the man’s real motivation. It wasn’t justice but greed. Behind his protestations about injustice lurked rampant covetousness.

But Jesus also knew this wasn’t an isolated incident. And so he took the opportunity to warn the man, the crowd who listened in at the time and those of us prepared to listen to him centuries later. He warned us of our need for constant vigilance in the face of an ongoing threat from our constant craving for more. For many of us the good life is the life with things, house, car, experiences and holidays. But according to Jesus, life’s not about having lots of possessions. And deep down we know that’s the case. But we just struggle to believe it. I know I’m not alone in flicking through the catalogues that come through the letterbox, browsing the internet or window shopping in the high street wondering what to add to my collection of furniture, electrical goods or clothes. And because we’re so slow to understand that life’s not about acquiring things, Jesus told a story. It’s a story about a farmer, his crops and a premature end. It’s got quite a punch. In the story the farmer makes three mistakes.

His first mistake was to invest selfishly with his unexpected wealth

Luke tell us, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. The farmer was already very wealthy. And God gave him more. But this man’s problem wasn’t his great wealth. After all there’s nothing inherently sinful in wealth. The Bible insists that wealth is a blessing entrusted to people by God. The farmer may well have known that he was dependent upon God. After all even with the advent of GM crops most farmers know that they’re reliant on the weather for productivity. His problem wasn’t his business practice. There’s no indication of him acquiring his wealth through unscrupulous methods. He prudently embarked on a rebuilding project; knocking down his old barns to create extra capacity in order to store the vast amounts that God brought his way. My rudimentary grasp of economic principles suggests that this is sound business practice. The problem wasn’t the decisions he made but philosophy that underpinned them. The man’s problem was his selfishness. Jesus deliberately emphasised the man’s sinful independence through the needless and excessive use of the first person singular personal pronoun! Jesus said, ‘And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. This man was thinking about no one else but himself. He invested selfishly with his fortune. He demonstrated an unrelenting, self-centred determination to accumulate surplus goods with no thought to anyone else but himself.

But is he that different to us? What would we do with unexpected wealth? What would we do if we were to receive an unexpected bonus at the end of the financial year, a cheque back from the inland revenue or an inheritance from a distant relative? Impulsively we’d be mentally spending the windfall before the ink on the cheque had dried, wouldn’t we? I wonder whether we’re really selfless with the resources God has entrusted to our care? We need to be very careful.

His second mistake was to comfort himself with thoughts of retirement

The rich man did a quick mental calculation to quantify his assets, ‘And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry’. He was confident that early retirement was a real option. He planned to ditch the daily grind of working. He thought he could live comfortably on what he’d amassed. He’d live off the proceeds of his investments. Nice! That’s not necessarily sinful. But his mistake was to think that the future lay in his hands. Fuelled by his great wealth he became convinced that he was the major player in the events of his life. His wealth had blinded him to the fact that he inhabited a world where his decisions aren’t the only thing influencing the outcome of his life. But he was an idiot. He’d forgotten God. Money can do that. Not always; but often.

But is he that different to us? His ambitions are our ambitions, aren’t they? Few of us would turn down the opportunity to stop work, put our feet up and enjoy a state of financial security. There’s nothing wrong with looking forward to retirement. His mistake was to do so thinking that he could plan his own life without reference to God. If the credit crisis has done one thing perhaps it’s to unmask the unreliability of trusting money for the future.

His third mistake was to neglect to consider the judgement of God

The rich man amassed a fortune and enjoyed wealth beyond his wildest dreams. He went to bed dreaming of houses and holidays but he woke up before the judgement seat of God. One night God demanded his soul and suddenly his immense wealth counted for nothing. Jesus tells us, ‘But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ From the perspective of death his accumulation of material goods must have seemed utterly pointless. He wasn’t able to take it with him and whatever was left in his bank balance was simply redistributed by the taxman and the lawyers. However, the situation was even worse than perhaps he’d first realised. It’s not only that he’d left his riches behind. He found himself in abject poverty before the judgement seat of God. If he were living today we’d call him a captain of industry, attend his seminars and read his autobiography. God calls him a fool. In all his thinking about the future, in all his planning for what lay ahead he hadn’t reckoned on finding himself before the one who really is at the centre of the universe. He found himself in a situation where his wealth was of no assistance whatsoever. He may have deceived himself that he was self-sufficient but at that moment his stupidity was unmistakable. Standing before God on the night his soul was demanded of him, he realised his wealth was powerless. But how did it happen? Greed dragged him away from contemplating life, death, heaven and hell. The possessions and comfort he craved led him to neglect the pursuit of God. He spent his life ignoring God and was seduced into thinking only about this world. But one night totally out of the blue God demanded his soul. He rejected the opportunity of relationship with God in this life and he would not enjoy a relationship with him in the world to come. This was a tragic end for the rich farmer and will be for any human being. All the more so because it’s avoidable.

But is he that different to us? Few of us are prepared to think about what lies beyond the grave. Many of us hold sincerely to the belief that life ends at the grave. That’s why we live only for possessions and this world. It’s a nice idea but it’s wrong. Jesus said so.

Conclusion

Although Jesus told a distressing story about a farmer, Jesus meant us to understand that the farmer is representative. He represents  every human being seduced into thinking that this life is all that there is and the good life consists in the abundance of our possessions. And so he spelt out the implications when he said, ‘So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God’. If we live like the man, we’ll end up like the man. If we lay up treasures for ourselves in this world and don’t lay up treasure with God for the next, our destiny will be the same. But there is an alternative.

Jesus commands us to be rich towards God. But what does that mean? He’s not suggesting that God can to be turned by money nor indeed by anything else that we could present before him. If we could live a life worthy of acceptance before God he would not have needed to come to earth in Jesus Christ and die upon the cross. To be rich toward God is to live a life of value from God’s perspective. We’re not to live a life of independent self sufficiency. This is worthless in God’s eyes. We’re to live a life in friendship with God in humble dependency, looking forward not to early retirement but eternal relationship, a life not seeking security in this world but security in the world to come. It’s to live life as a follower of Jesus Christ. That’s a life of value as God sees it. If we understand this it’ll transform our attitude to work and wealth. We won’t let it dominate our lives because we’ll realise we don’t need as much as we think we do. We’ll work hard enough to provide for the necessities, but we’ll leave the future in God’s hands. We’ll stop short of making work a means of securing our lives against all possible calamities.

But we need to hear the warning. Living and working in London is really dangerous. At least that’s Jesus’ take on things. Not primarily because of urban crime, pollution or stress. But because of greed. This is a dangerous place to live because so few people are troubled by covetousness. It’s perhaps those starting out in their working lives that face this danger most acutely. So much of their time and energy is expended in paying off years of accumulated student debt and scrambling onto the bottom rung of the property ladder. But the preoccupation with things and the desire for more is not an attitude that’s limited to those in their twenties. None of us is immune to the danger of acquisitiveness. Jesus told the parable of the because he thinks we’re in great danger. We must be wary of greed seducing us from our commitment to Christ.

So what will we pursue in life? Will we chase after possessions, a better lifestyle and wealth? Will we be convinced that greed is right or will we chase after a life with value as God sees it? Because one day our souls will be demanded of us and if we’ve spent our lives pursuing things and not God we’ll look very foolish. But by then it will be too late.

Let’s not repeat the mistakes of the rich man and face the same tragic end. Instead let’s listen to Jesus Christ’s words of warning that a preoccupation with possessions could one day be eternally catastrophic.