Continuing excepts from a recent thread of e-mails. One of my correspondents opined that Jesus was a socialist. Jesus quote about the rich man and the eye of the needle was brought up. My reply:
One of the things that really struck me when I was reading through the Old Testament for the first time was the earthy nature of God's promises to the faithful. If Israel was faithful, then they would be wealthy and virtually disease free. Pretty cool covenant.
The disciples had been raised on this stuff. To them a rich person wasn't a bad guy, he was a good guy! If he was rich (and he was a Jew) he must be an exceptionally diligent in following the commandments. The associated personal wealth with living an exceptionally good life. It was this context in which Jesus made his comment about the needle.
"It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." If the disciples had been schooled in socialism they would have replied something like this. "Right on! Power to the people! Stick it to the man!"
But that's not what they said. "When the disciples heard this, they were very astonished and said, 'Then who can be saved?'" Note that they were astonished. This was contrary to everything they had been taught as children. What they were saying was, "if a rich guy, who has been blessed with wealth because of his exceptional devotion to keeping God's commandments can't be saved, then what chance to us poor people have." The implication was that if the holy rich man couldn't make it, nobody could. Jesus agreed with this point of view.
"And looking at them Jesus said to them, 'With people this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'" In other words, it is impossible for any human, rich or poor to live a good enough life to be saved. What was impossible for man would only be possible for God, who had become a man and was about to die to pay the penalty for our sins.
This is not a socialist teaching, but it has been co-opted by leftists who want to portray Jesus as being on the side of the revolution. The point of the story is not that people need to give up their wealth, it was that people couldn't be saved by their own good works.
This would be my very brief, not well planned out in advance, summary of Jesus attitude toward money.
Don't worship it. Don't over emphasize it. Don't expect too much from it. You can't serve God and mammon.
Don't worry about it. Make the spiritual life your first priority and God will see to it that your basic needs are met.
Be generous with those in need.
And let it call come from the heart. That was hugely important to Jesus.
He was in the temple with the disciples when a rich man came in and made a very ostentatious show of giving a large sum on money. He was followed by a poor woman who dropped in the equivalent of a quarter. His take on this was that the poor woman had given the larger gift. Her motivation was pure. The rich man had been showing off.
I don't think Jesus would be impressed with a system that made giving a matter of law instead of a matter of the heart. The heart was of primary importance to him.
One other point.
The Obama's earned a million in 2006. That's pretty good money. In 2007 it jumped to 4.2 million with book royalties. In 2008 it dropped to 2.4 million. A great American success story. They were able to buy a house worth 1.6 million.
I'm reminded of a pastor I once heard preach. He was doing the "it's sinful for Americans to have all this money" routine. I would say to him the same thing I would say to the Obama's. Nothing is stopping you from giving it away. Figure out what the average income is in American and live on that. Give the rest away.
Practice what you preach. Don't buy a 1.6 million dollar house.
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