Right now I'm struggling a bit with what to spend on Christmas gifts this year. It is often interesting to hear how much people are spending, what they are buying, what they are not buying and ultimately their level of satisfaction with what they bought or received during the Christmas season. We can attribute many of these things to how we grew up and our parent's attitudes about money as well as on our own ideas about the purpose of money and material possessions. But, after all the discussion, it really comes down to our theology (as everything does!) to evaluate our motives and what we should celebrate or even condone.
What do I mean? I'm so glad that you asked!
There are three theological (or philosophical) positions regarding material possessions.These perspectives are not defined by how much we own or do not own, but rather by how we think about what we own (or what others own). I've outlined these in the table below but there are many other facets to these perspectives. It's also interesting that one person may have a perspective of poverty regarding work but another perspective when it comes to giving or buying. So we can see that people are not necessarily consistent in their application of these perspectives in every area or over the course of their lifetimes.
My intention should always be to adjust my thinking and practice toward having a stewardship perspective in every area of my life.
The basic premise here is that neither a poverty nor a prosperity perspective is really biblical and my intention should always be to adjust my thinking and practice toward having a stewardship perspective in every area of my life. This falls in line with God's original intention (and command) for humanity from the Garden of Eden, before the Fall. Our responsibility was and is to care for God's creation, knowing that all we have comes from Him and we are 'owners' only in the sense that we are personally responsible for how it is cared for under God's authority and direction. We will have to give Him an account for how we cared for creation, understanding that it was only placed in our care as a part of His gift to us. One aspect of our bearing of the Imago Dei is a deep desire to care for others, although this has been corrupted by sin to become a need for control, power over others, a consuming desire for comfort and safety, or a hoarding of resources for our personal benefit.
Here are some of the more basic perspectives:
When we look at Scripture we can see how these theologies played out in nearly every story. We can also look through history and see both the pain and the joy of these perspectives. The difficult part is to look at our own lives and understand that every time we have chosen a prosperity or a poverty perspective, it has damaged our own lives, our relationship with God and our witness to God's grace and goodness in the lives of others.
Every time we have chosen a prosperity or a poverty perspective, it has damaged our witness to God's grace and goodness.
Let me just give you one brief example. We can look at Solomon, the richest man in the history of the world. His original motivation was using his wealth to honor God and to make Israel the center of worship for God in the building of a beautiful temple. It is hard to guess his deeper motives, because they are not clearly defined in Scripture, but there appeared to be a shift in his thinking at some point. The book of Ecclesiastes tells us that as he looked for meaning in wealth, pleasure, power and even folly (or insanity?), he found that nothing satisfied his desires. My understanding is that he tried everything but did not truly understand his role as a steward of God's resources. Wealth did not make him an evil king, neither did it make him a good king. If he was a good king at any point, then it was because he took his responsibility to God and to his people (as a steward) seriously.
Jesus uses a parable that we call "The seed and the sower" (Matt. 13) while there are related ideas in many of His parables. This sets a biblical understanding of the concept of investment. Jesus explains this to His disciples in terms of the spiritual investment with the seed being the Word of God, which actually provides a foundation for the practicality of the principle in the physical realm...
- God has invested in us, giving us knowledge, tools, skills and resources that can be used in many ways.
- Our use of those resources can result in blessing (financially or otherwise) based on many variables.
- Ultimately He is responsible for the growth (blessing), but this does not lower or negate our responsibility to use wisely what He has given, to discern wisely the circumstances which will result in potential growth and to base our investments on the correct motivation.
- Our motivation should always be to serve God (the worship of God) and to bless others (also the worship of God). When this is done correctly, it takes the emphasis completely off of the resources (or personal benefit) as the motivation and places the emphasis correctly on the One who provides everything good in the first place.
