Giving Your All

The scriptures referred to are 2 Corinthians 8:7-15.

I first read the Harry Potter books because I heard them compared to C.S. Lewis' Narnia Chronicles. And, sure enough, I found that the ethics in them were Christian. One obvious sign of this is the fact that Harry was saved from death by his mother's self-sacrificial love. But I also saw examples of faith and hope, the other 2 theological virtues, though no mention was made of God. That and the fact that the books were about witches and spells got the fundamentalists in an uproar. They went after the books and their author for luring kids into the occult. After all, doesn't the Bible condemn witchcraft?

Yes but witchcraft in the Bible involves using spells to bind demons and even pagan gods to do one's will. It's idolatry. The 3^rd commandment, about misusing God's name, is at least in part a prohibition of using God's name in spells or hexes. Magic is an attempt to make the universe obey our will through the use of supernaturally powerful words and rituals and objects. As Christians we know that doesn't work. Instead we ask God for things through prayer, always with the subtext of “not my will but yours be done.” God is our heavenly Father. It is up to him in his love and wisdom to decide if our requests should be granted.

But the powers the students at Hogwarts display are not done by consorting with demons or gods. They are like the powers Samantha Stevens had in the old Bewitched TV series. The witch or warlock has not sold its soul to the devil but just has these powers, in virtually the same way the X-men or most superheroes have them. (BTW, Nightcrawler, the blue teleporting member of the X-Men, is a Catholic priest in the comics!)

Fundamentalists were notably quiet when the last book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, came out. Because J.K. Rowling tipped her hand. First she quoted two verses from scripture: Matthew 6:21 and 1 Corinthians 15:26. And secondly she revealed Harry to be a literary Christ figure who willingly goes to his death to save others. In that, he is like Aslan, who more obviously fulfills that role in the Narnia Chronicles.

It turns out Rowling is a Christian who attends the Church of Scotland. She became the first ever billionaire author, according to Forbes, but is on their list of billionaires no longer because of the hundreds of millions of dollars she has given to charities. She has also founded charities to deal with poverty and social inequality, to aid children and one parent families (she used to be a single parent) and to fight multiple sclerosis, which killed her mother. She said, “You have a moral responsibility when you've been given far more than you need, to do wise things with it and give intelligently.”

The reason I thought of that quote of hers was because of today's passage from Paul: “As it is written, 'The one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little.'” Paul is quoting Exodus 16:18 about the manna God provided the Israelites following Moses through the desert. The point was God provided enough that no one had too much or too little. Paul is applying that principle to a collection the Gentile churches were taking up for poor Christians in Jerusalem. The churches in Philippi, Thessalonica and Berea were not rich but their giving was impressive. Paul is merely asking the church in Corinth to be as generous as the poorer churches.

Corinth was a busy port and one of the wealthiest and most important cities not only in mainland Greece but in the Roman Empire. The fundraising had already begun and Paul was just asking them to finish up when his colleague Titus returned to pick up the collection. I think Paul was discovering something most modern clergy know: poor churches are more generous than rich ones. Wealthy churches give larger amounts but their contributions are often not as proportionally large as those of smaller churches. A study found that those who, in terms of income, are in the top 20% give 1.3% of that income to charities whereas those in the bottom 20% give 3.2%, more than twice as much. Just as Jesus noted when watching people donating to the temple, the rich give from their surplus; the poor give sacrificially. (Luke 21:1-4) Why is that?

It may just come down to whom you know. Studies show that those who live in more affluent zip codes are less generous. In other words, they don't know many, or any, people who are poor. Which makes the problem of poverty kind of abstract. And if you don't know people who are struggling with the basics of life, you can speculate on the reasons for that free of any kind of data. For instance, lots of folks who aren't poor think those who are must be lazy. Yet government data shows that 77% of households receiving healthcare through Medicaid have at least one person who is employed, full or part-time. More than half of those receiving food assistance through SNAP are working and 80% worked in the year prior to or following receiving assistance, meaning they needed help during a really rough period lasting a year or less. The majority of the poor in this country are not able-bodied adults but children, the elderly and the disabled. They make up 55% of those living in poverty.

And guess what? Those are precisely the people the Bible says we should help. I personally added up over 900 references to, in order of frequency, the alien (219), the poor (206), the sick (113), the oppressed (96), the blind (96), the widow (85), the fatherless (43), the lame (27), the leper (23), and the deaf (15). It would probably be closer to 1000 if I took the time to sort out how many times the Hebrew and Greek words for “old” referred to old things or elderly people or elders in the sense of church elders. The main thrust of this is that we are supposed to care for those who are vulnerable or suffering. That is not an optional or trivial part of being a Christian. It is commanded of us. It is our duty. It is also an opportunity to show God's love.

In the era before church-shopping, back when people simply attended their neighborhood church, that was the one place the rich and the poor encountered each other. People's proximity to the poor would hopefully engender more understanding of and empathy for those who aren't doing so well. Not that this always worked. In his letter James says, “My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don't show favoritism. Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, 'Here's a good seat for you,' but say to the poor man, 'You stand there,' or 'Sit on the floor at my feet,' have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?” (James 2:1-4) James goes on to point out that such discrimination goes against the “royal law,” as he calls it, to love one another as yourself. And he says that a lawbreaker is a lawbreaker, whether it's murder or adultery, or, he implies, not loving your neighbor. He concludes “...judgment without mercy will be shown anyone who has not been merciful.” (James 2:13; cf Matthew 25:31-46)

Sadly, this is one of those passages of the Bible that is honored more in the breach than in the observance. I remember touring a colonial church and noticing pews that were boxed off and had doors. Wealthy church members would pay for these pews so they could literally close themselves off from less affluent churchgoers. Blacks and slaves would be consigned to the balcony. And ever since Americans started self-sorting themselves by moving to the suburbs or gated communities, there have emerged churches which are composed mainly of people of one socio-economic class, either because they were planted in affluent communities or they were left behind in urban areas that have changed due to the flight of wealthy people. Small town churches are less likely to be as segregated, though some worshipers self-sort by race and education.

Paul told Timothy, “Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share.” (1 Timothy 6:17-18) Unlike James, he does not excoriate the rich but he does, earlier in the same chapter, say, “People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” (1 Timothy 6:9-10)

It is not money or wealth that are evil, though they do open people to some unique temptations. Money is power and power can corrupt. It's what you do with money or wealth that is important. If you are focused on just making more of it because you love having it, that's bad. If you want more of it so you can have an ever-growing fleet of vintage cars or a bigger yacht or so many homes that you rarely visit some of them, as I saw in a documentary on the super-rich, that makes no sense. It would be like someone who makes the world's best crafted medical equipment filling rooms of his home with scalpels or prosthetic legs, refusing to let anyone else use them. It is a waste of your ability. If however you focus on using money to help others, that's good. One of the best analogies I've heard is that money is like manure. Keep it in a big pile and it stinks. Spread it around and you can make things grow.

Paul actually uses a similar analogy in the next chapter of 2 Corinthians. “Remember this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” (2 Corinthians 9:6-7) Some mainstream preachers are hesitant to get into these verses because "Prosperity Gospel" preachers use them to tell people that if they give to their ministries generously, God will make the givers rich. But that is not what it says. Paul continues, “And God is able to make all grace overflow to you so that because you have enough of everything in every way at all times, you will overflow in every good work.” (2 Corinthians 9:8) The Greek word translated “enough” means “sufficient for the necessities of life.” What is promised is not an abundance of wealth but enough of everything you need to do good works. God is like a general sending you out on a mission, and giving you everything you need to carry out that mission. This is what Jesus is promising when he says, “Ask it shall be given to you...” (Matthew 7:7) The example Jesus gives is that of a parent giving a child proper food. He is not promising you a 4^th private plane, costing $64 million, as one "Prosperity Gospel" preacher recently said he needed.

Another thing the "Prosperity Gospel" preachers do is encourage their viewers to give more than they can afford. Paul doesn't do that. He writes of the poor churches in Macedonia, “...they gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability. They did so voluntarily...” (2 Corinthians 8:3) Paul says they went above expectations. (v. 5) He is using the example of the poor Macedonian churches to encourage the members of the rich Corinthian church, not to bankrupt themselves, but to give as generously as they can. He writes, “For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has—not according to what one does not have. I do not mean that there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a matter of equality. At the present time, your surplus will meet their need so that one day their surplus may also meet your need, so that there may be a fair balance.” I consulted the original Greek and several translations to cobble together that reading. The point is that while giving beyond your means is commendable, it is not required. One should, however, be generous with what we would call one's disposable income. And the idea is that it is a two way street. If you give what you can to help others in need they should do likewise when situations are reversed.

That's basically what J.K. Rowling did. She wrote the first Harry Potter novel while a single mother on welfare in Britain, fleeing domestic violence. Now that she is wealthy, she stays in Britain, pays her taxes without complaint and gives to others who are in need. To her this is simply fair. She wrote, “I am indebted to the British welfare state; the very one that Mr. Cameron would like to replace with charity handouts. When my life hit rock bottom, that safety net, threadbare though it had become under John Major's Government, was there to break the fall. I cannot help feeling, therefore, that it would have been contemptible to scarper off for the West Indies at the first sniff of a seven-figure royalty cheque. This, if you like, is my notion of patriotism.”

Speaking of which, we are dual citizens: citizens of our country on earth and citizens of the kingdom of God. As Jesus said, “Give then to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's.” (Matthew 22:21) And when Jesus said this, there was no welfare state on earth. There was no official entity that prevented people from starving. There wasn't even a police force as we understand it. There wasn't, as Professor Robert Garland points out, any idea of social conscience in the classical world. I do think the roots were there, in the Old and New Testaments, but this was a society so poor that unwanted babies were simply left by the roadside to be taken by either slavers or scavengers. It is because of the influence of the Christian idea of a God of love that most developed countries in the West take care of the poor and sick. Before the invention of the welfare state, the burden fell entirely on churches. Remove the church and the history of mankind would be entirely dog-eat-dog.

So what are the things that are God's? When confronted about taxes, Jesus asked for a coin. Looking at it, he asked whose image was on it. When someone answered “Caesar” Jesus made his famous pronouncement. By analogy, the things that are God's are the things bearing God's image. In other words, human beings. We are to surrender to God ourselves and those created in his image. And Jesus didn't say to give to God some of what's God's. We are to give to him all, in so far as we can. We cannot neglect to help anyone, even if they are not Christian to our knowledge, or not presently Christian. Everyone we encounter in this life is either a brother or sister in Christ or a potential brother of sister in Christ. Remember the good shepherd who, though having 99 sheep safe, goes after the 1 who is lost. That's how precious every human being is to Jesus.

We have drunk the Kool Aid of this materialistic world. We believe our life is our own, our possessions are our own, our talents are our own, our time is our own. None of that is true. All we are and all we have belong to God. He has given us what we have to accomplish a rescue mission. Just as Jesus was sent to rescue us from the evil and suffering we unleashed upon ourselves, so he sends us to rescue others. Like a human chain, reaching out to those being swept away by a flood, we are to use whatever we can to save them. We are to strip off our belts and our clothes to lengthen our reach, use our ingenuity to grab them, use our coats to keep them warm, use what we learned of first aid to make them better. Jesus held back nothing to save us. How can we do less?