God's Economy: 5 Incomplete Thoughts on Money

Ever convinced of my own greed and naiveté regarding money and its use in the kingdom, I attended J.W. Hartgrove's workshop at CCDA, appropriately entitled "God's Economy: Redefining the Health and Wealth Gospel."

Hartgrove, a leader in the New Monastic movement, author and member of the Rutba House community in Durham, NC, gave us his honest reflections on money and shared several stories that gave us a glimpse of the possibility of imagining another way.

Money is a force to be reconciled with; we all encounter the Siren call of the greenback. Jesus plainly said we can only have one Master. Will it be Christ or Money (among the ranks of similar idols)? As we consider money's mastery over us, Hartgrove's shared these five thoughts, summarized incompletely here.

He argued that Americans like to develop comprehensive strategies and plans for investing money, but perhaps Jesus offered us tactics instead. Tactics slowly infiltrate the system, cracking and eroding its oppressive power.

#1 - Subversive Serving

Matthew 20:26-28 - Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.

Jesus did not squash the disciples desire to be great here. Those who do not have money, often desire money, b/c it is such a visible sign of power in our economy. But in God's Economy, serving is the new power.

#2 - Eternal Investments

Matthew 6:19-21 - Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.

Use money now as a means to store up treasure in heaven, i.e. have an eternal perspective - don't use it for yourself! As someone once said, "The best things in life are meant to be given away."

#3 - Use $$ To Make Friends

Luke 16:1-15 - ...The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

Yup. Jesus said it. Use worldly wealth to gain friends. Seriously. Only Jesus could have said something this outrageous and have the Church take it seriously. But the problem is we don't take it seriously. We hoard our money and use it to bless ourselves.

#4 - "Give to the one who asks"

Matthew 5:42 - Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.

Jesus does not necessarily say "give exactly what they ask"; he says, "give to the one." Should we be the poor man's first accuser before God by refusing him money "in case" he may use it for sinful reasons? This is a hard saying from Jesus. I'll be the first to admit it.

#5 - Gracious Politics

Matthew 22:17-22 - Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not?...Whose portrait is this [on the denarius]? And whose inscription?" "Caesar's," they replied. Then Jesus said to them, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's."

You can't help but chuckle after Jesus leaves his accusers silent here. He flips their question on its head. Caesar has his "image bearers" (i.e money) and God has his (i.e people). Caesar will ask for his taxes and we do well to respond graciously. But, Jesus wants our whole being. And we do well to give him everything.

Question of the day

"What do you truly want?"

Donald Miller Live

It's not every day that you have the opportunity to sit within the spittal range of one of your favorite authors. I just returned from an evening with Donald Miller, where I surprisingly found a front row seat along with two friends.

Don discussed the themes of his newest book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, as well as the vision of The Mentoring Project, a non-profit created to organize the Church to meet the needs of the fatherless generation in America.

Don talked about the four central components of every story: a character, the object of desire, the conflict and resolution (or attainment of desired object). He argues that our brains necessarily organize our thoughts into story form; narrative is a natural part of our existence. And every narrative has conflict.

Don camped here for a while. Conflict. We hate it. Advertising tells us to do everything we can to soothe it or avoid it. But change does not come without conflict. In fact, Donald pointed out, there was even conflict before the Fall of Man. Adam could not find a helpmate suitable for himself. Read: there was no one like his species on the planet. After naming all the animals for years and years, he noticed that he was alone as a human.

Donald also discussed the insanity of our belief that the climax of our story is our personal conversion to Christ. If that were the climax, then why do we still have bad days? Better yet, the climax is the Wedding Supper of the Lamb, when Christ will renew all things and we will live the eternal Celebration in God's presence.

Conflict is normal. The climax is coming. That's what makes us unique as the Body of Christ. We hope.

Thanks, Don.

Talking about Singleness

One of the main sessions offered a look at the gift of singleness. Wayne "Coach" Gordon led a panel discussion with Elizabeth Perkins, Shane Claiborne and others.

I thought that Shane had some profound things to say...always in the sincere and humble tone that he speaks with.

We need to cease from making single men and women in the church feel as if there is something wrong with them if they do not have a mate. Each person in Christ is valuable and whole in Christ alone.

"We need to celebrate marriage and singleness in the church."

"We don't need sex; we need love."

"No one would look at Mother Teresa and say, 'Too bad she didn't find her man.'"

"We need a single mindedness and a singular focus on Jesus first."

"We need healthy models of families and singles in urban ministry, and if we don't have both, then we do a great injustice in urban ministry, where many men and women never get married today."

Lastly, Shane, who confessed that he actually dating someone currently and evaluates God's call to singleness in stages of life, said "I don't think I have the "divine gift" of celibacy, I have some serious libido."

Synergy

On day two, we were visited by Gabriel Salguero of New York and Jim Wallis, founder of Sojourners.

Salguero was a very engaging communicator and his wife was on stage to do simultaneous translation in Spanish. They made a hilarious duo. He told the story of his adolescent bully who would steal his lunch money and exhorted us to work together to take on the "grande, fuerte, feo" bullies of our day.

Wallis also encouraged us to synergize our efforts as the Body of Christ as we battle the injustice in our land. If our faith doesn't spill over and bring about change in society, then it's not revival, he said.

Perhaps the most challenging things that Wallis shared were the prayers of his two young boys, ages 6 and 11.

"Dear God. I want to pray for all of the hungry and homeless and sick people. Um....God...do you know there's a lot? Any comments or questions?"

"Dear Jesus. I want to pray for the 25,000 kids today who will die today from hunger and other stuff....Could you make that stop?....no that's dumb...Could you send people to help them all?...no that's dumb...God, Could you make this the best day they've ever had."

John Perkins

Each morning at the CCDA conference, we had the incredible opportunity to sit in on a study of 1 John with John Perkins. If you aren't familiar with this man, you need to be.

Perkins was a contemporary of MLK Jr. and fellow civil rights leader. He has lived in Mississippi for the better part of his 80 years on this earth, and suffered greatly at the hands of his Southern oppressors in the civil rights era. Along with his wife, Vera Mae, and their eight children, they stood firm on the foundation of Jesus Christ and persevered through difficult times, refusing to let hatred toward their white oppressors overtake them.

Perkins is the father of the CCDA and has been a champion for the marginalized and poor in our nation. His own mother needlessly died of malnutrition/starvation after his birth while they lived on a plantation. John said he couldn't imagine responding in another manner to his mother's death than to give himself to loving and serving the poor in the name of Jesus.

In addition to his firm faith in Christ and his courageous leadership with Christian community development in our nation and abroad, he is an engaging communicator who uses humor, honesty and southern charm freely and appropriately. He certainly didn't hold anything back on us!

I recorded countless soundbytes, humorous statements and prophetic words from this man during the week. I look forward to sharing them with you here; however, black and white print cannot capture the joy of sitting in on his preaching.

"We want community action that comes straight from Jesus and his Word."

"We've got to eat the Word and stop livin this hearsay, folklore Christianity. Stop livin' by reality (TV)."

"We can live a courageous life because death has been taken care of."

"[Christians today] don't have build into us what it takes to get hit 'n keep on goin'!"

After a fight one morning, his wife prepared a fabulous meal for him. "What Mama tryin' to do is get right without confession. Confession is just sayin what the other person already knows. So just come out and say it."

"When you walk in the world, your feet gettin' dirty. We need Jesus to wash us."

"We are all racist. We've each turned our racist way."

"Paul was the original Bin Laden and Jesus saved him."

Subversion

The five main sessions of the CCDA annual conference took us on a journey into five community development themes of Subversion, Synergy, Solidarity, Simplicity and Symphony.

Day One: Subversion

Our main speakers were Dr. Barbara Williams-Skinner, husband of the late Rev. Tom Skinner, and Dr. Soong-Chan Rah, professor at North Park Seminary.

How do we subvert the status quo? Can we imagine an alternative way of living out Jesus' kingdom values in a world that elevates the haves over the havenots and fear over hope?

Dr. Skinner was a powerful communicator and challenged us to mentor young people into the freedom we have in Christ, not fear. Freedom over fear.

Dr. Rah has studied and written extensively on the topic of the Next Evangelicalism. That's a fancy term for describing the movement of the global church. One hundred years ago, Europe and North America were the center of the Church. Today, the global South leads the way. Put simply: the Church is no longer "white", as the West has too long believed.

Dr. Rah challenged us to open our eyes to the present reality of the global multi-ethnic, multi-cultural Church. So, if this is true, he posed, then why are we beholden to an ecclesiology of the western "white" church? This is not a racist statement against Caucasians, but rather a wake-up call to see that God is turning the systems of the world upside down, the weak are surpassing the strong. "The white man" has held the power for centuries, but now the Gospel is empowering believers around the globe from every tribe and tongue. We have much to learn from our African or Brazilian or Indian brothers and sisters!

Focusing in on our own nation, Dr. Chah, told us to look around. We will soon be a nation of minorities, where the minorities will be the majority. How will we respond as the Body of Christ? If we want to work in the inner-city, and we are white and we have never had a non-white mentor, then we had better be careful, he cautioned.

Through the lens of the prophet Haggai, Dr. Chah encouraged us that the best thing we can "redistribute" (one of the three pillars of CCDA) to the broken heaps of rubble in our devastated inner-cities is Jesus, himself. Not another program. Jesus. He will bring beauty out of the rubble.

Tipping Points

I am confident that in the coming weeks and months, I will look back on this past week's CCDA annual conference in Cincinnati as a tipping point in my and Amber's life. It was absolutely incredible. Jam-packed? Yes. But, instrumental in our formation as members of the Body of Christ? Undoubtedly. And...it was so much fun! We were challenged and encouraged in countless ways. I look forward to reviewing the conference on this blog in the coming days.

Word of the Day: Reconciliation

I've spent a good amount of time thinking about reconciliation lately. The book we just read raised some good questions, so we have been wrestling with it in our Academy group discussions. And of course, we're encountering the challenges of reconciliation on the streets of Memphis, which has a history that we all know about.

But at the end of the day, this video sums it all up. :-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnOyMSEWNTs&feature=fvw

The Three Rs

Currently, we are reading Restoring At Risk Communities for the Academy. It's more or less the official handbook of the Christian Community Development Association, a compilation of essays from various seasoned community developers.

We are all being really challenged by the thoughts expressed in this book. We're talking about painfully difficult ways of living as disciples of Jesus Christ that I would rather not think or hear about. These aren't lofty treatises for utopian societies, but instead Biblical, Gospel-centered practices that are being tried and tested by men and women in communities around the globe.

The content of this book - and ultimately the call to live incarnationally on earth as disciples of Christ - centers on the three "Rs" of Relocation, Reconciliation and Redistribution. We are being confronted by the difficulty of living this out in a city that is rich with segregation and self-protection.

In the posts to follow, I will share some of the inner conversation we are having here on these topics.