James 5: 1-6Some months ago we took a drive with some friends to Lake Bogoria out in the Rift Valley. The lake is famous for its natural hot water geysers that spurt from underground. A favorite pastime for the visitors is to boil eggs in the geysers. But that’s just about all you can do on this lake. Two other things strike you about the lake: there a disturbing calmness on the surface of the water. It is not stillness of Psalm 23. It is a deadness that is not consistent with a water body. There is no activity on the water, no movement, no ripples that suggest to you there is life. There are flamingos that inhabit the shore; they live on some form of bacteria, but that’s about the two forms on life you find on this lake.
But with flamingos inhabiting its shores, Bogoria is not nearly as dead as what they say of the Dead Sea in Israel which is the receptor of the water from the great River Jordan, but has no obvious outlet. There no form of life in that highly saline lake. Scientists say that Lake Bogoria was once a fresh water lake. Its waters used to flow out on Lake Baringo. But now there is no overflow. With time it might just become another dead sea with no form of life in it.
The tragedy of Lake Bogoria and the Dead Sea is the tragedy of rich people as James warns. James is not condemning wealth; he is against the preoccupation of accumulating wealth at the expense of others in need (including your workers) and to the abandonment of all virtue. Resources that are stolen, withheld from others that need them or are just not shared corrupt the owner. The outcome of hoarding is growing greed—the desire to accumulate more and more without ever getting satisfied. Hoarding and greed come from the mistaken belief that there is not enough for all of us, and we have to grab as much as we can and keep it for ourselves. James offers admonishment against this attitude in the strongest terms possible “your wealth will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire”.
James is blunt about why people hoard wealth—so that they can secure their own future, live in wealth in luxury and self-indulgence. But that, he says is fattening themselves up for the day of slaughter (vs 5). When people have so much, they have no use for God and for others. Look at some of the richest people around us who have turned accumulation of wealth into their vocation, even politicians who have inherited a lot of wealth. Their lives and those of their families are marred by all kinds of miseries resulting from indulgence.
This passage reminds of the source of true blessing as God would have it “If you spend yourself on behalf of the hungry, and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will shine in the darkness, and your night will become like noonday. The Lord will guide you always, he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well watered garden, like a spring whose water never fails…you will be called repairer of broken walls…”Isaiah 58: 12
Well, the choice is your—to become a spring whose water never fails or to crystallize into a dull and dreary Dead Sea that can support no life.
What you have said reminds me of two stories in the bible, First is the story of the rich man and Lazarus, Lazarus sat at the gate of the rich mans house and desired to eat the food that fell from the rich man’s table, the rich man didn’t help Lazarus yet he feasted sumptuously every day, however when they both died their end was different, Lazarus was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom while the rich man was in Hades and in torment and requested Abraham to send Lazarus to dip his finger in water so that he can go and cool the rich man’s tongue..
ReplyDeleteThe second is the story of the rich fool who after his land had brought forth plentifully instead of helping the poor he pulled down his barns to build bigger barns to store his grain and goods; however his soul was required that very night.
Solomon wrote when goods increase, they increase who eat them and what gain has their owner but to see them with his eyes, since we know this we can do well by sharing with others, Paul tells the rich not to be haughty but to be rich in good deeds liberal and generous thus laying up for themselves a good foundation for the future..
In the Old Testament we are told of Job who was a rich man and some of the questions job asks to assert his integrity are:
Job 31:16 if I have with held anything that the poor desired or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail or have eaten my morsel alone and the fatherless has not eaten from it…
Job 31:31 if the men of my tent have not said ‘who is there that has not been filled with his meat’?
Job 31:38-40 if my land has cried out against me, and its furrows have wept together; if I have eaten its yield without payment and caused the death of its owners let thorns grow instead of wheat and foul weeds instead o barley.
There is nothing better in life than wealth earned in honest or righteous work, it has no trouble attached with it and as the bible says better is a little that the righteous has than the abundance of many wicked, I would hope one day I can chomoa (unleash) those questions like Job but I am still working on that, however Jobs questions illustrate why God had put a hedge about him, and his house and all that he had and why the devil had been unable to attack him for all that time.
F.O
God bless you and keep up the good work