Financial Responsibility to God

Recently the parish youth group for which I was asked to be a patron had a talk on how to manage finances. It was a good talk, but there were a number of important points that weren’t covered, which I thought I would write in an essay. 

 

The first point about finanances that all Christians must understand is that all money is God’s. God created all things, therefore, everything is His. Then Jesus said: “what does it profit someone to gain the whole world if they lose their soul?” So all humans must act as stewards of God’s gifts, and if they manage them unworthily and not repent, then they will be damned. Jesus Himself said this, when He met Zacchaeus at Jericho. Zacchaeus promised to make right if he defrauded anyone, and Jesus said: “Salvation has come to this household.” That means that in his greed, Zacchaeus and his family were destined for hell, but because of his repentance and a re-ordering of what is important in his life, he regained the possibility of salvation for himself and for his family. So we should be the same. 

 

During the talk, the speaker spoke about some of the wealthy people that we know about, like Bill Gates. He held these as an example of success. But it’s important to realize that success in this world is not success to God. Business owners need more money than the average person, because they need capital for infrastructure and the payment of their employees. God desires and He approves that they provide products and services to people, even at a cost. But it’s clear from the lifestyle of many of these wealthy people that they do not focus their life totally on God. Any human that does not go to church at least every Sunday (as is required in the old testament law) will not be saved, as heaven is like a daily church service. Similarly, God has given us everything we have, can we not give Him back a least 10% of all that we gain? It is clear that most of these millionaires do not attend church services regularly, and do not give The Church at least 10% of their income, and if so, they cannot expect to be saved. In their greed, unless they repent, they will surely be damned. Now, many of these millionaires give a lot of money to charity, and it is good that they do this, and it will be considered at their judgement, but it does not compensate specifically for a lack of generosity to God, and a lack of faithfulness to attending church. So we should not strive to emulate millionaires too much. A lot of their wealth was not directly related to what they did (but a matter of circumstances), and they were permitted to have great wealth by God so that they use it for His purposes, but it is clear that they don’t usually act this way. Further, a lot of the success of modern businesses is driven by greed, and the misuse of things like advertising to prey on its customers. These sorts of behaviours by businesses will be punished by God, and indeed God’s judgement is coming on our generation because of things like these. Virtually all of the saints that we know of were poor in the eyes of this world. That doesn’t mean they lacked the basic necessities, but none of them were millionaires, and virtually all of them lived in humble accommodations. Those few saints that were kings gave substantial amounts to the poor and the people of their kingdoms (much more than 10%), and even fed them at their own table. All of them lived simply, even if they had sumptuous palaces. The palace was seen as God’s church also should be, as a house also for the people. So this all helps us to understand what is success in God’s eyes.

 

Again, in the old testament, the law is clear that every believer must give the first fruits or tithe of all that they earn to God. God institutes this as a measure against greed, because if we can’t give at least 10% of what we earn, then by definition we are consumed by greed. It goes beyond this though, because God says that the first born of all humans and all the animals born to a rancher also belong to God. If those creatures are not given to God, then they must be redeemed by paying the amount required by the redemption. Most modern Christians disregard a lot of the ancient law, but Jesus Himself said that none of it has been abolished (nor will ever be). There are some aspects of the law like dietary requirements and the need for circumcision that have been changed as accommodations to our modern culture, but those aspects of the law must still be carried out by every Christian (even if they do it in different ways). So too must every Christian give at least 10% of all they earn to God, and give more to redeem the first borns of their family and their livestock. Anything less is offensive to God, since did He not give us all these things? Does not everything belong to Him?

 

An important aspect of this is the parable Jesus told of the servants that are given money (in one of the parables, it’s a pound of silver, in another, it’s a talent (an amphora full) of gold), and then the master leaves for an extended time. When most priests talk about a talent of gold, they speak about it as an impossibly high value. The truth is while it is very valuable, it’s not impossible. For instance, the old testament temple was decorated with twenty-three talents of gold. The menorah was made out of a single talent of gold, among this. A talent of Gold has held its value in every age, and currently it would still be worth about a million dollars. So by definition, every millionaire has been entrusted with a talent of gold. Still, it’s a lot of money for most people, but the point is that it matters to God how we make use of what He gives us. If we are not responsible with what He gives us, and use it to build up His kingdom, it will not reflect well on us at our judgement. 

 

There is also the parable Jesus tells us of the wealthy man who demolishes his barns to build bigger barns, but then dies that night. Every human must remember that they will die, and their wealth will go to others, and in light of this, wealth isn’t that important. As it says in the psalm: “In his riches man lacks wisdom, he is like the beasts that are destroyed.” In the graveyard, no one knows how much money the people there had, and no one cares. It’s like in the Christmas Carol when the spirit of Christmas future mocks Ebenezer Scrooge, calling him the “richest man in the cemetary.” So we must all remember that our wealth does not follow us below, as the psalm also says. 

 

Often Abraham’s wealth is used to try to support the “prosperity gospel” where people say: “God wants you to be rich.” But we must remember that Abraham left a big mansion and plenty of wealth to live as a rancher, and that he slept in a tent on the ground his whole life. God instructed him to do this, and he did not decline any of God’s instructions. This is why he is our father of faith, in that he did not deny anything that God asked him, even his only son. As many saints say (in particular St. Theresa of Calcutta and St. Padre Pio) God does not want us to be successful, He wants us to be faithful. So a lack of wealth in this life is not a sign that God doesn’t favour us. Rather, those that God favours the most have given up everything for Him. As Jesus says, these people also gain lands and children even in this life (as they gain spiritual property and spiritual children through their faithfulness), but then how much more will they gain in the next life? 

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We should also remember the poor widow who gave only a few mites. The coins she gave were one sixty-fourth of a daily wage (denarius), and were the smallest divisions possible in the money system at the time. Also a dollar (the modern denarius) was the world’s daily wage for most of history, only starting to depart from this in the late 1800’s, so that shows us how poor the widow was, and how much her contribution was in proportion to what she was making. Without this the widow would have starved, and so she was giving everything she had and trusting God’s mercy that she would remain alive. She was exactly like the saints that gave everything to God, and so she stood out to Jesus (and therefore God) as remarkable, and so even we honour her two thousand years later. 

 

So while everyone recommends that we put money in the bank and take advantage of investments, we should also be careful to invest in the bank of God. All the money we invest in God’s church or in charities of every kind will reap a copious interest here, and in the next life. God sees this and it will be part of our judgement, so we should never be afraid to donate generously to them (even all we have). There are saints like Paul of the desert that gave everything to God, though they inherited great wealth, and God even sent crows with bread to feed him when they were hungry. How much more will He provide for our needs if we show that we are generous with The Church in this life? So in all these things, we see it does not matter to God so much what we have as much as how much faithfulness to Him we show by how we use what we have.