{"id":11153,"date":"2012-05-07T08:12:36","date_gmt":"2012-05-06T21:12:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/?p=11153"},"modified":"2012-05-06T22:23:50","modified_gmt":"2012-05-06T11:23:50","slug":"give-me-neither-riches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/2012\/05\/07\/give-me-neither-riches\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Give me neither riches…’"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Lord, Give me neither poverty nor riches.”<\/em> Why? “Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, “Who is the Lord?”<\/em>. \u00a0Proverbs 30:8<\/a>, and 30:9<\/a><\/p>\n

In reading of some Australian billionaires\u00a0I was reminded of the aforementioned Proverb. The Bible is true to life and unsurprisingly it sets out the challenges\/ dangers\u00a0of wealth for our learning.<\/p>\n

At times I am tempted to say, “Lord, challenge me with wealth!” But upon reflection there are challenges that the Lord knows I am not up to!<\/p>\n

There are sound reasons for being wary of the challenges of riches:<\/p>\n

The motivation of the rich has long been a topic of interest to psychologists.\u00a0 Dr Paul Wachtel, a professor of psychology at the City College\u00a0 of New York,\u00a0 published a landmark paper a decade ago called ”Full Pockets, Empty Lives”<\/em>, in\u00a0 the American Journal of Psychoanalysis<\/em>.<\/p>\n

His research found one of the great pitfalls of the wealthy is a compulsion\u00a0 to continue to accumulate even more.\u00a0 ”The pursuit of money and material goods\u00a0 as a central aim in life comes at a rather high price,”<\/em> he wrote, noting that\u00a0 money plays ”a strikingly small role”<\/em> in a person’s real happiness or\u00a0 wellbeing.<\/p>\n

In fact, intimacy and family life are often sacrificed. Envy feeds the greed\u00a0 impulse, argues Wachtel: ”We may want not just what others have but more than\u00a0others have, or more for more’s sake.”<\/em><\/p>\n

The super-rich\u00a0are seen to take their wealth accumulation very personally,\u00a0 with their view of their self-worth apparently characterised through their\u00a0 achievements.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Stimulating article by Michael Evans with info on Australian billionaires, Billionaires’ winter of discontent<\/a> and another article on wealth and behaviour, A whole lot of dollars, but no sense of restraint<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jesus Christ shed light and wisdom on the perils of wealth leading us away from God and his purposes for the world. eg, The Parable of the Rich Fool, Luke 12:13-21<\/a><\/p>\n

There is of course the danger of poverty, “Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God<\/em>“. Proverbs 30: 9<\/a>\u00a0 Hence we are to pray and work collectively, “Our Father\u00a0in heaven … give us today our daily bread<\/em>“. Matthew 6: 5-14<\/a><\/p>\n

Pray for our billionaires that the Holy Spirit would enlighten their hearts and minds to see the Lord of Life and their responsibility for wise stewardship of their personal lives, their business lives\u00a0and their role in society.<\/p>\n

See also, Universal Desire to Worship Someone<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Lord, Give me neither poverty nor riches.” Why? “Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, “Who is the Lord?”. \u00a0Proverbs 30:8, and 30:9 In reading of some Australian billionaires\u00a0I was reminded of the aforementioned Proverb. The … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11153"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11153"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11172,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11153\/revisions\/11172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}