Poverty?

POVERTY?

For 2021, I am reading through the Bible with the BibleProject-Biblical Storyline Reading Plan on the YouVersion App. This devotional will follow along with the daily reading. 

Today's reading is: Genesis 1-3

Benjamin Franklin, On the Price of Corn and Management of the Poor (29 November 1766):

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer. There is no country in the world where so many provisions are established for them; so many hospitals to receive them when they are sick or lame, founded and maintained by voluntary charities; so many alms-houses for the aged of both sexes, together with a solemn general law made by the rich to subject their estates to a heavy tax for the support of the poor. Under all these obligations, are our poor modest, humble, and thankful; and do they use their best endeavours to maintain themselves, and lighten our shoulders of this burthen? On the contrary, I affirm that there is no country in the world in which the poor are more idle, dissolute, drunken, and insolent. The day you passed that act, you took away from before their eyes the greatest of all inducements to industry, frugality, and sobriety, by giving them a dependence on somewhat else than a careful accumulation during youth and health, for support in age or sickness. In short, you offered a premium for the encouragement of idleness, and you should not now wonder that it has had its effect in the increase of poverty.

As I thought about this quote from Benjamin Franklin, I wondered who is truly living in poverty. Who is in poverty before God? What action does God take toward those in poverty? More personally, what am I to think about how God treats me?

In Revelation 3:17, Jesus revealed to John the Apostle that what truly makes us rich and what truly makes us poor is very different from what we tend to think.

Revelation 3:17 NIV You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.

Revelation 3:17 offends my sensibility of being able to provide for myself what I most want and need. However, Jesus states that what I think I can provide for myself leaves me wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. What is truly enriching is found only in what God provides.

Genesis 3:6 ASV - 6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat; and she gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat.

In Genesis 3:6, Eve failed to recognize how rich she was. Though God provided everything she needed, Eve was distracted by the one thing she didn't have. Eve felt that the fruit would satisfy her. What she saw dazzled her. Eve wanted wisdom independent from God.

Matthew 6:8 NASB - "So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.

I tell myself that I know what I want and that I can get it. Without God, what I have is pitiful at best. The Story of the Fall is embarrassing, because it's my story. I keep trying to provide for myself instead of relying on what my Good Father provides everyday. 

Matthew 18:3 BLB - and said, "Truly I say to you, if you are not converted and become as the little children, you shall never enter into the kingdom of the heavens.

When I was little, I was valued for what I received. I was expected to accept what my parents provided to eat, to wear, and to do because they knew better than I did what I needed. When I did not accept what was provided me, there was a great deal of grief. It is regrettable for me to not know what I need and want, but it is much worse for me to desire what is destructive to me. If I think that I know what I need and want when I don't know, then I live against my best interests. When my desires oppose my opportunity for growth, I lose myself.

Luke 9:25 ESV - For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? 

“It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, and Other Addresses

Who is in poverty before God? 

Psalm 116:7 NKJV - Return to your rest, O my soul, For the LORD has dealt bountifully with you.

When I refuse to rest my soul in the beauty, provision, and wisdom of the LORD, I am in poverty. 

What does God do to drive me out of my poverty?

Genesis 3:16 ASV - Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy pain and thy conception; in pain thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

God pronounced that Adam would toil, and Eve would endure great pain. My life becomes more difficult the more I resist the gift of God's grace. 

What do I learn about God when my life becomes more difficult?

God does not want us to turn away from Him, because He is what is best for us. He loves us. Love means always wanting what is absolutely best for the beloved. God gives me difficulties in order to strengthen me in my faith that He will deliver me out of every impossible situation He uses for my good. God's will works in spite of, through, and around evil, but God does not will evil.

Ezekiel 18:32 BSB - For I take no pleasure in anyone’s death, declares the Lord GOD. So repent and live!