Seed and Thorns

Some thoughts stirred up by a friend’s blog post, who, in the thick of transition, writes “… he sees a good number of older people who have been in ministry for years, and who haven’t made provision for their older years. They have ‘trusted in God’ to look after them, without having the understanding or wisdom (or help from others) to get practical about it. How sad. How scary. How real”

There is a lot in this post. The Maths Of Mission. It scratches on the surface of the controversial and taboo subject of Christian provision; it rattles the keys to the cells of the ‘free’ church.

When I read this post it reminds me of things that I have read in a bible, or things that Jesus once apparently said - and that I once believed had some personal application, but now wonder if I misunderstood the character of ‘my’ God in what I have read … or if I believe in a different God to everybody else. Though I doubt that.

I remember respecting King David for “… buying the threshing floor and the oxen and [paying] fifty shekels of silver for them, saying “No, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.” (2 Sam, 1 Chr)

I remember reading something about “small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it“ and considering both the curiousness and weirdness of those that choose that path.

When I consider those who have ‘trusted in God’ at the expense of their future ‘life securities’ I’m not sure I would call it sad. The reality is that everybody’s reality is different. It is complicated because faith is individualistic and personal, but interdependence is not. And this is a truth that divides the church.

I guess everybody’s reality is also influenced by his or her own macro-political environment. Where I live, my government once told me that if I worked for 30 years that I would be entitled to a state pension. Twelve years on and the goal posts have already moved so significantly that by extrapolation I expect to be working until I die. I don’t mind that. But whenever the state announces disproportionate tax rises, it serves only to inspire me to become more tax-efficient and to further believe that Old Age Criminality will eventually become justified (!) So one could only imagine how I might feel about being asked to give to any ‘charitable’ organisations who add a further burden to the tax bill without returning a proportional service.

If I don’t know how to plan and budget, but I do have faith is that good? I think it's wonderful. Yeah, let's tear down the schools (!). But if I know how to plan and budget but I substitute exercising this knowledge with ‘faith’ is that irresponsible? Maybe. A pension plan is just a business risk, right? Is a ‘faith’ risk any more futureproof than a business risk? If my business risk fails, people seem to care less that I am poorer than they because they know that if I had succeeded then it would be they who would be poorer than I. But if my ‘faith’ risk fails then that just makes me a fool for Christ, right? Maybe.

I remember reading a parable about a farmer whereby Jesus said that “… the seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful. But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

If I speak to those OAPs, I mean OAMs, I wonder if they will speak in regret, or with a wise and unswerving faith that reflects depths like a pearl finely honed by a lifetime of abrasion.

[1739:5316]