Globally Significant Lifestyle
Living faithfully as global Christians in light of I John 3:17by Christie Borthwick
Consider
some statistics on global inequity, from the World Christian Encyclopedia:
2.2 billion people do not have access to safe water to drink; 700 million
are shanty-town or slum dwellers; 2.0 billion live in poverty (under $2/day);
1.1 billion of these live in extreme poverty (under $1/day); 120 million
are street children; 700 million children are sick; and 30 million die annually
from hunger (18 million of these are children under age 5).
These are overwhelming facts, yet with these staggering facts in mind we come to 1 John 3:17: "Whoever has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, and closes his heart against him - how does the love of God abide in him?" My question is this: How can we live as responsible Christians in this world of inequity - especially since we are the ones who "have the world's goods." What does 1 John 3:17 mean in a world of CNN, short-term mission exposure trips, and international communications? John's readers saw only the inequities before them; we see them across the globe.
We must consider a larger biblical worldview. The combination of our relative affluence (on a global scale) with the awareness of world needs calls for some sort of action, and the Scriptures guides our efforts. The Scriptures call us to a radically transformed worldview with respect to our resources. While a few are called to the complete abandonment of riches, all of us are called to stewardship, sacrifice, and solidarity. Let's look at these one at a time.
Stewardship means living with an understanding that all that we have or are is God's already, and that He has assigned us responsibility as caretakers of His wealth. Stewardship is the management of God-given resources in this life for which we will give an account in the next. This is the perspective Paul advocated in 1 Timothy 6:17-19:
Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, be rich in good deeds, & to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.
Sacrifice: giving away something that costs us. Generosity gives out of abundance, but sacrifice gives when it hurts. Zaccheus (Luke 19) demonstrates generosity, but the widow who gave her last two cents (Luke 21) demonstrates sacrifice. The Bible encourages a lifestyle of sacrifice. Killing the lamb without spot or blemish meant sacrificing one of the best of the flock. Paul exhorts sacrifice in Philippians 2:5-11 when he writes (and I'm summarizing): Follow the example of Jesus - who though he was in very nature God - emptied himself, became a man, became a servant, and died for our benefit. Here Paul holds forth the example of Jesus as an example of relinquished rights, privileges, and entitlements in order to serve others.
Solidarity: taking action to identify ourselves with those in need. The writer of Hebrews sums it up this way: "Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering." (Hebrews 13:3) Here the writer of Hebrews encourages us to choose intentional identification (i.e., solidarity) with those less fortunate than ourselves. We'll see this more when we look later at Isaiah 58.
All of this leads to the basic question: How can we choose a lifestyle which gives us the freedom to respond to 1 John 3:17 and live lives which reflect the biblical values of stewardship, sacrifice, and solidarity?
Questions, Not Answers
My intent is to raise practical questions that will stir us to wrestle with these global inequities and with the application of these Scriptures to our lifestyles. The focus of my challenge will be mostly to Christians from North America and the affluent western world, but I hope that some of these ideas may be transferable even across cultures. Before we delve into these questions, I need you to know three things:
1) You are responsible. Each of us bears the sole responsibility of our relationship to God and the stewardship of that which he entrusts to us. I'm not discounting the significance of community, nor am I saying that the encouragement of friends or the concept of mutual accountability won't help. I'm merely saying that we cannot determine someone else's lifestyle for them. I'm not here to tell you how to live. We're all on a different adventure of faith, and we're all supposed to wrestle with these inequities. In my case, I can feign spirituality by telling you about the simplified way that I purchase clothing or the "wrecks" that we've driven for our cars. But I must confess that we have a pet cat at home - something most of the poorer world would see as an absolute luxury, especially if they saw our veterinary bills or the amount we spend on specially processed cat food.
2) Don't procrastinate. I want to encourage you to wrestle with these questions now because your decisions accumulate. C.S. Lewis, quoted in Ron Sider's Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger, wrote: "Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you & I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may go on to victories you never dreamed of." If you say, "I'm a student, I'm too poor to be materialistic or to worry about downsizing my lifestyle," you will miss the chance of making value-based decisions which will shape the rest of your life.
3) Be thankful! We need to pause and thank God that we have lifestyle choices to consider. Our greatest affluence in our country is the affluence of choice. The essence of being poor is having no choices - yet we face more choices of food for lunch than some of the poor will face in a lifetime. Having laid down these foundational thoughts, consider five questions which can influence your own lifestyle choices so that our lives are in alignment with: a) God's concern for the whole world, and b) the realities of global economic inequity
How do we discern "want" from "need"?
We live in a world built on "conspicuous consumption." The advertising world does almost everything possible to appeal to what John the apostle called the "lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, and the boastful pride of life" (I John 2:15-17) - all designed to make us dissatisfied with what we have and longing for something else. Bill Hybels of Willowcreek Church says that one of the great challenges facing Western Christians is taming "the monster called more." Craig Blomberg, author of Neither Poverty nor Riches: A Biblical Theology of Material Possessions, writes: It is arguable that materialism is the single biggest competitor with authentic Christianity for the hearts and souls of millions in our world today, including many in the visible church" (p. 132). George Murray of Columbia International University stated it this way: "We live in a world where luxury has become necessity and optional features have become standard equipment."
In 1991, Juliet Schor did a landmark study on "the unexpected decline of leisure" entitled The Overworked American. In it, she summarized her findings that people were working harder, longer hours. The reason? To get more! That finding led to her second book, The Overspent American (1996) in which she documents the exponential growth of material expectations and how it has led to overwork and increased indebtedness. One advertising executive jokingly summarized his job as "convincing people to buy things they don't need with money they don't have."
Into this consumeristic world we come, under the Lordship of Christ. We want to learn the principles of discernment and contentment. The writer of Proverbs stated it this way (Proverbs 30:7-9): "Give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with food that is my portion. Lest I be full and deny thee or lest I be in want and steal and profane the name of my God." Paul the apostle wrote to the Philippians, "whether in poverty or in affluence, I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances" (my paraphrase).
Practically speaking, what does this mean - to discern want versus need? Here are some ideas that have helped my husband and me:
- Don't buy on impulse. Purchasing anything without thinking beforehand increases our submission to the advertisers' manipulation.
- Beware rationalization: inserting the word "need" is a great way to disguise "GREED" - as in "I need that new outfit."
- Practice an attitude of gratitude. Thankfulness helps us take an account of all that we have. Advertising appeals to all that we don't have.
- Beware of window shopping - it makes you think you need things you never would have thought of if they weren't dangling before your eyes.
- Never buy for "image" - whether that means "designer" clothes or new cars. You pay for pride - both economically and spiritually.
Scott Wesley Brown, a Christian musician whose life was transformed by a short-term mission trip serving with the Maasai people of East Africa, illustrates the discernment I'm talking about in his song, "Things":
Things upon the mantle. Things on every shelf. Things that others gave me. Things I gave myself. Things I've stored in boxes. That don't mean much anymore. Old magazines and memories, behind the attic door.
Things on hooks & hangers. Things on ropes and rings. Things I guard that blind me to the pettiness of things. Am I like the Rich Young Ruler Ruled by all I own? If Jesus came & asked me, could I leave them all alone?
Oh Lord, I look to heaven beyond the veil of time to gain eternal insight that nothing's really mine. And to only ask for daily bread and all contentment brings. To find freedom as your servant in the midst of all these things.
For discarded in the junkyard, rusting in the rain, lie things that took the finest years of lifetimes to obtain. And whistling through these tombstones, the hollow breezes sing a song of dreams surrendered to the tyranny of things.
Scott Wesley Brown exhorts us to discern. The first great challenge facing us as we develop a world Christian lifestyle is discernment, taming our materialism, and living with a sense of biblical contentment.
How should we sustain ourselves?
What does being a "world Christian" say about the way that we eat, dress, and where we live? This is the question that gets to the "nuts & bolts" of the daily things that constitute our lifestyle. What does being a "world Christian" mean when it comes to eating out? If most of the world has only two or three changes of clothes, should I likewise? How big should my apartment or house be? Here are some more questions:
Is it right to consume beef that used up 7 pounds of grain per pound of beef? Should we buy clothing produced in Southeast Asian "sweat shop" factories where workers are exploited or abused? How much "square-footage-per-person" do we actually need? Do we "need" our own bathroom? Our own bedroom? Around the world, you'll find that this affluence-of-space is one of the greatest affluences of North America. Are we willing to downsize - not just for the sake of solidarity - but because increased living space increases multiple costs: heating and air conditioning and the related consumption of fuel, furnishings, taxes - even the time required to clean! Tom Sine's books, Mustard Seed Versus McWorld, Why Settle for More and Miss the Best? and The Mustard Seed Conspiracy all discuss the alternative housing options world Christians can consider. As to practical living, my husband and I try to buy generic brands. When we have legitimate "needs" (and this itself is culturally defined), I try to shop with coupons, look for sales, and in some cases, buy in volume. We go through our closets and try to give clothing away every year or twice a year. If it sat in our closet for 6-12 months without being worn, someone else could use it better!
How do we spend our resources? Money? Time? Abilities?
Life stewardship is "whole life" - not just economic. All of the resources we've been given - money, time, intelligence, heritage, training, education - all of them are the stewardship given to us by God. How will you use your abilities? Will your career choices be influenced by your knowledge of global inequities? Could you make choices today which will help you to influence and change socio-economic structures? Maybe you'll become an organizer who leads boycotts of materials made in unjust working conditions in the poorer world. Or maybe you can become an executive with a multi-national corporation and change the way they treat their workers globally.
A friend of ours is brilliant with respect to money management and numbers. He could easily spend his life helping rich people get richer and getting richer himself in the process. But he made a decision over ten years ago to use his God-given abilities to empower the poor. Using his own resources and recruiting a staff of volunteer friends, he has started a "Micro Enterprise Development" loan ministry which now touches hundreds of villages and families in places like Mexico, Nigeria, South Africa's "townships", and Vietnam.
How will you use your time? Some people say that time - not money - is our most limited resource in the Western world. This points to the challenge of using our time as a stewardship, with the spirit of sacrifice and solidarity. This is why my husband and I have made a personal commitment to be in the 2/3 world every year. It builds friendships and partnerships. We're able to link together ministries across cultures. But most importantly, it renews our perspective on lifestyle issues: most of the world's people do not live as we do in the USA. We live on what one person has called "an island of affluence in a sea of poverty." We dedicate two or more months per year to service in the 2/3 world just so that we don't forget and grow hard-hearted.
How will you use your money? Monetary responsibility is not something that starts after you're out of college and you have your first full-time job. It starts now. Stewardship is the most basic: the Bible uses 10% as an amount that we give away regularly - just to remind ourselves that everything we have comes from God. Generosity means giving above and beyond the bare minimum. And sacrifice: giving at expense to ourselves - so that we cannot afford to live at the level of our neighbors. In C.S. Lewis' words, our economic lifestyle gets "pinched" because of our propensity to give our resources away. Practically speaking, here are a few personal lifestyle choices we've made concerning money:
Tithing: although we see this as a biblical guideline, it's our bare minimum. I struggled with this when we were first married because Paul wanted to tithe on the "gross" and I wanted to tithe on the "net." Biblically, the value is generosity - and I was missing the point. Tithing for us - on the "gross" - is bare minimum!
Buying: save whenever possible. I work at a hospital, and every day I bring my own tea bags because the hospital cafeteria gives free cups and hot water, but you pay for the tea bag. We calculated out that I save over $300 a year on tea bags alone, and $300 goes a long way in other parts of the world. A silly example, but it makes the point.
Try to think in terms of "dynamic equivalents". Before spending money on some optional item, ask, "What else could that buy?" Do you know that if you buy three CDs each month, you could support a child through World Vision or Compassion for the same amount? I read recently that the average American household spends over $2000/year in eating at restaurants or fast food places. That same amount can support full-time Christian workers in many parts of the world.
How much do we/will we compromise?
All of us live with some sort of compromise. None of us live with some biblically defined "absolute" standard of simplicity. Even Jesus had a 'seamless garment' which was valuable enough for the soldiers to bid for it. And he received money from wealthy women - thereby implicitly endorsing their lifestyles. So the question is one of cultural adjustment. How do we distinguish the difference between "living within the culture" and being sucked into consumer-oriented value systems in a materialistic culture? How do we make sure that we're NOT contributing to the structures of our society that oppress the poor? And what do we do to address these social, political, or economic structures? Three ideas may help here:
First, consider joining or starting an accountability group where you commit to asking each other tough questions - especially after you get out of college and your lifestyle begins to expand. My husband and I have this in our marriage, but we find the need to be with like-minded people so that we can think radically about lifestyle issues - and exhort each other when we see each other rationalizing.
Second, balance your thinking with the principle of "trade-offs". Not every decision in life is cost effective. Some things are short-term costs for greater long-term gains - like your education. Although the small fortune you're spending on your education could feed hundreds of starving people in parts of the world, your edudcation will become far more valuable with time.
Third, beware of debt! Credit card loans, car loans, church building programs and a host of other "culturally acceptable" debt loads often limit our ability to be the "soldier in active service - unencumbered by the affairs of daily life" that the Bible commands. Even school loans. Don't become so numb to college loans that you let these accumulate without ever thinking of the job or lifestyle it will require to pay them off. As older adults, what scares me is how "normal" it is that today's collegian routinely assumes that $20,000 or more in debt. I realize that some educational debt may be inescapable, but exercise caution as you accumulate it. Remember: it normally takes ten years to pay that debt off - ten years where you'll accumulate a lifestyle and other "stuff" which may render you less available for service in Christ's kingdom work.
Solidarity: How much will we identify with those in need?
Here's where we wrestle with that issue of "solidarity" again. Prayer - like the annual day of prayer for the Persecuted Church - is a great starting point. Remember to be thankful for your food - and to use your times of "grace" to pray for others who go without. Build friendships across cultural and economic barriers. Share. You'll often find that the so-called "poor" of this world are more generous than the affluent. Receive from their generosity. And think globally while living in your own "pocket" of the world. One single guy we know determined that solidarity for him means putting the children of leaders from the church in places like Haiti and Nigeria through college. He has adjusted his lifestyle to absorb their tuition.
This article is adapted from a seminar given by Christie Borthwick at Urbana 2000.
Unless otherwise noted, all materials on the urbana.org web site are Copyright InterVarsity Christian Fellowship / USA. All rights reserved.
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