Apart from the deep spiritual mysteries that it entails, the wonderful drama of Redemption and the stories that all point to HIStory, the Bible is marvelously practical.
Did you know that under the Mosaic law, there was actually a Building Safety Code that required handrails on the roof in order to avoid the liability of senseless injury (Deuteronomy 22:8)?
Recently, while listening to Pastor Jeff Chadwick, I got stuck on a verse that was pregnant with practicality; let me explain.
In Matthew 20 you can find a parable about a landowner who hired some workers one morning to work in his field and reap the harvest. For all of my "old movie"fellow travelers, you might remember Marlon Brando and that gaggle of dockworkers waiting to be picked to work in the movie,"On the Waterfront".
For those of you that just do not have the imagination or patience for Black & White entertainment - perhaps you could call up some images from "Cinderella Man" and Russell Crowe getting shut out of another work day behind the iron gate.
That's the scene that is painted in the parable: guys waiting on the street corner for somebody to come by and hire them.You may remember how the story goes, a group is hired for the day at a rate of one denarius.
But the landowner - apparently anxious to meet some deadline - goes back to that corner again and again throughout the day, hiring more workers each time. He finally returns to the corner with barely an hour left in the day . . . and hires one more group.
At the end of the day, they all cue up to the pay master. Everyone gets a denarius.
Though they had agreed to that rate, the first hour workers were kinda' sore on account of they were expecting to get more than those blokes that had only just arrived.
Those of you that fall in to the liberal egalitarian class will probably applaud the fact that equality abounded - the "playing field was leveled". What a moderate thing to do!!
Mr. Obama would applaud this landowner's action - might even make him a part of his brain trust . . . he might not even "bail him out" until last.
I don't really like the idea of "from each according to his ability to each according to his need".
That's when I heard the verse . . . and I must admit I was more than a little distracted for some time after that . . . verse 15, in the English Standard Version puts it this way:
"Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me?"
There is was, as plain as day - the Bible was displaying private property rights!
This landowner could do what he wanted with what was his.
Though it might have been deserved, I was a little troubled recently by the crowds cheering when Bernard Madoff was sentenced.
That whole episode was too easy of a reinforcement to the popular mindset that no one achieves anything honestly. I am troubled by the way that too large of a segment of our society willing gulps down the class envy that is doled out by the popular culture.
It is couched in phrases like: "the rich must pay their fair share" . . . and "we just want to spread the wealth around" . . . It is evident in the extortionate tactics employed against executives - and their families - recently who received big bonuses.
Many - if not most - well to do people are that way simply because they worked harder and sacrificed more than the rest of us. And many of us have a job now because some wealthy guy decided to pursue a profit and employed us to help him (or her) in that endeavor.
Though it is not the main emphasis of the parable, I am glad that Jesus shared that statement from the landowner, because he is right: he does have the right to what he chooses with what belongs to him - because he earned that right.
On a personal note (as if I haven't already interjected my personal opinion into this piece), I get very frustrated as I watch freedoms ebbing away.
I don't smoke - never believed it was a good thing to do (although I did think it looked cool so as kid, I was not above sneaking a drag on a white crayola or candy cigarette now and then); but suppose today some guy wanted to invest his life savings into a restaurant where smokers were not only allowed but were encouraged to smoke.
You know the answer - he'd never get a permit. Yet cigarettes (thanks to their enormous tax revenues) are perfectly legal.
That is not freedom.
Freedom says: "sure you can build your restaurant and if folks don't like it they are free to eat elsewhere".
Freedom says: "achieve all you can (honestly and legally) and then use your money as you wish: perhaps you will choose to build libraries or hospitals with it; or perhaps you will invest it in such a way that others may join you in your success".
You know, I am told that originally Jefferson had listed "the pursuit of property" instead of the "Pursuit of happiness" as one of our inalienable, God-given rights in the Declaration of Independence. Freedom is not all about property and stuff we grab for ourselves; but everyone that is grabbing stuff is not hoarding it - many will share it freely.
That's the American way.
It's the Bible way.
It's the Bible way.
But it only works when we share according to our own hearts... not when someone takes it from us in order to share it according to their own desires.
I like freedom... and I must say, I am starting to miss it.
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