“If the world were a village”, the theme of a popular email, several children’s books, videos and sustainability websites, conceptualizes the statistics of the world’s population in a meaningful and manageable way. The message demonstrates how truly blessed the people of North America are. You may have seen it. Based on various statistics from international organizations such as the U.N, the messages shrink the population of the world into a representative group of 100 people. According to one version, in this village, 70 would be non-white, with most living in Asia and Africa. Only 14 would live in the Western Hemisphere. Most significant are the conditions under which people live. Eighty villagers would live in housing considered substandard in North America, 63 have inadequate sanitation, 16 are unable to read or write and 33 suffer from malnutrition. Only one would have a college education and 7 would have access to the Internet. Six people would possess 99 percent of the world’s wealth, and they would all live in America. The message concludes with the thought that if you have food to eat, clothes to wear and a place to sleep tonight, you are richer than 70 percent of the world’s people.

It is easy for us who live in North America to not really appreciate what we have become accustomed to and expect. One only needs to consider the periodic lists that distinguish between those things which are considered necessities and luxuries, and how the luxuries of one generation later become the necessities of another. For example, in the early 1900s, telephones were luxuries. Today, they are essential links for communication, so we have landlines, cell phones, satellite phones and internet phones. Similarly, electric household appliances have become standard. We have moved from mixers, toasters, kettles and can openers to dishwashers, convection ovens, microwaves. We have moved from calculators to computers, from transistor radios to walkmen to iPods and MP3 players. Perhaps no area of life has changed as much as entertainment. A glance at a flyer for an electronics store reveals massive flat screen and plasma television sets, music and home entertainment systems, and seemingly countless game systems, all indicating a pleasure and entertainment obsessed culture. Yet, the world of luxury does not end there. Many people now live in large, fabulous homes, have cottages or time-shares or take trips or cruises for vacations, have boats, RVs, SUVs, campers, you name it. Today, life in North America has gone beyond the “conspicuous consumerism” of the past decades to a concept that seems to be “make your own paradise” – “heaven on earth.”

There have been many attempts to identify the reasons why evangelism has become difficult in North American culture for almost every religious body or group. The challenge is that it is difficult to interest people in an eternal Paradise, when their life, here and now, is filled with comfort and pleasure, virtually everything their heart desires, whenever they want it. When life is so good and comfortable now, the idea of a future hope, especially one that might require sacrifice, has little appeal. Who needs a paradise sometime in the future when they seem to have one today?

Our North American culture and economy have fed and feed off these desires. For many people, personal wealth has increased. North Americans have become comfortable, satisfied and secure. That is, until earlier this fall when a global economic crisis hit that threatened the financial world with utter disaster. To avert total disaster, the United States and other governments have responded with massive financial bailouts. Yet, many people will still lose their homes, jobs and investments. Who knows, ultimately, where or how this will all end, or how much it will personally cost.  Many people have lost their sense of safety and security. They had trusted in their things, only to discover such things are not worthy of trust.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus warned his hearers not to trust in material things where moth and rust corrupt or thieves break in and steal. Such things are impermanent. They quickly fade and disappear. Thus, the writer of Ecclesiastes concluded that “All is vanity.” Everyone ends up dead, no matter how much they have done or have.

Two stories in Luke are positioned closely together – only about 15 verses apart. Both are about men of position and wealth: one a ruler, the other a chief tax collector. Both men had an encounter with Jesus: one approached to ask a question about eternal life, the other climbed a tree just to see Him. Both wanted to know Jesus. But their different responses to Jesus are what we remember them by. The ruler loved and trusted in his wealth. When Jesus told him to give it all up, he could not. Wealth was his treasure, his source of security, the basis of his paradise. On the other hand, Zacchaeus, the tax collector, voluntarily surrendered his wealth, giving it to the poor and making restitution to anyone he might have defrauded.

The current financial crisis reminds us that material things are unstable and do not bring happiness nor provide true security for the future. Our possessions cannot create a lasting paradise, only a momentary and fragile escape. Like the rich fool who tore down his barns to build bigger barns and sat back smugly to admire his accomplishments, those who try to create their paradise on earth will always, in the end, only find disappointment.

Christians are not immune to the seductive call of the seeming security of the material. Ananias and Sapphira lied for it. Demas deserted Paul and his faith. Paul spoke of those for whom godliness would mean gain and warned that covetousness is idolatry.

Christians know that life in this world is only temporary. Any paradise created out of the things of the world is not a worthy exchange for the eternal paradise God has created for His people. What lies ahead is worth any price we might have to pay now, whether suffering or even death. Better to lose the world and gain Christ.

Paul wrote, “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.” His “if” was not one of doubt, but only for the purpose of logical argument. He continued, "But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead.” 

Like the Greeks of the New Testament world who valued a message of wisdom, and the Jews who sought a message of power, people today yearn for a message of convenience, comfort and prosperity, of paradise on earth. Those who seek paradise here, whose hope is in this life, are the ones truly to be pitied. Their paradise can only be lost.

Source: Gospel Herald