COLLEGE CHAPLAIN
‘Money doesn’t make you happy—it makes you unhappy, just in a better part of town’, says American David Siegel, who runs Westgate Resorts and has a net worth of 5.7 billion dollars. The pursuit of wealth without counting the cost is not a new trap for us, but it is one we keep stumbling into because the cost is never really financial, it’s personal.
All too often we will assume that because this world is enjoyable, full of so much beauty and delight that could be enjoyed, that it just makes sense to pursue that enjoyment as much as possible. Yet when that pursuit comes at the cost of others then we actually shut ourselves off to the real source of enjoyment in this world, namely our relationships with other people.
This trap lies behind the words of Jesus’ little brother, James, in James 4:1-6. James seems to be describing full on warfare in the opening verses with phrases such as ‘wars and fights…waging war…murder and coveting’. Sadly, James wasn’t speaking to military or political leaders, but to leaders in the early Christian church who were jostling for power amongst one another. While it’s unlikely that they were actually landing blows on one another or murdering each other, James is no fool and realises that their desire for positions of power stems from the same desire that does indeed lead to murder and wars.
James says that the source of this trap is the ‘passions that wage war within you’ (4:2). Being passionate about something is usually a good thing in our common parlance: ‘She’s passionate about the environment’, ‘He’s passionate about his family’, ‘She’s passionate about refugees’, ‘He’s passionate about coaching junior footy’. However, lurking underneath ‘passions’ in verse 2 is the same word later translated as ‘pleasures’ in verse 3. The Greek term is in fact the same word from which derive the term Hedonism, which is the pursuit of pleasure and indulgence just for the sake of pleasure itself. It is pure selfish consumption.
James knows how drastic this problem can be because he calls these church leaders ‘adulterous people’ (4:4). They are adulterous because they have run off for a cheap fling with the world and rejected God. They have become friends of the world and in effect have become the enemy of God.
David Siegel’s aphorism about wealth was cited in an article entitled ‘The Ugly Side of Getting Rich’, in which photojournalist, Lauren Greenfield, was interviewed about her 25 years following the mega rich and documenting them in her photos. She is quoted as saying that the pursuit of wealth ‘…doesn’t lead to personal or financial fulfilment, and eventually you fall’. She goes on to add, ‘The trajectory of the last 25 years isn’t sustainable on a lot of levels—environmentally, morally, spiritually, or within communities and families.’
Seeking out our pleasures and becoming friends with the world doesn’t work. Greenfield noticed that the mega rich have formed their own tribes, with their own markers. It didn’t matter if they were American, Russian, French, Chinese, etc, the mega rich mark out their wealth with these global status symbols. Symbols like the Hermes Birkin handbag, which retails for around 300 grand. Below is Canadian socialite, Suzanne Rogers, with her collection. There’s a Hermes bag worth as much as my house in each of those orange boxes!
The Hermes Birkin bag is a sign of being in the rich club, friendship with the world secured. However, Greenfield notes just how many of the rich lost it all over the 25 years she documented them. Now, we can scoff or gawk at that wealth and think ‘I’m glad I’m not so blindly chasing after ridiculous symbols’, but whether we earn a little or a lot, we are just as friendly with the world as those toting a Birkin bag. We are constantly striving for tangible, material things that we can hold onto, things which makes us feel secure and at peace in this world—friends with this world!
Those tangible things that we seek out don’t have to be a ridiculously expensive handbag, they can just be a glowing report card with As, awards, academic honours. All of those things are good and wonderful things to achieve, but our students must ask themselves why they you want those achievements. Is it the status, the sense of self-importance, the stepping stone to a high-paying or powerful job? Well then, we would be wise to listen further to James: ‘You ask and don’t receive because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures.’ (4:3)
How easily we turn a good thing like academic achievement into a god thing! Especially, if it means we turn on those in our class, envying their success, thinking how we will make sure we don’t miss out on our moment of acknowledgment. Whether it’s success in the classroom, on the field, on the stage, in the local newspaper, or maybe it’s the power of influence on social media, or the physical attention of that romantic interest— whatever it is—if our hearts are desiring those things for our pleasures, then our desires are misplaced, disaffected and disordered.
As we think about the vital signs of Christian faith this term in Chapel, I impressed to the student body that the first thing they should see in their Christian friends is that their desire in life is for God. That should be obvious and their difference should be stark, not just cozying up to the world. Because to do that is, as James says, to be an enemy of God. James goes onto say that God has placed in Christians his Holy Spirit, which envies in us intensely (4:5). That is, God loves us so much that he burns with jealousy, a pure and holy jealousy, when we chase after the world and not after him.
We have to admit that chasing after the comforts of the world has been a hard thing to do in 2020. We can’t go anywhere for holidays, we couldn’t eat out for ages and lots of products are still in short supply with COVID-19 slowing global manufacturing. So we probably feel like we deserve a bit of a splurge this Christmas, just chilling by the pool with food and drink, hoping for a better year ahead. My prayer is that we do get that break, that we are able to see loved ones and rest with them. There is nothing wrong with those things, they are good indeed, but if we are seeking those things so that we may ‘spend them on our pleasures’ as James says then we are asking with the wrong motives. Importantly, nowhere does James say that God does not want to bless us with rest, riches and relationships. In fact this passage speaks of God wanting to give these things to us, but only so that we will want Him as our giver, not just His gifts.
In verse 6, James says God gives greater grace and that he resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. As strong as God’s jealous desire is for us, he provides even greater grace for us to respond in humble thanks to his love for us in Jesus. That humble response is shown in our desire for others to be cared for, not just taking care of ourselves this Christmas. So as the Anglicare Christmas Pantry Appeal rolls around again this year, here is an opportunity where God’s grace should prompt us to humbly respond in thankfulness. Thankfulness, that even amidst this pandemic, we still have an abundance to share.
There is no reason why we shouldn’t see hampers of goods overflowing from this TRAC community. We can respond to God giving us greater grace than the world’s friendship by showing even greater grace to that world. I can’t wait to see how we respond.
Gareth Tyndall | College Chaplain