Uncle Ralph (Waldo Emerson) reflected, "The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn." And we can see that in the fall and winter times... a single oak can produce thousands of acorns. They're still out there on the ground, even now.
And here's the thing: The oak is not stingy about it. The oak does not try to hoard all those acorns, growing thorns around them so no one can get to them.
The oak is gracious and generous. And IF a squirrel (or hundreds of squirrels) "steals" an acorn for its own nourishment, the oak doesn't take offense. It is generous. It is gracious. It is giving.
Nature is like that. God is like that. The Beloved Community can embrace that, as well.
And to be sure, it can be hard in these cold winter times, when the stingy and graceless try to hoard and hoard, taking for themselves and unwilling or fearful to think about sharing with others. They demand "efficiency," not grace. They push away rather than gather in.
Nonetheless, the way of sharing, abundance and grace is the right way to go. There is a place for wise use of resources and "efficiency," but that really should be as a subset of grace and abundant sharing.
As various biblical writers and wise people have long noted, what happens to the stingy and the hoarders when they push others away and try to take it all for themselves, perhaps in the name of "efficiency" and with false claims about "They're all a bunch of lazy thieves!" ...what happens to these hoarders? They end up with a bunch of rotten, useless acorns. This is because acorns were meant to be shared and spread with careless abandon.
The greedy farmer said, "This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain."
But God replied, "You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?"
And when the Manna ("what is it?") fell to the ground so that there was enough for everyone... what happened to those who greedily tried to store more than they needed away? It rotted.
And when the rich business people refused to pay their laborers for the work they had done? God lashed out at them...
Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter.
May we embrace grace and grow into abundance and grow into sharing. May the season of the Greening of the Spirit begin soon and take deep roots.
8 comments:
The oak, much like leftists, have no brain, do not think, do not choose, do not know they are reproducing by dropping acorns.
There is far more charity among the wealthy in this country than you choose to believe. These people, either through inheritance or by starting from scratch, enjoy giving from their bounty. But you go ahead and keep pretending you know how the wealthy think and act so you can posture as morally superior. Because that's what embracing grace is all about, apparently.
The readers, like the oak, know that the Right has no sense of poetry or grace. Thanks for the illustration, Marshal. Your unsupported claim is duly noted as an unsupported claim.
“Truly I say to you that this poor widow has put in more than all;
for all these rich ones out of their abundance have put in offerings for God,
but the poor widow, out of her poverty put in all the livelihood that she had.”
How many rich folks are giving their all, Marshal? Just a ballpark guess. Let's make it easy and speak of those making over $1 million a year. Do you suspect that even 1% of the millionaires are giving their all?
Do you suspect that even .01% of millionaires are giving all?
Again, thanks for the illustration of being lacking in grace and coming to the aid of the wealthy while demonizing the poor. The rich really love it when you all pass on tales of their legendary boot-lifting feats.
You are correct, SOME rich people DO love giving a pittance out of their bounty. But so what?
Just to help you understand, my story is an illustration, echoing other biblical illustrations. It's a parable, if you will. When Jesus said, "“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves." ...those false teachers were not LITERALLY wearing "sheep's clothing," nor were they actually "ravenous wolves."
It's poetry. An illustration.
To paraphrase Jesus, Now the parable is this: The oak is the patient, giving grace of God. The acorn are the good gifts of God.
Marshal is a sacrament for the day: cruelty is a virtue. Like Russia, like Belarus, like North Korea. Trump bound us with the against Ukraine. Nations of brutalizing oligarchs who want to be worshipped and 90% of citizens struggling through life. Marshal worships at the altar of Moloch.
Your advice is terrible. Anyone who follows it is doomed to be broke.
Anonymous, anyone who comments here needs to be an actual person with an actual name.
In the meantime, there are many ways to be wealthy and many ways to be doomed to be broke. The pervert in office, for instance, in spite of his alleged billions, is a pathetic, broke and broken man. He has no wealth.
The wealth that he does have (such as it is) is destined, as the Apostle James noted, to become "rotted, and moths have eaten his clothes. His gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against him and eat his flesh like fire."
He is a small, miserly, pathetic shell of a man and his "great wealth" can't change that.
As to the oak illustration, it is just an illustration to demonstrate the great wholesome commonwealth that comes with flagrant sharing and grace. THAT is a wealth that lasts, from generation to generation.
Not that you're likely a real person, but just to address the awful hole in your claim.
And how much of YOUR earnings do you keep? Are you left with nothing at all after you cash your paycheck and give it all away?
It's not a matter of how many I know or how much those I might know give, as if I pester them to tell me what Christ says to do in secret.
But what I can do is speak to two situations that belie your grace embracing disfavoritism of the well to do:
1. For awhile some years ago, I explored the world of network marketing. I looked at several companies through joining up and came to find it just wasn't for me. But in one particular case of which I know without any doubt, the highest money earned in one of these companies, a woman who made a bit over $1 million per year at that time, started her own charity and funded it herself.
2. My father-in-law died from complications related to ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease). The father of the best friend of one of my daughters was a banker who dealt with wealthy people. An event to raise money for ALS research was being held at one of the swankiest hotels in Chicago. Dinner and an auction. The banker, whose name is Randy, got my whole family tickets for this event because we lost someone to the disease. This included myself, my wife, my mother-in-law, my step-daughters and both the young men to whom they are now married and last but not least, my daughter my wife and I produced together. That's eight of us. I don't know who paid for the tickets...Randy or someone else. Randy lived in the same middle class neighborhood as we did, but many wealthy people live modestly.
I wore my best suit and felt like a pauper amid all the well dressed wealthy.
There were actually three ways they hosted for raising money:
a) a type of craft show where items were offered with the proceeds going to the cause. I didn't look at any of the items, but one of or party said they weren't cheap.
b) a silent auction, which was ongoing throughout the period before dinner. Folks submitted bids and I believe they just chose the highest for that which was offered.
c) a typical auction after dinner, with an auctioneer. The Items could be expensive cars or lavish trips abroad or other such things.
On the last auction alone, they raised over half a million dollars in a matter of about two hours at most. I don't know how much the other two options raised. Randy told us later that the people there attend dinners like this every other month all the time. He said those who don't "win" the bidding still donate constantly (and the dinner itself was far more than I could afford).
So while you pretend you can condescend to them by citing a passage from Scripture, the example of which you don't follow yourself, it costs a lot more money for a rich dude to give 'till it hurts than for either of us...and we don't give to that point, either, you hypocrite.
And thanks again for the illustration of "embrace grace" by falsely projecting onto me the that I demonize the poor. I've never done it. EVER.
I also appreciate the equally grace embracing example of envy, covetousness and playing favorites in how you regard your fellow man.
It continues as you choose the word "SOME" when disparaging the rich you don't know. The "pittance" they give is no doubt far greater than the amount you'll have earned in your entire life because you pretend wealth is sin. That "pittance" is the result of their efforts to use their talents in a manner which results in their wealth, which allows them to give more than you ever could without regard to whether doing so hurts or not. You prefer to think they didn't sacrifice and risk to obtain that wealth and by doing so, the hurt took place already. You don't give 'till it hurts in that way, either. You just posture.
Oh, I understood it well enough. I was simply pointing out how you once again fail to understand how to craft an analogy. Since a tree has no consciousness, it can't choose to share or horde. To use an oak as an example of how one should behave is therefore stupid. My point here is that it would serve you well to cease all attempts at trying to craft analogies. You're horrible at it.
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