Givers and Takers
We all know that a growing number of people nowadays are taking more from society than they give. Why is this? Obviously, Christian morality teaches us to care for "the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind, for widows and orphans." The idea of voluntary sharing one's possessions comes from Christ's teaching in the Gospels, in Acts ch. 2:44-45 and ch. 4:32-35. It should be noted that these texts use the continuing, imperfect verb tense that indicates a gradual and unfinished action. It was also voluntary, not the forced confiscation as in modern communism or state taxation. The incident with Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5:1-10 teaches us clearly that this married couple had the right to voluntarily give as much or as little of their goods as they chose, but their sin was that they tried to cheat the Lord by pretending to give all the money from the sale of their property... however, they kept back a part of the money.
So it is today: it's easy to fool the government. There are millions of people in modern society who have learned how to pretend, how to "work the system." They pretend to be poor or sick or disabled so they can apply for government benefits or private charity. Millions of people in the U.S. are receiving Social Security Disability payments simply because their unemployment benefits ran out or a doctor was willing for a fee to write that they are disabled. The problem here is that after a while the role we play becomes who we really are: the fake disability becomes a real disability. Their bodies get fat and weak and their minds go to seed.
This isn't only a U.S. phenomenon: when we lived in Russia we met many disabled people who refused to get retrained so they could earn at least a partial living. And we met others, young people who continued living with their parents and wouldn't look for a job. Some had been unemployed for a long time and had fallen into the bad habit of watching TV until the wee hours of the morning, sleeping in until noon, and staying in their pajamas or underwear all day. A common expression was - "we have unlearned how to work."
Last autumn I wrote an essay "Many Want To Be Transformed, Few Want To Change!" Here are just a couple paragraphs from it:
St. Paul wrote - "Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, even as we instructed you; that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and may have need of nothing" (1 Thessalonians 4:11-12). "The Christian life is by its very nature a growth process analogous to the growth of the body; perfection in good habits ought to grow as faith grows" - so wrote St. Clement of Alexandria. Good habits take effort and practice, they don't come automatically.
Again, St. Paul wrote - "For even when we were with you, we commanded you this: 'If anyone will not work, don’t let him eat.' For we hear of some who walk among you in rebellion, who don't work at all, but are busybodies. Now those who are that way, we command and exhort in the Lord Jesus Christ, that with quietness they work, and eat their own bread" (2 Thessalonians 3:10-12). It is contrary to God's Word that we give food to people who refuse to work, or even look for a job. Many want to be transformed, but few want to change!
Read the whole thing! We can easily imagine ourselves as saints or as geniuses or as millionaires who just won the lottery. But it's not easy to actually become a saint or a genius... and the probability of winning the lottery is much less than the probability of being struck by lightning... we prefer, however, to think the former will happen to us rather than the latter. As long as it remains just wishful thinking, hoping that God will send an angel with a magic wand who'll wave it and make us a saint or an instant millionaire, nothing will really happen. It takes years of work and struggles to reach those goals.
Change comes hard: especially as we grow older, the neural pathways in our brains get etched deeper and deeper. We want to drive somewhere new but our old brain takes over and drives us to our habitual destination. We want to stand up and do some simple exercises but our body refuses - it stays on the couch and our eyes stay fixed on the TV or our body stays on the chair and our eyes stay fixed on the computer. I just got a "standing desk" last week so I can get off my butt and begin to think more clearly and act more decisively while I'm working at the computer.
The prophet Hosea wrote - "Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap according to kindness. Break up your fallow ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until He comes and rains righteousness on you. You have plowed wickedness. You have reaped iniquity. You have eaten the fruit of lies" (ch. 10:12-13). Let's stop deceiving ourselves, let's take the necessary actions to change. It's time for us to become givers, not takers; saints, not sinners. The Greek word for repentance is "metanoia" - changing direction 180 degrees, turning our life around. That's real change. It's called conversion.
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