You Might Be Rich If ...

Despite what you think, you might be rich by global standards if ...

... you complain about wifi.

... food spoils in your fridge.

... you have a refrigerator.

... you are worried that you don't have enough money saved for retirement.

... you actually expect to stop working before you die.

... you have a savings account worth more than $100.

... you have health insurance (of any kind).

... you make more than minimum wage.

... you make minimum wage.  

... you have ever felt like your closet is getting too full.

... you have more than one of any of these: coat, pair of shoes, phone, computer, car, earbuds, twenty dollar bill, book, water faucet.

... you have enough food in your house to sustain you for more than a week without going shopping.

... you have ever said that your kids have too many toys.

... you or your wife owns a diamond.

... you are only concerned about WHAT your family will eat tonight, not IF your family will eat tonight.

... you are able to read this blog worrying about how you will pay for the internet access.

Instead of trying to prove all of these simple statements individually, I offer you a few simple yet shocking facts (from here and here).

1. 80% of the world lives on less than $10 per day.
2. Almost 50% of the world lives on less than $2.50 per day.
3. Half of the 2 billion children in our world live in extreme poverty.
4. One in eight people are chronically undernourished.
5. One in six people don't have access to clean water.

The Appeal - By John Grisham

Grisham tackles corporate greed and malfeasance once again.  This time, Grisham adds the extra complication of political corruption and misuse of the American democratic process.
Krane Chemical dumped horrendous amounts of chemical byproducts into its back 40, and the result was the transition of Carey County into "Cancer County."  A small local firm nearly went bankrupt fighting the big corporate boys, but justice was served with a $41,000,000 verdict.
However, a few back room meetings birthed a plan to "deal with" that troubling verdict by electing a "friendly" Mississippi Supreme Court judge.  The conservative judge is pure as snow, but he is frighteningly naive in his conservative Christian battle against liberalism and all its ills.  He has no idea that he is but a pawn in a larger scheme to save a big business from a well-deserved bankruptcy (which would surely follow from the other lawsuits and settlements).
Grisham scores a few moral victories with this book.
First, his obvious point is that corporate greed must be checked for the good of a vulnerable humanity, and this check often necessarily comes through huge punitive verdicts.  Without massive punishments for corporate wrong doing, there is almost no financial incentive for greedy corporations to correct (much less to prevent) wrongs.
Second, Grisham really gets deep into the moral complexities of justice.  Churches take both sides of this issue.  Some churches are blindly rallied to fight for the "moral" issues of anti-homosexuality and punishment of criminals (all the while dumbly acting as pawns in the larger political machine to elect the corporate boy).  On the other hand, a few churches fight injustice on the side of the poor.
So although the plot is a bit too predictable, this same plot forces us into the midst of ethical questioning.  Grisham makes us question why we stand where we do, why we support certain candidates, and what is really going on behind the scenes of our political landscape.  Any time a novel can do that - and tell a good story - I consider that a success.

Rainmaker - Review

Our church garage sale had two John Grisham books I hadn't read, so I tipped Sarah off.  Emma gave them to me for Fathers Day.  Score.

Rainmaker picks up on several common Grisham themes - injustice, underdogs, corporate wrongdoing, and ultimately dissatisfaction with money.  

The premise is simple.  Donny Ray had medical insurance, but when he needed a bone marrow transplant, his insurers unfairly denied his claim.  However, his parents were so poor and uneducated that they simply fought the insurance company with letters and phone calls, until it was too late.  When Donny Ray lay on his deathbed, they stumbled into contact with a young law student who took their case.  Against all odds, and with some very fortunate help from others, Rudy Baylor took down one of America's largest insurance companies and exposed their widespread fraud.

What I love about Grisham is that he tells a story with a point, or in this case multiple points.  1) Beware of corporate greed and abuse.  Not every big business is a good business.  2) Beware of greed - from within.  Riches may not be worth the sacrifices required to get them (or to keep them).  

Thanks for another good one, Mr. Grisham.

Book Review: "The Client" by John Grisham

The Client reads fast and rips your heart out slow.  A couple of kids in a trailer park stumble upon a mob lawyer just as he's about to commit suicide.  Out of a mixture of curiosity and compassion, they get sucked into the mess.  One boy ends up learning where a certain celebrity body is buried.  Then, the lawyer bites a bullet from his own gun.
The rest of the story is the kid trying to find a way out of the mess he stumbled into without harming his family in the process.  He is being chased by the mob and the Feds, and he is a poignant mixture of crafty and helpless, cunning and innocent.
In addition to its sheer enjoyment value,  The Client offers a beautiful little glimpse into the lives of an underprivileged family.  They are simply struggling to survive amid tragically difficult circumstances, yet they maintain steady love and grace for each other.  That's one of the things I love about Grisham.  He can deliver a profound message without the reader ever being aware that a sermon lies between the lines of the narrative.  Well done, sir.  Well done.

The Just Trust (Habakkuk 2)

You talked back, and we heard.

• Why does God create people with mental illnesses?
• Why do so many people do good with bad results or do bad and are constantly blessed?
• If God is love, and God is good, then why does a good God allow suffering?

You talked back, and God heard you.  Before you even asked the questions, almost a year ago, God led our worship planners to plan a series on the Minor Prophets.  Somehow,God led us to the book of Habakkuk, which answers your questions directly.  

Habakkuk has the same kinds of questions.  Adam introduced them last week.  

• Why is there so much injustice in the world?
• How can God allow evil people to prosper while good people suffer?
• Where is the God who is supposed to protect us and to take care of us?
• Where is the justice in this messed up world?

Even a prophet has doubts and questions.  Perhaps, it’s the prophets especially who voice the questions and doubts.  Maybe they are the honest ones who say what everyone is thinking and feeling.

It’s time for you to get a little prophetic.  In your bulletin, you’ll find a piece of black paper.  On this paper, write down your biggest doubts and questions about our world.  How is our world unjust?  What bothers you the most about our world?  When you think abou the global situation or your personal life situation, what makes you really angry?  Write it down.  I’m not going to ask you to read it to anyone or to talk to anyone.  The paper is black so that even your neighbor or your spouse can’t read what you’re writing.  Be completely honest.  Use all caps and explanation points and curse words if you want.  No one will see it.

OK, go ahead and write.

---

Now, hold on to that paper and that doubt for a few minutes as we turn to Habakkuk.  He asked God his questions.  He shouted at God, and then God answered.  Today, we’re going to read Habakkuk 2, which gives us God’s longest answer to Habakkuk.  We’ll start where Adam left off last week.

Why do so many people do good with bad results or do bad and are constantly blessed? (Talk Back Series)

Question: I 1000% disagree that what you plant, you harvest. Why do so many people do good with bad results or do bad and are constantly blessed?

There are several ways to answer your question.  Each answer is a little different, but all are true.

1. There is the idea of what it means to have bad results.  As Christians, we believe in the idea of God controlling ultimate justice. There are eternal consequences, both good and bad, for our actions here on Earth.  In the end, we are subject to God's judgement.  (See Psalm 1: “How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked...but his delight is in the law of the Lord...for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.”) Blessings are not derived from health, wealth or earthly success, but by knowing and living with and for Christ. John 17:3 talks about eternal life in knowing Jesus. If we envy the wicked, we are being shortsighted. 2 Corinthians 4:17 says that the suffering of the righteous is nothing compared to the weight of glory.
2. Often, when we think about God giving us good and bad things, we tend to think of people being either good or bad.  We say, why do bad things happen to good people and why do good things happen to bad people?  The truth is, none of us are good people.  We are all sinners, and we all deserve death and hell.  But we are saved by God's great grace and mercy. Romans 5:8 states: “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”  All of the good in our lives is already from God, and God loves all of us, even those who have not accepted Christ.
3. The idea that we reap what we sow is more the idea that if we treat others well and with love, then that often comes back to us in the form of love and friendship and seeing good happen to those we care about.  Those who live lives that are selfish and uncaring may still gain fame and fortune, but they will drive people away from them.  Eventually, people will see through someone and will know a snake when they see one. 
4. Often, the Bible actually presents two sides of the same issue.  The “reap what you sow” concept that Josh talked about last week is a great example of this.  Some parts of the Bible (like Proverbs) speak heavily toward justice here and now on earth.  The basic premise of Proverbs is that if you make wise choices, you will be blessed in this life.  This is the basic “rule of life,” the way life normally operates.  If you eat well and exercise, you are probably going to be pretty healthy.  However, if you eat pizza and icecream while watching TV all day, you’re going to need a fork lift to get out of bed by the time you’re 50.  You reap what you sow.  However, other books of the Bible speak more to the “exception to the rule.”  Sometimes, even if you do everything right, you’ll still get cancer and die at 30.  Sometimes, life simply isn’t fair.  Ecclesiastes is a book that goes more in this direction.  Both are true.  There are definitely basic principles for wise and healthy living, but just like English grammar, there are always annoying exceptions to the rules.

(Answered by Matt and Josh)

Sabbath Liberation (Deuteronomy 5:12-15)

       Meet Chan and Tin.  They worked most of their lives in the rice fields of Thailand.  After working all year on the farm, there was barely enough money to feed the family.  They struggled year after year in desperate poverty.

One day a recruiter for a company called Global Horizons came to their village promising high paying jobs on farms in America.  In one month in America, they could earn what they make in a full year in Thailand.  It was the opportunity of a lifetime to change the lives of their children and their whole extended family.

There was just one catch.  To enter the program, they had to pay a recruitment fee of almost $15,000.  They mortgaged their farms and their houses.  They talked their relatives in to mortgaging their farms and homes.  Tin’s loans ranged up to 80% annual interest, but Chan’s loans reached 152% annual interest.

When they got to the airport, Global Horizons forced them to sign a host of new documents - including a visa renewal fee of $8,000.  When they reached America, the recruiters confiscated their passports “for safekeeping.”  This meant that they had no identification and no way to prove that they were in the USA legally.

At first, there was plenty of work and on-time pay.  After a few months though, the work began to run out and the pay started coming later and later.  Often, they sent 100% of their pay checks back to Thailand so that their families could make the payments on their loans.  That meant they often didn’t have enough to eat, so they caught wild animals for food and gathered wild vegetables from forests.  They usually lived in overcrowded housing without enough beds for each person.  Sometimes the toilet wouldn’t work for weeks at a time.  They often lacked kitchens, washing machines, and sufficient heating. To limit their contact with outsiders, their handlers told them that Americans are greatly prejudiced against Asians and that leaving their housing grounds would be very dangerous.  

Surely this couldn’t really happen in today’s world, right?  They are free people.  They could just change companies, right?  Wrong.  Global Horizons was their legal sponsor and guarantor.  If they quit, they would lose their visas and be sent home to Thailand ... and their families would lose everything.  

Well, then, they could complain.  They could talk get help from the police, right?  Oh, you mean, the same police who arrested them as illegal aliens because they didn’t have proper identification?  They thought that if they went to the police, then they would be sent home - either by the police or by Global Horizons ... and their families would lose everything.

Well, then, surely, they could at least go on strike and protest for better working conditions, right?  Managers continually reminded them that if they complained, they would be sent home to Thailand.  Then, they would have no way to repay those huge loans ... and their families would lose everything.  The U.S. Justice department decided that Chan and Tin were “victims of human trafficking.”  They were officially, legally, modern day slaves ... in the United States of America ... in 2007.

They aren’t the only slaves.  The US government estimates that there are somewhere between 4 million and 27 million slaves in the world today - at this moment.

  This is a horrific tragedy, and the Church of the Nazarene and many other Christian and secular organizations are actively working to stop human trafficking and to protect those most vulnerable.  

However, today I ask you to consider that the problem of modern slavery is far more widespread than we have ever imagined.  I think you will begin to understand as we read our Old Testament lesson for today. 

Community Art Project: Exodus 15, Isaiah 25

This is the last installment of our community art.  If this is your first post, just scroll back through the archives to see all 8 weeks of art made by the people of KNU International English Church.  Special thanks to all the folks in Greenhouse Worship for incubating our creative worship experiences!

Isaiah 25:6-9 There he will remove the cloud of gloom, the shadow of death that hangs over the earth.  He will swallow up death forever!  The Sovereign Lord will wipe away all tears.  He will remove forever all insults and mockery against his land and people.
    The Lord has spoken!

 Exodus 15:8, 12  At the blast of your breath, the waters piled up!  The surging waters stood straight like a wall; in the heart of the sea the deep waters became hard.  You raised your right hand, and the earth swallowed our enemies.

Me and Abel - Genesis 4:1-16

Today we skip forward in our journey through Genesis.  After the creation of humans, there was the famous “Fall,” when humans first sinned.  Chapter 4 tells us, we kept falling, farther and farther. 

Old Testament Lesson: Genesis 4:1-16

¹ Now Adam had sexual relations with his wife, Eve, and she became pregnant. When she gave birth to Cain, she said, “With the LORD’s help, I have produced a man!” ² Later she gave birth to his brother and named him Abel.

   When they grew up, Abel became a shepherd, while Cain cultivated the ground. ³ When it was time for the harvest, Cain presented some of his crops as a gift to the LORD. ⁴ Abel also brought a gift—the best of the firstborn lambs from his flock. The LORD accepted Abel and his gift, ⁵ but he did not accept Cain and his gift. This made Cain very angry, and he looked dejected.

 ⁶ “Why are you so angry?” the LORD asked Cain. “Why do you look so dejected? ⁷ You will be accepted if you do what is right. But if you refuse to do what is right, then watch out! Sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. But you must subdue it and be its master.”

 ⁸ One day Cain suggested to his brother, “Let’s go out into the fields.” And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother, Abel, and killed him.

Gracias! - Review

Last week I took a spiritual retreat up to the mountains of northeastern South Korea (just below the border).  While there, I picked up a Nouwen book out of the monastery library.  Nouwen has been my most common spiritual director on retreats down through the years.
Gracias! did not disappoint.  It was full of profound cultural and spiritual insights which I needed to hear.
Gracias! tells the story of Nouwen's six month sojourn in Bolivia and Peru in the early 1980s while he was attempting to discern whether he was called to serve in Latin America.  If you think back about your world history, Latin America was a mess in the 70s and 80s.  For hundreds of years Latin America was ruled by European colonialists and their grandchildren.  Native Americans and people of mixed ethnicity were poor, uneducated, and deeply oppressed.  The fair skinned ruling class wanted to keep them that way, but around mid-century, the poor slowly decided that they didn't want to stay poor.
The Catholic Church - by far the largest religious group in Latin America - took a "preferential option for the poor" and assisted them in developing their lives through education, health care, better farming, better saving, social organization, healthier diets, etc.  Gustavo Guiterrez was developing and teaching his now famous - Liberation Theology - at this time.  As the poor gained knowledge of their human rights and hope that enabled them to shed fatalism, they began to push for reforms.  As the reformers were first ignored, then punished, then brutally persecuted, reform slowly merged into revolution.
And - given the power dynamics of wealthy nations, USA vs USSR, democracy vs communism - all of these issues in Latin America were set in the light of communism versus everything else.  80-90% of Latin America was poor at that time, and anyone who sided with them or helped them risked being labeled as communist, leftist, destabilizing, disruptive problem-makers.  The result was mass persecution of the Catholic Church whenever and wherever it openly assisted the poor.  People began to disappear.  The martyrs began to be counted by the dozens, then hundreds, then thousands and tens of thousands.
It is in this milieu, Nouwen was considering a life among the poor in Latin America.  A brave question and a brave sojourn.
I learned or relearned three important lessons through Nouwen's reflections.  Some of the most meaningful parts of the book came in his reflections of Gustavo Guitierrez's lectures which Nouwen attended several times.
1. Reform takes time.  I consider myself a reformer, a progressive, someone who is participating in the larger reform of the Church of our time.  I deeply want us to return to our Biblical and Christlike roots as a church, which will - yes - include much more service to the poor, but also much more love for all our neighbors and much more intense commitment to understanding and following Jesus in every possible way and reform in our structures and styles of doing church.  I have struggled with others' resistance, apathy, and lip-service to this reform.  However, observing the Latin American struggle from the distance of space and time encouraged me - oddly.  Their struggle - far more painful than ours - persevered as was largely successful, though it is still incomplete and ongoing.  If they can persevere in the face of persecution and death, I can persevere in the face of complaints or walk-outs.  Also, some of the people in the liberation theology group advised Nouwen that this all takes a great deal of time, that progress is slow, and that it must be done at the pace of the people not the pace of the reformers.  I felt a strong call to perseverance and patience.
2. True reform is deeply spiritual.  Gutierrez lectured on the spirituality of liberation and explained that without maintaining a deep connection with God, we lose the both the heart of love and the will to persevere.  Gutierrez advocated spending time in the "useless" work of prayer and meditation.   Nouwen observed that many of the reformers around him were hostile, angry, and militaristic (at least in words and mindset if not in action).  But the "old fighters" called these young bucks to peace, to patience, to connecting deeply with the Spirit of God, and to working patiently with the people even if that means suffering with the people as the people develop their own desire to further the reformation.  I felt a call to go deeper in my own spiritual life - even if that means less time for "tasks" and "productive" things.
3. Gratitude is central.  Nouwen was deeply struck by the inherent gratitude of the Latin American people.  They view everything as the gift that it is.  Life is a gift.  Food is a gift.  Work is a gift.  Home and family are gifts.  Every good thing we have is a gift from a gracious God.  As a reformer, as someone who deeply wants our world to be better, often I can focus on what is lacking the good that we need but is not yet.  Often I can look at our world as one large bundled collection of problems and deficiencies.  This is an extremely distorted view.  Yes, our world is broken and needs healing.  But even amid our brokenness, God is at work, and God has blessed us with innumerable good gifts.  Despite the dents and the dust, these gifts retain their glorious goodness, and I am - we are - called to celebrate these many gifts at all times and in all places.

The Josh rating: JJJJ.