Money in the Hands of God

I suppose the root issue of all our discussions about poverty and oppression is unjust suffering. We can come to some semblance of reasoning when it comes to good vs evil, but unjust suffering is a different story. And it isn't the question "why do some people suffer and others don't?" that really bothers us, but "why do some people suffer more than others?"

I think it is an interesting question, given that we are all dying. We are all suffering, relatively speaking. The only life we've ever known was being formed in the womb. Ever since then it has been an exercise in suffering a slow death (for some). My neice had a quick go of it - 5 years. I can't count the number of friends who are being hurried through the decaying process by cancer.

Oh, we try to avoid our suffering by filling our lives with things that make us "happy", but they are simply short term fixes. In the end, even our relationships will suffer a miserable end.

Suffering, much to the surprise of humanity, is not just the presence of evil or the absence of happiness or "nothing going my way", but the absence of life and the fruit of the Spirit - the absence of God.

The fact that money has some power in easing suffering and delaying death has made it our god, and it has begun to destroy us. We hoard it as "insulation" or "insurance", believing it might actually accomplish the impossible. But money in the hands of God moves. When the fruit of the Spirit is present, money doesn't ease my suffering, it gives me the opportunity to "suffer" to ease someone else's.

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Tim Bailey