Money
Nazarene Theological College
Brisbane, Australia
Graduation Chapel Address
7 November 1996
by
George Lyons
Introduction: Tonight I feel constrained to speak about a subject
near and dear to the hearts of all of us here. Whether we have it in adequate
or inadequate supply, we all seem to need, or at least want, more of it. The
subject of which I speak is “money.”
The purpose of my address is not to be
original, entertaining, or more popular. Most of what I have to say is merely a
paraphrase[1]
of what John Wesley said about money more than 200 years ago. And most of what
Wesley said is merely an elaboration on what scripture says on the subject.
You may find it surprising that ten
percent[2]
of Wesley’s preserved sermons treat the subject of money at great length. At
least, I did. And you might be even more surprised to learn that he considered
tithing a sub-Christian practice. I know I was.
But I shouldn’t have been surprised.
For Wesley was not exaggerating in the slightest when he claimed that,
comparatively speaking, he was “a man of one book.”[3]
His sermons literally overflow with biblical quotations and allusions. He knew
his Bible so well that its words became his natural language. As a
Bible-teacher, I can tell you, without fear of contradiction, that the
Scriptures give few subjects more attention than money. And, much as I might
wish it were otherwise, Wesley’s expositions of the relevant biblical passages
are sound and compelling.
For most people, the prospect of
hearing a preacher talk about money is as entertaining as is the thought of
visiting the dentist. They seem to know innately: This is going to hurt! This
is going to cost me something! But most of us visit the dentist, occasionally
at least, because we know that the alternative will be even more painful and
expensive. Just so, Scripture tells us plainly that the way we handle our
money, and our other disposable assets, plays a decisive role in determining
our eternal destiny. If we believe, really believe, as we profess we do, in the
world to come, we must give careful attention to how we handle our resources in
this world.
So don’t expect me to entertain you.
Consider this your required visit to the dentist! Grin and bear it. Open wide
and say, “Ah!” And don’t try to talk back while I’ve got sharp instruments in
your mouth!
Wesley found
few subjects he preached about as unpopular with his own converts as what he
had to say about money. So, I’m prepared for the worst. The very success of the
Wesleyan revival became its undoing, as the wealth of many Methodists
increased.[4]
Wesley reports his visit to one society in 1770.[5]
“I . . . spoke as plain as possibly I could to a money-loving people” on
Jesus’ parable of the Rich Fool. “But I am afraid many of them are
sermon-proof.” He sadly learned that, in general, “the
more people increase in goods, the more they decrease in grace.”[6]
“Of all
temptations,” Wesley considered none so serious a threat to the life of
holiness as “the deceitfulness of riches.” He claimed to have seen “a thousand
melancholy proofs” during his more than half-century ministry. He writes:
Riches
are deceitful indeed! For who will believe they do him the least harm? And yet
I have not known thirty rich persons, during these years, who, as far as I can
judge, were not less holy than they would have been had they been poor.[7]
Riches
cultivate foolish and hurtful desires. By providing the means of gratifying these
desires, riches tend to increase them. And there is a close connection between
unholy desires and unholy dispositions, such as pride, anger, bitterness, envy,
spite, vengefulness; and a head-strong, unteachable, unreprovable spirit. The
desire or possession of riches naturally tends to create, strengthen, and
increase every kind of temporal, sensual, even diabolical desire.[8]
By
riches I mean, not thousands of pounds, but any more than will procure the
necessities and conveniences of life. Thus, I consider him a rich man who
has food, clothing, and shelter for himself and his family and something over.[9]
And few in these circumstances are not hurt, if not destroyed, by them!
Yet
who takes warning? Who seriously regards that awful declaration of the Apostle
Paul that not only those who are rich, “but [even] those who want to
be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful
desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction” (1 Timothy 6:9; New
Revised Standard Version).[10]
Wesley correctly reminds us that “St. Paul does not say, ‘Those that want to become rich by evil
means, by theft, robbery, oppression, or extortion; or those willing to resort
to fraud or dishonesty to become rich.’ His warning is simply that ‘those who
want to be rich will be sorely tempted.’”
And then Wesley
poses the $64,000-question: “But who
believes that? Who receives it as God’s truth? Who is deeply convinced of it?
Who preaches this? Who has the courage to declare so unfashionable a truth?”
At 78-years of age,[11]
Wesley resolved, “It is high time I should
speak as strongly and explicitly as I can. May God grant me the strength to
speak forthright and forceful words; and, you to receive them with honest and
humble hearts! Let it not be said, “They hear your words; but they will
not do them.”[12]
But this was Wesley’s unhappy lot.
Despite his impassioned pleas, God did
not grant Wesley’s prayer:
O that God would give me the thing which I
long for! that before I die I may see a people wholly devoted to God and dead
to the world; a people wholly given up to God, in body, soul, and substance!
How cheerfully should I then say, “Now let your servant depart in peace!”[13]
When he was 83 (in
1786), Wesley wrote in frustration:
I
am not afraid that the people called Methodists will ever cease
to exist. But I am afraid, that they will exist only as a dead sect, having the
form of religion without the power. And this undoubtedly will happen, unless
they hold fast to the doctrine, spirit, and discipline with which they
began.
I
fear because I have seen that wherever riches have increased, with but few
exceptions, the essence of religion, the mind that was in Christ, has decreased
in the same proportion. Therefore, I do not see how it is possible, in the
nature of things, for any revival of true religion to continue long. For
religion must necessarily produce both industry and frugality; and these cannot
but produce riches. But as riches increase, so will pride, anger, and love of
the world in all its forms.
How,
then, is it possible that Methodism as a religion of the heart should continue
long? For the Methodists in every place grow diligent and frugal; consequently,
they increase in goods. Hence they proportionately increase in pride, in anger,
in the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life. So,
although the form of religion remains, the spirit is swiftly vanishing away.
Is
there no way to prevent this continual decline of genuine religion? We ought
not to forbid people to be diligent and frugal. We must exhort all Christians
to gain all they can, and to save all they can. But to do so is, in effect, to
urge them to grow rich! So how can we avoid letting our money send us to hell?
There
is one way, and only one, under heaven. If those who “gain all they can,” and
“save all they can,” will likewise “give all they can;” then, the more they
gain, the more they will grow in grace.[14]
When he was 86 (in 1789), two years
before his death, Wesley wrote of his near despair over the Methodists’ general
neglect of his repeated warnings:
I
am distressed. I know not what to do. I see what I might have done once. I
might have said peremptorily and expressly, “Here I am: I and my Bible. I will
not, I dare not, vary from this book, either in great things or small. I have
no power to dispense with one jot or tittle of what is contained therein. I am
determined to be a Bible Christian, not almost, but altogether. Who will meet
me on this ground? Join me on this, or not at all.” . . . But, alas! the time is now past; and what I can do now, I
cannot tell.[15]
O
gainers, lovers, possessors of riches! I have given you one last warning. O
that it may not be in vain! May God write it upon all your hearts! Though “it
is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to
enter into the kingdom of heaven,”[16]
yet the things impossible with men are possible with God.
Lord,
speak! and even the rich men that hear these words shall enter your kingdom,
shall “sell all for the pearl of great price;” shall be “crucified to the
world;” shall “count all things as rubbish” that they may win Christ![17]
And what about the Church of the
Nazarene and other denominations of the Wesleyan-Holiness Movement that emerged
to pick up the mantle Methodists had dropped? Have we become so lifeless and
worldly that Wesley would despair of us as well? Are we “sermon-proof”? Will it
take nothing short of a camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle-scale miracle for us
to be saved?
The
Right Use of Money: Wesley’s sermon
on “The Use of Money”[18]
is an exposition of Jesus’ difficult parable on the “Dishonest Steward,” found
in Luke 16:1-9. Unlike the parable of the “Prodigal Sons,” which precedes it,
this is not addressed to the divided audience of tax collectors and sinners and
scribes and Pharisees. Jesus directed it to “disciples,” his followers — the
people of God.
The story concerns a rich man who
caught his steward in corruption and announced his intention to sack him.
Before he returned the books to his master, however, the corrupt manager came
up with a scheme to secure his future. He adjusted downward the accounts of all
of his master’s debtors, so they would be obliged to him once he was out of a
job. At the end of the day, “The master commended the
dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world
are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the
light.” Jesus concludes the parable with these words to his followers: “I tell
you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is
gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings” (Luke 16:8-9; New
International Version).
Wesley notes that the people of this
world are wiser “in their own way” than most Christians. “They are more
consistent with themselves; they are truer to their acknowledged principles; they
more steadily pursue their end” than the people of the light. Christ urged his
followers to learn a lesson from the unjust steward: Make wise and timely use
of worldly wealth. Gain friends “by doing all possible good, particularly to
the children of God,” so that when your wealth is gone and you “return to
dust,” God may welcome you into heaven.
In Wesley’s day, as in ours, worldly
people were more apt to discuss the right use of money than were believers. Wesley protested this neglect:
“The love of money,” we know, “is the root
of all evil;” but money itself is not evil. The fault does not lie in the
money, but in those who use it. It may be used badly. And what may not? But it
may be used well. It is fully applicable to the best, as to the worst uses.
Even in the
present, fallen state of humanity, money
is an excellent gift of God, answering the
noblest ends. In the hands of his children, it is food for the hungry, drink
for the thirsty, raiment for the naked. It gives to the traveler and the
stranger a place to lay their heads. By it we may supply the place of an
husband to the widow, and of a father to the fatherless. We may be a defense
for the oppressed, a means of health to the sick, of ease to them that are in
pain. It may be as eyes to the blind, as feet to the lame. Indeed, it may even
lift up the gates of death!
It
is, therefore, of the highest concern, that all who fear God know how to employ
this valuable asset. Christians need to be instructed how money may achieve
these glorious ends, and in the highest degree. All the instructions necessary
for this may be reduced to three plain rules. By carefully observing all of
these, we may prove ourselves to be faithful managers of worldly wealth.
The three-point outline of Wesley’s
essential preaching and teaching on money are familiar enough: First,
gain all you can. Second, save all you can. Third, give all you
can. But what did he mean by these words?
Gain All You Can: Wesley’s first
principle for the Christian use of money is:[19]
“Gain all you can.” Here, he says,
We
may speak like the people of the world. We meet them on their own ground. And it is our duty to be diligent. We ought
to gain all we can gain, honestly and conscientiously, without sacrificing
anything more precious.
We
ought not to gain money at the expense of life or physical or mental health —
our own or our neighbors’. Of course, we
may not engage in any sinful or hurtful trade — any business contrary to the
law of God or the law of the land, that requires dishonesty, that hurts our
neighbor, directly or indirectly. For we cannot gain money at the expense of
the soul — ours or our neighbors’.
Wesley recognized that there were some
lines of work that some might pursue with perfect innocence, without hurting
either their body or mind; but which others could not, for personal reasons.
Wesley, for example, believed that his own peculiar “constitution of soul” made
it unwise for him to pursue my wife Terre’s vocation. He wrote:
I am convinced, from many experiments, that I could
not study advanced mathematics without becoming a Deist, if not an Atheist. And
yet others may study it all their lives without sustaining any harm. No one,
therefore, can here decide for another. Everyone must judge for himself, and
abstain from whatever he in particular finds to be hurtful to his soul.
With “these
cautions and restrictions” carefully followed, Wesley considered it the sacred
“duty of all who are engaged in worldly business to observe that first and
great rule of Christian wisdom, with respect to money, ‘Gain all you can.’”
Industry, diligence, earnestness, persistence, and dispatch should mark the
work of Christians. There is no room for procrastination, laziness, carelessness,
or half-hearted labor for the people of the light.
Wesley urged his
followers:
Gain all you can, by common sense, by
using in your business all the understanding which God has given you. It is
amazing to observe, how few do this; how people run on in the same dull rut
with their ancestors. But whatever they do who know not God, this is no rule
for you. It is a shame for a Christian not to improve on whatever he does. You
should be continually learning — from the experience of others or your own;
from reading and reflection — to do everything you have to do better today than
you did yesterday.
Save All You Can:
Wesley continues: “Having
gained all you can, by honest wisdom, and unwearied diligence, the second rule
for the Christian use of money is, ‘Save all you can.’”[20]
Wesley did not have in mind wise investments in the stock market. The virtue he
recommends is frugality: Do not waste your money.
Wesley repeatedly
cites 1 John 2:15 and 16 as evidence that “Love Divine” leaves no room for the
love of money.
15 Do
not love the world or the things in the world. If any one loves the world, love
for the Father is not in him.
16 For
all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and
the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world (Revised Standard
Version).
Thus he urges: Do
not throw your money away on idle expenses. Do not spend it merely “to gratify
the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, or the pride of life.”
Before, we
Nazarenes say, “Amen,” too quickly, we should note that Wesley would probably
have condemned one of our favorite sacraments — the pot-luck. He explicitly
challenged the appropriateness of Christians over-indulging their appetite for
food. Not only drunkenness, but also gluttony, is strictly forbidden as a waste
of money, not to mention a waste of health. Wesley would also have had great
difficulty with our passion for restaurants. He wrote:
There
is a regular, respectable kind of sensuality, an elegant pleasure-seeking,
which does not immediately lead to indigestion or intoxication. And yet (to
mention no other effects of it now) it cannot be maintained without
considerable expense. Cut off all this expense! Despise delicacy and variety,
and be content with what plain nature requires.[21]
How
many of those who were once simple of heart, desiring nothing but God, are now
gratifying “the desire of the flesh;” studying to please their senses,
particularly their taste; endeavoring to enlarge the pleasure of tasting as far
as possible?
Are
you one of that number? Indeed, you are no drunkard, and no glutton; but do you
not indulge yourself in a kind of regular sensuality? Are not eating and
drinking the greatest pleasures of your life? If so, I fear that St. Paul would
have given you a place among those “whose god is their belly!”[22]
Wesley believed in
practicing what he preached. Once, for a period of three to four years he chose
to eat only potatoes in order to save money.[23]
On another occasion, a committee of
Methodist leaders came up with a scheme to help poor members cut unnecessary
expenses. They agreed that the health, time, and money of poor people would be
saved, if they could be persuaded to quit drinking tea. So Wesley resolved to
“set the example.” He writes:
It was
difficult breaking a custom of twenty-six years. For the first three days, my
head ached, more or less, all day long. And I was half asleep from morning to
night. On the third afternoon, my memory failed, almost entirely. In the
evening I sought my remedy in prayer. The next morning my headache was gone. My
memory was as strong as ever. And I have found no inconvenience, but a sensible
benefit in several respects, from that very day to this.[24]
And all the people
said, “Ouch!” Saving all we can calls, first, for the sanctified
discipline of all our bodily appetites — even legitimate ones.
Second,
Wesley applies the scriptural prohibition on “gratifying the desire of the
eye,” to needless expenditures on superfluous clothing,[25]
spacious houses, and useless decorations. He advises those who would use money
with an eye to eternal values: “Waste no part of it on expensive furniture; on
costly pictures, paintings, or gilded books; on elegant rather than useful
gardens. Let your neighbors, who know nothing better, do this!”[26]
To those who
objected, “But I can afford this or that!” Wesley replied: “You can afford
it? Quit talking nonsense! Let that silly excuse never come out of your mouth.
No one can afford to waste any part of what God has committed to
his trust for one purpose: to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. This is far
worse than simple waste. This is no less than to turn wholesome food into
deadly poison. And is there no harm in all this?”[27]
To those who
objected, “Why, what harm is there in these things?” Wesley replied: There is
this harm, that they gratify “the desire of the eye,” and thereby strengthen
and increase it; making you more and more dead to God, and more alive to the
world.[28]
Wesley was an astute observer of fallen humanity’s insatiable acquisitiveness:
Experience
shows that the imagination is gratified chiefly by means of the eye. Therefore,
“the desire of the eyes” is the seeking of happiness in gratifying the
imagination. Now, the imagination is gratified either by grandeur, by beauty,
or by novelty. Chiefly by novelty; for neither grand nor beautiful things
please any longer than they are new.[29]
Third,
Wesley reminds money-saving Christians: “‘The pride of life’ seems to imply the
desire of human honor and esteem. As
riches attract admiration and occasion applause, they serve as food for sinful
pride.”[30] And so he urges:
Spend
nothing to gratify the pride of life, to gain human admiration or praise.
Frivolous expense is frequently motivated by one or both of these. People chose
expensive diets, or clothes, or furniture, not only to please their appetites,
or to gratify their eyes, or their imaginations, but to feed their vanity as
well. Christians should learn to be content with the honor that comes from God.[31]
Wesley further
warns:
Those
who expend anything in gratifying these desires soon discover that to gratify
them is to increase them. The more they are indulged, the more they increase.
Whenever you spend anything to please your taste or other senses, you pay so
much for sensuality. When you lay out money to please your eye, you give so
much for an increase of curiosity, — for a stronger attachment to pleasures
that perish in the using. While you are purchasing anything which people
applaud, you are purchasing more vanity. As if you did not already have enough
of vanity, sensuality, or curiosity! What mischievous folly!
And
what you would not do for yourself, do not do for your children — now or in
their inheritance. If you have reason to believe they would waste your estate
in gratifying and increasing their sinful desires, at the peril of theirs and
your own soul, do not send your children to hell by leaving them your wealth.
Have pity on them!
How
amazing is the supposed love of those parents who think they can never do
enough for their children! What! Cannot you leave them enough of death and
destruction? not enough of foolish and hurtful desires? not enough of pride,
lust, ambition, vanity? When both you and they lift up your eyes in hell, will
you have enough of “the worm that never dies” and of “the fire that never shall
be quenched”! If you truly love your
children, give them enough to keep them above poverty and spend the rest in a
manner that gives the most glory to God.
Give
All You Can: Wesley’s third point met with the greatest resistance
among his Methodists. He insisted:
Do
not let anyone imagine that he has done anything, by “gaining and saving all he
can.” If he stops here, all this is for nothing. No one saves anything, if he
only piles it up. And you may as well bury it in the earth, as in the bank of England.
Not to use your money wisely, is effectively to throw it away. If you would
“use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves,” add a Third rule. Having,
gained all you can, and saved all you can, then “give all you can.”[32]
Nothing can be more plain, than that all who observe the first two rules
without the third, will be twice the children of hell they were before.[33]
In
spite of nature, and custom, and worldly prudence, give all you can. I
do not say, “Be a good Jew, giving a tenth of all you possess.” I do not say,
“Be a good Pharisee, giving a fifth of all your substance.” I dare not advise
you to give half of what you have. No, nor three quarters; but all![34]
You
may gain all you can, without hurting either your soul or body; you may save
all you can, by carefully avoiding every needless expense; and yet never store
up treasures on earth.
Permit
me to speak as freely of myself as I would of another man. I gain all I can
(namely, by writing) without hurting either my soul or body. I save all I can,
not willingly wasting anything, not a sheet of paper, not a cup of water. I do
not spend anything, not a shilling, except as a sacrifice to God. Yet by giving
all I can, I am effectively prevented from “storing up treasures upon earth.”
And that I do this, all that know me, both friends and foes, can testify.
But
some may say, “Whether you sought it or not, you are undeniably rich. You have
more than the necessities of life.” I have. Forty-two years ago, out of a desire to furnish poor people
with cheaper, shorter, and simpler books than any I had seen, I wrote many
small, one-penny tracts. Some of them sold far more than I ever imagined. And,
by this means, I became rich unawares. But I never desired or sought riches.
And now that they have come upon me unawares, I store up no treasures on earth.
I try to end every year with a zero-balance. I cannot help leaving my books
behind me whenever God calls me home; but, in every other respect, my own hands
are my executors.[35]
And despite the
millions Wesley earned, if we were to convert his income into today’s dollars,
he died a virtual pauper — not from wasting, but from giving.
Wesley’s rationale
for giving all we can is grounded on the biblical conviction that God alone is
“the Possessor of heaven and earth.” We are in his world, not as proprietors, but as managers. God has
entrusted us, for awhile, with goods of various kinds. But they remain his
property. We do not even belong to ourselves. We are his; as is all we enjoy.
God has told us clearly that we are to offer ourselves and our substance to him
as living and holy
sacrifices, acceptable through Christ Jesus, to serve him and
those for whom Christ died.[36]
If
we are to use our worldly substance as faithful and wise managers, we must
recognize that everything we gain and save belongs to our Lord. These things
are for the present in our hands, but he has the right to everything whenever
it pleases him.
Faithful
stewardship calls for us to provide for ourselves and our families food,
clothing, shelter, and whatever else health requires. When this is done, and
excess remains, we should “do good to them that are of the household of faith.”
If there is still an excess, as we are able, we should “do good to all people.”
In doing this, we give all we can — in fact, we give all we have to God. For we
“render unto God the things that are God’s,” not only by what we give to the
poor, but by what we spend in providing life’s necessities for ourselves and
our families.
We
should consider ourselves one in whose hands the Proprietor of heaven and
earth, and all things therein, has entrusted a portion of his goods, to be
disposed of according to his direction. And his direction is this — that we
should look upon ourselves as one of a certain number of indigent persons, who
are to be provided for out of that portion of his goods with which we are
entrusted. We have two advantages over the rest: The one, that “it is more
blessed to give than to receive;” the other, that we are to serve ourselves
first, and others afterwards.[37]
Wesley sincerely
believed that we would all have to give an account to God for how well we used
his gifts, but especially our money. Do we? How will those of us who call
ourselves Wesleyans respond at the judgment, when the Lord demands of us:
How
did you use your money? Did you waste it in gratifying the desires of the
flesh, the desires of the eye, or the pride of life? Did you squander it on vain
purchases for yourselves and your children? Did you pile it up to be left
behind? or, Did you use it to supply your own reasonable needs
and those of your family? Did you then restore the remainder to me, through the
poor, whom I appointed to receive it? Were you a general benefactor of
humankind? feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, comforting the sick,
assisting the stranger, relieving the afflicted, according to their various
needs? Were you eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame? a father to the
fatherless, and an husband to the widow? And did you use these works of mercy,
as means of saving souls from death?[38]
Wesley was persuaded that collecting “treasures on earth” was as clearly forbidden by our Lord
(Matt. 6:19) as committing adultery or murder.[39]
And he considered covetousness, greed, selfishness, pride, envy, and deceit as
all equally sinister manifestations of original sin.
Covetousness, in every kind and
degree, is an evidence of an unsanctified, if not an unconverted, heart.
Whether expressed as the love of money, which is too frequently “the root of
all kinds of evil,” or simply the desire of having more money, covetousness is
certainly contrary to the pure love of God.[40]
Wesley reports his frank conversation
with a wealthy, aged magistrate.[41]
You and
I are both on the borders of the grave. Shortly we must both appear before God.
Permit me to deal plainly with you,
without any reserve, in the fear and in the presence of God.
I
respect you for your office. I believe you are an honest, upright man. I love
you for having protected innocent people from cruel and lawless oppressors. But
I am obliged to say — though I am not your judge; God is — that I fear you are
covetous — that you love the world. And if you do, as sure as the word of God
is true, you are not in a state of salvation.
The man
replied: “Many people encourage others to give generously out of self-interest.
You do not seem to appreciate the fact that wealthy people must look after
their fortune. We cannot spend our time looking for poor people. When I have
seen them myself and given them something, they were scarcely ever satisfied.
And they did not use well what I gave them.”
The man
continued: “I simply cannot trust the stories of all those who plead for
generosity. Nevertheless, I have given hundreds of pounds to reputable
charities. You do not understand; I must support my own family. We Lowthers
have continued for more than four hundred years. We have always supported great
causes — like public charities and saving the nation from ruin. Others may
think as they please, but this has been my way of thinking, and has been for
many years.”
To this
Wesley replied:
1. Sir, I
have no self-interest in this matter; I am concerned about your best interests,
not mine. I want nothing from you. I desire nothing from you. I expect nothing
from you. But I am concerned for your eternal destiny.
2. It is
true, men of fortune must mind their fortune. But they must not love the world.
If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
3. It is
true, likewise, you cannot go looking for poor people; but you may be
sufficiently informed of them by those who can.
4. And if
some of the poor are never satisfied, this is no reason for not relieving
others.
5. Suppose,
too, that some use what you give them irresponsibly. That’s their problem. You
will not lose your reward for their fault. What you gave, God will repay.
6. You do
well to have all the assurance you can that those to whom you give are likely
to make good use of it. You should expect a stronger recommendation than their
own.
7. I
commend you for giving to reputable charities.
8. I am
pleased that you have given hundreds of pounds; I wish it had been tens of
thousands.
9. I cannot
object to your concern to support your family. But I wonder what God thinks
when you support them so lavishly, while they already live in extravagance.
10. I grant
that your family has been respected for hundreds of years. But does this matter
to God? Four hundred or one thousand years are but a moment compared to
eternity.
11. Great
things may be done. But little things must not be left undone.
12. And,
finally, if your opinions are scriptural, well and good. But, if they are
contrary to Scripture, the longer you hold them, so much the worse.
I must
earnestly entreat you to consider yourself, and God, and eternity. You are not
the owner of anything; no, not of one shilling in the world. You are only a
manager of what God has entrusted you with. It is to be spent, not according to
your will, but his. What would you think of your manager, if he spent your
money according to his own will and pleasure? If God is the sole and rightful
owner of all things and you are to give an account to him for his goods, how
will you justify spending any part of his bounty not according to his will, but
your own?
Is not
death at hand for both of us? Are we not about to appear in the presence of
God; and that naked of all worldly goods? Will you then rejoice in the money
you have left behind you? Will you rejoice in your so-called “support” for your
family. Will you not see it as it is — the support of their pride, and vanity,
and luxury?
O, Sir,
I beg you, for the sake of God, for the sake of your own immortal soul, examine
yourself, whether you do not love money? If so, you cannot love God. And if we
die without the fear of God, what remains? Only to be banished from him
forever!
Wesley would hear nothing of the
“common objection,” then as now, that poor people were in poverty because they
were lazy. He wrote out of his own experience:
I visited as many poor people as I could. I found some
in underground caves; others in their shacks, half-starved, cold and hungry,
weak and in pain. But I found not one of them unemployed, who was able to crawl
about the room. If you saw these things with your own eyes, could you spend
your money on ornaments or superfluities?[42]
Wesley tried to
warn his upwardly mobile Methodists of the dangers inherent in their apparent
success.
Rich
people face the continual temptation that comes from their unavoidable
associations with the worldly wealthy. They are always tempted to pride, to
think of themselves more highly than they ought to think. They are strongly
tempted to revenge, when they are affronted. And, having the means available,
few resist the temptation! They are continually tempted to choose ease over
self-denial. And without self-discipline, it is impossible to grow in grace.[43]
Rich
man! Rich woman! Do you deny yourself,
and take up your cross daily? Do you consistently practice the same spiritual
disciplines you did when you were poor? Why not? Is your soul not as precious
now as it was then? Who dares tell you the plain truth, but those who neither
hope nor fear anything from you? And if anyone does speak plainly to you, how
hard it is for you to bear it! Are not you far less reprovable, far less
advisable, than when you were poor? Will you even bear reproof from me?
Lord, I
have warned them! but if they will not be warned, what more can I do? I can
only “give them up unto their own heart's desires, and let them follow their
own imaginations!”
By not
taking this warning, it is certain many Methodists are already fallen; many are
falling at this very time; and there is great reason to believe that many more
will fall!
By what
method will God restore his decayed work? Will he not remove the candlestick
from this people, and raise up another people, who will be more faithful to his
grace, as in times past? When God’s people left their first love; lost their
simplicity and zeal, and departed from his work, in the past he raised up a new
movement, who are what they were, and sent them in their place.
Hear
me, all you Methodists who have not the same life, the same communion with God,
the same zeal for his cause, the same burning love for souls you had once! Take
heed! Be assured, the Lord has no need of you; his work does not depend
upon your help. As he is able “out of stones to raise up children to Abraham;”
so he is able out of the same to raise up Preachers after his own heart! O make
haste! Remember from whence you are fallen; and repent and do your first works! [44]
Do Bresee’s
Nazarenes need to heed this warning once sounded to Wesley’s Methodists? Is
there any hope for a revival of authentic, scriptural holiness among us? Aren’t
we weary of programs that prop up old corpses and bring in new ones? If we
succeeded in persuading unsaved Australians to visit our churches, would there
be any divine life there to sustain them?
Perhaps Wesley
expected too much of the experience of entire sanctification — that it should
affect the way we spend our money! Let’s get real! But, perhaps we need to
consider the possibility that Wesley might be right in his diagnosis that the
problem of lifeless, loveless, undisciplined, holiness churches lies in our
forgetfulness of the Bible’s teaching on the right use of money.
Conclusion: In conclusion, allow me to quote Mr. Wesley again:
Brothers
and Sisters, can we be either wise or faithful stewards, unless we manage our
Lord's goods as Scripture advises? Then why should we delay? Why should we
still seek secular solutions? Our kingdom, our wisdom, is not of this world.
Worldly prudence is nothing to us. We follow none any farther than they are
followers of Christ. Hear him! Today, while it is called today,
hear and obey his voice! At this hour, and from this hour, do his
will. Fulfill his word, in this and in all things! I beg you, in the
name of the Lord Jesus, live up to the dignity of your calling as managers of
God’s money!
Be done
with laziness! Whatsoever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might!
No more
waste! Cut off every expense which fashion or human whim demands!
No more
covetousness! Employ whatever God has entrusted you with, to do good, all
possible good, in every possible way, to the household of faith, and to all
people! Use worldly wealth wisely. Give all you have, as well as all you are,
as spiritual sacrifices to him who refused to withheld even his only Son from
you.[45]
Have
your riches not hurt you enough already, slackening, if not utterly destroying,
your “hunger and thirst after righteousness”? Have you now the same longing you
had once, for Christlikeness? Have you the same urgent desire as you formerly
had of “going on to perfection”? Have riches not hurt you by weakening your
faith? Have you still an uninterrupted sense of God’s presence? Have they not
diminished your hope for the world to come?[46]
Have
riches cooled, if not quenched, your love for God?
Can you honestly sing, “Jesus, Lover of my soul . . .
Other refuge have I none . . . Thou, O Christ, art all I want; / More than all
in thee I find.” I fear, not. And if your love of God is decayed, so is also
your love of your neighbor. And if you lose love, you lose all.[47]
Let
your heart be wholly committed to God! Seek your happiness in him and him alone.
Do not cling to the dust! “This world is not your home.” See that you use the
things of this world, without being engrossed in them (2 Corinthians 7:31). Use
the world, and enjoy God. Cling as loosely to all things here below as if you
were a poor beggar. Be a good manager of God’s money, so that when you are
called to give an account of your stewardship, he may say, “Well done, good and
faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!”[48]
We can only imagine what Wesley might
say to us. Modern life has certainly complicated the application of his three
simple rules. But I do not imagine that he would be pleased with our
consumer-economy and our love-affair with easy credit. What do you think Wesley
would say to those of us whose acquisitiveness has made our wallets fat with
plastic, our credit limits “charged to the max,” and our monthly payments kept
to the minimum, despite the exorbitant interest? And why? Not so we can be
generous, but so we can shower ourselves with more stuff. What would Wesley
think of so-called Wesleyans whose spacious homes, surrounded by lovely
gardens, sit in fine neighborhoods, so chock-a-block full of “stuff” that we
must rent storage space for the overflow? Would he consider these “treasures on
earth”?
I suppose the real question is: What
does God think? If Wesley were to return from the dead, he could tell us with
certainty. But would we even believe him then? With poor Lazarus on our
doorstep and the Bible in our hands, what more do we really need to know?[49]
I fear that what we need is not more information, but more obedience.
Endnotes
[1]This paper does not pretend to represent an original contribution to Wesley scholarship. I have taken the liberty of condensing, rewording, and otherwise adjusting Wesley’s eighteenth-century language to suit the late twentieth-century listening audience of non-specialists, for which it was intended. This unconventional approach to documentation is the case even when I use what appear to be conventional quotation marks and block quotes. Few of these are full and exact quotations. Strict quotations would have required more explanation than the time constraints such a presentation allowed. To have used scattered quotes, with ellipses, brackets, and transitional summaries would have made the paper visually distracting and virtually unreadable.
Notes provide interested readers with the necessary documentation to verify that I have not misrepresented Wesley. All references are to the 1872 Jackson edition of Wesley’s Works, which has been frequently reprinted by various publishers. For my research, I depended on the Providence House 1995 edition on CD-ROM.
[2]In Wesley’s Works, fourteen of the one-hundred-forty-one sermons devote at least several pages to money. The following five are devoted entirely to the subject: Sermon 50 — “The Use Of Money” (first preached in 1744), Sermon 51 — “The Good Steward” (first preached in 1758), Sermon 87 — “The Danger Of Riches,” Sermon 108 — “On Riches,” and Sermon 126 — “On The Danger Of Increasing Riches”
Nine others include lengthy sections discussing money: Sermon 61 — “The Mystery of Iniquity,” Sermon 68 — “The Wisdom of God’s Councils,” Sermon 78 — “Spiritual Idolatry,” Sermon 88 — “On Dress,” Sermon 89 — “The More Excellent Way,” Sermon 94 — “On Family Religion,” Sermon 95 — “On the Education of Children,” Sermon 107 — “On God’s Vineyard,” and Sermon 116 — “Causes of the Inefficacy of Christianity.”
[3]Wesley’s Works, 3: 213 (Journal from October 29, 1762, to May 25, 1765); 7: 203 (Sermon 107 — “On God’s Vineyard”); and 11: 373 (A Plain Account of Christian Perfection).
[4]See Wesley’s Works, 3: 187, Journal entry for 11 July 1764 — “I gave all our brethren a solemn warning not to love the world, or the things of the world. This is one way whereby Satan will surely endeavor to overthrow the present work of God. Riches swiftly increase on many Methodists, so called: What, but the mighty power of God, can hinder their setting their hearts upon them? And if so, the life of God vanishes away.”
[6]Wesley’s Works, 4:
303, Journal entry for 25 April 1785. See Wesley’s Works, 4: 366,
Journal entry for 31 September 1785 — “I went on to Macclesfield, and
found a people still alive to God, in spite of swiftly increasing riches. If
they continue so, it will be the only instance I have known, in above half a
century.”
[9]The
exegetical basis for Wesley’s definition of “rich” is found in 1 Timothy 6:8.
His exposition appears in Wesley’s Works, 7: 3, Sermon 87 — “The
Danger of Riches,” in which he writes: This “verse fixes the meaning of that:
‘Having food and raiment,’ (literally coverings; for the word includes lodging
as well as clothes,) ‘let us be therewith content.’ ‘But they that will be
rich;’ that is, who will have more than these; more than food and coverings. It
plainly follows, whatever is more than these is, in the sense of the Apostle,
riches; whatever is above the plain necessaries, or at most conveniences, of
life. Whoever has sufficient food to eat, and raiment to put on, with a place
where to lay his head, and something over, is rich.” Wesley sites the same definition of “rich” elsewhere in his Works
(see, e.g., Sermon 108 — “On Riches,” 7: 215 and Sermon 126 — “On The Danger Of Increasing
Riches,” 7: 356).
Wesley
allows that this definition may require some exceptions. “A person may
have more than necessaries and conveniences for his family, and yet not be rich.
For he may be in debt; and his debts may amount to more than he is worth. But
if this be the case, he is not a rich man how much money soever he has in his
hands. Yea, a man of business may be afraid that this is the real condition of
his affairs, whether it be or no; and then he cannot be so charitable as he
otherwise would, for fear of being unjust. How many
that are engaged in trade, are in this very condition! those especially that
trade to a very large amount; for their affairs are frequently so entangled,
that it is not possible to determine, with any exactness, how much they are
worth, or, indeed, whether they are worth anything or nothing. Should we not
make a fair allowance for them?” (Sermon 126 — “On The Danger Of
Increasing Riches,” 7: 356).
Wesley
attempts to undermine the excuses for the lack of generosity of those whose
investments make them appear to be poor: “Many have found out a way never to be
rich, though their substance increase ever so much. It is this: As fast as ever
money comes in, they lay it out, either in land, or enlarging their business.
By this means, each of these, keeping himself bare of money, can still say, ‘I
am not rich;’ yea, though he has ten, twenty, a hundred times more substance
than he had some years ago. It is possible for a man to cheat himself by this
ingenious device. And he may cheat other men. But, alas! he cannot deceive God;
and he cannot deceive the devil.” (7: 357-358).
[10]The preceding two paragraphs summarize Wesley’s Works, 6: 330-331, Sermon 68 — “The Wisdom of God’s Counsels.” The biblical text, 1 Timothy 6:9, serves as the basis for Wesley’s Works, 7: 1-15, Sermon
87 — “The Danger Of Riches.”
[12]Wesley’s Works, 7: 2, Sermon 87 — “The Danger of Riches.” This sermon is a careful exposition of 1 Timothy 6:8-9.
[16]Citing
Matthew 19:23. Wesley devotes an entire sermon to this text: Wesley’s Works,
7: 214-222, Sermon 108 — “On Riches.” Here he cites a number of reasons
why “it is absolutely impossible, unless by that power to which all things are
possible, that a rich man should be a Christian; to have the mind that was in
Christ, and to walk as Christ walked: Such are the hindrances to holiness, as well
as the temptations to sin, which surround him on every side” (7: 215).
[25]For a fuller discussion of Wesley’s views on the simple clothing appropriate for Christians, see vol. 7 of his Works, Sermon 88 — “On Dress.”
[35]This and the preceding three paragraphs depends on Wesley’s Works, 7: 9, Sermon 87 — “The Danger of Riches.”
[36]This and the next two paragraphs return to Wesley’s sermon on “The Use of Money.” He makes the same point in “On the Danger of Riches” (7: 10).
[38]This
paragraph summarizes Wesley’s Works, 6: 146-147 from Wesley’s Sermon
51— “The Good Steward.”
[39]Wesley’s
Works, 7: 3, Sermon 87 — “The Danger of
Riches.” He makes the same point in (7: 37)
Sermon 89 — “The More Excellent Way” (7:37). There he adds: “But
suppose it were not forbidden, how can you, on principles of reason, spend your
money in a way which God may possibly forgive, instead of spending it in a
manner which he will certainly reward? You will have no reward in heaven for
what you lay up; you will, for what you lay out. Every pound you put into the
earthly bank is sunk: It brings no interest above. But every pound you give to
the poor is put into the bank of heaven. And it will bring glorious interest;
yea, and, as such, will be accumulating to all eternity.”
[44]The preceding seven paragraphs summarize Wesley’s Works, 6: 333-335, Sermon 68 — “The Wisdom of God’s Counsels.”