Greed

Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in the power of your hand to do so. Do not say to your neighbour, "Go, and come back, and tomorrow I will give it,'' when you have it with you. Proverbs 3:27-28.

Ford motor company made a car in 1971 called the Pinto that was prone to bursting into flames when it was rear ended. The cost of fixing the problem was $121 million.
The potential compensation to victims was calculated at $50 million. Ford decided not to fix the car!

Ford is not alone in this respect. Ralph Nader has spent his life exposing the appalling safety record of the 3 major American car manufacturers. The callous cynical attitude shown by Ford, GM and Chrysler towards their customers is typical of many corporations past and present who place their own self interest above that of others. No surprise then that their customers have switched in droves to Toyota and Honda! No surprise either that they are all in trouble, and in danger of disappearing altogether.

Why have I chosen these examples? Because they are typical of human nature and behaviour. Look after number 1. Why do today what you can delay indefinitely?
The world is in a mess because of this attitude. In fact it’s always been in a mess because of this attitude. History is littered with examples of Empires, nations, kings, corporations and individuals who thought self interest was the right choice. God disagrees!

Not only does he disagree, He gets really ticked off when he sees one group of people taking advantage of others by grabbing all they can for themselves, and ignoring the plight of those less fortunate.
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. Matthew 23:25

Instead of Scribes and Pharisees we should substitute Chief Executives and Chairmen, to bring the quote into the 21st century. In the 19th century it would have been Mine owners and Mill owners, in the middle ages Cardinals and Barons, and so on and on.

God is not opposed to wealth, provided it is obtained legally and morally, and it is used wisely. After all He bestowed immense riches on Soloman after he had asked for wisdom. Some people use their wealth wisely. (Watch Bill & Melinda Gates, their lives will be long and are blessed.) Others accumulate wealth like a cancer. It’s only purpose is to grow! They will employ any means to get it, increase it, and keep it. They spend it on themselves, wasting it on frivolities. (Jeffrey Skilling was jailed for 24 years, and Ken Lay died of heart attack. Both CEO’s of Enron Corporation.)
Unfortunately there seem to be more Skillings and Lays than Gates in the world. When William Wilburforce set about the abolition of slavery, he had only a couple of allies in the house of commons. All the rest were either against him, or indifferent!
It’s a shocking indictment on the elected representatives of this country that they resisted efforts to end slavery for as long as they did. Hardly surprising though, as many of them had investments in the slavery business, and though it lay in their power to do good to the slaves, they preferred to protect their own wealth and privilege

Tsar Nicholas II was the last of the Romanovs, a dynasty of kings that had ruled Russia for centuries. Under the feudal system that they perpetrated, millions of Russian serfs had no rights in law, and were effectively slaves of the Tsar and the nobility of Russia. Other European nations had long since abandoned this system, and France had suffered a bloody revolution in the 1790’s because of a system that actually treated its peasants better than the Romanov’s did! Alexander, the Tsar at the time ignored the lessons of France, and 130 years later his descendant Nicholas II was deposed and murdered along with his family by the Bolshevik revolutionaries led by Lenin. One of Lenin’s co-revolutionaries was a man called Joseph Stalin. France’s revolution spawned Napoleon Bonaparte, who plunged Europe into war for 23 years, killing millions in the process and ruining France. Russia’s revolution spawned Joseph Stalin who was responsible for the deaths of millions of Russians and others in the ethnic regions. He actually made the lives of the Russian peasants worse, and was instrumental in causing a famine in 1921-22 that claimed an estimated 5 million lives! Stalin once said that the death of one man was a tragedy, but the death of a million was a statistic! The history of eastern Europe after the second world war is a tragic testimony to the monster that the revolution spawned. I wonder what the Tsars would have thought of him? I wonder if they would have accepted their responsibility for his rise to power?

After the first world war the allies (including Great Britain) imposed punitive war reparations on Germany, even to the extent that France stripped the Ruhr region not only of it’s autonomy, but also of much of its industrial capacity. The burden was so onerous that in the 1920’s inflation was so bad that people had to cart money around in barrows to purchase food. Then at the end of the decade the world fell into the great depression, and conditions for the people of Germany got even worse! Meanwhile a small party led by an ex army corporal was growing in popularity on the back of all this misery and discontent. By 1933 they had by fair and foul means managed to get 33% of the vote, which made the Nazi party the largest in the German Parliament, and it’s leader Adolf Hitler the most powerful man in Germany. I do not have room here to give you the rest of the story, most of which you will know anyway, except to say that by 1945 most of Germany and Europe lay in ruins, and over 60 million people were dead!

Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in the power of your hand to do so. Do not say to your neighbour, "Go, and come back, and tomorrow I will give it,'' when you have it with you. Proverbs 3:27-28.

Jesus said…
But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you. Matthew 5-44.

When will we ever learn?

The current world recession is the result of greed, immorality and selfishness. As Christians we must show the world a better way, the way Jesus trod. We must also pray for world leaders, for them like Soloman to desire wisdom above all else, or if not, for God to remove them. Above all we must pray that the present folly will not lead to a worse catastrophe!