No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other,
or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
Jesus of Nazareth
I'm surprised that none of Jesus' listeners challenged his assumption that people serve money. The first time the statement is recorded is in the Sermon on the Mount; the second was as Jesus confronted the religious establishment, which professed to serve God but who in fact were ‘lovers of money’ (see Matthew 6:19-34 & Luke 16:13-15). He never said anything similar about other vices: he didn’t, for example, say, ‘You cannot serve God and sex’. Nor did he say the more obvious, ‘You cannot serve God and the devil’!
Today, we take it for granted that people serve money. Money is the driving force of modern society and economic theory is a primary means of studying and explaining human life; maximising profit is the goal of modern business and every personal, moral choice has to be financially viable. Money itself is the global status symbol, promising freedom, security, purpose, power, happiness – and even love. Some people make its accumulation their life’s goal; others see it as the path to fulfilment or the things it can buy as defining who they are.
But it hasn’t always been this way and that’s why older translations of Jesus’ statement don’t say ‘money’ but ‘mammon’. The difference is still important. Money is a tool, invented at various times in history in various parts of the world, as if for the first time, to enable people to exchange goods and services easily. That’s why there’s no sin or evil in being rich, although wealth brings with it responsibility and many challenges.
But money evolved and took on a life of its own. It became more than just a tool for living – even an indispensable tool – and acquired the power of ‘the force of an idea whose time had come’. That's why generations of artists have portrayed mammon as a demon. When enough people began to give disproportionate importance to money, entire societies began to revolve around it. Everyone else had little choice but to rely on money too. That is, unless they trusted God sufficiently to underwrite their obedience to living by his criteria.
But money evolved and took on a life of its own. It became more than just a tool for living – even an indispensable tool – and acquired the power of ‘the force of an idea whose time had come’. That's why generations of artists have portrayed mammon as a demon. When enough people began to give disproportionate importance to money, entire societies began to revolve around it. Everyone else had little choice but to rely on money too. That is, unless they trusted God sufficiently to underwrite their obedience to living by his criteria.
The Sermon on the Mount describes a lifestyle that puts God and people first: not first ‘by a head’ but way ahead of every other consideration. I’m sure Jesus included his statement about serving God and mammon so his followers would not be deterred from living the way he described by the financial consequences.
Most people today, including most Christians, would say that they do put God and people first, and they would be sincere in saying so, but in my experience financial issues often come such a close second they divert attention and compromise rationale and behaviour. I’ve experience this in my own lifestyle choices and seen it in others. I’ve also seen churches submit what they believe to be God’s will to financial criteria, not quite believing that God will provide the resources for what he calls them to do but waiting for the money to be banked before taking even a first step of faith.
Money is system of trust. This was the case when everyday things like seashells and coloured beads were used as the first money. It remained the case, to some degree at least, even when coins were made of gold and silver but today it’s more true than ever. Almost all money now exists as data in sophisticated banking systems and there is so very much of it that Planet Earth lacks the resources to convert it all into material wealth. Even the 2-3% of money that are coins and banknotes exist in the real world only like a novel, giving expression to an idea but not really real.
This is another reason why we can’t serve both God and money. We can either live in grateful dependence upon God, using money as the tool it was created to be, or we can rely on humankind’s ultimate system of trust, loving and serving the money we think need to live. The Pharisees who listened to Jesus were prime examples of this: they purported to serve God but loved money. Next weekend, I plan to look at why Jesus called their wealth ‘unrighteous’.
© All Souls Clubhouse Community Centre & Church and Philip Evans 2014.
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