Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he [God] has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you." (Hebrews 13:5, ESV, emphasis mine)

Recently a large daily reported on the national debt of 82 major political economies selected from across all continents. By the end of this year those nations will have accumulated a staggering $52 trillion in public debt equalling roughly the whole world’s annual economic output! Add to it the corresponding figures of the other 110 odd nations of this planet as well as the world-wide corporate and private debt and you will easily reach a global liability level of $180 trillion, thus 3-4 times the world’s annual economic performance! Wow! And that doesn’t even include interest and hidden social liabilities (e.g. pension funds) of tremendous proportions of many nations. Its simply insane!

For most people those figures are so incomprehensibly high that they shut their eyes and ears to the reality of how much a burden this will mean for every single income earning world citizen. Because besides having to make room for likely private debt, each earner will also contribute to paying off public debts through continuously increased taxes and levies of all sorts as well as corporate debts through rising prices for goods and services.

Believer or not, the majority of people doesn’t even contest, question or scrutinize the validity and necessity of incurring debt anymore, perhaps because education systems and economical role-players have hammered it relentlessly into our brains as most normal and logic. And it seems they have succeeded to such an extend that any opposing views are ridiculed and laughed at. Still, as a general rule, borrowing money simply means being discontent with what you have, no matter how logic the arguments for any loan might sound.

Today we reap the hugely negative results of an ungodly man made financial system that is not only driving our economies but is also very destructive in its setup as it forces everyone to continuously grow to avoid economic death. However, because environment constrains and limited resources make a perpetual growth for everyone impossible, our economies, meant to be a provision platform for people’s needs, have turned into battle fields where role players fight ruthlessly and shamelessly with all possible means for their own survival.

All this has not in the least anything to do with contentment. And yet as believers we are exhorted to be content with what we have and ultimately look to God for provision instead to man or corrupt systems. Apparently good and honorable intentions of a minority are still drowned out by a majority thats driven by greed, selfishness, fear, and other profane attitudes and perceptions. And so we’re heading rapidly for the ultimate worse case scenario, the crash of our babylonian finance/economic system almost everyone depends on.

So what can we do as ordinary citizens? Change the system? Besides, is it possible and worth engaging in stemming the unavoidable? Well, knowing that we’ll never be sinless we still strive to avoid sin, don’t we? Likewise we need to strive to cooperate with God in establishing His rule and reign in the financial/economic realm also. So don’t get paralyzed by looking at the impossible but energized by Him who can make everything achievable.

For most of us it starts by cleaning up our own acts first to gain any authority and influence to help others. Stop borrowing, stop using future means now, make it a priority to pay your debts a.s.a.p. to escape the yoke of slavery (Proverbs 22:7). Be contend with what you have (Hebrews 13:5) and don’t let anyone entice you into buying what you don’t need and can’t afford. Operate within your current means and don’t bank on what you might get in the future since you neither know nor have influence on what will even happen tomorrow (James 4:13-14). Heeding all that advice would already mean a powerful start for change …

Gottfried Hetzer

08 June 2010