Lead Us Not Into Excess, Share the Abundance
Wess Daniels is a Quaker pastor and writer from Camas, WA. He was asked recently to reflect on the meaning of abundance. Below is his response.
Abundance surrounds us. It fills our closets, drawers, backpacks and our garbage cans. And for many of us who are connected to a wide variety of privileges our abundance often translates into waste.
A friend of mine recently made a documentary called Dive! It poignantly addresses the connection between garbage and hunger, excess and waste. The film tracks a number of young white urbanites who have a new found joy in ‘rescuing’ food from the dumpster. This joy is challenged as they become aware of other, less privileged folks, also coming to the dumpsters for food. The majority of the film dives into the connection between what lays as waste in our dumpsters and the great disparity and hunger both in our own society and around the world.
The film was documented during the growing global food crisis of 2008 and covers well the impact that this had on many low-income families in the US. The contrast between the amount of food found in dumpsters like Trader Joe’s in Los Angeles and the growing lack of food at LA food banks shocked the filmmakers. Filmmaker Jeremy Seifert notes, “In the physical act of jumping in a dumpster and eating waste something happens, the reality strikes you of what is taking place.”
And the reality is stark. Every year 96 billion pounds of food are thrown away in America, 11 million pounds a day, and a good majority of that food is fresh or days away from its expiration date. Recovering just some of this would make a huge difference. “The Department of Agriculture estimated in 1996 that recovering just 5 percent of the food that is wasted could feed four million people a day; recovering 25 percent would feed 20 million people. Today we recover less than 2.5 percent” (Dive Website).
The problem is not so much that we don’t have enough, but that some people have too much. Abundance is not the main issue at stake here, the abundance of the few is.
We live in a society of trash and are okay with this as long as it is our own excess we are throwing out. We forget that many in America (let alone other places in the world) do not have access to this excess. Thus, the poor among us end up eating our trash. The earth and all its creatures have for us become simply something to hoard, consume and then throw away. Excess and abundance counter our deep-seated fears of scarcity. As Abraham Joshua Heschel said, “Forfeit your sense of awe, let your conceit diminish your ability to revere, and the universe becomes a market place for you.” To take this one step further, when we lose that sense of awe, we lose that sense of right sharing and just distribution and in doing so we lose our sense of responsibility to one another.
We then turn this question back on ourselves and consider the ways in which our own fears of scarcity and desire for abundance can actually create a vacuum of resources for others. While we may want to foster and nurture abundance, how are we participating, implicitly or explicitly, in a system of unjust distribution? Who is and is not showing up to eat what is available? Are there ways that we can get “abundance” into the right hands, into the hands of the people who need it? Abundance is excess unless it leads to just distribution.
In our day, the Bible has been misused to mark out a theology of waste and excess. Yet, I am constantly drawn back to Jesus’ radical prayer where he teaches his disciples to pray for “daily bread,” to “forgive debts” and to “rescue us from temptation” (Mt 6). In these petitions, there is a recognition of our constant temptation to take more than we need, to hoard and build up debt, and to focus in on abundance rather than right sharing. I think Jesus’ intentions were to help form a community of sharers rather than takers. This community is based on the conviction that God has given enough for all people and a rightly ordered community will live in a way that makes part of its mission to actually be givers of daily bread. It will be a community that seeks to cancel debts and live in a way that frees from temptation to take more than is needed so that there is enough to go around. Otherwise this community might become people who pray to God for daily bread on the one hand, while on the other hand they take in excess so that their neighbors go hungry.
In the Quaker tradition, of which I am part, we have worked to limit what we take out of a desire to be better distributors or sharers. We recognize that greed and hoarding, or a desire for our own abundance, are actually at the heart of a lot of evil in the world. John Woolman, the Quaker abolitionist and 17th century advocate for human rights, wrote in his journal after visiting slaveholder’s homes to challenge them on their practice, “The love of ease and gain are the motives in general of keeping slaves.”
Some of the faces have changed (ever so slightly) but our own love of ease and gain still keeps our dumpsters full and many bellies hungry.
Questions for reflection:
● How is our own love of ease and gain actually implicated in enslaving others?
● What do we desire in excess? And how does this actually create a vacuum somewhere else, whether in our own lives or in the lives of others?
● What forms of “abundance” do I participate in that may be coded in a way that I do not recognize that I am actually being a taker rather than a giver of daily bread?
Released Minister @ Camas Friends Church: A Quaker Meeting
Sabbath Economics 101
An evening with Will O’Brien
“The Bible says more about economics than it says about sex!” Will O’Brien tells an intergenerational gathering inside a Lexington, KY living room.
It’s an interdenominational crowd, as well. We’ve just shared a potluck meal and Will, sitting cross-legged at the front of the room, gently pushes his glasses up his nose, opens a tattered Bible and begins the topic on why we’ve come together—something called “Sabbath Economics.”
Sabbath Economics is a bit nebulous to define, but boils down to living one’s life in a rhythmic manner, instructed through scriptural teachings, that promotes a life (and world) that is properly balanced. Through this practice, there is adequate work and rest, needs are met, and the societal burdens of both poverty and excess are alleviated.
Will muses at how much time and energy our faith communities spend tangling on issues of sexuality, of which the Bible speaks little and sometimes vaguely. This contrasts the Bible’s vast teachings on economic practice—that is how we spend our time and resources—and is often more explicit.
Will is a respected educator on this topic. Based in Philadelphia, he is a long time advocate for the homeless and those living in poverty. He is coordinator of the Alternative Seminary, and is a writer and editor for inspiring and artful Consp!re magazine.
I first came to know Will through a related class series last year at the Alternative Seminary in inner-city Philadelphia. I found my faith journey richly enlivened as Will powerfully demonstrated that dusty, youth-taught Bible stories are actually pulsing,
relevant instructions for a modern life lived faithfully and wholly. The discussions and realizations in that class have led me to reconsider much in my own life.
On this particular night, we only have about an hour to meet and the topic of Sabbath Economics is broad. Will does his best to succinctly share some ideas and guidelines.
Pointing to the “Loaves and Fishes” story of Jesus feeding the 5,000—a story that appears prominently in each of the gospels—we see that out of perceived scarcity, there ends up being enough for everyone with some even left over. Will draws our attention to the language Jesus uses in this story. Jesus seems to be referencing instructions given to the Israelites when Moses led them from bondage into a new covenant and way of being. (Read Exodus 16.)
In this model, you take only what you need—no more and no less—and have faith that God will provide the rest. “Provide the rest” is a powerful theme in Sabbath Economics, in which we are asked to labor, it’s true, but we also are invited to rest. Trust in a loving Creator provides the freedom that we can (and need to) take time to rejuvenate, enjoy, refuel and relax. It is commanded.
We will not always get it right. We miscalculate what we have, or what it takes to meet our needs. Our needs will also change unexpectedly through life-shifts that we can’t always anticipate. Through Sabbath Economics teachings however, there are systems in place to restore balance to individuals, communities, and lands. If we do not observe these, gross inequities occur. We see this exemplified in scripture and today in our surrounding world. God’s children are allowed to be crushed into poverty, the wealthy choke on excess, crimes against one another ensue, and destruction overtakes. We burn out. In the story of Moses, we see that this is the system—the old way—that the slaves have been freed from, with an opening, as God’s Chosen, to pursue life in a new way.
This is the new way:
We are to labor six days and rest on the 7th. We are to possess only what we need. Every seventh year, we are to observe a sabbatical as a community. While in sabbatical, we are to forgive (and be forgiven) of misdealings, to free those who have been forced to become debt slaves, and to let the land lie fallow (interpretable in both literal and various personal ways.) We are to focus on spiritual and physical restoration. After 49 years (7 x 7), we enter into the 50th year, which is called “Jubilee.” This season in Jewish law, instructs every household to recover its absent members, the land to return to its former owners, any slaves to be set free, and the remission of debts.
This is a time for us (as a community, group, or nation) to initiate the pardon of debts, release inequities, and open an intentional space for joy.
In both Greek and Hebrew, the word for Spirit also means “breath.” Will led us in a physical exercise drawn from the Burning Bush story in which Moses first encounters God whose name is given as “Yahweh.” As the name is repeated, Yah-weh, we notice that it sounds an awful lot like the intake and exhalation of breath. Could God be, at least in part, something of the life force being brought in, out, and through us? Is God as close as the pulse of our heart, the opening and constricting of our lungs?
Indeed we are brought back to this simple act of rhythmic grasp and release. Will demonstrates this motion, clenching his fists to him, then opening his palms outward.
We toil and we rest. We seek to control and be free from control. We clutch our possessions, then by sharing, unburden the weight. We need, we are needed. We forgive, we are forgiven.
This is part of the vision that God has for us. This is Sabbath Economics.
by Betsy Blake (betsy@rswr.org)
To learn more, visit:
Sabbath Economics Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabbath_economics
Sabbath Economic Collaborative: http://www.sabbatheconomics.org/content/index.php
Sojourners Magazine article:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa4010/is_200805/ai_n27899610/
More photos from the evening:
And a short video clip:
