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“Help the Poor”

        Hello, I'd like to discuss a matter that is my main passion along side Christianity, the two go hand in hand. I would like to discuss using financial wealth to help the poor. The Bible is very clear Proverbs 19:17 GNT "When you give to the poor, it is like lending to the Lord, and the Lord will pay you back." The trick is,"Do you believe God and the Bible?" I know God is real, Jesus is LORD. I believe in God, so I know this is fact. The cool thing is, God is very generous! God is so generous that when he pays you back, he'll pay you back far more than what you lend and with better things than money can buy. Fools spend excess money on luxuries they don't need in order to spark some sort of inner joy of just having stuff and they're left feeling empty. I think God will deliberately promote the feeling of emptiness in those who want to fill the hole with material things. It is good to have that hole if you don't have God. For God himself will fill it.

        The more you think about it from a spiritual standpoint, helping the poor is a good idea. We shouldn't need God to tell us,"Give resources to the poor so they're not starving to death instead of buying the 19' sub alpine fir Christmas tree" as a recent car commercial makes note of a splurge. For the spiritually immature though, they cannot see this. Spiritually immature people don't value all human life as precious, so they may say callous things like,"If I feed them, there will be more of them, and the problem will never be solved" The Bible lets us know this is simply untrue. Proverbs 13:23 GNT Unused fields could yield plenty of food for the poor, but unjust people keep them from being farmed. From the Bible we learn that the Earth can provide enough food to feed everyone. God does not fling conditional statements around so this means no matter how many people are on Earth, it can provide enough food for us all.

        Again, I think from a spiritual standpoint, even outside reading the Bible(but having faith in God), we should know it is right to feed people who would otherwise die or have health problems from lack of food! Because we know all humans are equal regardless of race in terms of worth to God, we should not think less of another(judge them) for any reason. Acts 10:35 GNT Those who fear him and do what is right are acceptable to him, no matter what race they belong to. So to help a random stranger from dying could be as important as helping a family member from dying! Have you ever fancy yourself as a hero who would stop a criminal from harming someone? That is a far fetched situation that may never happen, but there are people suffering neglect which can have as devastating effect on their life as a dastardly villain. You can be a hero by helping other people get enough food to eat. Not only can you you be a true hero by saving lives, it isn't a thankless endeavor either! Sure, no one on Earth may thank you, but the only one who's opinion really matters will praise you! You'll be blessed for helping the poor maybe on Earth, maybe in Heaven, or maybe in both places! Being blessed in Heaven is far greater than being blessed on Earth, unless you can use your Earthly blessings to help more people and thusly secure more Heavenly blessings. Matthew 6:19-20 GNT 19 "Do not store up riches for yourselves here on earth, where moths and rust destroy, and robbers break in and steal. 20 Instead, store up riches for yourselves in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and robbers cannot break in and steal.

Now let us delve into the Bible and explore many of the verses that talk about helping the poor:

        When Jesus was addressing a specific rich man: Matthew 19:21 GNT Jesus said to him, "If you want to be perfect, go and sell all you have and give the money to the poor, and you will have riches in heaven; then come and follow me." This applied to a specific rich man, not to everyone who reads the Bible. Spiritually we should feel this is how our lives are. We should feel all our resources are for the kingdom of Heaven. However, it may be unwise to give all your money to the poor if you have a family to support. Also if you have yourself to support you may make a philosophical error in scripture and go,"If the LORD will pay me back, I can give all my money to the poor, and he will provide." The problem here is if you have nothing to live on, you may start demanding the LORD provide you with money back so you can live on. We know from the LORD's prayer we're to forgive our debtors. So we know it is wrong to demand money back from those we lent it to. If we can't afford to live without the money, we should not be giving it away. Otherwise we're becoming part of the problem that needs fixing. Spiritually we're not to be attached to any of our wealth, as in it is all given away, but I think we're called to tactically distribute it. For instance if you had a billion dollars and wanted to give it to the poor, you don't exactly walk up to a random homeless man and give it all to him. It would be much better to distribute it across people who need it most. And to do that takes discernment. Also sometimes you don't want to give all you own because owning things can be tools in which you can make more money with.

        On that note, here is a side note. Let us explore one danger with the philosophy of,"If I keep my money invested all my life so I have a maximum to eventually give to the poor, what is the problems with this?" Luke 12:16 Then Jesus told them this parable: "There was once a rich man who had land which bore good crops. 17 He began to think to himself, "I don't have a place to keep all my crops. What can I do? 18 This is what I will do,' he told himself; "I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, where I will store the grain and all my other goods. 19 Then I will say to myself, Lucky man! You have all the good things you need for many years. Take life easy, eat, drink, and enjoy yourself!' 20 But God said to him, "You fool! This very night you will have to give up your life; then who will get all these things you have kept for yourself?' " 21 And Jesus concluded, "This is how it is with those who pile up riches for themselves but are not rich in God's sight." We learn,"If all we do in the world is try and earn wealth, but we never use this wealth to help the poor, we really never did help the poor!" So there is a danger even if you become a billionaire that if you never use the wealth to help the poor, then you didn't help the poor if you end up dying when all your money is tied up in stocks. Even if your intent was to eventually help the poor, some random person gets all your wealth and it is up to them to figure out what to do with it! There have been some wills debated in court where the family fights over millions willed to the poor. You can't just let a will take care of it. So investing is like a double gamble. People who talk about the stock market refer to it as a gamble. But it is a double gamble because the money in it isn't going to the poor. Now I'm not saying you shouldn't invest. I'm just saying you should not gamble with your entire wealth. Give some of it to the poor as you go along if your intent is to give a big chunk of it later in your life. Also if you're investing with the intent to give to the poor, tactically make moves if you get a terminal illness. David abdicated the throne to Solomon when he was getting close to death, but if David was not alive, the fight for the throne might have been messy.

        Mark 12:41 As Jesus sat near the Temple treasury, he watched the people as they dropped in their money. Many rich men dropped in a lot of money; 42 then a poor widow came along and dropped in two little copper coins, worth about a penny. 43 He called his disciples together and said to them, "I tell you that this poor widow put more in the offering box than all the others. 44 For the others put in what they had to spare of their riches; but she, poor as she is, put in all she had - she gave all she had to live on." Many are familiar with the Widow's Mite. The main thing to take from it is that God judges your giving from how much you give in relation to what you have. A common misconception here is that if you're down on your luck in your youth and you give what you have in your pockets to church that you're some sort of mega-spiritual superstar. This is not the case because you have your whole life ahead of you to earn money to give! Now if you give every moment of your time to the work of the Kingdom, and every moment not working for the kingdom, you're working on making money so you can help the church and the poor, then you might be in the running for being compared to the Widow's Mite. In fact I think this is what we're called to be. It just happens that not all of us have the faith to constantly be working for God. We should have the faith to constantly be at work for God, always being good and loving to those around us! I think the Widow's Mite is something we should all strive for, but not all of us will achieve it.

        Luke 11:37 When Jesus finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him; so he went in and sat down to eat. 38 The Pharisee was surprised when he noticed that Jesus had not washed before eating. 39 So the Lord said to him, "Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of your cup and plate, but inside you are full of violence and evil. 40 Fools! Did not God, who made the outside, also make the inside? 41 But give what is in your cups and plates to the poor, and everything will be ritually clean for you. Our sins are forgiven through Jesus, and we cannot earn grace. Grace is a free gift that God gives. We still should strive to be good and helping. God shows us here if he is looking to who is clean and unclean, there is a good argument for those who are helping the poor to be clean. I think we should not dwell on this because I don't think for the typical modern man we worry about if what we're doing is holy in relation to eating and drinking. We're supposed to strive to be holy though, and we learn in this verse that one way we can strive to be holy is to help the poor.

        Luke 12: 33 Sell all your belongings and give the money to the poor. Provide for yourselves purses that don't wear out, and save your riches in heaven, where they will never decrease, because no thief can get to them, and no moth can destroy them. We read something similar to this earlier in this article. It is good to see recurring themes in the Bible. It lends credence that it is an important topic. Obviously the poor need a lot of help in today's world. Many of them are literally starving to death. Money could help them buy food in which they can then survive. I think we should also bring them education so they could potentially give back to society, but having them not die is a huge bonus. Using one's money to help the poor is a rather big leap of faith. You have to realize that there is more to life than acquiring wealth and relaxing with it. Instead, you want to constantly work so you can help people in dire need. Even if you can't fix world hunger by yourself, working to saving a few kids helps stem the tide. I think we can fix world hunger if we have a change in perception across the people. Still, it is tough because it takes a lot of faith to give up on excessive luxuries and go into helping the poor with diligent and constant work. Matthew 8:20 GNT Jesus answered him, "Foxes have holes, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lie down and rest." Jesus was saying he had so much work he had no time to rest. We should follow in his footsteps as hard as it is and try. We're broken creatures though so we can't do a perfect Jesus run of always working and helping, but if we try, that is huge.

        Some people misinterpret this scripture: John 12:8 GNT You will always have poor people with you, but you will not always have me." Some people think that because we'll always have the poor that we'll always have multitudes starving to death. I think this isn't the case because it is possible to have all you can to eat, yet still be poor. As long as we have money, we'll have rich and the poor. And I don't see us moving towards a society of Star Trek yet where no one has money, yet everyone strives for greatness.

        James 2:5 GNT Listen, my dear friends! God chose the poor people of this world to be rich in faith and to possess the kingdom which he promised to those who love him. I'm not classically trained in scripture, but I think there are a few ways to interpret this passage. One way to look at it is to think back to Lazarus where he was poor in his entire life so he got great blessings in Heaven. We remember the rich man did nothing to help Lazarus so was sent to a bad place. We're not certain that is how God handles people and it could just be a warning as we should expect the worst. Yet, we see the people who have no chance in this world get great blessings in Heaven! If you ever wonder what happens to babies born dead, or someone who didn't get to see much of their childhood, God gives them great things! It makes sense too. Because God is generous, he may give them rewards on their best case scenario of them running their life. It is like, if you get cut off at the starting line, God may just say,"Well we'll view the rest of your life as if Jesus was running it for you." Maybe, but we do know the poor of Earth get it good in Heaven. But then what about the rich? Well the rich always had the opportunity to help the poor! That is how the rich of this world get to be rich in Heaven. It is through charity, their sacrifice of money is taken to mean great things in Heaven. This stuff really makes sense on how it should be, if reality is to be cosmically fair, and reality is fair even if this mortal life is not.

        Finally looking through scripture, let us touch on the Final Judgment. In this scripture we'll see that if God is to judge people, it could be based on how they treated others. Now God isn't going to judge any who are in Jesus, and we have forgiveness. The fruits of the spirit say when we're in Jesus that we'll help others though, but if we don't help before we perish doesn't mean we're judged at all. Matthew 21:31 "When the Son of Man comes as King and all the angels with him, he will sit on his royal throne, 32 and the people of all the nations will be gathered before him. Then he will divide them into two groups, just as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the righteous people at his right and the others at his left. 34 Then the King will say to the people on his right, "Come, you that are blessed by my Father! Come and possess the kingdom which has been prepared for you ever since the creation of the world. 35 I was hungry and you fed me, thirsty and you gave me a drink; I was a stranger and you received me in your homes, 36 naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you took care of me, in prison and you visited me.' 37 The righteous will then answer him, "When, Lord, did we ever see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you a drink? 38 When did we ever see you a stranger and welcome you in our homes, or naked and clothe you? 39 When did we ever see you sick or in prison, and visit you?' 40 The King will reply, "I tell you, whenever you did this for one of the least important of these followers of mine, you did it for me!' 41 "Then he will say to those on his left, "Away from me, you that are under God's curse! Away to the eternal fire which has been prepared for the Devil and his angels! 42 I was hungry but you would not feed me, thirsty but you would not give me a drink; 43 I was a stranger but you would not welcome me in your homes, naked but you would not clothe me; I was sick and in prison but you would not take care of me.' 44 Then they will answer him, "When, Lord, did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and we would not help you?' 45 The King will reply, "I tell you, whenever you refused to help one of these least important ones, you refused to help me.' 46 These, then, will be sent off to eternal punishment, but the righteous will go to eternal life."

        Now that we're through some scripture, you may be enlightened some if you never heard that stuff before. Or maybe you think all that is old hat. I think it is good to cover though to know how important the Bible makes helping the poor out. We're to help them so they can survive, and we're to help them spiritually so they know Jesus loves them. I like to add that we should educate them too if they need it, so they can return value to society, or perhaps read a Bible themselves. Let us look through some strategies about going to help the poor.

        First let us look at a flawed method of helping the poor. The flawed method of helping the poor is exporting food and giving it for free if you don't plan on doing it permanently. By flooding the market with free food for a few years, no local farming can make any money! Since local farming can make no money, they go out of business. Then when you stop exporting food to the foreign country, they're in worse shape than when you first started helping them because they don't have enough farming to support the region.

        That is a failure, but supply and demand can also be a solution. If you work with the government to provide food stamps to people in need, they can redeem them with local farmers. The local farmers stay in business, and actually see a surge in demand prompting the creation of more farms. In the same way, if you were wealthy enough to take a trip without impacting your money significantly, you could go into a country and personally buy from farmers and hand it to the poor who can't buy it themselves. After spending some time in a region and figuring how to help, you could then hire servants to do the routine you chose. Of course this requires great money and some risk to your own personal health, so maybe it isn't optimal. But I'm just illustrating if you use supply and demand positively, it could raise the amount of land being farmed.

        My own personal mission is towards helping the poorest of the poor in the Western Hemisphere. I figure by helping the poorest of the poor, my money can go further than if I was helping moderately poor, but surviving people. It costs less to help the poorest of the poor, and this means more of them can be helped. Also the poorest of the poor need the most help. And if you're really good at helping the poorest of the poor, they will no longer be the poorest of the poor and you can move on and help more people. I choose the Western Hemisphere because that is where I love and there is less cost associated with transportation of goods. Maybe if the Western Hemisphere gets up and running, it may make the Eastern Hemisphere jealous. Hey if you're reading this in the Eastern Hemisphere, let us race and see who can clean up their hemisphere faster. I don't think there is anything wrong with a race to stamp out hunger.

        The exact mission I am helping right now is Food For The Poor's fruit tree planting which is currently in Haiti. I like fruit trees because they can sometimes be neglected and still bear fruit yearly. You don't have to be a good farmer for fruit trees to bear repeat fruit. Repeat fruit is important because it is like a constant farming there whether work is put forth or not. Also there is deforestation because the timber was sold away so new trees should be planted. It is a green thing to do, planting trees. It fights global warming(not to say I care, but some people do). And if enough fruit trees are planted so there is a surplus, they can figure ways to preserve the fruit year round. For a country so starved for food kids have been known to be fed mud or minnows, fruit trees are a God send. It is working towards a long lasting solution towards hunger to plant fruit trees. Click here if you want to plant some trees and help kids with me

        Now that you have all the facts, you can strategize your path with God. If you're strong in faith, maybe you want to put in extra time and give more. If you're weak in faith, maybe you want to give some, but you can't give your all at first. Jesus helped people on Sunday which shows it is okay to help on Sunday. If you need to work Sundays as a job requirement, consider donating the money you make on Sunday's directly to the poor because you'll be doing as Jesus does and helping even on Sundays and then you'll have no worries about breaking a commandment. There are many charities to give to, and different strategies for each. Pick what is right for you and strive to make the world a better place. God is watching, he loves you. He will reward you greatly if you serve others. God will reward you far greater than anything money can buy for helping the poor.

-Jim Sager