Money vs Mammon, Soul vs Self
The Battle for Hearts and Minds - Part 3
'We use God's mighty weapons, not mere worldly weapons, to knock down the Devil's strongholds.' 2 Corinthians 10:4-5
An invading army cannot co-exist with a stronghold. It's the same in life. Either we take down the strongholds that threaten us, or the strongholds will take us down.
One of the great strongholds we face today, and something that constantly threatens to undermine our spiritual growth and influence, is the concept of 'lifestyle'. Lifestyle can be defined as 'the way I live expressing who I am.'
Many people believe that they can add to the quality of their lives by tacking things on to the daily routine or environment: 'If I can add a better style (house, car, holidays, hobbies) to my life, I will have a better life' So, we have magazines and TV shows that preach the gospel of lifestyles. We have doctors, fitness gurus and dietitians who preach about lifestyles.
But Jesus didn't say: 'I came that you might get a better lifestyle.' In fact, according to Jesus, if you don't put your faith in him, you don't even have LIFE, much less a lifestyle. Trying to improve your lifestyle without Jesus, is like a bald man trying to look better by going to a top hairdresser: if you've got no hair it's silly to think a new hairstyle will help you; if you've got no life, it's silly to think a new lifestyle will help you. (It's not the best analogy, I agree, but it will have to do! Apologies to my hair-challenged friends…)
When you focus on lifestyle, several things happen to your sense of perspective.
First of all, money becomes 'Mammon'.
In God's order, there's a difference between things created for utility and those created with personality. We shouldn't confuse the two. We shouldn't personalize 'things' and we shouldn't utilize (use) 'people'. Some things are given personal names, by us or by God, and others are not.
In Matt. 6:24-25, Jesus used the word 'Money' with a capital 'M'. Here, Jesus showed that money can take on a personality of its own in our lives. When we place our faith in money more than God, it takes on a life of its own. When that happens, money does talk; it says 'I can clothe you; I can feed you; I can give you drink.' It robs us of the opportunity to honour God.
When we focus on lifestyle, law becomes legalism.
When you talk about God's laws with people today, they think you're talking about restrictions on their freedom. But God's laws are not just arbitrary rules designed to stop us having any fun; they're descriptions of reality in God's moral universe.
In fact, God's moral standards as outlined in the Bible operate like walls in a building. They offer protection, safety and privacy, makring out the boundaries of a safe and rich life. You don't need to be constantly aware of them - they operate in the background of your life. You don't need to have a problem with them, unless you try to walk into them.
When we focus on lifestyle, soul becomes self.
The lifestyle industry owes a lot to Abraham Maslow, the father of the Human Potential Movement. Maslow taught that the greatest of all human needs is the need for self-actualization, the need to reach our potential as individuals. Go into any popular bookstore and you will face a plethora of materials that pay homage to Maslow, telling you how to look within yourself and discover the greatness within.
Christianity is based on the opposite proposition: If we look within ourselves, we will find only fallenness and failure. Abraham looked within himself and saw only an impotent old man. Moses looked within himself and saw only an inadequate stammerer. Jacob looked within himself and saw only a mischievious cheat. And Gideon looked within himself and saw only a timid coward.
Much later, an unknown German monk professor spent years looking within himself and saw only a filthy sinner beyond hope. Then he discovered in the book of Romans that the sinner can be made clean by grace. That simple but startling discovery started a revolution that reformed the world.
In each case, God could only use these people when they threw off their preoccupation with self and sacrificed everything for him. Your soul was not made for 'self'. Your soul (the inner core of your being) was made for God. As the Westminster Shorter Catechism has it, the chief end of man is 'To serve God and to enjoy him completely'.
We need to live life to the full, enjoying every good gift that comes to us from God, but we must be careful not to be preoccupied with lifestyle. Life takes on real meaning when we live for something bigger than such a narrow focus would allow.
© Mal Fletcher 2003
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