2 Corinthians 9:11
“You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.” (1 Corinthians 9:11)
There are three main types of poverty in the world. Collective poverty (which includes class and regional poverty) is the semipermanent insufficiency of the material means of life for an entire population and can be applied to nations. Cyclical poverty is the widespread but temporary deprivation caused by disease, crop failure, or economic breakdown such as occurred in this country in the 1930s and 1980s- possibly in the 2020s due to the pandemic and war. Individual poverty is a condition of want resulting from an individual’s misfortune or inability to work, including widows, orphans, the handicapped, outcasts, aged, mentally unable, and addicts of many kinds.
We tend to think of poverty as a personal matter, and we feel better about it when we are convinced that it stems from laziness or lack of discipline. Scripture recognizes that there is such poverty but says very little about it. Rather, the constant emphasis in Scripture is on poverty due to oppression. This oppression can be individual or corporate. A whole people can come under God’s condemnation for oppression and injustice. This corporate injustice seems to be a central theme in the great pivotal events in history. Violence was the only specific sin mentioned as a reason for the Flood (Gen. 6:11, 13); oppression and injustice brought judgment on Egypt (Exod. 1–12); Israel and Judah were sent into exile for injustice as well as idolatry. Even the Incarnation had something to do with this theme. Mary sang of it: “He has put down the mighty from their thrones, and exalted those of low degree; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away” (Luke 1:52-53).
Christ himself announced his calling: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord” (Luke 4:18-19).
This proclamation of Christ is normally spiritualized, but Christ’s own description of the next pivotal event – the Second Coming (Matt. 25) – makes abundantly clear that he will judge people, at least in part, on the basis of what was done to relieve physical need and oppression.
Is there something in societies’ structures that is unjust and is the cause of suffering? Something in the system itself must contribute toward the problem World Bank President and successful capitalist Robert McNamara graphically identified:
Two-thirds of mankind . . . remain entrapped in a cruel web of circumstances that severely limits their right to the necessities of life. They . . . are caught in the grip of hunger and malnutrition, high illiteracy, inadequate education, shrinking opportunity, and corrosive poverty.[109]
I do not present these comments in an attempt to define any specific systemic cause for the present human tragedy; that lies in the province of specialists. But both Scripture and human history do point toward corporate responsibility as well as individual responsibility and call for corporate action as well as private charity. The solution must begin with the private individual. But each individual is responsible to involve those in his sphere of influence to find corporate solutions, whether a mother with her children, a pastor with his church, a businessman with his policies, or a public servant with his power to change and use the structures of society to promote justice and mercy.
Scripture calls for both broad based action and private involvement. Change must begin with the individual. Take a few moments to examine before the Lord how you can better relieve others’ physical need and oppression. What will you do to break the web of circumstances that limits access to the necessities of life? As we broach the Christmas season, can you purpose to reach out of your abundance to not only meet the needs of the poor for the next weeks, but work to relieve systemic poverty? What might this look like?
[109] Robert McNamara, One Hundred Countries, Two Billion People (New York: Praeger, 1973), 30.