BY AVIAN JOSEPH

here often are thoughts on your mind on issues affecting the church known only to yourself. When these thoughts make their way to the pulpit in somebody’s sermon, you listen attentively and realize that God had been speaking to you on the same issue all along—remarkably with the same conviction.

I’ve always cherished those moments and thanked God that He still speaks to people today, in so many uncanny ways. One such time had to do with a text that has always baffled me: “The poor we would always have with us” (forgive my paraphrase). I have mused over this text long and hard.

I never thought Jesus asked His followers to take vows of poverty. He may have given special prescriptions to some would-be followers, but it was not an outright command to all.

I wondered if a state of poverty would make me more dependent on God to supply all my needs and if such a dependency would keep me closer to His side.

Then I looked closer at the Bible. Abraham was rich. Job had his fortunes restored 10 times more. Doesn’t the abundant life begin here and now? Are we to experience only spiritual riches without the material in tow? Why, then, at least in my part of the world, do we seem to have such a problem with progressive Adventists who do well on their jobs and move up the social ladder? We often look at them with scorn and disdain.

In my church, until recently, people kept it a secret—where they worked or what position they held—for fear of ridicule from their fellow members. One Sabbath evening we decided to bring the subject out into the open. “Let’s discuss this poverty thing,” we volunteered. Texts like “the love of money is the root of all evil” (1 Tim. 6:10) came up. Everybody had their say.

We concluded that God blesses us in different ways and that nothing is wrong with money per se; it’s how you use it. Both the rich and the poor can find themselves out of the kingdom—the one for being greedy for filthy lucre and the other for being like the rich fool, just building bigger barns with no concern for his soul. I concluded that the long and short of the matter is that once we accept Jesus Christ as our personal Saviour, He changes everything—if we allow Him. So that the poor we always have with us are not necessarily the same poor.

As we near the season of peace on earth, goodwill to all, there’s yet another idea that has bothered me for some time. Some Adventists in Trinidad and Tobago often talk about not celebrating Christmas. A familiar argument says that it’s a pagan festival; Christ was not born on that day.

I’ve personally felt that Christmas is a great time of year, one that I eagerly look forward to. In spite of the overcommercialization, it’s a time of laughter, merriment, and a real sense of joy—the carols, the hymns, the stories, the gifts. Why can’t we enjoy a time when the rest of the world is at least thinking of the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, Saviour of the world?

Perhaps you can imagine my sense of déjà vu recently when in a midday sermon the president of the South Caribbean Conference waded a bit into our stodgy, stuck-up mannerisms and lamented that some Adventists would have no ginger beer, sorrel, or Christmas cake to offer Jesus should He be ministering in our town at Christmastime.

I wonder if some of us are so heavenly minded that we are no earthly good. We are often so out of touch with our immediate reality. We have taken a bit too far the text that talks about being in the world and not of the world. And I’m reminded of the powerful point on contextualization made in lesson 12 of last quarter’s Adult Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, “Errors and Setbacks in Witnessing” (Sept. 9-15, 2000). The idea of being true to principle but at the same time understanding the context within which we work; the culture of the people whom we wish to reach; our own culture, for that matter; and the whole business of flexibility and acceptance resonates with me.

I thank God that truth is progressive; and I thank Him that He is still leading His church, step by step, day by day, till we all come into the unity of the Spirit.

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Avian Joseph is a corporate communication manager who lives in Trinidad, West Indies.