Others don't have to lose for us to win

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Someone else’s belonging does not require my exile.

Scot Loyd

What is the opposite of abundance? It's not scarcity. It's greed. Greed is the belief that there is not enough for everyone, so you'd better grab yours now. What is the opposite of love? It's not hate. It's fear. Fear is the belief that someone or something can hurt you.

Robert G. Allen

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Most politicians make promises.

In 1920, Warren G. Harding promised a “Return to Normalcy”

In 1928, Herbert Hoover promised “A Chicken in Every Pot and a Car in Every Garage”

In 1956, Dwight Eisenhower offered “Peace and Prosperity”

In 1988, George Bush offered a “Kinder, Gentler Nation” 

Barack Obama offered “Hope,” and Trump said he would “Make America Great Again”

Promises, promises

And now we have a President promising that if we let him stay in power

He will give every American adult $5000

The check is in the mail!

If you think about it, what most politicians do is appeal to our sense of scarcity.

They promise us what we think we don’t have

Wealth.  Power.  Safety. Hope.

A chicken in the pot.

To put it another way, they often appeal to fear (or create it)

Trump spoke to those people spooked by the emergence of a “new America” that had dared to elect a black person to the Presidency.  To a nation of people suddenly realizing that white, Christian, heterosexual, and culturally conservative was not the definitive identity of the “true American.”

Trump promised to take us “back”

Make us “backward” is more like it

He has succeeded in some horrible ways

We are such malleable people.

So easily influenced, swayed, so easily controlled.

We are afraid of “not enough”

Not enough money, food, water, housing

Not enough health care

And every leader ever (with a notable exception)

Preys on that mentality

And promises to give us what we are afraid of losing, or what we think we don’t have.

Obama promised more equality and equity to a nation controlled by white conservatives for years.

Trump promised white evangelical Christians that they would regain control of American culture.

Biden promised less Trump.

Trump promised cheaper gas and more affordable groceries (and underneath it all, white supremacy)

We truly believe, I think, that if others gain, we will lose

We have been taught that there is not enough to go around

This, by the 10% who have (and are hoarding), who control 68% of America’s wealth

By the 1% who control more than 30% of America’s resources

Someone once said (often attributed to Mahatma Gandhi), "The [Earth/world] provides enough to satisfy every man's needs, but not every man's greed." 

What do we do with the fact that our fear, our sense of scarcity,

gives people like Donald Trump so much power?

Maybe we listen to the one guy who didn’t buy into the scarcity model

And who defined an abundant life in a far different way

Blessed are the poor

Blessed are those who mourn

The first shall be last and the last first

Sell all you have and give to the poor (are you listening, Elon?)

Jesus did not sell wealth.

Jesus sold abundance

He promised that if we could learn to trust in God

(remember the lilies of the field)

We would be set free from the scarcity mindset

And we would be able to be

Welcoming

Accepting

Generous

Forgiving

And we would be satisfied.

Remember Isaiah?

Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your earnings for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. (55:2)

Why do we keep listening to Donald Trump

And not to Jesus?

Seems like a valid question

And I believe Walter Brueggemann was right.

The power of the future lies not in the hands of those who believe in scarcity but of those who trust God's abundance.

Lord, help us trust

Creating space

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Recently I’ve been wondering: if, when Jesus says deny yourself and follow me, that maybe it’s not about ensuring his followers are doormats. Maybe he’s inviting us to deny the part of us that wants to see itself as separate from God and others. 

Deny the self that believes that spirituality should be a suffering avoidance program.

Deny the self that always creates a list of demands.

Deny the self that is so turned in on itself that it cannot see much of anything beyond itself…

Because in the end, one aspect of the whole death and resurrection thing that Jesus promised us is the death of the false self.

But the death of the false self doesn’t feel good. In fact, Richard Rohr once wrote that “holiness never feels like holiness; it just feels like you’re dying.”…

But no matter how painful, when the unhealthy ideas and habits and identities we rely on are taken away from us, it just makes space for that which is actually real and actually holy….

Nadia Bolz-Weber. Daily Meditation, CAC, August 31, 2026

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Those who follow Jesus

Have signed on to something weird,

A path that leads not to ascent

To what is normally seen as victory and success

But to descent.

To what is normally seen as renunciation, 

Perhaps even failure and defeat.

Those who will be first must be last.

If you want to live, you have to die.

Give, if you want to receive.

Weird.

Or not.

Honestly, if I want to grow,

If I want to become a better human creature,

If I want to “move on,”

I must be continually letting go,

Continually dying.

Beginnings often can only come after endings.

If I am full of ego, for example,

Full of “me,”

(like someone we all know)

Then there is no room for other people,

No room for God.

And if there is no room for God,

Then I must become my own god

If I am too full of “victim,”

Then there is no room in my soul for self-examination;

“What about this mess I am in, is really about me, not them?”

If I can’t let go of my fear, I can’t be open to

Other people.

Change.

God’s new thing.

Maybe Jesus was on to something.

Deny the self,

Let it all go

Hand it all over.

And God will keep much of it.

But God will also hand back that which is worth keeping

And much more besides.

Know the job

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Thomas Howells, my beloved English Professor in College

Once opined

That you ought to know the job requirements before you take a job

 

Sounds right!

 

But I think, looking back, that I have

More often than not

Taken jobs, and then tried to make them fit my expectations

 

I don’t think I really thought it through

When I decided to take on the job of “minister” or “pastor”

 

Even after four years of seminary and an M.Div.

I am not sure I had really thought about what it meant to take on that role.

 

If I had, I would have understood that I did not have the skill set

I had some of the skills

But not all

Perhaps not most

 

So I remade the job to fit my natural skills

Which meant parts of the job got neglected

Perhaps worse

 

I got away with it, mostly

But underneath some real successes

Was some real poverty

 

It gets even worse if we start thinking about the whole idea

Of being a follower of Jesus

OMG

Seriously!

 

It is one thing to go through the motions of

Memorizing scriptures

Showing up on Sunday morning and being pious

Thinking it looks cool to wear a cross

 

It is quite another to die to one’s self

To embrace radical love

Which means embracing

Radical generosity

Radical forgiveness

Radical compassion

Radical acceptance and welcome

 

Which means being willing to let go of much that we prize

And be a servant

And perhaps

Stand against the powers of this world

And resist abusers of power

And haters

And the greedy

 

To go against the core values

Of a nation gone wrong

Of a religion gone off the tracks

 

To try and be a follower who is also a “minister,” a “leader?”

Way beyond me

 

All I can do is echo the words of Paul (Romans 7,  JB Phillips)

In my mind I am God’s willing servant, but in my own nature I am bound fast, as I say, to the law of sin and death. It is an agonizing situation, and who on earth can set me free from the clutches of my sinful nature? I thank God there is a way out through Jesus Christ our Lord.

 

Thank God for the Spirit

Thank God for grace and forgiveness

 

Thank God for the ways God can use us

Despite ourselves

 

May we, in these difficult times

Be honest about what the “way” looks like

About who we follow

What we embrace

 

May we, as best we can

“take on the job”

Of being God’s people