The Fear of Greed
what good is it to gain the whole world but have fear in your soul?
(a meditation on Luke 12.13-21)
Money stresses me the fuck out.
To be more accurate, the lack of money stresses me the fuck out.
When I have money, when I can take care of bills and groceries and medicine and provisions for my family, during these times my anxiety sits at a low simmer—hello anxiety disorder—and I move and breathe and have my being easily.
But, when the bank account is low, empty, overdrawn, when it’s a tight budget to only get the groceries we absolutely need, when shoes need to be replaced but there’s only enough money for a tank of gas… when the money isn’t there and I don’t feel secure, it’s these times especially that I become an anxious mess, taking my stress out on those around me, and pleading and bargaining with God desperately for fishes and loaves enough to get us secure again.
I don’t think I’m particularly greedy to want the basics of life in a capitalistic society taken care of—food, shelter, clothing, utilities. But, my fear is rooted in the same place as greed, and when I use money as a security blanket or a spiritual Xanax, I do run the risk of cultivating a particular kind of greed in my core.
Let me explain.
Once—at least once, although I imagine it happened a few times—Jesus was asked to make a judgment between two brothers over their family inheritance. This was a fairly common request of rabbis, Jewish people asking their religious teachers to help interpret the Torah—specifically Deuteronomy 21.17—in cases of family dispute. It was a WWJD before Jesus did anything.
The Torah was more than a spiritual document to Jewish people. It was instructions for life. So, when life seemed unfair because of another Jewish person’s actions, they appealed to the Torah, and when there was a dispute about the interpretation of the Torah, then went to the teachers of the Torah, the Rabbis.
So, a man approaches Jesus as a rabbi, asking for an interpretation of the Torah to help settle a dispute about family inheritance. “Jesus, judge on my behalf. Make my brother give me what I feel is mine.”
Jesus refuses to be throttled into instrumentalization, he refuses to be used towards an end. See, the man is asking for a judgment not necessarily based in fair justice but rather based in something so sinister that it takes the divine eye to point it out.
Greed.
The asking man probably didn’t think of himself as greedy. In fact, he probably thought of his brother as the greedy one—they both could be though—and was trying to get a judgment against what that greed was keeping from him, his portion of the inheritance.
But the truth is (and Jesus points this out) there’s more than one type of greed.
Jesus then tells us a story of a landowner, an already rich man whose land produced an abundant harvest. There is so much that he didn’t have a place to store it all. It was beyond his capacity to maintain. So, the rich landowner goes and builds larger storehouses so he can keep all the bounty for himself.
He rests in the security his wealth gives him, saying to himself, to his soul, “I have so much that I can live for years without concern. So I can eat, drink, and live it up. I’m rich!”
Then, God steps in, telling the man that he is going to die that very night. What’s going to happen to all the wealth and excess he has accumulated then? Someone else—I hope it was many other people—will own and enjoy his riches.
In telling this story, Jesus does actually interpret the Torah, but he does it at a deeper level than the original man was asking for. Jesus judgment from the Torah isn’t just about the actions of greed. Jesus goes deeper, to the substance of all kinds of greed. Jesus is getting to the core not of the inheritance dispute, but of what causes us to need the security of wealth and money in the first place.
Jesus took aim at scarcity and hit a bullseye.
Scarcity is the thing under the thing, the source of what drives greed to be greed. Rarely, if ever, do people accumulate wealth just to have wealth. There’s a reason people want more and more and more, and it’s because they have bought into the lie that there isn’t enough to go around.
When we believe that there isn’t enough, we become afraid that we are going to become one of the people who end up with nothing. That fear drives us to use wealth and money like a drug, something to keep us from facing the reality of the situation. Money becomes our security blanket, the emotional Xanax to keep anxiety at bay. Money keeps us from the stress, the fear, of our trust in the system of scarcity.
The reality is that there is enough to go around… as long as people stop hoarding, collecting, and gathering wealth they will never use.
That rich landowner was like the billionaires we have these days. Instead of making sure everyone has enough, they hoard wealth as if it will give them the security they long for.
Truth is, money does give a sense of security because we live in a system that is rooted in, generated by, and dependent on greed. Capitalism is a system of scarcity, and as long as we all continue to buy into the fantasy that the free market will balance itself and that capitalism is the best, only way towards progress, we are going to be fighting the lie of scarcity over and over and over precisely because people are afraid to go without.
But, hoarding resources is the very thing that generates people having to go without. The lies of the system provide the proof that “the system works,” and that’s a feature, not a bug. Without the lies of capitalism, the whole system of wealth disparity falls apart, and we truly see what is becoming more and more obvious: billionaires are sinning against their fellow humans by depriving us of the basic things we need to live in this kind of market just so they can do extravagant, meaningless things.
When you can solve world hunger and don’t, that’s a sin.
When you can fix the housing crisis and you don’t, that’s a sin.
When you can give free schooling to all and don’t, that’s a sin.
Kids have to go without school lunch, often the only meal of the day they get, because their parents can’t afford to pay for it. Everything that’s wrong with this situation can be fixed with a fraction of what one billionaire hordes, and it’s not. That is a sin.
So, when I say that I run the risk of cultivating a particular kind of greed in my heart, yet remain far, far, far from the billionaire class, what I’m saying is that by buying into and perpetuating the lies of scarcity and capitalism, I am fostering the environment where these kinds of sins can continue to be justified. This is my place in the system of oppression.
Yes, I need money to live and to take care of my family. But ultimately, I have to believe there is enough for everyone and that I don’t have to be closed fist with what I have, seeking to gain more and more so that I won’t be hurt, even if it is at the expense of my neighbor.
Scarcity stalks us all, and the lies of capitalism and the billionaire class—the lovely American Dream—will keep us all in bondage to wealth unless we can move into an economy of daily bread.
Just a chapter before this story, Jesus taught his disciples to pray, and part of that we teaching them to pray, “Give us our bread for today.” This is a callback to the wilderness the Israelites were in after the exodus out of Egypt. During their time in the wild lands, God gave them bread from heaven they called Manna. Every morning, it would be on the ground ready to be gathered for the day. But they could only gather enough for that day. After that, it would go rotten.
Truly, God gave them daily bread.
And there was enough for everyone.
They never ran out. They never went without. They always had enough. There was no scarcity, no need to hoard or keep from others so you could have more for yourself. There was plenty to go around.
This is the mentality Jesus tells us to pray with.
God’s kingdom come.
God’s will be done.
And we will have our bread for today.
Right now, in this system of oppression and lies, we need each other to have that daily bread. We need each other to give mutual aid, to fight for a different way, to believe that there is enough. We need each other to give what we have, to speak where we can, and to act for justice for all.
Greed is the fruit of scarcity, and it is rotten to the core. Greed is a posture we take towards our neighbors, not just an accumulation of resources. It’s about how we view each other. To begin to trust there is enough for all is an act of grace.
It’s time to build a bigger table, not bigger storehouses.
If you’re in a season of unraveling, reimagining, or just aching to be met with compassion, I offer spiritual direction as a space to slow down, listen deeply, and be fully seen. It’s not about having the right answers—it’s about attending to the sacred in your questions. If that sounds like something your soul could use reach out to me via DM or click the button below. I look forward to seeing what we hear together.