My sister-in-law has reminded me for years that, as she puts it, "Many a truth is said in jest."
I thought of her when a good friend sent me a report on the "comic relief" dished up by comedian Rich Little at the Constitution Ball at the Hilton Washington on Inauguration night week before last.
While I won't repeat all that the impressionist shared with the festive crowd, one story really got to me.
At one point Little said that he missed and adored the late President Ronald Reagan. He continued, "I wish he was here tonight, but as a matter of fact, he is."
Of course, as one would expect and appreciate, the crowd loved it.
Then he went on to say something "funny," but terribly disturbing to me.
Impersonating Mr. Reagan, Little continued, "You know, somebody asked me, 'Do you think the war on poverty is over?'
"I said, 'Yes, the poor lost.'"
The crowd went wild.
Our nation seems to love the Bible these days, what with our passionate concern over values and all.
Maybe we need to rest with this passage for a day or two:
"Those who mock the poor insult their Maker; those who are glad at calamity will not go unpunished." Proverbs 17:5
5 comments:
It's a very eye-opening and convicting experience to trace out through the Bible all that God has to say about the poor.
It's obvious that He has a special place in his heart for them. And an obvious disdain for those who would take advantage of them or ignore them.
We've moved a longs ways from God's people taking care of the poor to thinking that some program or government will step up for them.
Thanks for keeping them in front us, so we don't forget them.
It just hit me. We are the government. Under our form of democracy, we are the government. So, any program that we come up with and support to help and lift the weak could be seen as an evidence of our values and our faith. Why have we been trained to react so negatively to the government and its efforts? We are the government. . ."we the people". . .
Two thoughts about relying on government to help the poor:
1) Government uses a ton of money to support its bureaucracy. Local churches can help to poor much more efficiently and effectively.
2) Government agencies and politicians love to be spotlighted and receive the credit as opposed to God receiving the glory as the poor are helped through local churches.
I appreciate that "we the people" (government) are involved with the poor. And I believe a much more efficient way to help them is at the local level with people of faith. I'm thankful that the government helps, but I'm more comfortable to put assistance to the poor in the hands of people at the local level.
That's a really sad joke, isn't it? And the laughter it brought was sadder still. Larry, you're a voice crying in the wilderness...keep shouting because we need to hear the message.
In regard to the government's role...didn't God place Joseph in the Egyptian government at just the right time to begin a seven year harvest that would be redistributed by the government during a seven year famine? Just something to think about.
Putting resources in the hands of locals sounds great. In practice since 1980, it hasn't really worked at all. Local governments have not responded to the challenge. The other problem is one of scale. The fact is churches in the US don't have the budgets to address the enormous size of the problems. Sadly, given what we all know about how they spend their funds now, even if they did have enough funding, would they really spend it on the poor? How many churches in this nation even know how to engage the poor?
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