“When you offer a sacrifice of well-being to the LORD…”
(Leviticus 19:5)
“When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the alien: I am the LORD your God” (Leviticus 19:9-10)
It’s always interesting to see how God’s economy is presented. To be sure, God is very interested in how Israel (and the Church today) understands the material and financial resources God has given it. First, God wants us to – in the words of Psalm 24 – understand that “The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it.” Any conversation about ownership rights begins and ends here. From there, we are told to understand that God provides for us – a message we receive in illustrative form (e.g. the manna in the desert) and in direct exhortation (e.g. Jesus telling us “do not worry… about tomorrow… about what you will eat… about what you will wear”). There are even instances of a radical economic policy that occurs a few chapters after our reading for today in Leviticus 25. In this chapter, God lays out the year of Jubilee – a once-every-50-year event in which ALL previous transactions are reset. For 50 years, Israel can barter and trade, buy and sell, but in the 50th year, all property returns to each family. Just consider the rational decisions that would have to be made if this were followed (side note: there is no evidence that Israel ever did this, even once). Let’s assume its year 47. Would you take out a 5-year loan to buy a piece of land that you weren’t going to have for more than 3 more years? Maybe actually. Because all debts – all loans – were also forgiven in year 50. Even still, would you work hard to build up another’s land if you knew that you would soon not occupy it? Maybe actually, if you loved your neighbor enough to see them benefitted in this way, but you wouldn’t do it for your own personal gain. It’s just an interesting economic proposal.
Today’s reading is of the same nature. In v. 5, we’re told to bring our offerings – and to make sure they are good offerings and offered in a good way. Then, a few verses later, we’re told to make sure we don’t over-reap our fields. We’re supposed to leave some goods still on the vine so that others who have need can come and take them. So, in the first instruction, we are to actively give away that which is ours and in the second instruction, we are to passively give away that which is ours. All of this, I’m convinced, is meant to remind us of this: “that which is ours” is a theological fallacy, for “the earth is the Lord’s.”
Maybe one of the toughest challenges in reading about God’s economy is figuring out how to translate it to our lives today; lives that include currency and investments and international exchange rates and the like. This is why I appreciate the essence of the instruction in today’s reading. It reminds us that there is both active and passive generosity and that we, God’s people, are called to both. Maybe one way to think of our taxes is as passive giving and our gifts to the church as active giving? Maybe we’re meant to take these principles to understand our giving to the church as active and our lending out books or movies or tools to friends and neighbors as passive giving. I think the ways we can interpret these principles is rather deep if we give our moral imaginations over to it. But that’s just the thing: We have to give our imaginations about viewing what is “ours” over to God’s understanding. But when we do so, we will find that we’ve made “a sacrifice of well-being” – that is, our well-being in the Lord. Amen.
