This is a layman’s understanding and frustration of what’s going on in the world. Maybe I’m off in my perception of things – feel free to correct me.
So, lately, all we’ve been hearing about is stimulus and bailouts and huge sums of cash. What no one seems to be taking seriously in these discussions is where the huge sums of cash are coming from. Technically, all these big organizations, and our government on top of that, are broke. So where’s the money coming from? We know there aren’t stockpiles of cash lying around that is being drawn from. So where?
In one sense, it’s coming from nowhere. In a more real sense, it is being stolen from our pockets. The Treasury department is being ordered to print new cash. Printing new cash can be a good thing, but in this case, it’s bad and immoral. All those hard earned dollars that you have saved away? Yeah, it’s becoming worth less and less. More on why that’s immoral later.
The pieces of paper we call cash symbolize a backing physical precious commodity held in trust by the government – for example, there’s a bit of gold lying around that is equitable to your dollar.
So why is printing more cash bad? Well, first, when can printing cash be good? Printing cash can be good in two instances that I can think of: (1) the government has an increase in its backing stores of precious commodity or (2) the government is trying to keep the value of its cash equitable with other places in the world that are experiencing a decline in the backing value of their cash. In this latter instance, you are devaluing your cash but for the benefit of maintaining equitable currency exchange between foreign markets. To be honest, I don’t know how useful (2) really would be and if it ever has come into play. There’s also a 3rd option – you print cash to replace cash. So you print cash, hold it in reserve, wait to reclaim cash to destroy (’cause it worn out, damaged, whatever), and release an equitable amount of cash that was held in reserve.
So those are the three instances where I think printing cash can be good. There may be others.
When is printing cash bad? In the second good instance mentioned above, I noted that the printing of cash will decrease the value of cash if there’s not an increase in the backing stores of commodity. So for example, you have a dollar bill, and its backing is a chunk of gold. The government comes along and prints some cash, and now that chunk of gold is backing two dollars. So now your original dollar is worth half of its original chunk. If the government gives you your second dollar – great! You’re breaking even. But what happens when the government gives that dollar to someone else? Well, the short version is, you’ve been robbed. And that’s exactly what’s going on today.
And thus here we are in our present situation. Our banks are failing. Economic backbones such as the auto industry are failing. And the government is printing cash (thus devaluing all of our present currency) to bail everyone and their dead great great grandfather out of debt. Does anyone else see the problem there? Debtors owe creditors money. The government is printing new money, giving it the debtors, and letting them pay off their creditors. In some sense, what debt there is should be increasing by the printing of money (i.e. devaluation caused by printing should make the value of debts owed increase), but either way, the value of your money is being decreased so that the difference can be given to someone else that has squandered the money they had away.
It’s kinda like the prodigal son, upon realizing that he’s broke and all manner of screwed up, sending a letter to his father asking for more money (“Dad, need more money”), and the father sending the prodigal son money obtained from the wealth of the responsible son. Note in this version, the prodigal son did not change his ways or return home. If you don’t think that’s occurring right now in our economy between wayward banks, institutions, and irresponsible private citizens (the prodigal son) and our government (the father) and the rest of us (the responsible son), wake up.
Let the banks fail. Let people go bankrupt. You can’t spend your way out of debt. You have to save your way out of debt. And while that may seem like a lot of inaction, it’s actually a very different form of action than what has been exercised for the past 17 years. The current form of action being proposed by Obama and his administration is just a continuation of what got us here in the first place. Obama’s not turning the country away from the cliff, he’s hitting the accelerator. The short term will make people feel good, but the long term just cannot sustain itself.
Shortly after the election last year, the Sage posted a message on the politics of Jesus entitled A King Without a Quarter.
It’s worth reading for yourself, but to summarize it briefly so you can get through the rest of this post, it asserted that Jesus was social not political. Not particularly mind blowing, but at the time when people were using religion as a means of divinely selecting a political party, it was important. There were a few other discussions on AYOR that surrounded it – especially the war – that made this whole thing particularly gut wrenching for me, but eventually I put it out of mind and got on with my life.
That was until after New Years this year. I can’t remember what prompted it, but I started to think about this essay again. The agitation and aggrevation that it caused in me earlier started to surface violently. Wouldn’t Jesus go to war? Don’t we have a just and righteous cause? …and that essay came screaming back at me: no, He wouldn’t. People are too precious to be sacrificed for causes and politics – the dealings of men. People are to be ministered to as we can – to be led to righteousness through Jesus and, in that, salvation.
What’s worse is that in all of this I found myself as a cog in the great war machine. The things I have worked on have motivated and aided the current war effort. And at the time I had nothing but pride for my work – blinded by the fact that my work, right or wrong, was justifying the death of some other human, some soul in need of redemption.
Now, I’m no commander-in-chief. The burden of what has happened is not directly upon me. Nor is the salvation of others my burden to bear directly. But my consent and participation makes me party to any soul who may be in hell right now because of my passive agreement to take their life in this time. If salvation is a communal affair… then our failure in these matters are also a burden upon us.
How am I to respond to this? What does this mean to me?
I then thought of – as I often do – the story of the rich young man. The rich young man approached Jesus asking how to find eternal life. Jesus said to obey the commandments of the Law, and the young man answered that he has kept the commandments since his youth. Then Jesus told the youn man to sell everything and follow after him, at which point the rich young man walked away dismayed because he owned a great many things.
I am a rich young man. I do my best to keep the commandments, and I have a great many things – much more by the standards of the whole world. And before I ever say that these things are of my doing, I acknowledge God’s blessing and providence in all my opportunities. I have no home – it is His before it is mine – and I gladly give it up when I should be called.
But now I find myself in a world of cognitive dissonance. I have a job under Caesar, for Caesar – an occupation of politics and not service to all mankind. The nature of how I came by these jobs is nothing short of God’s providence I do believe. They each came unexpectedly, easily, and most providentially. …but, in a world of guns, bombs, and wars… I’m working in some manner against the Gospel – against the ministry of Jesus, against seeking and saving souls.
And now, after having finished school, when my family is looking for some breathing space… I’m considering moving once again into something new… to possibly throw our lives once more into some kind of stress… I think they deserve more than that: some time to me, some time to peace, some time of stability.
The hardest part of all this for me personally, I’ve dealt with now. The hardest part was that, as far as I was concerned up until the beginning of this year, my current job is my dream job: simulation – games. And now I’m thinking of giving it up. Every thing that I had done to prepare myself for the real-world was for this specific kind of job, and now I’m going another way. It hurts. It’s disappointing. Yet it’s frightfully emancipating. It’s dying to myself and, hopefully, rising once more in Christ.
I don’t know what’s to come. As I told Sage, I think “it”, whatever “it” may be, is coming. I see two possibilities before me at the moment. I probably should look into them instead of letting them slip past me, and that’s the rub, right? If “it” is coming, you would think it would hit you over the head like a two-by-four, but I’m not certain God works so obviously – He certainly hasn’t so far in things such as these, though I see His hand guiding me in the choices I’ve had and, in part, the decisions I have made. For every opportunity I’ve had to lead me here, I’ve had other options. I think my choices, however poor, God has worked toward the clarity I have right now. And the funniest thing is that it’s not a clarity of action but a clarity of purpose. …I think, in general, we’d all prefer the former over the latter – it certainly makes things easier.
Now I wait, standing on the brink of a coming time, to more fully join the revolution of revolutions – to more properly join in and live for my Lord in pursuit of each fellow man. I pray for patience, I pray for wisdom, I pray an open heart, and above all, I pray that not my will but Yours be done. Amen.