The subject of poverty and riches is very much in the news in the Cayman Islands at the moment. Much comment has been expended on recent statistics seemingly showing a remarkable rise in government indebtedness as well as a decrease in cash reserves in the space of a few weeks in May, during which there happened to be a change in government.

As St. James says, every good endowment and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. As we get older we get to appreciate more and more the blessings of whatever health and wealth we may be endowed with, and that appreciation may partly be because we have more reason to fear the effects upon us of sickness and poverty than we had when we were younger.

However, St. James describes God’s attributes as being without variation or shadow due to change, and I must conclude that there is an unstated comparison in these words with the human condition, which we know to be very variable and changeable. And one truth about our human condition is that because of that inconstancy and variability a blessing can become a curse.

So even if St. Paul does indicate that God’s will is that we might become rich, in whatever sense we take his words, those very “riches”, in our possession, may become a snare to us. That is due to our fault, not to any fault of the Giver, who is without variation or shadow due to change. Because of this, the person who is without good health or without any wealth in the ordinary sense may end up being the truly blessed person, rather than the other.

The book of Lamentations (chap 3 verses 32- 33) asserts that God “does not willingly afflict or grieve the sons of men” – that even if times of grief are caused, the abundance of His steadfast love does not fail or come to an end, and His compassion continues. St. Paul takes us to the heart of the matter when he declares that God’s grace may be perfected or made complete in our lives through our weakness. And that in itself obviously affects greatly what St. Paul actually means when he refers to poverty and riches.

In 2 Corinthians 8: 9 St. Paul says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.” In referring to our Lord Jesus Christ as rich and then becoming poor he is clearly referring to something more than we ordinarily mean by those words. He is referring to the pre-existent Christ being rich, that is the Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity in His eternal glory before the Incarnation. All the riches of God the Father are the riches of God the Son. “Yet for your sake” says St. Paul, He became poor.” That is to say, He took upon Himself the flesh of mankind. He remained the Son of God, but He became, too, the son of man.

We could say that the One who had Divine Status expatriated Himself, in part veiling for the time being that Divine Status and taking upon Himself the manhood that had utterly alienated itself from His heavenly Father. The end of this process was inevitable from the beginning: He died on our behalf and in our place bearing our sins and the faultiness of all humanity in a supreme act of sacrifice, offering up the one perfect human life ever lived to God, so that we humans can be reconciled to the Father. The dereliction of Christ upon the cross was the epitome of His poverty. The reconciliation of our humanity to God is the riches that He won for us through His poverty.

Such an interpretation of riches and poverty takes us far beyond the wealth of Mammon and the lack of it. Part of the effect of Christian discipleship is to wean us from reliance on the narrow concept of wealth, and to give us concepts of it that are more in accord with the mind of God. “Seek ye the Kingdom of Heaven”, said Jesus, “and all things shall come unto you.” Having the wider understanding of wealth, it may be that if wealth in the narrower form does come to us, we will be less liable to be ensnared by it.

But the riches that God has to give us are never at the expense of what He has to give to another, and that also is a major difference between the gift of God and the gift of Mammon. If we are to become rich through the poverty of Christ, our “wealth”, in whatever form it may be, will enrich rather than impoverish others, because He became poor that others might receive restoration, neighbourly care, and all other forms of the life abundant, here and to eternity.

For commentary, information and devotional material see www.churchofenglandcayman.com and www.anglicansatprayer.org