Mission Trip Prayer & Devotional PlanНамуна

“There Need Be No Poor People”

Yesterday we reflected on a passage in Leviticus that shows God’s radical plan to eliminate permanent poverty. This passage in Deuteronomy is somewhat similar. Every seven years, all debts were to be cancelled. Everybody would start over, unburdened by accumulated indebtedness.

God says something controversial and striking about the society he wants to build: “There need be no poor people among you.” (15:4) His intention is to build an economy so prosperous that poverty can be eliminated. That is the optimistic framework that God’s justice requires. He created a world where all flourish. He means to bring about that condition again.

Of course, God knows the failings of the people he has called. So he also says, “There will always be poor people in the land.” (15:11) Whether through oppression or natural calamity or through their own failings, people will become poor. But that is not what God wants!

He has made a world where no one need be poor. He gives laws to his people that are meant to stop poverty in its tracks. Is his remedy fair to those who loaned the money? Again, as with the land laws in Leviticus, it’s God’s money! Not ours! According to him, it’s not right that any one of his creatures should be permanently poor.

These verses are also notable in urging us to be generous to the poor. In other words, it’s not just the legal, economic structures that should eliminate poverty. It’s also our hearts and our hands. God’s people are to give generously to the poor, and with a willing heart. (15:10) By siding with God in his concern for them, we will experience God’s blessing in everything we do.

Prayer: Lord, keep me from gripping my money so tightly. It’s your money, not mine — you have merely loaned it to me. Show me how to put it to work for your good purposes of justice.