What If?

What if?

There are many ways to view our world. Two are scarcity and abundance. The scarcity model is about acquiring and keeping as much for oneself as one can. The abundance model focuses on improving distribution and building cooperative relationships.

Currently our economics and social structures are based on the scarcity model. Winning or losing. Who's right. Who's wrong. Our religions teach that God has only a limited supply of love so we'd better make sure we're the ones getting chosen. Most of us believe there simply is not enough love, food, money, stuff, power to go around. So, rather than focusing on the many ideas/ways/things we have in common we focus on building fences to keep others out. How tragic. In a universe of vast abundance, a universe created to keep evolving, reproducing, and recycling its rich resources, we, in our greed and selfishness, artificially limit supplies, hoard our wealth, even destroy valuable resources so others cannot flourish!

What if we intentionally chose the abundance model since we really do have a choice? What if we actually took Jesus, and the essential teachings of all major religions seriously? What if we actually chose to live as they taught? Loving our enemies. Feeding the hungry. Blessing those who curse us, Clothing the naked. Healing the sick. Forgiving those who persecute us. Visiting the imprisoned. What if?

When one gets right down to it, a truly sustaining faith is not about participating in a specific religion and blindly adopting the rules and doctrines taught to preserve the fences, but choosing to trust. Trust in a world of abundance. Trust that what we do truly matters. Trust that there is enough to go around. Trust that God is love.

I believe that it matters if we trust in an inherently good world and a good God. It matters if we trust in the basic worth of everyone. It matters if we trust that the Golden Rules is not pie in the sky by and by but a basic truth reflecting the very foundation of abundant living. That treating others with the same respect and dignity we want for ourselves brings abundance back to us.

Success in the abundance model is not about how much money, stuff, or power we have, but the many large and small ways we help others improve their lives.. It's about the relationships we build. In a world of abundance there is no failure, only lessons that enable us to become more attentive, more aware, more sensitive, more open, more willing – to do, see, and listen in new ways. When we operate from the abundance paradigm, faith, hope and trust are what's celebrated, not wealth or power. In the abundance paradigm the focus is on new ways of sharing information, technology, expertise, income, skills, abilities, insights, love, resources, friendship, compassion.

In the end, education is not about memorizing information or getting high test scores, but freeing everyone to ask the questions enabling them and us to move into God's open future. Study after study document that money, power and stuff doesn't bring happiness by themselves. Caring and sharing it does. When we focus on abundance we all flourish.

Joyce Shutt is pastor emeritus of the Fairfield Mennonite Church.