How Money Cannot Pay Our Nation's Debt

As talk of our nation's financial position continues to flood the public square, we must be aware of a few critical truths.  Like a meticulous and caring physician, it is our obligation to assess the situation accurately and offer a diagnosis that faithfully represents the truth.  While I don't pretend to be an economist, I feel that  our Christian presuppositions empower us to offer an objective, deeper-than-economics, perspective.

Here are a few of my thoughts in this regard.

First, that we must cease to exalt money as God.  One of the greatest injustices our nation has ever seen and/or committed is the active promotion and exaltation of the worthiness, sovereignty and satisfaction of money.  Money is all-powerful and can fix the foundations that, by any other means, are unfixable.  This is simply a lie.

As I mentioned in a previous post, America (or any other nation for that matter) cannot buy redemption.  And if we continue to trust money for that end, we will continue to acquire debts beyond our ability to repay.  This is the financial equivalent of total depravity - being personally responsible beyond personal ability. This is why bankruptcy is just over the horizon.

Second, that money, without a gospel-centered life accompanying it, will serve to deceive rather than deliver the person receiving it.  By giving money alone, we exalt the power of money alone to solve all of life's problems.  We therefore pay more attention to the stories of how money has done this or that, rather than cherishing the Word of God the testimony of how the Lord does whatsoever He pleases (Ps 115; Matt 13:22).

Third, by giving money alone, we affirm our own trust in money.  If my second point says something about money, this point says something about us.  Instead of fighting for justice on behalf of the marginalized, we try and purchase it.  In other words, we send money to work for us.  Writing a check is less of a sacrifice than bearing a burden.  Instead of showing how the Lord loves through us, we send the message that money works instead of us.

Finally, as money is shown in the coming days to be powerless, we must spend our lives sharing the All-Powerful One.  This is done by repenting for the times when we have not trusted in Christ alone and then actively clinging by faith to Christ alone for our righteousness.

It is quite possible that the days to come will bring great hunger and thirst.  As Christians, however, we should not reject this; but rather wholeheartedly welcome it.  Hunger and thirst, while physically tragic, often accompany the spiritual redemption of the Lord (Exodus 15-17; Numbers 10-11).  For stubborn sinners such as ourselves, it takes great hunger and thirst to shake us from our idols.  But our gracious God uses such times to save stubborn sinners by giving them Manna from heaven and water from the Rock.

Our debt is not ultimately financial.  It is moral.  We don't need a loan.  We need redemption.  For this Christ alone is sufficient.