religious question

[gayathri]

I'll have to ask my folks about this one, but...

I was flipping thru the various tv channels at the gym today, and was trapped at one talking about some version of evangelical Christianity. The comment on the screen was "People have been taught not to expect results from what they sow," which reminded me of a phrase "As you sow, so shall you reap,".

But I listened to the guy for a bit and he seemed like he was talking about how to "get stuff from God,"

which confused me. Maybe this is really one of the bigger differences in how I was raised -- we were taught that you didnt 'get stuff' from God, you didnt 'expect' stuff from God and there were no rewards promised other then movement up the ladder in future lives. The Gita is all about living your life without expectations, without attachment to the _result_, but living in the moment according to your duty.

Amma always said, "Dont pray for things, or results. Pray for the strength you need to do what is necessary,"

So anyone more familiar with Christianity, any comments on using sowing and reaping for personal gain vs some other kind of gain?

Comments

[rmd.livejournal.com]

there's a strain of christianity - particularly, ime, on the fundamentalist evangelical side - that eschews the "blessed are the poor" part and somehow inserts the phrase "god helps those who help themselves" into the bible.

and that if god likes you, then you are rewarded in this life, not just the afterlife.

[seasonalkat.livejournal.com]

This is a particular offshoot of "Christianity" that is all about happiness and prosperity, and God giving you everything you ask for. Like it's some big Santa thing, and that obviously if you're a good Christian, you'll be financially blessed. This isn't in line with mainstream Christianity and it's certainly not what *I* believe as a Christian.

[pony-bootblack.livejournal.com]

Well...as a minister this kind of thing really bugs me and as a biblical scholar it bugs me even more. This verse is being seriously taken out of context.

Here is the context: Galatians 6:1-10

My friends,* if anyone is detected in a transgression, you who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness. Take care that you yourselves are not tempted. 2Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfil* the law of Christ. 3For if those who are nothing think they are something, they deceive themselves. 4All must test their own work; then that work, rather than their neighbour’s work, will become a cause for pride. 5For all must carry their own loads.
6 Those who are taught the word must share in all good things with their teacher.
7 Do not be deceived; God is not mocked, for you reap whatever you sow. 8If you sow to your own flesh, you will reap corruption from the flesh; but if you sow to the Spirit, you will reap eternal life from the Spirit. 9So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. 10So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith.

So, the verse itself is not about personal gain. It's about doing what is right. The reaping and sowing is about sowing to the Spirit...about doing what is right and good and about serving God. The reaping is about "eternal reward". While i do not believe in the concept of a heaven or hell, i do believe that what we sow in the world we eventually reap...more like karma. If we sow a bunch of nastiness, eventually all we can reap is nastiness. If we sow good things, we reap good things. This is actually the intention of this verse-- to emphasize that whenever we have a chance we should work for the "good of all". This means we should do whatever we can to make the world a better place so not only do we get to reap good things, but because of our actions other may have such a harvest as well.

So, the person you were listening to? Yeah...an idiot. He's one of "those" Christians who selectively interprets the bible for their own purposes. This is the kind of selective literalism that plagues the fundamentalist/evangelical strands of Christianity and in my opinion is much of what is wrong with the world.

[missionista.livejournal.com]

I have usually seen this kind of attitude in Protestantism, where there is an idea that if God loves you, then He will bless you, and you will be successful in this life (rather than the afterlife). This sometimes gets turned around to “I am successful, therefore God loves me.” And it is a short jump from there to start asking God for things, stuff, money, the trappings of success. Janis Joplin rather famously mocks this attitude.

I was raised Roman Catholic (full disclosure, so you know where my biases are), and the emphasis was on asking the saints to intercede with God on your behalf. So, if you lose something, and you want to find it, you pray to St. Anthony to help. If you want good fortune in business, you pray to the patron saint of your business. The emphasis is on living out this life in whatever cruddy circumstances you get, knowing that your reward will come later in Heaven (assuming you make it that far), so there’s less asking God for money.

[lil-brown-bat.livejournal.com]

The root of this is found in the writings and teachings of John Calvin, a major mover and shaker in early Protestantism. Before Calvin, Christians took the Biblical prohibitions against usury pretty seriously and expanded on it considerably. What this meant, in practical terms, was that pre-Reformation, as a Christian, you not only weren't supposed to lend money for interest, but you also weren't supposed to make a really big profit (which suited the powers that be fine, since profit is a mercantile-class thing). Along comes Calvin and reinterprets all that using a steward metaphor, specifically that a good Christian is a faithful steward of God's bounty, and what does a faithful steward do? Cause his master's wealth to increase, that's what. So all of a sudden you've got a theological justification, not only for lending money at interest, but for working like a donkey (and working those under you like a donkey) and squeezing all the profit you can.

Now, mind you, as crazed as the Calvinists could be on the subject of profit, they weren't all into spending it, on themselves or on anything else. Unlike the Catholic church, which would extract all the money it could from society, and then turn it into fabulous gold ornamentation and the like, Calvinists kept themselves and their churches lean and mean...and the money just piled up. So there's a very big difference between today's "God has blessed me with a Mercedes Benz" funnymentalists and the original Calvinists, but it's in the Calvinist theology where the big switch took place from the "accumulating riches = bad (unless you're the Church)" to "accumulating riches = what God wants you to do".

If you really want to read up on this, I suggest Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.

[missionista.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the eloquent distinction between Calvinists in specific and Protestants in general! In Catholic school, I managed to pick up that Protestants were weird, and Not Like Us, but they didn't get much into the finer points. :)

[boyastridgirl.livejournal.com]

IF we apply the fact that when we reap we are really called to do what is considered Good by the religion, then for me as an amalgamation of Roman Catholic and Pagan practices, it's the one thing I've found that most closely resembles Karma, except the end result is that what we have reaped here on Earth, we sow immediate results in our lives but also sow the results in Heaven, without climbing the incarnatin ladder. . .which sux because I don't know of one human who can claim with absolute certainty that there isn't one thing in their life they wouldn't like the chance to atone or try to make better in another go on the Merry Go-Round of Life.

Thanks for the question!

[antuvschle]

There are certainly examples of evangelical "Christians" on TV who are definitely expecting to "get stuff" from God. Whatever they get from the masses is justified (rationalized) by the pace at which they are spreading their distorted versions of the Word.

These people are the reason my thinking friends look at me funny when I mention that I am Christian.

I tend to go by Matthew 6:5, that these loudmouths who like to hear themselves talk and be seen by others have their reward. Thus, those people do not represent me...

[unclebooboo.livejournal.com]

Why limit your question to Christianity?

It's an interesting phenomenon in any religion when a sect begins to tell its followers that they can achieve worldly gains by participating in the sect. In my experience this is often sign that you've encountered an out of the mainstream cult. For example, this was something that you could find in the NSA version of Nichiren Buddhism in the 1980's.