July 7 Krum Star Article
"The Extravagance of God"
Most people I know live in
a world of scarcity. There never enough to go around,
and too much generosity for others means not enough left
over for the self. If one person gains something—be
it fame or fortune or accomplishment—then someone
else must lose. This mindset, known in some scholarly
circles as “The Theory of Limited Good” seems
to make sense. After all, if one assumes a finiteness
and limits to our universe, then hoarding, not generosity,
should rule the day.
But what if our universe were
infinite? What if there were a never ending source of
goodness and possibility and love and generosity that
stays available to us at all times and in all places and
under all circumstances?
What if there is such an extravagance
to the world that open-handed generosity becomes the norm
rather than what seems to be the more normal—and
responsible—closed-handed approach?
When I observe the natural
world, I am often amazed at what I see as the extravagance
of nature. Such multitudes of beings! We’ve yet
to probe even a small portion of the types of life that
inhabit this planet. From plants to animals to insects
to the tiniest pieces of life, we see awe-inspiring variety
and abundance. And only a cursory examination of the universe,
as our astronomers have discovered, leads to numbers of
stars so vast as to leave them uncountable. Perhaps even
infinite—should we be able to conceive of such a
thing.
And for those who see God as
the Creator to this vastness, surely all this extravagance
of creation also tells us something about the extravagance
of the Creator. What little we are able to understand
about God indicates giant riches yet to be discovered.
Will we ever reach the end of discovery?
I think that God’s economy
of abundance operates very different from the human economy
of scarcity. We’ll explore this further at the Krum
United Methodist Church this Sunday at the 11:00 service.
I’d love to see you there!
