Christ’s teachings and the sharing economy
I have spent the past year passively reading the Bible (specifically the Books of Job in the Old Testament, as well as the Books of Mathew, Mark, Luke, John, and the Act of the Apostles in the New Testament). Before now, I have only once had the opportunity to read the Bible in its entirety; that was in 2011 when I needed answers to my questions about life (after suffering the loss of a loved one, as well as a health challenge). What I find interesting is that my understanding of the Creator’s ways through the lens of Christianity differs a lot more now than my limited understanding in 2011.
I find the Bible fascinating to be honest (and I would encourage every Christian to endeavour to read it from cover to cover at least once in their lifetime). The Gospel of Jesus though is a radical shift from the Books of the Old Testament. If the Books in the Bible can be considered as songs, you can think of the Old Testament as listening to your favourite Enya song, while the New Testament (and specifically the story of Jesus) is like…heavy metal!!!
Jesus was literally out of this world! Water to wine. Check; walking on water. Check; ascending to heaven in physical form (without a jet-pack). Check ; feeding multitudes with 3 loaves of bread and 2 fishes. Check; raising the dead after 3 days. Check. Who is this guy?! Are these things even possible?! As someone who was born a Christian, I am conditioned to believe these miracles no matter how outlandish they may seem.
However, I find Jesus’s teachings more important than the miracles He performed (and I think I may be seconded by Jesus on this as well). His miracles may be highly debatable from a scientific position, but His teachings are not. You could almost say that His teachings were way ahead of their time, and you can see why it was and is so fiercely rejected even today.
His teachings reflect on man’s need to reject the sense of self (which is the defacto model we operate today in our world) and factor others into our plans.
Love your neighbour as yourself. If a man has two tunics, let him give his neighbour one.
These teachings were essentially about the need to sacrifice for others and share prosperity: which the early disciples and apostles tried to practice by selling their assets collectively so that no one lacked among them.
By practicing pure capitalism, we still sadly live in a world where the self is all we can think about, with no regard for God or His ways. For me, this is not really a Christian conversation per se but a human one, as we cannot have a world where we are disconnected from each other in our desire to get to the top of the food chain.
This path will definitely not lead us to utopia as a species, and I am grateful that God — the Lord of all the worlds in His ultra-mysterious ways has provided a path out of this current economic model with a technology-led shared prosperity model.
What does this technology-led model look like? I am not yet sure of this, but I am extremely humbled to be one of “the called” who have been selected to take up this moonshot. Cheers to a great 2022, and greater years ahead!
