A Little Dab’ll Do Ya

For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy,  2 Timothy 3:2 NASB

Lovers of Money – I’m guessing that most of you are too young to remember the punch line of the advertisement, “A little dab’ll do ya.” The message was clear. You just need a small amount to make it all work. Paul would have agreed, but with an entirely different subject—money! It’s fortunate for all of us that Paul does not say, “owners of money.” He is not addressing the wealthy. He is addressing anyone who covets money. It doesn’t matter if you are rich or poor. If money is on your prized possession list, you are one of the philarguros, “lovers of silver.”

You will notice that Paul has combined two words again. We encountered the first combination in “lovers of self” (philos and autos). We discovered that self-love inverts true love.   True love is benevolence toward another at cost to myself. Philautos is benevolence toward myself at cost to another. Now Paul notes that those who put money high on the list of desires are also lovers of the power of exchange. They calculate the cost, as Yeshua instructed us, but their calculation is perverted. They calculate the cost in terms of what they receive, not what they give. They live lives of accumulation rather than distribution. For them money is the power of control and if they have that power, they will order their lives as they see fit. They will use the exchange to benefit themselves.

The Bible has a lot to say about money. In fact, money is one of the most frequent topics in Scripture. My late friend, Paul Meyer, used to challenge his compatriots by saying, “Show me your checkbook and I’ll tell you what you really love.” Paul’s comment was directed toward those in his economic class, millionaires and billionaires. Perhaps we haven’t arrived at that level yet, but that does not mean we don’t crave the power of possession. The man who says, “I’ll give to charity after I achieve my financial goal” will never give to charity because his goal is himself and charity is the demand to think of others. Philarguros are those who think life is determined by what I have, not what I give away.

“In the last days,” says Paul, philarguros will become the norm. The righteous will be surrounded by a culture of consumption. Greed will drive men to accumulate far more than they could ever use. The two hundred and fifty richest people on the planet today have more financial assets than the poorest 2.5 billion people on earth. And who does the culture value? Who are our heroes, our models of success? Who do we emulate? The ones at the top, of course. It is not their status we desire. It is their power. In this game the yetzer ha’ra is never satisfied. “More” is the modus operandi of the age.

“You only have what you give away.” Do you believe that? Show me your check book!

Topical Index: money, philarguros, 2 Timothy 3:2