Lesson Ive learned from the book I just read and I think Im much the better for it. Good intentions...by itself...is worthless, utterly worthless. Too many people try to help others by asking themselves Is it the right thing to do? and make a decision off of that. What people, Christians or not, should ask when pursuing a desire to help others is...Is it the right thing to do AND does it work to help them? The book I read talks a lot about Poverty and what one can do to work towards eliminating poverty. Poverty, in this case, means having no other options available to you. It does not mean being too lazy to work for your own good. To eliminate poverty, people have got to create solutions that actually produce positive results. There are a lot of issues like minimum wage, immigration, gas prices, and more recently Mandated Healthcare laws that are at debate at all times. Oftentimes people complain about something by only looking at an issue superficially. This lesson is impactful for me because, I feel like thats God telling me to look deeper into issues before I get my mind set on which stand I will take. Pertaining to the Affordable Care Act, I believe I will have to look at it from a more economic standpoint. Instead of looking only at the short run (WHICH, quite frankly does not look good) I need to attempt to look at the long run and then ask myself the question. Does it work? On paper, the ACA seems like a good, and noble thing to do. However, that does not always mean that it is a good thing to do. In the Epilogue of the book I read, It analyzed one of Jesuss most famous parables from a economic-ish standpoint. The parable was over the Good Samaritan. Im going to assume that my friends know this parable and not tell the story. If you really want to read it then look up Luke 10:25-37. At first glance, it seems like the Levite and the Priest are just cruel and heartless, walking past a man whos nearly dead and that the Samaritan is OBVIOUSLY the good guy. But...in reality, at the time of Jesus, It was really not obvious. The jews (the priest and the levite) had purity laws that forbade any association with dead bodies. To touch a dead body would make you ritually unclean, a sinner. With the victim nearly dead anyways, the Jews could not do anything that wouldnt violate their purity laws. Their morals were getting in the way of things, they Loved God so much! They knew God hated sin and they thought to help the victim would most likely result in sinning (think: what if that man died while they were trying to help him, they would be sinning then). They just couldnt do anything for the poor man! Plus, a man near death, would most likely look dead so they probably would rather be safe than sorry. However, the Samaritan came along and did what Jews would have thought would be the WRONG thing to do, associate somebody that could possibly be dead and help him. However, in the end, the Samaritans action proved inevitably that he did the right thing. He saved the mans life and helped him out of a situation that was dire by using practical solutions. The reason the authors chose to analyze that parable was because sometimes, things that are thought to help people and is the moral thing to do winds up only making the situation worse. Raising the minimum wage as a solution to getting people out of poverty is one glaring example. The authors suggest EITC instead. One of the authors is an economist and have made the observation that the EITC works really well for poor people in America. Well that was a long read for you guys, go reward yourself with a cookie, if you read this whole thing, then you are awesome, and you are also probably bored out of your mind. Thank you for taking the time to read this! Hope you learned something!
Posted on: Thu, 14 Nov 2013 03:33:34 +0000
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