Is Free Enterprise Righteous?

Is Free Enterprise, Righteous?

Have you noticed the condescending, maligning way in which the subject of “business” is discussed? Have you noticed that business executives as portrayed in Hollywood movies are almost always, aggressive, unfeeling, evil-minded, scheming, etc…..? Have you ever noticed the negative way people talk about the people who own or operate the companies they work in?

If all this is true, and there is truth in all these opinions because no reputation goes entirely unearned, then how can we possibly think that Free Enterprise, this greed-based system we have here, came from God? The short answer is, it didn’t. It came from evil. This greed based system is evil. Evil’s main characteristic is that it opposes God. As you reflect on the reputation of “big business” or business in general, being profiteers, gaining at the expense of those less fortunate, ask yourself if these practices are FOR or AGAINST God? The answer seems pretty obvious, they are against God.

Now, is this how things were intended? Is this just the nature of business? Of course not. If you remember an earlier posting about the Beginning or Genesis account you will note that God gave Man the RIGHT to partake of the fruit of Man’s labor. This PROFIT or PRODUCT is a fundamental condition of the way God designed work. We produce, we work as we are created to do AND we get to keep what our hands have made. Since the right to do this comes from God, we need to see that everything we have COMES FROM HIM. We can trade what we earn for other people’s goods, or services, or for $100 bill, or a whole stack of them. This is how God set it all up and we’ve been doing it this way ever since it began a long time ago.

The corruption we see today and have always seen, is a result of SIN. Man’s Sin is primarily greed, or selfishness, which places serving SELF as the only goal. As such Greed is the setting up of “another God” a replacement God. The theological term for this is idolatry, or idol worship. Whenever we put something before God, we practice the sin of Idolatry. Since greed does this de facto, greed is idolatry. Since evil opposes God, and greed is the worship of self, you can see that greed is evil, because it excludes God and opposes Him.

It’s true that God set this system up for our material benefit, so we would create wealth, so we can provide for our needs, so we could be fed, clothed and sheltered, and, so we could help those who are less fortunate.

What God wants is for us is to use his system of working, and profiting in a way that does the MOST Good; Good for us, Good for our families and Good for those in need. This is the point of it. When we work, we profit. And if we are smart with what we earn we can create more of it. This “excess” is called WEALTH. In the Old Testament, in the book of Deuteronomy, which means “Second Law”, in Chapter 8, we learn that it is GOD who gives the power to make wealth. This excess that we can produce by our intelligent use of what God has given us the right to keep, is called wealth. Wealth is stored up economic POWER. And as we shall learn, the purpose of power is EMPOWERMENT.

So if we set our minds and hearts on work, and use what we earn intelligently we will have power, economic power. And if we understand that this economic power is meant to be an empowerment for those outside of ourselves, we can see that God set up a system whereby “there will be no poor among you.” A world where we receive and give, FREELY.

THIS is Righteous Free Enterprise! And if everyone practiced it, the world would be a very different place than it is today.

Jeffrey Pelletier- 651-492-8540

www.becominggreat.com