The Hole

Imagine for a moment that all your debts have been paid.  How would you feel?

Pay to all what is due to them - taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due. Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. - Romans 13:7-8

Some of the folks we serve meals to each day are totally free from debts.

They have nothing and they owe no one anything.  Is that a good way to live?

We tend to think of debt-free living as a luxury, something only the rich can do, and yet there is another way to have no debts.  We can be poor.

That's probably not the way most of us would like to free ourselves from debt, and most of us won't ever have to worry about it, but what if we suddenly found ourselves with nothing?

We may all know what it is like to have more owed out than we have coming in.  At the end of the month, we make decisions on what to pay and what to extend to the next paycheck.

But what if we had no bills?  What would we do with that first paycheck?

Chances are it will not be enough to pay rent and a month's security deposit, and it won't go far if we have to use it to pay for a room. 

Having money makes us a target.  If we stay in a shelter, we may be robbed in our sleep.

Each step we take to try to get ourselves out of the hole we have found ourselves in brings us more problems, more obstacles.

At some point, we need to take on debt to get free, because we will never save enough to do it on our own.

Paul tells us we need to love one another, and through that love all the law will be fulfilled.  What he means is that all of the things we need to do to serve God and man are tied to love.

So, out of love, we feed the hungry and give warmth to those who are cold, but we don't solve the problem of being in the hole.

We look at the size of the hole and see that it's too big a problem.

Maybe what Paul is telling us is not achievable.  Living truly debt-free means we either have much more than we need or we have nothing.

For all of us in the middle, we owe someone something so we can live.

So, maybe the solution is to help people who have nothing take on obligations as they start to make some money, so they can work their way out of poverty.

It's something to consider.

More to come...