G.D.P (God Declares Peace)      

by: Pastor Tony Haglund, Canton Lutheran Church  

During World War II, Britain developed a way to keep track of the resources necessary to fight the war. After the war, the United Nations adopted the British model as a way to compare the relative wealth of nations and today, nearly all countries use this measurement--called the Gross Domestic Produce, or G.D.P.--to calculate their nations wealth.

At first glance, this simple accounting method seems useful but upon closer inspection we might began to wonder about its wisdom. For when wealth is measured only in terms of goods and services bought and sold, only those actions involving money are seen as good and useful.

Consider a woman in Somalia who rises early to walk two miles to the nearest well to get water for her family, returns to feed her children and ready them for school, spends the morning working the soil of the family garden, the afternoon tending to the sick of her village and then in the evening cooks, mends clothing and sings songs to her tired children. As measured by GDP, this woman has no value.

Now, consider her cousin, a Somalian military pilot. He is ordered to bomb a mountain enclave deemed sympathetic to a rebel cause. A great deal of money is spent to bury the dead, to rebuild destroyed buildings, to pay for the airplane, fuel and bombs. In addition money is needed for extra doctors, emergency personnel and aid. By dropping a bomb that kills hundreds, this young pilot has done a very good thing--at least as far as the GDP is concerned. And at the end of the day, it is the pilot, not the mother, who will get the medal for serving his country.

This odd paradox is the very foundation of the world's economy. It is repeated a billion times a day in a billion different ways. Actions performed with love are dismissed while actions performed with money are honored and rewarded.

Sabbath Living invites us to ask; what is true wealth?

During Sabbath, God declares peace (a holy GDP) and commands that we stop counting and measuring and instead simply love, accept and be.

At rest we can take a deeper measure of our true wealth. 

For if we do not rest,  we will continue to make the mistake of valuing things as the world values things and over the course of a lifetime, find ourselves impoverished in our riches.