Oliver Wendell Holmes and Francis Bacon: What to do with money

“Put not your trust in money but put your money in trust.” Oliver Wendell Holmes (1841-1935)

“[Money] is like manure, of very little use except it be spread.” Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

These two quotes are cited by Thomas Binney (1798-1874) on the title page of Money: A Popular Exposition in Rough Notes.

“If you put your trust in riches, if money or Mammon be your master, the God of your idolatry, you will expect everything from it; you will give it your heart; you will make “gold your hope, and fine gold your confidence.” Your supreme desire will be to accumulate it; you will live for that; it will fill your thoughts and form your dreams; it will give color and shape to all your feelings, and direction and strength to every purpose: and, if so, and so long as it is so, your soul cannot repose with faith on God, nor your heart swell and beat with love to him. Nay, you will be incapable of seeing his glory, of appreciating or discovering his character…

The man whose trust is in money, whose exclusive confidence is in what he can touch and look at, and feel that he possesses, if he is destitute of that which constitutes his security—his sole security—against the calls of life, the realities of today and the possibilities of tomorrow; why, he will be just as incapable of receiving the kingdom of God, as the man who can fare sumptuously every day, and has much good laid up for many years…

He who “loves the world,” and who is manifested as such, either by the pride of success in “laying up treasure,” or by the canker of disappointment eating into his soul, “the love of the Father is not in him.” It is not only not in him, but while either mental condition lasts, it cannot be; by the very constitution of things, by all the laws which govern the mind and regulate thought, it must of necessity be excluded.” (cf. 1 John 2:15)

Thomas Binney (1798-1874) Money: A Popular Exposition in Rough Notes, excerpt from Sermon I.

“A person’s life is not measured by its income but by its outflow.”

William Jennings Bryan (1860-1925) as recounted by Bill Brown in “Jesus and the American Dream”, Cedarville Magazine, Spring 2013: 10-11.

“Everything around us works against reordering and simplifying our lives. Everything! Ours is a cluttered, complicated world. God did not create it that way. Depraved, restless humanity has made it that way.

God made us plain and simple, but we have made ourselves very complicated. Ecclesiastes 7:29 TEV

Advertisements have one major goal: to make us discontented, woefully dissatisfied with who we are and what we have. Why? So we will acquire what they offer. And acquire we do! The watchword of our consumptive society is very loud and assertive—more! Enough is never enough…

And not only do we want more, we must spend more time maintaining those things. Staying ahead of that maddening pace leaves us strained, fretful, and breathless…

To reorder one’s own world, the need to simplify is imperative.”

Charles Swindoll, Intimacy with the Almighty (Nashville: Countryman, 1999) 26-28.

“It’s hard to give you my thoughts about those who support missionaries, because it moves me so deeply to know that people choose to be obedient with their money and to prioritize the expansion of God’s kingdom. My whole adult life I have lived on the provision of faithful Christians who have responded to God’s promptings. I am thankful to God, because He has never failed me, but I am also thankful for His people who have been obedient.”

Rachel Hill, Anglican Missionary to Peru, comments from Society of Anglican Missionaries and Senders dinner on April 5, 2013.

“In his classic book on art, The Gift, Lewis Hyde distinguishes between a gift, which is something of value that continues to circulate among givers and recipients, and a commodity, which is held and hoarded. He goes so far to say that even cash—effectively “given” to us from above—should continue to circulate and was never meant to be commodified in early human society. Gifts and cash “perish” for the temporary holders of them (we’d call them stewards) as they circulate, but in Hyde’s notion of a “gift economy,” copious circulation ensures everyone has enough.

Alternatively, when people keep and hold onto what has been given to them—when they hoard out of fear or selfish desire—what was a “gift” to them becomes a commodity that creates value only for the holder, who becomes a false owner. The risk, of course, is that this commodity might suddenly lose value. Consider the man who hoarded a large amount of Bear Stearns stock. One day he’s a multi-millionaire, the next day his hoarded pile is worth ten cents on the dollar. The commodity perishes to all—holder and everyone else—and never fulfills its true purpose of adding value to the economy.

And then we look at Jesus, who described himself in John 12:24 when he said, “unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” Were he to have “hoarded” his life, which was a gift as life is a gift to each of us, he would have denied the Father’s will and not effected our salvation. A gift must “die” to the “owner” of it and circulate in order for it to grow and produce fruit. In circulating the gift, then, the owner becomes a sower.”

Howard Freeman, Senior Campaign Director, Young Life, Greater NY Division, personal correspondence on April 4, 2013.

“It is easy to justify larger savings accounts for the sake of security. However, for the heart hungry for God, security is in Christ, not a bank balance. Future uncertainties are submissive to faith, not finances. Yes, to be rich toward God is to be rich in faith that exhibits generosity.

To build excessively bigger bank accounts builds on ego and fear, but a life rich toward the Lord wisely gives away as the world wonders. Fools lose what they only prepare for themselves, but those who give away their extra, gain more. How is your degree of richness toward God? Are you overly cautious or aggressively generous?”

Boyd Bailey in Wisdom Hunters daily e-devotional April 2, 2013.

“When Christ calls us to a new act of obedience that will cost us some temporal pleasure, we call to mind the surpassing value of following Him, and by faith in His proven worth, we forsake the worldly pleasure. The result? More joy! More faith! Deeper than before. And so we go on from joy to joy and faith to faith.”

John Piper in Desiring God (Colorado Springs: Multnomah, 2011) 74.

“God is always at work in His world. He seeks to bring every person into a personal relationship with Himself through Jesus Christ.

Jesus described the way He knew and did the will of the Father. Because the Father loved the son, He showed the Son what He was doing. Jesus watched to see where the Father was working and joined Him.

You can follow the same pattern by watching to see where God is at work around you. When He shows you, join Him in His work.”

Henry Blackaby, Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God (B&H Publishing, Nashville, 2008) 77.

“We please God when we comply with His will… We please God when we do the work He sets before us… We please God when we dedicate our hearts to giving Him the best of everything. We please God when we serve Him with love, fervency, and zeal. There is but one God. Therefore there is but One whom we must please, namely, God.”

Thomas Watson (1620-1686) Puritan preacher in Glorifying God: A Yearlong Collection of Classic Devotional Writings (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2009) June 26 reading.