Kingdom Economics Equality

I like when we get the opportunity not to just hear a sermon but to also debrief the sermon together. Social media sometimes allows us to do this. Here is one example of this. Dayle after the message last Sunday summed it up for us.

If the giver isn't helping the receiver become a giver, you're really not giving them much of anything that matters.

Dayle Garris

This way is not popular and often times is more difficult.

Sabbath for the land in the seventh year

Leviticus 25:1–7 HCSB

1 The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai: 2 “Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When you enter the land I am giving you, the land will observe a Sabbath to the Lord. 3 You may sow your field for six years, and you may prune your vineyard and gather its produce for six years. 4 But there will be a Sabbath of complete rest for the land in the seventh year, a Sabbath to the Lord: you are not to sow your field or prune your vineyard. 5 You are not to reap what grows by itself from your crop, or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. It must be a year of complete rest for the land. 6 Whatever the land produces during the Sabbath year can be food for you—for yourself, your male or female slave, and the hired hand or foreigner who stays with you. 7 All of its growth may serve as food for your livestock and the wild animals in your land.

Year of Jubilee

Theologically

Socially

Economically

Theologically

Leviticus 25:8–24 HCSB

8 “You are to count seven sabbatical years, seven times seven years, so that the time period of the seven sabbatical years amounts to 49. 9 Then you are to sound a trumpet loudly in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month; you will sound it throughout your land on the Day of Atonement. 10 You are to consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim freedom in the land for all its inhabitants. It will be your Jubilee, when each of you is to return to his property and each of you to his clan. 11 The fiftieth year will be your Jubilee; you are not to sow, reap what grows by itself, or harvest its untended vines. 12 It is to be holy to you because it is the Jubilee; you may only eat its produce directly from the field. 13 “In this Year of Jubilee, each of you will return to his property. 14 If you make a sale to your neighbor or a purchase from him, do not cheat one another. 15 You are to make the purchase from your neighbor based on the number of years since the last Jubilee. He is to sell to you based on the number of remaining harvest years. 16 You are to increase its price in proportion to a greater amount of years, and decrease its price in proportion to a lesser amount of years, because what he is selling to you is a number of harvests. 17 You are not to cheat one another, but fear your God, for I am Yahweh your God. 18 “You are to keep My statutes and ordinances and carefully observe them, so that you may live securely in the land. 19 Then the land will yield its fruit, so that you can eat, be satisfied, and live securely in the land. 20 If you wonder: ‘What will we eat in the seventh year if we don’t sow or gather our produce?’ 21 I will appoint My blessing for you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years. 22 When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating from the previous harvest. You will be eating this until the ninth year when its harvest comes in. 23 “The land is not to be permanently sold because it is Mine, and you are only foreigners and temporary residents on My land. 24 You are to allow the redemption of any land you occupy.

The Land is the Lord’s. Once again a reminder that everything is the Lord’s and we are simply stewards of that which he has provided.

You are only foreigners and temporary residents on My Land!

The jubilee affirms that the Lord is not only the God who owns Israel’s land; he is sovereign over all time and nature.

His act of redeeming his people from Egypt committed him to provide for them on every level because they were his own.

Therefore, Israel’s observance of the Sabbath day and year and the year of jubilee was a function of obedience and trust.

In practical terms, the jubilee year embodies the trust all Israelites could have that God would provide for their immediate needs and for the future of their families.

At the same time, it calls on the rich to trust that treating creditors compassionately will still yield an adequate return.

Socially

1. The first stage is depicted in

Leviticus 25:25–28 HCSB

25 If your brother becomes destitute and sells part of his property, his nearest relative may come and redeem what his brother has sold. 26 If a man has no family redeemer, but he prospers and obtains enough to redeem his land, 27 he may calculate the years since its sale, repay the balance to the man he sold it to, and return to his property. 28 But if he cannot obtain enough to repay him, what he sold will remain in the possession of its purchaser until the Year of Jubilee. It is to be released at the Jubilee, so that he may return to his property.

A person could simply become poor.

The presumed scenario is that of a farmer who borrowed money to buy seed but did not harvest enough to repay the loan. He therefore must sell some of the land to a buyer in order to cover the debt and buy seed for the next planting.

If there was a person who belonged to the farmer’s clan who wished to act as a “redeemer”, he could pay the buyer according to the number of remaining annual crops until the jubilee year when it reverted to the farmer. Until that time, the land belonged to the redeemer, who allowed the farmer to work it.

2. The second stage was more serious (Lev. 25:35-38).

Leviticus 25:35–38 HCSB

35 “If your brother becomes destitute and cannot sustain himself among you, you are to support him as a foreigner or temporary resident, so that he can continue to live among you. 36 Do not profit or take interest from him, but fear your God and let your brother live among you. 37 You are not to lend him your silver with interest or sell him your food for profit. 38 I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God.

Assuming that the land was not redeemed and the farmer again fell into debt from which he could not recover, he would forfeit all of his land to the creditor.

In this case, the creditor must lend the farmer the funds necessary to continue working as a tenant farmer on his own land, but must not charge him interest.

The farmer would amortize or slow pay off this loan with the profit made from the crops, perhaps eliminating the debt. If so, the farmer would regain his land. If the loan was not fully repaid before the jubilee, then at that time the land would revert back to the farmer or his heirs.

3. The third stage was more serious still (Lev. 25:39-43).

Leviticus 25:39–43 HCSB

39 “If your brother among you becomes destitute and sells himself to you, you must not force him to do slave labor. 40 Let him stay with you as a hired hand or temporary resident; he may work for you until the Year of Jubilee. 41 Then he and his children are to be released from you, and he may return to his clan and his ancestral property. 42 They are not to be sold as slaves, because they are My slaves that I brought out of the land of Egypt. 43 You are not to rule over them harshly but fear your God.

Assuming that the farmer in the previous stage could neither pay on the loan or even support himself and his family, he would become temporarily bound to the household of the creditor.

As a bound laborer he would work for wages, which were entirely for reduction of the debt.

At the year of jubilee, he would regain his land and his freedom (Lev. 25:41).

Leviticus 25:41 HCSB

41 Then he and his children are to be released from you, and he may return to his clan and his ancestral property.

Throughout these years, the creditor must not work him as a slave, sell him as a slave, or rule over him harshly (Lev. 25:42-43).

The creditor must “fear God” by accepting the fact that all of God’s people are God’s slaves (NRSV “servants”) whom he graciously brought out from Egypt. No one else can own them because God already does.

The smallest unit of Israel’s kinship structure was the household that would have included three to four generations.

The jubilee provided a socioeconomic solution to keep the family whole even in the face of economic calamity. Family debt was a reality in ancient times as it is today, and its effects include a frightening list of social ills.

The jubilee sought to check these negative social consequences by limiting their duration so that future generations would not have to bear the burden of their distant ancestors.[6]

1. God desires to break the bondage of generational sin and poverty. This is a reset to help with breaking this cycle.

2. It is not the desire of God that generations continue to experience the sin of previous generations. GOD DESIRES TO RESTORE! (preach/expound)

Economically

The economic angle reveals the two principles that we can apply today.

First, God desires just distribution of the earth’s resources. According to God’s plan, the land of Canaan was assigned equitably among the people. The jubilee was not about redistribution but restoration.

According to Wright, “The jubilee thus stands as a critique not only of massive private accumulation of land and related wealth but also of large-scale forms of collectivism or nationalization that destroy any meaningful sense of personal or family ownership.”[7]

Second, family units must have the opportunity and resources to provide for themselves.

In most modern societies, people cannot be sold into slavery to pay debts. Bankruptcy laws provide relief to those burdened with unpayable debts, and descendants are not liable for ancestors' debts. The basic property needed for survival may be protected from seizure. Nonetheless, Leviticus 25 seems to offer a broader foundation than contemporary bankruptcy laws.

It is founded not on merely protecting personal liberty and a bit of property for destitute people, but on ensuring that everyone has access to the means of making a living and escaping multigenerational poverty.

As the gleaning laws in Leviticus show, the solution is neither handouts nor mass appropriation of property, but social values and structures that give every person an opportunity to work productively.

1. God wants to restore

2. God cares about poverty and creates laws that bring us to a place that God desires. God restores opportunities for families to make a living and providing for themselves.

Point Us to Jesus

Luke 4:16–19 HCSB

16 He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. As usual, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read. 17 The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to Him, and unrolling the scroll, He found the place where it was written: 18 The Spirit of the Lord is on Me, because He has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim freedom to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

I don’t know about you but when it comes to sin.

I have a massive amount of debt in sin. I owe my creditor so much.

I need to pay the penalty of my sin which is death, but my owner King Jesus went to the cross and paid the debt for me that I owed.

HE SET ME FREE FROM THE DEBT THAT I OWED!!! (preach) I don’t deserve it because I racked up the bill in sin but Jesus while I was sinner died for me.