“I’m not suggesting that everyone take a vow of poverty, but what would happen if every person who claimed to follow Christ simply set an income ceiling? It’s a counterintuitive way to live, but what would the world look like is we practiced radical generosity with everything we made above and beyond that threshold?”- Mark Batterson
As Mark Batterson continues Chapter 11 of Double Blessing, he exhorts the reader to answer this question: How much is enough? Because, Pastor Batterson asserts, you do yourself a disservice if you read this book without answering that question. Furthermore, the author notes, you’ll fail to tap your potential to be a double blessing.
Consequently, our society’s insatiable appetite for more means that enough is never enough. Unless, Pastor Batterson advises, you predetermine an amount of enough in your heart. And when you consider that half the world’s population lives on less than two dollars a day, that makes How much is enough? a truly difficult question.
In addition, Mark contends, if we fail to define success for ourselves, we generally default to a cultural definition. In America, the author observes, we view happiness as a sport called Keeping Up with the Joneses. Pastor Batterson continues:
“The struggle it (that idiom) represents is as old as Cain and Abel. If you benchmark success by comparing yourself with other people, it’s a no-win scenario. The comparison game ends with either surplus pride or inflated jealousy. The result is this: you cannot keep up or catch up with the Joneses! And the Bible has a word for it: covetousness. . . . So we buy things we don’t even want to impress people we don’t even like!”
Therefore, we need to see blessing defined as what we give, rather than what we get. Thus, we find the most profound joy on the giving side of life.
Today’s question: How does the concept of an income ceiling strike you? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “An internal reality – the blessing of God”
