I just finished reading a very helpful book for Christians interested in how they should think about capitalism, wealth, and the Bible.  The author is John R. Schneider and the title is The Good of Affluence: Seeking God in a Culture of Wealth (Eerdmans, 2002).  It is 13 years old and I thought I would have seen it by now, but I didn’t know about it until last year at the Institute for Faith, Work and Economics.  At any rate this book deserves to wider reading.  Evangelical Christians should read it to get a more biblically sound discussion of the place of wealth, markets and business.

Schneider’s theme is grounded in Genesis 1 (as it should be) and what the dominion mandate and creation in the image of God mean for economic life—without in any way shorting spiritual life.  In an economic sense, Genesis is said to be “the cosmic vision of delight.”  Affluence is not, Schneider argues, something to be shunned as somehow either sinful in itself or sub-Christian.  Some Christian writers (Ronald Sider, Jim Wallis) make that argument.  Schneider writes that wealth is to be accepted with gratefulness, enjoyed with thankfulness and used ultimately for God’s purposes.  But God’s purposes are not limited to giving everything away to the poor.  There is also the good of business, working through freedom and entrepreneurship, that brings proper delight to the owners/proprietors and also give dignity to others who have jobs through commerce and profit.

Of course sin interferes with the ideal operation of God’s will in economic matters.  But it does not destroy His ideal.  If one believes that wealth is the only and highest value, then that person is in a severe situation before God.  Schneider makes clear that this can be a problem, but it is individuals who sin in this way.  It is not the ideal of God that causes that, nor is it markets themselves.

The theme of delight is traced all the way through Scripture, from Exodus, to the Prophets, Proverbs and into the New Testament, and especially in the teachings of Jesus (but also in Paul and James).  Jesus’ teachings are especially important, as Schneider sees no contradiction between the God in the Old Testament and Jesus—as we would of course expect, but some do deny.  Jesus sanctioned wealth, he “ate and drank” with the wealthy, as well as the poor.  He did not, as is sometimes misunderstood, command those who would be disciples to sell all they had to follow him.  Some he did call for that, others maintained their wealth and used it for God’s Kingdom, broadly understood.  Jesus loved these no less than the poor.  He did, as Schneider points out, criticize, even condemn the rich at times, as the Prophets had done, but this was not a criticism of wealth per se.  I was a condemnation of those who used their wealth to oppress others, to take from the poor, to act unjustly by virtue of their greater wealth.  In effect Jesus and the Prophets condemned these wealthy because there was no effective rule of law and that absence opened the way for injustice—something Jesus roundly condemned.

The book is written with careful attention to biblical exegesis.  As a bonus for Evangelical scholars, while the author interacts with some of the best exegetical scholarship he remains firmly within Christian orthodoxy.  He assumes for example, for reasons he elaborates elsewhere, the narrative unity and authorship of the Scriptures in the face of form critical scholarship which takes the story out of the hands of the eyewitnesses and even of Jesus and places it in the early Christian community.

I would highly recommend this book for use in a Christian college course in theology and economics, or even in a worldview course.  I might even suggest it for use as part of a general theology course.