[TheRealThing]

"The last shall be first."
"Blessed are you who are poor now...but woe unto you who are rich."

Now, you, sir, may be of the sort to spiritualize these teachings thereby taking all revolutionary power out of them, but, then again, I am not as taken with your expository insight as you yourself are. It is called "The Great Reversal" and is not a new idea. It was the poor and downtrodden and oucast who "heard Jesus gladly." This is no social gospel, nor socialism: that is your spin on my words. At the Great Reversal it will be foolish to speak of Man's systems: the kingdom and economy of God need no name, take no spin: Christ Hinself is Light, and we live on love divine.
You simply cannot refrain from the straw man fallacy. It's a compulsion.

The last shall be first is speaking of those who are humble before God, not those who are broke. But like I said, you've been talking out of both sides of your mouth. At what point in history did Israel go past the point of helping the poor through acts like gleaning, to giving them an estate with vineyards, fallow fields and livestock? Of course the answer is never, but want to know why that's a fool's errand? Let's take the Lotto for example, one of the favorite analogies of those who teach the great reversal. A guy goes to Circle K and buys a lottery ticket which turns out to be a big winner. One day he has barely enough to cover a 2 dollar ticket, the next he has 150 million dollars in the bank. But what always happens? Two or three years down the road he's broke again. Now, according to your ilk, the poor are being mistreated by the rich, and that's why they are in need. Who are the dirty rats out there forcing all these lotto winners to go broke, that's what I want to know! Anytime the so-called downtrodden are handed things, those things lapse into decay or loss in short order. You give a guy on the street a farm with every piece of equipment he could possibly need to work it, and in a few years that farm will be a grown over disaster. Why do some insist on living on the streets when the government offers every possible form of assistance for the asking?

And why is it that only a few find their way to the straight gate? It doesn't matter because man is not their judge, nor is he their keeper. According to the Lord owing to man's free will, that is just the way of things. Now, I didn't say we can slack on spreading the Gospel or that we should shut down the soup kitchens. In fact though, between Church benevolence and State assistance programs, I'd say every effort is being made to meet folks physical needs. But that doesn't stop Mommy and Daddy from selling their food stamps and buying beer and cigarettes now does it? AFWIW, I couldn't help but notice that you completely sidestepped the fact that foodstamp recipients grew from 350,000 in 1964 to 50 million currently. We pay people for sloth as the record proves. Death, suffering and want entered into the world through sin. The poor of spirit are not those who necessarily lack for money, they are the ones humble enough to recognize their need of a Savior. Great by this world's standards does not make one great by the Lord's standards, it's a spiritual issue, and has not a lot to do with money. And why does the Lord say a man who doesn't take care of those of his own house is worse than an infidel? We are responsible before Him to make our own way.

There is nothing wrong with having money. The problems come with the love of money, not the amount of money loved, which could conceivably be any amount. You argue for socialism which you clothe in spiritual heresy. The length of time a particular fallacy has been around doesn't gain it any more credibility in my eyes. And because the Bible doesn't mention any doctrine of some kind of great financial reversal, that doesn't mean the notion is diminished at all in your eyes, right? Christ said after He forgave the woman taken in adultery, "Go, and sin no more." It's no more an affront to men to be afflicted by sin, or disease than it is to be poor, or vice versa. Christ is interested in the souls of men, not getting even with the people of means of whom He gave their wealth in the first place.