The Wired Word for 1/31/2010

Dear Class Member,

The news we're using as the basis for our next class discussion didn't make it into the headlines, but it illustrates two key biblical principles: the danger of being possessed by our possessions and the importance of loving our neighbors in ways that really help them. So those will be the topics of our class lesson.

  

If you wish to start thinking about our topic in advance, below is some introductory material. 

 

 

Family Downsizes Home, Gives $800,000 to Charity

The Wired Word for January 31, 2010 

 

In the News

 

One day in 2006, Kevin Salwen, a writer and entrepreneur in Atlanta, and his wife, Joan, were driving their 14-year-old daughter, Hannah, home from a sleepover. Stopping for a red light, Hannah noticed a Mercedes coupe on one side of the street and a homeless man begging for food on the other side. A thought suddenly struck her, and she said, "If that man had a less nice car, that man there could have a meal."

 

After the light changed, Hannah pursued the topic, pushing her parents about inequity and insisting that she wanted to do something personally. Finally, her mother, thinking to bring Hannah back to reality, asked, "What do you want to do? Sell our house?"

 

Wrong question for an idealistic teen.

 

Hannah leaped on that idea, urging her parents to sell their luxurious home and give half the proceeds to charity. They could buy a more modest home with the other half, she said.

 

Kevin acknowledges that they were fairly well off, "a result of hard work, good education and career luck," he says. And at the time, the family of four, including Hannah's younger brother, Joseph, were living in an attractive, spacious, three-story home.

 

Hannah wasn't deterred, and in the days ahead, she continued to promote the idea and finally got the rest of her family on board. The Salwens sold their home and moved into one that was half the size and, significantly, half the price of the one they sold. They ended up giving $800,000 to the Hunger Project, a New York City-based international development organization, where it's being used to sponsor health, microfinancing, food and other programs for some 40 villages in Ghana.

 

The whole process brought the family closer together. They researched charities to find the right one to receive their gift. Along the way, they participated in World Vision's 30-Hour Famine to learn what it was like to be hungry. They worked together at a local food bank and soup kitchen, and they labored on a team helping Habitat for Humanity build homes. They even traveled to Ghana with Hunger Project executive John Coonrod. The Salwens discovered that Coonrod and his wife donate so much back to the project from their modest aid-worker salaries that they're among the top Hunger Project givers from New York.

 

But the family came together in another way as well. Kevin says that in the larger house, the family scattered in different directions, but after the downsizing, with less space to scatter to, the family members spend more time in proximity to one another. Unexpectedly, the smaller house turned out to be more family-friendly. "We essentially traded stuff for togetherness and connectedness," Kevin says.

 

The family who purchased the home the Salwens sold were so impressed with what the family was doing that they gave $100,000 to the same project.

 

The Salwens haven't been without critics. Some have called them sanctimonious showoffs, and others have said they should be helping Americans instead of people in Ghana.  

 

Kevin and Hannah have written a book about the whole experience. Titled The Power of Half, it's due to be released in February. Their aim, the father and daughter say, isn't to encourage others to sell their homes but rather to urge them to step off the treadmill of accumulation and define themselves more by what they give than by what they possess.

 

Hannah, now 17 and planning to become a nurse, says, "Everyone has too much of something, whether it's time, talent or treasure. Everyone does have their own half; you just have to find it."

 

More on this story can be found at these links:

 

What could you live without? New York Times

Why we gave away our home. Parade

The Power of Half. Salwen Family Blog 

 

The Big Questions

Here are some of the questions we will discuss in class:

 

1. How much of what you possess could you give away without harming your well-being?

 

2. What possessions or commodities do you have in quantities that are more than you need to be comfortable?

 

3. Under what circumstances might giving away most of your possessions to help others be the right thing to do? 

 

4. What is the main biblical view of possessions?

 

5. To what degree and with whom does motive count when we do acts of charity?

 

Confronting the News with Scripture

We will look at selected verses from these Scripture texts. You may wish to read these in advance for background:

 

Genesis 13:2-12

Luke 14:25-33

Luke 19:1-9

Acts 10:1-8

1 Corinthians 13:1-13 

 

In class, we will talk about these passages and look for some insight on the big questions, as well as talk about other questions you may have about this topic. Please join us.