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A Gospel of Wealth Redistribution

A Gospel of Wealth Redistribution

Last updated on: January 24, 2025 at 10:45 am by Herb Montgomery

A Gospel of Wealth Redistribution 2025-01-24T10:45:36-04:00 Herb Montgomery

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Part 2 of A Gospel of Economic Justice

Luke’s gospel also calls for wealth redistribution. But before we get there, considering how many times Luke’s gospel mentions “the poor,” it is no wonder that many consider it to be the gospel of economic justice. I’m reminded of what the late father of liberation theologies Gustavo Gutiérrez wrote in solidarity with the poor: “The poverty of the poor is not a call to generous relief action, but a demand that we go and build a different social order.” (The Power of the Poor in History, 2004, p. 45).

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Certainly this was Jesus’ call in Luke, too.

So central is Jesus’ gospel of the wealth redistribution of the kingdom for the poor that when John’s disciples ask Jesus about the authenticity of his own movement, he responds that the good news to the poor validating his ministry:

So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor. (Luke 7:22)

One of the transitional moments for me in my own journey in ministry was realizing that the Jesus of the gospels never mentions so many of the things I used to be passionate about preaching. And so many of the things Jesus taught and that were central to his emphasis in the synoptic gospels, I never even mentioned.

The poor, poverty, and economic justice were one of themes for me.

In Luke, Jesus centers the poor. The kingdom belongs to them. And Jesus’ “kingdom” is good news for them. As Gutiérrez would say, it’s a different social order where poverty is no longer created. Poverty is an indictment of the system it exists in, because that system creates and allows for poverty. A system of winners and losers will always have those who lose. But in Jesus’ new social order, everyone has enough to thrive:

Looking at his disciples, he said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” (Luke 6:20)

For Jesus, everything depended on how generous our attitude and actions were toward those our system places in poverty. Notwhithstanding the problematic nature of purity cultures in general, and given that this passage was written within a kind of purity culture, notice how everything “being clean” hinged on generosity toward the poor:

But now as for what is inside you—be generous to the poor, and everything will be clean for you. (Luke 11:41)

It is often said that Jesus’ advice in Luke 18 to the rich man, to sell his superfluous possessions and give them to the poor, were an isolated, private, and individual call only to that man. But this is far from the truth. Consider Jesus’ words to this man in Luke 18 and then compare them to Jesus’ words to the crowd in Luke 12. In Luke 12, this call is not to a specific wealthy person, but to all wealthy listeners in general.

When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” (Luke 18:22)

“Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.” (Luke 12:33)

The wealth redistribution Jesus was calling for actually makes sense. Today, the difference between a $30,000 income and a $60,000 for a family is dramatic for the adults but especially dramatic for that family’s children. Their stress, health, life expectancy, and social outcomes are all dramatically different. At the same time, we now know people aren’t dramatically happier or more fulfilled if their net worth grows from $1 billion to $10 billion.

I’m reminded of Zacchaeus, who in Luke is one of those wealthy members of society (who also was a tax collector) who choose to heed Jesus’ call:

But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” (Luke 19:8)

There remains one more example of how central eleminating poverty was to Luke’s gospel. We’ll take a look at that in Part 3.

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About Herb Montgomery

Herb Montgomery, director of Renewed Heart Ministries, is an author and adult religious re-educator helping Christians explore the intersection of their faith with love, compassion, action, and societal justice. You can read more about the author here.

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January 22, 2025

A Gospel for Those in Poverty

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January 24, 2025 A Gospel of a New Social Order

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