These are trying times. Add to the long list of uncertainties the economy. It seems $700 billion won’t buy what it used to buy, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average has now dropped 1,400 points in the last week. The DJIA is now below 10,000 for the first time since October 2004. Recession is out of the closet and in everyone’s vocabulary.
Here’s how it the DJIA chart looks on a five-year scale:
While there are many factors in play, it’s clear that the driving force in the global economic debacle is greed. Greed is a constant in the midst of changing times.
It’s easy to rail against the Wall Street bosses and their crafty minions who got us into the present mess, but Martin Luther brings it close to home for me:
“There are some who think that they have God and everything they need when they have money and property; they trust in them and boast in them so stubbornly and securely that they care for no one else. They too, have a god – mammon by name, that is, money and property – on which they set their whole heart. This is the most common idol on earth. Those who have money and property feel secure, happy, and fearless, as if they were sitting in the midst of paradise. On the other hand, those who have nothing doubt and despair as if they knew of no god at all. We will find very few who are cheerful, who do not fret and complain, if they do not have mammon. This desire for wealth clings and sticks to our nature all the way to the grave.”
So how will I handle things? It’s a big test of faith.