Sow righteousness for
yourselves, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up
your unplowed ground;
for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and
showers his righteousness on you.
- Hosea 10:12
Now that you have
purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you
have sincere love for each other, love one another
deeply, from the heart. For you have been born again,
not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the
living and enduring word of God.
- I Peter 1:22-23
Anytime anyone does
anything, they are making some value claim and inevitably
transferring some portion of that value to someone else. The
question "What is truly valued and by how much?" is one that has
been asked through the ages. Does a thing have intrinsic or
instrumental value? It is the premise of this webzine that there is
not a single thing that has intrinsic value. Not one thing. All
things have instrumental value (if they have any at all) simply
because a thing is valued by the one who observes it, assesses
that value, and may work to appropriate that for his or her benefit.
Does this mean everything is
subjective? Not at all. Many things are universally objective, set
that way by a God who is pure subject Himself. In that sense there
is one thing that does have pure intrinsic value: God Himself. The closest
thing to earthly intrinsic value is the human soul seen through the eyes of
God (in this sense things still have instrumental value
because it is God making the assessment of something outside
Himself). God made man to enjoy His creation, man immediately
went off to reject God's assessment of value, and God then sent His
Son to die for man effectively "buying him back" so he could
once again employ God's perfect measure of value, His love.
This means that everything
God has made and redeemed has a measure of "intrinsic" value. The
World, though, cannot understand this. As such, it has erected
grand institutions to make elaborate pronouncements of value
assessments, often going so far as to claim that man can "create
value." This is the giveaway phrase that someone is claiming to be
God himself, for we can only discover the value God already created
value that He desires we assess the way He does. That procedure
occurs only when we engage in transferring that value from one human
to another. The question is, are you doing it God's way, or the
World's way?
Below are the ten ways I see that man generally transfers value from one person to another. I've
established these ten and in my deep contemplation I see only these
ten. If you see any others, please email me, I'd be happy to add
them. Notes about some considered transfers that are merely a form
of one of the ten are made after each type of transfer.
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Activity by
Receiver of Value |
One Doing the Providing |
What is being bought |
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1 Spending |
Producer |
Good or service |
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A strict exchange of goods and services
is one of the most common forms of value transfer. When this exchange
occurs and the price is true and fair, then there is increase
of value both parties are better off than they were
before. Profits that are meaningful and beneficial are only those
that are sowed (see below). Profits that are selfishly
appropriated are just a form of human sacrifice. In a way all forms
of value transfer are simply spending on something, but that is
covered in the column "What is being bought." After all, with any
value transfer comes something that someone is buying,
however implicit that thing might be. What it is that one is
actually buying reveals the heart's contents.
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2 Saving |
Holder |
Store of value / Assurance of future use |
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A fee is a legitimate charge for the
task of providing a secure place for stored value, such as a bank
holding one's money. The World System generally has dismissed the
fee and instead enters into usury, which is paying small amounts of
interest to savers from the large amounts of interest receipts the
"holder" gets for
lending that saved money. This type of usury is, like exploitive
profits, simply a form of human sacrifice.
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3 Borrowing
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Lender |
Borrower: Immediate capital. Lender: Part of increase as price of foregone
immediate consumption |
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One of the two on this list in
which the money flow goes from right to left. (The other is theft,
see below) The purchase here is financial capital, the money itself. Saving and lending are closely linked,
but lending is very different. In a fiat money fractional reserve
banking system, financial institutions merely "create" money
that is their "product" then
lend it at high interest. This is indeed the most rank form of
usury, though it is required for the millions in a populace who
themselves
habitually exploit others. Essentially, high interest is
the price of sin, and is the most significant motivating force in
keeping World inhabitants from lascivious indolence and getting them
to labor at all. Any type of renting or leasing arrangement would
fall within this form of value transfer.
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4 Investing |
Entrepreneur |
Larger increase as price of foregone
consumption, often accompanied by claim of ownership. (Entrepreneur:
protracted engagement in capital movement) |
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Capital movement is a
necessity for value expansion within a community or nation. Note
this is value expansion, not creation. The expansion comes
when the God-infused value already innate within the created human
is given more opportunity to be further manifest. When done is a
spirit of sowing (see below), I've called it value enhancement.
In a way investing is merely spending and saving
spending in that
there is an agreed-upon fair and true price for a capital item, and
saving when the use of present value is exchanged for claim of value
in the future.
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5 Hoarding |
(No one) |
Temporary relief from profound dread
(the real price is the withheld investment from producers) |
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The exposing activity of a
pathologically fearful person. The hoarder was one of the few people
that Jesus expressly censured in his parables, the individual who
takes the measure of his God-given value and keeps it completely to
himself (described as the one who buries his talent). One of the
highest forms of selfishness.
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6 Paying tribute (taxes,
tithes) |
Administrator |
Protection
To the prince: from another's iniquity. To the priest:
from one's own. |
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Both the tax and the tithe are
forms of tribute one pays to another for the basic purpose of
mitigating the sinful behavior that destroys. Traditionally the tax
is paid to a civil governor to do the job of cracking heads of those
who'd hurt others. In the same sense the tithe is paid to an
ecclesiastical officer (priest, minister, non-profit director) to
"crack heads" of sinners who know they need their services to
protect themselves and others from themselves. Tribute is
legitimate capital movement albeit implemented by force. It is
required chiefly for sin management. If it were only for building
libraries and paving roads it would be just spending, in this case
spending for "merit goods," those things that whole communities pay
for to augment everyone's value enhancement. Of course the
reason civil government must be engaged in these things is that
without it, sinful people at each others' throats won't quite
accomplish even those simple things.
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7 Stealing |
Theft victim |
The thief: Protracted dissolution of
anger / instant gratification of perceived need. The victim: Immediate dissolution of threat. |
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This is the simple taking of
value straight away with no pretense of offering anything of value
in return. It is often accompanied by elaborate acts of deceit;
indeed most theft is executed by con men of some stripe. This is the
most brazen form of human sacrifice, and if a value transfer does
not involve authentic sowing, any of these value transfer
items could actually be theft. Say the word "theft" or "stealing"
and most would probably think of the petty burglar you know, black
mask, striped shirt... that kind of stereotypical image. But theft
is accomplished best by tyrants, and is much more common. In fact
the only difference between paying tribute and stealing
is that tribute is legal. I don't say this facetiously; paying
tribute is indeed a fully proper form of value transfer for those
who are agreeing to purchase the extraordinarily important service
of sin management.
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8 Giving
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Needy |
Gratification for charitable works
(often registered with the requisite attention) |
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In its very best sense, this is
capital movement with no expected return. Is seen by many World
inhabitants as the highest form of unselfishness, the complete
antithesis of theft. The problem is that giving is usually done for
"value points" scored, such as a tax deduction, which invalidates
much of the unselfishness. Even more troublesome is that it is
usually done by just handing over value to someone else who (1) has
no continued relationship with the giver, and (2) is considered so
inept that the gift is ultimately wasted and it often is because
of the codependent nature of most giving. (While it requires a much
more extensive definition, in it simplest sense "codependent" means
someone else is made responsible of one's well-being, and is so in a
fearfully dysfunctional way.) Giving also creates another quite
significant problem, that of moral hazard. This is simply the
truth that an individual's desire to maximize his or her God-given
talents drops dramatically when the incentive for laboring with
those talents is eviscerated by just handing over the fruit of
someone else's bounty. A related problem is the disrespect the giver
has for the sowing work the receiver may do if the fruit of such
work is simply handed over with "no strings attached."
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9 Sowing |
Future sower |
Passed-on instruction about
self-sacrifice / Expanded agape expression / Wider and deeper provision for
all in community |
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This seems like the rarest of all the
forms of value transfer, but God does amazing things through those
who live richly by His love.
Sowing is only meaningful when done by Kingdom people faithfully
drawing on Christ, because sowers confidently know they can be part
of realistically providing for the well-being of others out of the
deep, abiding love they have for them. Other value transfer
activities like spending and investing can be done out of a
commitment to be sowing into the lives of others, but if any value
transfer activity is done outside of the principle of sowing, it
really amounts to human sacrifice. Sowing involves capital movement
with no expected return but has a firm expectation that growth
happens in others' lives and those of their families and communities. That growth
is both spiritual and material. It is wholly relational and
results in a generous portion from the fruit of that growth being
unselfishly returned it to the one who commenced the sowing.
Yes, it is a sort of Kingdom "pay-it-forward" but it goes
everywhere. The key is that rich value enhancement
only happens when the sower is receiving the initiation of the
growth from Christ who already has all things, and one of the most
important of those things is the capacity to truly value things.
Christ valued things with his shed blood, which means those who
follow Him do their sowing the way He did self-sacrificially
and knowing fully that God is holding them in His hands. In a real
sense, after giving their lives, they are certain to be resurrected
into bountiful life. They have nothing to lose, everything to sow,
and the harvest is more abundant than the World can ever dream
about.
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10 Sharing |
Learner |
Information increase. When it comes
from a Christ follower it is life itself. |
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I've added this one because in a
very real sense, any information transfer from one to another is a
form a value transfer. The act of saying a thing to another is
handing over a measure of value. Remember, Jesus is "the
Living Word." He is the message of salvation. Jesus as
value transfer is not just information one receives, but transformation
of one's whole self, from a hapless sinner to a restored son or daughter in the
embrace of a
beaming Father, from a benighted World inhabitant to a rejoicing
heir to His Kingdom. When this is accomplished in an institutional
domain such as formal education, the money flow goes from right to
left. The phenomenal value of this transfer form is highlighted by
the obsession people have with advanced electronic communication
devices like cell phones. It isn't the device itself that is so
entrancing (except in the fascination with the very interesting
things it can do), it is the information one instantly receives
from another.
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It may go
without saying that a form of money is instrumental in all
of these transfers, but this entire web page enterprise is a
more lucid description of the very functions of money: a
unit of account / measure of value (what is that
measure?), a store of value (how does that change over
time?), and a medium of exchange (how much is that respected
among those engaging in the transfer?) These questions can
only be meaningfully answered when thoughtfully considering
what it is precisely that money is representing. It
is that value which is the focus of this conversation.
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There are many ways to assess and assign value to any given item,
the most common is to use a monetary unit like the dollar. One of
the most fascinating new value assignment tools is the
non-fungible token, a way to place a value on a digital item
and have that registered in cyberspace. This and the
cryptocurrency fad do not alter the value transfer
principles elucidated herein, but make for interesting
manifestations of these exchanges.
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A critical aspect of value
transfer has to do with the consideration of one's authority
or legitimacy to make a claim of value. There are generally
two ways this is done. The World does it mostly by making
ownership claims. While it is indeed a convention that
is important for property management, ultimately anyone who
claims ownership of anything is succumbing to the greatest
lie. Because God already "owns" everything in the universe,
for any individual to say he or she owns a thing is
to take the place of God, in a sense saying "I am God."
These kinds of decisions are made from the standard
operating emotion of the World: fear.
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The contrasting claim to a value
assignment is made by Kingdom people, trusting in Christ and
acknowledging that it is all His anyway. They make
stewardship claims, which is simply managing goods and
resources based on the Kingdom's motivating force: love.
This does not mean certain people cannot have firm
boundaries about valuable things and make wise and often
very tough decisions about those things. But stewardship is
chiefly about sowing. Rank selfish worldly ownership,
on the other hand, only fosters human sacrifice.
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Another distinction must be made
regarding the fact that everyone does need things from
others to survive, much more thrive. Isn't this basic
human need a form of selfishness? It isn't when seen through
the eyes of God who desires to give us all He made. The
difference is between covetousness and
acquisitiveness. Covetous people selfishly take;
acquisitive people want to have the very best from God and
use that indeed sow that into the lives of others.
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In its simplest sense, the
practice of human sacrifice is hacking off value from
others to fearfully fulfill one's own purposes and please
his or her god. I've put together a
rough sketch of human sacrifice,
and I've compiled a series of blog posts that get a bit more
into the way the financial
world does human sacrifice, something I've discovered is
better known as value extraction.
An introduction to
the concept of human sacrifice is in a home page piece I
did in 2008. The point cannot be
overstated: If someone is not sowing, they are by their
very nature doing human sacrifice.
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Human
sacrifice is traditionally considered an instance when
someone completely takes the life of another. Murder
then is really just another form of theft ("taking a
life"). Just as Cain's murder of his brother Abel was an
instance of human sacrifice, any murder from the most
heinously calculated occult-oriented killing to a wanton act
of instant rage is ultimately a theft, a value transfer
that goes strictly from victim to perpetrator.
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I find it interesting in the
context of value transfer how much two school subjects are
so esteemed, and yet so intensely reviled by most pupils.
Those two subjects are mathematics and rhetoric (more
commonly reading and writing). How much do we need math to
do our damnedest to measure the value of things, and
rhetoric to make the value transfer expressions as clear and
concise as we damned well can. These wonderful tools can
also be utilized for the most abject deceit, which is also why
exploiters like them so much.
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It was written above that one of
the tasks of a sower is initiating the value enhancement
that Christ started. But it must be added that this is only
accomplished by mobilizing others and their God-given gifts
to produce things of value. The increase in the magnitude
of the value of those things occurs when those things
are freely distributed to all in community but
accompanied by a firm acceptance by all of how
God made it to begin with. It must also come with an
impassioned expression by all that it is people who
are most important, and while the things are important they
are only instrumental to their well-being.
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It is axiomatic, though not as
emphatic as it should be, that much of all this revolves
around the idea that we all need one another, particularly
because of the universal fact that each of us is subject to
the inevitability of old age, disability, illness, or some
incapacity that nullifies our immediate productiveness. Each
one of us has already been in this state as children. We are
fluctuating constantly into this state whenever we are
presently not laboring, such as during days of rest
or leisure. The crucial question is, how do we facilitate value transfer,
particularly when it should be done in some measure to
benefit those who cannot easily reciprocate? The World's way, which is woefully deficient leaving
countless people wretchedly impoverished, or the Kingdom's
way, which is all about sowing both material and spiritual
bounty into the lives of industrious and grateful people?
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One of the
most significant ways theft occurs by "con men" is through
elaborate manipulation of those subject to codependent
interaction. Some of the most respectable-looking
individuals will overstate the value of something and then
exploit the neediness of others to hand the measure of that
deliberate misassessment over to them. It is done in so many
different ways by so many clever people, it is enabled
within all the strata of the System, and it is one of the
most common ways to execute human sacrifice.
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A splendid
treatment of all this comes from the philosophical "debate"
between Robert Nozick and John Rawls, who both gave their
elaborate take on how this thing value should be
considered by all. It is quite prevalent in modern academic
discourse. Because this is the genesis for a larger volume,
I won't get into it now, except to say that this is merely a
rough sketch and definitely worth greater expansion when I
have time.
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An important elaboration should be
made about the nature of the Catholicist Nation regarding
the fine distinction between giving, sowing, and paying
tribute. Dutiful Catholicist operatives will always secure
more power as the legitimate legacy of Cain by keeping
people as covetous as they can, and in doing so compel them
to abandon providing for those not immediately productive
and request their needs be funded from the nation's
treasury. Essentially the job of giving is expected to be
administered by the state. The more that people hand the
responsibility for "caring" over to Caesar, the less
incentive they have to minister God's truth and grace to
them through the vibrantly charitable work of Christ. Most
American churches stunt the impact of the gospel by aligning
themselves with Caesar in his task of co-opting the work of
"sowing," and they do this by contracting with him as 501c3
non-profit organizations.
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The way
Christ does value transfer is to give up the full measure of
His value as He did on the cross so that others may
appropriate His sacrifice for their deeply entrenched value
extraction natures, otherwise known as sin. The proud
and powerful of the World take through human sacrifice of
others and destroy lives, the humble and gentle of the
Kingdom give once again, much better: sow and
restore lives.
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If you can think of any ways that
I've missed the idea of value transfer here, I'd love to
hear about it. I invite you to
email me. I
want to get all of this true and draw as many into the
Kingdom and experiencing Christ's love as I can, and I am
open to correction in any way in order to do that. Thank
you.
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***
Scripture
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More about the Catholicist Nation
Human Sacrifice
How Churches Make
Themselves Human Sacrifice Institutions
This page was
updated on March 23, 2021
This page was originally posted by David Beck at
yourownjesus.net on December 30,
2010
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