Professor Thomas Phillips has been a friend of Jenny and I for several years. In addition to teaching our first year of Greek (and most of Scott’s New Testament courses), Tom also provided our marriage counseling (or more accurately our pre-engagement counseling) and officiated our wedding. More specific to our topic of wealth, Dr. Phillips wrote his PhD dissertation on Wealth and Poverty in Luke-Acts. Tom illustrates the difficulties of trying to build a single biblically based ethic regarding wealth and offers a model of how we might begin to practice a Christian understanding of wealth.
Article: "The Scripture and Poverty"
Questions:
- How does Phillip’s approach differ from that of Schneider’s?
- What does his ethic say regarding the enjoyment of luxury?
- Do any of the examples from Luke-Acts represent your current (recent) views on how Christians respond to wealth?
- What does Phillips position offer for western protestant Christians functioning in a capitalist society?
