Debt — A Biblical Exploration (Day 3 of 5)

 The year of release put a stop to the familiar cycle of the rich getting richer and the poor poorer. Regardless of how much debt the poor may have incurred or the reason for that debt, the year of release provided a comprehensive program of debt cancellation and freedom from indentured servitude. This radical economic legislation was grounded in Israel's identity as a nation with firsthand experience of God's generosity.

Stewardship theologian Ronald E. Vallet notes that both "Exodus 21:2-11 and Deuteronomy 15:1-11 spelled out provisions for the remission of debts every seven years." Vallet points out that God went even further.

In Leviticus 25, those provisions were incorporated into the practice of the Jubilee year. Every 50 years — Sabbath of Sabbaths, the year after seven sevens — the land was to have rest from cultivation. There was a homecoming in which family land that had been forfeited was to be returned. Debts were to be canceled; slaves were to be set free. The provisions were radical. In effect, all society was commanded to pursue God's interest and passion for justice. Isaiah 61, especially verses 1-2 with their reference to "the year of the Lord's favor," is Isaiah's allusion to the year of Jubilee, an idea that influenced the prophets greatly. Isaiah 61:8 sums up forcefully the divine passion for justice embedded in all scripture: "[For I, the Lord, love justice; I hate robbery and iniquity. In my faithfulness I will reward them and make an everlasting covenant with them]."

Imagine what it would be like to experience a financial jubilee one time in your lifetime: to be able to start from a clean slate with no debts or obligations to be repaid. What would that freedom enable you to do?

Proverbs 3:28 — "Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come again, and to morrow I will give; when thou hast it by thee."

Psalms 37:21 — "The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again: but the righteous sheweth mercy, and giveth."

2 Kings 4:7 — "Then she came and told the man of God. And he said, Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt, and live thou and thy children of the rest."

Deuteronomy 15:1-2 — "At the end of every seven years thou shalt make a release. And this is the manner of the release: Every creditor that lendeth ought unto his neighbour shall release it; he shall not exact it of his neighbour, or of his brother; because it is called the Lord's release."

Nehemiah 10:3 — "And if the people of the land bring ware or any victuals on the sabbath day to sell, that we would not buy it of them on the sabbath, or on the holy day: and that we would leave the seventh year, and the exaction of every debt."

Philemon 1:18-19 — "If he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee ought, put that on mine account; I Paul have written it with mine own hand, I will repay it: albeit I do not say to thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides."