A car in my neighborhood has a bumper sticker that says, “Jesus loves you, but I’m his favorite.” That the car also boasts a Trump sticker is not surprising. I imagine this person  means well, even thinks he is evangelizing because he has the name of Jesus on his car. But people who are not religious would be turned away, thinking that Christians are arrogant, ethnocentric, and selfish.

Some believe that wealth is a sign of God’s favor. You can see the “prosperity gospel” preached on TV and in some mega-churches, and two “prosperity gospel” preachers were invited to speak at Mr. Trump’s inauguration. You can  find support for it in certain Old Testament biblical passages . “Praise the LORD! Happy are those who fear the LORD, who greatly delight in his commandments. Their descendants will be mighty in the land; the generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches are in their houses –.” (Psalm 112:1-3a) This would seem to support the idea that God blesses people with wealth, but read on and you will find that these people are also generous to the poor, merciful, just, and faithful. It is more that the wealthy have a responsibility than that they are favored.

More commonly scripture reveals that God’s favor goes to the poor, the stranger, and the outcasts. The prophets warned Israel and Judah of a loss of God’s favor due to their worship of idols and mistreatment of the poor. In the New Testament, Jesus called a rich young man, but he went away sad, because he could not give up his wealth. Jesus commented, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God.” (Matthew 19:24) But Jesus did not give up on the wealthy; in Luke 19, Zacchaeus, a rich tax collector, climbed a tree to see Jesus. Jesus called him down and went to his home, where Zacchaeus stood and announced that he was giving half his possessions to the poor and paying back four times anything he had taken by fraud. Jesus said that salvation had come to that house that day. (Luke 19:1-10)

People gain wealth by any of a number of ways, some of which are legitimate and some of which are fraudulent. Wealth is not a measure of God’s favor, nor an indication of Christian values. God cares more about what you do with what you have, whether it is little or much. Do you feed the poor? care for the needy? dig wells in Africa? Or do you equip your private jet with gold-plated seat belts? The real measure of God’s favor is in Matthew 5: the blessed are not the haughty or the rich, but the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, and the peacemakers.