"As goods increase, so do those who consume
them. And what benefit are they to the owner except to feast his eyes
on them?" -Ecclesiastes 5:11
“Welcome to the Grand Illusion.” The opening lyric of the
Styx song beckons us into an insatiable orgy of consumerism. Like the
gullible child tricked by the unscrupulous showman, we buy our ticket
and enter the tent with eyes wide and mouth agape. We are bedeviled with
broken images, trite slogans, clever distortions, and abject lies. Just
what I needed. Every kiss begins with Kay. Because you’re
worth it. A diamond is forever. Good food, good life.
Before we realize what’s happening, our pockets have been picked
clean and we’re left with nothing but an empty wallet, an emptier
heart, and a burning lust for more. Fortunately, we’ve still got
our credit cards.
This grand illusion is the nightmare that masquerades as the American
Dream, and it is as ubiquitous with Christians as it is with the rest
of America. Sure, Christians acknowledge the truism that “money
doesn’t buy happiness.” However, they usually follow this
avowal with a caveat, “But….” “I want a safe,
reliable car for my family. I want my children to have a good education.
I want that new sweater; it matches my pants so well. I want to live
in a nice house—and besides, my house isn’t nearly as big
as Mr. and Mrs. Smith’s house down the street anyway; it’s
only a modest size compared to that one.” Of course, all of these
“wants” are soon turned into “needs” as we slip
deeper under the spell of our self-induced hypnosis. We only fool ourselves
when we believe that these excuses justify our materialism.
We have a clever way of turning the material things we desire into
good. We deceive ourselves, not realizing that it is in chasing after
the lesser good that many have found the road to hell. As long as they
were not doing evil, they failed to recognize their need for the true
Good. It was always somebody else who was greedy, someone else who was
too rich. But what are we? An excellent test for ourselves is to imagine
how we would respond if Jesus came to us and commanded, “Go, sell
your possessions and give to the poor” (Matt. 19:21). If this
thought is distasteful, our one master is not God.
In contrast, imagine the man in Plato’s allegory of the cave
and ask, “How can the man who has truly seen the light go back
into the cave and tolerate living the rest of his days in the Shadowlands?”
It is impossible. Even if he is a prince in the Shadowlands and a pauper
in the world above, he cannot do it. For him, the lesser good does not
exist. There is only one Good. One True. One Beautiful. If the Christian
has truly grasped the goodness and truth of what God promises, he has
no appetite left for the things of this world. They are but rubbish
to him.
This wisdom is foolishness to the world. But we reject it at our own
peril. How many of us will believe lies and spend our best days worshiping
the golden calves of American capitalism? When we lie dying, what will
we whisper as we think back over our days? Will we mouth “Rosebud”?
The child who finds joy in simple beauties is far wiser than the man
who takes 70 years and a broken life to grasp the emptiness of what
he has been chasing. As T.S. Eliot wrote in the last of the Four
Quartets, “And the end of all our exploring / Will be to
arrive where we started / And know the place for the first time.”
This truth is the same wisdom proclaimed at the end of his life by
the Teacher of Ecclesiastes, who warns us, “Remember your Creator
in the days of your youth” (Eccl. 12:1). For, as he—a man
who tasted the bitterness of every other fruit—can truly caution,
all else is “Meaningless! Meaningless!” “Vanity of
vanities.” “Utterly senseless.” “A chasing after
the wind.” The American Dream is hollow and those who breathe
its lies are but hollow men. If we buy into the illusion, it is inevitable
that we will end our days chanting some version of Ecclesiastes. “We
made the grade and still we wonder who the hell we are!”
John Montague is on staff with Manna Christian Fellowship. He graduated
from the University of Virginia in 2003 with a degree in economics and
philosophy, and he currently works for an industrial supply company
in the Princeton area.