Inconspicuous spending: how to be really rich

How do you know if someone is rich? For millennia the answer was simple: they tell you. Or more accurately they show you. They wear garish jewelry and drive ostentatious cars, and decorate their homes with antiques and Persian rugs and/or Persian cats. In a word, wealth has always been…conspicuous. But apparently no longer. Or so argues Elizabeth Currid-Halkett

in her book The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class.

She observes that instead of hoarding the flashy accouterments that were formerly used to signal a financial arrival—Rolexes, Ferraris, yachts, country club memberships, and box seats in various arenas and opera houses—the less boorish approach is now to direct spending to inconspicuous products and services that improve quality of life and pass on a legacy of education and health to their progeny.

Replacing the ostentation of gilt and pedigree pets, the opulence today manifests in the employment of cleaning services, gardeners, au pairs, chefs, personal trainers, and private tutors to foster elite performance in academics and sports. Yoga lessons, adventure vacations, mud clubs, and other more personal or intimate experience-based enjoyments are more in vogue than the gold-plated, silver-spooned, and bronze-skinned visible wealth that characterized preceding generations. And investing in health and wellness as a way of life is at its zenith among the blue bloods of today.

Currid-Halkett notes that the tectonic shift between the moneyed elite of yesteryear and today’s Ivy League/Silicon Valley nouveau riche is that most contemporary upper-crusters actually had to work for their wealth.

Other than the odd trust fund playboy or oligarch’s debutante, the leisure class no longer exists.”

For the first time in history, and in a dramatic inversion of the days of Downton Abbey, the top earning fifth of the workforce now puts in more hours on the job than the bottom earning fifth. This might explain the value placed on food, lifestyle, education, and experiences; since people have to work hard for their money, they would rather spend it on making their few non-working moments in a cocoon bliss where everyone else does their dirty work and they can focus on feeling healthy and happy. She terms this “inconspicuous consumption.”

As Christians, we understand the need for a whole other level of inconspicuous consumption. We (should) not only work to live, or work to thrive, but we work to give. We want to invest not only in our health and wellbeing and that of our children; we want to invest in an eternity of riches beyond all earthly comparison. We are not only willing to put in hours on the job, but we are willing to spill blood and lose life, in order to secure more eternal souls who can worship Jesus forever.

The pursuit of eternal happiness is the ultimate inconspicuous expenditure, because we value anonymous giving, surreptitious generosity, and behind-the-scenes service over all forms of self-aggrandizement and public credit.

Here are some verses that underpin this characteristic of every mature believer:

Matthew 6:2-4 “Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

Matthew 23:6-8,11 and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others. But you are not to be called rabbi, …The greatest among you shall be your servant.

Luke 18:29-30 And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life.”

2 Corinthians 4:17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,

These verses are just a sampling of this quintessential Christian teaching. Inconspicuous spending is the financial paradigm of every true disciple of Christ. We don’t want to look rich or act rich. We want to be rich. And we want to be really rich… which means we want to be rich in God’s eyes (Luke 12:21).

For more on the theology of earning and forfeiting eternal rewards for believers, see The Preacher’s Payday.