First world problems

My son once had a girlfriend who lived in a small town and her parents were exactly as you described. Their mentality was, "now if you are not from our small town and you don't drive a Ford and you don't attend our little church in the woods, then we don't want anything to do with you!"

Yep the Bubbles can look different but it is all the same mentally.. Being focused on just one group or way of thinking and blocking out anyone or anything that does not conform to your group or way of thinking..

Amen to that! We once had lunch with my son's ex-girlfriends' parents and talk about awkward! I sat straight across from her dad and he would not even look me in the eye. He either (with a smug look on his face) looked to my right or to my left the whole time. I had to initiate all the conversation and he did not have much to say and even criticized the suburb we lived in as "too crowded" and referred to it as "the big city."

I'm sorry, but I don't consider a population of 52,000 as constituting a "big city." During lunch, a couple who lived in his small town walked into the restaurant and he lit up like a Christmas tree and proceeded to walk over to them and he talked with them for like 15 minutes, which I thought was rude. During lunch, my sons' ex-girlfriend asked her dad what he thought about my sons' new SUV and he sarcastically said, "it's a Dodge." My son at that time had a Dodge Nitro. It's one thing to have a "buy American" attitude when it comes to purchasing automobiles, but it's another thing to narrow it down to only one American auto maker and snub the other two American auto makers, in his case "Chevy and Dodge." The guy didn't even work for Ford!

In Australia when i was a kid we had the same kind of rivalry between Ford Cars and Holden Cars.. ( In the US i believe Holden is known as General Motors ) Although Holden is no longer a producer of cars in Australia..

Anyway you where either in the Ford car bubble or the Holden car bubble and often Ford and Holden owners did not speak to each other .. Especially when the major car race event in Australia was happening, the Bathurst 1000 race..

Silly what people get all worked up about..

i dont think so, I think Jesus really wanted equality amongst brethren, which is why, the city of new Jerusalem, the most holy of holies, lies foursquare and all the measurements of the holy city are equal. Its also why, he told the parable of the workers, everyone was paid the same, even if some had worked more hours than others.

Satan didnt actually want equality, he wanted to Be ABOVE God. Thats not realistic. when he attacked Job, he really got Job to thinking he was above everyone else, just cos he was so wealthy and blessed. it got so bad that Job thought in his self righteousness he could tell God what to do.

I worked in. a gated community of retired wealthy people. my goodness the petty problems they had.
the managers would run themselves ragged over the silly complaints they had trying to placate them. Talk about making mountains out of molehills!

apparently the biggest first world problem people face according to wikipedia is slow internet access.

Id be the first to go hooray internet is down I can read some books.

In permaculture they would say you dont have a slug problem, you have a duck deficiency.

Going back to the OP, I can definitely say in the US I’ve heard of these. Let me think of some around that notion

-Houses that have like 3 sitting rooms (which to me makes no sense)
-People who spend half the year in one area and the other half on the other side of the country
-The notion that being the person who pays is a competition of personal pride. I have legit seen people knock each other over almost when trying to get their card out first. Poor waiters
-People treating their animals like humans including clothing, weddings (with actual dresses from real fancy bridal shops), and yoga classes
-Children who, probably even at the tender age of 5, feel they are entitled to play on their parent’s phone. If not to have a phone of their own already.
-People who think that, because they spend a bunch of money or have a bunch of money, they are the most important human in the store up to and including the workers, managers, and probably even the owner of the dang store.

haha I heard of that. They are just cars people.

in nz the biggest problem, apart from slow internet...would be if the All Blacks lost. People seem to get really upset if the nz rugby team happens to lose. The nation would grind to a halt and the paper reports it like its the end of the world.

although if you took everything the newspapers and media/advertising said was gospel you would have a very skewed idea of what was important to people.

It's important to remember that God's "equality" (if He calls it that, I'm not sure) is defined much differently than how you seem to be defining it. God does not automatically "even everything out" -- in fact, He often seems to choose to do things in ways that most people would call "unfair."

In the parable of the vineyards, which you mention above (Matthew 20:1-16), the workers did indeed work varying hours but were all paid the same. I believe you've mentioned that you work at a library, right? Would you call it equal if you had worked there for a full 8-hour day, and a co-worker sauntered in for the last 2 hours, but you were both paid the same?

I understand what you're saying in that the parable paints a picture of both people receiving equal pay, but most people would not call this "equal". (I'm just pointing this out to illustrate that God's definition of equality is different.)

One person has more money for less time, which is basically what you are calling out in this thread -- those who have more of something, while others have less. They both might have the same amount of money, but there is still an inequality of time. So even this "equality" was produced "unequally."

In the story of the talents (Matthew 25:14-30), one person is given 1 talent, another 2 talents, and the third person, 5 talents, according to their ability. The first person buries his talent, while the other two double theirs, and in the end, the master says to take the 1 talent from the first person and to give it to the person who now has the most (5 original talents + 5 talents of interest.)

Again, to most people, this would seem unfair. Some would say, "Oh, give the poor first person a chance; maybe he's learned a lesson. and deserves to start over with another talent." Many would be rallying to give it to the person who doubled his 2 talented, so that he could "catch up" with and "be more equal" with the one who now has 10. Most would probably argue, ""Aw c'mon, the one with 10 talents has more than enough, why would he need more?" (Even the servants in the story bristled at the thought.) But God says specifically in verse 29, "For the one who has will be given more, and he will be given more than enough. But the one who has, even what he has will be taken from him."

Sometimes things AREN'T equal, and for whatever His reasons are, God chooses it that way.

Even 1 Corinthians 12:11 says the Holy Spirit will give His gifts to those He chooses, with no mention of an "equal" distribution.

I think it's great that you get us to think about what we have and how we can be serving God with it, but some inequalities are actually what God Himself has decided to do.

Now, I completely agree that if we have more than enough, we should use it to help others.

But I have often wondered: if Sarah and Abraham were alive today, would they shop at Walmart?

I've read estimations that men like Abraham and especially Solomon had wealth that would likely be counted in the billions today. Not just millions, but BILLIONS.

And I often wonder what God asked the to do with all of that excess (because Solomon obviously still had plenty to spare, even after building the temple.)

Asked the kids yest. and one said no ear pads

Yeah that's one thing I've noticed. It doesn't seem to matter to God what you started with or what you ended up with... compared to anybody around you. In fact it doesn't really seem to matter if what you did with what you had was a raging success. All God seems interested in is if you were diligent about using what you were given.

I have a good A/C system too. Good thing 'cause I live in Florida.

acc means accident compensation not air conditioning. in nz more likely to use heat pumps as houses are cold and damp in winter. This was from people thinking it was good to build houses with no insulation.

ear pads?
I think people are going to grow up with hearing problems later on if they use them all the time. who knows what junk people listen to. I know cos my dad couldnt go without blasting his ears with 'music' on the car radio and stereo all the time. I now have damaged hearing because of growing up with loud decibels in the house and car.
I know people use them so they dont have to listen to anyone else talk.

i define equality the way God defines it.
much of Library work is about quality not quantity. many people cant get their head around it though, they assume that the longer hours you do the more you should be paid. but that just means people work slower. .

I think you ought to look a bit deeper into the way God measures things. its not a mans measure.

How does God define equality? I think equality is His original purpose but we messed up His design so we are now suffering with inequality. God made it like that to expose what is inside the human heart which is nothing but pride, greed and envy. An example of God's wisdom, aside from the fall, is what he did in the tower of Babel.

I was speaking about the world in general. And the world is fallen and can never achieve this idealistic equality. So all attempt by human idealist to enforce equality will eventually lead to disaster.. We have seen many ""cultural revolutions"" through history wanting to create a perfect society and all of them end in violence and the breakdown of society.. All the experiments seeking to create a perfect society have failed dismally..

As for the brethren God wants us to love the brethren but God himself declares that some will be called greater in the kingdom of Heaven and some will be called lesser in the kingdom of heaven.. All of them will be loved and are loved by God but some will have greater honor in eternity..

As for the parable of the workers in the field which you mention the same "pay" is Salvation the time the workers are working in the field is referring to the length of time a person is a Christian.. Some people become Christians early in their lives and they work for God for many years. Others become Christian near to the end of their lives. Some even on the day of their deaths.. The same reward is given to all Christians (Salvation) no matter if they are Christians for 80 years before the die or if they are Christians for only 8 minutes before they die..

Satan wanted to be a God equal with God..

Isaiah 14: KJV
12 "How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! {13} For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: {14} I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. {15} Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit."

The Most High is God..

And i am not sure how you come to the conclusion that Job was telling God what to do?

The media like to stir up emotions in people and to exaggerate things.. They believe they will get more views of they stoke controversy and press peoples emotional buttons.. It's called rage culture.. People getting whipped into a frenzy over trivial matters.

rage culture...havent heard of that one.

I have heard of some of the muckracking that goes in journalism, things like 'if it bleeds, it leads'. Its only because they dont have good news to report and prefer the bad.

I had a friend who would often tell me negative stuff as if I ought to know about it because she watched the news on tv and read the paper, but it would have abosolutely nothing to do with me or the way I live life. it would be like so Lanolin have you heard about the latest shocking thing that happened.

Im like no I dont read or watch that rubbish. You dont have to repeat it to me.
people take their eyes off God and the Good news when they pay too much attention to what media is saying, like interest rates are the low right now or theres a sale on or lotto has gone to jackpot. because news is basically run by advertising. its how it makes its profit.

children know this and have even written to parliament saying they dont want junk food advertised to them. It confuses them, people say dont eat this or that be healthy but everywhere they look its like all the big companies target them. Instead of uplifitng messages on billboards ad bus shelters we get ads aaying eat this or that junk food. Limited time only. Hurry now. even get alcohol advertised on billboards beside the road!

its a first world problem I think, especially in cities places are saturated in adverts vying for peoples attention, with logos and brands names everywhere.