…By Moses Ayodele Orji
Dr. Alex Otti the governor of Abia State was a brilliant student. He passed out of the University of Port Harcourt in flying colour, and also rose to the pinnacle of his career as a banker.
But after listening to our Pastor’s homily today on the need for us to share the proceeds of labor with our co-labourers; and the need for us to reach out to the poor and vulnerable at this perilous period, an uncanny feeling within me has been revolving and darting around the person of our governor.
How does Governor Otti treat the poor in our midst, and what is his attitude towards sharing the fruits of collective endeavor?
Permit me therefore to draw your attention to the story we know very well: the story of a man who by all modern standards today should be considered an accomplished and successful man. Yet, our Lord Jesus Christ called him a fool.
The central character in this drama was a ‘certain rich man’ whose farm yielded so much that he had to expand his barns, saying to himself, “There will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to myself, ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for thee for many years. Take thine ease, eat, drink and be merry”.
But God told him, “Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee”
And it was so. At the height of his stockpiled wealth, he died.
Now, let’s take a closer look at this man. If he lived in our community today, he would abound with social prestige, and the aura of a big shot for his possible connections with the dominant and economic power structure of the day.
He would be seen amongst the juggernauts, men of timber and caliber and the shakers of society. He would be respected and even feared.
But he lacked one thing: the heart to share. He lacked the ability to look beyond self. He was ‘Mr. Chop Alone’ as we have it in local parlance.
He was so absorbed in his selfish passion to accumulate for self, he forgot those who toiled with him.
Little wonder an itinerant preacher of his time spared no indictment when he called him a fool. My dictionary defines a fool as ‘ someone whose decisions and actions lack good judgement’.
The rich man was a fool because to him, the end justifies the means. He
has used the labourers to amass wealth, but the proceeds are for him alone. They no longer matter.
Acquisitive inclinations has always tended to turn ordinary good people into heartless beasts, as their focus remains to acquire more.
The rich man allowed his desire to live in grandeur and splendour to shut his eyes to the mass sufferings and misery milling around him. He no longer has any modicum of social conscience.
The richer the man became materially the poorer he became spiritually. It did not matter to him anymore that he may have made promises earlier which compelled the labourers to work even harder.
Slogans such as,” Weep no more, Help is on the way” may have stirred the zeal of the workers who looked forward to a bountiful harvest, and some shared prosperity.
The rich man was a fool because he failed to realize his own dependence on others. Our parents taught us that, ‘ a single bracelet does not jingle’.
The rich man’s soliloquy contains about sixty words. Yet, “I”, “my” and “mine” occur twelve times. In his quest to hoard it all, he lost the capacity to think or to say “we” or “our”.
And Jesus seeing through his egotism called him a fool.
He talked as if he could plough the fields, or build the barns alone. And we all can appreciate the fact that tragic foolishness always occurs when we as individuals overlook the mutuality and interdependence of life.
No man is self-sufficient, and no man is an island.
I also think that the rich man was called a fool because he failed to realize his dependence on God as well. He talked as if he had the powers to decree rainfall and to usher in the seasons, or to provide fertility for the soil and the other processes conducive to good harvest
This attempt to make God irrelevant has been the bane of self-centered men through the ages.
We tend to rely on our cold calculations alone as we push through the dark alleys of uncertainties. And in our consuming wisdom, we brush aside the nagging eerie voice: I juola chi. Yet we know from everyday experience that no man holds the four aces.
After the rich man had accumulated his vast resources; after he had built more barns (yes, after establishing more branches with the lean resources meant for the ordinary poor citizens); at the moment when his stocks were accruing great interest, and his palatial homes were the talk of the town; the rich man arrived at the irreducible common denominator for ALL men, he died
The fact that he died at this point in time adds verve and drama to the story. But the story would have remained the same had he lived to rival Methuselah.
To me, he died when he couldn’t distinguish between the means by which he lived, and the purpose of life itself.
In the Words of Winston Churchill, “We make a living by what we get, but we make our lives by what we share with others”
The rich man also died when he couldn’t recognize his dependence on God, and on others. How other labourers fared, or how they felt were not factors that he cared to consider
And so, even if he had not died, he was already dead spiritually.
A time like now therefore calls on leaders to reestablish the spiritual ends of their lives through personal character, and a broader vision for the people’s wellbeing. Indeed, a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.
There is time for every purpose under heaven.
And the priority of this period does not call for the hoarding of the commonwealth.
It calls for a new heart: a heart for the people.
N/B: This Opinion is Solely that of the author
