It's In The Book (Or Maybe Not)

Christians love telling each other how sinful they are. If everybody is talking about their favorite foods a Christian will try to kill the mood by pointing out that, "Man does not live by bread alone." (Matthew 4:4) And if everybody is eagerly talking about their retirement plans, a killjoy Christian will say, "There's nothing in the Bible that talks about retirement." 

That's what Greg Gianforte told his audience during a speech at the Montana Bible College in February 2015:

There's nothing in the Bible that talks about retirement. And yet it's been an accepted concept in our culture today. Nowhere does it say, 'Well, he was a good and faithful servant, so he went to the beach.' It doesn't say that anywhere ... The example I think of is Noah. How old was Noah when he built the ark? 600. He wasn't like, cashing Social Security checks, he wasn't hanging out, he was working. Right? So, I think we have an obligation to work. Now the role we have in work may change over time, but the concept of retirement is not biblical.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/09/greg-gianforte-montana

But how come the Christian always manages to find a biblical text that fits so neatly into the conversation? Well some of the sayings are so well-known they have become cliches, but oftentimes the Christians will just make something up!

They don't give a damn about whether or not the bible says such a thing as long as they score a debating point. And they do so, safe in the knowledge that no other Christian is going to haul out a bible and start looking for the alleged text.

So when I heard Greg Gianforte saying that retirement is not mentioned in the bible, I decided not to take his word for it. Instead I went to an on-line concordance; typed-in "retire", and up popped this result:

http://www.blueletterbible.org/search/

Proof once again that accusing a Christian of "telling lies for Jesus" is not an insult but a statement of fact.

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In the days before the Internet I had several popular versions of the bible and their Concordances as well. In all my life I never met a Christian who had one. In fact, I never came across a Christian who even knew what a Concordance was! (Priests and parsons knew of course, but I'm talking about ordinary parishioners.)