In his book, Jesus Wants to Save Christians (2008), Rob Bell offers some startling statistics about America’s affluence:

America controls nearly 20 percent of the world’s wealth. There are around six billion people in the world, and there are roughly three hundred million people in the U.S. That makes America less than 5 percent of the world’s population. And this 5 percent owns a fifth of the world’s wealth.

One billion people in the world do not have access to clean water, while the average American uses four hundred to six hundred liters of water a day.

Every seven seconds, somewhere in the world a child under age five dies of hunger, while Americans throw away 14 percent of the food we purchase.

Nearly one billion people in the world live on less than one American dollar a day.

Another 2.5 billion people in the world live on less than two American dollars a day.

More than half of the world lives on less than two dollars a day, while the average American teenager spends nearly $150 a week.

Forty percent of people in the world lack basic sanitation, while forty-nine million diapers are used and thrown away in America every day.

1.6 billion people in the world have no electricity.

Nearly one billion people in the world cannot read or sign their name.

Nearly one hundred million children are denied basic education.

By far, most of the people in the world do not own a car. One third of American families own three cars.

One in seven children worldwide (158 million) has to go to work every day just to survive. …

Americans spend more annually on trash bags than nearly half of the world does on all goods.

Source — Rob Bell, Jesus Wants to Save Christians (Zondervan, 2008), pp. 122-123

Let’s thank God for what we have . . . use what we have unto Him . . . while we trust and obey Jesus Christ. And preach the gospel.