Matthew 6:24-34 (Part 3)
I hopefully painted a gloomy enough picture of what a life can be like when you choose to serve your money and possessions (mammon). To sum it up, you will be miserable, unfulfilled, full of worry, and will most likely end up alone with your regrets one day. As the old saying goes, “No one ever said (while laying on their death bed), ‘I wish I had spent more time at the office.’” Mammon is a hard taskmaster and he is never satisfied – enough is never enough.
But praise God we have a wonderful alternative; we do not have to serve mammon; we can choose a far better and greater Master. And let me say right here, you will always be serving somebody, but you have a choice as to who that somebody will be. The obvious choice; the wise choice; is to serve the Lord. He is not a cruel Master, but a loving and compassionate one. And He has a few points for us to pay attention to in the passage we have been looking at for the last three times together.
The first point is we can eliminate worry from our lives. When you truly reach the point of serving God, following His commands and principles, and allowing His ways to be your ways, worrying about everyday life will be a distant and hazy memory. Jesus first uses the example of having enough food and drink by pointing out the birds. Let me ask you a question: Have you ever seen a worried bird? Have you ever seen a bird planting crops so it would have something to eat come harvest? Yet God provides for them everyday and He views you and me as far more valuable than birds.
Jesus then uses the example of clothing and how beautifully He has clothed the flowers of the field. God could have just as easily created all plant life beige. Ladies, how excited would you be if your husband or boyfriend brought you home a lovely bouquet of beige stemmed and beige bloomed roses? (I know, some of you would have a coronary if he brought any flowers home to you) How boring would it be if all plant life was beige grass? Yet God created a rainbow of colors and wide variety of shapes and sizes and scents. But as beautiful as the flowers are, God looks at them as “here today, gone tomorrow” and He created you with an eternal soul, designed to have fellowship with Him forevermore. God will most certainly care for you if He cares so much for the beauty of His flowers.
So God’s children have absolutely no reason to worry. And even if we did have good reason, worry doesn’t accomplish anything. If you worried about any and every thing from the time you came from your mother’s womb to the time you breathed your last breath, you would not have added a single moment to your life. Jesus is simply telling us that worry is a colossal waste of time and energy – not to mention the undisputable medical fact that worry causes ill health, and steals the joy God has instilled within each of His children.
The second point Jesus wants to make clear to us is worry is supposed to be reserved for unbelievers – and they definitely have something to worry about. When those of us who are genuine born-again believers in Jesus Christ; who have accepted Him as our Lord and Savior; when we worry, we are acting as if we are unbelievers. Beloved, for a child of God, worry is a sin – plain and simple. When we worry, we are denying the promised provision of our heavenly Father. When we worry, we are demonstrating that we serve mammon and not God.
Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and He will give you everything you need. I can’t add anything else to that.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Handling Money & Possessions (Part11)
Matthew 6:24-34 (Part 2)
Last time I made the attempt to convince you of the truthfulness and the implications of Jesus’ statement, “No one can serve two masters.” This is a statement of fact from our Lord and not a suggestion or a concept to consider. If you have divided allegiances then you are not serving God. You may have many entities that you rightfully and biblically submit to, but you can only have one Master of your life.
Sticking with the terminology, for a master to be a master he must have servants or slaves that do his bidding. Jesus is giving us the choice of doing the bidding of the Almighty God or doing the bidding of “mammon”, as the KJV puts it. And remember last time I explained that mammon is the combination of your money, property, and all your material wealth and possessions. Being a slave to your mammon can be detected simply by how you make decisions in circumstances that involves your money or possessions. If your financial decisions are made by your own wisdom and desires then you are serving mammon. If your financial decisions are made by searching God’s Word and praying for the Lord’s leading, then you are serving God.
So what are the benefits and/or drawbacks of serving one master or the other?
If your master is mammon, then prepare for a life consumed by worry. When your life is spent in servitude to the money you have, the money you want, and the things your money has bought and can buy, your appetite for the things of this world will never be satisfied. You will be in a state of worry to one degree or another. Will I have enough money to pay the bills? Can I get the fancy car or truck this year? My clothes are getting old and out of style, can I afford a new wardrobe? I wish I had enough money to eat out at a fancy restaurant. You will always be worrying about money if your focus is on the material things of this world – and there will never be enough money to fill the gaping hole in your soul.
When mammon is your master you will be forced to compete in the “rat race” of what the world views as the good life. Your schedule will be cram-packed with places to go, people to see, jobs to finish, and opportunities to pursue. There will be no peace in your household as you try and keep up with the other “rats” in the race. Your master will be cracking the whip for you to keep up and get ahead. You will work an ungodly amount of hours always trying to stay busy and be productive. Your mind will not know how to relax, your body will begin to rebel, and your relationships will be strained if not damaged and destroyed. And for what? To be able to display your trophies of bigger and better stuff than your neighbor or your brother?
As we discovered in an earlier devotion in this series, the true value of this life is your relationship with God and your relationships with people. And you don’t need to pursue mammon to have either of these. Many who have made mammon their master eventually find themselves in a big house with fancy cars and fancy clothes, with a string of failed relationships behind them and the regret of a life wasted – and this regret is usually experienced alone.
Ah, but Jesus gives us the solution to this mess – make God your Master and eliminate worry from your life. Make God your Master and rely on Him to provide for all of your needs and desires. And I will need one more devotion on this passage to develop this final thought. See you next time.
Last time I made the attempt to convince you of the truthfulness and the implications of Jesus’ statement, “No one can serve two masters.” This is a statement of fact from our Lord and not a suggestion or a concept to consider. If you have divided allegiances then you are not serving God. You may have many entities that you rightfully and biblically submit to, but you can only have one Master of your life.
Sticking with the terminology, for a master to be a master he must have servants or slaves that do his bidding. Jesus is giving us the choice of doing the bidding of the Almighty God or doing the bidding of “mammon”, as the KJV puts it. And remember last time I explained that mammon is the combination of your money, property, and all your material wealth and possessions. Being a slave to your mammon can be detected simply by how you make decisions in circumstances that involves your money or possessions. If your financial decisions are made by your own wisdom and desires then you are serving mammon. If your financial decisions are made by searching God’s Word and praying for the Lord’s leading, then you are serving God.
So what are the benefits and/or drawbacks of serving one master or the other?
If your master is mammon, then prepare for a life consumed by worry. When your life is spent in servitude to the money you have, the money you want, and the things your money has bought and can buy, your appetite for the things of this world will never be satisfied. You will be in a state of worry to one degree or another. Will I have enough money to pay the bills? Can I get the fancy car or truck this year? My clothes are getting old and out of style, can I afford a new wardrobe? I wish I had enough money to eat out at a fancy restaurant. You will always be worrying about money if your focus is on the material things of this world – and there will never be enough money to fill the gaping hole in your soul.
When mammon is your master you will be forced to compete in the “rat race” of what the world views as the good life. Your schedule will be cram-packed with places to go, people to see, jobs to finish, and opportunities to pursue. There will be no peace in your household as you try and keep up with the other “rats” in the race. Your master will be cracking the whip for you to keep up and get ahead. You will work an ungodly amount of hours always trying to stay busy and be productive. Your mind will not know how to relax, your body will begin to rebel, and your relationships will be strained if not damaged and destroyed. And for what? To be able to display your trophies of bigger and better stuff than your neighbor or your brother?
As we discovered in an earlier devotion in this series, the true value of this life is your relationship with God and your relationships with people. And you don’t need to pursue mammon to have either of these. Many who have made mammon their master eventually find themselves in a big house with fancy cars and fancy clothes, with a string of failed relationships behind them and the regret of a life wasted – and this regret is usually experienced alone.
Ah, but Jesus gives us the solution to this mess – make God your Master and eliminate worry from your life. Make God your Master and rely on Him to provide for all of your needs and desires. And I will need one more devotion on this passage to develop this final thought. See you next time.
Monday, July 25, 2011
Handling Money & Possessions (Part 10)
Matthew 6:24-34
No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to Him than they are? Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, He will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith? So don’t worry about these things, saying, “What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?” These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and He will give you everything you need. So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.
This is a lengthy passage, obviously much longer than I ever try to deal with in a one or two devotions as I will attempt to do, but in it Jesus is making a single primary point. There are many other principles I could expound upon, but if I stick to the issue at hand we will hopefully grasp the tremendous truth in this passage in regards to how we handle our money and possessions, no later than next time.
Jesus opens this section with the statement, “No one can serve two masters.” Before we go any farther you must take a moment to convince yourself of this truth. It is my belief that the vast majority of Christians do not believe this statement from our Lord. We may give it lip service, but our actions prove otherwise. We call Jesus our Master but we live as if our allegiance is divided between Jesus and several other masters. We simply have to take stock and determine that this statement from Jesus is absolutely and unequivocally true. If we do not accept this as absolute truth, then we have no business claiming anything else in Scripture is true. You cannot pick and choose what to believe and what not to believe when it comes to God’s Word.
And just so we are clear, the Bible tells us to submit to many different kinds of authority, but submission and attributing someone or something to be the master over your life are two different things. I can submit to my boss at work without making him or her my master. I can submit to the government and the police without making them the master of my life. Wives can submit to the authority God has given their husbands in the marriage relationship without making them the master of their lives.
If you are settled with Jesus’ statement as being absolute truth, then let’s continue.
In the context of this passage, and in the context of our current series of devotions, Jesus is comparing only two options: God and money. The King James Version uses an old English word that we rarely use any longer instead of the word money; and that word is “mammon.” It is a word that the KJV translators created, or transliterated from the Greek word “mamonas” when they were converting the Greek into English. There is no single English word that can convey what Jesus is meaning here. The NLT (above) and the NIV, among others, have somewhat weakened the meaning by choosing the word money. Most of the more literal translations (KJV, NASB, NKJV) have stuck with the word mammon, which means, “wealth, property, material goods.” Money is obviously included in this meaning but is only a part of it. So Jesus is really saying, you cannot serve God and the combination of your money and possessions.
We serve mammon as our master when we place it in higher esteem than we do the Lord; when we choose to view the money and possessions God has given us as our own to do with as we please, or when we accumulate and hoard money and possessions for our own pleasure. We serve mammon when we are faced with a choice of giving a portion of our mammon away for God’s Kingdom, or keeping it for the betterment of our own little kingdoms, and we choose the latter.
There is a tremendous principle yet to come in this discussion by Jesus; and we will cover that next time. But for today, consider who is truly the Master of your life and all the implications that go along with it – and firmly believe that “No one can serve two masters.”
No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to Him than they are? Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, He will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith? So don’t worry about these things, saying, “What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?” These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and He will give you everything you need. So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.
This is a lengthy passage, obviously much longer than I ever try to deal with in a one or two devotions as I will attempt to do, but in it Jesus is making a single primary point. There are many other principles I could expound upon, but if I stick to the issue at hand we will hopefully grasp the tremendous truth in this passage in regards to how we handle our money and possessions, no later than next time.
Jesus opens this section with the statement, “No one can serve two masters.” Before we go any farther you must take a moment to convince yourself of this truth. It is my belief that the vast majority of Christians do not believe this statement from our Lord. We may give it lip service, but our actions prove otherwise. We call Jesus our Master but we live as if our allegiance is divided between Jesus and several other masters. We simply have to take stock and determine that this statement from Jesus is absolutely and unequivocally true. If we do not accept this as absolute truth, then we have no business claiming anything else in Scripture is true. You cannot pick and choose what to believe and what not to believe when it comes to God’s Word.
And just so we are clear, the Bible tells us to submit to many different kinds of authority, but submission and attributing someone or something to be the master over your life are two different things. I can submit to my boss at work without making him or her my master. I can submit to the government and the police without making them the master of my life. Wives can submit to the authority God has given their husbands in the marriage relationship without making them the master of their lives.
If you are settled with Jesus’ statement as being absolute truth, then let’s continue.
In the context of this passage, and in the context of our current series of devotions, Jesus is comparing only two options: God and money. The King James Version uses an old English word that we rarely use any longer instead of the word money; and that word is “mammon.” It is a word that the KJV translators created, or transliterated from the Greek word “mamonas” when they were converting the Greek into English. There is no single English word that can convey what Jesus is meaning here. The NLT (above) and the NIV, among others, have somewhat weakened the meaning by choosing the word money. Most of the more literal translations (KJV, NASB, NKJV) have stuck with the word mammon, which means, “wealth, property, material goods.” Money is obviously included in this meaning but is only a part of it. So Jesus is really saying, you cannot serve God and the combination of your money and possessions.
We serve mammon as our master when we place it in higher esteem than we do the Lord; when we choose to view the money and possessions God has given us as our own to do with as we please, or when we accumulate and hoard money and possessions for our own pleasure. We serve mammon when we are faced with a choice of giving a portion of our mammon away for God’s Kingdom, or keeping it for the betterment of our own little kingdoms, and we choose the latter.
There is a tremendous principle yet to come in this discussion by Jesus; and we will cover that next time. But for today, consider who is truly the Master of your life and all the implications that go along with it – and firmly believe that “No one can serve two masters.”
Friday, July 22, 2011
Handling Money & Possessions (Part 9)
Matthew 6:22-23
Your eye is a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is good, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is bad, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is!
There have been many times in my life when I was rudely awakened to exactly how little I know about God and His Word. Whether it was from faulty teaching or my own lack of discernment as I read the Bible myself, the Holy Spirit has vividly shown me on several occasions where I had misinterpreted Scripture in the past, and/or taken the principle of it completely out of context.
Today’s passage is one of those that many Christians have missed the point Jesus is making - Your eye is a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is good, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is bad, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is!
Our Lord is in the middle of a discussion about money and possessions from Matthew 6:19-34. Everything He says in these 16 verses is teaching us about handling the finances and material goods we are blessed with. Our two verses for today’s devotion are no different. The light and darkness (understanding and ignorance) Jesus speaks about is our understanding or ignorance concerning the handling of money and possessions.
If you were to go into your local bookstore, you could literally find hundreds of titles dealing with money and finance. These books contain a wealth of information. The advice and strategies recommended in these books will often contradict one another, yet both strategies may indeed work. But many of the strategies you will find in secular books don’t mesh with God’s principles for handling money.
In the world’s understanding of mathematics, for example, $10-$1=$9. Meaning if you had $10 and you gave $1 to the church or to the poor, you would have $9 left over. But God is not confined by the world’s understanding of mathematics. In God’s economy, giving $1 of the $10 back to God will leave you with more than $9; sometimes more than $10. The world’s understanding, or light, in this regard is actually ignorance, or darkness.
Which brings us to the primary point of Jesus’ teaching in this passage: You could have PhD in finance and a doctorate in mathematics, but if you are ignoring God’s teaching on the topic, you are like a blind man who thinks he can see. As a matter of fact, your blindness is worse because you don’t realize you are blind. A blind man who accepts his condition can learn to get around and take the necessary precautions to protect himself. A blind man that doesn’t realize he is blind faces untold dangers through his condition and through his ignorance.
So when we choose to ignore God’s teaching on the handling of our money and possessions, and only use the world’s wisdom or our own wisdom, we are facing untold turmoil, pain, and hardship that is completely avoidable. The understanding you and I think we have concerning money, treasure, wealth, possessions, prosperity, etc., is actually ignorance if it is not understanding from God – something worth thinking about.
Your eye is a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is good, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is bad, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is!
There have been many times in my life when I was rudely awakened to exactly how little I know about God and His Word. Whether it was from faulty teaching or my own lack of discernment as I read the Bible myself, the Holy Spirit has vividly shown me on several occasions where I had misinterpreted Scripture in the past, and/or taken the principle of it completely out of context.
Today’s passage is one of those that many Christians have missed the point Jesus is making - Your eye is a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is good, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is bad, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is!
Our Lord is in the middle of a discussion about money and possessions from Matthew 6:19-34. Everything He says in these 16 verses is teaching us about handling the finances and material goods we are blessed with. Our two verses for today’s devotion are no different. The light and darkness (understanding and ignorance) Jesus speaks about is our understanding or ignorance concerning the handling of money and possessions.
If you were to go into your local bookstore, you could literally find hundreds of titles dealing with money and finance. These books contain a wealth of information. The advice and strategies recommended in these books will often contradict one another, yet both strategies may indeed work. But many of the strategies you will find in secular books don’t mesh with God’s principles for handling money.
In the world’s understanding of mathematics, for example, $10-$1=$9. Meaning if you had $10 and you gave $1 to the church or to the poor, you would have $9 left over. But God is not confined by the world’s understanding of mathematics. In God’s economy, giving $1 of the $10 back to God will leave you with more than $9; sometimes more than $10. The world’s understanding, or light, in this regard is actually ignorance, or darkness.
Which brings us to the primary point of Jesus’ teaching in this passage: You could have PhD in finance and a doctorate in mathematics, but if you are ignoring God’s teaching on the topic, you are like a blind man who thinks he can see. As a matter of fact, your blindness is worse because you don’t realize you are blind. A blind man who accepts his condition can learn to get around and take the necessary precautions to protect himself. A blind man that doesn’t realize he is blind faces untold dangers through his condition and through his ignorance.
So when we choose to ignore God’s teaching on the handling of our money and possessions, and only use the world’s wisdom or our own wisdom, we are facing untold turmoil, pain, and hardship that is completely avoidable. The understanding you and I think we have concerning money, treasure, wealth, possessions, prosperity, etc., is actually ignorance if it is not understanding from God – something worth thinking about.
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Handling Money & Possessions (Part 8)
Matthew 6:21
Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.
Have you ever noticed the tendency of some to get people’s names wrong? No matter how often you correct the person, it is somehow stuck in their heads and they continue to say the wrong name time after time. My brother-in-law has the last name of Maple. Many people through the years continually refer to him as Mr. Maples with an “s” regardless of how often your correct them.
Along the same lines, today’s verse is one of several that quite often gets misquoted. Many people will say, “Where your heart is, there will your treasure also be.” And while mixing up the order of this verse does not do irreparable harm to the meaning, it does in essence “put the cart before the horse” and it does shift the true emphasis of the context.
There is a story of young boy who was pestering his father one afternoon. The young boy wanted to play or to at least have his father’s attention but the father was wrapped up in his own thoughts and projects. At one point the father took a page of the newspaper with a map of the world and tore it into quite a few pieces. He then gave his son a roll of tape and told him to put the world back together – a spur of the moment puzzle to keep the lad busy. In what seemed to be an amazingly short period of time the boy was finished. The father asked, “How did you get it back together so quickly. The boy responded, “There was a picture of a man on the backside. Once the man was right, then the world was right.”
The object of today’s verse is the heart. The heart must be right first. If the heart is right, then everything else in life will fall into its proper place. The person who is right with the Lord will have a proper view of his treasure. A person who is not right with the Lord will display covetousness, self-indulgence, and miserly traits with his or her treasure.
In Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol”, Scrooge has a cold and miserly heart in the beginning of the story and his view of treasure followed. It was not until his heart changed that his attitude and view of his treasure changed.
Jesus is not telling us to put our treasure in the right place to correct the issues of our heart, but He is telling us that the location of our treasure will reveal the condition of our heart, or the location of where our heart already is. Your treasure and your heart occupy the same location. Sinful actions come from a sinful heart and righteous actions come from a righteous heart. So if your treasure is consumed by the things of this world, so too will your heart be consumed by the things of this world and all of your actions will be governed by this. You will not be acting as a steward of God’s money and possessions but you will be acting like an owner – an owner of something that is not rightfully yours.
So where is your heart? Are you consumed by the cares of this world or are you saturated by the things of God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit and heaven and God’s Word? It’s real easy to tell the difference – just take a look at where your treasure is.
Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.
Have you ever noticed the tendency of some to get people’s names wrong? No matter how often you correct the person, it is somehow stuck in their heads and they continue to say the wrong name time after time. My brother-in-law has the last name of Maple. Many people through the years continually refer to him as Mr. Maples with an “s” regardless of how often your correct them.
Along the same lines, today’s verse is one of several that quite often gets misquoted. Many people will say, “Where your heart is, there will your treasure also be.” And while mixing up the order of this verse does not do irreparable harm to the meaning, it does in essence “put the cart before the horse” and it does shift the true emphasis of the context.
There is a story of young boy who was pestering his father one afternoon. The young boy wanted to play or to at least have his father’s attention but the father was wrapped up in his own thoughts and projects. At one point the father took a page of the newspaper with a map of the world and tore it into quite a few pieces. He then gave his son a roll of tape and told him to put the world back together – a spur of the moment puzzle to keep the lad busy. In what seemed to be an amazingly short period of time the boy was finished. The father asked, “How did you get it back together so quickly. The boy responded, “There was a picture of a man on the backside. Once the man was right, then the world was right.”
The object of today’s verse is the heart. The heart must be right first. If the heart is right, then everything else in life will fall into its proper place. The person who is right with the Lord will have a proper view of his treasure. A person who is not right with the Lord will display covetousness, self-indulgence, and miserly traits with his or her treasure.
In Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol”, Scrooge has a cold and miserly heart in the beginning of the story and his view of treasure followed. It was not until his heart changed that his attitude and view of his treasure changed.
Jesus is not telling us to put our treasure in the right place to correct the issues of our heart, but He is telling us that the location of our treasure will reveal the condition of our heart, or the location of where our heart already is. Your treasure and your heart occupy the same location. Sinful actions come from a sinful heart and righteous actions come from a righteous heart. So if your treasure is consumed by the things of this world, so too will your heart be consumed by the things of this world and all of your actions will be governed by this. You will not be acting as a steward of God’s money and possessions but you will be acting like an owner – an owner of something that is not rightfully yours.
So where is your heart? Are you consumed by the cares of this world or are you saturated by the things of God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit and heaven and God’s Word? It’s real easy to tell the difference – just take a look at where your treasure is.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Handling Money & Possessions (Part 7)
1 Corinthians 3:12-15 (Part 2)
Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
My congregation has come to embrace a phrase that applies to my style of teaching and preaching. They sometimes say, “Pastor Al is running down a rabbit trail again.” Sometimes my mind wanders and sometimes I am following the Holy Spirit’s leading (hopefully much more of the latter) but quite often I stray from my notes and follow a topic or a concept that needs to be developed in more detail. While I may seem to be getting off track a bit from our study on finances and possessions, I really am not. Hang in there with me and you will hopefully see how it all comes together in the end.
Last time we got together, I left off with the thought of storing up things of value in heaven. All of the actions we take or choose not to take, all of the words we speak, and even all of the thoughts we think, are in essence converted into gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw, and stored in heaven awaiting our arrival. This is not representative of six different categories of “works”, but instead, only two: things of value (gold, silver, jewels) and things that are worthless (wood, hay, straw). So I think we should spend some time discovering what God views as valuable and what He views as worthless. The things we place value on doesn’t count in this regard unless we are perfectly aligned with God’s thoughts on the subject.
So what does God value?
First and foremost, God values worship. Loving God with all of heart, mind, soul, and strength is number one (The Great Command). And while it would be nearly impossible to express all the different ways in which we can worship God, the bottom line is obedience to His Word. Studying His Word, singing praises to Him, praying to Him, giving to Him, serving Him by serving one another, etc., are all primary forms of worship but they are also commands in the Bible. Obedience to His Word will lead you to proper worship.
The second thing God values most is PEOPLE! God values people. Loving our neighbor as ourselves is the second half of what is known as the Great Command (Mark 12:30-31). We could spend the next twenty devotions together going through passage after passage, but in the end we will come to the same conclusion that God values people. When Jesus gives His great parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25:31-46, He speaks of how the righteous ones feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, shelter the stranger, clothe the needy, take care of the sick, and visit the imprisoned. The unrighteous ones didn’t do any of these things. If you read the Beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-12, it is undeniable that Jesus is speaking about the needs of people.
As a matter of fact, you could open your Bible to any chapter in the Old and New Testament and find that the context deals with either the worship of God or God’s love and care for people.
So when it comes to storing up gold, silver, and jewels in heaven, the way to do this is to love God and love people just as Jesus did. You need to analyze your daily activities and determine which ones contribute to these two issues and which ones do not.
Now, connect this truth to how you handle your money and your possessions. Are you accumulating the things of value (in God’s eyes) or are you accumulating kindling?
Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
My congregation has come to embrace a phrase that applies to my style of teaching and preaching. They sometimes say, “Pastor Al is running down a rabbit trail again.” Sometimes my mind wanders and sometimes I am following the Holy Spirit’s leading (hopefully much more of the latter) but quite often I stray from my notes and follow a topic or a concept that needs to be developed in more detail. While I may seem to be getting off track a bit from our study on finances and possessions, I really am not. Hang in there with me and you will hopefully see how it all comes together in the end.
Last time we got together, I left off with the thought of storing up things of value in heaven. All of the actions we take or choose not to take, all of the words we speak, and even all of the thoughts we think, are in essence converted into gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw, and stored in heaven awaiting our arrival. This is not representative of six different categories of “works”, but instead, only two: things of value (gold, silver, jewels) and things that are worthless (wood, hay, straw). So I think we should spend some time discovering what God views as valuable and what He views as worthless. The things we place value on doesn’t count in this regard unless we are perfectly aligned with God’s thoughts on the subject.
So what does God value?
First and foremost, God values worship. Loving God with all of heart, mind, soul, and strength is number one (The Great Command). And while it would be nearly impossible to express all the different ways in which we can worship God, the bottom line is obedience to His Word. Studying His Word, singing praises to Him, praying to Him, giving to Him, serving Him by serving one another, etc., are all primary forms of worship but they are also commands in the Bible. Obedience to His Word will lead you to proper worship.
The second thing God values most is PEOPLE! God values people. Loving our neighbor as ourselves is the second half of what is known as the Great Command (Mark 12:30-31). We could spend the next twenty devotions together going through passage after passage, but in the end we will come to the same conclusion that God values people. When Jesus gives His great parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25:31-46, He speaks of how the righteous ones feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, shelter the stranger, clothe the needy, take care of the sick, and visit the imprisoned. The unrighteous ones didn’t do any of these things. If you read the Beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-12, it is undeniable that Jesus is speaking about the needs of people.
As a matter of fact, you could open your Bible to any chapter in the Old and New Testament and find that the context deals with either the worship of God or God’s love and care for people.
So when it comes to storing up gold, silver, and jewels in heaven, the way to do this is to love God and love people just as Jesus did. You need to analyze your daily activities and determine which ones contribute to these two issues and which ones do not.
Now, connect this truth to how you handle your money and your possessions. Are you accumulating the things of value (in God’s eyes) or are you accumulating kindling?
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Handling Money & Possessions (Part 6)
1 Corinthians 3:12-15 (Part 1)
Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
People spend enormous amounts of money on the most ridiculous things – at least in my opinion. And I will not go into the details of what I think is ridiculous because it is just my opinion. The person who spends the money, in some way perceives there to be enough value in his or her purchase to justify the amount spent. Just because I may not see the value in it does not make the purchase necessarily wrong. I am sure many people walk into my office and are stunned at the collection of books I have on the shelves. Most do not see the value I see in these books and would consider spending that much money on a library to be ridiculous. It is all a matter of perceived value.
While perceived value will be as different with each of us as our taste for different foods, real value is defined by God. One day in the not so distant future God will show each of us what true value is. In a moment in time, everything we have done in this life, everything we have said, thought, and even decided to not do will be piled up into a big divine bonfire. That fire will consume everything that was worthless and only the things of real and true value will remain. This is called judgment day by some and the day of reward by others. Let me try and make some sense out of this issue that confuses so many.
Our passage today actually describes what is called the “Bema Seat” in the Greek. In ancient times after the athletic competitions of that day, the victors would be summoned to the Bema Seat – a raised platform in view of all the people. The king would then take the victor’s crown and place it on the head of the ones who won the competition. The Bema Seat was a place of honor and reward.
It is unfortunate that many English Bible translations choose to use the word judgment in this passage; that word makes many believe this judgment and the Great White Throne Judgment in the Book of Revelation are the same event. But they are two separate and distinct events for two separate and distinct groups of people. The Bema Seat will only be attended by God’s children – the saved, the ones who have confessed Jesus as Lord of their life and believed in Him for the salvation of their souls. The Great White Throne Judgment will only be attended by those who have rejected God’s gift of salvation – rejected His Son Jesus Christ. One event is a time of uninhibited joy and eternal reward and one event is a time of unimaginable sorrow and eternal punishment.
Since we are in the midst of a study on what God has to say about finances and material possessions, I want to focus on the Bema Seat so we understand true and lasting value. Last time we looked at Jesus’ words telling us to store up treasure in heaven as opposed to accumulating treasure here on earth. In today’s passage we see why this is a wise practice. The earthly treasures we accumulate will not be going with us when we physically die, so that fact alone should give us a hint as to what God considers to be truly valuable. So what is represented by the gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, and straw?
The illustration is simply speaking about what we do with our life while on earth. Are we storing up valuable treasure in heaven or are we storing up worthless kindling in heaven? What do I do each day that is of true and lasting value and what do I do each day that is worthless and a waste of the time God has allotted to me?
There's more to say so instead of rushing through this, we will pick this up again next time.
Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
People spend enormous amounts of money on the most ridiculous things – at least in my opinion. And I will not go into the details of what I think is ridiculous because it is just my opinion. The person who spends the money, in some way perceives there to be enough value in his or her purchase to justify the amount spent. Just because I may not see the value in it does not make the purchase necessarily wrong. I am sure many people walk into my office and are stunned at the collection of books I have on the shelves. Most do not see the value I see in these books and would consider spending that much money on a library to be ridiculous. It is all a matter of perceived value.
While perceived value will be as different with each of us as our taste for different foods, real value is defined by God. One day in the not so distant future God will show each of us what true value is. In a moment in time, everything we have done in this life, everything we have said, thought, and even decided to not do will be piled up into a big divine bonfire. That fire will consume everything that was worthless and only the things of real and true value will remain. This is called judgment day by some and the day of reward by others. Let me try and make some sense out of this issue that confuses so many.
Our passage today actually describes what is called the “Bema Seat” in the Greek. In ancient times after the athletic competitions of that day, the victors would be summoned to the Bema Seat – a raised platform in view of all the people. The king would then take the victor’s crown and place it on the head of the ones who won the competition. The Bema Seat was a place of honor and reward.
It is unfortunate that many English Bible translations choose to use the word judgment in this passage; that word makes many believe this judgment and the Great White Throne Judgment in the Book of Revelation are the same event. But they are two separate and distinct events for two separate and distinct groups of people. The Bema Seat will only be attended by God’s children – the saved, the ones who have confessed Jesus as Lord of their life and believed in Him for the salvation of their souls. The Great White Throne Judgment will only be attended by those who have rejected God’s gift of salvation – rejected His Son Jesus Christ. One event is a time of uninhibited joy and eternal reward and one event is a time of unimaginable sorrow and eternal punishment.
Since we are in the midst of a study on what God has to say about finances and material possessions, I want to focus on the Bema Seat so we understand true and lasting value. Last time we looked at Jesus’ words telling us to store up treasure in heaven as opposed to accumulating treasure here on earth. In today’s passage we see why this is a wise practice. The earthly treasures we accumulate will not be going with us when we physically die, so that fact alone should give us a hint as to what God considers to be truly valuable. So what is represented by the gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, and straw?
The illustration is simply speaking about what we do with our life while on earth. Are we storing up valuable treasure in heaven or are we storing up worthless kindling in heaven? What do I do each day that is of true and lasting value and what do I do each day that is worthless and a waste of the time God has allotted to me?
There's more to say so instead of rushing through this, we will pick this up again next time.
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