Lately, while preparing for my LIT talk tomorrow, I've been doing a lot of hard thinking on an even harder topic: Money and Possessions. I've been reading 1 Timothy, and it has one of the most convicting passages in the Bible:
6 Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, 7 for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. 8 But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. 9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils.
If you have food and clothing, you should be content. How radical is that? Boom. It blows everything you've thought (and bought) to pieces. Even if you're homeless, if you can survive, you should be content. Why? For one, every day thousands of people die of starvation or exposure. If you have a roof over your head, you should be even more thankful to God.
What does this practically mean for us? I believe that we have to completely forsake everything the world teaches us if we want to really follow God's command here. If you're reading this, you obviously have a computer. Do you really need a better computer? Do you have a TV? Do you really need a bigger, better model? And so on and so forth. When it comes down to it, we don't really need anything but what God talks about in 1 Timothy: food and clothing.
6 Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, 7 for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. 8 But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. 9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils.
If you have food and clothing, you should be content. How radical is that? Boom. It blows everything you've thought (and bought) to pieces. Even if you're homeless, if you can survive, you should be content. Why? For one, every day thousands of people die of starvation or exposure. If you have a roof over your head, you should be even more thankful to God.
What does this practically mean for us? I believe that we have to completely forsake everything the world teaches us if we want to really follow God's command here. If you're reading this, you obviously have a computer. Do you really need a better computer? Do you have a TV? Do you really need a bigger, better model? And so on and so forth. When it comes down to it, we don't really need anything but what God talks about in 1 Timothy: food and clothing.
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