Number 28

Lindsay and I have a lot of stuff. I am not going to say who has more but I will say that our closets are bursting and our garage is getting there. Sometimes we look around and think, “Why do we need so much junk?” And that is really what it is. Do two people (or a family of five for that matter) need over twenty coffee mugs? Do we need a huge clunky entertainment center? Not really, but we like to own stuff anyway. I think that is why verses like those in Matthew 5 really jar our American sensibilities. “Blessed are the poor! No way! I need my stuff!”

In the Bible those who posses little seem to be held in higher esteem that those who are rich. Most of you will remember the story of the Rich Young Ruler who was asked to sell all he had in order to follow Jesus and it solidifies the point. Some even go so far as to believe that God does not want us to have money at all (well at least we think no one is allowed to have more money that us.J) In another story Abraham was given a promise. He was promised a son. Not just any son but a son who would be a part of God’s redemptive work in this world. When this son was born Abraham loved him dearly. He loved him more than anything else in this world, almost more so than the God who gave him the son in the first place. I cannot imagine how crushed Abraham must have felt when God asked him to sacrifice his son, his only son who he dearly loved, on an altar. We don’t know if he knew that God would stop him at the last minute. We only know that he willingly and agonizingly obeyed God and gave up possession of his child.

Would you sacrifice that thing you dearly love if God required you to? Most of us would have a serious problem giving up our DVD collection or iPod let alone our firstborn. I think the secret of the poor in spirit is found in holding our plans and possessions, even our very life loosely. Once we understand all is a gift from God and that we truly own nothing; that is when we have the capacity to own everything. We don’t like this idea because it crushes the American idol to the “Self made man.” Godly courage and sacrifice takes a different form. G. K. Chesterton said, “He who would find his life must loose it, is not some piece of mysticism for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors and mountaineers…. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire to live with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely cling to live, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He must not merely wait for death, for he will be a suicide, and will not escape. He must seek his life with a furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine.”

Talk amongst yourselves J

Further thoughts: Genesis 22, Matthew 5, John 12 and The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer