When I was young, my parents, my sister, and I went to Myrtle Beach. Every year, the last two weeks before school started, we would hook up the camping trailer to the pickup, head down I-77 from St. Marys to Charleston, down the Turnpike, and then we’d get stuck in traffic in Virginia because I-77 was being still being built through Virginia and North Carolina. We’d travel over winding roads up and down the mountains, and then eventually, we’d hit a wonderful straight, flat road that took us through Conway, SC, when the stench of the swamps would hit us and then, after some more traffic, we’d be sitting there at the traffic light in front of Mammy’s Kitchen.
We camped in several places, but we eventually settled in at Apache campground, a few miles north of where the mall is today, just above the Rice Planter’s restaurant.
And then began our routine. We’d go to the beach in the mornings, go to some air-conditioned place in the afternoons, eat out for dinner, and play miniature golf in the cool of the evenings. But every morning, there was the beach.
We’d go out swimming and playing in the waves, taking along a float, and then we’d come into the sand when we got tired. And there in the damp sand – never in the dry sand because that was too hot – there in the damp sand, I’d begin to build a sand castle.
I was never the type that built a manicured sand castle using molds. My castles were functional – they were built to protect the center from the approaching waves and tide. And so I’d dig a big moat, build a big wall, and put a small, decorative castle behind the wall, using wet sand. My castles looked like little sandy worms had piled up together to form cones and spires of wet cement. I’d get several other kids to help me build those walls so that that little castle would survive the waves.
And as the morning wore on, the waves would come closer and closer as the tide steadily came up the beach. And I’d build the walls higher and higher, sometimes building two or even three walls to protect the castle against the waves. But eventually, every day, we’d have to go eat lunch and when we got back to the beach, the castle was just a rough spot which the waves were smoothing out. The castle was quickly disappearing into the flat beach that the power of God’s waves was removing. All the morning’s work was gone, hopeless to begin with, gone!
And sometimes, the castle would be overrun while I was still building. But I could often repair the walls if I moved quickly enough, because at first only an occasional wave would break over the walls, and if you moved quickly and moved enough sand, the gap could be repaired. But eventually, the waves that broke over wall became every fifth wave, and then every third wave, and every other wave and you just couldn’t move fast enough. And so I learned that there is a time when you just have to stand up and say, “Let it go!” There is a time when the forces of destruction overwhelm what you can do. And so I learned to walk away from my castles when the waves were too strong for me and my crew of workers. “Let it go”, I said. And we watched the castle melt into the water.
King Solomon is the author of our first reading, the Teacher of the book of Ecclesiastes. Solomon, who ruled Israel for many years and led her to her greatest extent, was declared to be the wisest ruler ever of Israel. And so, what does Solomon say?
“Meaningless! Meaningless!”
says the Teacher.
“Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless.”
12 I, the Teacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem. 13 I applied my mind to study and to explore by wisdom all that is done under the heavens. What a heavy burden God has laid on mankind! 14 I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
20 So my heart began to despair over all my toilsome labor under the sun. 21 For a person may labor with wisdom, knowledge and skill, and then they must leave all they own to another who has not toiled for it.
In this book of the Bible, Solomon tells us that he tried all sorts of things. He looked for purpose in warfare, he looked for purpose in enjoying life, he built things, he became wealthy, he looked for purpose in learning knowledge and in the gaining of wisdom. In all of these, he discovered that everything was ultimately meaningless, because ultimately everybody dies. And yet, seeking wisdom was still significantly better than the other pursuits, for wisdom leads to happiness.
And Jesus tells the story of a wealthy farmer. If you will, allow me to retell this parable in a modern style:
There was a man who had worked hard. He eventually started up his own business and he worked very hard. One week, he gained wonderfully profitable contracts with Walmart, with Sears, with Penney’s and with Kroger’s. His products were flying off the shelves, and in the course of one year, his struggling company made a profit of $50 million.
The man did some calculations and realized that he could put the money into savings and retire, living very comfortably for the rest of his life no matter what happened to his business. So he did this and hired a manager for his business, and put the $50 million into various CD’s, mutual funds, savings accounts, and annuities, so he would have a million dollars a year to live on for the rest of his life. He was set for life and never needed to work again! So that evening, he decided that he would travel the world, buy a home in the Bahamas for the winter, a home in the Canadian Rockies for the summer, and a nice house in his home town for whenever he wanted to be there. He planned to put 70 inch televisions in each home, hire a gardener and a housekeeper for each home, a gourmet cook to travel with him, and he decided that the next day, he would buy some new cars. He was all set.
“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’
And the man clutched his chest and died that night. He was buried four days later.
Jesus told a similar story when he was teaching one day. A man in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”
Jesus answered him. “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?” Jesus then goes straight to the heart of the matter: He said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” The man in the crowd thought that he was just trying to get his rights. But Jesus disagreed. For you see, the man in the crowd was greedy. He was more concerned with how the land and homes and cattle and grain from the inheritance would be divided – what was his share? He was more concerned with his dead father’s wealth than he was with his brother - or in understanding God.
And then Jesus told the story of the rich farmer who sat up one night counting his financial blessings from the wonderful harvest God had given him. The man planned to build brand new barns to hold all his grain from his wonderful harvest. Yet he died that night. And Jesus pointed out:
“This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”
As much as our culture and other people will tell you to fight over money, to fight for your rights, Jesus tells us to be on the guard against our greed to protect our souls. Do you really think that the same Jesus who tells us to give our spare cloak to the man with no cloak will tell us to fight over an inheritance, over a legacy, over who gets Grandma's favorite teddy bear? No, let it go, for it is all greed – “which is idolatry”, worshiping the money and the land and the house and the possessions rather than God.
And I’ve seen this greed in churches I’ve attended. Because other non-Christian organizations are very protective of what they own, for some reason, we think that we who attend a church - or we who are on certain committees - own everything in the church or a particular part of it. We’ve all made fun of the people who claim ownership of a particular pew – but I’ve seen this greedy attitude go well beyond that point at some other churches I’ve attended or heard about.
At one church I know this was particularly bad. One committee, who decorated the sanctuary and the wall outside the sanctuary, believed that they owned everything inside the sanctuary. Oh, they never said that – they talked about "protecting" things or “controlling” things. For example, the church had a beautiful grand piano. The committee insisted on keeping the piano locked, holding onto the key, only allowing the pianist to play the piano on Sunday mornings. The pianist wanted to give piano lessons on the beautiful piano so that children would understand how beautiful what they were learning could be, but she was banished to the parlor to give lessons on the cheap, out-of-tune piano there because the committee did not want children touching their piano – after all, some of those children did not even attend the church!
(As a pianist, I've noticed that many people are afraid children "banging" on a piano will harm it. Here's the news: Pianos are made strong enough for adults to pound upon! People call this "playing loudly". The pianos are designed to take a beating from strong hands. It is actually our more delicate ears that are the best reason for children to not "bang" on a piano - the piano will be ok.)
The same committee was very upset when another woman in the church talked to the pastor and put up a tasteful painting on the wall outside the sanctuary. It was their wall and they decided what went up on it and what did not go up on it!
At another church, there were arguments about who was allowed to play on the playground – could outsiders from the neighborhood use the swingset? There were great debates about the supposed wasting of copy paper when a member asked to run 50 copies of a meeting notice. I knew of still another church where every use of the building had to be approved by a full meeting of the congregation to make sure the wrong people weren’t allowed in the church – meaning some families were allowed and some families weren’t allowed. Control of the keys was very important.
And in another church, the issue was the cheap old china plates that had been purchased thirty years before. Those plates were never to leave the cupboard except for Women’s circle events, because they were not the property of God, they were not the property of the church, they were the property of the Women’s circle that had purchased them so many years ago – when there were 50 women in the club, and now there were 8 women there and the plates were used once a year.
In all of these examples, the church members were showing greed – like the ten-year old boy saying “this is my ball and only I decide who can play with it!” And in each case, their greedy attitudes turned people off to the church.
They forgot, just like the man in Jesus’ story, that God owns everything. As Paul wrote to the Colossians -
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.
Notice that greed is singled out as being a form of idolatry, loving the created thing rather than the Creator.
You see, there are a couple of things we need to do to change our view of money and stuff from the world's view to a more Biblical, Christ-taught view:
First of all, ask yourself – why do I own anything? Why do I have money, why do I own a home, why do I buy little things for my house, why do I have tools? Isn’t it because of fear that you will not have these when you think you will need them? I own a house so I will never be homeless. I buy things for my house so I will never be uncomfortable. I buy tools so I will have them when I need them. I am reacting in fear. Faith will conquer that fear. Let me explain what I mean:
My parents live in St. Marys. When Saundra and I lived in Georgia, I began to acquire tools, because we knew very few people who lived near us, and I had no faith that those people had tools I could borrow - either because they did not have the tools, or I felt I couldn't ask to bottor them. But after we moved to Marietta, I stopped buying tools, because I had faith in two things: First, I had faith that my dad already owned every tool ever made by Sears, Roebuck, and Company, and second, I had faith that my dad would loan me any tool I needed. And that faith failed only a few times, such as when I needed a set of tile-cutting tools, for my dad had never had to cut tiles. You see, my dad could be trusted to have the capacity to solve my tool needs, and he had the goodness to solve my tool needs.
In the same way, both individually and as a church, we are told to have faith in God’s capacity and goodness. First, God owns everything. Scripture talks of God owning the cattle of a thousand hills. God has the wealth of the Universe at God’s disposal. So God always has the capacity to give us the wealth and items we truly need.
Second, God loves us deeply and is more good than any other person. And so, God desires to give us what we need.
Now don’t go away thinking that I’m some television preacher promising you that you’ll always have what you want. No, God gives us what we need. You may want but not need a 12 ounce ribeye steak this evening – you may need to eat an apple or even fast this evening. You may want a new Mercedes convertible, but God knows you need an $800 used Ford Focus with 130,000 miles on it so you can save up for other things.
You may want a new four bedroom home on five acres in the country – but God knows you need a three bedroom apartment because you are going to be so busy talking to your neighbors about God that you won’t have time to mow or maintain a larger place.
And God gives you what you need. Have faith in the capacity and the goodness of God.
The last couple of years our church has been losing money at the rate of about five to six thousand dollars a year. Someone asked me if I was worried about that, and I said, “No, because that will turn around as we begin to grow.” I learned this through my business.
Our business had grown to almost a million dollars a year in sales, yet we were not profitable. And then, as God had grabbed ahold of my collar and turned me to look at Jesus more and more, I added something to our ads and our website. Where before, we had been “Inkjet Ink by the Pint”, I now changed that to “The Christian Source for Inkjet Ink”.
Our sales growth stopped. Our sales began to fall slowly. But our profitability and cash flow improved. Instead of running up debts, we began to pay down our debts. And when prices in our industry fell as more people came onto the web, our customers continued to buy from us. Eventually, I went into teaching at a Catholic school, and then into the ministry. Our combined income today is less than half what we made at the peak of our business, but we are more financially secure today than ever before, I think because I trusted God to take care of us and focused upon doing God’s will. I have the same faith in our church’s budget.
And for the first six months of this year, our church budget has been balanced, and our attendance has been running about 5-10 people higher each week over last year, largely because as a church we have begun to focus more on what people outside the church need, what people new to our church need, instead of exclusively on what those who have been in the church for years need.
For God did not ask us to operate as a special club, like a country club where everything we do is for the benefit of the members, but instead we are to act as the representatives of Jesus Christ, moving into the world, doing things for others outside the church, sharing what we own individually and as a group with others, for we recognize that God owns everything and we are to use all we have for others. The church is to do God’s will, not be run for our benefit.
You have heard of people giving their lives to bring the Gospel to others. How much more should we use our worldly possessions to bring the Gospel to others instead of greedily protecting them, putting them in new barns just for ourselves?
Paul had strong words for the church at Colossae:
Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.
You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
You see, in the church at Colossae, there were factions. People did not trust everyone in the church, for different people were from different backgrounds, they were from different families, some were slaves and some were slave owners, some spoke Hebrew and some spoke Greek, some had been Jewish and some had worshipped many gods, some were from Colossae and some were from the lands beyond the Roman Empire, barbarians or Scythians, the people of the north.
They were much like us, who have people who grew up in Quiet Dell and people who grew up in other states, people from Methodist backgrounds, people from Baptist backgrounds, people from Catholic backgrounds, people who grew up, as I did, completely heathen. We have Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. We have owners and employees, men and women, young and old, healthy and sick. Yet, as Paul said:
Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.
And so we are brothers and sisters in Christ, looking beyond our walls to find and adopt more brothers and sisters, for it is only because of the Christ within us that we have any purpose, any hope, any reason to live in a world full of meaninglessness.
There is an old story about a dog, a hound that was given a big piece of meat by his master. He was afraid the meat would be stolen, so, as dogs do, he set off to the field to find a place to bury that hunk of meat. But he had to cross a bridge over a brook to get to the field and as he crossed the bridge, he looked down and saw another hound carrying a big piece of meat. The old hound was so greedy for meat, that he decided he’d take that other piece of meat away from that other hound. So he opened his mouth to bark at the other hound and Splash! His own piece of meat fell into the deep water. As the water settled, a sad old hound looked down at a reflection of himself in the water, without any meat. He had traded the reality of what he had been given for the illusion of the meat that he worshiped and because of his greed, ended up with nothing.
As Jesus said, “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”
One last story:
When we moved to a particular town, we heard on the radio about a terrible accident. A woman was driving a mini-van. In the van were her six children. And at an intersection, a tractor-trailer did not stop and t-boned the minivan. Two of the children were killed outright. The mother and the other four children were injured, one of the children with severe brain damage and neck injuries.
A few months later, we began attending a church and discovered that this family attended that church. Over the next few years, we grew to know the survivors. As you might expect, they were all emotionally scarred by the experience – they were still dealing with the one child’s injuries when we moved away, years later.
But perhaps the saddest thing was the way the lawsuit came to dominate the mother’s life. For years, this became topic A for the woman – nothing else happened in her life except the events surrounding the lawsuit. It wasn’t that she was overtly greedy, but winning the lawsuit became her entire life. For nearly a decade, her life was on hold until the settlement. And during those years, her children grew up – and we never heard any stories about them. Only the lawsuit. It was a grim reminder of how material things can grab your attention, how material things and finances can become a god to us, how the things of this world can distract us from the important things in life.
And so, when my hand was severely burned some years later in an industrial accident, and we encountered a host of medical bills without any medical insurance, I remembered that woman, and we did not sue the company where the accident happened. Instead, we praised God I was still alive, we returned to work and church, we continued to be thankful for our children. And one day, the bill was paid. We don’t know who paid it – we have a couple of guesses. But it doesn’t really matter, for while we don’t know who the agent was who wrote the check, we know that God paid the bills.
At the end of Solomon’s book, after reflecting on all this life has to offer, the wealthiest king that ever was, the man who had everything that could be had, the man who was also known to be the wisest king ever says:
Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the duty of all mankind.
For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.
Friends, when you would greedily attempt to hold onto something, let it go, read your Bible, and talk with God. Fear God – seek God’s will – and keep his commandments. And in this way, your deeds will be good and God will feed you, just as He feeds the sparrows in the wild.
The same committee was very upset when another woman in the church talked to the pastor and put up a tasteful painting on the wall outside the sanctuary. It was their wall and they decided what went up on it and what did not go up on it!
At another church, there were arguments about who was allowed to play on the playground – could outsiders from the neighborhood use the swingset? There were great debates about the supposed wasting of copy paper when a member asked to run 50 copies of a meeting notice. I knew of still another church where every use of the building had to be approved by a full meeting of the congregation to make sure the wrong people weren’t allowed in the church – meaning some families were allowed and some families weren’t allowed. Control of the keys was very important.
And in another church, the issue was the cheap old china plates that had been purchased thirty years before. Those plates were never to leave the cupboard except for Women’s circle events, because they were not the property of God, they were not the property of the church, they were the property of the Women’s circle that had purchased them so many years ago – when there were 50 women in the club, and now there were 8 women there and the plates were used once a year.
In all of these examples, the church members were showing greed – like the ten-year old boy saying “this is my ball and only I decide who can play with it!” And in each case, their greedy attitudes turned people off to the church.
They forgot, just like the man in Jesus’ story, that God owns everything. As Paul wrote to the Colossians -
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.
Notice that greed is singled out as being a form of idolatry, loving the created thing rather than the Creator.
You see, there are a couple of things we need to do to change our view of money and stuff from the world's view to a more Biblical, Christ-taught view:
First of all, ask yourself – why do I own anything? Why do I have money, why do I own a home, why do I buy little things for my house, why do I have tools? Isn’t it because of fear that you will not have these when you think you will need them? I own a house so I will never be homeless. I buy things for my house so I will never be uncomfortable. I buy tools so I will have them when I need them. I am reacting in fear. Faith will conquer that fear. Let me explain what I mean:
My parents live in St. Marys. When Saundra and I lived in Georgia, I began to acquire tools, because we knew very few people who lived near us, and I had no faith that those people had tools I could borrow - either because they did not have the tools, or I felt I couldn't ask to bottor them. But after we moved to Marietta, I stopped buying tools, because I had faith in two things: First, I had faith that my dad already owned every tool ever made by Sears, Roebuck, and Company, and second, I had faith that my dad would loan me any tool I needed. And that faith failed only a few times, such as when I needed a set of tile-cutting tools, for my dad had never had to cut tiles. You see, my dad could be trusted to have the capacity to solve my tool needs, and he had the goodness to solve my tool needs.
In the same way, both individually and as a church, we are told to have faith in God’s capacity and goodness. First, God owns everything. Scripture talks of God owning the cattle of a thousand hills. God has the wealth of the Universe at God’s disposal. So God always has the capacity to give us the wealth and items we truly need.
Second, God loves us deeply and is more good than any other person. And so, God desires to give us what we need.
Now don’t go away thinking that I’m some television preacher promising you that you’ll always have what you want. No, God gives us what we need. You may want but not need a 12 ounce ribeye steak this evening – you may need to eat an apple or even fast this evening. You may want a new Mercedes convertible, but God knows you need an $800 used Ford Focus with 130,000 miles on it so you can save up for other things.
You may want a new four bedroom home on five acres in the country – but God knows you need a three bedroom apartment because you are going to be so busy talking to your neighbors about God that you won’t have time to mow or maintain a larger place.
And God gives you what you need. Have faith in the capacity and the goodness of God.
The last couple of years our church has been losing money at the rate of about five to six thousand dollars a year. Someone asked me if I was worried about that, and I said, “No, because that will turn around as we begin to grow.” I learned this through my business.
Our business had grown to almost a million dollars a year in sales, yet we were not profitable. And then, as God had grabbed ahold of my collar and turned me to look at Jesus more and more, I added something to our ads and our website. Where before, we had been “Inkjet Ink by the Pint”, I now changed that to “The Christian Source for Inkjet Ink”.
Our sales growth stopped. Our sales began to fall slowly. But our profitability and cash flow improved. Instead of running up debts, we began to pay down our debts. And when prices in our industry fell as more people came onto the web, our customers continued to buy from us. Eventually, I went into teaching at a Catholic school, and then into the ministry. Our combined income today is less than half what we made at the peak of our business, but we are more financially secure today than ever before, I think because I trusted God to take care of us and focused upon doing God’s will. I have the same faith in our church’s budget.
And for the first six months of this year, our church budget has been balanced, and our attendance has been running about 5-10 people higher each week over last year, largely because as a church we have begun to focus more on what people outside the church need, what people new to our church need, instead of exclusively on what those who have been in the church for years need.
For God did not ask us to operate as a special club, like a country club where everything we do is for the benefit of the members, but instead we are to act as the representatives of Jesus Christ, moving into the world, doing things for others outside the church, sharing what we own individually and as a group with others, for we recognize that God owns everything and we are to use all we have for others. The church is to do God’s will, not be run for our benefit.
You have heard of people giving their lives to bring the Gospel to others. How much more should we use our worldly possessions to bring the Gospel to others instead of greedily protecting them, putting them in new barns just for ourselves?
Paul had strong words for the church at Colossae:
Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.
You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
You see, in the church at Colossae, there were factions. People did not trust everyone in the church, for different people were from different backgrounds, they were from different families, some were slaves and some were slave owners, some spoke Hebrew and some spoke Greek, some had been Jewish and some had worshipped many gods, some were from Colossae and some were from the lands beyond the Roman Empire, barbarians or Scythians, the people of the north.
They were much like us, who have people who grew up in Quiet Dell and people who grew up in other states, people from Methodist backgrounds, people from Baptist backgrounds, people from Catholic backgrounds, people who grew up, as I did, completely heathen. We have Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. We have owners and employees, men and women, young and old, healthy and sick. Yet, as Paul said:
Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.
And so we are brothers and sisters in Christ, looking beyond our walls to find and adopt more brothers and sisters, for it is only because of the Christ within us that we have any purpose, any hope, any reason to live in a world full of meaninglessness.
There is an old story about a dog, a hound that was given a big piece of meat by his master. He was afraid the meat would be stolen, so, as dogs do, he set off to the field to find a place to bury that hunk of meat. But he had to cross a bridge over a brook to get to the field and as he crossed the bridge, he looked down and saw another hound carrying a big piece of meat. The old hound was so greedy for meat, that he decided he’d take that other piece of meat away from that other hound. So he opened his mouth to bark at the other hound and Splash! His own piece of meat fell into the deep water. As the water settled, a sad old hound looked down at a reflection of himself in the water, without any meat. He had traded the reality of what he had been given for the illusion of the meat that he worshiped and because of his greed, ended up with nothing.
As Jesus said, “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”
One last story:
When we moved to a particular town, we heard on the radio about a terrible accident. A woman was driving a mini-van. In the van were her six children. And at an intersection, a tractor-trailer did not stop and t-boned the minivan. Two of the children were killed outright. The mother and the other four children were injured, one of the children with severe brain damage and neck injuries.
A few months later, we began attending a church and discovered that this family attended that church. Over the next few years, we grew to know the survivors. As you might expect, they were all emotionally scarred by the experience – they were still dealing with the one child’s injuries when we moved away, years later.
But perhaps the saddest thing was the way the lawsuit came to dominate the mother’s life. For years, this became topic A for the woman – nothing else happened in her life except the events surrounding the lawsuit. It wasn’t that she was overtly greedy, but winning the lawsuit became her entire life. For nearly a decade, her life was on hold until the settlement. And during those years, her children grew up – and we never heard any stories about them. Only the lawsuit. It was a grim reminder of how material things can grab your attention, how material things and finances can become a god to us, how the things of this world can distract us from the important things in life.
And so, when my hand was severely burned some years later in an industrial accident, and we encountered a host of medical bills without any medical insurance, I remembered that woman, and we did not sue the company where the accident happened. Instead, we praised God I was still alive, we returned to work and church, we continued to be thankful for our children. And one day, the bill was paid. We don’t know who paid it – we have a couple of guesses. But it doesn’t really matter, for while we don’t know who the agent was who wrote the check, we know that God paid the bills.
At the end of Solomon’s book, after reflecting on all this life has to offer, the wealthiest king that ever was, the man who had everything that could be had, the man who was also known to be the wisest king ever says:
Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the duty of all mankind.
For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.
Friends, when you would greedily attempt to hold onto something, let it go, read your Bible, and talk with God. Fear God – seek God’s will – and keep his commandments. And in this way, your deeds will be good and God will feed you, just as He feeds the sparrows in the wild.
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