April 19, 2013
Treasure on Earth
Recently in the news media a few financial advisors are expressing
concern that people in their 50’s are taking money out of their 401K. They feel
that the only legitimate reason for dipping into a nest egg would be to
purchase a house and those who have used funds for other purposes should pay
back into their retirement fund ASAP. I gave value to their opinions until one
30-something accountant tweaked my jaw saying, “If you haven’t planned for retirement you better enjoy living with
your kids…and if you haven’t put aside enough money for your retirement, you
will be unfairly burdening the rest of us because we will have to take care of
you.” Wow. Some of us already have a hard time grasping that God will take
care of all our needs; we certainly don’t need the added pressure of storing up
treasures on earth so that we won’t be a burden to others. “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust
destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for
yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where
thieves do not break in and steal.” (Matt 6:19-20 NIV)
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1 comment:
Gail;
-----This is one of the more confusing Biblical concepts. When Char and I go camping, I stop working. That’s simplistic. But it well demonstrates that what we eat during the camping trip was treasured up at least from the day before we left. I am a CPA. I earn the bigger half of my annual income by the end of April. Am I wrongfully storing up treasure for November and December, months in which I neither earn nor receive enough to pay my bills? In my early twenties I sat around on the couch looking for the ravens to bring me bread from God. I learned I was not that important. I store up money for November and December. And now that I‘m fifty-nine, I wish I had done the same for the Autumn of my life.
-----God designed responsibility to be a spiritually healthy characteristic. Tally up what you eat everyday. Tally up the few items of clothing you must occasionally purchase, and the gasoline you need to go get them and the groceries and to do other things necessary, too. Tally up the heating fuel for your comfort in the winter day, and in your daily shower, and for cooking the food for which you needed the gasoline to fuel the car you must keep in good repair and well insured. What? Did you make all this tallied-up stuff with your own hands? Now multiply that day’s tally by the seventy-five hundred or so days you expect to live beyond your career. You gunna make that stuff yourself? Look out the door. Do you see pouring from the clouds vast swarms of ravens laden with food and gasoline and clothing and car parts and even cars issued from Heaven’s treasury to every retired soul out there so he doesn’t have to store up treasure where moth and rust consume? I’ve not seen them. Somebody’s hard efforts make all that stuff. If more folks are consuming it than are making it, uh…
-----What I see are generous folks letting mom and dad live with them if not a generous government doling big sums of money to them. And where did that money come from? Well, it was taken from the young folks making stuff to pay their daily way. The kid has a point. Moreover, some of the stuff they make is also purchased away from their consumption by the old folks with the very money taken from the young folks. This is the current way God feeds those who have not saved. When it breaks down (and it will as production collapses while retired masses mushroom,) whatever other vehicle God finds to move younger folks’ money and goods into the service of older folks will still be only a vehicle. The fact remains, younger folks, not God, make what older folks consume. Responsible older folks who did save buy what younger folks make with what they themselves previously earned by making stuff, too. That’s the way economy works. That’s the way responsibility works. I think that’s the way God would like to feed His people.
-----I suppose I could have said this in a few sentences, which would not have been as fun to write, but maybe would have been less boring to read. So, I’m wondering if “provisions” might have a slightly different connotation than “treasures.” And I’m not so sure the kid doesn’t have a good point to his boot for my irresponsible backside.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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