16 Now behold, one came and said to Him, “Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?”
17 So He said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.”
18 He said to Him, “Which ones?”
Jesus said, “ ‘You shall not murder,’ ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ ‘You shall not steal,’ ‘You shall not bear false witness,’ 19 ‘Honor your father and your mother,’and, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”20 The young man said to Him, “All these things I have kept from my youth. What do I still lack?”
21 Jesus said to him, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.”
22 But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
Matthew 10:16-22
These verses have been floating around in my head since Saturday. I have been trying to figure out how these verses would be lived out today. I can sell all that I have, I can also give all the proceeds to the poor. The “come, follow me” part…literally, I can’t do that. Jesus is not walking this Earth, I cannot go, and follow Him.
Mr. OverKill and I were talking about it last night. We came to the conclusion that while, yes Jesus was speaking literally to that young man, He was also speaking figuratively to the rest of us. Perhaps the lesson for us is that we shouldn’t allow the entire focus in life to be on monetary gain. Our main focus in life needs to be following Christ.
Which means I shouldn’t be spending my time, my energy on creating wealth. I should however, be spending my time and energy on learning more about the Lord, and how I could live in order to bring glory to Him with my life.
But there is a balance.
In all labor there is profit,
But idle chatter leads only to poverty.-Proverbs 14:23
The plans of the diligent lead surely to plenty,
But those of everyone who is hasty, surely to poverty.-Proverbs 21:5
More on balance tomorrow :)