Orange Moon Cafe "What Money Cannot Buy"

The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe

(A repeat from 2012)

"What Money Cannot Buy"

     "We had everything money couldn't buy."

 (Mr. Jack Howell, 1/4/2012)

    Instantly upon hearing our dear friend Mr. Howell's testimony about growing up in a wonderful family during the Depression, I knew I would be writing about it.  Indeed, outside of Scripture, I don't know if I've ever heard any words more descriptive of what life is all about - and what it isn't all about.  Again, "we had everything money couldn't buy!"

    I do not expect during this lifetime to hear truer or more profound words, other than those directly stated in the Bible's Divinely-inspired text.  Money serves as a tool to be used for the exchange of goods and services.  Scripture speaks much of it, and clearly commands that we view money properly for the purposes of giving, spending, and investing.  However, the truest thing about money is that none of us actually possess a penny of it!  It rather belongs to Somebody else.  Let us breathe the sweet sigh of Heavenly relief as we recall the truth that neither our money or our possessions belong to us - "The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof, the world, and they that dwell therein" (Psalm 24:1).  

    Few Biblical truths more instantaneously infuse our hearts with God's tranquility as we remember the proper place of money, and our rightful role as stewards rather than owners.   Those who have everything money cannot buy understand the truth that real things come to us by way of grace rather than barter.  Indeed, the Lord Jesus Christ scourged and drove the moneychangers from His Father's house because the temple of God serves as a place of grace rather than buying and selling.  This includes the temple of our hearts, wherein our Lord freely gives to us the relational realities that alone satisfy and fulfill our innermost being.  As my wife Frances often says, "Life is about God and people.  Everything else is just stuff!"  Or, as both Old Testament and New Testament command, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength.  This is the first commandment.  And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" (Mark 12:30-31).

    The more we realize that "real things" can't be bought with money, the more we will know the joy of  "the true riches" (Luke 16:11).  Moreover, as we realize our role as stewards rather than owners, our hearts will rest in the peace of a life wherein our possessions do not possess us.  Again, let us breathe the sweet sigh of faith's relief as we look to our Heavenly Father in the acknowledgment, "It's all Yours, Lord, just as I am all yours!"  Thank you, Mr. Howell, for a sublime reminder of such truth, and for words that many of us will remember for a lifetime and an eternity.  "We had everything money couldn't buy!"  And thank You, Heavenly Father, for Your ongoing gift of that which money cannot buy, the gift of Yourself revealed in innumerable expressions of grace unto and within our hearts.

"A man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth."

 (Luke 12:15).

Weekly Memory Verse

    God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.

 (John 4:21-24)

  

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