Friday, July 13, 2012

Valuables Insight

Scripture Verse that Caught my attention today: Hebrews 10:34 For you had compassion for those who were in prison, and you cheerfully accepted the plundering of your possessions, knowing that you yourselves possessed something better and more lasting.

Observation:
Because of Christ, one’s sense of value changes.

Application: Suppose for a moment that you were a victim of a robbery. For today’s purposes, let’s make it a relatively pleasant robbery—you know…the kind where things do indeed get stolen, but nobody gets hurt. Let’s say the robber binds you securely to a chair, but lets you look on while he looks through the house for valuables. You see him rifle through various drawers, check the freezer for—as they say—“cold cash,” and grab your laptop computer. In the cookie jar he stumbles upon a plastic bag with few hundred dollars. On the way out he stuffs some miscellaneous jewelry in his pocket for good measure, tosses you a kitchen knife with which to cut the ropes that bind you (like I said, it’s a pleasant robbery), and then he’s gone as fast as he came.

What he didn’t know was that in the pantry in the bottom of an unsuspecting open box of stale cereal was the biggest treasure of all.

So you cheerfully accepted the plundering of your other possessions, knowing that you yourself possessed something better and more lasting.

I realize that this is a far-fetched and less-than-perfect analogy, but the principle still stands—in Christ our ultimate sense of value changes—and it’s something that no-one can ever really rob from us.

Don’t get me wrong. I like “stuff” too. But there will always be things of much more lasting value. Jesus would have us keep that very much in mind.

Prayer: Lord, thanks for the perspective that we can find only in you. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

(Readings today included: Isaiah 15-18 and Hebrews 10)

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