April 13--Money

Money Joshua 7:16-9:2 Luke 16:1-18 Psalm 82:1-8 Proverbs 13:2-3 The communion that day was actually the sharing of a watermelon. Everyone got a piece. It was cut and it's red flesh was shared there in the sand between posts in a roofless little "church" on the shore of Lake Managua. The people lived in small huts and survived on fishing and subsistence farming. At the end of the church service, their little pigs showed up and rooted the rinds from the sand between the rough-hewn board "pews." The meal after the church service was for us visiting missionaries and students from the Baptist Seminary. Members brought chairs from their homes and we ate outside for there was no home big enough for 6 guests and a family. Half-way through the meal of fish soup, I realized that we guests were the only ones eating. The family insisted. They would fish later and make more soup. That experience in Nicaragua was the culminating event of my year in Central America. That time left such an impression on me and my walk with Jesus, that I devoted the next 10 years to serving God by helping refugees. I wanted to serve God and, for years, I took a vow of poverty and wanted little to do with money. In today's reading from the Gospel, Jesus tells us about money. He says that we cannot "serve two masters" and we "cannot serve both God and Money" (Luke 16:13). In my own spiritual journey, I became so impacted by poverty (like that of the people of that watermelon communion) that I felt to even have much money meant I did not serve God. I soon learned what Jesus suggests in the full context of this passage. As I was faithful in my work, in using my talents to serve the Lord and "in handling worldly wealth" and "someone else's property" my own wealth increased (see Luke 16:11-12). By God's grace, my wife and I have now been able to give more to God's work in the church and through missions than we had ever expected. I believe my experience has made sense of this verse: "I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings" (Luke 16:9). As we are blessed, may we be a blessing. May we never let money be our master, but may we wisely use wealth to help others fall in love with Jesus as we have. May we look forward to being welcomed into their homes in heaven! Blessings, Pastor Paul