They were a young couple just recently married. Both had been reared in homes where the parents wanted to make sure their children had life better than they did. As a result, neither had wanted for much during their 20-plus years on earth.
Both had been closely tended by their parents. They were picked up after. Their clothes were washed and put away for them, their beds made. Both got most everything they wanted in material things. The young husband’s mother even prepared his favorite food for him when the teenager did not like what she had prepared for the rest of the family.
As young adults both had good paying jobs, so neither wanted for things during their first weeks and months of marriage. Their apartment was appointed with new furnishings, not overly expensive but nice. They drove a new car. They went and did what they wanted with little thought about tomorrow and no thought at all about others.
Two or three times a week, each showed up at work wearing some new article of clothing. It would be years before the explanation came out: The couple was too busy having fun to wash their clothes, so whenever something got dirty they threw it in the corner and went to the store and bought something new. That went on for almost two years.
Unbelievable? Perhaps, but true. Money had little meaning to the couple. They had more than they needed to satisfy immediate needs. And because they had always been cared for by others, they never considered the need to take care of personal possessions such as clothes.
The young husband and wife were both Christians and active in a Baptist church. They had studied stewardship in Sunday School and heard it preached from the pulpit. But it had never occurred to them that the way they cared for personal possessions is part of biblical stewardship. Tithing, that was stewardship — not caring for clothes or the car or anything else.
The abundance of “things” had numbed the young couple into thinking that “things” were inexhaustible. The doting care of parents had reinforced the selfishness of the human spirit into concluding that life is “all about me.” The couple believed they were entitled to all they wanted of everything.
This inward focus of insensitive spirits had trouble grasping giving even a trifling to God. But if one gave to God, everything else certainly was for one’s own pleasure, the couple believed.
The couple lived like they had never heard “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof” (Ps. 24:1), as if they had never heard that “all that is in heaven and in the earth is the Lord’s” (1 Chron. 29:11).
The couple lived as if they had never heard that man is a steward of what is entrusted to him. He is not the owner but the caretaker.
The couple lived as if they had never heard that how one uses possessions reveals the character of one’s soul – that a follower of Christ is supposed to care for the poor, the needy, the hungry (Matt. 25).
The couple lived like they had never heard the warning of Leviticus 25 not to “harden your heart” against a brother or a stranger or a sojourner in need, as if they had never heard about the principle of gleaning outlined in Leviticus 19, sharing some of one’s harvest with the needy.
The couple lived like they had never considered that how much they spent on themselves was a spiritual question and how they cared for their possessions was a Christian stewardship issue.
According to the Bible, life is not about us. It is about God. He is the source of all that we have. Then life is about us in community with others. What God entrusts to our stewardship is to be used in ways that honor Him and build up God’s kingdom. Not just the tithe, but all one has is to be used in such ways.
Caring for possessions makes them last longer. That means we consume less. There is more for God and more with which to help others.
Unlike the young couple, we are not free to throw our dirty clothes in the corner and buy new ones. We are not free to wastefully consume the blessings of God in careless or selfish ways. We are not free to trample possessions underfoot like they had no importance or meaning. After all, life is not about us. It is about God and obedience to His direction including how we care for our possessions.
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