Leftovers

Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits will have plenty of poverty. – Proverbs 28:19

This is not just about farming; it is true in any business, any pursuit, ministry, avocation or vocation, if we work at it, fervently and diligently, we will in that area prosper.  Plenty of poverty awaits the neglectful, the slothful or the person who is constantly shirking and complaining and blaming others for their circumstances.  We need a minimum wage that allows servers of Big Macs to buy a new Escalade because there is no way that would cause people to think Big Macs were too expensive or cause McDonalds franchises to close because they weren’t making any money. 

People who do not take care of their own business will become satiated with lack, emptiness, and the pointlessness of existence.  Our business is, ultimately, to find a place in our hearts for Christ.  We must break up that fallow ground so that the Word may take root in us and grow.  In Him we find wholeness, fullness of joy, and peace with God.  To busy ourselves with anything else while neglecting the business of eternity is to set ourselves up for plenty of poverty. 

To be in poverty means that we lack something essential – in Christ we lack nothing:  The young lions suffer want and hunger; but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing (Psalms 34:10).  Those who roar and rampage trying to find satisfaction in the animal life and in the passing fancies of the world system will suffer and hunger.  They will never find sufficiency or be able to fill the emptiness inside. 

Seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness puts us in line with the Way.  When we are in the Way and of the Way, we are free of the anxieties, wants, and viewpoints of the world system.  Be it unto you, Jesus said, according to your faith.  The more we immerse ourselves in Him, the more the mind of Christ controls us, the less we subject ourselves to the mind of the flesh, the more Bread of Life we will have, with basketfuls to share.

Finding My Way

Thomas said to him, Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?

Jesus said to him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. -- John 14:5-6

Thomas is my favorite disciple.  Peter and John are great.  We love Paul, the one born out of time.  All of them deserve admiration, but Thomas just resonates with me.  He's this hard-headed, practical guy.  When Jesus told the disciples in John 11 that they were going back into the environs of Jerusalem, where the religious leaders were threatening to kill the Lord, Thomas responded:  So Thomas, called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him (John 11:16).  He has no faith.  I've been there. We're all going to die.  Shoot, man, let's just go die with Him and get it over with.

Thomas had happened to be out when Jesus appeared to the others on one occasion after His resurrection.  These are his best friends in the world, and he says, "You boys have lost it. I understand the stress and everything, but He's dead!  I'll believe it when I can put my fingers in the nail holes in His hands and put my hand into the wound in His side."  Yet when he does see the risen Christ, he falls to his knees crying, "My Lord and My God!"

How can you not love a person like that?

In this passage, as Jesus is speaking with His disciples immediately before His crucifixion, He tells them that He is going to leave them, but they know the way to where He is going.  Thomas is incredulous.  How can we know the way when we don't even know where You are headed?

Jesus replies that He is going to the Father, and that the only way to the Father is through Him.  They know Him, thus they know the way.  The destination and the road to that destination are one.  If we get on the right road, we cannot help getting to the right destination.

I am not capable of fully comprehending God.  The good thing is that I don't have to.  I don't have to become a monk or a hermit.  I appreciate that there are those called to the life of an anchorite.  I appreciate the theologians and the philosophers and all who delve deeply into the nature of existence and of the Divine.  Thank God for them.  But my lack of understanding, the limitations of my intellect, and my calling to a more mundane vocation will not prevent me, in the end, from reaching the heavenly goal.  For I know the Way.