You know, I’ve thought about this.
I can only live in one house at a time.
I can only drive one car at a time.
I can only eat one chicken a day.
I can, however, freely share the spiritual and material treasures that the Lord has seen fit to grant me. Even the talent He gave me is His own: It has only been mine to borrow.
I’ve seen, and have been a party to, those consumed with materialism. I’m embarrassed to say this, but my husband once inherited money. A lot of money, which he spent with the gleeful abandonment of a drunken sailor on a three day tear in Singapore. The long and short of this is that we ended up, for a time, with five boats. You heard that right. Five. At one point he was actually thinking of buying an airplane. Since he was obviously money-crazed at the time, I told him that was just fine with me, as long as I wouldn’t trip over it in the driveway while schlepping groceries out of the car! I think he got the point, because he stopped talking about buying an airplane.
Now more material possessions means more to take care of. We spent more time fooling with those boats, maintaining them and fixing them, than we ever did enjoying them.
A reversal of fortune forced him to sell off four of the five boats. We now have one left, and it does require a lot of work. We do, however, get to enjoy it.
Part of the problem with materialism is the lack of a concept of what “enough” is. Money, prestige, and power tend to tempt us for more and more of the same. This all leads to the rat race, that pathetic struggle to the top of the heap.
Did you ever know anyone who, on their deathbed, say they wished they had spent more time on their careers? No, the more anchoring values are faith and family, and friendships. Those we love, whether here or in the hereafter. As St. Paul said, “The greatest of these is love.”
Jesus said it best (doesn’t He always
“What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his soul?” Or: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.” I’ve figured out that last one–you simply can’t drag all that cr-p with you. St. Peter would be reduced to a case of holy hiccoughs if he saw what some of us think we can take with us. And once in the kingdom of Heaven, all that stuff isn’t going to matter one little bit.
So, to be honest, I have enough. There’s a roof over my head. I ate a delicious dinner (prepared by me) tonight. My closet has acceptable clothing that fits me well in it. I can meet my obligations. My little Honda takes me where I need to go–it doesn’t need to be a Lamborghini. Anyways, the Honda gets better mileage than a Lambo would. There is no sense in paying premium prices for petroleum products to those who would like to kill me just so I can drive a high performance car.
There are a lot of people in this world who don’t have any of those things. Probably sixty percent or more of the world’s population lives in conditions that those of us in the USA and Canada would term “squalor.” So materially, I’m very successful. I once heard a wonderful definition of success: “True ambition is the desire to live usefully and walk humbly under the leadership of God, Who presides over us all.”
Myself? I won’t count myself as “successful” until and unless I hear these words from Jesus Christ Himself:
“Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of thy Lord!”
