Cares of This World

Jesus said that God’s word was like seed sown into people’s hearts. The condition of the soil, he said, was the determining factor in how well the seed produced.

One type of "soil" is the person who is delighted to receive God’s word, but the cares of this world choke the tiny growing plant. I remember a fellow for whom "the cares of this world" was a favorite topic. I got tired of hearing about it, but the truth is, worldly cares are a huge problem.

I always thought of worldly cares as being selfish, and I still think so—but now I have realized that they can be selfish in a most subtle and unexpected way. This happens when we accept the very "normal" job of taking care of ourselves, an occupation that Jesus didn’t approve of.

In the past week, I’ve had a "real life experience" that demonstrated this to me quite clearly. I’ve had a niggling thought in my mind to expand my mostly—bookkeeping business to include tax preparation. I knew I would need a bit of money, some software, and some help. The problem was, I had no time to order the software, and my desired helper isn’t quite inclined toward this type of work.

The "taking care of myself" problem became apparent, however, after I got word that I was in line for a tidy little sum of money. ‘There you go,’ I said to myself. ‘The Lord is putting this into your hands, and you are responsible to invest it properly.’ That is all good and well, but after several days of feeling extremely pressured by all of this, I got down to business with the Lord and discovered the real truth about my thinking.

What I really thought was, ‘This is the last time the Lord will ever put money into my hands. From here on out, I’m on my own, so I must handle this money perfectly, and put it to work immediately.’

On the surface, you see, appropriate investing of God’s gifts to us is not a selfish thing. In fact, it’s a very good thing that can bring marvelous results. But we must always keep in mind that God sees our hearts. He sees why we do what we do, and that is what He is really after. Wise investing isn’t selfish, but wise investing out of fear that what we have now will have to last us forever ...isn’t wise at all.

The care of all of that—the feeling of responsibility for my own welfare—drains the life out of me. It distracts me from focusing on God’s goodness and His provision. It chokes out the growing life planted in me by the word of God.

The truth is that God has more than enough for you, and more than enough for me. He’ll never run out, and He’ll never become selfish. When we really get that, we can relax and grow and follow where He leads.

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