March 7th – A Fool’s Game

Taking It to Work:

There’s a great book on my shelf by John Ortberg called, “When the Game Is Over, It All Goes Back in the Box.” What a great title and great reminder of the truth of today’s devotional.

One of the world’s most popular board games, launched in 1935, is the game of Monopoly. I was born in Atlantic City, the city the game is based on, so almost every house in my neighborhood had that game.

How did you win? Well, first off you had to last, sometimes those games would go on for four hours or more. Secondly, in the end, you had to have more money, houses and hotels than the other people did. Usually, we wouldn’t want to go the whole game, so we would set a time, and at midnight, or whatever we set, we’d count our wealth, and see who won.

Well, you know where this is going. In our spirit, and also straight from Scripture, we know that’s not how God wants us to live. We already know it, yet most Christians are still doing life with the “Monopoly Mindset”, where wealth is the name of the game, and he who dies with the most toys wins.

We’re playing the wrong game, or maybe more accurately, we are playing the game wrong. God has a different Name in the center of His game, Jesus, and the strategy of His game, is a life lived richly toward God and His Kingdom first; and not for mere pleasure, security and the wealth of our short-lived kingdom.

The good news is, especially for the entrepreneurial, we still get to play the game, but the way we win, is much, much different. We win by belonging to Him first. We win by laying up treasure in Heaven. We win by making a lasting positive impact on those around us. We can still aim high in our careers, and we can still command great wealth in our lives, but the wealth is not the end-game. The end-game is using all that we have been blessed with, and all that we acquire, to create a lasting Godly footprint on this earth, and in Heaven.

That is a much different goal, and our scriptures today speak loudly to get us to pay attention. Read and meditate on them carefully, because before we know it, everything we have will be going back in the box; and the only thing God will be counting, is what kind of influence we had while it was still on the board. Play to win, as His Word works in you, today.

Matt 6:19-20 (ESV) – “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.”

1Tim 6:17-19 (ESV) – As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.

Luke 12:19-21 (ESV) – And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’  So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

1Cor 3:12-15 (ESV) – Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. 14 If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.

Listening to the Holy Spirit:

The life lived well, judged by My eye, will be a life protected and guided by My Spirit. Trouble and blessing, bringing forth fruit in season and out. Look not for comfort and worldly riches, but look instead for the great blessings of a life lived for God. Comfort and ease are not rewards of the holy, but growth in holiness, and the peace and joy of My presence through all. Glad is the heart that has walked with the Spirit; a life given to wealth is the gold of fools. Wealth given by My hand builds the man to greater in the eyes of Heaven. Wealth pursued at the expense of the Spirit empties the man to a shell, with his only glory left at the grave; forgotten is this man. I bring you storm, that your course might be made right, and for blessing in season of harvest. Seek not the wide road. You are called apart, that you would follow Me through storm and sun, that your way would not be lost, and your riches not lost to time.