My husband came into the family room this morning, "Grrrr....I've got stuff stuck all over the bottom of my feet!!!!" "Sorry, about that," I said. "Pretzels...." Last night we had some Bible Quizzing kids over and the younger ones were upstairs. They were imagining my littlest was a cheetah and the pretzels were the treat they used to catch him. So they made a trail of pretzels going up the stairs into a pile where the "cheetah" was supposed to get caught. Very cute, except they forgot all about the cheetah trail of pretzels and left them for our feet to find this morning....squished, crushed, and spread all over the entire house now......classic. A day of vacuuming lies ahead.....
But I digress....I am reading a fiction book right now about the life of Martin Luther. It tells his story through two main characters, a sister and a brother. Their struggle to find God and how to please Him is clear. They never know if they've done enough good because they don't have access to the Scriptures. They can't afford to buy the indulgences the priests offer so they always feel guilt, never sure of their salvation.
They are very poor and barely making it with their large family. The father, (not unlike ours!) is a crazy inventor who just can't seem to get his big break, so they always struggle. The oldest sister, who tells the story through her eyes, is constantly trying to figure out God as well as why life seems to be so hard. The priests don't help her much. At one point she says, "I have just heard a sermon about despising the world, from a great preacher, one of the Dominican friars, who is going through the land to awaken people to religion. He spoke especially against money, which he called 'delusion, and dross, and worthless dust, and a soul-destroying canker.' To monks no doubt it may be so. For what could they do with it? But is it not so to me. Yesterday money filled my heart with one of the purest joys I have ever known, and made me thank God as I hardly ever thanked Him before."
They had an enormous debt that could not be paid. Her mother and father didn't know what to do, but then in a "chance" meeting, someone noticed her beautiful embroidery and offered her a contract to sew all the altar-cloths and coverings for the church. The sum he was to pay her was enough to almost cover her father's debt and he was going to pay her in advance. She ran home to tell her family. She wrote, "No! Whatever that Dominican preacher might say, nothing would ever persuade me that these precious guldens, which I took home yesterday evening with a heart brimming over with joy and thankfulness, which made our father clasp his hands in thanksgiving, and our mother's eyes overflow with happy tears, are mere delusion, or dross, or dust. Is not money what we make it? Dust in the miser's chest; canker in the proud man's heart; but golden sunbeams, streams of blessing earned by a child's labour and comforting a parent's heart, or lovingly poured from rich men's hands into poor men's homes."
How many times has that exact thing happened to us? We've often found ourselves in a tight spot, not sure what to do, then a contract will come in or a new job is offered and we find ourselves in awe of God's provision, thanking him with clasped hands and tears flowing, just like the parents in this book. Is that the love of money, like the friar suggested? Or is it the love of God for His provision? It seems strange to be so happy about money, yet money does ironically bring happiness at times. But, I think the author of this book says it best, "Is not money what we make it?" The worship of money, the love of money, when we make it an idol....that is what is dangerous. But so often God uses money to answer our prayers and the joy that comes when He does so is amazing! Money can be dangerous, too, when we rely on it for our joy and security. But when we know and love the Provider, then it brings "streams of blessing", just like the young girl said. A bit of a fine line perhaps, but the reason her little story resonates so much with me is because I could have written that story myself. We've seen God do miracles like that so many times I can hardly recount them all. In that sense, money has been a true blessing to us.
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