Noooo! Not an Egg!
I dropped an egg on the kitchen tile floor this morning. It was as if it happened in slow motion and then I just stood there for a brief moment and stared at the mess and mourned this great loss. Eggs are valuable these days! I saw a couple of memes on social media about getting your significant other something expensive and valuable this Valentines Day–a dozen eggs. I even heard on a news report that somewhere eggs are being sold individually for $1.50 each. Wow! Yes, eggs are indeed pretty valuable right now, but to be sure they are not my most valued possessions.
Consider the heart-wrenching situation families and individuals living in the fire-ravaged areas of California recently experienced. If there were some kind of emergency and you had to evacuate your home immediately, knowing that everything left behind could be lost, what would you grab to take with you? I’m sure many of you are like me. I’d grab as many photo albums as I could and, yes, probably my most worn and precious Bible. And in the end, if all was lost but I had my loved ones with me, that’s all that would truly matter. Many victims of tragic storms or fires or floods that I hear interviewed often testify that what really matters is that their family survived. They have each other and everything else can be replaced.
God’s Word speaks to this. During his well-known Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said in Matthew 6:19-21, “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. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Where are we storing up treasures? And what does it mean to store up treasures in heaven? Truly, this comes down to people over possessions, doesn’t it?
The treasure I hope to store up in heaven is never going to be a thing. We take nothing with us. (You’ve all heard the saying that no one has ever seen a hearse pulling a U-haul.) So any treasure that would be in heaven has got to be something to do with people–how we treated them, how we shared Jesus, how our love touched others’ lives, and so on. Treasure in heaven is also how we treated God Himself. Did we give Him the respect, honor, praise and glory He deserves? Did we follow Him closely, looking to Scripture for guidance? (Psalm 119:9)
Deep down, I think most of us know that people are more important than anything we may own or the amount of money we may have in our bank accounts, but do our daily lives reflect this belief? I have some nice things and I take very good care of the things I have. I enjoy making my home warm, inviting and attractive. I’m sentimental about some of the treasures I have received from generations before me. And I mentioned the photo albums. Yes, I treasure family memories that have been made and would miss the visual reminders terribly. But my heart’s desire is to treasure people more. (The current condition of our family room carpet can attest to this fact. Haha.) Now, there are still rules like “no jumping on the furniture” for when the grandkids are over and that sort of thing. But I desire to hold my possessions loosely, with an open hand. The Lord has generously given and I am to be a responsible steward but never a greedy possessor. As Matthew 10:8b states, “Freely you have received; freely give.” Let’s not hold tight to our stuff and live in wild pursuit of gain. If what we value are people, let’s live that way now and not reserve it for emergency moments.
Back to my egg situation. I was going to fry two eggs for myself and two for my husband. Since I dropped one, I only ate one and gave him two. It made me feel better. But if a neighbor were to contact me to ask for a few eggs today, I’d give them up–gladly. I’d much rather build a relationship than hoard these precious and sought-after kitchen staples. Let’s live out our days with generous hearts and seek out heavenly treasure through our daily contact with those around us. It could be eggs-citing! 🙂
