It seems that the American economy has taken over the spotlight as the number one conversation topic.  Fears, doubts, worry, and anxiety are spreading among the communities that I visit, and it shines a spotlight on what we hold dearest in our life.

What are we afraid of?  What are we worrying about?  What is triggering the anxiety?  Is it the fact that you will run out of money?  or is it the idea that you might just have to do without a few creature comforts?  In the greater scheme of your life, what in the world does it matter if you have everything, but don’t have happiness or Love?

God’s economy is so much bigger than what we seem to be focused on.  The currency in God’s economy is more substantive and solid than any paper you fold and place in your pocket.  The transactions in God’s economy are inverse to how we seem to run our lives these days.

Christ Jesus came to this earth to explain to you and me that man made economics fail 100% of the time but God’s economics are true from beginning to end.  If you are the analyst type, let me put it into the following terms: In order to measure the results of economic impact, you need a constant common denominator.  Variables are not an option if you want absolute results.

There is nothing that we can make, manufacture, calculate, or contrive that can compare to the constant, dependable common denominator of God’s love.  Make sense?

Our economy is based on acquisition.  God’s economy is based on giving.

The time that we spend trying to develop new strategies and programs to get more stuff… is vain and wasted.  We search for happiness and contentment inside of these transactions and the products we acquire, but it’s all empty.

When we give ourselves to God and start operating in His economy, we learn that the gift of contentment we receive when we give to others from the heart… is that “something” that we’re all searching for.

God does not charge us for Love or Grace… it’s free.  There is a cost, but it’s a man made cost.  We must give up the pursuit of material items and gaining more… but don’t hang that burden on God.  He did not manufacture our greed… we own that outright.  We each have a personal cost that is relative to the hardness of our hearts.

It’s easy to understand Christ Jesus when He told the rich young ruler that he must sell everything if he wants to experience what God has in store for him… eternal life.  It’s not whether we are wealthy or not, it’s how deep our desire for “stuff” is rooted into our hearts.  There are many God fearing men I know that are very wealthy… but it is plainly evident that they could care less about the “stuff”.  I also know some wealthy men who are so hung up on their “stuff” that religion is used as a measure to get more… that is tragic.

Listen to this… don’t worry and stop living in man’s economy.  Find ways to make transactions in God’s economy.  In other words, look for opportunities to give.  You don’t have to give money… give your heart.  Open your eyes, discover your talents and use those to enrich another life.  Doing this will turn our lives around so we aren’t dependent on things of this world, but dependent on God.

If we all lived according to God’s economy, none of the worries and panic of the stock market, 401k, or unemployment rates would bother us at all.  But we are human, we do worry, but it is in vain.

May we all examine why we toil, and understand that the pursuit of anything less than God is a waste of effort.  Find joy in your toil, use your talents, and watch the anxiety of the economy of “now” fade into the background.

Peace,
Greg
Acts 4:31
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