If you are anything like the rest of our country, you have been glued to your television screen and your newspapers wondering how the financial picture could get any worse.  It seems that we are seeing history unfold right before our very eyes, and for some of us who are younger, it is tempting to think that the sky is literally falling around us.  Yet it is in these times of great turmoil and upheaval that we must discipline ourselves all the more to look to the Word of God for our counsel, wisdom, and insight.

If you look at what the Apostle Paul writes to his young prodigy Timothy, his closing words to him are quite profound as we see them in 1 Timothy 6, beginning in verse 17.  "Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain..." (17a)  Now before you react and think that Paul is singling out those who are considered by Forbes and others to be wealthy, consider this: most would put America as one of the richest countries in the world.  You and I, comparatively speaking, are rich in the eyes of the bible, so this text applies to us.  And it is here that Paul reminds us to not put our hope in wealth, which is what?  That's right.  So uncertain.  But he goes on, and writes this: "but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment." (17b)  You see, it is God who provides us with everything!  Our hope is in him, and not in wealth.  Stocks, financial blessings, they come, and they go.  Of course, you may be saying "but wait!  I just saw half my savings blow up in smoke in the recent financial market!"  But notice, friends, that our natural tendency is to think that we can control our lives and our futures.  If we just plan enough, we can control.  But God won't let us stay there.  No, God wants to remind us over and over again that HE is the one that provides for our every need.  In fact, Paul says that he provides us with everything for our enjoyment!  What an amazing truth!  Though we are sometimes spoiled, God has provided us an abundant life to enjoy on this earth, as a mere foretaste of the abundant life we will enjoy in heaven.

Paul goes on to tell Timothy "Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share." (v. 18) Our wealth, as the bible describes it, is in the goodness that we show to others.  Our willingness to share.  Our willingness to put our hope in God, and then share that hope with others with deeds of kindness, mercy, and grace.  Why?  Because, as Paul concludes, "In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life."  (v. 19)  Remember, dear friends, that our treasure is not of this world, but is of the world to come.  The life that we live, we live as faithful pilgrims who are on a sojourn from grace to glory.  May we, as Paul exhorts us, take hold of the life that is truly life, and put our hope in God, trusting that our treasures, though fleeting now, are everlasting in the world to come.

Amen.