Our only true possession?
I was thinking last week of taking out a home equity loan, and began to ponder the term "homeowner." In American society, if we live in a home for which we are making payments, we are considered "owners" of our homes, of course, but sticklers will point out that until we make that final payment, our homes are the property of the banks holding our mortgages. The uber-sticklers would got further, saying that so long as we owe property taxes, and the Government has the right to take our homes away from us if we don't pay those taxes, we are not truly the owners of our homes.
Most of us are willing to go along with the conventional wisdom, though, that despite mortgages and property taxes, we are home owners, at least in the eyes of the law.
However, if we want to be truly pragmatic, death steals from us all our material possessions, and while taxes are just as certain as death, death has a lot fewer loopholes. Do we "own" our souls? No - if we did, we would be able to do with them as we pleased after death, and you can bet that would make a lot of people feel a lot better about their eternal futures. There is a "dread judgment seat of Christ" which will, however, determine the fate of our souls.
So, then, we are deprived of all our possessions by death, and while we will certainly do what we can to steer our souls in the right direction, we are reliant on the judgment of God for their ultimate disposition. Do we, then, truly own anything?
In a sense, that's very easy to answer. Since God is omniscient, omnipotent, and the maker and inhabiter of all things, it is accepted in most Christian circles that we have nothing to barter with God. Thus, we have only the grace of God to appeal to when it comes to our final dispositions.
But then again...God does ask - demand - certain behavior of us, and that's a clue to the identity of the one thing which we really do "own." It is, really, the only thing we own.
It is our will. Our free will. At the end of the day, that is the only thing which we have today, and which we will have after we die. God allows us to choose our own fates, which means that he has given us something which he does no longer has, himself. For if we are truly free, God has forfeited control of us. And that is why we do own at least one thing, and why we do have at least one thing to give to God which he does not automatically have: a voluntary, willful, acknowledgement of him and his role in our lives, and all that he has endeavored to teach us. Obedience to him.
Is it any surprise, then, that the only thing God ever asks for in the Bible is the only thing we really, truly, have to offer, anyway? What else would he ask for, after all?
Most of us are willing to go along with the conventional wisdom, though, that despite mortgages and property taxes, we are home owners, at least in the eyes of the law.
However, if we want to be truly pragmatic, death steals from us all our material possessions, and while taxes are just as certain as death, death has a lot fewer loopholes. Do we "own" our souls? No - if we did, we would be able to do with them as we pleased after death, and you can bet that would make a lot of people feel a lot better about their eternal futures. There is a "dread judgment seat of Christ" which will, however, determine the fate of our souls.
So, then, we are deprived of all our possessions by death, and while we will certainly do what we can to steer our souls in the right direction, we are reliant on the judgment of God for their ultimate disposition. Do we, then, truly own anything?
In a sense, that's very easy to answer. Since God is omniscient, omnipotent, and the maker and inhabiter of all things, it is accepted in most Christian circles that we have nothing to barter with God. Thus, we have only the grace of God to appeal to when it comes to our final dispositions.
But then again...God does ask - demand - certain behavior of us, and that's a clue to the identity of the one thing which we really do "own." It is, really, the only thing we own.
It is our will. Our free will. At the end of the day, that is the only thing which we have today, and which we will have after we die. God allows us to choose our own fates, which means that he has given us something which he does no longer has, himself. For if we are truly free, God has forfeited control of us. And that is why we do own at least one thing, and why we do have at least one thing to give to God which he does not automatically have: a voluntary, willful, acknowledgement of him and his role in our lives, and all that he has endeavored to teach us. Obedience to him.
Is it any surprise, then, that the only thing God ever asks for in the Bible is the only thing we really, truly, have to offer, anyway? What else would he ask for, after all?
posted by Bob at 2:14 PM
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