"For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"
Matthew 16:25-26
This is kind of getting to me this morning. I guess that always before when I have thought of this scripture, I have thought it pretty obvious... of COURSE my soul is more important than the world... mostly thinking about material things. Vacation homes, yachts... nothing that really applied to me personally. :) Today though, the last part: "what shall a man give in exchange for his soul" kind of hit me. I think that is the exact deal we are making every day when we make the wrong choices. If we steal a pack of gum from the store, we're exchanging that pack of gum for a little bit of our soul. When we tell a lie, we're exchanging that erroneous information for some of our soul. If we get into an extra-marital sexual relationship, maybe we feel like we're saving our lives, but we're actually losing them... and if we resist temptation like that, then no matter how it feels like we're losing something, we're actually gaining our lives. There isn't anything, anywhere that is worth trading for our souls. Whatever our personal addictions, whatever our desires, nothing is that important. God is watching out for us, letting us know the consequences of our actions. Let's take him seriously today, and make sure that we aren't selling our priceless eternal souls for pretty, shiny, worthless junk.
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"
Matthew 16:25-26
This is kind of getting to me this morning. I guess that always before when I have thought of this scripture, I have thought it pretty obvious... of COURSE my soul is more important than the world... mostly thinking about material things. Vacation homes, yachts... nothing that really applied to me personally. :) Today though, the last part: "what shall a man give in exchange for his soul" kind of hit me. I think that is the exact deal we are making every day when we make the wrong choices. If we steal a pack of gum from the store, we're exchanging that pack of gum for a little bit of our soul. When we tell a lie, we're exchanging that erroneous information for some of our soul. If we get into an extra-marital sexual relationship, maybe we feel like we're saving our lives, but we're actually losing them... and if we resist temptation like that, then no matter how it feels like we're losing something, we're actually gaining our lives. There isn't anything, anywhere that is worth trading for our souls. Whatever our personal addictions, whatever our desires, nothing is that important. God is watching out for us, letting us know the consequences of our actions. Let's take him seriously today, and make sure that we aren't selling our priceless eternal souls for pretty, shiny, worthless junk.
No comments:
Post a Comment