Rēad to Read …Again
Daily Reading: I Chronicles 25-28
I Chronicles 26:27
Out of the spoils won in battles did they dedicate to maintain the house of the LORD.
Not much has changed over the past 3,000 years or so. Individuals still dedicate a portion of the spoils won in their battles to maintain the house of God. No, the battles are not with soldiers, armaments, and military strategies. They are in the office, on the production line, and out in the field. Earning a living is a battle. There is competition, difficulties of all types: inventory issues, not enough capital, personnel, or just the fatigue of doing the work. Perhaps the biggest battle of all is the battle over boredom, repetition, and disappointments. Yes, earning a living is a battle.
Consider the changing work environments, the new policies of enlightened (so called) mangers, and the advancement in electronic technologies. Can you recall the days when the charge for your order was $8.50 and you gave the cashier a $10.00 bill wherein they opened the cash drawer and immediately gave you $1.50 in change? Now it takes pressing numerous keys on a keyboard, waiting for the computer to do its computations, and then counting out the change which all seems to take much longer. It is a battle of patience on behalf of the customer and the cashier. How about this scenario, you ask for an auto part, or an airline ticket, or a question of any sort and the employee types a lot of things into a computer, waits, waits, and waits some more, taps on the side of the machine, blames it for being slow, and finally tells you they can’t help you. It’s a battle.
But from that battle comes the spoils of work, meaning money. Money is earned from the effort and energy one puts into the job. Want more money? Put in more effort and energy and your spoils won in battle will increase. If not, take your effort and energy to another job that better rewards your work. For the child of God those spoils won in battles, a portion of them, are to be used for the maintenance of the house of God, the local church. This means more than the actual building, but the staff, the pastor, the supplies, the utility bills, the care of the grounds, on and on the list goes.
Just like in David’s day when individuals increased their wealth by the spoils won in life and death battles and dedicated a portion of those spoils to maintain the house of God, so too today individuals that increase the money they have through working at their job, that are believers in Jesus Christ, children of God, the “saved” through the Gospel of Christ, so too are they to maintain the house of God, their local church. How else, who else, will provide a church with money to do the work it is commissioned of God to do? Are church leaders to pray for money to fall out of the sky? According to giving records many must think so.
Look at it like this. If a person goes to their local grocery store and purchases some steaks, potatoes, vegetables and salad ingredients for a nice dinner at home they will be told by the cashier after many moments at the checkout computer how much money they owe. Let’s say it is $50. That same person goes to church, hears a life changing message, is encouraged by other congregants, and enjoys the songs. There is no cashier, no set amount owed, no bill given. But which is more beneficial to the life long, even eternal, wellbeing of the person? The steak dinner in which they are told how much to pay, or the church experience? Both are to benefit, one short term, one long term, and both are to be maintained through the spoils won in battles of work.
Dr. William T. Howe
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