DON'T PUT ALL YOUR EGGS IN ONE BASKET UNLESS IT BE GOD'S

Readings: Jeremiah 17:5-10; Luke 16:19-31

There are two big mistakes we can make in life. The first is to depend completely on another human; the second is to depend completely on ourselves.

Now I am not saying people can’t be very important to us. How can children get along without parents? Where would husbands and wives be without one another? We need friends, we need each other. We need someone in our lives we can depend on, especially in a crisis. Experience teaches we can’t do everything ourselves.

But we must never let anyone take the place of God in our lives. When it comes right down to it, the only one we can really and truly and forever count on is God. When our loves are gone, when our friends have died, who have we to turn to? God! And God alone!

“Thus says the Lord,” writes Jeremiah: “Cursed is the man who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the Lord. He is like a barren bush in the desert that enjoys no change of seasons, but stands in a lava waste, a salt and empty earth. Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose hope is the Lord. He is like a tree planted beside the waters that stretch out its roots to the stream: it fears not the heat when it comes, its leaves stay green; in the year of drought it shows no distress, but still bears fruit.”

No one can be God to us except the one and only true God. We might try but we can’t be god to anyone else either. We are to help one another as best we can, but place our eggs only in God’s basket. He only is able to be with us whenever, wherever, and however we need him. Too bad the rich man dressed in purple didn’t know that. He seems to have placed all his confidence in money.