Who wants $25 anyway?

Your mom hands you $25 to go pick out a toy as a kid.

She tells you that the money is only to buy a toy and if you decide not to buy one that you have to give the money back. However, if you buy a toy, you get to keep it.

It's a no brainer, right?

You buy a toy.

You wouldn't want to squirrel away the $25 because you couldn't keep it anyway. You might as well buy something so you come out ahead in the end.

"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."

I'm not sure this is a perfect example of this quote that I wrote down in church a couple of weeks ago, but I think it makes sense.

When you think about the Christian life, it doesn't look tempting to some people. It looks like you have to give up everything fun in order to live by faith. But life is something we can't keep anyway. Right now, I know people struggling with cancer. They are young, and they aren't choosing to give up their life. It's just that life is temporary. We can't keep it.

However, when we give up this life to live for God, we gain something better. We gain a life on earth that is full of peace in every circumstance. We gain a sense of purpose. We gain unconditional love. We gain eternal life with Jesus in heaven. We gain unending perfection, unending life, unending peace.

None of these things can be lost.

So it's like that $25. Why would you keep it when you can have something better than just money and when you wouldn't get to keep the money anyway?

"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."