[2Co 12:14 KJV]
Behold, the third time I am ready to come to you; and I will not be burdensome to you: for I seek not yours, but you: for the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children.

[Mat 6:19-20 KJV]
Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

[Mar 4:19 KJV]
And the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful.

Thinking yesterday and this AM about the deceitfulness of riches. The world’s riches vs. treasure in heaven. I can strive to lay up both. One is fleeting, hard to get and hold on to, and demands a lot of attention. The other is only as hard to get as I am willing to give time to, it is incorruptible, undefiled and does not fade away. Things reserved for us in the heavens do not require our constant guarding and concern for. One consists of a medium who can do little more than help me procure stuff and junk. The other is no less than the stuff of our being.

I know the Lord knows what things we need, and that before we know. There is nothing wrong with having things…nothing at all. But it is well to know the value of temporary estate compared to eternal. Esau comes to mind. Only “The Word” can produce eternal fruit. After that bit of bread and bowl of bean soup, it says Esau rose up and went his way. How far down the road can you go on a bit of bread and a bowl of bean soup. Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats. God will destroy it and them (1Cor 6).

There is a truth that contains a very hopeful knowledge:

[Luk 12:4 KJV]
And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.

With the end of this body, comes the end of anything that can threaten. It is a bit of knowledge that is useful all the time…not only in the face of bodily peril. The house eternal in the heavens is not threatened by anything. There is real rest in knowing that.

I am convinced that in all things, the words the Lord speaks are spirit and life. He was not saying one can purchase eternal things with this world’s good, by giving them away. Rather, to divorce from the thinking, any notion that this world’s good gas any power at all to purchase or affect eternal inheritance. I know people who are believers, and are entirely caught up into believing in the stewardship of this world’s good as if it were a divine mandate. We are stewards of the mystery.