To heart this Morning Devotion, please click Risky riches
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The verse’s message was so clear: some much-adored measures for life success are actually the worst possible things that a person could gain.
It’s so ironic, but also so true.
Proverbs 15:17 says this, “Better a meal of vegetables where there is love than a fattened calf with hatred.”
My goodness.
They sure don’t teach this principle in business schools or with most consumer advertisements pushing people to spend money.
“Get more, have more, BE more” is the mantra of marketing forces in our world.
Look where this philosophy has gotten our country, though.
We are a nation of credit-financed fattened calves that aren’t producing the happiness for which millions had hoped.
Divorce is at an all-time high, with arguments over money as the most common root conflict.
Adult sibling conflict over what happens with the parents’ estate — always an issue in all cultures — seems worse than ever.
I’ve met some affluent people who are fountains of generosity, but many people of economic standing seem less inclined toward sharing their possessions.
That doesn’t mean that these people are feeling secure in their tight grip on the stuff.
If you have a fattened calf in one form or another — or even are perceived to have one — all sorts of solicitors and identity thieves are out to get it from you.
I’ve met a number of people lately who are sick of the fattened calf lifestyle and who yearn for simpler times.
The big house with the big social expectations and the big bills and the big demand for upkeep is too big of a price tag, they’ve decided. The same applies to the big boat or the big car or the big club membership or the big whatever.
The problem is that many people now recognize the big headaches from chasing the fattened calf and that means that there are fewer people with an interest in paying to take it off the owners’ hands.
The Great Recession has slammed millions, but it has also succeeded in teaching lessons that people weren’t getting otherwise.
Lessons like Proverbs 15:17.
The wisdom of eating more vegetables and less beef is relevant not just to the realm of good nutrition in order to reduce the risk of physical health, but also to spiritual health.
If I am making any compromises that are hurtful to family or friends in order to have the fattened calf, then I am doing wrong.
Simply stated, if anything material is becoming a hindrance toward my showing love toward someone, I need to give it up.
It’s that simple.
I’m in a season of circumstances, it seems, that God is insulating me from this trap.
I’m simply not in the position to embrace the fattened-calf lifestyle just now.
I don’t know that I would since I haven’t done so in the past.
But through God’s choice for arranging my circumstances, I’m in a “vegetables” life zone just now.
And that’s OK.
For I am surely loved by the family and friends that I love.
That’s far more important to me than having a pasture filled with fattened calves.
Solomon was absolutely right when he wrote that it was better to be eating beans and rice with loving people than to be eating prime rib with those scheming to take your place.
Please, dear friend, keep first things first.
Always focus first on feeding your heart and soul when it comes to your life priorities. That way, you’ll have peace with those you love, something not available to those who focus first on feeding their insatiable appetites of pride and material craving.
As always, I love you
Martin
