FanStory.com - Stewardshipby T B Botts

Several days ago I read a poem by my Fan Story sister, Dolly. She covers a number of topics with her poems, some controversial, some common. She wrote about debt, which, for one reason or another, is never far from my thoughts. Not because I'm in debt, because I'm not. Neither am I wealthy. Nonetheless, my house, car, boat and permits are all paid for and every month I pay off my credit card.

We have a problem in this country. It's a spending problem. We want more than we can afford, so we get a loan and pay the bankers ridiculous fees, which they use to buy themselves bigger houses, nicer cars or better vacations.

The Bible mentions that the borrower is a slave to the lender. Sounds about right. If it weren't so, why do so many people go to jobs that they hate and spend so much time away from loved ones? I know that you need a place to live and a way to get to work, and there is nothing wrong with going on a well deserved vacation. The question is, do you need to have a four bedroom house if three will do? Can you make your car last another year with some routine maintenance?

How many people stop at the coffee shop on the way to work every day? Judging by the number of coffee drive- ins in town, I'd say quite a few. You might say, well it's only $5.00. OK. So if you get coffee five days a week for a month that's $100.00 a month. For coffee. Something you can brew at home for much, much less.

Where I live, every house has a garage attached. In the summer, the owners often leave their garage doors open. As I pass by I can see inside, and I'm amazed at the amount of junk that is packed in there. Obviously, one man's junk is another man's treasure, but Holy Toledo, if you have so much stuff in your garage that there is no room for the car, maybe it's time for a yard sale.

Not too far from my home there is a storage facility. Some people have so much stuff that they can't put any more in their house, so they pay someplace to store their stuff for them. I wonder how often they visit the facility to get something that is stored there. I suspect not very often.

I read that for a number of Americans, perhaps even half of the country, if an unexpected expense come up, they couldn't meet it. There is a scary number of folks who don't even have a thousand dollars in an emergency fund in the event that their car broke down or the washing machine gave up the ghost. News flash! Things are going to break down, and when they do, we need to have the money set aside to deal with them.

I know it's none of my business what people do with their money. At least not until their decisions end up costing me more because the government has to bail them out due to their poor choices.

This post is about stewardship, which means I'm responsible for what I do with what God has given me. Make no mistake, all that we have is from God above. From the time Adam and Eve were set in the Garden of Eden to tend it, God has given the earth to people. It's our responsibility to care for it. That doesn't mean that we can't use it's resources, we can, and we can be blessed by them. What we can't do is disregard the principals of good stewardship as we utilize those resources. The word says- the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. He owns it all. He's good enough to let us live off of all that it provides us; we just need to take care of it, knowing that it belongs to someone else, and we'll be held accountable.

The recent earthquake in Turkey and Syria has devastated thousands of homes and buildings, as well as taken tens of thousands of lives. Whole towns in Ukraine are being destroyed by war. Last year Ft. Meyers Florida suffered with a horrible hurricane that demolished untold numbers of homes. These are just a few of the issues that are going on in the world. Try to put yourself in any of these situations. Can you imagine the sense of hopelessness and helplessness and despair you might feel? What if there was no one around to lend a hand? What if you had to spend the night huddled around a fire with no food and no idea when you might eat again or where you would live? It would be overwhelming.

When you're in debt, you can't help anyone else. People who have real problems are left to deal with them by themselves. God never intended us to be reservoirs with our finances. The Dead Sea is dead because it has no outlet. We are given the responsibility of caring for His money and goods. Does He want us to be poor and unable to care for our families? Certainly not. Does He want us to be able to help our neighbors near or far to meet their needs in times of disaster? Most certainly. I'm not advocating any form of socialism. On the contrary, I find capitalism the best way to create wealth for the most number of people. I'm just saying let's be good stewards of what we have, so that when trouble comes, whether in the form of new tires or meeting the need of one of our neighbors, we can be in a position to deal with it.

I mentioned to Dolly a saying that my friend Buffalo Bob's father had. He said, "it's not what you make, it's what you spend." No truer words were ever spoken.