Today’s Scripture Reading (August 7, 2018): Genesis 47
I recently underwent
a stress test, evaluating the condition of my heart. It is something that most
of us have to suffer through at some point in our lives; the endless tests of
our medical system trying to evaluate our health and predict, at least a little
for those who want to insure us, when we
are likely to die. According to the cardiologist, that point of death is still
a bit into the future, at least if it is my heart that is going to take my life
from me. My heart is fine.
Which is a little surprising. I haven’t always been nice to my
body. While I am getting better, I still don’t treat my body with the respect it is probably due. I have
friends, who are my approximate age, who are beginning to watch their health
suffer. A running joke among a group of us is that we have no retirement plans.
With the amount that we have saved in our retirement accounts, we are going to
have to work well past our sixties and, at least, into our seventies. But that
only works if our health holds. Although he didn’t need to, my father-in-law
worked, at least part-time, until he was admitted into the hospital in his
mid-eighties with the disease that would claim his life a couple of weeks
later. What is the difference between him and some of my friends who are
experiencing health issues and are not yet even closing in on their eighties? I
am not sure that I know the answer.
Except maybe that everything
is God’s. It is a truth against which we want to wrestle. The trap is to
believe that the things that I own are mine because I am the one who worked
hard for what I have achieved. And while that is partially true, the ability is
given to us to work hard, and the aptitude
with which we conduct our jobs is something that belongs only to God. We are
blessed when our health us good and we are productive in our jobs. While there
are things that we can do to increase our riches and maintain our health, the
truth is that we are not the originators of all of our opportunities, and
genetics, which is beyond our control, has a voice in the reality of how long
we might live. Even self-made people have had the benefit of opportunities that
were not within their ability to control.
And what might be
that the best illustration of this principle is
found in Joseph’s Egypt. Pharaoh
had come through for his people, keeping the people alive in Egypt and the
surrounding nations when the great famine raked the land. But that help came at
a price. By the end of the famine, everything, at least in Egypt, belonged to
Pharaoh. Now, it appears that Joseph had no intention of making the lives of
the people miserable, but the reality that the people couldn’t escape was that
Pharaoh owned everything. The cost for working the land, owned by the Pharaoh,
with seed, also owned by the Pharaoh, would be twenty percent, actually not a
bad rate of taxation. But the truth of life in Egypt, as life returned to
normal, was that none of the land
belonged to the people.
Our lives are no
our own, no matter how much we may want to pretend that they are. Our days are numbered, and all that God asks of us is to
do the best with the opportunities that he gives to us. Take care of your
health and maximize the difference that you can make on this planet. After all,
that is precisely Joseph’s story. He made the most of his opportunities, and
the result was that he was in a position to give his family the best that he
had to give.
Tomorrow’s Scripture
Reading: Genesis 48
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