the basic message # E77
Matthew 6:1
“Be careful not to do your ‘acts of righteousness’ before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.”
I guess I’ll have to forfeit my reward by telling you I bought lunch for a bum today. “Mr. Albert” came walking past the restaurant I was leaving, and we made brief eye contact. Since I was with a friend, and since I needed to get back to work, I let him walk on by. I had no doubt in my mind that he was homeless, and as I left the parking lot I saw him walking down the street. It so happened that I had a little take-out box with me, so I stopped and asked him if he was hungry. After some conversation, I took him back to the restaurant and bought his lunch.
Matthew 25:37 and 25:40
37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink?” 40 “The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’”
OK, now that you know how Jesus feels about us helping the downtrodden, let me confess something. I got more than $10 worth of wisdom from Mr. Albert in our 15 minute conversation. He basically talked non-stop the entire time, linking a widely varying group of topics together without even taking a breath. In that short period of time, I heard about Socrates, Plato, Tom Sawyer and his black companion Jim, how Jim was coaxed into impersonating an African King, how the Apostle Paul was formerly a Pharisee and how the stars and moon had been in a very unusual pattern a few nights before. I learned that before he lost his teeth, he liked to eat “cracklin”, and how Neil Diamond wrote “Cracklin Rosie”, and how Billy Ray Cyrus admired Neil Diamond and how Billy Ray nearly drove himself nuts after writing “his famous song”. I’m probably leaving out over half of what Albert said, but you get the idea. There was one thing though, that stuck in my mind over everything else, but was the meaning I received what he intended? Am I reading too much into what he said? You be the judge.
After I told Mr. Albert I needed to get back to work, he shared some unconventional ideas about work, wages and such. In the process of sharing his thoughts, he said “I don’t want to forfeit my salvation.” I took this to mean that during the time he was employed, the pursuit of money, jobs and related things put a strain on his relationship with God. Did I understand correctly that he prefers to be homeless rather than risk his salvation? Whether he does or not, I’ll never know, but I learned something valuable today. Would I voluntarily choose homelessness if I knew my salvation depended it? Let’s face it, we humans have created a complex, frustrating world with more than it’s share of trials and tribulations. If God spoke to you today and told you to grab a few clothes, put them in a garbage bag and live under a bridge, would you do it? If God told you that you might lose your salvation if your soul continued to become soiled in our filthy world, would you follow his advice, or is the pull of our world stronger than the pull of Heaven? Most of you will consider this to be some far-out scenario which has no merit, but perhaps one day you’ll get to find out if God really did send an important message to Mr. Albert.