One day on my way home I stopped by the Clifty general store
for some rabbit or chicken feed. (Well, feed for some critters or other.)
While there I met a man with his pickup backed up, picking up a load
of feed.
He told me someone had given him three or four horses. Neat, cool,
great, can't beat that. (Would you like a deal like that?) But he found out
you have to feed them. He was willing to sell them cheap. I could have
gotten a horse real cheap that day.
The only thing that kept me from getting a cheap horse that day was;
I did not have time to run home and build a barn.
Nor buy the pasture next door and fence it.
Or knew a veterinarian I could pay to help take care of it.
Or wanted to buy the feed for it too.
"If you love money, you will never be satisfied;
if you long to be rich, you will never get all you want.
It is useless. The richer you are, the more mouths you
have to feed. All you gain is the knowledge that you
are rich."
(Ecclesiastes 5:10,ll TEV)
God helped me buy a small patch of woods for a retreat, get away,
or personal space - whatever you want to call it. Of course I wanted
more. In fact sometimes I have envied all the land the neighbor had.
As near as I can tell from public records, he has about twenty nine
times as much land as I do. And to boot, it looked to me like he
inherited it.
Would I trade places with him? He is an invalid and about the
only time he gets out of the house is to go see the doctor. However,
he does get the joy of paying taxes on all that land.
In his book, Victory in the Valleys of Life,
Charles L. Allen said:
"Someone wrote these words:
For those who seek the answer
in houses, lands and rings,
Will someday find their empty lives
Just as empty filled with things.
One can be successful in accumulating things
and still find nothing in life really worth living for."
p. 16,17
There was a time in my life when I wanted to have rental properties.
(I did, once.)
My son-in-law is a man of much greater wealth than my self.
He is not like me, content with hand-me-downs. He goes for the
good stuff.
My son-in-law owns rental properties in Florida, Pennsylvania and perhaps
still in upper New York or Maine.
But I have noticed something. Just the expenses of holding on to
these investments, with out loosing them, would bankrupt me.
"Workers may or may not have enough to eat,
but at least they can get a good night's sleep.
The rich, however, have so much that they
stay awake worrying."
(Ecclesiastes 5:12 TEV)
Down to my size.
I own more than one motorcycle.
But I can only ride one at a time.
BUT,
I do have the joy of:
Buying license for them.
Paying taxes on them.
Buying tires for them.
Lubing chains on them.
Changing oil and filters on them.
Trying to keep the batteries up on all them.
etc,
etc,
etc.
"Of course, there is great gain in godliness combined
with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world,
so that we can take nothing out of it; but if we have food
and clothing, we will be content with these.
But those who want to be rich fall into temptation
and are trapped by many senseless and harmful
desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction.
For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil,
and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered
away from the faith and pierced themselves with
many pains."
(1 Timothy 6:8-10 NRSV)
