A self-centered society

We are such a self-centered society. Everything revolves around our own wants and desires and we pay little attention to how our decisions and actions affect others. We have so much and yet much of the world has so little. And yet we think we are entitled to what we have. But we're not. We have a responsibility and an obligation to use what we have been given to be a blessing to others.

According to www.worldhungeryear.org nearly 1.3 billion people live on less than $1 a day and nearly 3 billion people live on less than $2 a day. Knowing this, how can we justify the expensive homes, new cars, the walk-in closets full of clothes we rarely wear, and the enormous amounts of clutter that fill our homes?

Most of us prefer to be ignorant of how poor most of the world is. Afterall, why should we give away our hard-earned money? Because it isn't ours and it can be taken from us in an instant. Consider those who just one year ago lived in comfort along the Gulf Coast who now have nothing.

When Jesus encountered a rich young man in Matthew 19 he is asked what to do to be saved. Jesus responds by telling the man to sell everything he has and give it to the poor. Elsewhere Jesus says it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Does this mean it's wrong to be rich? Of course not. But what we do with our riches is indicative of whether we are yielded to the Lordship of Christ.