Am I being trustworthy from heaven’s perspective with the worldly possessions entrusted to me?

10  "Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.  11  So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches?  12  And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else's property, who will give you property of your own?  

INSIGHT:  As I have pointed out in several past teachings, God and Jesus are almost always focused on and talking about the spiritual-eternal and we are thinking mostly natural-temporal.  We tend to relate Jesus’ teachings to everything in our life on earth and forget about the eternal implications.  I used to read this passage and say, “Ahhh, if I’m wise with my finances in small matters, God will give me even more.”  That’s what it means to be a carnally minded or a worldly-minded believer.  I focused only on how this teaching would benefit me now.  While the principle may apply here sometimes, it is not the main point Jesus is teaching at all (the disciples clearly did not benefit in this way while on earth).  Jesus is making the more important point of saying that how we handle the things he puts in our hands here, will determine how He handles us in eternity.  Everything on earth, and everything we have, all belong to God—our time, talents, and resources.  We are called to be wise stewards.  A good steward is one who understands God’s ownership of all, and who places importance on using His stuff to increase His return on investment, not squandering it on the pursuit of worldly pleasures. 

God tests our hearts even in seemingly insignificant matters.  Our irresponsibility in the little things shows our true character and holds back our progress and His blessings.  If we have failed at this in the past, let us receive His forgiveness and grace now, so that we can grow in this area and bring much pleasure to God and blessing to our self.

By the grace of Jesus Christ, I grew not only into someone who began thinking almost entirely with a spiritual-eternal mindset, but I also found myself caring more about other’s property than even they did sometimes.  One of the valuable lessons my mother taught me, not even knowing it was Christlike to do so, was to always return something you borrowed in better shape than when you received it.

There came a time when the Lord was pleased to move me around a lot.  I stayed in 11 different places in one year, anywhere from three days to three months each.  Lisa was with me in all of them except two.  We made it our mission to leave each place in better condition than when we arrived.  At most of the places we spent one to two days deep cleaning them because they were not clean to our standards.  At one place, we accidentally burned the cutting board, so we replaced it with a nicer one.  At another place I repaired a loose doorknob and lock, and because the home was for sale, I made sure the place was spotless before each showing, even one time sweeping up the storm debris in front of their house.  At another place we spent our own time and money trying to minimize the spread and damage caused by a bed bug infestation we found.  At another place, I bought some silicon to fix a leaking shower floor that the owner thought he fixed, and I repaired a leaking pipe under their kitchen sink, to minimize the damage done to their property.  Wherever we stayed, we remained conservative with our water and electricity use, even our internet use for work, so we didn’t waste their money. In each place, even though we were paying guests, we looked after their places, to the best of our ability, as if they were our own.  There are some Christians who could have done even more and better than we did, but we made our sincere efforts according to our abilities (1 Cor 8:12).  The owners may not know about, or even appreciate, many of the things we did to look after their property, but we believe by faith, the Lord did, and that He is pleased when we do these little loving things towards others.