Big banks like Washington Mutual get taken over by the government and sold. Congress tries to bail out the financial system to the tune of $250 billion to $700 billion.Pundits predict the stock market could lose a third of its value this week.
These are powerful reminders about how fragile our comfortable American lifestyle is. Those who lived through the Great Depression know that things come and go, and that the wise don't get too attached to anything here on earth.
That's a tough lesson for those of us born long after the Depression. I grew up during the 1970s and 1980s, when it seemed like people had a lot of everything. Jobs and money was abundant during the later half of the 1990s. Almost everyone in the work world built a retirement portfolio consisting of appreciating securities in their 401(k) plans, pensions and other investments. Within the last year, a lot of the security offer by those securities has withered. Home values of plummeted. Equities are losing value. Banks are calling loans. A lot of the comfort we grew used to is disappearing. It's not pretty. If only we could all be as assured as Paul, the great evangelist. Here is what he wrote to the Philippians (4:11-13):
I have learned, in whatever situation I find myself, to be self-sufficient. I know indeed how to live in humble circumstances; I know also how to live with abundance. In every circumstance and in all things I have learned the secret of being well fed and of going hungry, of living in abundance and of being in need. I have the strength for everything through him who empowers me.
Paul is saying that whether he is in good times or bad times, he has found contentment, and that is faith in Jesus Christ. I think that is really a powerful message. Most of us find our contentment in our comfortable house, or in our nice car or fashionable clothes -- but those things come and go, oftentimes due to circumstances over which we have no control. God does not come and go. He is there no matter what happens in the financial markets. No matter how low the Dow Jones Industrials average sinks, God is there. Clearly, if your contentment is based on your relationship with God, you have a much better opportunity for lasting happiness than you do if you place it in something earthly.
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