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Friday, January 08, 2010I Ate My Cookie
A wife asked her spouse what he wanted for Christmas. The husband smiled and said, honey, I want something black that goes zero to 200 in four seconds and I want that gift to be placed inside the garage on Christmas eve.
On Christmas Eve, the wife said to her husband, "I have a gift for you in the garage." The husband said, really! He had a big smile on his face hoping to get the present that he wanted for Christmas.
The wife asked her husband to close his eyes while she escorts her to the garage. The husband, getting really excited, closed his eyes and walked with her wife towards the garage entrance.
As the garage door opened, the wife said, tada!
Can you guess what was in the garage door?
I will tell you at the end of my blog.
By the way, did anyone here gained five pounds last Christmas? If you did, welcome to the club.
In this blog, I will be talking about the cookie I ate last Christmas. Allen, what does it have to do with faith and money? Well, read further and you'll find out.
When I had the chance to eat my first chocolate chip cookie last Christmas, three things came into my mind.
1) I will hide it and then eat it later.
There is nothing wrong in saving something for the rainy day. I will wrap it in a nice plastic wrapper and hide it in my fridge. I will hide it at the very back so no one can see it. By the time I get hungry, I will have something to eat.
2) I will sell my cookie and give the proceeds to the poor.
This is probably a noble thing to do. Depriving myself and giving what is suppose to be mine this Christmas will probably make me a saint.
3) I will enjoy eating it with my family.
I choose option 3.
Before I go further, to be honest, I find it hard to write this blog because there is a fine line between being selfish and just simply enjoying God's blessings in your life.
Like a popular song by George Benson goes, "Learning to love your self is the greatest love of all." True?
Not true! Loving yourself is not the greatest love of all. God's unconditional love for us is the greatest love of all.
Loving yourself is good but it is not the greatest love of all. How can you not love yourself if you know that God loves you? Eating your cookie is simply showing your appreciation to the one who made it. Eating all of it with your family does not make you selfish at all.
Selfishness and greediness is relevant when you do not acknowledge the fact that you are enjoying God's blessings. When you say, "I have this because of I, me and myself," that is the root of the problem. I was like that before - selfish and greedy. Being selfish and greedy is not loving yourself.
When you acknowledge your blessing as a gift from God, there is no way you cannot enjoy what was given to you. If you don't, there is something wrong. You may have this problem because you do not love yourself and that is not easy to achieve. Some people have a very difficult time loving themselves. When you do not love yourself, you are punishing yourself.
Just imagine, why would you not enjoy something that is God given? If you know how much God loves you, the more you will love yourself. Learn to love yourself so you can love others. Love your neighbour as yourself.
I'm not telling anyone to become self-conceited, especially with their blessings. Let me give you an example of what I mean.
When I was 19 years old, I had a gift in playing music. I am not a singer or an instrumentalist but a deejay. Yes, yes yo! Your blogger was a disc jockey. Do you want to know how good I was? That's how I met my wife.
At that time, everyone wants me to play at their parties. I was loud and arrogant because I know and they know that I was the best (I thought I was). I never heard from anybody that I wasn't good (or maybe I was just selective in their comments). That boosts my ego. This is self-conceited, arrogance, pride, egotism and immature all in one!
However, when you attribute a gift as an answered prayer from God and you begin to feel good and proud about it - this is not pride. When God gives you something through prayer, he wants you to feel good about it. Feeling good is an expression of gratitude.
If you think that I'm being spiritually immature and materialistic, let me give you my example.
After meeting with a client on a one hot summer afternoon back in the Philippines, it was 35 degrees centigrade, I was waiting for a train (Light Rail Transit) sweating all over while wearing my casual long sleeve attire.
While waiting at the station, I prayed to God asking Him that the next train would have an air-condition unit (at that time there were few air-conditioned trains, probably one out of five). After praying, the next train stopped and what do you know - it was air-conditioned - my gift from heaven and my answered prayer.
I never appreciated something so simple before but at that moment, that was a big deal to me.
In our next weekly prayer gathering, it may sound silly but I shared that incident in the congregation when we were asked "What were the blessings you received last week?" Others did their sharing of healing; others had their financial blessings while mine was a simple ordinary train ride which happens to several thousands of commuter's every day. But that sharing changed me. After my sharing, that made me realize how bless I was that I was able to appreciate even the smallest thing that happens to my life and I felt very proud proclaiming to the world how good God is - that he answers all our prayers, even the simplest ones. That felt really good.
This is a simple form of gratitude but that is how I started to feel good about so many things in my life, even the smallest things.
When you begin to be grateful in small things, the big things follow.
This Christmas, my wife and two boys were blessed to travel in a place where we never had been before. This was my cookie last Christmas. This was our gift from God. Our answered prayer.
I asked myself, would it have been better if I saved my money for the whole trip and bought silver to invest? Or, I could have been one step closer to my sainthood if I donated our vacation money to a charity, right?
"Here is what I have seen to be good and fitting: to eat, to drink and enjoy oneself in all one's labor in which he toils under the sun during the few years of his life which God has given him; for this is his reward. Furthermore, as for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, He has also empowered him to eat from them and to receive his reward and rejoice in his labor; this is the gift of God. For he will not often consider the years of his life, because God keeps him occupied with the gladness of his heart." (Ecclesiastes 5:18-20)
My primary vocation being a married man is married life. Being married, I have the responsibility to provide for my family.
The scripture says, "But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever." (1 Timothy 5:8)
Putting your family first is not being selfish. This is fulfilling your duty as a father and head of a family. This is glorifying God!
During our trip, we saw a man assisting two woman in a wheelchair. My wife and I looked at each other and said, we are so blessed that we are able to do these things while we still enjoy it.
Remember, one of the major causes of sickness is stress. Give yourself a break. Be sensitive to what you need. Enjoy God's blessing to you so you can bless others more.
Life is short, enjoy it!
When was the last time you went out with your family?
Invest on good memories.
"All that my eyes desired I did not refuse them I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart was pleased because of all my labor and this was my reward for all my labor." (Ecclesiastes 2:10)
I ate my cookie with my family and it was good!
Spend your money with your family but do not forget to control your expenses by handling your finances with a faith perspective. You will be guided.
In my next blog, I will write about knowing your purpose in life.
And finally, do you want to know what the gift of the husband in my story was?
Let's recap. He wanted something black that goes zero to 200 in four seconds found inside the garage... he got a black weighing scale in the garage!
God is the greatest!
Happy New Year!
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