Matthew 6:24

Today's scripture mastery verse is Matthew 6:24:

No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

 This is another verse from Christ's masterful Sermon on the Mount.  Here Christ teaches us that we must make a choice on who to serve.  We can't be fence sitters.  We must either serve Him, or someone or something else.  We must focus on the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of the devil.  I have heard it said that we can't try to keep a summer home in Babylon (the scriptures often refer to the world or worldliness as Babylon).

Have you ever heard this verse, and wondered what mammon is?  I looked up the definition of mammon, and it is defined like this:

Wealth regarded as an evil influence or false object of worship and devotion.

So, that means that if we put more thought in to riches and worldly gain more than we do in Christ and His teachings, we are in effect choosing that wealth as our master--meaning we either hate or despise God.  Those are very straight forward words from the Master. . .

Now, is wealth in and of itself evil?  No.  The riches of the world have been given to bless the lives of God's children, and can (and should be) be used for very good causes.  There is a prophet in the book of Mormon, named Jacob, who teaches his people (who are starting to fall in to the trap of desiring riches more than they should).  He says this about riches (Jacob, 2:19):

And after ye have obtained a hope in Christ ye shall obtain riches, if ye seek them; and ye will seek them for the intent to do good—to clothe the naked, and to feed the hungry, and to liberate the captive, and administer relief to the sick and the afflicted.

 What is the differentiating factor here?  It is what our thoughts and desires are focused on.  Do we put all our thoughts and feelings in to gaining riches?  Or do we put our thoughts and desires in to other things that Christ wants us to do?  If we do the latter, the Lord may bless us with riches, but we will not be greedy with them--instead, we will use them to bless the lives of those around us who are less fortunate than we are.