Going, going, gone
By Pastor Scott Gamel

Gamel

I enjoyed the auction. It was a household auction, with lots of furniture, pots and pans, and tons of miscellaneous stuff. I spent $20.50, and came home with an iron that cost $70 brand new, an antique floor lamp that an experienced dealer said he could sell for $50, and a box of "junk" that c o n t a i n e d copies of Look and Satu r d a y Evening Post m a g a z i n e s from the early 1960s. I think I did quite well.

There is an undercurrent of sadness at most "household" auctions. The surviving family watches as the bits and pieces of their childhood are sold to the highest bidders. Maybe they remember eating from a certain dish, or sleeping in an old bed, or how the nick in the antique dining table got there. There are usually some teary eyes when something that belonged to their mother or father is going, going, gone.

There are two aspects of an auction that are most striking to me.

The first is watching things that were originally purchased at great price and with money earned through hard work, being carted off by someone who paid a few cents on the dollar of the original purchase price. More than once I overheard people saying they had bought a box full of goods in order to get one particular item, and that they would sell, give, or throw away the rest of the stuff. Possessions that had once been highly valued were now disposable, sold for "giveaway" prices.

The other striking aspect is the high value placed on certain other items. Some things that had been bought for very little money bring premium prices. Furniture that had been handmade, or that had been purchased for its practical use is now "collectible". A piece of glassware that had been bought for a few cents at a five-anddime fetches a hundred or even a thousand times its original price. The bidding reflects how desirable items that had once been "everyday" have become.

And so it is in life. Some of the things we work hard to achieve and accomplish will, at the end of our days, be revealed as having very little lasting value. Indeed, much of it will be, according to the Scriptures, "burned up" and destroyed! At the same time, common, ordinary things we have done will be proven to be priceless in eternity.

Knowing how to tell the difference is the stumper, isn't it? Jesus Christ provided some clues for us during His life, including when He said, "I tell you the truth. What you did for even the smallest of these people you did for me. They are my brothers and sisters."

Ultimately, the lasting value of life is not determined by possessions, perks, or power. It is measured by how we have treated the people - anyone we saw who had a need we could help with - that God brought into our world.

Scott Gamel is pastor at Jubilee Fellowship, Flora.