“Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal.”

When you head out on the road for a trip, do you ever consider that you should pack one day’s extra set of clothes in case you need to extend the trip?  If you are like me, you probably don’t.  I have often thought of the things I have missed or the opportunities that could have come from being able to stay one day longer.  But, I didn’t because I didn’t have another set of clothes, and of course we aren’t quite equipped enough in our egos to wear the same clothes one more day with others recognizing such.  So, we go home.  We do this in business too.  With a little more extra time we could keep on the productivity roll we are on, or we could makes sure we close the sale on this trip, or we could engage more deeply with others with one more dinner.  But, we go home because we packed only what we thought we needed.

Did you know that there was a time when missionaries were going to Africa that they would pack all of their needed belongings in a coffin and ship the coffin with them?  There was an expectation that they may indeed be going on a one-way trip.  They packed what they thought they might need for the calling they had.  Is that not what God is saying to us when we are told to not store up the things of this world?  Where we are going next, we don’t need to over pack.  We only need to unpack all that God wants to do with us.  I like that kind of packing.

Reference:  Matthew 6:19 (New Living Translation)