the "my" challenge

i am not teaching sunday school this month... as a class, we are taking a month to focus on biblical budgeting and attaining financial freedom *pretty great timing for that, huh... beyond the in college/recent grad status and being up to our eyeballs in debt :)* we were issued a challenge on sunday... it is thursday, and i have failed horribly... it didn't even take three days- pretty sure i didn't last 60 hours...

the challenge- deposit a nickel into a jar every time you say the word "my" for the week. why? to bring home a fairly significant point= GOD owns it all. we are merely stewards of what God has entrusted to us. every time i claim ownership by saying "my _____" i am defying principle numero uno. it isn't really mine...

as a little kid, i was very possessive. my little sisters had this great habit of putting my "little people" in their mouths... playing with my baby dolls without putting them back in their assigned cribs... taking one of my 14 goldfish (i counted out my serving sizes like a good little diabetic child) main thing is, i liked my things to stay mine! i learned how to share during my college years... no lie~

*i owe 40 cents for that one paragraph, ps*

is it stealing from God's ownership when we appoint ourselves as masters over things of importance in life? i don't really know...

things like my hands, my head, my face, my hair, my heart, my eyes, my body... those are entrusted to me. my car, my house, my job, my responsibilities... those are not really mine. my choices, my dreams, my decisions, my ideas, my hopes- they aren't mine either. it gets really deep, really fast.

*that's a dollar thirty... that's a meal at mickey d's for a grad student :)*

God owns it all; i am merely a steward of what He has entrusted to me; i don't own any of it... that is the lesson here.

try it the rest of the week. had i not just cleaned the car out of all of the change i had collected over the past 6 mos, i would still be participating in this exercise... take the money you collect and put it in savings... all one dollar and thirty cents of it :)

... or go to your favorite dollar menu :)