Human life often moves between two powerful pursuits: the pursuit of meaning and the pursuit of wealth.
Wealth itself is not evil. It can provide comfort, support families, create opportunities, and help others in need. The Bible does not condemn wealth itself, but it repeatedly warns us about loving wealth too much.
Many people spend most of their lives gathering wealth. They work tirelessly, sacrifice time, neglect relationships, and sometimes even damage their health. They hope that the wealth they accumulate will bring security, honor, comfort, and satisfaction.
Yet there is a quiet truth that life eventually reveals: the wealth we love will not cry at our funeral.
A Lesson from Debre Libanos
Five decades ago, while I was in theological training, I had the chance to visit a monastery known as Debre Libanos Gedam—the monastery of Debre Libanos.
During my visit, they showed me a magnificent gravesite that had been prepared for wealthy people and their families. It was highly decorated and built with expensive marble. It was meant to be a place of honor, dignity, and lasting remembrance.
A few years later, when the communist government took over, those who expected to be buried in that beautiful gravesite did not get the chance to be buried there. For many of them, it was not even easy to locate where they were buried.
This experience taught me a serious lesson. The riches that were expected to display their glory—even on the final day of their funeral service—did not serve them as planned. What they prepared for themselves did not follow them. What they hoped would honor their memory could not protect them from the changes of history.
What Remains Behind
When the day of departure arrives, money will not sit beside our bed. Bank accounts will not speak words of comfort. Houses, lands, and possessions will not follow us to the grave.
All the things we spent our lives collecting will remain behind. Others may enjoy them, divide them, argue over them, sell them, or forget them, but they will no longer belong to us.
Jesus reminded people of this truth in the parable of the rich fool. The man stored great wealth in his barns and told himself that he had many years to enjoy life. But God said to him, “You fool! This very night, your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?”
Use what you have wisely, because it is only temporary ownership. Someday, you will lose it all.