RE: Hey christians! You may give me all your money
Now for the true test of mastery. What then did Jesus mean by this parable from Matthew 25:14?
"Again, it [Jesus' return] will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his wealth to them. To one he gave five bags of gold, to another two bags, and to another one bag, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received five bags of gold went at once and put his money to work and gained five bags more. So also, the one with two bags of gold gained two more. But the man who had received one bag went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money.
"After a long time the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received five bags of gold brought the other five. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with five bags of gold. See, I have gained five more.'
"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'
"The man with two bags of gold also came. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with two bags of gold; see, I have gained two more.'
"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'
"Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. 'Master,' he said, 'I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.'
"His master replied, 'You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.
" 'So take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has ten bags. For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'
This is easy!
The message is: You should invest everything so you can have more later.
Investing in this case is the point that I made in the OP. The more you give away ("invest") in this life, the more you will receive in Heaven.
Those people who haven't given anything in this life will lose everything and more after they die.
Close, but there is also this to consider:
Salvation is based only on faith in Jesus Christ. How you use the resources God has given you will merely determine your eternal rewards (specifically, how much responsibility you will be trusted with in the next life.)
This one is little bit trickier.
I'd say that this is something like what Jesus talked about Pharisees.
Christians who use gold and other valuable stuff to show their faith are not cool. The right thing to do is to forget all shiny megachurches and rely only on personal faith. Probably you will get saved even if you build (or donate your money for) shiny megachurches, but seriously, that's not cool.
Your best option is to donate all your money for non-christians.
And being poor helps a lot, like I pointed out in the OP.
Very insightful. All we have is entrusted to us. IMHO there are increasingly better things to do with it, from least to best:
So, its about giving the Lord the best possible return on investment. This is not necessarily just for non-Christians. You could meet the needs of poor Christians or train rich Christians to be more obedient and effective disciples.
The man with just one bag of gold merely returned it to his master without adding any value. To me, that would be like thoughtlessly giving it away. No increase in value, merely redistributing what you have received.