When Burning Money Is Godly
“They added up the cost…& found it to be 50,000 pieces of silver.…”
Acts 19:19
It must have looked like a tremendous waste: scrolls worth perhaps $10 million up in smoke. What led to that?!
Well, former sorcerers in Ephesus were now Christians. These scrolls held their incantations: which they now viewed to be useless, even diabolical. To sell these in a garage sale would only risk snaring somebody else. Instead, the Lord considered the rising smoke from them a sweet-smelling sacrifice to Him.
You may, on the one hand, have something in your own life to burn, to exorcise. But generally, that’s not true of your money. That’s God’s gift to you. It’s up to you to use that money to serve Him: by providing for the needs of others and yourself, even perhaps by providing for the some of the wants which you and others have—with hearts which are thankful to Jesus.
Surely though, you wouldn’t consider it an up-in-smoke waste to give a healthy percentage right back to Christ: in offerings, at church. After all, consider what our Savior did for you. His all-consuming love led him to walk in your footsteps, only obediently. And then, his love consumed him in a complete sacrifice for your transgressions.
Therefore: burn what you must; spend what you need; but first, be consumed with Christ….