John 10:11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.”
Serious financial investors are always mindful of the quality of their investments. In the business world, the acronym ROI stands for Return on Investment, and is an essential metric used to evaluate the profitability of an investment. By comparing its gain or loss relative to cost, ROI makes it easy to compare the returns on diverse investments. That same principle can be applied to our daily lives.
Some people possess wealth but never realize its full benefit because they lack the heart to bless others with it. Others have an abundance of time, and yet spend it exclusively on personal pleasures. Scenarios like that focus solely on self, and are in stark contrast to Jesus, “the good shepherd who gave His life for the sheep.”
The reality of our Shepherd purchasing His sheep with His own blood seems a great inequity to me, yet not according to heaven’s calculation. The price of our salvation was enormous, but for Jesus, love far outweighed the cost of laying down His life. The return? You, me, and countless others in heaven for all eternity.
The advent of each calendar year is an open invitation to reassess our various pursuits. Some investments, such as marriage or child-rearing, resemble that of the farmer, who sows liberally in anticipation of a harvest—they take time to mature, yet their rate of return is worth the effort and the wait.
God has graciously given you diverse resources to use. Invest them as Jesus did—liberally, joyfully, and for the profit and blessing of others.
– Pastor Jack
Click here to read all of Jack Hibbs’ Weekly Devotionals at Real Life with Jack Hibbs.
