Not Like Yesterday
"Man
does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the
mouth of the LORD" (Deuteronomy 8:3).
When
our grandson, Jay, was a small child his parents gave him a Pokémon tee-shirt
for his birthday. He put it on and proudly wore it all day. When he appeared
the next morning in his Pokémon shirt, his dad asked him, "Jay, does that
shirt make you happy?" "Not as much as yesterday," Jay replied.
That's
the problem with material acquisition: Even the good things of life cannot give
us the deep, lasting happiness we so ardently desire.
The
world offers happiness through material accumulation: new clothes, a new automobile,
an update to our iPhone or Apple Watch. But no material acquisition can make us
as happy as it did yesterday. That's because we were made for God and nothing
less will do.
One
day, when Jesus was fasting and faint with hunger, Satan approached him and tempted
him to satisfy his hunger by creating bread. Jesus countered by quoting the
text above: “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes
from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
Jesus
did not say that we “should not live on bread alone.” He’s rather stating a
fact: We are spiritual beings and thus we cannot exist on
material good alone.
That's
why so many of us, though we have many possessions, are still unhappy.
David
Roper
3.27.18
