Guardrails: Avoiding Regrets In Your LifeEgzanp

When you think of financial guardrails, you may think of staying out of debt. Staying out of debt is good, but according to Jesus, you could have zero debt and lots of money in the bank and still be in a ditch financially. Intriguing, right? Keep reading. 

In today’s verses from Matthew, Jesus says that all of us are mastered (or owned) by someone or something. Then he gives us two unexpected options: God or money. Most of us would expect him to say we could either be mastered by God or Satan. But Jesus says his chief competitor is our money.

Essentially, he tees up the question: Do we own money or does money own us? 

Without financial guardrails, most of us will end up in one of two ditches. We’ll either veer off the cliff of spending or we’ll crash over the median of saving. One is unbridled desire: buy, upgrade, repeat. The other is unbridled fear: What if I don’t have enough? What if that happens to me?

In both cases, money is our master. We’re chasing it so we can consume it now. Or we’re chasing it so we can save it and consume it later.

We need a financial guardrail that makes God our master. And that’s exactly what we find in Matthew 6:33, tucked at the end of a long talk about how we should view and use our money. It’s just four words: "seek first his kingdom." 

God’s kingdom is an others-first kingdom. Or, to use the same words as yesterday: in God’s kingdom, what’s best for other people is what’s best. The guardrail that will keep us out of the ditches of spending and saving is putting others first in our finances. 

Give to others first. Save for your future second. Then, live on the rest. 

Give first. Save second. Live on the rest.

And here’s the good news about this guardrail: it can be automatic. Once you’ve identified an organization or cause you care about and set up a system of giving, this guardrail will keep your finances on track without any extra effort or thought.