Document: /pub/resources/text/Our.Daily.Bread: db931207.TXT
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    OUR DAILY BREAD                      Tuesday, December 7, 1993
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    Read:  Luke 6:20-26

                         BAD AND GOOD OF POVERTY
      
                 Give me neither poverty nor riches...
        lest I be poor and steal, and profane the name of my God.
                            --Proverbs 30:8-9

    The  young  man  I visited in jail had been  arrested  for  armed
    robbery.  He was bitter as he spoke of the inner-city school from
    which he had dropped out because he felt unsafe.  He asked,  "Why
    couldn't I have gone to a better school?  Why didn't someone help
    me  to learn a trade?"  He said he committed the robbery  because
    he  was  sick and tired of having so little while others  had  so
    much.

    I  felt  sorry for him.  Poverty has a down side.  It  can  place
    people in a position where they are tempted to commit crimes.

    Like the writer of Proverbs 30, I would never ask God to send  me
    poverty.  Yet Jesus said, "Blessed are you poor" (Luke 6:20).

    I  grew up in the 1930s during the Great  Depression.  My  family
    seldom  ate meat, and we wore secondhand clothing.  Yet  we  were
    happy.  We were supremely thankful for small favors.  We  enjoyed
    simple  pleasures.  We  appreciated one another.  We  valued  our
    spiritual riches.

     'm  not  saying  that we should desire poverty, but  we  can  be
     hankful  for it.  We can learn lessons through it that we  could
     earn  in no other way.  Let's be like the apostle Paul who  said
     hat  he had learned to be content, no matter what his  situation
     Phil. 4:11).

    Author:  Herbert Vander Lugt

                    Lord, help me not to set my heart
                        On things that pass away;
                    Make me content with what I have
                   And help me stay that way.  --Sper

    THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:
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    Those  who are content are never poor; those who  are  discontent
    are never rich.

    THE BIBLE IN ONE YEAR:  1 Thessalonians 1-5

          
          










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