Well I think there were some good points made thus far so here is the next brain engager. this is one of the most interesting stories so far (at least in my mind). It tends to make one think a bit about what they are giving and what they are holding onto.
I also enjoy the story of IT, as it makes me think of the E-Bay commercial that tells us what ever IT is you can get IT here. I couldn't help but think of people wearing IT, driving IT, living in IT, cooking with IT. The list goes on so put it into your situation.
I hope that there are some lurkers out there reading and not participating and I also hope those who are will share some thoughts with the rest of us. A conversation is only as exciting (no offense Deb) as the participants. So far we only have a couple of perspectives and that leaves a lot out. Join us, we are on journey and wish many to come with us.
Grace and Peace Pastor WaynO

The Selfishness Blockade
Leonard Griffith retells a classic story by Dostoevski about a woman who died and was consigned to eternal torment. In her agony she cried out for mercy. After much time had passed, an angel answered, "I can help you if you can remember one altogether unselfish thing you did while on earth." It seemed easy, but when she began to recite her good deeds, she realized that every one of them had been done from a motive of self-interest. Finally, at the point of despair, she remembered a carrot she had once given to a beggar. She feared to mention it. because it had been a poor withered carrot that she would never have used in the stew she was preparing anyway.
But the angel consulted the record, and the record showed that the act had been prompted by unselfishness—not a great unselfishness, or it would have been a better gift, but it did qualify as unselfishness. The carrot was lowered on a slender string down through the space between heaven and hell. Could this weak thing bear her weight? Desperation made her try. When she grasped the withered carrot, she found herself slowly rising. Then, she felt a weight dragging at her. She looked down and saw other tormented souls clinging to her, hoping to escape with her. "Let go! Let go!" she cried. "The carrot won't hold us all!" But grimly, desperately, they held on. Again, she cried. "Let go! This is my carrot, I tell you. It's mine." At that point, the string broke. Still clutching the carrot she had reclaimed for herself, the woman fell back into the torment of hell.
Dostoievsky's story is an illustration of Jesus's parable of the rich man and the beggar. Both stories sum up the fate of people who live by the philosophy, "What's mine is mine!"—on this side of death and on the other side. Yes, if you wish to extend your personality in that way. you will get the carrot, but that is all you will get.

When Jesus tells the story of the rich man and the beggar, he is once again connecting with Old Testament teachings that his listeners knew well but were not practicing: "Those who oppress the poor insult their Maker, but those who are kind to the needy honor him" (Proverbs 14:31). "Do not rob the poor because they are poor, or crush the afflicted at the gate; for the Lord pleads their cause and despoils of life those who despoil them" (Proverbs 22:22-23). To those classic texts, Jesus adds new illustrative force: "Give to everyone who begs from you. and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you" (Matthew 5:42). "If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?" (Luke 16:11).

The Yaguey tree in Cuba is a living parable of the story that Jesus told about the rich man and the beggar. The Yaguey tree begins its life when a bird or the wind deposits its seed in the moist crevice on the trunk of another tree. The seed takes root and begins to grow. Its thick string-like roots go down the tree and eventually find the earth. Then, the Yaguey begins to grow upward. New roots form, gradually creating a net encasing the host tree. Slowly, the outer tree strangles the inner tree, and the parasite that arrived as a guest becomes the only tree remaining alive. That is what Jesus says happens to us if we do not unselfishly practice the giving of our money to help the less fortunate. The guest in our pocket becomes commander in chief. What we got gets us— and brings eternal consequences.
We tend to think of mythology as something that existed only in the ancient past. But we. too, have our myths. One of the most prevalent of these is the mythical "it." The advertising world and countless other kinds of manipulative attempts to control our behavior pump hundreds of images into our minds even' day. Many of those images, either implicitly or explicitly, are directed toward helping us get the mythical "it." Lift the surface of conversation with others (and even your own thought patterns) and you can hear this powerful myth, saying things like. "I don't have much now, but when I get that job. I'll have it made." Again and again, we get and store the signal that a positive response to an advertising plea means "When you get it, you will be happy."
Few people recognize that the culture they live in is mentally and spiritually wiring them for a lifetime of chasing the "it" myth. Fewer still, even if they see this trap, have the courage to call it what it is and pursue other priorities. For even Mother Teresa, a million others buy the myth that money makes you wealthy. There really is an "it" that can make us wealthy beyond imagination, but "it" is not what we think it is. Jesus called this real "it" the kingdom of God. He said that entering this kingdom of spiritual reality empowers us to focus on caring about the less fortunate rather than caring only about ourselves. When we enter this "it," we see what Jesus saw: Focusing on money as the highest goal in life blocks our connection with God's presence and creative power—and eternal life. Focusing on money as a means to help the less fortunate, however, strengthens that connection. Money cannot bring us into the kingdom; but money, used by people who have entered the kingdom, can bring us the wealth that money cannot buy.
Paul was saying the same thing when, later in the New Testament, he advised young Timothy. We often hear people quote a small part of Paul's advice to Timothy:
Money is the root of all evil. Because most of us have memorized only that phrase,
we tend to miss Paul's real meaning:

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil; and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains. But as for you. man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, gentleness (1 Timothy 6:10-11).
When Jesus and Paul speak about money, they do not see it as evil—unless you allow it to distract you from connecting with God and from helping the less fortunate. A man in Houston tells about a time when the government reissued $2 bills. Thinking they might someday be quite valuable, he bought a hundred of them at the bank. He gave the bills to his mother, suggesting that she keep them in a safe place. Months later, he asked her where she was storing the bills. She replied that she had deposited them in the bank the day after he gave them to her. Accumulating money is a good habit, but if that is your only way of using money, it becomes as meaningless as depositing $2 bills in the bank in order to keep them. Our attitude about money is eternal. If our only goal is to make it and keep it. we lose it