Trying to Serve Two Masters

Matthew 6:24

Jesus is speaking

“No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

For the longest time, I’ve ignored the above verse. Not because I didn’t want to hear it, but because I didn’t see it as applicable to my life. I’m not miser. I’m not a greedy individual fighting for every penny, and I tithe and give money on top of that to charity. Sure, I’m not the biggest giver in the world, but I by no means serve money. Why would I have to worry about it then? So I’ve often skipped it in search of verses that meant more to me.

Recently, though, I’ve become less and less comfortable with this verse. As I’ve looked at the lives of amazing individuals such as St. Francis and many modern day Franciscan monks, I’ve been blown away by the intensity with which these people serve the Lord. To put it frankly, these saints, a term I don’t lightly use, are insane. They give up all worldly possessions (literally, mind you) and will go into absolutely horrendous situations that many other Christians have given-up on, and they not only bring the Truth of salvation in the next life, but they bring the light and joy of salvation in this life. We are talking about flat-out, awesome individuals.

The more I hear stories about these and other saints, the more I’ve been challenged to think that maybe the life of a saint should be the normal life of a Christian in general. That’s not to say that we should all be martyrs, not marry, or other such things, but we all should serve the Lord completely. Isn’t that the whole idea behind the Gospel, anyway? Isn’t the point of Christ’s death and resurrection to reconcile us to God so that we may be free to serve others as He served us? Isn’t that why Jesus sent forth the disciples and why the disciples sent forth more disciples? We are supposed to be the Body of Christ, striving for the perfection of the whole world.

What I’ve found with me, though, is that I try to find some mythical “middle road.” I want to live for Christ, but I don’t want to be that extreme about it. I want to live for Christ, but you know, Christ wants us to be happy, too. We don’t want to give too much ourselves away because if we do that then we will stress-out, and we’ll have high blood pressure. What good is it if we are disciples but work ourselves to death, right?

This line of thought is dangerous, though, because, at the heart of it, is a desire to have my cake and eat it, too. Essentially, I don’t really want to serve God. I just want to serve Him enough so that I don’t feel guilty and can enjoy serving my worldy desires. You see, this verse isn’t just about money. It’s about who you are serving and why. If living a comfortable life comes before giving to those in need, I feel like we’ve missed the point. If we go on one or two short mission trips a year just so we don’t feel bad about not serving our local communities the rest of the year, then something is wrong. Jesus never said, “Well, work as much as you’re comfortable.” In fact, He said a lot about the opposite.

Now, we are not expected to get it perfect immediately; the teaching of the Church has always been that it’s a process of getting it right. In addition, “giving your all to Jesus” doesn’t mean forsaking loving your family and friends. Instead, it means that all of our lives should be focused on striving for holiness in all its various forms, and I know that I can’t do that and serve myself at the same time. It’s one or the other.

Sam Hunley