Then what? copertina

Then what?

Then what?

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 It’s a Monday. I’m driving into my office and listening to a voice memo from my good buddy out in Colorado. We banter about faith & finance topics all the time — in fact a few of my newsletter ideas have come from chats with him. And this one’s no different.He proposed to me the question on the other side of most every financial goal. And let me pause there — financial goals like…Build a businessGet rid of the mortgagePay for your kids’ collegeSave $1 million in your retirement accountsGet the promotion to secure your income for the foreseeable future.So you get the point. But I wanna share this question with you. On the other side of those goals … now what?The economic warning light that used to flash in the corner of your life has finally turned off.So what’s next?It’s a fair question because more money really can make life better, especially when there isn’t enough of it. Money can put groceries in the refrigerator, fix the transmission, cover the electric bill, and give a family room to breathe. The longing to provide well isn’t greed. For many people, earning more would relieve real pressure.But my friend’s question assumed that pressure had already lifted. The income is there, the family is healthy, the house is comfortable and the boxes are checked.What do you pursue when you no longer need to pursue the things that got you here?The little Eden we buildI think many of us spend years trying to architect our own little Eden.We want a beautiful life with everything we need, arranged carefully enough that very little faith is required. We don’t mind God being present, of course. We would simply prefer that he not disrupt the plans.So we work, save, insure, diversify, and optimize until we’ve protected ourselves from every problem we can imagine. Then, once the structure is secure, we plan to give God the overflow.One problem here is that we never defined how much was enough, so the overflow never quite arrives.There is always another expense, another upgrade, another milestone, or another risk to guard against. The imaginary line moves every time we get close to it. We keep assuming that one day we will look around, discover we have far more than we need, and become radically generous without having practiced generosity along the way.Proverbs says, “The wealth of the rich is their fortified city; they imagine it a wall too high to scale.”Read that last phrase again: “…they imagine…“Money can protect us from many things. It can absorb a bad month, replace a roof, and pay for excellent medical care. But the wall is never as high as we imagine it is. Eventually, life reminds us that we are finite.The finish line keeps movingEven if life goes wonderfully, there is no natural point at which desire declares itself satisfied.I once heard a kind Englishman named Richard share his life story. He described what happened when his career changed and his income took off. He began earning in a month what he once earned in a year. Then he earned it in a few weeks. His lifestyle rose just as quickly.Wool became cashmere. Nylon became leather. The house got larger, and the schools became more exclusive. None of the upgrades stood out as outrageous on their own, after all … he could afford it. Couldn’t he?Then he realized that his consumption had become insatiable.Around that time, his church began raising money for a new building. As he studied the plans, he started researching what the same money could accomplish through ministries serving people in much poorer parts of the world. He had spent years asking what more money could add to his life. He began asking what it could accomplish through his life.That question changed the way he gave.For years, he increased his generosity beyond what felt comfortable. Each time, he feared he had finally gone too far and would discover that God would not provide. Each year gave him another chance to learn that God’s provision was sturdier than his fear.Then he was diagnosed with terminal cancer.Near the end of his life, he said he was grateful God had gotten hold of his heart before the fear of death forced the issue. His generosity had been freely offered, not extracted by a diagnosis.I heard his story 2 years after he died, and shared it with my friend on an ordinary Monday morning voice memo.Richard had no way to know where his obedience would travel or whom it would reach.A larger storyThe question “then what?“ assumes there is a finish line where the important work is complete and the rest of life has to be filled.But you may already have much of what you once thought would make you feel secure. You may have savings, a home, healthy children, meaningful work, and enough margin to absorb a surprise. In a real sense, you may have already arrived at someone else’s dream.And yet the worries remain. The goals multiply. The finish line moves.Life may still feel quite hard.Money cannot give us the kind of security that lets us...
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