What Counts?

Soon after Angi and David's sixth wedding anniversary, the couple's home burned to the ground.  Angi's first act, when they were allowed to hunt through the blackened remains, was to search for their photo albums.  When she went to tell David that the pictures had indeed survived, she found him carefully placing in a box some charred, folded pieces of paper -- their courtship love letters.

"As I watched David kneeling there in the ashes," she says, "I was overcome with the certainty that we were meant for each other.  There, in the face of our greatest tragedy, our first thoughts were not of our material loss but of the potential loss of these precious parts of our life together.  As I knelt to help him with the letters, I was certain that we hadn't lost anything that mattered after all." *

"Everything that can be counted does not necessarily count;
everything that counts cannot necessarily be counted."
– Albert Einstein

So what counts?  What matters most?

In one word: RELATIONSHIPS.  In three words: FRIENDS, FAMILY, and FAITH.

In Philippians 3, the Apostle Paul enumerates many of the accomplishments that he attained as a Jew (vs. 4-7).  But at the end of the list he wrote: "But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ" (v. 7).  Then he explained his new priority:

"Yet indeed I also count ALL things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ {9} and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith" (Philippians 3:8-9).

The Apostle Paul teaches us that in the END, what matters most is one's relationship with God through Christ...

Sin separates us from God (Isaiah 59:1-2) and from all that is good, right, and eternal.  But God loved us so much that He gave His Son to die on the cross for our sins, so that we might be reconciled to Him and live eternally with Him in heaven (Romans 5:6-10).

We can be reconciled to God in Christ through: faith (Acts 16:30-31), turning from our sins in repentance (2 Corinthians 7:9-10), confessing Jesus before men (Romans 10:9-10), and being baptized (immersed) into Christ for the forgiveness of our sins (Acts 2:38).

Life's true meaning is discovered when we focus upon what truly counts: friends, family, and especially our relationship with the Father.

What counts in YOUR life? 

David A. Sargent

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