All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need. Acts 4:32-35
“Your abundance has supported the want of many that some day their riches may abound to supply your want [2 Corinthians 8:14]; you have made to yourself “friends of the mammon of unrighteousness that they may receive you into everlasting habitations” [Luke 16:9]. Such conduct deserves praise and merits to be compared with the virtue of apostolic times. Then, as you know, believers sold their possessions and brought the prices of them and laid them down at the apostles’ feet [Acts 4:34-35]: a symbolic act designed to shew that men must trample on covetousness. But the Lord yearns for believers’ souls more than for their riches. We read in the Proverbs: “the ransom of a man’s soul are his own riches” [Proverbs 13:8]. We may, indeed, take a man’s own riches to be those which do not come from some one else, or from plunder; according to the precept: “honour God with thy just labours” [Proverbs 3:9]. But the sense is better if we understand a man’s “own riches” to be those hidden treasures which no thief can steal and no robber wrest from him [cf. Matthew 6:20].”
Jerome of Stridon (347 – 420) in Letter LXXI.4 To Lucinius. Jerome is the third of the Four Doctors of the Western Church that we will explore on the topic of abundance.
Jerome knew God’s Word on the topic of money and wove Scriptures in this letter to Lucinius like a tapestry. If you are in ministry, this letter shows you how to talk to people about money. It reminds us that the Lord yearns for our souls more than our riches and we trample on covetousness when we put His resources to work!
But how does setting the money at the apostles’ feet “trample on covetousness? If we don’t master money, it masters us. If we don’t make it our slave, it enslaves us. We master it and make it our slave by putting it to work to accomplish God’s purposes. We trample on it’s power over us, only when we handle it in accordance with the teachings of Jesus.
Put whatever you possess in a place where no thief can touch it. Store it up in heaven! “Keeping” is not an option. And, if you missed it yesterday, “keeping” is an operative word in a recent Soulcare Anchoress post by my wife, Jenni. It’s simply entitled “Money” and uses the word “keeping” in a powerful way (and shows what the wife of the Generosity Monk thinks about money).