Acorn's Challenge

Randy Alcorn tells the following story in his book The Law of Rewards:

When I was a pastor, a wonderful couple came to my office and told me they wanted to give more money to the church and to missions but they couldn't if they were going to keep saving to build their dream house. They said, "We've always had this dream of a beautiful home in the country, and we can't seem to shake it. Is it wrong?" I told them I thought their dream of a perfect home was from God. I think they were surprised to hear that. Then I said, "It's just that your dream can't be fulfilled here in this world."

Randy goes on to write that as Christians our dream house is coming, we do not need to build it ourselves. Any house on earth will eventually be ravaged by floods, earthquakes, overpasses or simply by father time. A dream house today will be a tear-down candidate in 50 years. He asks who would want to divert kingdom funds to build a dream house on earth when they know it will leave them or they will leave it. Instead why not use resources to send building materials ahead to the Carpenter, our Bridgegroom, who at this very moment is building our dream house in heaven.

We are currently thinking about moving into a house that is a bit bigger and nicer but has a much bigger back yard. Of course it will require a significantly higher mortgage payment and of course, will reduce our capacity to support the Gospel. I read Randy's story about four years ago and have yet to "shake it."

I'll leave his controversial position that we should give away our resources in life now to get greater rewards in heaven. He espouses this position. Many Christians naturally mitigate against this, although I do not necessarily. Maybe I could write a future post on this topic.

But on his second point about the dream house, do we as Christians think about the fact that large purchases will reduce our capacity to give? Or if we can fit it in the budget do we go for it?