Monopoly, The Recession Edition

by Steve Kelly, courtesy of the Times-Picayune

For much of our nation's history, each successive generation has enjoyed an increasingly prosperous standard of living.  An obvious exception to this would be the Depression Era of the early 20th century when the country experienced a monumental economic downturn.  It was during that time that the original Monopoly board game came into being and provided people with an escape from the harsh reality of the times.  In the cartoon above, editorial cartoonist Steve Kelly does a great job of updating that game to line up with our current situation.  Where did we get the idea that life was always going to be rosy, anyway?

At least for Christians, Jesus made it pretty clear that following him was not gonna be any bed of roses.  If this life was all that there is, I might be a little disappointed.  I  wouldn't have any right to be disappointed since like most Americans, I qualify as one of the richest people on the planet when you consider all of the people inhabiting this blue ball spinning out there in space.  Sure, things are somewhat tougher for us now than they may have been in the past but there are probably a few billion people who would trade places with me in a nanosecond.  Last week, I followed the stories of 4 bloggers traveling in Guatemala with Compassion International.  I'm pretty sure that the vast majority of the people they came in contact with would be thrilled to live with the minor limitations that I'm living with. 

Here's some good news:  this is not all there is and this is not even our home. We're here on this planet for a season but the best is yet to come!

How does looking at life from an eternal perspective change how you view your current challenges?