Not too long ago, I was sitting by the entrance of one of my favorite restaurants waiting for takeout. I
usually dine in and hadn’t paid much attention to my surroundings. The place is clean, good customer service and superb food, nothing to complaint about. This particular day, while having the opportunity to seat there and with nothing more to do than look around (my phone battery was low); I noticed something I had never noticed before. Right behind the bar was an altar to a god. Something inside of me didn’t feel right. Here I was picking up lunch and now I had a dilemma, where am I investing my resources?
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. Matthew 6:24
If we look at social media and regular media, the world has decided that our belief system should accompany our support as patrons to different businesses. If you agree with their policies and their beliefs, we support you, if we disagree, we don’t. That’s actually a great concept.
Many remember the issue with Chic-fil-a a few years ago. A sector of the population disagreed with their views and decided to stop eating there. Others who didn’t even eat there, decided to do so out of principle. Walmart has had the same issues, where some people support them and others not due to their practices.
Which way you decide to go is a decision between you and God.
However, my experience at that restaurant has left me thinking, what businesses do I support? And by support I mean where I spend my money? As a believer, I’m responsible for administrating the resources I’m provided, which are not mine, are for kingdom purposes. “Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be. ” Luke 12:34 I will be held responsible for how I used them. No, I’m not cutting everything out of my life, but I’m more aware of the things I do and allowing the Holy Spirit to let me know, where I need to go to do what?
You may be asking why you chose Starbucks on your title. Do you have something against them? Aside from the overpriced coffee, not really, I actually love their soy chai latte. But for the last few weeks I have not been able to stop looking at their logo and decided to look into what it meant. It did look like a Hindu goddess to me, but in researching, Starbucks says she’s a siren. A seductive siren…
CEO Howard Shultz has explained the following: “The mermaid was exotic. She was also topless. At first, and despite some complaints, Starbucks just rolled with it. As Schultz later explained, “Bare breasted and Rubenesque, [the mermaid] was supposed to be as seductive as the coffee itself.” But then the time came to put the logo on the delivery trucks, and that was problematic. “The logo was huge,” Heckler’s website relates, “—and so were the mermaid’s breasts.”
Are they selling coffee or sex?
In the Starbucks website the same man describes her as follows:
She is a storyteller, carrying the lore of Starbucks ahead, and remembering our past. In a lot of ways, she’s a muse –always there, inspiring us and pushing us ahead.
And she’s a promise too, inviting all of us to find what we’re looking for, even if it’s something we haven’t even imagined yet.
She means something different to everyone who sees her, who knows her. For me she’s kind of the final say on the spirit of everything I write and everything we do. Even as I’m writing this, I wonder what she thinks. (She likes it, by the way.)
That’s interesting…
Am I launching a campaign against Starbucks? No. I’m just trying to demonstrate a point, which is… There’s a lot that we do in auto pilot without knowing what and who we are really supporting. We should take pause in our lives and see where and how we are investing the resources that were entrusted in us.
Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. Colossians 2:8
Food for thought
.
In Romans 12: 14-16 we get a lesson on how to be with others regardless of how they treat us.
like a chant, but in the actual day to day is a different story. Be honest with yourself, how loving and blissful are you in your commute? How forgiving with that parent that yelled at your kid at the game.
Believe it, at the end of the day, you will learn that you are more blessed by them than whatever you were able to do for them.
We are no looking at:
peace to get the job done. Remember, he never sends out to the field the equipped, but equips the chosen ones.
The tricky part about love and honor is that it’s not just for those who we like. Being devoted to love those who are mean to us is no easy task. But this is something we really need to get serious about, after all is our second commandment right up there with loving God above all else. 
When that love is not possible, it means that we don’t understand the love of God. Its at this time that we need to have Him show us his love and show us how to love others. 
leader, the elder, the minister, the main person? Honestly we were not all created for every job. Yes, some positions have more exposure than others, but it doesn’t make it more meaningful. In their immaturity people want to be in the center of a stage or the center of attention and those who are not place there by God will not thrive. 
On the opposite side of the spectrum, yes I have the opportunity to speak in front of people. It’s not my favorite thing to do, but I know I do it well and its part of my mission. Now, if you ever catch me with a microphone ready to sing, you all have open permission to knock me out of the stage before your ears start bleeding. Both the worship leader and I are in front of people, but we both have very different roles. At the same time, if the person behind the sound system is not there in their gifting, it doesn’t matter because nobody is going to hear us. 
ho was free from sin to cast the first stone? Wasn’t Jesus who said to the woman at the well that she was forgiven even though she had been promiscuous? So who are we to judge?
remember that we are administrators and not lords. We need to recognize that we each have a place on a mission that was specifically designed for us. In other words, in the eyes of God the CEO and the janitor are equal… and sometimes the janitor gets extra points for doing his work for God.
In my conversation with the Lord I was telling him that apparently I was feeling lonely. I say apparently because I didn’t recognize it until without thinking I told someone that I was carrying my burdens alone. I was also telling the Lord about something that I need, but not sure how to go about it. I said that maybe I shouldn’t push forward and settle for something less in the meantime because maybe I’m not ready for the actual blessing I’m praying for.
God.
There are two things that catch my attention on this verse. First we need to recognize that although we are in this world, we are not of this world. You can laugh, but yes we are kind of aliens. We belong to God whose kingdom is way beyond this earth. As adopted children, His home is our home.
yourself new clothes, gifts for your friends, have a spa day on your business credit card? Isn’t the company paying all your expenses? In life, God is providing for you to fulfill the mission that he commanded you to do. How are you going to account for what you did?
Sometimes as Christians we get hung up on religion. We hold on to a single scripture that may be out of context. Or better yet, we think that if we say the right things at the right time we’re part of the “club”. For those of us, especially those who are new to the faith, that’s not enough. We want to know what really pleases God. We want to be doers of the word, so what’s the answer?
Naty Matos 