Lessons Learned From My Million Dollar Candy Run - Daily Devotionla March 9th, 2010

Bible Reading - Exodus 19, Luke 22 Job 37, 2 Corinthians 7

Lessons Learned From My Million Dollar Candy Run

When I was 5 years old I did something that at first I did not know was wrong but later felt very guilty about. My dad was a pastor in small town called Plummer Idaho. We would go to every meeting at the church whether there was something for the kids or not. While the meetings were taking place in the sanctuary we were allowed to play in the kids classrooms. It was really like a home away from home for us. One particular Sunday evening we were playing hide and go seek in one of the classrooms. Upon hiding in one of the cupboards we found a bowl full of money. It was probably only a couple of bucks but it seemed like a million dollars to my brother and I. We took the money out of the bowl and decided to jump out the window, walk to the corner store and buy a million dollars worth of candy with what we found out later was the offering from the children's ministry.

After buying the candy we made it back to the church just in time for the evening activities to come to a close. When my parents came to get us my bother told me we should probably hide the candy from mom and dad so that they would not take it from us. It was at that moment that I began to feel guilty about what we had done but my million dollar candy run tugged on my heart so we hid the candy. As time passed I began to fill more and more guilty and so did my brother. After about 3 days of hiding our candy underneath our socks in the top drawer of our dresser the guilt was so enormous (plus the candy was running low, it's amazing how fast a million dollars of candy runs out) that we could not take it any longer. We went down to the basement and had a conversation with God in which we repented for taking the money and buying a million dollars worth of candy. Wow the guilt was lifted off and neither of us wanted to touch the candy again.

Unfortunately God was not the only one who heard our heart felt repentant prayer. One of our older bothers was listening too and thought that it would be good to take what he heard to mom and dad, so he did (something we were unaware of at the time). Later that evening mom and dad asked if there was anything we needed to tell them and like good little children we said, "no"! They asked again and this time we said, "absolutely not, there is nothing we need to tell"! With that my parents went to the sock drawer and uncovered what now only appeared to be about 1/4 of million dollars worth of candy. They pulled it out and asked again if there was anything we wanted to tell them. With that we broke down crying and told them everything. We then got spankings for lying to our parents but not for taking the children's offering and going on a million dollar candy run.

This was the day that I learned the difference between what 2 Corinthians 7:10 calls Godly grief and worldly grief. It says in this passage, "For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death". I have always explained it this way. Worldly grief is feeling sorry because you got caught, but Godly grief is genuinely feeling bad about what you did without getting caught because it was wrong. Godly grief is what was working in me the minute I got back from my million dollar candy run. This Godly grief caused me to repent to God for my actions and want to make a change in my life (even at the age of 5). Worldly grief is what happened when I got caught in the lie to my parents. I was fine with the fact that I lied to my parents until I got caught in that lie. That lie not only caused pain in my parents, and in God but also on my bottom, thus proving the scriptures true that worldly grief leads to death.

Too often times in life we ignore the feelings of guilt which is the tool the Holy Spirit uses to produce godly grief in us and we wait until we get caught in the act. The problem with this is that the more we ignore those feelings of guilt the less often we feel guilty and therefore the less often we actually end our days in repentance for our actions. Weeks and even months will go by until we get caught in something and then once we are caught we decide we need to change. We need to take more time to listen to the Holy Spirit and end our days with true repentance.

This is what I learned from my million dollar candy run, what have you learned today? Let's choose Godly grief rather then worldly.

Tomorrows Bible Reading - Exodus 20, Luke 23, Job 38, 2 Corinthians 8

Dream Big
Ben