The land, moreover, shall not be sold permanently, for the land is Mine; for you are but aliens and sojourners with Me. Leviticus 25:23
A sojourner has been defined as "one who is an alien in a land but resides with them." Where they are living is not their home; it's just where they happen to be staying.
In the giving of the Law, God told Moses how to deal with land issues. For a farming society, land was wealth and security, so the rules of buying and selling property were of the utmost importance.
But God has a reminder for Moses, one that we can learn from as well. Land was not to be sold permanently. If it was sold, it could be returned to the previous owner in the year of jubilee. It was not a permanent possession. Why? It is God's the Creator's. Man, the creation, was an alien, a sojourner in a land owned by God. As Paul reminded Timothy, "For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out" (1 Timothy 6:7).
I was reminded of this truth while listening to a message at Mahaffey Camp. I thought of the house Cindy and I enjoy now. We'll pay for it, fix it up, live in it and then, in the not so distant future, it will be somebody else's.
The more I thought about this the more liberated my thoughts became. My life is not composed of what I own for, in reality, I can never own anything permanently. My life is composed of who I am, a sojourner with God. My permanent, eternal home is with Him.
This is liberating because it frees me to let go of what the world calls wealth and embrace what God calls wealth, mainly, God Himself. I can sojourn in this land a servant of the true owner and trust Him to provide what I need.
As we travel through this consumer-driven society of ours, let's keep the words of God to Moses in mind. Maybe it will help us make some right choices and avoid thinking that true wealth is made up of what we own and not whose we are.