Does money interest you? If you were breathing, I would suppose the answer to that question would be yes. Do you have enough? Do you want more? We can all guess the answers to those questions. But if we are among the richest people in the world, why do we never seem to have enough? In other words, why is it that although we are rich, we don’t feel rich? In fact, many have never felt rich in their entire lives. Why? The answer to that is a simple thing called “margin”. 

Margin has to do with our debt-to-income ratio. It’s the difference between what I earn and what I save. If I put money away, as in a savings account, I start to accumulate a reserve. As the margin between what I spend and what I save continues to grow, I start to feel rich because what I have saved creates buying power. If I spend all that I earn, I will feel like I’m living paycheck to paycheck, and that’s true whether I make $30,000 a year or $300,000 a year. So now the question is what percentage of your income you need to live on?

In Mark 12:41-44, Jesus gathers his disciples to observe people putting money into the Tabernacle offering box. Some place large sums, while a lowly widow comes along and places two small coins. Jesus turns to his disciples and says, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has given more than all the others who are making contributions. For they gave a tiny part of their surplus, but she, poor as she is, has given everything she had to live on” (Mark 12:43-44). The point is that, in percentage terms, the widow gave it all, while the rich gave only a small percentage of what they had. I wonder which felt rich, the rich who had the money but kept most of it for themselves, or the widow who gave it all away? Quite simply, the widow’s hope was in God, which is why she could give it all away. The rich, on the other hand, had their hope migrate from God to their money. What does that say about us? Think about it.