The Dog with Two Masters // How to Live an Extraordinary Life, Pt 12

A Different Perspective Official Podcast

Most of us have heard that expression about being a dog with two masters. Turns out that dogs are simple, loyal creatures. Two masters is hard work. Two masters is confusing. So they always, always settle on just one master. The trick is … choosing the right one.

When I was a young lad I had a dog called Banner. He wasn’t any particular breed. I think the technical term for him was that he was a mongrel. Great dog, truly man’s best friend or at least he was my best friend as I was navigating those difficult up-and-down teenage years of my life. Banner was my dog. What I mean by that is that even though we had a family of four – Mum, Dad, my sister, me – he was loyal to me. He did what other people told him to do as well but ultimately he listened to me.

Anyone who’s ever had a dog will understand that. Most dogs are friendly and sociable but there’s someone in the family that they look to as their ultimate friend and master, because a dog can’t have two masters. If he listens to one who tells him to come and the other who tells him to stay, what’s he going to do? He can’t obey both. He can’t stay and go at the same time so dogs, being simple, loyal creatures resolve this dilemma by deciding upon one ultimate master. If in doubt, listen to what the master says and do that.

That may all sound a bit simplistic and trite, but can I tell you that’s exactly what a good dog will do. Everybody who’s ever owned a dog is nodding at this point because you know from experience that what I’m saying is true. So Berni, what are we doing? Talking about dog training classes or something? No, we’re going to continue on talking about what we’ve been talking about every day over the past few weeks. We’re going to chat about "How to Live an Extraordinary Life".

So what’s with the dog then? Well, the dog is a great picture, a metaphor if you will, for something that Jesus talked about. In fact it’s something He talked quite a lot about. The question He was addressing, the thing He was putting His finger on in people’s lives was who or what are you serving?

You look at Jesus’ own life and the answer to that is pretty clear. But first lets take a look to see what He had to say on this really, really important subject. Well, it’s important if you happen to feel a bit like a dog with two masters. Let’s have a read. Matthew Chapter 6:

The eye is the lamp of the body, so if your eye’s healthy your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye’s unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If the light in you is darkness how great is the darkness. Don’t store up for yourself treasures on the earth where moth and rust consume and where the thieves break in and steal, but store up for yourself treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust consumes; where the thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.

No one can serve two masters for a slave will either hate the one and love the other or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You can’t serve God and wealth.

Now that’s a great bit of advice. None of us can serve two masters even though sometimes we try really, really hard. Like that loyal and faithful dog, at some point we have to decide who you and I are going to serve: wealth, success, position, comfort – all the things the world tells us we should have – or God. Which one is it in my life? Which one is it in your life. When push comes to shove, when one says and the other says go, which voice do we listen to? Which one do we obey and respond to? The call of wealth and success or the call of God?

When God calls us to give sacrificially into something that He’s doing, do we hang onto our money or do we give freely and sacrificially. A lot of that has to do with whether we really trust God to provide for us. Do we feel the need to hoard the wealth for ourselves or can we give it up freely when God demands it of us to get done what He wants to get done in this world. Jesus knew that so He went on to say:

There for I tell you, don’t worry about your life, what you’ll eat or what you’ll drink or about your body or what you’ll wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of air, they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you or much more value than them. And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to the span of your life? And why worry about clothing.

Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. Now they neither toil nor spin yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was never clothed like one of those. But if God so clothes the grass of the field which is alive today and tomorrow it’s thrown in the oven, how much more will he clothe you, oh ye of little faith. Therefore don’t worry saying ‘What will I eat, or what am I going to drink, or what am I going to wear?’ It’s the gentiles who strive for all of those things and yet your Heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. Strive first for the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these other things will be given to you as well. So don’t worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will bring worries of it’s own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.

Let’s come back to Jesus’ most extraordinary life for a moment and let me ask you this. How much of it had to do with money, a good car, nice home, comfortable sofa, membership at the country club, the circle of nice, safe, comfortable, loyal friends and family? The answer is, none of it! In fact, to a would-be disciple He said, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head". Jesus died penniless with not even the clothes He was wearing on His back. The King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the Creator of heaven and earth who owned everything, yet possessed nothing.

He laid it all down for you and for me. Even His life He laid down for you and for me. That’s what made Him so extraordinary. It seems to me that the degree to which you and I lead an extraordinary life is defined, not by what we earned, by what we have, by what how much wealth we amass, but by what we give, what we sacrifice, what we’re prepared to lose in order to love God and love others as ourselves. Without a doubt, the most extraordinary person you’ve ever known in your life is the one who’s give the most and sacrificed the most for you. Am I right?

When are we going to wake up that we can’t serve two masters. And when are we going to wake up to the fact that wealth is such a rotten master. Because it is a master. Money is a servant, wealth is a master. It owns us, it drives us, it robs us, it ruins us. 1 Timothy Chapter 6 beginning at verse 9:

But those who want to be rich fall into temptation, they’re trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And in their eagerness to be rich some have wondered away from their faith and pierced themselves with many pains.

My friend, if you and I want to live the extraordinary lives that Jesus came to give us then it’s time to choose masters. It’s one or the other. It can never, ever be both. Choose wealth and lives may at first appear comfortable but when all is said and done what will the world say of us when we’re gone. What will they remember, what legacy will we leave? The extraordinary life choice is the life lived for God. Wise stewards of our resources? Yes. Servants to wealth? Absolutely not!