My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding; yes, if you cry out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for its treasures; then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.
Proverbs 2:1-5
What can’t you live without? This is an interesting question. Let’s consider fourteen different things, and as you consider each, file each one under one of four categories: Like it, love it, don’t care for it, can’t live without it. Here are the fourteen items and where we might file each:
Tacos, pizza, TikTok, sleeping in, family, football, coffee, God, I-phone, friends, work, the beach, vacation, love.
Where do you classify each? I’ll give you my answers:
Tacos—I like them, but I may go a month in between eating them, so they are not essential.
Pizza—I like pizza, like I like tacos, but if I don’t eat pizza for a while, my life is still complete.
TikTok—I don’t have it, I do watch some people’s TikTok videos, so this classifies somewhere in between like it and don’t care for it. Definitely not essential to my life.
Sleeping in—I like it, but I rarely get to do it.
Family—This goes into the can’t live without it category. I love my wife and our son. I can’t imagine life without them. Although, we are separated at times because of ministry obligations like summer camp, or when my wife goes to visit her family. On a given day I may not see much of my family. They are essential and foundational to my life overall. There are some people who do not have families, they are estranged from family. And they live successful and faithful lives.
Football—I like it, and on some Saturdays in the fall, I spend some of the day watching it. Though I do not rearrange my schedule around it. I like it, a lot, but I don’t love it.
Coffee—I don’t drink coffee, so for me it’s in the “don’t care for it” category.
God—Can’t live without Him. He is the highest on my list. Why? Because if I was about to die, if I was about to be permanently separated from my family, if I have God, then I truly have everything I need for eternal life. And if I have all the other things on this list but don’t have God, then my life had no meaning really. It would end with my death. With God and with faith, life continues to eternity.
I-Phone—Now this creates an interesting quandary. Where do classify this? Is it in the “can’t live without it” category? It certainly would make life a lot harder if I didn’t have it. I can’t imagine working without it. It is the primary means by which we communicate with others. But is it really right to classify the phone in the same category as family and as God? Could I function without it? Yes. This goes somewhere between the “I love it” and “Can’t live without it” categories.
Friends—This goes in the can’t live without it category. We don’t have to have many friends, but it is essential that we have some. We are meant to live in community, in relation with other people. Family we do not choose. Friends we choose, and friends choose us. We bond with family over common ancestry. We bond with friends over common interests. Again, we don’t necessarily need many friends, but I believe a few are essential.
Work—I suppose this answer varies based on your age and stage of life. In my life, work goes in the “I love it category.” What if I was injured and couldn’t work? What if I got a serious illness and had to take six months off from work? I’d live. Honestly, I struggle with where to classify my work, since when a priest is ordained, he “marries” the church. So my work is more lifestyle than job. I think the idea of doing some kind of work is essential when we are young. It’s how we use our talents. And that work might be raising children, or being a volunteer. Work does not mean necessarily a fifty-hour-a-week job.
The beach—I like the beach, I go there not as often as I’d like. I don’t go in the winter because the water is cold. The beach is in the like but not essential category.
Vacation—I love vacation, but really it is not essential. There are years when circumstance didn’t allow for a vacation, and I survived. So that’s in the strong like/love category.
Love—the final subject, which I would place in the “can’t live without it” category. It is essential that we feel loved and that we express love. If we don’t have a lot of people to love, we must at the very least know that God loves us and express love for God. In following Christ’s command to love our neighbor, we are “required” to express love. Yet, love is a choice, it is not forced. We are supposed to cultivate loving relationships with others, and especially with the Lord. We cannot live without love.
If one was about to die tomorrow, and perhaps this is how the list should be viewed, what would be in the can’t live without it category—According to this list and in my opinion, it would be God, love, family and friends. But let’s go even further, what if you were about to take your last breath? In my opinion, God and love make the final list of “can’t live without it.” Without God, there is no hope for eternal life. And without love there is no relationship with God.
Each of these categories means something different to everyone. In a third world country, where there isn’t clean water, things like tacos, TikTok and I-phones don’t register a care in the world. If one is locked up in prison with no access to family or friends, God and love can still be present.
As we will discuss, God and love are interchangeable and essential. God and love are what we can truly not live without. The challenge is that the world devalues both, and promotes I-phones and TikTok, and with enough social pressure, these become the essential items and even things like family and friends become challenged by their presence. God and love should be in the lead in our lives, and everything else should fall in line behind (and for some of these items, well behind) them.
Heavenly Father, thank You for the gift of love, which You have offered in our creation and in our redemption. Thank You for the many opportunities there are in life to like things and to love people. Help me to remember what is really important, that You and that love should lead the way in all times and in all circumstances. Help me to be a person who chooses love. Help me to experience God-like love through the presence of other people, and through Your presence in my life. Help me to love You and to love others better, to make this a priority each day. Amen.
What can’t you live without?
