All You Can Take With You
My favorite holiday movie — far and away — and one of my all-time favorite movies, is It’s a Wonderful Life, directed by Frank Capra and starring James Stewart as George Bailey.
Faced with myriad difficult circumstances and continually put in situations that called for him to be unselfish rather than focused on self, George relied on the inspirational example of his father, who left him with this guiding principle (from the picture):
“All you can take with you is that which you’ve given away.”
It’s a wonderful quote from a wonderful movie. But the concept behind the quote did not originate with Capra. It’s clearly a reference to the words of Jesus in Matthew, chapter 6:
“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”
