It’s like Jesus took a story out of our recent headlines when He spoke of a current event about eighteen people killed in a tower accident. He used the tragedy to awaken His listeners’ memories of the Teachings to walk the path exactly as Yahweh their Elohim had commanded so that they would thrive and live long in the land of their inheritance. It wasn’t that the folks who died were bad people who deserved an untimely death but accidents do happen so people needed to be more concerned about their long term (as in forever) living arrangements than if the tower had targeted only sinful people.

“Where are you living?” Will you have a forever life or a forever death?

Don’t love the world’s ways.

Don’t love the world’s goods.

Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father.

Practically everything that goes on in the world—

wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—

has nothing to do with the Father.

It just isolates you from him.

The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—

but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity.

(1 John 2:17 MSG)