When Dreams Meet Truth

I was just sitting here this morning drinking a fridge cig, reminiscing about a time when collecting aluminum cans was a pretty popular thing around these mountains. Folks would save them up in garbage bags, old barrels, truck beds, or whatever else would hold them, then haul them off to the scrap yard hoping to make a few dollars. That got me thinking about a time when me, my sister, and three neighbor kids became convinced that aluminum cans were fixing to make us wealthy.

When I was about second-grade age, we had some great neighbors, and back then kids didn’t need Wi-Fi, cell phones, or somebody planning an activity every fifteen minutes. You just went outside in the morning, found some other kids, and tried your best not to do anything that required a tetanus shot.

There were five of us in our little group: three of the neighbor kids, my sister, and me. And one day we had what I would call a very important board meeting.

The Christmas catalogs had arrived.

Now, for younger folks, the Christmas catalog was basically Amazon with pages. You could sit there for hours looking at stuff you didn’t have, couldn’t afford, and were absolutely convinced you could not live without.

And there it was.

A two-seater go-cart.

We wanted that thing bad.

There was only one problem. We looked at the price and realized pretty quickly that none of our families were buying it. When we asked our parents if Santa might bring, they said it was even outside Santa’s budget. Apparently Santa had overhead too.

But we were not discouraged because we were young, ambitious, and completely ignorant about the scrap-metal market.

We knew people around our area collected aluminum cans and sold them. So somebody in that little board meeting came up with what seemed like a brilliant idea:

“We’ll collect aluminum cans, sell them, and buy the go-cart ourselves.”

Now that sounded reasonable to five elementary-school kids.

So we went to work.

We collected cans everywhere. We watched for cans like a hawk watches a field mouse. If somebody set a pop can down, they better keep one hand on it.

I’m ashamed to admit there may have even been a couple occasions where I opened one of Mom’s cans of TAB, poured the perfectly good drink out, and kept the can.

I wasn’t wasting pop. I was investing in transportation.

We collected for months.

And every so often we would have another board meeting at the fence and pull that Christmas catalog back out. We didn’t just plan on buying the go-cart. We had already worked out the custody agreement.

Monday, somebody would get it.

Tuesday, somebody else.

We had a rotation.

We had schedules.

We had plans.

We had everything figured out except how much aluminum cans were actually worth.

Finally, the great day arrived.

We had trash bags full of cans. Our friend’s dad had a truck, so we loaded that thing up and headed to the scrap yard. In our minds, that go-cart was practically already ordered.

We got there and the fellow started looking through our cans.

Then came the first bit of troubling news.

Some of our cans weren’t aluminum.

Apparently our sophisticated quality-control department had overlooked that.

The man told our friend’s dad that he wasn’t going to sort all those cans, so we had to load everything back into the truck.

On the way home, their dad stopped and bought us a magnet for about five dollars. We learned that if the magnet stuck to the can, it wasn’t aluminum.

So we went back and sorted through months of work.

Can after can got thrown out.

Our pile started getting smaller.

We were a little concerned by then, but we still had faith. Surely there was enough aluminum left for that go-cart.

So we loaded everything back into the truck and made our second trip to the scrap yard.

They weighed the cans.

We stood there watching that man count out the money to our friend’s dad.

I remember thinking we might even have enough left over to stop for ice cream on the way home.

Then their dad walked over and handed us...

Fourteen dollars.

And reminded us that the magnet had cost five.

Net profit: nine dollars.

Five kids.

Months of work.

Trash bags full of cans.

Two trips to the scrap yard.

One five-dollar magnet.

Nine dollars.

I don’t remember anybody saying much riding home in the bed of that truck.

Reality had run head-on into our dreams, and reality didn’t even tap the brakes.

We eventually divided up our little nine-dollar fortune and went on with life. I think i got a slush puppy with my residuals. A couple days later we were probably playing something else and had forgotten all about becoming go-cart owners.

But I’ve thought about that story through the years because I believe there are a lot of people approaching eternity the same way we approached that go-cart.

They are putting all their hope in what they can collect.

Good deeds.

Church attendance.

Giving money.

Helping people.

Being a pretty good neighbor.

Not being as bad as somebody else.

Maybe even preaching, teaching, serving, singing, or doing religious things.

And somewhere along the way we start believing, “Surely I’ve collected enough.”

That is the problem.

We don’t just come up a little short. We come up completely short of God’s perfect righteousness.

I’ve always said, sometimes it seems easier to convince an old drunk or a thug that he needs Jesus than it is somebody who has spent their whole life believing they are a pretty good person.

The man who knows he is broke isn’t counting his money.

But the person trusting in his own goodness keeps collecting cans.

The Bible says: “Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it.”

Psalm 127:1

Works without Christ cannot save us.

You can fill the whole truck.

You can mash them cans down and squeeze a few more in.

You can make another trip.

You can work harder than everybody else.

But when they are weighed, they still aren’t enough.

And Scripture actually talks about our works being tested.

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 3:12-15 that a believer’s works will be revealed by fire. Some are described as “gold, silver, precious stones,” while others are “wood, hay, stubble.”

Now this is important. Paul is talking about believers here. This is not a judgment determining whether we have earned salvation. Salvation was never earned to begin with.

“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.”

Ephesians 2:8-9

At the judgment seat of Christ, our works will be examined. What did we do for Christ? What was done in obedience to Him? What was done for His glory? And what was simply done in our own strength, for our own recognition, or according to our own plans?

Some of what looked mighty impressive down here may turn out to be wood, hay, and stubble.

It burns up.

But that which Christ led us to do, empowered us to do, and received the glory for becomes gold, silver, and precious stones.

That means there is a tremendous difference between working for salvation and working because we have been saved.

We don't work to get the gift.

We work because we have already received the Gift.

And for the person who rejects Christ, there is another judgment described in Revelation 20:11-15, the Great White Throne Judgment. There the dead are judged “according to their works.”

Friend, you don't want to stand before a holy God carrying your truckload of cans.

Because when our works are weighed against His righteousness, we are going to discover what five little kids discovered at a scrap yard many years ago:

It ain’t worth what you thought it was.

That is why our hope isn't in the truckload.

Our hope is in the Cross.

Jesus did what we could never do. He lived the righteous life we couldn't live. He paid the debt we couldn't pay. He died the death we deserved and rose again victorious over death and the grave.

So quit trying to save up enough goodness to buy something God only gives as a gift.

Trust Christ.

Then let Him guide your works, direct your life, and receive the glory from everything you do.

Because when eternity comes, you don't want to discover you've spent your whole life collecting cans for something only Jesus could give you for free.