I’m assuming you love God, Dan. Email me and I’ll tell you where to forward all of your hated money.

You cannot serve both God and Money. Such puts the majority in a precarious situation, but do ye serve Mammon freely, or are ye simply a slave unto its yoke? This is the problem with any capitalistic approach, for such is the way of Mammon, yes, capitalists are evil, but what’s new?

You either love God and hate money, or love money and hate God, simple really. Although having a seeming need for money (which we all do) and living for the sole purpose of attaining material wealth… – there is a very big difference between the two.

It’s pretty clear from the surrounding verses that he’s specifically talking about worldly possesions in regard to the other master.

In Matt 6 Jesus is basically saying, don’t sweat the little worldly things, concentrate on finding God and it’ll all work out. Just chill out and believe.

I think he’s basically saying you can’t prioritize wealth and God on the same level, if you really are serving God the money doesn’t matter, and if you put money before God, you’re not going to be showing your love for God.

If someone wants to genrealize these statements and apply them to all sin, that puts a whole new slant on things and raises several questions about priorities and the definition of serving God.

I’ll ask my rabbi and get back to you.

I don’t know if the reading you present is common or not, but it’s clear to me that because of our sins, we never fully serve our master here. It would be arrogant and ignorant of the atonement if we though otherwise. Therefore, I’ll try to press forward through my sinfulness and serve the true master the best I can. I hope this makes sense.

The issue I presented isn’t whether we can ever serve God; it’s whether there is ever a situation where we can serve two so-called masters.

Well, I also presented on whether keeping the commandments is what defines “service”.

My point is that in mortality, we seem to serve Satan at some level always. Therefore, if we are to serve God’s purposes, we’d have to serve two masters. For instance, I love doing service in the church and out. I feel that this is serving the lord. Yet no matter how hard I try, a little part of me swells with ego and self congratulation, thus serving Satan (or hindering my progression, same thing). I try to conrol that side effect of serving, but I suspect it will be there as long as I walk this earth. The bread example you gave is another good instance where one would have to serve the lesser of two evils.

As far as the other question, I have always viewed keeping the commandments as service to god. But this I realize is very self centered, as commandments are given for our benefit and progression.