Augustine of Hippo: TheSafest Deposit Box

If on the other hand you put good works into the other deposit box, the fruits of justice, or continence, or virginity, or the chastity of marriage; if you are a stranger to fraud, to murder, to crime; if you remember the needy, because you yourself are also in need; if you remember the poor, because you yourself are also poor, whatever the abundance of your wealth, you are clothed in the rags of the flesh; if with such thoughts as these, and such actions as these you contribute to the good deposit box against the day of judgment, the one who cheats nobody, and will repay each person according to his works, will say to you, “Take what you have deposited, because there is plenty of it. When you were depositing it, you couldn’t see it; but I was keeping it, just as I was going to repay it.”

Because indeed, brothers and sisters, everyone who puts something into a savings box knows that he is putting it in, and cannot see it when he has done so. Suppose a savings chest buried in the earth, with one opening or small chink by which you put money into it. Little by little you put in what you have won, and you can’t see it. If the earth is keeping for you what you have put in and can’t see, will the One who made heaven and earth not keep it for you too?"

Augustine of Hippo (354-430) in Essential Sermons, trans. Edmund Hill, ed. Daniel Doyle, The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century (New York: New City Press, 2007), Sermon 339.3.

This is the fifth of seven posts exploring the theme of 'abundance' in the sermons of one of my favorite orators. If you love these excerpts, do download the PDF of this collection of sermons freely here.

We can trust that God will pay back all people according to their works.

Today, Augustine inspires us to good works using another one of his masterful word pictures: the deposit box.

Those who put remember the forgotten and marginalized in the name of Jesus put money in the safest of deposit boxes.

And today's Scripture reminds us that the Lord will reward those who do this. To apply this practically, I am encouraging everyone to lend to the Lord this week.

It's not for me but for suffering souls in Ukraine. I return there with CTU Global in December 2026.

This marks my fourth trip since the conflict escalated in 2022.

Click here to go to the CTU global website. Click the blue give button to give and be sure to write "Project: Ukraine" in the "add a note" section.

In this life, whatever you give to this effort will provide generators and other aid to Christian workers. And rest assured, it will simultaneously go in the safest deposit box.

In the words of Augustine, "the One who made heaven and earth will keep it for you."