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Aug 09, 2025 06:00am

What Monopoly Taught Me About My Walk With Jesus

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While recently visiting a friend, I decided to pack Gilmore Girls Monopoly. My friend and I have always been fans of the show.

We actually have a game between the two of us where we will, when watching GG, text one another a quote from the episode we’re watching and then see if the other person can guess what episode we’re on.

As I suspected, when I pulled the game out, my friend quickly made herself a cup of coffee and enthusiastically agreed to play.

I joked while setting up the board, “Monopoly changes people.”

At the beginning of the game, all was well. With a crisp $1,500 of Monopoly money in hand, we were both ready to win!

The thing about Monopoly is, it’s a game of risk, chance, and thinking ahead. There are many ways a person can approach the game.

Some choose to go slow and steady; only purchasing things when they know the cash is available to do so.

Others choose to play a riskier game, not fearing the mortgaging of several properties to buy one they value—or one they don’t want their opponent to have.

As a general rule, I play the safe way. I lean towards making investments as I would in my daily life.

Either way, playing the game involves risk.

Neither way is certain.

What struck me while my friend and I played is that we often approach our Christian life the same way.

We begin our Christian journey, and we are spiritually born again as Jesus describes in John chapter three. At the time of our re-birth, we have the full promises of God—every crisp Bible page now open and available to us.

We often enthusiastically begin following the Lord as our Lord (i.e., the one in charge of our lives), but as time goes on and the pressures of life hit, we change who we put our trust in—and therefore how we approach life.

Despite knowing that “Every word of God proves true and is a shield for those who take refuge in him,” we begin to trust our own best thinking and feelings to guide us into wise investment.

We think we are experiencing freedom and satisfaction when living like this, but that is not the case.

Zechariah 10:2 says,

“For the household gods utter nonsense and the diviners see lies;
They tell false dreams and give empty consolation.
Therefore the people wander like sheep; they are afflicted for lack of a shepherd.”

This Old Testament passage highlights the idea that any idol we chase gives a false sense of hope and will leave us feeling empty.

Even worse, the pursuit of idols will lead to us being afflicted mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually.

A New Testament example of this is the Parable of the Prodigal Son, found in Luke 15. In this parable, the son lived in his father’s house and had access to all his father had, but chose to leave and take his inheritance with him. He spent his inheritance as he saw fit. For a while, he enjoyed the pleasures and experiences the world had to offer.

It didn’t take long, though, until the son was afflicted and felt empty. So he went to the one place he knew was safe and could restore: his father’s house.

This is a parallel to our Christian lives.

As a good friend of mine said, “As Christians, we can live a disobedient life, but there will always be something that feels off until we repent and return back to living with Jesus as our shepherd.”

The good news is, just as the Prodigal Son is welcomed home in Luke 15 as he repents (i.e., changes his mind and begins to live his father’s way instead of his own), we have the same opportunity to repent, return, and be restored.

The difference between playing Monopoly and real life is that approaching our Christian life in an unwise way (contrary to the Word of God) will always be a costly investment with unwanted return.

The opposite is also true: when we live—or return to living—according to God’s Word, we store up treasures in heaven. Treasures that cannot be destroyed or stolen—a sure investment.