QUESTION OF THE DAY #18: What do you collect?

There are so many kinds of collections!  I thought that I wasn't a collector at all, but then I thought again.  Very few of the things that I have do I have just one of!  By far the biggest collection I have is my collection of books.  I "literally" could not count them all, much less read them all, to be honest, especially given the sheer number of books I have stored on computer.  I'm trying to picture a room filled with those books right now.

Whew!  They aren't as satisfying as paper and ink books, though.  One set of books I have is a collection of classic authors and their works published by Walter J. Black, Inc., over a hundred  years ago.  On the inside cover of each book is the signature, W.H. Finney, M.D., 1931.  To think that I have a set of books bought by a doctor before my parents were even born kind of blows my mind.  I've only read a fraction of the volumes, though, the ones by Poe, Doyle, Kipling, and bits of one or two others.  Even now it bothers me a bit that I can't find one of the volumes, and another one has started to rip.

What is it about human beings that makes us collectors?  Is it a habit?  Is it that it makes us feel more complete?  Is it nostalgia?  Is it a way of expressing ourselves?  It can be all of these things, and more.  What do you like to collect?  Pottery?  Figurines?  Art?  Toys of various sorts?  Collections can serve many good and noble purposes.   Still, I'm feeling a little guilty here, swamped by the things I've collected.

Which reminds me, there IS one kind of collector mentioned in Scripture quite often.  You might have guessed it, the dreaded tax collector, considered by religious people to be an especially awful kind of person back in the day.  

Isn't it interesting that Jesus made a point of hanging out with tax collectors?  He came to collect outcasts and to forgive.  He came to pick us up, dust us off, gather and keep us.  May our collections always be able remind us of that!