Introduction:
In this essay we will be studying some of what the Bible has to say about
finances. Contrary to what you might think, the Bible has much to teach on the subject
of money and how to manage it. Unfortunately since there has been a lot of
false teaching in this area, the church leadership has responded by largely
ignoring the biblical principles presented in the Word. Worse yet they have
perverted them in such a way that Christians now are largely unaware of the
fact that our God wants us to be abundantly supplied. It is my aim to present a
balanced and Scripturally accurate approach to the subject of finances so that
the child of God can be well grounded in these principles and to reap the
benefits of them in their lives.
Now just in case you think that the
subject of finances is irrelevant to the Christian walk, you would be wise to
consider just how much of the precious Word of God is devoted to financial
matters. There are literally hundreds of Scriptures that are dedicated to the
subject of finances, and how to handle them. It is then obvious that God is
quite interested in how we manage our financial affairs as well as providing
the means for us to be abundantly supplied to be ready for all good works.
Foundation
Scripture: III John v. 2 Beloved, I wish above all things that thou
mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospers. KJV. Now there
are many promises in the Word concerning prosperity that I could have chosen,
but this is one of my favorites because it really conveys the heart of the
Father toward those who serve Him. The Greek word translated prosper is euodoo;
(2137) which means; to help on the road, to succeed in reaching, to succeed in
business affairs, to have a prosperous journey. Now do not make the mistake of thinking that God is not
interested in your financial matters, because He certainly is, since He is well
aware that most of us spend the majority of our lives in the pursuit of and the
management of our finances. And not only this but our finances are a major area
of attack by the adversary who seeks to devour us. So it is vital that we be
well grounded in biblical matters of prosperity.
I.
Steps to God’s Plan for Financial Success:
Believe it or not the Word gives an ordered approach to managing money, and I will now begin to cover it in stepwise fashion.
A: Seek Him first: In His teachings on the sermon on the mount, the Lord Jesus
admonishes us to give top priority to seeking the kingdom of God for our lives,
and that if we did this, then He would be in a position to provide for our
needs and desires. The mistake that many Christians make is thinking that God
does not care about their finances, so they think that they must shoulder the
burden of seeking these things, which of course leaves very little time for
pursuing the things of God. However the Lord Jesus has given us a promise which
is that if we would seek first the kingdom of God, then He would add all other
things unto us. We need only ask ourselves the following question. Is God a man
that He should lie? Certainly not! Well then we can have full faith and
confidence in His ability to provide for us if we would only believe. The Lord
Jesus goes on to say that our heavenly Father knows that we have need of the
things that make for our sustenance. So
this tells us that we don’t have to whine and beg hoping that He will hear us,
but it is sufficient that we go about our daily affairs with simplicity of heart,
endeavoring in all things to be found living a life consistent with the Word.
In this we find the environment in which the Lord can bless us. This explains
why many Christians go lacking since the reason that they don’t have all
sufficiency is not because God is unaware of their plight, but it is because
they are not living according to the command of the Lord to seek Him first,
preferring to waste time and energy in a futile attempt to make ends meet, and
that, by employing the tools of the god
of this age.
I
suggest that you let the Lord Jesus tell you in His own words in the following
Scriptures.
Matthew
6:19-34
Luke
12:13-21
Mark
10:17-27
I Timothy 6:17-19
B: Be Content: One of the
strongest pieces of evidence that we are in compliance with step A above, is
that we will not have an anxious heart about our circumstances. We will be what
the Bible calls content. Now this contentment, what does it mean? It means that
in whatever state that we find ourselves that we will not worry and fret,
especially if we find ourselves in a state of lack. Now the reason that we need
not worry is that if we believe the Word of God then we know that the Lord
knows, that we have need of whatever it is that we lack. We also know that He is
not slack in seeing to our needs, but only if we believe. Based on this we can
see the unmistakable relationship between contentment and faith. Now this is
the faith that God finds most pleasing, and provokes Him to move swiftly on our
behalf. You see He is not moved by mere need alone, but He requires faith on
our part. So we can see that contentment comes from a belief in the heart on
the truthfulness of God’s Word, and that belief begins in the hearing of that
Word. So if we are not skilled in the Word of righteousness then we will be
subject to assessing our lives on the basis of the testimony of the world, and
we know who runs it.
The
bottom line is this. If we have full confidence in the Word of God, then we
will not be discouraged by the circumstances no matter how hopeless the
situation seems. This is what the Lord meant when He answered Paul on his
request concerning his thorn in the flesh saying,“ My grace is sufficient for
you”. Many mistakenly think that God
was refusing to deliver him, preferring to derive some kind of perverse
pleasure out of seeing him suffer. This is of course absurd but nonetheless it
is a very prevalent mindset to this day, where Christians assuage themselves
with the false notion that they are suffering for the Lord in enduring lack. In
reality they are victims of the faithlessness that ensues from ignorance of the
Word, and worse yet they make God out to be a liar by effectively blaming Him
for their predicament. Now notice Paul’s testimony in 2nd Tim. 3:11
where he declares that out of all of his afflictions and persecutions, the Lord
had delivered him. Don’t you know that
He will also deliver you out of all of yours? The key to obtaining this is to
make God bigger in your life than the problems that you face.
Let
me at this time say a little bit about the difference between
contentment and satisfaction. Lest you be put in bondage you must understand
that the Word does not preclude you from operating in benign ambition, or
relegate you to an existence of perpetual lack as a sign of some sort of badge of honor. On the contrary as we have
already discussed, the Lord’s position is simply for you to be at internal
peace no matter what state you find yourself in, whether plenty or lack, or
feast or famine. It is also clear from that same Word that He prefers us to
exist in the state of plenty and feast rather than lack and famine. Now the
difference between contentment and satisfaction should be becoming clear.
Contentment is the condition of peace of mind in the face of lack, or plenty,
while satisfaction is the state of peace in the midst of plenty. You should always be content, even though you
may never be satisfied. As usual, below are listed Scriptures to help you
confirm the truthfulness of what I am saying.
I
Timothy 6:1-10
Hebrews
13:5
Philippians
4:10-13
C: Convince Yourself that it is God’s Will for you to
Prosper: This may be the
toughest task of all seeing as how so many of you have been lied to concerning
God’s attitude about prosperity. There is nowhere in the Word where we find
that God’s will is for us to be poor and suffering lack. On the contrary,
everywhere that we see God moving in the midst of His people, His intentions
and actions are always to bring full sufficiency. Consider for example the
deliverance of the nation of Israel from bondage in Egypt. Overnight they went
from being slaves and paupers to being rich, and so much so that when the call
went out for provision to build the tabernacle, so much came in that the elders
finally had to constrain the people from further giving. Now when was the last
time your church said “ please don’t bring any more money for thus and so. We
have enough”. Again in the person of Abraham we see another example of God’s
power to bless, when we consider the incident of Abraham’s servant who was sent to find a wife for
Isaac. Notice how he told Laban that God had blessed his master Abraham
greatly, and also notice that the nature of those blessings were material not
spiritual. I think that the heart of
God concerning the matter of wealth can be summed up excellently in the
following pronouncement from the Lord to the nation of Israel before they
crossed over the Jordan. “ And you shall
remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth,
that He may establish His covenant which He swore to your fathers as it is to
this day”. (Deut. 8:18) Well I want you to know that God is still in the
business of giving power to get wealth, because the necessity remains for the
covenant to be established. As a matter of fact if it took wealth to establish
the older inferior covenant, how much more wealth do you think it necessary to
establish the newer and better covenant?
Finally consider King Solomon
who God had made so rich that silver was like rocks in the street.
Well if this message of God’s will
for our lives is so positive, why then do so many Christians reject it? Mostly
because of poor teaching which, rather than filling the child of God with hope
in the complete delivering power of the Gospel, has resulted instead in their being taught to revel in
false humility and ignorance, thinking that they are honoring God with their
poverty. You see God gets no glory from people operating under the curse of the
law, which includes sickness, disease and poverty. But He does get glory when
He has a chance to respond to our faith and to deliver us from the bondage of
the curse, and thus to show us and the world His salvation. Now am I saying that if you are sick and or poor, that you
are precluded from being in the family of God. Certainly not! As a matter of
fact it is usually these types of people that will finally humble themselves to
seek His face and receive salvation. But as good as it is to serve God from a
position of lack, it is better to serve Him from a position of His having made
you abundantly supplied. Now this can be accomplished through belief in and
obedience to the Word of God. So do not
allow yourself to be defrauded by deceitful men, thinking that you are serving
the cause of the Gospel by persisting
in poverty after you have received the knowledge of the truth. It then becomes
imperative for you to convince yourself by the Scriptures that it is indeed the
will of God for you to prosper, and that His plan for that prosperity is
spelled out in His Word. Below are just a few examples of God’s will for our
prosperity.
Mark
10:28-31 (One hundredfold)
Luke
12:29-32 (Father’s good
pleasure)
Psalm
35:27 (Pleasure in the
Prosperity)
Now it should be superfluous to
discuss the fact of God’s prosperity, however because of the volume of
erroneous teaching perpetrated on the church, many Christians believe that
their God is weak and poverty stricken
Himself. And if that be the case then how can they possibly expect Him
to supply their needs, seeing as how He cannot provide for Himself? Well what
does the Bible say about this matter? Is the Almighty on food stamps, and
receiving government cheese? No, but the God that I see in the Bible has laid
claim to all of the wealth of the earth. Now who can oppose Him in this boast?
Moreover was it not He who proclaimed that it was His good pleasure to give us
the kingdom?And was it not He who said that we were heirs together with Christ
Jesus? Now what did He inherit? Was it sickness, disease, death, or poverty?
No, but He came that we might have life, and moreover to have it more
abundantly. I could go on and on for the Bible is full of such promises from
the Most High. Did you ever consider just why it was that the Gospel was called
the good news? Below I have listed
just a few of the many Scriptures that tell us of the attributes of our God
and His desire to share with those who
have been found faithful.
Revelation 21:18-21 Streets
of Gold
Psalms 24:1 The
Earth is the Lord’s
Hag 2:8 The
Silver and the Gold
Psalms 50:7-15 Cattle
on a Thousand Hills
III.
The Law of Sowing and Reaping:
By this time many of you may be thinking
that I have painted a very unrealistic view of the kingdom of God, and that I
have focused only on the matter of prosperity. Well if you think that, you
would be wrong. First of all the subject of this essay is prosperity, and
inasmuch as the Bible has much to say about the subject. It would be
shortsighted to ignore it as many others in the past have done, or probably
worse yet to teach erroneously concerning it as others still have done. No I
will give you the precise teaching in the Word on God’s view concerning our
financial life. In addition, if you think that I have described a genie like
God who, if you say the right combination of words, will magically grant you all of your wishes, then you are also in
error. As I will now explain, the economy of God is governed by certain
spiritual laws that must be followed if you are to achieve success on this
earth in the affairs of life. One of these laws is what I call the law of
sowing and reaping. Now this law is a spiritual law and has applications in
many areas, but seeing as how this is about finances, we will limit our
discussion of it to that arena. You will find that in every case of the Lord’s
making a financial promise, there is a condition upon which that promise is
predicated. That condition always has something to do with what we must do first, in order for God to do on our
behalf whatever it was that He has promised. In other words, if we wish to reap
something from the Lord, then we must first sow something to Him. Now this
sowing something to Him, what does it mean, seeing as how we cannot actually
put anything into His hands? The Word makes it abundantly clear what kinds of
financial sowing are acceptable to God. Among them are the support of your
local church and its activities, helping the truly needy, and the like. So
basically then your sowing is going toward the building up of the house of God.
This is the only sowing that carries the promise of reaping.
Now there are many Christians who are robbed of their heritage because they judge the promises of God by other people’s circumstances, or by the poor history of the church in the handling of its finances. For instance, someone may appear to really have it together spiritually, because they quote a lot of Scriptures, and carry around a Bible. However usually that person is living a life that is quite contrary to the Word. They are in debt and their testimony amongst those who are outside is terrible. Their word is no good, for they are always making financial promises that they know they will not be able to keep. You dare not accept a check from them, since it is not likely to be worth the paper that it is written on. Now these are the sort that unlearned Christians will be fooled by, being carried away with their empty religious façade. Then, measuring the disparity between what the Word of God that they are quoting has promised, and the lack of the fruit of that Word being demonstrated in their lives, the gullible Christian will then conclude that it is not God’s will to actually make good on His promises. If this were true then God would be no better than us, seeing as how we are covenant breakers, and our word is no better than the breath used to give it. How then could He stand in judgement of us? But no, God does keep His word and stands by His promises. That’s why you must never judge the truthfulness of God’s Word by the unfaithfulness of those who are chosen to bring it and live it. Remember these two things, that the Lord is not impressed with how many Scriptures you can quote, but by how many you can live, and also, “let every man be found to be a liar, but let God be found to be true”.
Secondly, many Christians become
cynical and distrustful of their local church leadership because of the
church’s very poor track record of financial stewardship. Many churches are
constantly on the verge of financial collapse, and the pastor spends most of
his time whining and begging for, and in some cases extorting funds from his
beleaguered congregation. Some churches have elevated the art of fundraising to
highway robbery, and some pastors deserve academy awards for their performances
proclaiming the direst of consequences if they don’t receive a certain amount
of money in a given amount of time. This will result in compulsory giving, and
that will destroy the cheerful heart that the Lord expects to be the motivator
of giving. Now in some extreme cases this error has degraded into all manner of
silliness, with ministries coming up with some very bizarre tricks to seduce
the people into giving. I’m sure that there is not one of you reading this that
has not at one time or another, received in the mail a letter from some
ministry which contained some sort of “blessing” enhancing talisman. They
contain things such as mustard seeds, water from the Jordan, dirt from Israel,
holy oil from Lord knows where, and my personal favorite the “hands of Jesus”.
Oh and let us not forget the hand annotated letter to you personally from the
pastor, which states that he was up at three o’clock in the morning last night
thinking of you, and the Lord impressed upon him to write you this letter to
encourage you to send in your best offering for his “xyz project”. After dealing with this lunacy for so long,
I can almost understand why most of the church world is lacking and the people
are full of cynicism. However, they are not off of the hook because there are
churches that do it right and they testify against those who continue to walk
in error, and those who are caused to stumble by them are not spared because
they failed to exercise good judgement according to the Holy Word which clearly
revealed the heart of those who perpetrate such cunning craftiness against the
unstable, and the ignorant.
Sometimes pastors innocently victimize
their congregations financially. Through their ambitions to evangelize the
world, they sometimes exceed the calling of the Lord for them. They try to do
the whole job themselves, allowing their pride to contaminate their efforts at
ministry building. The admonitions for the Christian here are the same as for
the one who might judge the Word of God by rebellious unbelieving brethren.
Reckon that God is not a man that He should lie, or the son of man that He
should repent. Whatever He has said in His Word, whether pertaining to an
individual or to the church at large, He is well able to perform. If you find
yourself in a church that has a history of continued financial impropriety,
then you would be wise to find another storehouse for the Lord’s portion. But
you should also remember that the Lord Jesus said that “where your treasure is,
there your heart will be too”. And to this I will humbly add: where your heart
is there your body should also be.
Below are just a few of the many Scriptures
that cover this concept of sowing and reaping.
Ecclesiastes
11:1
II
Cor. 9:1-8
Luke
6:38
Philippians
4:17-19
Galatians
6:6-10
I
Timothy 5:17-18
I
Corinthians 9:1-14
In addition, here is some of what the Word has instructed the shepherds as to
how they should comport themselves in the ministry concerning the finances. The
Scriptures clearly point out right and
wrong ways of financial stewardship within the ministry.
a. Preaching
for Dishonest Gain I Timothy 6:3-5
b. Teaching for Dishonest
Gain Titus
1:10-11
c. Shepherd
Willing Not for D.G. I Peter 5:1-4
d. Qualifications I
Timothy 3:3
IV.
The Law of The Tithe:
Tithing! Mention this word and it will strike fear into the heart of most Christians. After the aforementioned discussion, you can see why. Most Christians see tithing as just another “trick” of the pastor to extort from them their meager earnings. They vehemently protest that the tithe is part of the law of Moses and as such has been nailed to the cross with it. Well this attitude demonstrates ignorance of the law of the tithe which, being a spiritual law, has validity far outside of the bounds of the law of Moses. The concept of the tithe was introduced to man’s consciousness long before Mt. Sinai, for it is a vitally important part of God’s economy. Consider for example the story in Genesis of Abram’s rescue of his nephew Lot and his family from the five kings. After he delivered his family, Abram gave honor to God by paying a tithe of the spoils to Melchizedek, the priest of the Most High. (Gen. 14:1-24). Now this event took place fully 600 years before the law of Moses was given. Where do you suppose Abram, the father of the faithful found out about the benefits of the tithe and its relationship to the concept of honoring God? Was it not from the Most High Himself? So don’t make the mistake of thinking that the tithe is an outmoded concept that is only being used today as a tool to extort money from unsuspecting Christians. On the contrary, it is the channel that God Himself has opened to us that we may be blessed in all that we do, even though the prosperity of the earth is being held hostage by the evil one. The tithe then is that portion of our increase that the Lord has sanctified unto Himself, thus removing it from the dominion of the devil. And as such he cannot hinder that seed from producing a good harvest of fruit that is abundantly accredited to our accounts.
Now I have an interesting question to ask you. Are you an embezzler? What do I mean by that? The earth and its fullness is owned by God, and it was originally given over to Adam and his descendents. However he didn’t keep it long, for in the rebellion in the garden, part of the consequence of the sin was that the kingdom of the earth fell under the control of the devil. This is why his offer to Jesus during the time of the temptation was legitimate. After taking Him to an exceedingly high mountain, he showed Him all of the kingdoms of the earth and their glory. He then said that all of this would be His if He would bow down to him and worship him. He backed up the claim by stating that all that He had seen had been delivered unto him, and that he gives it to whom ever he pleased.(Luke 4:5-8). The Lord Jesus wisely refused his offer, preferring to obtain the kingdom in a lawful manner, but the implications of the devil’s boasting are staggering. It means that he now has control of all of the earth’s finances and resources, and I can assure you that he is particularly stingy when it comes to the children of God. Now if you belong to God but have not been faithful in the tithe, then you are not operating through the channel of safe passage provided by God. Remember, the tithe is that part of the resources of the earth that the Lord has exempted from satanic dominion, thus allowing His people to be blessed in the midst whatever financial storms the devil may send. What you may not realize is that every dollar that you have, was obtained from the devil. So if you are unfaithful, this means that as far as the devil is concerned you have embezzled from him, and then he has a right to require it of you at any time or place of his choosing. And it’s a pretty safe bet that he will wait until it is most inconvenient for you, to snatch the financial rug out from under you. This is why the Lord instituted the tithe, so that we could be insulated from the economic chains of the adversary.
Another way
to look at this situation is from the parable of the strong man. In defending
Himself against the charges of the Pharisees concerning by whose authority
Jesus was casting out demons, He stated that a house divided against itself
cannot stand, meaning that Satan would not work against his own kingdom, but
that the work that they had witnessed was the result of the intervention of One
stronger than the strong man. This One bound him up, so to speak, and plundered
his house. Well the tithe is the mechanism by which we lawfully “bind” the
strong man and plunder his house. Now this plundering occurs because of
obedience to the Word of God concerning sowing and reaping. Otherwise whatever
you obtain in this life is by virtue of embezzlement, and therefore still
subject to satanic influence. This is why most people still struggle with their
finances, because either by ignorance or disobedience they have become
spiritual criminals, and their finances remain cursed. Now the devil’s grip on
your finances is broken through faith, but faith without works is dead. You
must speak and act based on the Word. So by being found faithful in the law of
the tithe, the Christian will not fall victim to the god of this age who has
made slaves of all men who have not loved the truth. These consequently have
been made subject to him through the sin of the first man Adam. But those who
have been translated from the kingdom of darkness, and have been made partakers
of the ministry of the last Adam, namely
Christ Jesus, are entitled to the financial immunity that is provided
for by the obedience to the law of the tithe. In the same way that Abram gave
glory to God (by paying the tithe to Melchizedek, in honor of his victory over
his enemies), we also give glory to God by bringing our tithes to the same
Melchizedek ( a.k.a. Christ Jesus), in honor of our victory over our enemy.
a. The
Purpose of the Tithe:
There are basically three reasons for the tithe, a practical one and two spiritual ones. On the practical side, we see the tithe ordained by God to be a reward and recompense to those who have been charged by God to minister unto Him on behalf of the people that they have charge over. For example in the old covenant, the Levites had no inheritance in the land. Their needs and those of their families were met by receiving and using the tithes of the people (Num. 18:21-32). In this way they were free to consecrate themselves solely to the work of ministry, and to do so without distraction. This process was an antitype to the new covenant command that those who are taught should share in all good things with him who teaches (Gal. 6:6), and that those who preach the Gospel should live from the Gospel (1st Cor. 9:14). In addition to this there is the command of the Lord Jesus which says that the laborer is worthy of his wages, and that it is not lawful to muzzle the ox while it treads out the grain. So then on a practical level we can see that God uses the tithe to support those who have given up personal ambition in order to serve the cause of the Gospel. Now of course these still have the same needs as anyone else who tills the ground or tends the herds so to speak. So God has provided a mechanism by which these can receive sustenance from the ones who are being blessed by their ministry..
The second reason for tithing is a spiritual one and has to do with the ongoing battle between the forces of good and evil. Now, as already discussed, the wealth of the earth long ago fell into the hands of the devil because of the sin of Adam. And left to himself the adversary would insure that everyone remains a pauper for the rest of their lives. He is the agent of the curse that is on the earth because of the sin of Adam, and part of the manifestation of that curse is that the devil is loath to let you prosper if you belong to the Lord Jesus. Now what the Lord has done to mitigate this situation is to sanctify the tenth part of our increase unto Himself, thus removing it from the dominion of the devil. Now so freed, this tithe can now serve as a foundation upon which the Lord can build a stable financial house in our lives. Thus He insures that we will always have all sufficiency despite the devil’s control over the world’s overall financial empire.
Now of course this only works when we are faithful in the tithe, and when we are not then the curse automatically kicks in because that is the natural state of man’s finances. That is why the Lord said what He did in the book of Malachi concerning the children of Israel and their unfaithfulness in the tithe. He said that they were cursed with a curse. Now most people think that He was pronouncing punishment for being disobedient. However what He was actually telling them, was that their rebellion in the tithe had made them subject to the curse that was already present in the land and working in the sons of disobedience. A good analogy to understand this is as follows. When it is raining outside you usually carry an umbrella so that you won’t get wet. However, this protection only works if you use it, moreover it will not stop the rain from falling. It will only keep you from getting wet. Now if you lower your umbrella then you will get wet because it is still raining. So too is everyone who is not faithful in their tithes. The devil is “raining” down financial cursing on everyone. Now those who are faithful have their “umbrellas” up and they don’t get wet. But those who are rebellious have their umbrellas lowered and therefore they are subject to getting wet. So then it should be helpful to view tithing not as some sort of punishment from God, but as a channel of safe passage through some very treacherous financial waters.
And
finally the third reason for tithing is that we might show our obedience to His
commandments, which is of course indicative of our faith. Now remember that
without faith it is impossible to please God. You see it demonstrates great
faith when one is willing to “sacrifice” a portion of their precious resources
and then to put their trust in the promises of God who has said that He is a
rewarder of those who diligently seek
Him. So tithing becomes one of the best ways to honor God, by sharing with Him
that which is very precious to us, namely our money. The exercise of our faith
comes from the fact that He has promised to reward us in a certain way if we
are faithful. And we have the choice to believe Him or not. The process then
essentially becomes a contract between us and Him. If we do our part and we
have confidence in Him as not being a man that He should lie, then we can fully expect Him to live up to His end of
the deal. ( Mal 3:8-10). This principle is beautifully illustrated in Hebrews
7:1-10.
.
b.
The Mechanics of the Tithe:
Now I will discuss the nuts and bolts of tithing. First of all, the tithe consists of the tenth part of our “increase.” Well just what exactly is an increase? Back in the days of the law of Moses the people were generally farmers and herdsmen. So calculating an increase was easy. If you started the year with 500 head of cattle, and finished the year with 600 head , then your increase was 100 head. Therefore your tithe was 10 head. Or if your field was empty in January and then produced 1000 bushels of wheat in October, then your increase is 1000 bushels, and your tithe is 100 bushels. Of course today few people still work in the farming or cattle industry, but most of us punch a time clock and are paid in currency. So then your increase is simply the amount of your salary for the given period of time. For example if you are paid every two weeks and your gross pay is $1000.00, then that is your increase and your tithe is $100.00.
I am frequently asked questions about whether one should tithe on their gross pay or their net. The rational for this question is that most people think that because the government deducts their portion of your money before you get it, that it isn’t really your money or attributed to an increase unto you. Well that isn’t true and whether you have the money pre-deducted or you send it in quarterly, your increase is still the gross amount of your salary. For example if someone asks you how much money you make, and the amount is $50,000.00 per year, don’t you say fifty thousand, and not thirty five thousand, which is the actual amount that you get to keep? It is evident that we don’t have any control over the government’s refusal to trust us to send in the money, and if they deduct it up front that does not absolve us of our responsibility to pay the Lord what we owe Him. Now if we tithe on the net then we have allowed the government to have the firstfruits which rightly belong to the Lord. So don’t let the IRS defraud you of your blessings by being prioritized higher in your financial mindset than the Lord of heaven. The only way to avoid this is to tithe on your entire gross paycheck.
At this time it is appropriate to discuss just where one should pay their tithes. In the book of Malachi, the Lord commanded them to bring all of the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in His house. Well what or where is the storehouse? According to the Law of Moses the storehouse was the temple where the people brought their tithes and it was from here that the Levites disbursed them for themselves and for all who had need. Well I don’t think that you have to be a rocket scientist to figure that the New Testament equivalent is the local church. Inasmuch as each local congregation is an independent organization that ministers primarily to the spiritual and material needs of its own members, it is the responsibility of those members to see that the pastor of that church has what he needs to discharge his duties.
Now what if you don’t have a church that you call home? Then I would suggest that you find one as soon as possible. Not for the sake of the tithe per se, but for your own spiritual development. And when you do find one, then your tithe belongs there, and all of it belongs there. Do not split it among other churches or organizations, but if you wish to give then give an additional offering. In addition it is important to make sure that the storehouse that you sow your tithe into is sound. In other words, you should not tithe to the dead (Deut. 26:11-15), for if you do then your tithe will be unfruitful. So what constitutes a dead church? I would define a dead church as one in which the Spirit does not dwell or has been quenched, and the Word of God is of no effect. If you sow your seed there, that is tantamount to throwing it onto concrete. It will not grow.
Another issue on the mechanics of
tithing is the question of rounding. Remember that the Lord commanded to bring ALL of the tithes into the storehouse.
Don’t be robbed of your return for the sake of a few cents. For example, let’s
say that your increase was $437.00. So then your tithe would be 43.70. Now
maybe you would like to round to the nearest dollar. Well don’t round down to
$43.00 since then you would be robbing God of seventy cents. But rather round
up to $44.00 so that the Lord receives ALL
of the tithes into His storehouse. Now some may think that I am nitpicking, but
this attention to detail concerning the Word of God shows great faithfulness.
And finally above all else be
consistent in your paying of the tithe, for if you really do believe the Word
then you will never give up on being obedient, no matter how long it may seem
to take to get a return. I believe that the main reason for the usual time lag
between the sowing and the reaping is to weed out the unbelieving by showing
the intentions of their hearts by their inconsistency. Remember the admonition
of the Lord, that we should not grow weary in doing good, and that in due
season we would reap if we do not lose heart or grow faint. Also be mindful of
the fact that the tithe is due whether or not you come to church on a
particular Sunday. If for some reason you miss a tithing cycle, say for example
because of vacation, then add it to the next tithe when you return. Now what if
you are one of those who knew these things but were not faithful to them? Are
you permanently disqualified? Certainly not! Only be mindful that continued
inconsistency is the result of weak faith and that weak faith will keep you
from walking in all of the liberty of the Gospel.
V.
Personal Stewardship:
Now that we have explored the realm of the tenth part, let’s spend a little time discussing the proper disposition of the remaining 90%. Improper stewardship in this area can derail your finances just as easily as not paying your tithes. There are many times that I have seen Christians who are paying their tithes faithfully, but still seem to be struggling financially. Usually it is relatively easy to discern that they are falling short in the financial stewardship of their 90%. Remember that the Lord is no fool, He will not throw good money after bad. Remember what Jesus said “ If you are not faithful in little, nor will you be faithful in what is much” (Luke 16:13). The most important warning that I can give concerning money is not to love it. In other words make money your servant, don’t you be a slave to it. Now the interesting thing about the love of money is that you can be guilty of loving it even if you don’t have a dime. Your love of money is defined not by how much of it you have, but by what you are willing to do to obtain it. Will you lie, cheat, steal or, God forbid, murder to obtain money? Then you are guilty of serving mammon . Believe it or not, there are many brethren who faithfully tithe but nonetheless are filled with the pride of life, and a lust for things, and therefore see tithing as a means toward that end. I remind you that God is a discerner of the heart, and He is always aware of your true motives for anything that you do. So remember my warning about being content. In this way you cannot be seduced into the trap of loving money, which will lead to lust for things, and all of the financial impropriety that goes along with it.
In addition to this, you must be careful not to become a slave to the system of unrighteous mammon which seeks to keep all men in financial bondage throughout their entire lives. Now the main way that this deception works is by operating through man’s basic lust for things. The system will provide the means for obtaining these things, but at the cost of your future. The principle tool of the system is usury. This is the fetter that makes the borrower a slave to the lender. What you must realize is that when you borrow money at interest you are trading portions of your future earnings in exchange for the use of that item now. We have been bound for so long under the regime of the beast system that most of us have forgotten that it is God’s primary wish for us to be in liberty. Now it is impossible to walk in liberty as long as we are encumbered financially. Think about it for a minute. Most people spend the overwhelming majority of their waking moments in the pursuit of money in order to provide for their basic needs. We spend 8-10 or more hours on a job, and then several more preparing for and winding down from the job. Then we throw our weary bodies into bed so that we can gain the strength to repeat the process all over again the next day. This is the existence to which most people endure, being slaves or serfs to someone else who has found out that it is better to be the master than the slave. I tell you that there is a better way, and it does not require you to be a multimillionaire.
If you learn to be faithful in these principles that I am laying out, then you can be abundantly supplied and have sufficiency for all of your needs and your desires. In Luke ch. 16 the Lord Jesus commands us to make friends with the unrighteous mammon, which means to be good stewards so that we may obtain a good testimony. Remember the admonition that in all things to be content. In this way you will not succumb to the temptation to be a lover of money, and as such, to submit yourself to lifelong slavery to the system. Now am I saying in this that you should never borrow money? No of course not, but I am saying that you should be thoughtful about what you are willing to mortgage portions of your future for. For example, it is better to have a mortgage on a home that you will eventually own, than it is to be a lifelong renter. In addition, if you are borrowing to buy a car that enables you to get to a job that pays much more than the one that you can take the bus to, then that would be a wise expenditure. Historically it is not these kinds of purchases that get people in trouble, but borrowing for too many superfluous things that can be put off until a cash purchase is possible. We in the church today do not hear solid teaching on how to handle our finances, and moreover the leadership of many churches are themselves guilty of fiscal irresponsibility. So therefore if the blind lead the blind, then you know the final destination. I will now briefly cover some of the more common financial areas that people are subject to falling short in so that the reader may be adequately instructed in the ways of good stewardship.
1. Credit Cards: These are terrible instruments of evil when
improperly used, as they frequently are. Credit cards are some of the most
effective weapons in the devil’s arsenal of financial tricks. Misuse of credit
cards allows the impatient and discontented Christian to pursue the lusts of
the flesh. They operate by allowing you to indulge the flesh now and pay for it,
albeit at a high premium at a later date. By design they violate the
fundamental spiritual law of sowing and reaping. They are like a farmer who
goes out to his field in January and finds there an abundant harvest, but then
is required to sow that field in September, as well as three other neighboring
fields in addition. Now this is of course illogical, but then so is mortgaging
your future to take a vacation that you will still be paying for long after you
have forgotten where it was that you visited. Consider the following chilling
fact. If you owe say 2 or 3 thousand dollars on a credit card and you pay only
the minimum payment that the credit card company requires, then it will take
you approximately 18 years to pay off that balance. And when you are finished,
you will have paid three to four times
the original amount borrowed. Now you understand why there are so many
companies offering to send you cards. You didn’t think it was because they
cared for your financial health, did you?
No it is because they seek an ever renewing pool of financial slaves
whose sweat can continue to fill their coffers with wealth so they don’t have
to be the ones sweating. In this nation there is a huge industry of debt incursion and management through
deficit spending which plagues every facet of our society, not only personal
finances, but also business and the government. It has all gotten so bad, and
the debt load so large, that there is no hope of ever truly paying off all
of our national indebtedness. The
entire situation is spinning wildly out of control unbeknownst to most of us.
Trust me, in this game of financial musical chairs, you don’t want to be there
when the music stops.
What recommendations then can I make
concerning credit cards? The first one is
this. If you cannot be trusted to use them responsibly, then you should cut
them up immediately. Responsible use
would constitute not using them to make unnecessary purchases, or non emergency
purchases that cannot be paid off by the end of the billing cycle. If you carry
more than one or two cards, and run a balance on them then you are guilty of
financial mismanagement. You should destroy your cards immediately before you
get yourself in more trouble. And don’t fool yourself, you can always come up with
some excuse to use them if they remain in your pocket and you remain in rebellion.
2.
Home Equity Loans: These are particularly nasty little buggers.
Inasmuch as most people have already succumbed to the kinds of financial
bondage that I have been discussing, their financial picture has been looking
pretty bleak. However, there was a safety net which was the equity that people
had in their homes which built up as they paid them off. In that way although
most folks couldn’t save very much, they at least built up a hidden savings
account in the equity of their homes. Now this “savings” could be cashed in
when the home was paid for and the kids were gone, and retirement loomed. For
at this time the large home that was no longer needed could be sold at a
substantial profit and a smaller one purchased for cash leaving a goodly sum of
money to help secure one’s retirement. Well you didn’t think that the devil was
going to overlook this loophole did you?
He found a way to appeal to the lingering greed and love of money that
could no longer be satisfied through traditional means. Now you are being
enticed to tap into all of that tidy equity through home equity loans and
second mortgages. The pitch is not to let it just sit there, but why not use it
to do all of those things that you have always wanted to do but didn’t have the
money? Buy that (fill in the blank :
motor home, boat, car, country home, etc.) take that vacation that you have
always wanted. Use the money for anything at all. Of course what you are not
told is that by the time your body has used up its usefulness in making money,
you will still be heavily in debt and unable to retire. I know of cases where
there are people over 70 years old trying to get thirty year mortgages on their
houses, making them over 100 when they finally get their house paid off. Now
why would a bank even lend such a person the money, seeing as how it is
practically impossible to repay the loan? Well remember that the mortgage is
secured by the value of your home, meaning that if you default on the payment
or die before completion of the term of the loan the bank gets your house. So
much for your children’s inheritance, unless of course they can satisfy the
amount of the debt. Not very likely seeing as how they are probably every bit
as fiscally irresponsible as their parents.
3. Car Leasing: This is the
phenomenon where you essentially rent a vehicle long term. It is a way for
people to drive more car than they could otherwise afford. It would be ok if
your goal in life were to be perpetually in debt. But after all just how long
do you really want to have a car payment? You are much better off buying a less
expensive car and spending a few years paying for it. Thereafter you will be
driving for the cost of maintenance only.
The only time that leasing makes any sense at all is if your job
requires the use of the car in actual income generating purposes, such as a
traveling salesman, or a real estate broker. Under these circumstances the cost
of the lease may be fully tax deductible, and may be further subsidized by
being able to get rid of high mileage vehicles at regular intervals before they
become cash cows.
4. Taxes: You know the old adage
about the certainty of death and taxes. Well I’m more convinced of the
perpetual presence of taxes than I am of death. Now it amazes me how many
people develop amnesia concerning paying their taxes. They somehow think that
the IRS will forget about them and not demand payment. Eventually you will have
to face the music, and it will always be accompanied by high interest and
penalties. Nobody can make debt multiply like the federal government. They can
easily turn a $3,000.00 tax debt into a $10,000.00 one literally overnight. Beware of those who try to tell
you that we are not obligated to pay taxes because the government engages in so
many unwholesome activities, or that paying taxes is unconstitutional. These
are true but nevertheless we have allowed the camel’s nose into the tent. and
now he is not only eating our figs, but also defecating on our Persian rugs. I
would strongly advise you not to make your stand of Christianity here, because
if you do, you will very likely be making it from the inside of a jail cell.
There are much more important issues to risk incarceration and death over than
the protest of taxation, especially since the Lord expressly commands us to pay
taxes to whom they are due, so we do not have a scriptural mandate to forego
this responsibility. Moreover, we cannot refuse to pay simply because the
government is a poor steward of our tax dollars. So until we all rise up and
agree to hold the government accountable to live within its means and to return
to a constitutionally mandated form of income generation, you do well to make
sure that the proper withholdings are being taken out of your paychecks. This
is much better than to having to pay the piper later.
5. Too Many Kids: Is there such a thing as having too many children?
Absolutely. Well then who decides how many are too many? That’s easy, your wallet! Be advised that
having and successfully raising kids is very expensive business. That is if you
plan on doing it correctly by providing them with every opportunity to grow up to become useful citizens. In some
cases educating a child can cost about as much as buying a house. Now with most
of our society in non agricultural work, and with the great improvement in
infant mortality, there no longer remains a need for voluminous procreating to
ensure the survival of the family into the next generation. I guess a good
credo would be to have as many children as you like. Just make sure that you
can afford to pay for the responsibility of having those children.
6.
Keeping Up With the Jones’ (Escalating Home Buying): I’m sure that all of you have heard of this term. It has to do with
the compulsion that many have to make sure that they don’t appear to be less
prosperous than their family, friends and neighbors. Well I hate to be the
bearer of bad news, but sometimes you are less prosperous than the others
around you. You have to learn not to measure your self esteem by the quantity
of your possessions. When you think
about it, not a soul owns anything anyway. What do you get to take with you
when you depart this earth? I believe that you get to depart with exactly what
you came with, and that is nakedness. No more, no less. Besides all of this,
those who appear to be so prosperous are not really so. They have all of those possessions through violating all
of these principles that I have been giving you. Most of the people in this
country don’t even own the clothes on
their backs. Everything that they purchase is on credit and therefore is still
owned by the creditor. If you don’t believe this, then just stop making
payments on your car or house or washing machine for three months. Then you
will find out who really owns your stuff when they send someone to retrieve
their property.
A particularly
onerous subset of this phenomenon is what I call escalating home buying. This
is where people continue to buy bigger and bigger homes, and then reverse the
process as their circumstances change. What they don’t realize is that every
time you purchase a home, it incurs an enormous financial burden that is
manifested in the form of the many fees, taxes, real estate charges, and the
like. Not to mention that every time you make another purchase of a home, you
reset your mortgage pushing your payoff date further into your future. Sooner
or later you will run out of future before you run out of mortgage payments. Now I’m not saying that a family should not
upgrade out of a house that is too small, especially in the face of increasing
numbers of ever growing children. But beyond a certain size more house is
simply a statement of status and not a matter of necessity. Now if you simply
wish to portray status then pay cash for the house, because a slave is still a
slave no matter how well hidden the chains. Now this situation is made even
worse when you factor in the fact that nowadays most homes are saddled not only
with a 1st mortgage, but also with at least one more. In many cases
these loans are simply rolled into the new mortgage which serves the purpose of
tightening the noose of financial collapse ever tighter around the neck of your
fiscal empire. My recommendation in this matter is to eventually upgrade to a
“right” sized home, one in which you and your wife can grow old together, and
one that can be paid for before your bones turn to dust. Just in case you
didn’t realize it, there is no law that says that you must be in debt.
7. Quality vs. Price: Have you ever noticed that most every item that you
purchase is available in different levels of quality, and consequently at
different price points? All other things being equal, generally you get what
you pay for. From a long term cost
perspective, it is better to pay a little more for something than to purchase
the lesser expensive item several times. I believe the old saying went
something like this; don’t be penny wise and pound foolish. In other words you
may not be actually saving money by buying the lesser expensive version of a
particular item, since it is likely to wear out faster or break more easily and
need replacing more often. Now of
course if your finances are extremely tight and the least expensive is all that
you can afford, then thank God for the least expensive, otherwise you might
have to go naked.
8. Education – “Trade schools”: There is a direct correlation between your
earning power and you educational level. Simply stated, the higher your educational
level, the more money you make for a given expenditure of man-hours. If you are
going to work eight hours a day, wouldn’t you rather come home with $1,000.00
in your pocket than $100.00? Of course you would. Well the difference between
the two is your level of education. So get all the education that you can and
get it while you are young and on your parents “dime”. This way you have the
best chance to arrive at adulthood in good shape to make a success of your
life, and to provide a good family environment for your own children.
One caveat is in order here. Be wary
of certain kinds of so called “trade” schools. These are those who charge
exorbitant rates and give very little of practical usefulness in return. They
are basically businesses that exist solely to receive the proceeds from the
student loans of their hapless student victims. They promise jobs that they are
rarely able to deliver on and provide “skills” that are marginal or available
for almost free at the local junior college. So before you encumber yourself
through student loans on a questionable educational experience, check out the
school carefully. Check references and the local BBB. Ask to see their
statistics on successfully placing graduates in the jobs that they were trained
for. Make sure that the curriculum that you will be studying is not available
at your local junior college for a fraction of the cost. Most importantly,
dispassionately consider as to whether
or not there is a job market available for the field that you have chosen to
study. In other words it would not be wise to study oceanography if you plan on
staying in Iowa.
9.
Debt Consolidation: Frequently when people are in financial
difficulty they make efforts to extricate themselves. Toward this end they will
try many different tactics and schemes to put themselves on firmer financial
ground. The reason that this almost never works is that unless a person has a
change of heart concerning their financial stewardship, any attempt at fixing
the problem will simply be like putting a bandage on a bleeding artery. It may
hide the damage for a while, but it will not stop it from eventually killing
you. A frequently used method of this type is the concept of debt
consolidation. This consists of obtaining a new loan, usually secured by your
house, to pay off existing loans such as credit card debt and the like. Now in
theory this arrangement can work since it rolls all of those individual monthly
payments at high interest rates into one smaller payment at a lower rate. The
problem is that this does not address the issue of fiscal irresponsibility that
got you into trouble in the first place. So more often than not, what happens
is that in short order you will not only have the debt consolidation loan, but
also renewed credit card and other debt piled on top of it, thus making a bad
financial situation even worse. So one must exercise wisdom in this matter. If
you have truly repented of your spendthrift ways, then rolling all of your
debts into one payment is fine. But do not fool yourself into thinking that
this will save you from an attitude of loving money.
10. Funerals: You might be thinking, what do funerals have to do with
financial stewardship? Well obviously you have never had to bury anyone.
Generally it costs more to dispose of someone’s carcass than it does to bring
them into the world in the first place. And since death is usually such an
uncomfortable subject, few people make adequate preparations for their funeral
costs, thus leaving the task to their bereaved family members. Now when you
factor in the inevitable guilt that many families have concerning the dearly
departed, you have a recipe for serious overspending that results in financial
distress. It is important for the Christian to take a more pragmatic approach
to matters of death, since we are supposed to have more insight into the
phenomenon than the world. We should not succumb to heavy emotionalism and
despair as those of the world who are without the hope of the resurrection. Nor
should we be guilt laden over some sense of failure to love the dearly departed
while they were alive. After all what better expression of love is there than
to smell like Jesus to them? So don’t get caught up in the ways of the world by
trying to assuage guilt in overspending on a lavish funeral that you cannot
afford, and will be paying for, for many years to come. Account that the love
of the Lord Jesus that you exhibited before them while they were alive was
sufficient to demonstrate your love for them.
11. Weddings While I’m on the subject of needless
overspending, let’s consider the issue of weddings. It has been my experience
that in an awful lot of cases, betrothed couples (especially women) have spent
much more energy and effort on the wedding then they ever did on the marriage.
They somehow fail to realize that the wedding lasts for one afternoon or
evening, but the marriage is supposed to last a lifetime. Young women will
begin planning their weddings from the time that they are little girls. They
will pay attention to the smallest detail, and ponder endlessly the
implications of a particular color scheme, or floral arrangement. They will
agonize over the guest list and who will sit next to whom. But despite all of
this they will marry the first guy that fills their head with lies and empty
promises. It is the responsibility of the father of the bride to help his keep
his daughter from making a poor choice in a husband. He would do well to see
that all of this effort, rather than being geared toward the irrelevance of the
wedding, would be much better expended in making sure that his virgin is
marrying the right man in the first place. So don’t go into debt over a
marriage that won’t last much longer than the wedding that initiated it.
Convince your daughter that the wedding does not make the marriage, nor does
the success of the marriage depend on the lavishness of the wedding.
12. Overspending for Holidays: Well I guess that I am still on the subject
of overspending. This time let’s talk about the practice of spending too much
on holiday gifts. Every year most people engage in a ritual of buying too many
or too expensive presents for people and then suffering through the rest of the
year trying to pay for their purchases. This error would be a lot harder to engage
in if people weren’t so dependent on credit cards, seeing as how they make it
possible for you to spend money that you do not have. So once again motivated
by guilt, low self esteem, pride, greed, or all of the above, the Christian
will give in to the lust of the flesh and end up in dire financial straits. Now
buying all of the gifts that you want is fine, if you pay for them immediately,
and don’t use money that should be spent more judiciously elsewhere. The
problem is not in the buying of gifts, but in incurring additional debt to do
it. If you can’t afford to buy presents, don’t worry about it. Any family
member of friend who truly loves you, will understand and not think
disparagingly of you. And any who do, are lying when they say that they care about
you, and are not worthy of a gift anyway.
13. Asset Management: The last item of personal stewardship that I will
discuss is the area of how you handle your assets. Now I recognize that to a
lot of you this part of the discussion will have no relevance. Seeing as how
you have already fallen short in the previous twelve areas, you don’t have any
assets to manage. Nevertheless after you have begun to apply these principles
and to reap the fruit of them, you will begin to have more money staying in
than going out. At that time it will become important to know how to manage
those assets so that the devil doesn’t have the opportunity to rob you after
all. In light of the previous sections, it should be obvious that there are a
couple of major themes that run through all of the areas in which Christians
fall short. They are greed and impatience. Well if you are not careful, you can
fall short in these areas when it comes to managing your finances. If you find
yourself with money that is in excess of your obligations, then you are well
positioned to help to shore up your financial future. However you must be wise
in how you “invest” it. First of all I would say this. It is always better to
use extra money to reduce current indebtedness than to invest it in something.
The reason is that your rate of return will always be less than the interest
that you are paying on a debt. The system is designed that way to keep people from using other
people’s money to actually get ahead. So say you have an extra thousand dollars,
but you owe two thousand on a credit card at 18% interest. Apply it to the
credit balance rather than put the money in some kind of account which would
likely pay considerably less interest than what the credit card company is
charging you. Until your debts are paid, I would suggest keeping only enough
extra money aside to handle emergencies, and applying the rest to getting out
of debt.
Now once you are debt free and you
continue to have surplus, you will then need to consider what to do with it. In
this matter I do not claim to be an expert in
charting a course through the murky financial waters of the world
system. But by applying some basic spiritual principles, I can give you good
guidelines to follow so that you run less risk of having your hard earned money
fall into the hands of unscrupulous individuals. There is an entire teaching
that I can give on the subject of finances and how the world has corrupted the economic system that the Lord has given
us to supply the needs of everyone. But for now I will limit myself to a few
simple principles to enable you to steer clear of the devil’s financial
pitfalls.
The first thing that you must
consider when you are dealing with the concept of your assets is this. Are they
loanership, or ownership assets? Loanership assets are the most common way to
accumulate wealth, and they involve you “lending” your money to some financial institution such as
a bank, or the government (through savings bonds),who will pay you in the form
of interest for the use of your money. Now while they have your money, don’t
think that they sit idly on it, because they don’t. They put it to good use by
lending it to someone else, someone who has not learned the lessons of this
essay. And of course these banks do not lend the money for free, but they
charge the borrower interest for the use of your money. Now count yourself
quite insightful if you guessed that the amount of interest that the bank
charges the person to whom they lend your money is much more than the amount of
interest that they pay you for loaning them your money. So then loanership
assets are those in which you exchange actual valuables for a receipt for those assets, and a promise to
pay a certain rate of return for their use. The risk of this arrangement should
immediately become apparent. You are relying on the good intentions of the
people that you entrust your money to. If they are not faithful then you could
lose all of your assets, and be left with nothing but your receipt.
Now ownership assets are those that
represent something of true intrinsic value. Examples include real estate, and
precious metals such as gold and silver. The value of these assets cannot be
made to disappear with the stroke of a pen or a keyboard, so it is much harder
for the rascals to engage in shenanigans with them. Inasmuch as the value of
these types of assets are not so nearly linked with the beast system of the
world, they tend to be much more stable in their buying power over the long
haul. This is the very attribute that tends to make them unattractive to the
greedy and the impatient.( In other words, those who are trying to make the big
score). Remember this general principle. The
greater the return, the greater the risk. Ultimately you will have to
prayerfully consider what balance you would like to maintain between these two
forms of investment. As long as the basic structure of our fiat money system
remains intact, you will probably see your money again if you let the devil
borrow it. But it is certainly prudent to hedge your bets by keeping some of
your assets in the form of something that
is more than a promise to pay you in the future.
Conclusion: We
have covered quite a bit of territory in this teaching, and I have endeavored
to present a balanced approach to these very important issues. You should never
make the mistake of thinking that God does not care about your financial
status. It is evident from the high number of Scriptures devoted to instruction
on stewardship of finances that the Lord is acutely interested in our being
abundantly supplied. However, He is also willing to sacrifice our prosperity if
it keeps us from serving Him. Of course it is best to serve Him period, and
then watch as He performs His Word on our behalf, and shows us His salvation.
In other words, you can have the Lord and prosperity, for they need not be
mutually exclusive. If any of you fancy yourselves spiritual, then you will
acknowledge that I have presented the admonitions of the eternal Word of God,
and that His Word will not come back void. So then if you have lack in your
finances, search your heart to see where you are missing it, and then make the
correction. But don’t you dare blame God for your predicament by claiming that
your poverty is His will, or that He has no desire to see His people be
obedient and to do well, so that He may make their way prosperous. Amen.