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"Owe no man
anything..."
-Romans 13:8
"...the borrower becomes the lender's
slave."
-Proverbs 22:7
"...the
righteous man shall live by faith."
-Romans 1:17
"...without
faith it is impossible to please Him."
-Hebrews 11:6
"No one can
serve two masters..."
-Matthew 6:24
"The Lord
will make you abound in prosperity..."
-Deuteronomy 25:11
"...God
loves a cheerful giver."
-2 Corinthians 9:7
"...the
Lord... is giving you power to make
wealth..."
-Deuteronomy 8:18
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Greetings in the name of Christ Jesus!
Biblical prosperity is the state of total well being where God
is meeting all your needs: spirit, soul and body.
Since the beginning of this series we have emphasized that
biblical prosperity isn't limited to just money and finances.
Rather, the prosperity that God offers is for the entire human
life: spirit, soul and body. This perspective is accurately
expressed in the Hebrew word "shalom" translated in the Old
Testament as both "peace" and "prosperity." It's also expressed
in the New Testament as the "peace that passes all
understanding" by which Jesus makes available abundant LIFE
to all Believers (John 10:10). Both expressions convey a
condition of completed well being in which there's nothing
missing or broken in any area of one's life.
But we've also maintained that the Word of God does not
exclude our finances from His prosperity. On the contrary, our
money is an important part of it even though traditional
teaching has tried for centuries to convince us that the Bible
isn't really talking about our personal finances when it
mentions "prosperity." Rather, according to tradition those
particular scriptures are concerned with higher spiritual things,
a type of esoteric prosperity reserved for the future that we just
can't fully understand in our present condition without
assistance from experienced theologians.
Friend, the truth is prosperity scriptures speak clearly for
themselves; study them out in the original languages and
you'll find they're usually talking about our personal
possessions in one form or another. Men have tried to exclude
finances from biblical prosperity in an attempt to explain why
so many Believers aren't prosperous. But, it just isn't possible to
experience "shalom" if one's finances are inadequate.
Likewise,
the fullness of the "peace that passes all understanding" can't
exist where there's present financial lack. Scripturally then,
completed well being includes our current finances. Shall we
believe the Word of God as it's written or the traditions of men?
In sum, while the Lord's prosperity message isn't limited to just
our current personal finances, it's NOT correct to interpret that
scripture excludes those personal finances from His message.
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Why God is Concerned About Money |
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In fact, God is actually quite interested in how we deal with,
relate to and use our finances in the present here and now. Did
you know that more than two-thirds of the parables in the four
New Testament Gospels are concerned with money,
possessions or property? Although Jesus said and did much
more than what was actually recorded in those Gospels (John
21:25), it's reasonable to conclude from the parables that
money was an important topic for Him. Indeed the parables are
there in His Word because God wants to teach us about His
money. But the question we want to address today is: why is
God so interested in the topic of personal finances?
One reason can be found in Luke 12:34: "For where your
treasure is, there you heart will be also" (see also Matthew
6:21). In other words, whatever you value highly in life will be
important to you. Jesus was trying to teach us here that if we
hold money in too high a regard, we are likely to end up with
wrong priorities in our lives because the power of money is so
strong it will become of higher importance to us than the
Kingdom of God (Luke 12:31). Jesus taught that when that
happens, when money is too important, we will then prefer to
store up for ourselves treasure on earth instead of treasure in
Heaven (Matthew 6:19-20, Matthew 19:21, Mark 10:21, Luke
12:21, and Luke 18:22).
Another reason God is so interested in how we handle money
is the simple principle that if we fall in love with our money or
possessions, we're sure to fall into evil. Does the Bible not say
that "the love of money is the root of all evil" (1
Timothy
6:10)? It also says that the love of money leads to
disappointment, dissatisfaction and destruction (1 Samuel 8:3,
Proverbs 1:13-16, Ecclesiastes 5:10, Jeremiah 17:11 and
Micah 3:11-12) as well as to sorrow and wandering away from
the faith (1 Timothy 6:10 and James 5:3). Thus, it can be said
that although Jesus came to bring us abundant life (John
10:10), the love of money is in fundamental conflict with that
gift because we are required, among other things, to seek first
the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33) in order to receive His
abundance.
Most of God's material provision comes to us in the form of
money or possessions which we have to learn how to deal with
it in a Godly and righteous manner. While we are not to love
money, we can't hate it either because God has purpose for us
in the use of His money. He needs to be able to get it into our
hands with confidence it will be used correctly according to
scripture to achieve two principle objectives: 1) to build the
Kingdom of God, and 2) to bless other people. The bottom
line is that Jesus devoted so much attention in the Gospels to
the subject of finances because no Believer can fulfill the
purposes God has called him/her to fulfill without learning how
to prioritize and use money correctly and because nothing in
life approaches the power of money to corrupt us and lead us
into destruction.
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God's Priorities for the Use of His Money |
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Scripture reveals that God has definite and specific priorities
for how we're to use the money He provides. Despite this, most
of us go through life without giving too much thought to how
we're spending it or whether or not He might have a plan we're
supposed to be following. As a result we make wrong decisions
and suffer the consequences of not having God involved in this
important area of our lives.
The truth is God's priorities for spending money are
significantly different from the priorities we pursue when left to
ourselves. If we compare the different priorities starting from
most important and going to the least important, we can see
the clear difference:
God's Priorities Tithes
Offerings/Blessing others Our
needs Rewards
Our Priorities Rewards Our
needs Doing what we want to do Tithes and Offerings
The Word clearly shows that God's highest priority for His
provision is the return of the first 10 percent of our increase, the
first fruits or tithe. By returning the first part to God, we honor
Him (Proverbs 3:9) because we're releasing something we
treasure and we're putting Him ahead of our personal wants
and desires. We're also putting first the Kingdom of God
because tithe money is used for building the Kingdom. But,
when we allow the flesh to tell us what to do instead of the
Word, most of us will tithe only after we've spent our money on
what we want and then only if we have
anything left over.
Why does God require that we place Him first in our lives?
Certainly He's worthy; He's the Creator and everything in the
universe belongs to Him. He's Lord of all. Is this why He
demands that we put Him first? Well, those would be good
reasons; but there's a much better reason in the Father's heart.
The truth is putting Him first is for our own good
because if we don't put Him first, we'll wind up putting
ourselves first. And when we put ourselves first, we're doomed
to certain failure in everything we try because we'll be trying to
do those things in our own strength. Jesus said, "apart from
Me you can do nothing" (John 15:5).
Friend, the bottom line is this: we've been created with an
inherited dependence upon God. If it weren't so, He would
have created peers instead of children. And by returning the
tithe as your first priority for His money, you are making the
admission, confirmed in scripture, that you have chosen to
depend on Him for your provision. You have voluntarily
submitted to His Lordship over the one thing you would
otherwise hold most dear. When you do that, you open the
door to the prosperity and the running over abundance God
has promised in His Word (Malachi 3:10, Luke 6:38, 2
Corinthians 9:8 and many other scriptures).
And what are we supposed to do with that abundance? A lot of
us in the Christian community want to believe that God desires
to bless us with prosperity and abundance simply because He
wants us all to be rich and have big houses, a lot of cars and
surplus money to spend on whatever comes to our minds. But
that's an incomplete perspective. Indeed God wants us to
prosper and succeed, but friend there's a higher purpose: we
are to use that wealth to bless others as an expression, a
manifestation, of God's love (2 Corinthians 9:8-11)
before we consume it all on ourselves. In other
words, blessing others must be a higher priority in our lives than
self consumption. When it's not, we're in danger of consuming
on ourselves the seed God has given for the purpose of
blessing others and in the process cutting off the multiplied
harvest God wants to make available to us (2 Corinthians 9:10).
Scripture warns us to be on guard against greed and to not use
our abundance to acquire possessions just to store them up
(Luke 12:15-21). Therefore, each of us must find out from God
how much we are to sow into good works so we avoid the
mistake of consuming that money on ourselves.
Not until the third priority for the use of money do we come to
provision for our needs. The reason is that the Word makes it
clear in Matthew 6:25-34 that we're not to be concerned about
the basic requirements for life because God has already taken
care of them. The only thing we really need to do is clearly
identify what our needs actually are because we have a
tendency to let other things come over into the "needs"
category when we ask God for provision. If we think we have to
ask Him for funds to cover our needs it's probably an indication
that something in our lives is not quite right anyway because
scripture says not to be concerned about it. One of the major
problem areas is indebtedness which has usually resulted from
occasions when we provided for ourselves instead of being
content with God's provision. Then once in debt we began to
view our repayment requirements as a need that God is
supposed to cover for us when in fact His Word warns us to stay
away from indebtedness. In sum, we need to avoid debt so
repayment doesn't become an issue with God's provision and
we should identify what our needs really are and refuse to be
concerned about the related provision.
The fourth of God's priorities for money is that it be used to
reward or compensate each Believer according to the fruit he
or she has produced working for the Kingdom of God. The
Bible says that a laborer is worthy of his wages (Luke 10:7).
Therefore, those who produce fruit for the Kingdom of God can
expect to receive the appropriate "wages" for their work. When
you give offerings of your money out of love to bless
others you are producing fruit. And whatever you give up for
the sake of the Gospel will be returned to you a hundred times
over in this present age (Mark 10:29-30). Therefore a portion of
the money God is giving you is a return for the good fruit that
you have produced for the Kingdom of God. As you prove your
faithfulness with a little, God will trust you with greater amounts
and He will reward you with increasing compensation.
In addition to compensation here in this age, the Bible says in
several places (Matthew 19:21, Mark 10:21, Luke 12:33, and
Luke 18:22) that God will also reward you with "treasure in
Heaven." Out of this treasure God compensates you for
your
good deeds both in this life and also in the life to come. In
fact, the Bible says that Jesus will reward you for as a part of
the final judgment (Revelation 20:11-12 and 22:12).
Left to ourselves and the influence of the world, we will tend to
spend God's provision with an entirely different set of priorities.
We put ourselves first instead of God and so our primary
concern is how much money we have coming in. We will strive
to maximize our income and even compromise our God-given
values and principles to do so. Since we are in control instead
of God, what we buy to cover the basic areas of need tends to
exceed what we actually need and so we begin to go into debt
to supplement God's provision. We go further into debt by
purchasing consumer goods that we want and desire and by
doing so we become involved in a transfer of wealth from the
Kingdom of God to the world instead of the other way around
thus depleting the funds that are available to do the work of
the Kingdom. Many Christians are so bound up in interest
payments to the world there's nothing left over and they have
to "postpone" tithing and giving. When you are not able to
tithe, you are no longer placing God first in your life and you
become temporarily disqualified from the financial part of the
abundant life that Jesus came to give us (John 10:10). This is
what happens when we don't place God first in our lives and
resort to our substitute priorities for the use of His money. And
this is why God is so interested in seeing to it that we learn how
to handle His provision according to the right priorities.
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Some Final Thoughts |
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Friend, would you like to experience greater financial blessing
in your life? Maybe you can see now that the manifestation of
biblical prosperity is directly dependent in large degree on how
well we learn to handle money. Prosperity seems to flow to
those who are good stewards of their finances. Thus, since God
wants us to be prosperous in every area of life, He is interested
in teaching us how to be good stewards. If we can learn to
follow His priorities instead of ours, we are sure to experience
His prosperity in this present life as we wait for the better life to
come.
God bless you and thanks for reading Prosperous Life
Newsletter. We'll be looking for you again in three weeks on
August 3.
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Sinners' Prayer |
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If you have never invited Jesus to become the Lord of your life,
you can do so today by saying the following simple prayer:
Jesus I believe in you and that God raised you from the
dead. I receive you as my Lord and Savior. Please forgive me
for my sins and come into my life today.
If you were sincere as you prayed, God has already come into
your life and you are a new creation. Now ask the Lord to lead
you to a good faith based bible teaching church where you can
be developed to fulfill your potential in the Kingdom of God. If
you're unable to find a church, give us a call and we'll help
you find a good one.
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Prayer Requests |
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Please e-mail your prayer requests to:
[email protected]. We'll be honored to bring them
before the Lord each Tuesday morning at 10:00 AM, Eastern
Time.
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Donations |
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If you have been blessed and edified by
Prosperous Life Newsletter, please pray about
making a Spirit-led love offering to support the work
of the Ministry (Galatians 6:6-7). PLN is a non
profit [501(c)(3)] gift to the Body of Christ so your
financial gifts are tax deductible (please consult your
tax advisor). You may mail your check or money
order payable to Cornerstone Consulting Ministries to
10621 N. Kendall Drive, Suite 113, Miami, Florida
33176 or click on the donation tab for other payment
options. May God bless you with His abundant
harvest from sowing your precious seed into this
Ministry.
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Questions and Suggestions |
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It would bless us to have an opportunity to answer your
questions concerning any of the areas covered by the ministry
of PLN. We would also be happy to consider your
comments and suggestions. Please feel free to e-mail them to
us or give us a call anytime during normal business hours at
our toll free number 1-800-357-4223.
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