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THE LAWS OF BIBLICAL PROSPERITY
Part Twenty-Eight - Understanding God's Purposes for Money
Volume X Number 11 August 3, 2007

In this issue

Links to FREE Articles

God Always Operates Out of Purpose

Universal Purposes

Individual Purposes

Some Final Thoughts

Sinners' Prayer

Prayer Requests

Donations

Questions and Suggestions


 

Links to FREE Articles


Links to Special Financial Services















"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

















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.

In the last issue of Prosperous Life Newsletter we discussed God' priorities for how we are to use the money and material possessions He provides. As we saw there's a big difference between His priorities and the ones we tend to pursue if left to our carnal desires and wants. In this issue we want to delve more deeply into His purposes for those priorities and what He trying to accomplish.

In the form of a brief review, God is very interested in how we deal with, relate to and use our finances in this present life. You may have observed that about 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 content of those recorded parables that money was and still is an important topic for Him. Indeed the parables are there in His Word because the Holy Spirit wants to teach us how to deal with present financial issues. Therefore, the instruction from the parables is part of the ongoing process of being conformed from who we used to be into the image of Christ (Romans 8:29).

In the previous Newsletter we dealt with the question of why God is so interested in how we handle our finances. Why is there so much teaching about it in the Word of God? And we saw that 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 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 the Lord 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 give us abundant life (John 10:10), the love of money conflicts with the manifestation of that gift and must be dealt with if God's purposes are to be fulfilled.

God is so interested in how we handle our finances because He has purposes for the use of those finances in the life of each Believer. We're not supposed to continue carelessly making our own frivolous spending decisions even though most of us are still doing just that. No, God has a better way and He has a purpose for everything we do.


  • God Always Operates Out of Purpose
  • It's important to understand about God that He doesn't do anything in the universe without having a purpose for what He does. He is after all the God of purpose; therefore, His provision is always attached to purpose. He doesn't do things aimlessly according to how He feels on one particular day versus some other or on whether or not we'll be happy and content. On the contrary we must learn to be content whether we receive a little or an abundance (Philippians 4:11, Hebrews 13:5). Likewise His provision is not tied to our need. What He DOES do is provide ALWAYS according to His specific purposes: some of them are universal purposes that apply essentially to all Believers and are articulated in His Word and others are individual purposes that He has established for the life of each Believer.

    Now, most of us are quite sensitive about our money and possessions and God uses that sensitivity as a primary means for teaching us to consider His purposes. At PLN we don't believe He's engaged in a massive program of withholding and releasing provision in order to make us learn essential lessons. Certainly He could if He wanted to, but He doesn't have to because for the most part the choices we ourselves make produce the consequences and results we're living out in our lives. The Kingdom of God is set up that way because Jesus already paid for your abundance at the Cross. To withhold it now would contradict the perfect and complete work of Christ at Calvary. So, as we're living through the consequences of our own actions, the Holy Spirit uses what we are living through to teach us, to comfort us and to lead us back to victory.

    The manner in which we use God's provision is called stewardship; therefore, stewardship is really about using God's provision for the purposes He has established. What do we do with what He provides: do we consume it on ourselves without thinking or do we seek God and His Word to determine His purposes? If we're ignorant of the principles of stewardship or worse if we know them but refuse to submit, then He's not able to trust us to use His provision for the purposes He's established. Poor stewards then are those Believers who can't be trusted with His provision. And so because of poor stewardship our provision will tend to be diminished from the abundance God would otherwise prefer for us to receive. The GOOD steward is the one who pursues an understanding of His purposes and then strives to live by them.

  • Universal Purposes
  • According to the Word of God, there are several universal purposes God has for His provision that apply generally to most Believers:

    1) To Learn to Put the Lord First - God requires that we put Him first in our lives. We have to learn to do that because our carnal nature refuses to do it until it has been retrained. Learning to put God first is for our own good because if we don't, we will put ourselves first in His place which always results in disaster and death. The easiest way to learn to put God first is to return a tithe to Him on all His provision. The Holy Spirit then uses this "sacrifice" to help us learn to put God first in all areas of life. If we resist tithing, the task of learning to put God first will be much more difficult for most people and they will eventually have to come to the point of returning the tithe anyway. Even if you go to a church where they don't teach tithing, the fact remains that tithing is a biblical responsibility, a financial principle that every Believer needs to embrace for his/her own good. It's a practice that preceded the Law (Genesis 14:20), that Jesus endorsed (Matthew 23:23) and that was never discontinued anywhere in scripture after the New Covenant was established even though Jesus had a number of opportunities when He could have done so.

    2) To Establish His Covenant - The next generic purpose is to establish (or confirm) His covenant (Deuteronomy 8:28). He has promised to provide; therefore, His act of provision serves to confirm what He's promised to do so that all people will know that He's a God of covenant that can be trusted. In line with this we're to use His provision to assist Him in raising up His Kingdom according to the instructions we can find in His Word and those He speaks to us individually. We must learn not to consume this part of our provision on our own agenda but to give both tithes and offerings into His work (Malachi 3:8-11) as directed by the Holy Spirit. Most Christians resist tithing and substitute their own system of giving which over the centuries has produced a Church that's under-funded and much less effective than it should be. It has also produced a body of Believers that have difficulty putting God first in their lives. Man's systems always fall far short of the ones God comes up with and the tithe was intended, and still is, as a major means for establishing His Covenant on the earth.

    3) To Bless Others - Another major part of God's provision is designated for the purpose of blessing others. One of the most relevant scriptures on this subject can be found in 2 Corinthians 9:8-9 which says that one of the purposes God has for our sufficiency and abundance is that a portion be used for good deeds. God himself provides seed to the sower (verse 10) which the sower (the Believer) must not consume for his/her own agenda. That is, we are not to "eat" the seed that God has provided for the purpose of doing good deeds. This requires that we confer with the Lord continually so that we know which portion of His provision is for the Kingdom of God, which portion is for others and which potion is for us.

    4) To Provide for Our Basic Needs - The Bible says that we should not worry about provision for meeting our essential needs because God will take care of them (Matthew 6:25-34). Through this purpose we come to learn to trust Him in all areas of our lives. Once the Believer can by faith get past this fundamental reassurance, the way is open for other uses of His provision. Basic needs include housing, food, water, clothing, etc., the necessities of life. As discussed in the previous Newsletter, it's important for Believers to avoid indebtedness so that debt repayment doesn't become part of our "need" structure. Since God advises as a general rule against going into debt, it's hard to convince Him that He's responsible for providing funds for your interest payments.

    5) To Compensate Believers for Faithful Service - 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 appropriate compensation 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 in this present age a hundred times over (Mark 10:29-30). Therefore, a portion of the money God is providing you is a return for the good fruit you've produced for the Kingdom of God. As you prove your faithfulness with a little, God will trust you with greater amounts and He'll reward you with increasing compensation.

    When we receive God's provision, we're expected to disburse it more or less according to these universal purposes. Therefore, we must be knowledgeable stewards fully understanding our responsibilities and spending time with the Lord so that we properly allocate His provision among the various purposes. For this reason we can't just wait at home for God's favor and blessing to fall on us. There's a lot we have to learn and there are important responsibilities to be assumed in order to qualify to receive His favor and to be ready to use it for the right purposes when it comes. Then once we have spent time with the Lord we should always make our expenditures in faith believing and trusting that the promises of God found in His Word will be fulfilled in our lives because we've been faithful to pursue His purposes before we made our expenditures.

  • Individual Purposes
  • There are also individual purposes which God has established for the life of each Christian. Indeed, God has a special and unique plan for each Believer and there are many examples in scripture of people who found the favor of God so they could accomplish some particular purpose(s) He had for a particular time and place. God is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8) and He is still using favor to empower His people to accomplish His purposes. Every Believer needs to find out from God what specific plans and purposes He has established for their particular lives and then expect His favor as an empowerment to accomplish them.

    Sometimes you may not even know God has given you some purpose until the favor shows up. Whenever you do receive God's favor and blessing, you need to confer with Him and find out why He's providing them. If you fail to do so and you consume His favor on your own priorities instead of on the purpose(s) He was intending that you deal with, the favor will be cut off and you'll have to wait for the next time. The faithful steward is the one who has learned over time to discern the purposes of God and then use His provision in a precise way to accomplish those specific purposes.

    God's purposes for the life of any one Believer are different than those for any other. For this reason, we can't look at what He's doing with others to try to figure out what He wants us to do. The only way to know His purposes for your life is to develop a relationship with Him and then be led by the Holy Spirit. Friend there's no other way.

  • Some Final Thoughts
  • The bottom line today is this: if you want to enjoy the fullness of biblical prosperity in your life, you'll need to understand and pursue God's purposes for the finances you have been provided. You'll need to bring your purposes into line with His; He will not bring His into line with yours. When your purposes DO line up with His and when you ARE using your finances the way He wants you to, then you'll discover the abundance that Jesus won for you on the Cross of Calvary.

    Thanks for reading Prosperous Life Newsletter today. God knows you had other things you could have been doing and He takes note that you are pursuing Him. God bless you and we'll be looking for you again in three weeks.

  • Sinners' Prayer
  • 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.

  • Prayer Requests
  • 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.

  • Donations
  • 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.

  • Questions and Suggestions
  • 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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