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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!
Thanks be to God who ALWAYS gives us the
OVERWHELMING victory!.
When HARD TIMES come around, a lot of people start getting
fearful. And one of the things they begin to do is conserve and
protect their possessions thinking they might need them down
the road if/when they start experiencing shortage and lack in
the midst of the difficult environment the media is telling them
they should expect. Even many Believers suspend or reduce
their tithing and giving so they can hold onto their money in
case they lose their jobs or their income is reduced. It's
interesting that many national ministries and large churches
are reporting reductions in giving this year on the order of at
least 20% which is far greater than the negative impact of the
Recession on individual incomes. As a result Believers are
revealing their TRUE inner priorities as they put themselves
ahead of God and ahead of His Kingdom.
Unfortunately the financial strategy of conserving and
withholding that so many people are following these days is
the exact OPPOSITE of biblical counsel. Please consider the
following verses:
"One man gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds
unduly, but comes to poverty. A generous man will prosper; he
who refreshes others will himself be refreshed. Whoever trusts in
his riches will fall" (Proverbs 11:24-25, 28).
This Old Testament scripture says that by conserving and
withholding your substance (e.g. your tithes and offerings)
you'll actually wind up with less. The more you try to hoard
money and possessions, the more they get away from you. But
the generous giver, the one who continues to trust God even in
HARD TIMES, that person will grow and prosper. And we can
also find this same principles expressed in the New Testament
when the Apostle Paul was taking up an offering from the
Corinthian church on behalf of the church in Macedonia:
"He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who
sows bountifully will also reap bountifully, and God is able to
make all grace abound to the cheerful giver, so you will always
have all sufficiency in everything" (2 Corinthians 9:6-8).
Please take the time to read all these verses; because of
limited Newsletter space they've been excerpted and you'll
want to meditate on them in their entirety to get the full
meaning and revelation for yourself. In sum though, both the
Old and New Testaments make the very clear point that a
financial strategy of conserving and withholding one's giving
will be disastrous in an environment of HARD TIMES. And the
strategy that would actually be GOOD to follow is to
INCREASE one's giving in order to qualify for a more bountiful
harvest that will be more than sufficient to overcome HARD
TIMES.
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| The Law of Sowing and Reaping |
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The principles of life expressed in these scriptures flow out of
the biblical Law of Sowing and Reaping which is one of the
basic factors that interact with the financial prosperity of the
Believer. It's a LAW because it always works in a certain way:
first you sow, you wait a while and then you reap a harvest.
The Law of Sowing and Reaping can only work in this one
way; there's no other way. It's absolute and it's also
eternal: "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest - shall
not cease" (Genesis 8:22).
Now the New Testament shows us that essentially the ENTIRE
Kingdom of God operates out of this basic Law: "The Kingdom
of God is like a man who casts seed upon the soil - when the
crop permits, he immediately puts in the sickle, because the
harvest has come." (Mark 4:26, 29). In other words,
EVERYTHING that goes on in the Kingdom of God is
connected to the Law of Sowing and Reaping; and this Law
requires Believers to be BOTH the sowers of the seed and the
reapers of the Harvest.
The basic idea is that in order to reap (harvest) something
desirable for our lives like biblical prosperity sufficient to avoid
HARD TIMES, we have to sow (plant) something (seeds) of
value INTO the Kingdom of God. Then, whatever we sow of
value will be multiplied back to us many times over as a
harvest. A key point is to sow something that's important and
valuable to us like our money, or something that causes us to
make a sacrifice in expectation by faith of a harvest of greater
value in the future. In other words, if we sow bountifully we'll
reap bountifully; conversely, if we sow sparingly (something of
little value to us) we'll reap sparingly (2 Corinthians 6:6).
Now there are five key requirements that are necessary to
produce the right conditions for biblically-based sowing and
reaping that will produce biblical prosperity sufficient to
overcome HARD TIMES:
- We need to have seed to plant. God provides seed
to the
sower (2 Corinthians 9:10) for the express purpose of sowing.
Therefore, after a crop is harvested we must be careful not to
consume on ourselves our future seed for replanting. There will
always be a future planting season and there will be no harvest
if we're caught with no seed to sow.
- We need to sow our seed into the Kingdom of God
instead
of into the idea of receiving a harvest to consume on our own
agenda. If our hearts are wrong the harvest will not come
in the
abundance God wants us to have. If we put the Kingdom of
God first in our sowing, we'll come to reap the prosperity we
need to avoid HARD TIMES (Matthew 6:33).
- We need to sow our seed into good ground in order to
receive the harvest of prosperity we're hoping for.
Accordingly,
we should consider our options and choose carefully. We
consult with the Lord and find out where He wants us to sow our
seed. If we sow into poor ground our harvest will be sparse but
if we sow into the ground God directs us to, our harvest will be
bountiful (Mark 4:13-20).
- We need to walk by the Spirit in faith believing that the
seed we've sown will produce the harvest we're seeking
(Romans 1:17 and Hebrews 11:6). Every time we sow seed, we
need to attach our faith to it. We should speak out that we're
expecting the seed to be multiplied back to us as God has
promised in His Word and then believe that we have ownership
over that multiplication before it actually manifests (Mark 11:23-
24).
- We have to know HOW to reap the harvest which
requires us to be familiar with the Word and recognize when
the harvest season is at hand. Not only do we do the
sowing of
the seed, we're also responsible for performing the harvest; in
between God performs the multiplication (Mark 4:26-29). Many
Believers have a harvest all around them but don't realize it
and are still standing around waiting for it to manifest. Each of
us must be able to discern the harvest and then "put in the
sickle" to bring it in.
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| Cheerful Givers Overcome Hard Times |
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Many Believers perhaps MOST are experiencing financial
shortage during these HARD TIMES. The truth is most of them
were experiencing financial shortage three years BEFORE THE
HARD TIMES STARTED (and probably even before that) and
they were already wondering why. Why was God withholding
His prosperity? Why did the trial of financial shortage never
seem to end? Now they have the excuse of a worldwide
Recession to blame and so they've embraced this explanation
for their shortage and have joined themselves into the
Recession instead of resisting it and taking responsibility for
failing to take possession of the prosperity Jesus won for them
at the Cross of Calvary.
Friend, could it be that many of these Believers who're
suffering from the HARD TIMES are reaping according to what
they've sowed? Or according to the attitude they had when
they sowed? Or according to the priorities they had when they
sowed? Did those Christians decrease or suspend their giving of
tithes and offerings out of FEAR that they would wind up at
some point with no resources in the midst of HARD TIMES?
According to the scriptures we saw above in 2 Corinthians 9:6-
8, God is prepared to make ALL grace (unmerited favor)
abound (overflow) to the CHEERFUL giver who should then be
expected to ALWAYS enjoy ALL sufficiency in EVERYTHING.
The question is: do you believe the Bible or not?
In order to fully appreciate these verses we need to understand
that a cheerful giver is someone who gives enthusiastically and
quickly and who looks for opportunities to give of his/her
substance and be God's blessing to other people. Cheerful
givers are full of joy when they're faced with an opportunity to
make disbursements of their valuable property even when
personal sacrifice will be involved. They disregard their
environment; they ignore the evaluation of their five physical
senses and proceed according to the Word. If the Word says a
bountiful harvest will come back from bountiful planting, they
believe and trust what the Word says even though their Flesh is
trying to tell them something entirely different. Then they wait
for the harvest to come.
Another point is this: since without faith it's impossible to
please God (Hebrews 11:6), in order for God to LOVE someone
for the manner of their giving it would mean that faith has to
be involved. Therefore, cheerful givers are those people who
give in faith trusting God to replenish their seed and for
multiplication back to them in the form of a future harvest, a
harvest of favor and blessing, a harvest of biblical prosperity.
Sometimes we forget to attach faith to our giving but the truth
is without faith it isn't possible to please God and it isn't
possible to be a cheerful giver. Without faith you can't give
freely unencumbered with concern and anxiety for the future
but by faith you can even INCREASE your giving in the face of
HARD TIMES and then you are assured of coming soon into
the victory of Christ.
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| Some Final Thoughts |
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Friend, to enjoy victory in HARD TIMES we need to persevere
in being cheerful givers of the substance God has given us.
Don't allow the devil to come and convince you to conserve
and protect your money, to reduce the percentage of your
giving because of such a "terrible" environment. Reducing your
giving in HARD TIMES is the exact opposite strategy that we
need to pursue. If anything we should give more during HARD
TIMES expecting a multiplied harvest that's totally
independent from the World's environment. It's to God's glory
that Believers prosper and walk in victory during such times as
these. Cast fear out of your home and out of your finances and
trust in the Word of God to perform as it was written. Test God
and see if He won't open the windows of Heaven for you in
response to your cheerful giving (Malachi 3:10).
Thanks for reading PLN today and we'll be looking for you
again in three weeks on July 17. In the meantime, may God
overwhelm you with the fullness of His love and spiritual
blessing! Enjoy your victory over HARD TIMES!
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| Sinners' Prayer |
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If you've never invited Jesus to be the Lord of your life, you can
do so today just by saying the following simple prayer:
Jesus I believe in you and I believe that God raised you
from
the dead. I receive forgiveness for my sins and I ask you to
come into my life today. I receive you as my Lord and
Savior.
If you were sincere as you prayed this prayer, God has already
come into your life and you are a new creation, a totally new
species recreated in His image. Now ask the Lord to lead you to
a good faith-based, bible-teaching church where you can be
equipped to fulfill your potential in the Kingdom of God.
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© Make A Way Ministries, Inc.
10621 North Kendall Drive - Suite 120
Miami, Florida 33176
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