Month: December 2017

Think Paul, the New Testament apostle who, during seasons of his life, supported himself as a tent maker.

Maybe you go to a job every day, work hard, bring home a paycheck, follow a budget, give generously when you can, invest wisely where you can, make sacrifices, and reap rewards. You earn your own living, pay your own way, plan for the future, and provide for your family.

If this is what God has called you to do, then your experience with money shines a spotlight on the goodness and greatness of God. God values your hard work, your diligence, providing for your family, your sacrificial generosity, your wise planning. These are bedrock values in a healthy society. These are character qualities that mark a man or woman of God.

The danger, however, of living your entire life here is this: It’s easy to look at others and assume they are morally deficient because their life experience is different than yours. It’s easy to become impatient with those who are struggling, hard hearted toward those who are needy. Another danger is this: When disaster strikes, you may not have learned the spiritual skills needed to sustain you when all your money is taken away. It’s easy to put faith in your own ability to provide, instead of putting your trust in God.

Some verses for further study: 2 Thessalonians 3:6-12, Proverbs 10:4, 11:4, 11:28, 12:24, 13:11, Colossians 3:23, Luke 8:14, 12:42, Matthew 6:19-21, 6:24, 7:1-5, Philippians 4:11-13, 1 Timothy 6:17-19, James 2:1-7

We are looking at five different ways Christians experience money.
1. The diligent Christian
2. The Christian living by faith
3. The destitute Christian
4. The prosperous Christian
5. The Christian in financial recovery

Image of construction worker adapted from a public domain image provided by pixabay.

Over the next several posts, I will be describing five different ways Christians experience money:
1. The diligent Christian
2. The Christian living by faith
3. The destitute Christian
4. The prosperous Christian
5. The Christian in financial recovery

I’m not saying that every believer will fit neatly into one of these categories. Probably not. In different seasons of your life, you may fit into one or more of these categories—or maybe none of them at all.

What I am saying is this: Understanding that these categories exist opened my eyes to a God I never knew was there. Understanding that these categories exist also opened my eyes to something else: We usually need to look outside our own life experience to gain a better understanding of God and how He operates. Its very easy to judge others by our own life experience, but in doing so we miss a huge opportunity to identify with the heart of God.

One other thought: Getting out of debt, getting ready for retirement, giving wisely and generously, becoming a better financial manager, and earning more money are all worthy goals. But they take a back seat to simply staying in step with God and His purposes. If you let Him, God will use your financial situation to show you and your world His goodness.

Multi-colored image adapted from an image by the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Flickr, Creative Commons.

My experience with money is probably different than yours.

With no money to my name—zero dollars—I made an offer on a million dollar piece of real estate and bought it. Many people don’t understand how that works. Yes, I was part owner of a million dollar piece of property. But that didn’t make me rich. It just meant I had partners, I had debt, and I had risk—if anything went wrong, I would go bankrupt and lose everything.

I’ve had the experience of sitting in swanky downtown offices with high-priced attorneys discussing how we would obtain $35 million in funding to turn our million dollar property into something spectacular. I’ve also had the experience of getting my food at a food pantry because I didn’t have any money to buy groceries. Sometimes both those experiences occurred on the same day. (By the way, the $35 million never came together; we ended up selling the property for a modest profit.)

I’ve had a middle class government job where I received a regular pay check that I needed to budget to make sure we had funds to pay our bills. And I’ve been self-employed—sometimes making $75 or more an hour, sometimes working for months without earning a cent.

I’ve been homeless. I’ve gone bankrupt. I’ve been debt free, and I’ve been heavily in debt. More times than I can count, I’ve not had money to pay the rent or the mortgage, but—miraculously—that money became available at the last moment.

I’ve bought groceries for others, and others have bought groceries for me. I’ve been the recipient of great kindness, and I’ve been ripped off for thousands and thousands of dollars.

I’m grateful for these life experiences because they’ve allowed me to see something about the heart of God that I might otherwise have never seen. Over the next few posts, I’d like to share those thoughts with you.

Image of woman on bench adapted from an image by PetteriO, Flickr, Creative Commons

Hey, wanted to share this Christmas video with you. I think you’ll enjoy it. People from around the world have told me that this story meant much to them.

Does the embedded video show up below?

If not, here’s a link to see it on YouTube and here’s a link to see it and share it on Facebook.

Enjoy!

It seems to me that God has to pull together a family from unlikely sources. Pacifists side by side with Crusaders. Slave owners living next door to civil rights leaders. Polygamists, Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Democrats, Republicans. People from every tribe and nation, from every generation.

We might look some who manage to get inside heaven’s doors and hold them guilty for the things they did in God’s name. Even King David, the man after God’s own heart, a hero I admire greatly, most likely killed hundreds of people with his own sword. I cringe. Yet people from another time and place might look at my life and be horrified at what I’ve done, or left undone.

Somehow, we’ll all live in the same home. We’ll all like one another. We’ll enjoy hanging out together.

How will God do this? I don’t know exactly. But I’m reminded not to be arrogant. I’ll probably get to heaven, just like the rest of us, and discover that I was way off the mark, but somehow, in His grace, Jesus still opened the door and let me in.