God helps those who help themselves, amen.
God wants me to be rich.
I want to be rich.
That, my friends, is a match literally made in heaven. Material blessing is our God-given right and I am staking my claim here and now. Do you hear that Mr. Wealth Devourer (AKA Satan)? No more devouring for you in my life. Until recently I didn’t really think that wealth was compatible with living a simple Christian life in meekness and humility. Was I ever wrong? ”We have not because we ask not…” it really is just that simple.
I think we can all agree that being rich is much more preferable than being poor (just ask some Christian in a 3rd world country). I mean who wants to live paycheck to paycheck when God owns the cattle on a thousand hills? Or is it a thousand cattle on one hill… I forget. No matter, the point is: God is WEALTHY! If we know how to give our kids good gifts like action figures, legos and video games how much more does God know how to give us good gifts like stock portfolios, real estate investments and designer suits? God is seriously like our unlimited supplier of all the creature comforts we could ever want or hope to attain. We do have a responsibility in this whole equation, though. To set this monetary windfall in motion we must first sow seeds, seeds of money. Sowing and reaping is an essential principle found all throughout scripture and to deny its effect on our finances is simply ridiculous.
If the parable of the master handing out the talents tells us anything it’s that God expects us to do something with our cash. Now we don’t literally plant our cash in the ground (you won’t even get interest that way!), that’s taking it a bit too far, but we must plant our financial seeds into the God-fertilized institutions He has provided for us such as the NYSE, commodities exchange and TBN. And how great is it that we live in a country where we can obtain the “American Dream” of 3 cars, 2 houses and 1.5 kids? Capitalism all the way! God was smart when He started America, I don’t see any other way He could have blessed the world with our wealth-making potential. America is clearly called to spread free enterprise and democracy throughout the world as a testimony to God’s commitment to the competitive spirit of mankind while crushing your industrial opponents with superior products and services. (Or maybe even a smidgen of deceitful business practices - I’m looking at you Wall Street *Wink* - hang in guys!)
Now before I get nasty emails saying that I don’t care about the poor I do think we as capitalist Christians have a duty to show our fellow welfare Christians the light. By following the ever so eloquent book of Proverbs, “Give a man a fish and he eats for a day but teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime” we can teach the poverty stricken brethren in Africa, the middle east, south America, or wherever that Christians are not meant to live off the handouts of others but we are to be money makers. Anything less is a tragic waste of God’s provision at best and downright sinful at worst.
Let us set the financial captives free through this message of unlimited prosperity potential. The task may seem large but with Jabez as our model we can boldly proclaim over and over, “ENLARGE OUR TERRITORY!”
We can do this… converting one pocketbook at a time by the grace of God.
