New Year's Thoughts on Prosperity

On a plane, crossing the ocean, you reach the point of no return, a matter of not having enough fuel to retrace your flight path, just enough to continue to your destination. One plane, the Model 76 Voyager went completely around the world without refueling. On crossing anything, it becomes a matter of mathematically determining whether to retreat or proceed... a point of no return. We have already passed the point of no return, in our nation's present financial dilemma.

Our nation faces an economic storm, brought on by growing federal, personal, and corporate debt. There are too little savings and the dollar has declined to just a few cents. In 1987, Peter Grace of the Grace Commission told President Reagan that a dollar barred in 1987 would be worth just a few pennies by the year 2000. We certainly know this to be true. There is no way that the national debt can ever be repaid. If the United States goes under, so will the rest of the world because unlike the Great Depression, the entire world is in depression. Some nations like Iceland and Greece are already in bankruptcy. Obama has put our nation into more debt in his first 8 months of presidency than all previous 43 presidents, from George Washington to George W Bush combined. Get ready for many years of economic uncertainty.

I speak only to Christians, God does not need friends. In his sovereignty, he owns everything. We, as Christians, are involved in the stewardship of trust. We think we can bring God into our lives on our terms. It may scare you to know that God makes the decision... On His terms... He makes the choice... You can walk the aisle of every church in the community... Sign every card of church membership... You may think you receive Jesus but be concerned that Jesus receives you. The New Testament, gives the good news that we are not operating under law. The early sophisticates could not understand the paradoxes with which Christ talked, that we must die in order to live. That we must go down in order to go up. That we must be weak in order to be strong. That we must forgive in order to be forgiven. We must give in order to receive. If you do not have the desire to give, there is something wrong with your faith. You can give without love but you cannot love without giving. (Matthew 16:24-28) He tell us through our faithfulness, that He will take care of our enemies (Psalm 109). We are a peculiar people.

The surest way I know for prosperity in the new year, and it makes no difference when your year starts, is the giving to God of your first fruits, the first money that comes into your possession. The first of the first fruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the Lord thy God (Exodus 34:26, Leviticus 23:10, Numbers 18:12-13, Deuteronomy. 26:10, 18:4). This pertains to our material blessings. God also demands the first fruits of our lives.

God gave His people a symbol of their peculiar nature... A circle with a dot in the center, separated, the world could not get to them, and cannot get to us. The world will fuss and fume about finances, but God has complete control of the needs of His own. When God knows you will not steal from Him (Malachi 3:8), he knows that he can trust you with His blessings in the way you handle your material things. Christ talked about material things more than anything else, even heaven and hell.

The verse of scripture which completely changed my life, which lead me into the financial success which I enjoy today, I first heard from a missionary in Samoa. She made sure I understood Psalm 84:5, Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee; in whose heart are the ways of them. Here you have the secret for surviving the greed, corruption, and decadence of today's world. It is our national motto, you find it on every piece of currency, and our forefather's believed it, “In God We Trust”.

Remember, the tithe is the Lord's whether you give it to not. One seventh of your time is the Lord's whether you give it or not. We were made in his image whether we want to recognize it or not, the greatest gift anyone can give me, these words: “you are in my prayers.” I have a prayer list which I refresh every week, when you are on my prayer list, you can be assured that you have someone praying for you. I do not put the names of many of my family, relatives, friends because I know they do not want God involved in their lives, their business.