Simple Money, Rich Life: Design a life of eternal impact
Notes
Transcript
Nothing beats fresh-baked homemade bread coming out of the oven. The aroma that fills the house is simply amazing. As you probably know, bread is made from a few key ingredients: flour, water, salt, yeast. But here’s the thing: if you forget a key ingredient, then the end product is very different. You’ll learn this the hard way if you forget to add yeast to a recipe. The amount of yeast in a given recipe seems insignificant. However, if you forget the yeast, you’ll end up with a brick of cooked dough that is inedible. If you’ve ever made this mistake, then you’ll know firsthand how significant yeast is in making that perfect loaf.
It’s the same with living a Biblically balanced financial life. We should earn, save, give, and enjoy money for God’s glory. But all four are necessary for a healthy and balanced life. These four ingredients work together to help us achieve a rich life and significant eternal impact. But, as with the bread recipe, if you leave out even one ingredient, you probably won’t get the desired result. If we earn all we can just to store up treasures for ourselves on earth, we’re shortsighted. If we give all we can but our spending is out of control, we’re missing out on a lot of opportunities. If we save, earn, and give all we can but don’t enjoy any of the process, I believe we are missing out on the abundant life that Jesus promises.
The Trap
The Trap
3 If anyone teaches false doctrine and does not agree with the sound teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ and with the teaching that promotes godliness,
4 he is conceited and understands nothing, but has an unhealthy interest in disputes and arguments over words. From these come envy, quarreling, slander, evil suspicions,
5 and constant disagreement among people whose minds are depraved and deprived of the truth, who imagine that godliness is a way to material gain.
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out.
8 If we have food and clothing, we will be content with these.
9 But those who want to be rich fall into temptation, a trap, and many foolish and harmful desires, which plunge people into ruin and destruction.
10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and by craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.
11 But you, man of God, flee from these things, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness.
12 Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of eternal life to which you were called and about which you have made a good confession in the presence of many witnesses.
Money cannot bring satisfaction. It is like the man who said, “Last month my aunt died and left me $25,000. Last week, my brother died and left me $38,000. I am so depressed.”
His good friend said, “Why are you depressed?”
He said, “Because this week, nobody died.”
Many of us were like the dog in the fable carrying a juicy steak across a bridge. As he walked and crossed the bridge, he looked over and saw the reflection of his face with the steak in his mouth. He thought it was another dog with a bigger steak. So he went after the bigger steak and got neither.
A Right Focus
A Right Focus
17 Instruct those who are rich in the present age not to be arrogant or to set their hope on the uncertainty of wealth, but on God, who richly provides us with all things to enjoy.
We learn to enjoy God’s gifts when we have God’s standard of progress
Paul said it well. Riches are uncertain. Our financial plans are in the hands of the Lord. Your path to debt freedom will have many ups and downs. Progress isn’t proportionate to the amount of effort that we put in. Why? Because it’s one of life’s uncertainties. There will always be unexpected things which happen. And so, it is important that we have God’s vision of our progress. Our goal is obedience. We want to be like a stonecutter hammering away at a rock. I like how Jacob Riis illustrates this:
“When [nothing seemed] to help, I would go and look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it would split in two, and I knew it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.”
It might look like you aren’t making progress, but every moment of obedience and faithfulness to God matters. And it’s a good idea to remember the importance of momentum. That’s the thing about financial progress; it typically requires more effort on the front end and less on the back end. At the beginning, it often doesn’t go as quickly as you expect and there are more hiccups than you predicted.
If we do not have the right vision or the right goals then we will never be able to be satisfied with God’s gifts.
We learn to enjoy God’s gifts when we learn contentment
This is really the message that Paul was charging Timothy with giving to the wealthy members of his church. Be content. Contentment leads to enjoyment and it leads to being a faithful giver.
Did you know that if your annual income after taxes is over $33,000, then you are in the top 4% wealthiest people in the world?* (To put this in perspective, if you took 99 random people from around the world and placed them in a room with you, then 96 of them would be poorer than you while only three would be richer.)
How is it that we can be living more comfortable lives than 96% of the world’s population and yet still feel like it isn’t enough? Solomon hit the nail on the head when he wrote, “The eyes of man are never satisfied.” As the wealthiest man in his time, Solomon concluded that there was no endpoint to when our desires would be fulfilled. Where we would say, “Enough. No more.” No matter how much we get, we always crave more.
Paul knew that if those in Timothy’s church had anything but contentment in God as their standard they would end up in a miserable cycle when it comes to money. The Enemy wants us to waste our lives chasing arbitrary goals, believing the lie that our contentment is contingent on our possessions or circumstances. All the while, he just continues to move the target, like in a game of whack-a-mole.
As soon as we acquire the thing we believed would make us content, the next thing for us to long for pops up. And on and on it goes. We think that getting what we crave would satisfy us, but just like drinking salt water, it only increases mour desire. Only when we identify our sources of discontent are we able to contend with the enemy.
Pastor: This would be a good place to illustrate a time when you really wanted something (like the latest electronic device) for Christmas and now it's collecting dust in your closet.
A Right Practice
A Right Practice
18 Instruct them to do what is good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and willing to share,
19 storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of what is truly life.
There are two surefire ways to grow in contentment.
First, we must stop comparing ourselves to others. We are called to run our own race. We need to make a commitment to not judge how others spend their money (let them run their race) and to commit to bringing our finances always before the Lord and then not feel guilty about our own spending. We recognize that it’s all God’s and prayerfully manage the money entrusted to us to the best of our ability. When we keep our hearts tuned to God, we can spend guilt-free and enjoy the fruit of our labor.
Secondly, we learn contentment when we practice gratitude. It has been shown that practicing gratitude has physical health benefits. According to Dr. Robert Emmons “regular grateful thinking can increase happiness by as much as 25 percent.” So, consider creating a gratitude journal. Or today make a commitment to go home and make a list of 50 things you are grateful for.
As we shift our perspectives, say no to our urges, and actively seek out gratitude, we have more control of our finances. We no longer feel the urge to buy that new phone but are content with what we have for the moment.