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May 4
Gods four purposes for money
For reading & meditation: 1 Timothy 6:6-19
"But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that."(v.8)
Before we can understand what God may be trying to achieve in our lives by putting us into tight financial circumstances, we must know something of our Lord's purposes for money. Many Christians think that the purpose of money is to provide security, establish independence, or create power and influence, but this is a very worldly view of the subject. The Bible shows us that God has four basic purposes which He wants to achieve through money - and understanding these purposes is crucial if we are to be fruitful and productive Christians. The first purpose of money is to provide basic needs. Its surprising how little money we need in order to sustain the basic needs of life. These needs can be summed up in the words food, clothing and shelter. And God demonstrates His loving care by assuring us of His help in obtaining these basic essentials: "And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labour or spin ' will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?" (Matt. 6:28-30). Since the dawn on time, humankind has tried to become independent of God. There are tendencies in our fallen nature to be self-sufficient and self-supporting. We would much rather pray, "Give us this month our monthly pay cheque" than "Give us this day our daily bread." And why? Because it doesn't bring us face to face with our need to be daily dependent on the Lord. How wise was our Lord in including that phrase in the model prayer He gave His disciples. He knew the recognition of daily needs would help to produce daily dependence.
Prayer:
Father, I pray that You will bring me under the complete sway of Your Spirit so that my spiritual dependence will not be year by year, month by month or week by week - but day by day. This I ask in Jesus' Name. Amen.
For further study:
1. What are we to seek first?
2. What will follow?
