The Commerce Bank Review

In addition to short-range planning, a Christian needs to assess his long-range goals. Any financial plan for Christians should be in harmony with prayer-guided long-range goals.

- What are you here to achieve?
- How are you going to accomplish God’s plan?
- If God blesses you with an abundance of money, what will you do with it?
- What kind of a plan do you have for such an eventuality?

Too many Christians go through their entire lives without establishing any prayerful goals for the use of their wealth. Many get trapped into a dogmatic, day-by-day routine. They have minimal short-range goals and almost no long-range goals. Understandably, many find themselves after forty- or fifty-years of work with an accumulation of wealth and in a quandry about where it should go. Others find themselves surrounded with problems and financial difficulties without any prearranged plan of action. Christians should visualize their long-range financial objectives.

Not every Christian will be wealthy, nor should everyone be wealthy. But everyone, wealthy or otherwise, has a responsibility to plan well, to have good, sound objectives, and to operate according to God’s principles.

A Christian should establish long-range goals only after much personal and family prayer. The following biblical principles should be the cornerstone of all such goals.

This cashless system may seem farfetched to those unacquainted with monetary trends, but even a cursory investigation clearly establishes that systems similar to the one presented here are now being tested throughout the United States and Europe in contemplation of a totally “cashless” banking system. Virtually no one in major banking circles will deny either the necessity of such a system or its future certainly. In fact, the world bank has already begun work on a massive computer system that will be used to catalog and categorize every individual in the world.

How does this relate to Christian finances? This is the kind of system that must exist prior to the last days. It must be a system so subtle that people will ask for it and, unless they are aware, even the “elect” may be deceived.

If I had to identify the area of Christian finances that is least understood, it would be inheritance. Not only do many people wreck their lives by hoarding, but they also wreck the lives of their children and grandchildren with an abundant inheritance. The result of giving large amounts of money to those who are untrained in its use can be seen in the parable of the prodigal son, Luke 15:11-24.

At least the father in this parable had enough sense to give his son the inheritance while he was living. He then had the opportunity to provide his son with counseling. Even so, the result of the inheritance was trouble for the recipient.

Large amounts of money given to children will usually be squandered to their disservice, and large amounts of money stored up for children in trust can be used to buffer them from God’s will. Is that your wish? Allow your children the joy of earning their own way. That doesn’t mean to impoverish them; provide for your family, but do not buffer them with great hoards of money.

God’s will concerning inheritances is partly expressed in Ecclesiastes 6:3. “If a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years, however many they be, but his soul is not satisfied with good things, and he does not even have a proper burial, then I say, ‘Better a miscarriage than he.’” This parable denotes the necessity of leaving the family some provision. God said that as godly men we leave our children’s children an inheritance, but that inheritance is spiritual.

The other aspect of God’s will can be found in Psalm 37:25-26. “I have been young, and now I am old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, or his descendants begging bread. All day long he is gracious and lends; and his descendants are a blessing.”

It becomes obvious that the same promises God makes about lifetime provision extend from generation to generation. Provide for your family within reason. Trust God for their protection. God promises He will not let your offspring be forsaken.

The key to realizing God’s will in the area of finances is a proper understanding of stewardship. Unfortunately, this term has been so misused that today most people think of stewardship only in terms of Christian fund-raising activities. As defined earlier, a steward is one who manages another’s property. We are merely stewards of God’s property while we are on this earth, and God can choose to entrust us with as much or as little as He desires. But in no case do we ever actually take ownership. When we try to do so we are depending either on what Satan can supply or what we can achieve through our own self-will.

Once a Christian accepts his role as a steward and manages God’s resources according to His direction, God will entrust more and more to him. But why would He entrust property to one whom He knows will hoard it and to one who feels he is the owner?

God will not force His will on us. A verse that relates specifically to God’s attitude is Proverbs 28:26, “He who trusts in his own heart is a fool, but he who walks wisely, will be delivered.” God is looking over the entire earth for men who Christians who do this regularly have not accepted that God’s wisdom is superior to theirs.

1. A Christian should learn to practice patience and moderation in every financial decision.
2. Have a positive decision attitude.
3. Never get involved in financial decisions that require instant action, but allow God to take His course. The difference between a profit and a loss may well be the attitude with which we approach financial investments.
4. Avoid any get-rich-quick schemes, no matter how tempting.
5. Maintain your plans as long as you have peace about them; they’re the plans for your life.
6. Do not be inflexible, but don’t change your plans just because somebody tells you something different.

The majority of businesses that fail do so because they are undermanaged or undercapitalized. They have inadequate planning. It is futile to operate a business without a cash flow plan (income versus expenses) to allocate resources for paying bills. How could anyone maintain a business without knowing where the capital was coming from?

God has exactly the same plan for a Christian’s home, but unfortunately most of us ignore it. How can anyone manage a home without coordinating income and expenses?

Very important attitudes are necessary to develop a sound, basic financial plan for the family. That plan falls into two areas—short-range goals and long-range goals.

Every Christian should be concerned with providing for his family. But how much is enough? Of course, there is no magic formula that can be uniformly applied to every family. There are several variables that need to be considered such as the ages of the family members, the size of the family, educational needs, personal aspirations and where the family lives.

But other factors should be taken into consideration in making decisions about future provision:

a. God’s plan for your life
b. Present spending level
c. Future income potential
d. Dependability of present income
e. Potential vocational changes

There are many individual factors to consider. However, there are certain basic decisions that can be made:

a. Each Christian should adjust his life-style until it fits the plan that God has for his life.
b. A minimum savings plan for purchases should be started.
c. A minimum expense buffer should be established.
d. Future education plans should be made.

Just as protection is wrong, so is too little or no provision. Neglect occurs when we have the capability of supplying our family’s needs but fail to do so.

If circumstances change so that we are no longer able to live within a reasonable budget, God will provide for our needs beyond any doubt. But we have the requirement from God to be prudent.

What are the requirements for us as Christians to provide for our families? Let’s look at a parable in Proverbs 6:6-11. “Go to the ant, O sluggard, observe her ways and be wise, which, having no chief, officer or ruler, prepares her food in the summer, and gathers her provision in the harvest. How long will you lie down, O sluggard? When will you arise from your sleep? ‘A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest’—and your poverty will come in like a vagabond, and your need like an armed man.”

God uses this parable to tell us that if we are slack and do not earn our way, poverty will come upon us and our families. This same admonition to work is found in 2 Timothy 5:8. We must provide for our families, lest we be considered less than an infidel. But ants never hoard; they store only that which they ca eventually use.

The other end of the range is expressed by these verses: “For all these things the nations of the world eagerly seek; but your Father knows that you need these things. But seek for His Kingdom, and these things shall be added to you” (Luke 12:30-31). Do you recognize the importance of this principle? While God expects us to provide for our families and allows no attitudes of laziness, He also supplies every one of our needs. And He will never allow us to lack for anything when we follow His principles.

We are also directed to share with the non-Christian community. When God talks specifically about the “believer,” the “elect” or the “Body of Christ,” He is referring to Christians. Other Scriptures that deal with sharing but do not refer directly to the Body of Christ are intended to include the non-Christian community.

I have found that the majority of Scripture deals with supplying the needs of the non-Christian community. Perhaps ten time as many references pertain to sharing with non-believers as opposed to only Christians. It is obvious that God set up absolute standards:

1. We are not to accept resources from the non-Christian.
2. We are to be a witness to them through our readiness to share.

Matthew 5:42 states, “Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you.” Matthew 10:42: “And whoever in the name of a disciple gives to one of these little ones even a cup of cold water to drink, truly I say to you he will not lose his reward.” Neither of those Scriptures, as well as more than fifty others, deal only with Christians. They deal with the community at large, both believers and nonbelievers.

We are to be witnesses to non-Christians through our material resources, demonstrating that Christ, not money, is ruling our lives. Commitment is Christianity is often related to whether one is more committed to money than the needs of others. Upon this principle Christ based much of His teaching, such as in Luke 12:33, “Sell your possessions and give to charity; make yourselves purses which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven where no thief comes near, nor moth destroys.”

Ask God to relieve you of the burden of worry and anxiety and frustration surrounding money. Ask that He would place on your heart only those people that you are able to help. Believe that God is going to give you the ability s well as the responsibility to do so. Commit yourself to becoming a Christian witness in this area of giving.

The most common type of bondage is excessive use of credit. Many individuals today think the credit card companies will not allow them to borrow beyond their ability to repay, but such is not the case. The average credit card company in the United States will allow an individual to borrow 250 percent more than he can conceivably repay.

Delinquent accounts are generally regulated by statutes favoring the creditor, meaning that delinquent debts fall under a different set of rules. Those rules allow the creditors to charge more interest for debts in delinquency than they can for accounts that are current.

Care for the Christian community. “Honor widows who are widows indeed” (1 Timothy 5:3). The directive Paul gave for “widows indeed” concerns those who have no family to support them. Therefore, the burden of support is placed on the church; and the church is to supply their needs.

How many churches really do that today? How many congregations in the United States have, as a regular part of their budget, money to supply the needs of Christians in their church who cannot make their own way? That applies to those who are temporarily out of work, to the injured or disables, and to the elderly.

I believe it is an abomination before God to see widows in the Christian community depending on welfare for support. If they are qualified and have established themselves accordingly, it is a direct requirement from God to the church to care for them.

Here is also the key to where our tithe goes. In God’s plan, the church is to administer the tithe and distribute it to the needs of the body. Unfortunately, not all churches adhere to this plan. I believe that if a church observes God’s plan, both teaching His Word and administering His money, then al of the tithe should be placed in its care. However, if the church ignores its physical responsibilities, then each Christian must vote his own conviction. Under no circumstances can the qualified needy be ignored. Christ gave this admonition to the Pharisees in Matthew 15:5-6: “But you say, ‘Whoever shall say to his father or mother, “Anything of mine you might have been helped by has been given to God,” he is not to honor his father or his mother,’ And thus you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition.”

As long as you receive teaching from the church you must provide the needs of its workers. If the church does not understand God’s plan, you should work diligently to help them do so. If you find a closed attitude in this area, I would recommend changing to a place of worship compatible with your commitment where you can entrust God’s wealth.

If we really trust God with everything that we have, He will satisfy all of our needs as He promised. “For all these things the nations of the world eagerly seek; but your Father knows that you need these things. But seek for His kingdom, and all these things shall be added to you” (Luke 12:30-31).

One of the greatest scriptural references to attitude can be found in the story of Abraham. God asked Abraham to sacrifice his most important possession—his son Isaac. Born of his old age, Abraham truly loved his son, and, although Abraham was a wealthy man by worldly standards, nothing meant as much to him as Isaac.

But God asked Abraham to take his son up to the mountains and sacrifice him unto the Lord. He asked Abraham, as He asks us, to sacrifice everything for His name’s sake. Abraham could have argued with God concerning the logic of sacrificing Isaac, but he did not. Abraham knew that if God had given him a son in his old age, surely God could recover him from death.

So he packed up the mules, his servants, and Isaac, and set out for the mountain. Laying his son upon the altar, Abraham raised the knife.

It was at that point that God stopped him, saying, “Abraham, I know that you are a true man and you have withheld nothing. Because you withheld nothing, I’ll make your seed as abundant as the sand upon the shore. And I’ll bless you beyond every nation on earth” (Genesis 22:16-17, paraphrased).

As a result of Abraham’s obedience, God entrusted to him stewardship of His kingdom on the earth. For not only did Abraham love and trust God, but he bowed his will to God’s judgment. Christians must accept this concept of total stewardship, because when they transfer assets to avoid creditors, when they file bankruptcy to avoid creditors, or when they deal deceitfully with creditors, God’s channel for help is blocked.