Financial Confidence

Recently a bank was handing out fliers on how to have financial confidence; they gave a very simple flow chart on how to use your tax return to its fullest advantage. There was quite a bit of wisdom on the page instructing that money towards debt and savings would be quite helpful if you ever found yourself in an emergency. They also were wise enough to know that if they did not allot some leeway for luxury spending that non one would really take the flier seriously.

Just one small problem. The flier mentioned no instruction at all of giving the Lord His first cut, His portion, His just due. Non-Christians can feel free to skip this step, but those who claim God should know that there is no such thing as financial confidence until the Lord is satisfied. Haggai 1:9 tells us quite simply, why do you have money problems, well you aren't taking care of the Lord's work.

This is quite helpful when in it comes to planning out your finances. Budgets are created so that we can determine where money should go, and so all of our needs can be met. If we follow the Lord's advice He tells us that He will stretch our budgets, that He will bless us. We actually will reap an abundance because the Lord's hand will be with us.

What is utterly troubling is when our budgets don't work, when expenses come up out of no where, where misfortune and emergencies overtake us at the worst times. In these times it seems like life itself is working against us, and this probably is the case. The misfortune of Christians does not come by chance it can only come by the hand of the Lord. Sometimes He brings misfortune our way so that we may be disciplined or groomed in our character; other times it is because we simply have not chosen to honor God.

Why does this surprise us? We are made in the image of God and so we have a deep understanding about God and how He shall act because we are His children. If someone doesn't honor us after we have helped them, if they don't use money we have given them for the right reasons, do we still hold out our generosity to them?