Recently, we've been working our way through subjects Christians avoid. And as I mentioned even last week, it's good that you're not totally avoiding them because you're here. But as we work through Another subject today, I just want to just give us a brief overview, not of what we have covered in the past, the recent past, but just why we're doing this is that, you know, there are just some of those things that that we don't touch on because either they're a little too personal or too sticky or We just overlooked them. As a matter of fact, just not to go over it so much, but to just mention, we talked about fasting for the last couple of weeks. And that's not necessarily something controversial. It's just something that we're not necessarily really well informed about. And so that was one of the reasons why we brought that topic up. But today, we're going to talk about money. I got it, OK? Now, last year about this time, we talked about stewardship and giving for a short period of time. And that's just one aspect of money. And that may not even play into what we're going to be looking at. But culturally, money is a sensitive topic that we just don't talk about. We keep our private financial matters private. How much we make, how much we owe, our net worth, what we spend our money on. Many of those things are just done privately. And by the way, I'm not going to be asking about your business during the message or even next week. But what we are going to do is examine what the scriptures say about money so that we can be more obedient in what we do with it or how we view it. So that's the idea that we have behind this. As we consider today money misconceptions, and these are specifically those that we're dealing with when it comes to scripture, God provides us with some extremely valuable principles regarding our resources. Not surprising, much of what it covers relates to the spiritual and ethical elements of money and wealth. Now, some of us in this room might be thinking, well, I don't have any, so I don't have to listen. That might include those of us who are college-aged or below. And what I would encourage you to do is to think about, hey, you have a future, right? And some of you might even have odd jobs right now, part-time jobs. And so even if you are some of the younger folk, this is one area that if you can get a handle on, boy, it'll take care of a lot of problems. Okay. Today we're going to tackle the misconceptions people may have about money, specifically mistaken or false ideas about what the Bible says about money, including printing counterfeit money. No, just kidding. Anyway. We have to keep in mind the concepts we are dealing with today need to come out of an accurate understanding of the scriptures. So that's what we're trying to do is address some misconceptions. So keeping that in mind as we're going through these things, you know, there might be a point in time where, you know, you're, you're listening, you're thinking we're on point, whatever. And it's like, Oh, okay. It's like, no, no, these are not good. All right, so we're kind of cleaning house a little bit, so to speak, when it comes to our thinking, so that then we can, next week, put some principles together that are maybe a little more accurate. Are all these going to affect everybody in the room? Probably not. But there are also things that sometimes, well, we'll get into that. So the first thing we're gonna be looking at is misconceptions about the Bible and money. And as we take a look at that, misconceptions, I'm really highlighting here, okay? But the first one is, Jesus spoke more about money than any other subject. Now, right now what I'm gonna do is just kind of give these to you. Later on I'm going to dispel them, but right now I'm just letting them out there and then we'll treat them. Jesus talked about money in 13 of his 36 parables. As a result, people often overemphasize the fact that he spoke about money. And again, like I say, we will get into that a little bit later. But there's another one. This is a misconception. You cannot obediently serve God and be rich because riches are evil. 1 Timothy 6.10 is often cited, Psalm 73.12 says this, So rich people are ungodly, right? Matthew 6.24, No one can serve two masters, for either he'll hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other." You can't serve God and mammon. Mammon, we like to kind of put some kind of evil spin on that, but it just means money, wealth, riches, whatever. Okay? It's just another word for it. And so, you know, sometimes we say it's, well, it's ill-gotten gain. Not necessarily, but here's the point. If you have money, you're not serving God. That's a misconception, okay, and we'll get into that, all right? God promises prosperity to his obedient, hardworking Christians. Psalm 92.12 says this, the righteous shall flourish like a palm tree, he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. This is not the same necessarily as the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel. This is basically saying, I am living an obedient life, therefore God is going to reward me for that. And while we're on the subject, as we think about this, Abraham. What do we see about Abraham in Genesis 13? It says, Abraham was very rich in livestock and silver and in gold. Was Abraham a faithful man? Yes. Job. We looked at Job for a very long time. And so we have two verses here, Job 1.3 and 42.10, the bookends of his life, right? Also, his possessions were 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys, and a very large household, so that Job was the greatest of all the people of the East. And then how was the book concluded? After he went through all of those terrible sufferings that he did and his friends, advice, And the Lord restored Job's losses when he prayed for his friends. Indeed, the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. So everything you just read, he doubled. Solomon. It's interesting what it starts off with in his reign, 1 Kings 3, 11 through 13, when God said, what do you want? And he said, what? I want wisdom and understanding. Look at how God responds to him. Then God said to him, because you've asked this thing and have not asked for long life for yourself, nor have asked riches for yourself, nor have asked the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern justice, behold, I have done according to your words. See, I have given you a wise and understanding heart, so there has not been anyone like you before you, nor shall any like you arise after you. And I have also given you what you have not asked, both riches and honor, so that there shall not be anyone like you among the kings all your days." Now, there was only one king in Israel at the time that was Solomon. He wasn't talking about other Jewish, Israeli kings. He was talking about all the other kings of the earth. During your reign, there will be no one as great as you. And then in 10.23, it says this, King Solomon surpassed all the kings of all the earth in riches and wisdom. This was a summary statement in the middle of a listing of Solomon's vast fortune. And by the way, these blessings came as Solomon was faithfully serving the Lord. He did not end necessarily well, but he began well. All right. We've got this idea, God promises prosperity to his obedient, hardworking followers. Another one, we should not worry about money because God promises to take care of us. Matthew 6.25-27 says this, Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on it. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns. So that's talking about birds. They don't gather their what? Wealth. Yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? Philippians 4.19, and my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. So we don't need to worry about our money. And then, it is sinful to be in debt. Romans 13.8. happens to be our memory verse for this month, but it was really, if you didn't know, Valentine's Day is in February. So I was thinking about love for one another. So I was looking at more of the last part of the verse, but the beginning of the verse says, owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. Right? Now, I just want to go back real quick, right? It is sinful to be in debt. And I'm calling this a misconception. And I'm just wondering out there, how many of you are going? So we have these misconceptions, whether you agree with all of them or not, we'll get to that. But one of the problems with misconceptions is they produce wrong responses. Now, this is not going to take us too long to get through this, but what I want us to see is there's some fruit with wrong thinking, specifically when it relates to money. So an inaccurate understanding of scripture, what it says about money, then produces flawed actions and reactions regarding money. So here are some of them. I'm not gonna try to pretend that this is an exhaustive list, but I tried a little bit. Just as far as general wrong responses, and you'll understand why I'm qualifying this a little bit later, but we might judge those who have more or less than I do, right? Whether it's more or less. Why don't they have more? Why haven't they provided for themselves better? Or, look at all that they have. Oh, they think they're so, you know, ritzy and everything, right? So we judge based upon what other people have or don't have. We judge how we think people handle their money. Well, if they would just, they wouldn't be in that situation. Or, boy, don't they have too much? Maybe they should do something else with it. Sometimes we confuse blessing with greed. People can be oversensitive sometimes. And we can look at how God has blessed us and say, you know, I'm being selfish. But we can also confuse greed with blessing. Notice, and I'm forecasting a little bit here, we're talking more about heart issues here, aren't we? That's what we're going to get into next week a little bit more. But seriously, folks, both of these can be a problem. We can become too focused on money. Whether it be focused on it from the standpoint of, I got to do what's right and be all hot and bothered about everything, or the acquiring of it. Or the keeping of it. Let me tell you something, a little bit of confession here, right? My wife and I have investments. We've tried to set some things aside over the years, and there will be a point when we'll be retired, not retired from serving, but retired from full-time service. And, you know, my focus on my, you know, it's a 403B, but it doesn't matter, my focus on what I have set aside there was no focus for many, many years. Now all of a sudden it's a little more important to me. Right? Because there's gonna be an end to what comes in. And now I have to live off of what I done put away. And so there's that, oh, the stock market went down a lot today. Stock market went up a lot today. Anyway, you get the idea. So we can become too focused on money. You might have very different reasons why you're focused on your money today, right? We can become irresponsible with money. That kind of lends itself to that whole, don't worry about that. God's going to take care of us. There's a lot of other reasons why we can be irresponsible with our money too. Now, when we're talking about other wrong misconceptions, I'm focusing on those who are the faithful rich. the faithful rich, because notice before we talked about, you know, having a lot of money is sinful. That's a misconception. So that means that there are those who have more than others, but they're still faithful, right? How can they have misconceptions? And by the way, I'm not going to get into a lot of detail about this. We've talked about this before. As Americans, we are extremely wealthy. regardless of what strata we are in, all right? I mean, we've already won, so to speak, just simply because of the country that we are in. I mean, you think about how a king lived 150 years ago, right? And then complained because your air conditioner isn't quite keeping up with your 102 degree day. Or I have nothing to eat in my refrigerator that is keeping all of my delicacies fresh. And on and on we can go, right? Kings would have no concept of how we live today. Guilt over success and wealth. Someone who has can feel guilty over God allowing them to succeed. And confusion about their spiritual gift or diminishing their spiritual gift. Now, we're not going to get into the scripture today, but I just want to tie in that Romans 12 says that there are those who are generous. How do you exercise your generosity? You have to have something to give. Now, the scripture also tells us there that there are degrees by which people are given. So some are given more to be generous with. You understand that? Now, I do believe that sometimes we can sidestep the fact that we should all be generous, but there are those who have been given the gift of giving. So as we think about that, we can have some confusion about that because like, well, you know, I had these possessions. If I'm wrong to have them, then, you know, what do I do with them? You see where I'm going? There can be some confusion because of these misconceptions. All right. Hopefully I haven't confused you. But as we move forward here, now let's dispel these misconceptions. And as we do that, one thing I want to keep in mind is this. And think about this for a minute. As we think about these wrong responses, maybe you sat through the part of the message that we're talking about misconceptions and you were thinking, eh, I don't know that this necessarily applies to me. But here's the point. If you have ever responded to financial situations, either yours or somebody else's, you know, how much people have or whatever, in relation to the responses that we talked about, then guess what? Those responses go back to misconceptions. So if your responses looked anything like any of those, then you have some misconceptions. If we've evaluated someone else or we've evaluated ourselves by how we use our money, by how much we have, by how little we have or whatever, by the wrong criteria, then we will have the wrong response. Because the misconceptions flow out, they produce the wrong responses. So now we're going to dispel those things. We're going to go right back through the same ones. All right. So some of this is not going to be new to you. The first one is Jesus spoke more about money than any other subject. It is true that 13 out of the 36 parables that Christ gave mentioned money, but money is not the focus. Money is often used as an illustration, hence the parable, okay? But not necessarily the primary subject. A man named Jeffrey Poore, which is kind of a weird name to have for this topic, said from an article in Relevant Magazine, 18 of Jesus' parables also mention food, but that doesn't make food the point of the stories. So let's go back and look at an example of where Jesus did talk about money. And then let's look at a couple of examples where Jesus wasn't really talking about money as the primary topic. The first one, we need to go back to Luke chapter 12. Luke chapter 12. I'm gonna be reading for you verses 13 through 21. 13 through 21. And by the way, I'm not picking on our young people today, but I'm trying to include them as best I can. I remember being a young person and making comparisons to what I had and what others had and what I didn't have, what others didn't have, right? So this is relevant. This is relevant. Luke 12, beginning in verse 13. Then one of the crowd said to him, Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. Now, you can imagine, this is open air conversations that Jesus is having, and this guy just whips this out, right? You're a teacher, you have authority. Tell my brother to give me what's mine, right? So we don't have anything else but that. But here's what Jesus says. But he said to him, man, who made me a judge or an arbitrator over you? And he said to them, take heed and be aware of the covetousness for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things that he possesses. Right. So he's he's setting him straight on this. So this parable that he's going to say now relates back to this guy's issue. It's about money. Then he spoke a parable, saying, The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. And he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops? And so he said, I will do this. I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry." Right? Enjoy life. But God said to him, Fool, this night your soul will be required of you. Then whose will these things be which you have provided? So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God." Now, it was very much about money, but it was about the wrong focus on money. His focus should have been on his soul and where his destiny was in Christ, right? So, that's the picture here. But then, as we take a look into, to make comparison where he uses money as more of an illustration, Matthew 13, verses 45, and by the way, there are longer examples. I chose a couple of shorter ones just for time. But Matthew 13, 45 and 46, again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls, who when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it. Now this might not be one of those occasions where someone will kind of fudge the context a bit and try to pull a financial principle out of this as opposed to what is actually being said, but the subject is the kingdom of God. The subject is the greatness of the kingdom of God and sacrificing anything and everything else to get that, to possess eternal life basically. Luke chapter 15, verses eight through 10. Or what woman having 10 silver coins, if she loses one coin, shall not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it. And then when she found it, she calls her friends and neighbors together saying, rejoice with me for I have found that piece which I have lost. And so we stop there and we say, fantastic. This is about good stewardship. You need to keep track of your money. You need to have a good accounting of your money. Except Jesus went on and said, likewise, I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. The idea is the elation that we have of finding one tenth of our fortune, of all that we had that we lost is equivalent, right? That elation, that celebration of one sinner who repents. It's an illustration. So Jesus' parables often, not always, but often represented something spiritual. Just like the many other things that he talked about in the parables represented something spiritual. Even when he was talking about the money, there was a spiritual aspect to it, right? So we've kind of dispelled that, all right? You know, sometimes what people do is they say, well, Jesus talks so much about money, it's really important. That would be stretching it a bit. That would be elevating that subject probably to a greater degree than what it needs to be, right? You cannot obediently serve God and be rich because riches are evil. Obviously, I'm stretching some of these things in the beginning of the message because that's what people do, right? But in 1 Timothy 6.10, it says very clearly, for the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. It's not the amount that we possess, it is whether or not what we have or don't have, for that matter, triggers a sinful desire to either have it or keep it, do something with it, acquire it, whatever it is. And again, we'll talk more about that a little bit next week. But as we look at Psalm 73, 12, behold, these are the ungodly who are always at ease, they increase in riches. I'll be honest with you, I purposely grabbed this out of context because that's what people do when they try to pull principles out and we have these misconceptions. Let's put it this way. How can we have, you know, misconception, wrong concept, improper thinking of something unless we've pulled it out wrong. Right? So that's the whole idea behind this anyway. So yeah, I took a little bit of liberty and threw this in. But let's look at the context. Let's go back to Psalm 73. Psalm 73, and I want to read verses 1 through 12 for you. And we'll see if this idea, this misconception of what we talked about holds true. Psalm 73 verses 1 through 12. For God is good to Israel, to such as are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled. My steps had nearly slipped, for I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no pangs in their death, but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble as other men, nor are they plagued like other men. Therefore, pride serves as their necklace. Violence covers them like a garment. Their eyes bulge with abundance. They have more than heart could wish. They scoff and speak wickedly concerning oppression. They speak loftily. That's arrogance, pride. They set their mouth against the heavens and their tongue walks through the earth. Therefore, his people return here and waters of a full cup are drained by them. And they say, how does God know? And is their knowledge in the most high? Behold, these are the ungodly who are always at ease. They increase in riches. These, These, he's just described who these are. These are not necessarily those who increase in riches. These are this description of what the wicked do who are increased in riches. And it goes on. Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain and washed my hands in innocence for as long as the day. Actually, I didn't want to go into all that, but you get the idea here. What he's saying is this. This is a description of the wicked rich, those who have enriched themselves by all the wrong means. And in their riches, in their place of power, they are doing terrible things with the privilege that they now have, okay? It's not just because they have funds. Matthew 6.24, we read that, no one can serve two masters. For either you hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon. That is absolutely true. It's absolutely true. But as we think about this, does this mean that money and possessions are wrong? No, it's when money and possessions come before God, which then makes them an idol. If we are faithful and loyal to God, then even our wealth will be put in its proper place. And dare I even say, because sometimes we tend to gravitate toward the wealth, our lack of wealth. because sometimes it's the pursuit of the money that is the biggest problem, not what we have, but what we want. And so as we think about this, It's not the money itself, it is the pursuit of it. It is the desire that then eclipses our desire for who God is. It is honoring either the pursuit of wealth or wealth itself as opposed to the one who gives all things. What is all about then? Money in a lot of ways is neutral, just like many other things. What makes money evil or good is our attitude toward it and what we do with it. Not necessarily even how much we have or don't have. The evil or the good comes with what we do with it. And again, we'll talk more about that next week. But then we come to God promises prosperity to His obedient, hardworking Christians. And again, this is not a name it and claim it health and wealth prosperity gospel that I'm saying here. That's wrong. We've talked about that in other venues. But when we're talking about this here, we're talking about just simply being rewarded for what we have done in the Lord, for seeing some earthly something come about there, right? As I mentioned a little bit earlier, this came up in our study of Job's life, but it bears repeating. God does say that prosperity is a general result of wise living. Look at Proverbs 8, 18-19. Riches and honor are with me, enduring riches and righteousness. My fruit is better than gold, yes, than fine gold, and my revenue than choice silver. Now, what we have here is a mix of both things. There is this idea of wealth that's attached, but then there's also the spiritual wealth that's in here as well. But what's interesting is this is the personification of wisdom, wisdom is speaking here. So if someone is living wisely this is what is going to be a part of their life as a rule, that is what a proverb is, it's a general rule of life. So it can be an evidence of God's blessing. But a lack of wealth is not a definite indicator that God is withholding his favor from someone for some reason. The example of Job having much, that's there, but there's also the example of Job losing everything. Everything. His circumstances changed, but his faithful character did not. And then we see Proverbs 28.6, better is the poor who walks in his integrity than one perverse in his ways though he be rich. So here we even have in someone's poverty there is virtue. There is virtue in it if in fact they are following the Lord as they should. And again, I was purposefully vague when we did quote Psalm 92.12, the righteous shall be flourished like a palm tree, he will grow like a cedar in Lebanon. If we expand that understanding, the righteous shall flourish like a palm tree, he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Starting then in verse 13, those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bear fruit in old age. They shall be fresh and flourishing to declare that the Lord is upright. He is my rock and there is no unrighteousness in him. So what's the flourishing? It's a spiritual flourishing, right? So yes, God does promise flourishing. Wealth, in one sense. but it's on the spiritual side of things. It's in our relationship with Him, not necessarily in what we have in our pockets. So the psalmist contrasts the life of the wicked to the life of a righteous person. So here's the problem as we think about, you know, God promises prosperity to obedient, hardworking Christians. What scale do we go by? Because if you look at a lot of different things that God expects in scripture, he gives us a measurement by which we can verify that we're there. So how do we verify this? Someone who has more than I do, that's now evil. Someone who has a lot more than I have, now they're sinners. Right? Or they're the blessed ones I need to catch up. Right? What's the criteria? Do we measure by the living standards in America? In Peru? In rural China? What makes us rich? What makes us not rich? What makes us blessed? How do we know that we're not blessed? Prosperity doesn't bear out as an indicator of God's blessings. Yes, men are named in scripture who are blessed with wealth. Abraham, Job, Solomon, we talked about them. There are many others. But we also have those who were nearly destitute. John the Baptist. I don't know, maybe it kept him nice and trim, but locusts and honey? I'm not signing up. Camel hair clothes. Living out in the wilderness, right? Why did he do all that? To stand out. To stand out as the forerunner of Christ. To do without so that everything was focused on the one to come. But it didn't mean that he lacked God's blessing. The opposite was absolutely true in his life. So if his attire was the criteria of whether or not he was being blessed by God, well, no wonder the Pharisees didn't go out and see him. How about Paul? He said, I know how to have plenty, and I know how to be destitute, my paraphrase. Listen. Paul's measurement of his spiritual walk or his measurement of whether or not God was working in his life wasn't how much he had or didn't have. And then I think of what is mentioned about a number of the Old Testament prophets and other servants. where it says in Hebrews 11, 36 and 38, still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain in the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins. Okay, wandered about. What does that tell you? Right? Being destitute, afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy. They wander in deserts and mountains and dens and caves of the earth. So we don't necessarily always have the exact picture of what the prophets particularly went through. This tells us many of them had a really difficult life. But yet they were God's mouthpiece. They were choice servants. So Is this misconception true or are some people given a bad deal by God? Right? Because that's what we'd have to say. If I can't see God's blessing materialistically, then I've gotten a raw deal. That's not the right standard. And of course, we can go and say, well, what about Jesus himself? He even said about himself that he had no place to lay his head and he had no earthly belongings besides the clothes that he wore. And by the way we remember that even as he was going to the cross those were stripped from him. So we can't measure God's blessing by what we own. One of the other misconceptions is we should not worry about money because God promises to take care of us. Now, I have to confess, I purposefully included the word worry because we're told not to worry. And so, yes, you would be right if you technically said, you know, no, we're not supposed to worry. So that's bad. I know that's bad. But in one sense, the statement is also not true because we often use worry in the broader sense of concern or duty. Like it's just it's something that we have on our minds. So are we supposed to sidestep our responsibility over our finances and resources because God promises to take care of us? You know, I've got this divine safety net so I can kind of live fast and loose, not really worry about things because God's going to take care of me, right? Proverbs 10, four and five says this, he who has a slack hand becomes poor, but the hand of the diligent makes rich. Again, these are rules of life, not necessarily guarantees or promises. He who gathers in summer is a wise son. He who sleeps in the harvest is a son who causes shame. Right? What's interesting is this. Paul, we're going to see two quotes, one from each letter that Paul wrote to the Thessalonians. The Thessalonian believers, they had a couple of issues, but it was all related to what they saw was end times, but we're told that's an immediate possibility, right? That Christ could come. Some were under the false teaching, don't know exactly where it came from, that the resurrection had already taken place, and he fixes that in 1 Thessalonians 4. But there was also an issue with, we'll just say motivation, because of the imminency of Christ's return. And by the way, there seems to be usually a group around that focuses on this, but let's see what he says. This is what he tells them. One of the things is that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands as we commanded you. In other words, work, be busy, do something. And then in 2 Thessalonians, he gets back with them again and says, for even when we were with you, we commanded you this, if any will not work, neither shall he eat. They had the problem of some people being like, well, the Lord's coming back. I don't have to do anything, right? That's the ultimate provision, folks. Christ is coming back for us. So, hey, you know, banks are evil, just going to a lot of debt because Jesus is going to come and they're going to stick it to them, right? That's spiritual. Now, you understand what I'm saying? But that's what they were doing. They're looking ahead saying, hey, Christ is coming. Yeah, I can take it easy. that was not responsible. So we probably do still have some responsibilities in relation to our finances. We don't look to God for a bailout. And then lastly, it is sinful to be in debt. Again, going back to Romans 13.8, owe no one anything except to love one another. Here, Paul isn't talking about having any kind of debt. And frankly, even when you go through the scriptures, there were times when people owed people, you know, if you're running a business, there are times when you're going to need capital. Well, it's got to come from somewhere. We call that an investment, but you still owe somebody something, right? So how do we get around this? Well, we're not trying to. The context has to do with paying taxes and customs. Paul expands the idea a bit to instruct believers to owe no one, but the meaning is to owe no one to their harm or loss, or to owe taxes that should be paid. In other words, don't fall behind in your payments or owe what you cannot repay. So for example, if you happen to have a mortgage, you're not living in sin. as long as you're paying it back, okay? But if you're purposefully squandering resources, or I say you, someone, hypothetically, were to be purposefully squandering their resources and then get foreclosed on, right? Now notice, I'm not talking about something devastating happens in your life. I'm just talking about, you know, you've not been responsible To put that debt then on somebody else is wrong. But to be able to manage an investment of a car or a house or that type of thing, there's nothing wrong with that kind of debt. It's the owing to the other person's detriment, even if it's an institution. How many of you have heard people say, ah, they're a big corporation. Right? It's not going to hurt them. They don't need it. Is that really what it's about or is it the fact that we're supposed to pay what we owe? Right? So we don't owe from the standpoint of not paying our obligations. That's what this is talking about. So just as a little bit of application today, kind of clearing the air a little bit, getting some of these misconceptions out of the way. As with other subjects in scripture, our thinking can get off center for several reasons. We can overemphasize some aspects of a subject or diminish or ignore other aspects and come away with a skewed understanding. And that's what we sometimes do when it comes to money, when it comes to wealth, when it comes to the pursuit of it, all of those different things. We overemphasize it in the wrong ways or we diminish it or ignore the principles in other ways. We can also flat out misuse scripture as I just illustrated today, not advocating, by taking it out of context. We can muddy the clarity of God's word through our own experiences or influences of our culture. Sometimes we call that justifying ourselves, right? Or we put everybody else in with us and say, well, see, look, this is common. So it's not a big deal. I'm going to give you a quick illustration. I'm not going to name any names. But there was, I think it was right around the 2008, 2009 time frame. My wife and I had some friends who were trying to sell their house. The houses, the bottom went out of the market. They were going to be losing tons of money. They were getting ready to foreclose on their house. And frankly, it really wasn't necessarily their fault. Okay. But the bank literally came to them and said, okay, here's what you need to do. You just need to let that go. Let it go. We'll absorb it. And then, uh, we're going to turn around and we will give you a new loan for a new house. And I was like, what? You can do that? This is the bank coming to them. So, you know, honestly folks, I'm not sure what I would have done. I have to be very transparent because that money, well, frankly, the government paid it, right? That money got absorbed by our government, which was all of us. And then they got a clean start. And I struggled with that, but then I thought, this is the bank coming to them. This is the government. So, you know, sometimes it can get rather complicated. But I really did see that as, that's an obligation. You know, that's just not how I was raised. I think that there's some biblical things going on here, right? So anyway, sometimes we can get put in some really difficult things, but it's the influence of our culture sometimes that can be very difficult to deal with. Also, frankly, we may be living by some false teaching, whether we know it or not. I'm not accusing anybody of anything. I'm simply saying that if we picked up something along the way, that wasn't correct, if some of these misconceptions maybe match something that was in your thinking, it's important to get rid of those, right? So now that as we just think of these wrong responses that we're talking about, and we're just gonna spend just a couple of minutes here, but judging and becoming too focused on money, being irresponsible with money, whatever it might be, When the subject is money and possessions, our misconceptions produce wrong responses. And this is what I want us to guard ourselves against more than anything else. Whether it be a part-time job, or babysitting, or having your own business, or being a CEO, or working on the line, or whatever it is. So the goal today was to dispel or rid ourselves of false views of money. This will then set us up for the rest of our study to be more effective, to kind of free our minds from some of these things that we can kind of get diverted by and really, and maybe a little bit more pure way, kind of look at, okay, what's the right view of money and the pursuit of it and what's the wrong view of it? and not kind of justify things or explain things or have some of this baggage that I think comes with this topic. All right. There's a lot of helpful things out there. But even when you're talking about Christian organizations that want to give you principles for living in relation to obedience to God with your finances, you still got to square it with scripture. All right. You still have to square it with scripture, make sure that it really is something the Bible is saying about money. But it's also today is trying to put some things in perspective, right? There are some things that are an awful lot more important to us should be than money. And there is one person in particular as our Lord and Savior that has to be, right? There's an oft-used quote that says that, you know, so many marriages end in divorce, and most of those marriages end, you know, the majority of the time, it's because of finances. And I would actually disagree with that. What I would say is, is that finances might be the subject, but it's really how the people are relating to one another, right? So again, Finances are somewhat neutral. It's what they're doing with it and how they're responding to one another as they do it, okay? That's called marriage. It's not called money. Well, it's the same way with our relationship with the Lord, right? We have this relationship with Him, and money happens to be a part of it. Money's not the problem. If it is a problem, the money isn't the problem. It's our relationship with him. So ultimately, it's a matter of getting that straight. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, sometimes we kind of hear something in it, and it hits home a little bit. And it's like, Oh, you know, I had some of those thoughts, I need to correct that. or Lord help me to not respond that way or whatever it might be but we're talking about what can be a touchy subject, we're talking about something that's very personal to us because it does affect a lot of our lives. But yet Lord I pray that even this portion of our study will have just helped us to put it in perspective that ultimately this is not bigger than us and frankly if our finances are bigger than us we've created that. and so we need to get it back under control. But Lord I pray that we would understand that ultimately everything falls under you and your authority. May we begin by getting our minds right. in relation to some of the baggage that we might carry but as we continue to pursue this Lord I pray that we'll just take a real unvarnished look at how we see others, how we see ourselves, how we see what we have and don't have and everything in relation to our finances but ultimately that it's in relation to you and we put things in perspective. Lord we thank you for Your patience with us and this one's probably going to require some because it's just one of those areas that it's hard to actually wrestle down and deal with and it's not going to be over in a couple of Sundays. It's something that we're going to need to persevere with Lord and so we ask for your patience but we also ask for that conviction and for that understanding. May we respond to you in faith taking you at your word and doing what you've instructed us to do. In Jesus name, Amen.