Are You Being Held Hostage By Your Money?
Financial freedom is something that all of us want to obtain, but it is also something that is rarely acheived.
Why?
Because we don't earn enough money?
Because we don't work hard enough?
Because we don't work long enough?
Because we need more time to make money?
No, for the most part, any of those things will never give us financial freedom, if we are always being controlled by our money. Money is, and has been throughout the years, something that people have used, abused, and have been used by at the same time. Often times we believe that more money will make us safe, or secure, but this has proved to be untrue. Money provides a sense of false security, and in fact, any things that we have can ultimately be ripped from our grasp no matter how hard we try to hold on to them.
In this world we often tend to use people and increase the number of things we have, instead of the other way around. Don't get me wrong, being rich is not wrong in and of itself, however, using people in order to get rich is what is wrong, and that is often what we try to do.
The Bible tells us that the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. I'm sure there is evil that has nothing to do with money, but the majority of it does seem to revolve around money issues. We want, we see, we take. If someone else got hurt in the process, then that's okay, right? It's not okay. It's not, because we didn't act in love, we didn't show any concern, and we didn't care.
Is it wrong to want things?
I don't believe that it's wrong to want things, but I do believe it's wrong to become controlled by our wants and desires, especially if these are things that we just don't even need anyway. The Bible even tells us that if we ask in faith, we will receive all of the things that we need, that we ask for, however, we often ask with wrong intentions. We ask because we are greedy for gain. We want more things, and then we don't receive, and then we wonder why God didn't give us what we asked for like He was supposed to do.
Jesus told us that we cannot serve two masters. We can serve God, or we can serve money, or we can serve a number of other things as well, but we cannot serve everything at once. He also told us to do something different. Jesus said that instead of investing our time in storing our treasure in various places here, where it can be stolen, destroyed, and used up; we should actually store up our treasure in heaven.
How do we store up treasure in heaven?
In order to store up treasure in heaven, Jesus said that we needed to be rich in good deeds, which should not be confused with doing good deeds in order to get into heaven, which is not possible. Jesus once told a rich man to sell his possessions, give the proceeds to the poor, and follow Him. The rich man returned home sad because his heart was controlled by his things. He just couldn't give them up. However, when we give our time, talents, and treasure, and when we act in love and help others around us, no matter how we feel or they feel, we are storing up treasures in heaven that will not pass away, unlike the ones we have here.
Do you know where your money is going?
It's going away, that's for sure, but what is it being used for? It's okay to have money. It's okay to save your money. It's okay to use it for things that you need. However, once we become discontent with what we have, we may begin to use our money in a way that will bring future trouble.
Be careful how you use your money, and be careful that it is not using you in the process. God put us here in order to love each other and use things, but instead we often love things and use people. Somewhere we became lost, and we got things backwards.
Lets get things straight, lets learn to become content in our situations, and lets experience true financial freedom. It's not about having more, but wisely using that which we do have.
Be blessed!
