Money Trees?
May 20, 2010 • By
I see a problem in the body of Christ that is a train wreck in the making. It's a set-up by the enemy...and the sad thing is that it is predominately the fault of many pastors. The train wreck is that too many believers are tired of being told that if they become extravagent or sacrificial givers that they will become rich like television preachers. Okay, I guess I'm about to step into it now.
Now I am a prosperity preacher, which means that I believe that God takes pleasure in the prosperity of his servants (Psalms 35:27). This verse says that God takes pleasure in the prosperity of His servants. The Bible also tells us that if we will give bountifully or generously so that blessings would come to others (the Amplified Version), God will make all grace abound toward us so that we would always have all sufficiency in all things and have no need of outside help (2 Corinthians 9:6-9). Psalms 112 tells us that wealth and riches should be in the house of the righteous. I could go on and on with verses like these, so as I said, I am a "prosperity preacher".
However the problem with the prosperity message that many nationally known preachers or mega church pastors are preaching is that it majors on believers giving, and minors on explaining what giving actually does and what the believers' obligations are after they have given...making their message counterproductive and actually contrary to the Word of God! Uh Oooo, here we go!
Many are preaching in a manner that leads one to think or believe that, "...if you just sow or give into my ministry, then God is going to come down from heaven and plant a money tree in your backyard that only you can pick from". Maybe that's an exaggeration, but the point is, God says again and again that if you give He will bless the workS of your hand (I meant to capitalize that S).
For the LORD thy God hath blessed thee in all the works of thy hand...Duet 2:7
And there ye shall eat before the LORD your God, and ye shall rejoice in all that ye put your hand unto, ye and your households, wherein the LORD thy God hath blessed thee. Duet. 12:7
Thou shalt surely give him, and thine heart shall not be grieved when thou givest unto him: because that for this thing the LORD thy God shall bless thee in all thy works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto. Duet 15:10
These three verses (and there are others) clearly show us that we definitely have something to do with our prosperity. In fact, Joshua 1:8 tells us that we will "...make our own way prosperous..."
The problem, as I see it, is five-fold:
1. Though many of these pastors and preachers define the word bless to mean: empowered to prosper (to push forward in life), they teach it as if God is going to do the pushing. God isn't doing the pushing, he's doing the empowering and we take His power and use it to push forward.
2. Too many Christians just want something easy. They want to believe in a slot machine in the sky. Just give your money and pull the lever, without doing anything else, and money will just come rolling in. Certainly you should release faith for favor and prosperity angels to ASSIST you in gathering in your money harvest, but you can't just sit on your rusty dusty and do nothing...God will bless the works of your hand.
3. The thought of many believers, even so-called "Word of Faith" believers, studying the Word of God for themselves has become a foreign thing. I don't just mean reading the Bible and I don't mean studying the notes from your pastors sermons the previous Sunday, or reading books on this subject. I say this having written two books on the subject myself. No, what I'm referring to is believers being of noble hearts, like the Berean Christians, to daily study whether the things that I teach (or any other ministry gift) arew so. Dig into the Word and discover not only God's promises of prosperity, but God's precepts and principles for prosperity for yourself!
4. Even though we've been redeemed from poverty and lack, so that we might be made rich through Christ's poverty (I know that many will have a theological issue with this, but I won't back down from the Word), you can't practive destructive practices that produce poverty and still walk in the blessing. I wish I had space and time to go into more detail regarding this, but I don't. But I will just mention one, which is living above one's means and being caught up in usecured debt. The average American family, including Christian families, owe $8,000.00 in unsecured debt. This includes everything from credit cards to automibiles and homes that are worth less the the outstanding debt that is owed upon them.
5. There is a misunderstanding about the manner in which God has chosen to bless the 5-fold ministry (priests) vs. the manner in which God has chosen to bless the believer (kings). The passage below will explain what I mean.
God spoke to Aaron, "I am personally putting you in charge of my contributions, all the holy gifts I get from the People of Israel. I am turning them over to you and your children for your personal use. This is the standing rule. You and your sons get what's left from the offerings, whatever hasn't been totally burned up on the Altar-the leftovers from Grain-Offerings, Absolution-Offerings, and Compensation-Offerings. Eat it reverently; it is most holy; every male may eat it. Treat it as holy. "You also get the Wave-Offerings from the People of Israel. I present them to you and your sons and daughters as a gift. This is the standing rule. Anyone in your household who is ritually clean may eat it. I also give you all the best olive oil, the best new wine, and the grain that is offered to God as the firstfruits of their harvest- all the firstfruits they offer to God are yours. Anyone in your household who is ritually clean may eat it. "You get every Totally-Devoted gift. Every firstborn that is offered to God, whether animal or person is yours. Except you don't get the firstborn itself, but its redemption price; firstborn humans and ritually clean animals are bought back and you get the redemption price. When the firstborn is a month old it must be redeemed at the redemption price of five shekels of silver, using the standard of the Sanctuary shekel, which weighs twenty gerahs. "On the other hand, you don't redeem a firstborn ox, sheep, or goat-they are holy. Instead splash their blood on the Altar and burn their fat as a Fire-Gift, a pleasing fragrance to God. But you get the meat, just as you get the breast from the Wave-Offering and the right thigh. All the holy offerings that the People of Israel set aside for God, I'm turning over to you and your children. That's the standard rule and includes both you and your children-a Covenant-of-Salt, eternal and unchangeable before God." Numbers 18:8-19 (TMSG)
Without going verse by verse and line upon line, there are three things that this passage from the Message Bible brings out:
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First, God has put the Priesthood or the Ministry Gifts in charge of His offerings. He has turned them over to them as Compensation Offerings for there personal use. Obviously, portions of these offerings were and are to go to sustain the entire operation of the ministry, including building and whatever else that was and is necessary to run the work of God smoothly. God empowers ministry gifts to prosper relative to their ministries. In a sense, their ministry is their business, even though we know that it's not a business in the worldly sense. But churches and ministries are in the soul-winning, diciple making business. Ministries who do this better than others will have a higher income and be able to compensate its staff better than those who do this poorly. Ministries who only have one stream of income, the tithe, usually struggle because God never intended for the church to be run only from the tithe.
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Second, there was more than one type of offering. In fact the tithe isn't even included here. The tithe went to the Levites or the Priesthood's staff or helps workers. Read the rest of this chapter to see this. Whatever portions that weren't to be burned as a sacrifice to God Himself, of the grain offering, absolution offerings, and compensation offerings went to the priests. Then the wave offering or the firstfruits offering went to the priests. Finally whatever vows or devoted offering went to the priest. All throughout the Old Testament, the tithe went to the Levite or the ministry of helps. Purchase my book called: Firstfruits...for a more detailed explanation.
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Third and you need to pay close attention to this. Here and in other places, you see that the Israelites brought in firstfruit offerings from their grain offerings, "fruit" offerings, oil from their olive trees, wine from their grapevines, grain from the barley and wheat harvest, along with their firstborn animals. Why is this important? This teaches us that the Israelites used their land for multiple streams of income!
Today most Christians think that if they just give their tithes and offerings and work that one little job that they will have the prosperity that the bible promises. However the problem is that these promises were not given to people who were the employees (or slaves). They were given to free people who owned and worked their own land, tithed and gave generous or extravagent offerings and God in turn blessed the works of their hands big time, as long as they walked in line with His Word.
My brothers and sisters, God has not and will not change (Malachi 3:6). This is God's method for blessing His people. The body of Christ is being raped through misinformation because all too many preachers are teaching people to just give to their ministries and the money will just supernatural roll in. With all of the giving that has taken place into tele-evangelist and mega-church ministries, almost everyone in their congregations should already be rich. But with each new sermon on giving, they come up with another reason or thing that the people sitting in the pews haven't done to explain why the Word isn't working on the level that they teach that it should. The Word works when you work the Word, but you must rightly divide the Word of God.
Brothers and Sisters, God is going to bless the works (plural) of your hands. I'm not saying that it's the might and power of your hand that will make you rich. It's God's power that He gives to you to get wealth that will go to work in your life; if you will stop sitting around waiting for money trees to fall from heaven in your backyard. God doesn't give the wealth...He gives us the power to get the wealth...as we put our hands to work in multiple areas. This is one of the secrets that even unsaved wealthy people have understood: To be rich you must have multiple streams of income.
I just completed a series in my church called "Redeemed from the curse of poverty and lack" in which I go into these multiple streams of income and much more. We will soon make it available in our online store.
God showed us in Genesis 2:7 - 15 how to have and keep a paradise:
God formed Man out of dirt from the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life. The Man came alive-a living soul! Then God planted a garden in Eden, in the east. He put the Man he had just made in it. God made all kinds of trees grow from the ground, trees beautiful to look at and good to eat. The Tree-of-Life was in the middle of the garden, also the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil. A river flows out of Eden to water the garden and from there divides into four rivers. The first is named Pishon; it flows through Havilah where there is gold. The gold of this land is good. The land is also known for a sweet-scented resin and the onyx stone. The second river is named Gihon; it flows through the land of Cush. The third river is named Hiddekel and flows east of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates. God took the Man and set him down in the Garden of Eden to work the ground and keep it in order.
Genesis 2:7-15 (TMSG)
God placed man in the Garden of Eden, a veritable paradise. Notice too that God gave the man a place to live or land and a job before He gave him a wife. I tell all the women in my church that if a man doesn't have his own place and a real job, then he isn't ready to be married. The Bible doesn't give men the option of not working. If a man doesn't work he should not eat. That's another blog for another day. But there is another more subtle point that this passage teaches.
Notice that after telling us about the Garden of Eden, God mentions a river that flowed out of Eden to water the garden. This would mean that the city or land of Eden was bigger than the garden itself. This river watered the garden. But then God tells us that the river divided into four rivers!!!! From the beginning, God here is telling us that if we want to maintain our Garden of Eden or a paradise lifestyle we need multiple streams to water our garden!
Pastors, let's do some proper exegesis of Scriptures and preach the full gospel. And lay people (kings), put your hands to work in multiple areas, or create multiple streams of income and God will bless whatever you do as long as you put Him first in your character and your contributions into the kingdom of God!
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