“Yes, the Almighty will be your gold and your precious silver; for then you will have your delight in the Almighty, and lift up your face to God.” (Job 22:25–26, NKJV)
My mind was transformed and my attitude toward money was radically changed when I began soaking my heart in the Word of God. From a practical standpoint, material wealth had become the god of my life. The Chief Consumerlator had been extremely successful in deceiving me with the “bling” of the world system and had convinced me that this world had a lot to offer! Unfortunately, I was blind to the fact that not only was my wealth going to disappear someday; it was also leading me down the path of destruction. Wealth and material blessings can be like a rattlesnake—deceptive and dangerous! And I had been deceived and was on a dangerous path.
As I became increasingly dissatisfied with my life, one day I took out a piece of paper and wrote the words GOLD and GOD beside each other. We all know that many people make gold or worldly wealth their god and, from a practical standpoint, that is exactly what had happened to me.
As I looked at those two words on my piece of paper, I first placed parentheses around the “L” in GO(L)D. After looking at that for a while, I then blacked out that “L” and had the word GOD!
As I sat staring at that word, I was reminded of Jesus’ words, “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money” (Matthew 6:24, NLT). As I sat there meditating on that verse, I wrote in an “L” under the word GOD. The “L” represented everything I was living for at that time: my money, possessions, opportunities, and time for pleasure. I realized that I needed to place all of these things under the control of God so that he could bring balance into my life for the proper use of these resources. I needed his wisdom to resolve the intrinsic conflicts we all have in determining the balance in managing the perishable and the imperishable. I wanted to increase my focus on participating in the advancement of God’s kingdom. This was a huge revelation to me.
At that time, I made a basic heart decision, “I am submitting the control of my entire life to the Lord, including anything and everything related to me.” That included my time, talent, and treasure. For me, this was a huge undertaking and continues to be a work in progress. Since that time, I have become progressively more of a strategic kingdom investor by investing more of my time, talent, and treasure for the imperishable values of the eternal kingdom. Ruth Ann and I continue to take increasing steps to deposit more of our material wealth in the “Bank of Heaven” for the purpose of advancing the kingdom through endeavors related to the fulfillment of the Great Commission. My motives and talents for generating wealth have been converterlated into making an impact for the kingdom of God. And this has all come about from soaking my heart in the Word of God!
In what ways would your converterlating become more effective if I were to make the study of God’s Word more important in your life?
Converterlators increase their focus on participating in the advancement of God’s kingdom.