Happy Valentine’s Day (a day early)! Please know how much you’re loved and appreciated for being faithful channels of His love to the women and girls in your area. We thank God for you! Have a blessed week!
During the month of February we’re focusing on Wisdom about Money. Let’s turn to Proverbs to get wisdom that goes beyond the gold!
LITTLE BY LITTLE
Dishonest money dwindles away, but whoever gathers money little by little makes it grow.
Proverbs 13:11
“Slow and steady, steady and slow. That’s the way we always go” is a quote from a Walt Disney Goofy book that I read to my girls often when they were little. It’s how Goofy made it across the finish line. It’s also one of the aspects to financial planning that God gives us in the book of Proverbs.
Little by little, slow and steady, when we’re diligent in earning money and managing it rightly, savings accounts can grow. Add patience and faithful stewardship to the principle of compound interest and the resources can greatly increase.
Throughout Scripture and within the book of Proverbs diligence is often associated with wisdom and wealth, and contrasted to laziness, foolishness, and poverty. Little by little is God’s economic wisdom for personal finance and His Kingdom. Steady diligence pays off (Proverbs 13:11b, MSG).
In the Parable of the King’s Ten Servants recorded in Luke 19, Jesus tells of a king who gave his ten subjects ten minas. “Put this money to work,” he said, “until I come back” (v. 13b).
The first two servants were praised and rewarded for gaining more money than they were originally given, ten minas, and five minas, respectfully. The third servant was called wicked for laying his mina aside. The master replied, “Why then didn’t you put my money on deposit, so that when I came back, I could have collected it with interest?” Then he said to those standing by, “Take his mina away from him and give it to the one who has ten minas” (v. 23-24).
What gifts of money, resources, time, and talents, has God given to you? He’s entrusted us with so much! Just think of three. Write them down:
- ________________________________
- ________________________________
- ________________________________
What does your investment portfolio look like? Are you using these things to store up treasures on earth or are you diligently, little by little, slow and steady, investing them in the treasures of heaven (Matthew 6:19-20)?
Jesus said, “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked” (Luke 12:48b). Those who are faithful with what’s entrusted to them will be richly blessed, but those who are eager to get rich will not go unpunished (Proverbs 28:20).
Wisdom Step: Describe your investment in God’s Kingdom. Is it easy come, easy go or a steady diligence for His glory?
We measure our worth by what we have; God measures it by what we’ve left behind.
Bob Goff
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