But be doers of the Word [obey the message], and not merely listeners to it (James 1:22). This scripture is easy to understand and straightforward enough for us to know if we are practicing it. We should ask ourselves “am I an admirer of Jesus or a follower of Him?”
Besides becoming the atonement for our sins, the reason Christ came to this Earth was to show us how the Father is. In John 5:19 Jesus said that He is “able to do only what He sees the Father doing, for whatever the Father does is what the Son does in the same way.”
Ephesians 3:19 encourages us, “[That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience].” I feel this is really a deep verse worth digging into. God’s Word is telling us that in order to know Christ’s love that we must do it through experience.
Think about this in light of your finances.
To see (experience) your faith in God rewarded for tithing—he promises to open the windows of heaven for you, it requires you to take the first step of giving.
The same goes for giving unto others, He says to “give and it will be given unto you”. In order to experience this blessing, what must precede is the act of giving.
For overcoming debts, we have to take the action initially to trust God’s wisdom to “spend less than we make” (Proverbs 21:20) so that we can then pay down our bills.
In order to succeed it is vital that we not stop at only admiring God’s Word or His wisdom in these areas and think to ourselves “it would be good to tithe, give, or pay off debts”. It is a given that we cannot see God, but we can see Him manifest in our situations as we obey His Word. It is when you see your needs being meet as a result of tithing, experiencing blessings overtaking you after giving to another, and view your bills getting smaller as you progress being a good steward that the impact of God’s manifested power becomes more real to you than ever before.
Remember the classic movie The Wizard of Oz, with the Scarecrow, Tin Woodman, and the Lion? Each of them sensed that they lacked in an important area (brain, heart, courage). The beauty of the plot and writing was how they all acquired in the end what they sought as they helped Dorothy to get home—this would not have been accomplished had they stayed put. Much like the scripture above in Ephesians talked about “experiencing for yourselves the love of Christ”, they could not have experienced their gains without doing something.
The chapter in Ephesians concludes by reminding us just who it is that makes such gracious promises to us,
“Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
God Bless you and may He show Himself greatly to you,
Paul
