I am not envious or jealous of those who are wealthier than I. If a person earned their wealth honestly and were frugal and made wise investments, they deserve the fruit of their labors, and I respect that. If they inherited their wealth, their benefactors deserve the same, including leaving their wealth to whomever they cared to; but the recipients
deserve nothing but the inheritance itself. If others cheated and stole to gain wealth, they deserve nothing but the full force, prosecution and penalty of the law. That said, If you fit the "earned it" category, you have nothing to be apologetic or ashamed of and have the God given right, as His steward (manager), to do with your wealth as you please, and are answerable to nobody but God, who gave it. He allowed you to earn it and you alone must decide how to use it. "...Remember the Lord thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth...." Deut.8:18. "Both riches and honor come of thee (God)...." 1 Chr.29:12. "Every man also to whom God has given riches and wealth... this is the gift of God." Ecc.5:19.
The important thing, for the wealthy, that is so easily forgotten by them, is....
1. Don't forget who gave you the power and knowledge to get wealth. "And when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied; Then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the LORD thy God, which brought thee forth ... from the house of bondage..." Deut.8:13-14.2. Don't put too much importance on your wealth and too little on why God empowered you to get it. "...If riches increase, set not your heart upon them." Psm.62:10.
3. Don't let the pursuit of wealth make a miserable, drunken, selfish, drug addicted crook of you. "But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows." 1 Tim.6:9-10.
4. Keep your heart on the eternal, not the temporal. "Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself. But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out." 1 Tim.6:5-7.
There are many good and descent wealthy people recorded in the Bible.
1. NOAH - "Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord .... and Noah walked with God." Gen.6:8-9. Noah was obviously a fine, descent man but had to be wealthy as well. The ark, God told him to build, was mammoth ... as long as one and one half football fields from goal line to goal line, half as wide and three floors high. It contained one and a half million cubic feet of space, as much as 569 modern rail-road cars. That took a lot of man power and wealth ... which God gave Noah the knowledge and power to earn.God used Noah to begin the whole human race over again with a new start.
2. JOB - "There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil. .... His substance also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she asses, and a very great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the men of the east." Job 1:1-3. Obviously a very wealthy man ...but he lost it all, trusted God, and regained twice the amount back. God used Job as an object lesson, to the world, of profit and loss, suffering, patience, healing, forgiveness, diligence and faithfulness.
3. ABRAHAM - "And Abram was very rich in cattle, in silver, and in gold." Gen.13:2
Abraham was clearly a very wealthy man and was proven and used of God to found the Jewish race through which His Son, Jesus, would come to seek and save the lost.
4. JOSEPH - "And (Pharaoh) made (Joseph) to ride in the second chariot which he had; and they cried before him, Bow the knee: and he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt." Gen.41:43. Joseph had control over all the treasures and resources of Egypt.
He was an extremely wealthy man. God used Joseph to save the entire family of the twelve tribes of Israel from starvation and preserve them for God's eternal plan.
5. BOAZ - "And Naomi had a kinsman of her husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech; and his name was Boaz." Ruth 2:1. Boaz was used of God to be the kinsman redeemer of Ruth and they two would become ancestral grandparents
of Jesus through whom God would redeem all, who would believe on Him, to eternal life.
6. ESTHER - "Who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" Esther 4:14. Esther, as the queen of Persia and Media, had massive wealth with the king. She was used of God to literally preserve the Jewish nation from extermination, through whom would be born the Son of God Jesus Christ.
7. JOSEPH of Arimathea - "When the even was come, there came a rich man of Arimathaea, named Joseph, who also himself was Jesus' disciple: He went to Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered." Matt.27:57-58. Joseph was not only rich but powerful, as a ruler of the Jews. God used him to speak against the authorities, in defence of Jesus, and then, with Nicodemus, bury Jesus in his own new tomb, of solid rock, in a garden.
8. NICODEMUS - "There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews." John 3:1. "And there came... Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury." John 19:39-40. Like Joseph, Nicodemus was a ruler and a wealthy man. He brought a very costly hundred pounds of spices and linen in which to wrap the body of Jesus and bury him in the garden tomb of Jospeh. He too was used of God to speak up for Jesus to the authorities and set an example of sacrifice, courage and loyalty to Christ.
9. CORNELIUS - "There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of the band called the Italian band, A devout man, and one that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to the people, and prayed to God alway." Acts 10:1-2. God used him to demonstrate to all the world that God is no respecter of persons, loves and will save any race, class or status of people.
The lesson here is, that it is no sin to be wealthy or to be poor. God uses wealthy people who will yield their lives to Him, and the poor likewise. He has done so many many times and still does. There is no honor in being rich or poor. The honor is in being a faithful steward and disciple of Jesus in all that you are and all that you have. So bad mouthing the poor or the rich exposes your ignorance of the Scriptures. There is no special reward for being poor. Grow up to maturity and sincerely say with Paul,
"Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. Phil.4:11-12. This is a spiritually grown up Christian. RB
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