Money & Wealth Can't Save You In The Day Of Trouble

Ezekiel 7:19-22; Proverbs 11:4

Soul Food

“They will throw their silver into the streets, and their gold will be treated as a thing unclean. Their silver and gold will not be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s wrath. It will not satisfy their hunger or fill their stomachs, for it has caused them to stumble into sin.

They took pride in their beautiful jewelry and used it to make their detestable idols. They made it into vile images; therefore I will make it a thing unclean for them. I will give their wealth as plunder to foreigners and as loot to the wicked of the earth, who will defile it. I will turn my face away from the people, and robbers will desecrate the place I treasure.

They will enter it and will defile it.”

- Ezekiel 7:19-22

“Wealth is worthless in the day of wrath, but righteousness delivers from death.”

- Proverbs 11:4 

Soul Search

• How much time and effort do you put into accumulating and investing your money and wealth? How much time do you spend thinking about it? 
  Be real with yourself and gauge it as a percentage of your time each day.

• How much time and effort do you put into developing your spiritual life through Bible reading, devotional time, prayer and serving others? 
  Gauge this as a percentage of your time each day.

• It is said that whatever is most important to a person is what he or she spends most of his or her time doing.
  Usually, we spend as much time as possible doing the things that we enjoy doing.
  Do you spend enough of your time doing ‘eternal’ things – prayer, Bible study, attending church, helping and serving others – or do you spend the majority of your time doing whatever things you love doing that are temporal in nature?
  Life is always a balance between the eternal and the temporal – it is never all or nothing.

• In our culture we spend a lot of time discussing, planning, reading and talking about retirement and having enough money to live on.
  How much money is really enough?
  How much time do you discuss, plan for, read about, and talk about your next life in Heaven and in eternity?

Soul Moves

• If the percentage of time that you spend preparing for eternity is low compared to how much time you spend preparing your finances and readying yourself for retirement in this life, then turn things around and make your preparations for eternity more important and do the things necessary to make it a greater percentage of your time each day or week. 

• Want to minimize the power that money and wealth might have over you?
  Practice generosity and start giving your money and material possessions away.
  The more you give the less ‘hold’ money and material possessions will have on you.
  If giving is not something you regularly do, don’t be afraid to begin in even small ways.
  Buy someone a cup of coffee.
  Mow your neighbor’s lawn (but do a nice job).
  Bake someone cookies.
  Your giving in size and scope can grow over time.
  Ask God to show you how He wants you to give.

• Think of people in your life that you might want to bless and ask God to show you people who He wants you to bless.
  You might be surprised at who God shows you to give to.
  Give some of your money away to bless that person or those people.
  Give an item of value in your home away to someone who has admired it in the past and who you know will feel especially blessed to have it.