Investing in uncertain times…

We live in troubled times. We hear it everyday even from secular media. We see what has happened around the world in various countries when socialistic policies rule & we know from God‘s word what happens to a country that forgets God. America is in trouble.

The Lord recently dealt with me about the thoughts that seemed to be infiltrating my mind. There is no doubt, difficult days are coming. Things that were once “certain” are no longer. Things are changing now, not only for America financially but concerning our liberty. Our rights to teach our children, to preach God’s unadulterated word, to hold up standards of righteousness. How can a country be governed without a standard? When we just look to what every man deems as right or wrong as the standard, then you become a society where anything goes. Our founding fathers used God’s word as the standard by which right and wrong were judged. Now that is offensive to people. America, as a whole, has been our making a living; buying better, bigger, nicer things for several decades now allowing the public schools to raise up it’s children so that now these young adults who have come up are virtually clueless when it comes to the principles with which our country was founded. They did not embrace church vs. state divisions.. The documents they drafted were all about this achaeic book some of us still choose to live by. Parents neglected to teach their children that the bible was the standard by which right and wrong could be judged and allowed their children to be molded by a mentality of godlessness, so they just lean to their own feelings and thoughts to guide them. It’s a ‘feel good’ generation. It isn’t just the young though.. It’s much more widespread than that. We live in a rebellious world where people refuse to submit to any authority whatsoever that would attempt to show them that they are living wrong, thinking wrong, acting wrong and are headed to a tormenting hell if they don’t repent and change their ways. Not too long ago there was an entire family of siblings, parents, aunts and uncles that refused to leave the mall when one of the family members was asked because his pants were hanging down exposing his underwear clad rear-end. The parents resisted the police even with FORCE, choppers and SWAT were called before these people would go. IS THIS NOT THE MOST REDICULOUS SHOW OF REBELLION SET FORTH BY ADULTS?! ‘How offensive! How DARE anyone tell me that!’ Isn’t that the mentality today? ‘Well, I’m headed to heaven too. It doesn’t matter if I drink, cuss, smoke, & look at pornography. If I am a homosexual, live an immoral lifestyle, have sex with someone who isn’t my spouse then get rid of the life I’m not ready to raise. It’s okay to have a heart filled with malice, pride, hate, envy and strife. God is full of forgiveness and mercy‘. What do you say to a person who doesn’t have that basic, fundamental belief that God’s word IS the truth? That is completely blinded to their own sinfulness and desperate need to be saved from themselves, their sinful Adamic mentality? Nothing. You merely toss your pearls before the swine (Matthew 7:6). It’s going to take God’s spirit to deliver them out of darkness. We must not despise them, we must love them and pray for them.

This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are manifest (they are evident), which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, seditions, heresies, envying, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. Galations 5:16-26

This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, buy denying the power thereof: from such turn away. II Timothy 3:1-5

I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, hath he reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities. Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee. But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core. These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withered, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever. Jude 5-13

I found myself reading and listening to all the panicky advice the world was giving me about buying shares in various companies, hoarding food, buying guns and ammunition, land, etc… and just allowing my thought process to go that way. He said, ‘invest in me, buy stocks in my ‘company’, invest in my house, give to those who are in need, have confidence in my ability to keep you to such an extent that you back it up by your thoughts and deeds.

TRUST IN THE LORD, AND DO GOOD: SO SHALT THOU DWELL IN THE LAND, AND VERILY THOU SHALT BE FED. DELIGHT THYSELF ALSO IN THE LORD AND HE SHALL GIVE THEE THE DESIRES OF THINE HEART. COMMIT THY WAY UNTO THE LORD; TRUST ALSO IN HIM; AND HE SHALL BRING IT TO PASS. AND HE SHALL BRINGFORTH THY RIGHTEOUSNESS AS THE LIGHT AND THEY JUDGEMENT AS THE NOONDAY. REST IN THE LORD AND WAIT PATIENTLY FOR HIM: FRET NOT THEYSELF BECAUSE OF HIM WHO PROSPERETH IN HIS WAY, BECAUSE OF THE MAN WHO BRINGETH WICKED DEVICES TO PASS. CEASE FROM ANGER AND FROSAKE WRATH, FRET NOT THEYSELF IN ANY WISE TO DO EVIL. FOR EVIL DOERS SHALL BE CUT OFF: BUT THOSE THAT WAIT UPON THE LORD, THEY SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH. PS 37:3-9

If you want to buy stocks in a company, you choose a company that you trust. Really trust. You don’t want to loose your money-you are putting your money where your mouth is. Where your confidence is. You aren’t just “saying” you think this company will prosper, you are putting your means, your very heart, behind it.

WHERE YOUR TREASURE IS, THERE WILL YOUR HEART BE ALSO. MATTHEW 6:21

I never thought of this as a very profound scripture before today. Yet it is. What a person treasures, they invest in. Commitment, time, effort, money; all invested in what is really important to them. We invest in things we feel will come back and “bless” us in return-the stock market (in the old days), real estate, land, shares of a company, a talent (art or music ability), a sport (horse, ball, etc..), fitness (health, nutrition), material things, our children.. But do we have that same hope and zeal to give to the house and work of the Lord? Do we consider that an investment in our future that will yield a return? Or do we just write that tithe check every week-maybe not grudgingly- but of necessity? It has been necessity for me personally. I recently realized this.. My hope, confidence and trust has been in everything else BUT Him. It’s painful to realize and admit, but true nonetheless. The $99. I spent to learn about purchasing stocks in various companies with seemingly bright futures could have been given to world missions or to someone in need. All the world offers is more confusion! So much information, so many choices and voices-everyone telling you something different and swearing by it. It reminds me of when we first got horses; every horse person we met had some advice for us, it was ALL supposedly good advice and all different and all claimed they KNEW the right answer! I became so overwhelmed, it almost made me regret getting the horses in the first place!! What happens? Fear sets in, fear you are doing the wrong thing, listening to the wrong voice, following the wrong advice. This is soon followed by an overwhelming feeling, which then is followed by stress. I CAN’T DO THIS!! Then we loose sleep, we worry, we become irritable. Is this cycle familiar? I know it well. We better open God’s word and take off our worldly spectacles and really SEE what’s in there. We need to pray the blinders fall off and God gives us ears that can hear what He is saying to us.

TRUST IN THE LORD WITH ALL THINE HEART AND LEAN NOT UNTO THINE OWN UNDERSTANDING. IN ALL THY WAYS ACKNOWLEDGE HIM AND HE SHALL DIRECT THY PATHS. PROVERBS 3:5-6

BLESSED IS THE MAN THAT WALKETH NOT IN THE COUNSEL OF THE UNGODLY, NOR STANDETH IN THE WAY (or path) OF SINNERS, NOR SITTETH IN THE SEAT OF THE SCORNFUL BUT HIS DELIGHT IS IN THE LAW OF THE LORD AND IN HIS LAW DOETH HE MEDITATE DAY AND NIGHT. AND HE SHALL BE LIKE A TREE THAT IS PLANTED BY THE RIVERS OF WATER, THAT BRINGETH FORTH HIS FRUIT IN HIS SEASON; HIS LEAF ALSO SHALL NOT WITHER; AND WHATSOEVER HE DOETH SHALL PROSPER. PSALMS 1:1-3

I WILL INSTRUCT THEE AND TEACH THEE IN THE WAY WHICH THOU SHALT GO: I WILL GUIDE THEE WITH MINE EYE. PSALMS 32:8

Jesus asked the question, when I return, will I find faith on the earth (Luke 18:8)? What are we really putting our faith in to keep us in the coming days?