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"God is saying that prosperity is all about 'flourishing in a place of well-being and peace.'"
As quoted from the book "Victor - Breaking Free From a Victim-Based Society" by John H. Hovis Page 106.
It is easy to say that I'd rather be in a place of well-being and peace than have more of what I already have in my life when I have so much to be thankful for. What if I had nothing? What if I had to struggle to put food on the table day in and day out? Would I be so quick to say that I could be content with just well-being and peace in the absence of all the privileges I now enjoy?
It is so easy to be brave and to put on an air of nobility when bravery and nobility isn't needed to make my comfortable life a reality. The rubber really hits the road when choices are such that bravery and nobility really come into question.
The problem with dealing with "what if" scenarios is that we really don't know how we will react until we come face to face with the kinds of situations that challenge us to our souls. What I have found is that victors don't question their status based on the unknown of situations that might challenge them in the future. Nor do they think less of themselves for facing the cold, hard fact that there is no way of knowing how they will react given bad times in their lives.
All we can do is prepare. It is through the preparation of identity that I believe we stand the best chance of acting in a brave and noble way when challenges come our way. It is when we know that we are loved, we have a purpose and that we are not alone that we put ourselves in a place where well-being and peace can have the power that prosperity is suppose to have in our lives.
Aside from identity issues, the victor can also deal with perspective shifts to help stand the winds of storms that may come their way. Viewing prosperity through the lens of things is a victim thinking way of living out this life. One is truly prosperous when they have a calm in their souls that just can't be explained. Money, power, position or any of the other worldly things we often use to define prosperity just can't deliver the kind of well-being and peace needed to be truly prosperous no matter how much we want it to.
I have known people with obscene amounts of money that would give it all away just to have one night of peaceful sleep. I have also known people with absolutely nothing to their name that have a calm in their life unlike anything I have ever know. What's the difference in these two people? I have found the difference can best be summed up with trust.
The rich man with anxiety has his trust placed in worldly things. The poor man with peace trusts something greater than what he might be able to control from time to time. I don't know if it takes being a pauper to achieve that kind of peace. I hope it doesn't, but I want that well-being and peace to be in my life.
Check out what today's Bible reading says on the subject.
Do you have any idea how difficult it is for the rich to enter God’s kingdom? Let me tell you, it’s easier to gallop a camel through a needle’s eye than for the rich to enter God’s kingdom. Matthew 19:23-24 (MSG)
Jesus didn't have a thing against money. We often misquote Jesus and say that "money is the root of all evil." Jesus actually said, "The love of money is the root of all evil." It isn't money or power or possessions that will keep any of us out of heaven. It is the love of those things that will make it hard for us to ever enter in that place of well-being and peace. What we love is often times what we choose to put our trust in. When we put our trust in things of this world it gets awfully hard to ever trust what God chooses to do and who God says we are. Loving things of this world is an open door to victim thinking in the life of a victor.
Jesus is in no way saying that if we have riches - like the vast majority of those of us blessed enough to live in the United States have when compared to the rest of the world - that we will not be able to go to heaven. I believe that Jesus is making the point that it is so hard to get the benefits of heaven, like well-being and peace, when we trust this world for proof of who we are. God wants us to be as prosperous as we need to be as long as that prosperity isn't predicated on definitions this world wants us to accept.
In other words, we can be just as prosperous in God's eyes when we have billions of dollars as when we have no money at all. Prosperity from God's perspective has everything to do with being OK in His eyes and has nothing to do with our net worth, worldly standing or our position in society. The kind of prosperity that is built on well-being and peace in our soul is just like heaven - it lasts forever. Settling for anything less than that, even when less is a big ole pile of money, can never bring the permanence when it comes to well-being and peace that our souls need in this world.
How much peace do you feel in your life right now? How would you rate your ability to say that you are truly well off? If well-being and peace have anything to do with things that you have or things that you can earn you are either in the victim thinking trap are soon will be. I don't care how much you have right now or how much potential you have to gain things, everything in this world is temporary. The temporal nature of things is what makes well-being and peace an elusive concept when we look to this world to make those characteristics of a victor part of our lives.
Today you can settle it. You can either settle on allowing this world be the dictator of what well-being and peace look like in your life or you can settle on what God says. Settling for the temporary things of this world will put you in a place where you will not be able to settle, once and for all that yearning we all have deep down in our souls. Allow your trust to be in what God says about you. Your victor status is guaranteed by the fact that God calls you His Child. That, and that alone is all we can count on for the kinds of well-being and peace that define a heavenly perspective on prosperity all victors need in their lives.
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