Jesus' Terrible Financial Advise - By John Thornton

This book, Jesus' Terrible Financial Advice, was in a list of books available for review in the book reviewing program of which I'm a member.   The description of this book caught my attention.  It was described as not being the book that the author, John Thornton, intended to write.  He wanted to write about how his family had gotten to a debt free state and wanted to back it up with biblical principles.  But then He went to the Bible to study the topic and found that Jesus' teachings on money shocked him, they really seemed like irresponsible teachings, teachings that didn't seem like the type of instructions that God would give wise stewards to follow.  He put off writing the book for a long time.   I was intrigued by this information and so I requested the book. 

Thornton later decided to dive in and write the book with this perspective,  "If my theology disagrees with God, one of us is wrong, and it's not Him."    Thornton directs us to think about why Christ came to the earth in the first place, "to glorify His Father".  And all of Jesus' teachings, including his teachings on money, stem from this purpose. God does not need money to get things done, and we Christians do not need money either because God supplies all our needs, and he does not need money to do that.

 Thornton makes it clear that being rich does not make you an evil person, nor does being poor make you a good person.  Money is not bad in and of itself, but it does have potential to become an idol when we look to it for peace, security and help.  Poor people can do this just as much as rich people.  The love of money is deceiving, it promises that money can supply all our needs, directing our focus to it rather than to God.  And many also may be deceived by thinking that the Lord's work cannot get done without money (look at all of the Christian ministries out there begging for money!). God can supply our needs however He wants, with or without money. 

Being a wise steward does not mean building up earthly treasure, but building up a heavenly treasure.   "Imagine if you were playing Monopoly, and you were offered the chance to trade in your pink fivers for real ones.  Or better yet, trade the yellow $100 Monopoly bills in for Benjamins.  You'd go straight to the bank and make the exchange.  And  you wouldn't ask how many of the Monopoly bills you could keep.  You'd trade in every last one."  The author demonstrates from the Bible that this is the perspective of a believer.  We are after real treasure, not fake treasure.  A believer doesn't care about storing up treasures on this earth, but storing up treasures in Heaven.  A believer doesn't care about gaining worldly acclaim, but commendation from His Father in Heaven.  A believer's goal is to glorify the Father, to do His will.  And Christ tells us how this is to be done, "Jesus explains how we can make the most of the lives He has given us…"  Many of the means by which Christ says we can glorify the Father are shocking to us, such as letting people sue you and giving them more than they demand of you, by giving to everyone who asks, by letting yourself be wronged financially, even by a brother in Christ, or rather, especially by a brother in Christ. There are some questions about how we are to implement the 'giving to everyone who asks you', and I think that Thornton addresses them pretty well by pointing out that it may be clarified by other biblical truths. 

In this book we are reminded that God wants us to run our whole race, the beginning and end of it, at full speed. This, among other things, involves being wise stewards of everything God has given us, including our use of any money He has allowed us to have.  We look to our Master to give us the standards for how we are to use His property and money, He defines what good stewardship looks like.  And we should not look on our growing old as permission to use God's gifts to us however we want. The thought should not even cross our mind that we will ever reach an age where we will be able to retire from being good stewards of the Lord's gifts. We should not look to slow down as we get old, and enjoy our earthly life, our goal should still be to serve the Father with all the strength He gives us, grasping any opportunity He gives us to serve Him and invest in eternal things.  Thornton laments that some older Christians do not desire to end their spiritual race at full speed, and yet hypocritically ,"We condemn our brother who squanders his early years, all the time longing to squander our later ones."

All in all, I think that this is an excellent book, pointing us back to the Lord as our Master, and reminding us that we are to live a life of faith.  We must trust that God really is infinitely wiser than we are, even when we think that His commands are not humanly logical.  As Thornton says, "God has a better plan for our lives than we do", God knows best whether or not our earthly richness or poorness will bring the most glory to Himself.  And we Christians desire to be content with His sovereign placement of us in this earthly life.  

Many thanks to MoodyPublishers for sending me a free review copy of this book (My review did not have to be favorable)

My rating:  5 out of 5 stars

*****

This book may be purchased at (among other places), Christian Book Distributors and Amazon

Answers to Prayer - George Muller

Answers to Prayer by George Müller is part of the Read & Reflect With the Classics Series (I am reviewing the hardcover version) which provides thought provoking questions and also prayers at the end of each chapter.   Müller's book details various accounts of God's all sufficient grace in the works that God had prepared for him to do.

The way that Mueller approached the ministries that God graciously gave him is very unique compared to most present day Christian ministries (and perhaps most ministries in Müller's day as well).  Ministries today are very focused and reliant upon, money.  They  hold fundraising drives, have commercials on the radio asking for people's support, and some will send tons of letters and emails begging for monetary help. I think of one ministry in particular, which, although its founders believe in God's absolute sovereignty, they contradict their belief by implying that their ministry cannot continue without the help of people, that "your support makes ministry happen". 

Many ministries act as if they are the most important ministry in God's Kingdom and that if you do not give money and they expire, that God's Word will not be given out any more.  Muller did not act like that.  He knew that God did not need human beings in order to get His work done. 

Müller took a more faith-based approach, relying upon God rather than upon people for help.  He would not ask people for help with ministries, he asked God, period.  And God provided.  "Never since the Orphan work has been in existence have I asked one single human being for any help for this work; and yet, unasked for, simply in answer to prayer, from so many parts of the world, as has been stated, the donations have come in, and that very frequently at a time of the greatest need."

He also came to the conclusion that one should not rely on people's promises to give money and that one should not even think about those promises: "Now this morning it came to my mind, that such promises ought to be valued, in a certain sense, as nothing, i.e., that the mind ought never for a moment to be directed to them, but to the living God, and to the living God only.  I saw that such promises ought not to be of the value of one farthing, so far as it regards to thinking about them for help."  This is quite a contrast to ministries who beg for pledges of money, and put large or regular donors names up on plaques.  They make more of the people, more of the tools,  that God uses than the Supplier Himself!  God is the One who supplies all our need, and though he may use people to do it, they are but channels (think "Channels Only").  God doesn't need people, or their money, AT ALL in order to supply our needs!

As Müller puts it, "Earthly friends may lose their ability to help us, however much they desire so to do; but He remains throughout eternity the Infinitely Rich One.  Earthly friends may have their minds after a time diverted to other objects, and, as they cannot help everywhere, much as they may desire it, they may, though reluctantly, have to discontinue to help us; but He is able, in all directions, though the requirements were multiplied a million times, to supply all that can possibly be needed, and does it with delight, where His work is carried on, and where He is confided in.  Earthly friends may be removed by death, and thus we may lose their help, but He lives forever, He cannot die.  In this latter point of view, I have especially, during the past 40 years, in connection with this Institution, seen the blessedness of trusting in the Living God alone.  Not one nor two, nor even five nor ten, but many more, who once helped me much with their means, have been removed by death; but have the operations of the Institution been stopped on that account?  No.  And how came this? Because I trusted in God, and in God alone."

Müller would at times give updates on God's provision for the ministries in times of great need, but this was to encourage Christians in the faith, not to work on their emotions to make them feel compelled to give supplies.  At least one time Muller and his fellow workers put off giving an update because at the time they were, from a human perspective, in desperate straits, and they did not want other people to know it, wanting to rely solely on God for help.

Many ministries want God to give them a yearly supply rather than just their daily bread.  The ministries that God gave Müller charge over lived day by day in reliance upon God's supply, many times literally being given the means for their daily needs DAILY on the day they were needed, rather than in advance.

I really liked this book. The only thing that I didn't quite like were the prayers that were added at the end of each chapter.  I would rather that they have been commentary rather than prewritten ways that we can use to talk to God. Yes, we do not know how to pray as we ought, but neither does the person who wrote those prayers.  Though I don't think that using other people's prayers is necessarily wrong, Christians ought not to rely upon other Christians to write their prayers for them, we have the best Helper of all in the Holy Spirit who is our Interceder in our prayers (Romans 8:26-27).    There are good concepts in them though, "You provide what I need, and if I don't have it, I can absolutely trust that I don't need it. "

Before I end, and I really need to end because this is quite long, at the end of the book there is an appendix containing an article by Muller on "The Careful and Consecutive Reading of the Holy Scriptures".  It is an excellent read, and describes Muller's goal in writing this book.  He advocates the consistent daily reading of the Scriptures, over and above any other book.  He describes how he once slacked in that area and how he had gotten into the habit of reading other books, including Christian ones, instead of the Scripture.  "…thus, like many believers, I practically preferred, for the first four years of my divine life, the works of uninspired men to the oracles of the living God."  As he put it, "God himself has condescended to become an author" and this is the "book of books" containing all that we ought to know!  We should not value Christian books (including this one) above the Scriptures, the Scriptures themselves should be our delight. 

Many thanks to the folks at B&H Publishers for sending me a free review copy of this book (My review did not have to be favorable).

My rating:  5 out of 5 stars

*****

This book may be purchased at (among other websites) the Christian Book Distributors website and Amazon.com