“But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given you as well.” Matthew 6:31

We falsely believe that if we do not put our finances first they will not be taken care of. We believe that if we do put things in the kingdom first and our own finances second that our finances will spin out of control. We falsely believe that if we focus constantly on our finances, that we can hold back the financial storms. Therefore we flip what Jesus tells us to do. We worry about everything, and we put our finances first and the kingdom of God second. We have been so conditioned to worrying about our finances that it seems ludicrous to even believe that our God has commanded us don’t worry about these things, but put me and my kingdom first.

In the midst of our financial storms, Jesus is telling us that He is willing to give us a compass that will navigate us through the difficulties. If we focus on the fixed points He has given to us in His word, we would navigate every financial storm. As Christians we know that the Bible, the written Word of God, is the navigational tool that has been given us to enable us to reach our destinations. Trust and faith in His promise would allow us to navigate our financial storm without worry or anxiety.

Wealth or our lack of finances can become the center of our life and take our focus off of God. Jesus tells us in Matthew, “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.” Part of the financial storm that we feel is about the fact that we cannot both love God and serve money at the same time. Jesus asks us to seek Him first and He accompanies that request with a promise. If we focus on Him and make Him first, He will give us all the things we need. He is the one who give us the ability to produce wealth and He is the one who can take away that ability.

The way to navigate our financial storms is to begin to take seriously His charge to us to ... Seek first His kingdom. That is our compass and that is what will give us direction in the midst of the chaos and stress that financial storms bring.

Exercise... Dealing with Financial Stress

1. Sit quietly and ask the Holy Spirit to come and fill you with the ability to see yourself truthfully.

2. Ask the Holy Spirit to create again that “safe place” for you where you can look at yourself with radical honesty.

Jesus is giving us three imperatives. Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven... Do not worry about your life...Seek first His kingdom.

3. Jesus tells us to “store up for yourselves treasures in heaven”. Seeking the kingdom means treasuring God and freeing yourself from the drag of earth. Truthfully ask yourself if you have been storing up treasures in heaven or have you been storing up treasures here on earth?

4. Jesus alludes to a war that can go on inside us where finances are concerned. If we love God, He says we will hate money, and if we love money, we will hate God. How do you think this verse reflects where you are in your life? There is something about God and money that makes one of them have mastery. Have you served God or money?

5. Jesus tells us, “Do not worry about your life..” If you look at the whole passage in Matthew 6:25-33, it actually says “Do not worry” three times. Look at yourself in the mirror and tell yourself three times, DO NOT WORRY! The world deals with finances by worrying. God is asking us as His children to have a completely different way of dealing with our finances. He’s calling us to free ourselves from anxiety over money.

6. Verse 33 is like the compass pointing north for us. If we are seeking first the kingdom of God everything else will be given us. Measure how you have dealt with your finances in the storm using this verse. We tend to beat ourselves up with a verse like this. Reflect on this verse in your safe place meditating on it until it encourages you. Do not allow any condemnation in your safe place.

Discussion Questions for Growth Groups

Hopefully this week has raised questions that need a little more exploring: "Am I serving God or mammon? Am I deluding myself? Have I thought that I have been a Christian committed to Jesus Christ, willing to serve him, but all the time have I been secretly deceiving my own heart and serving materialism?"

Here are three questions by which you can test it. Remember, Scripture says to do this. "Examine yourselves to see whether you are holding to your faith. Test yourselves," (2 Cor. 13:50 {RSV}).

1.The first question is in the realm of the heart, the emotions, the feelings. Ask yourself, "What are my feelings toward material things, material values? Do I find them very important to me? Am I deeply disturbed if there is something I want but I cannot have it, or that I have and lose? Does it upset me? Do I think of myself as a pilgrim, a sojourner passing through this earthly life? Can I regard these things with a kind of detachment, an objectivity that allows me to use them but not to be bound to them?" That is the first question, in the realm of the feelings.

2.The second is in the realm of the mind. Ask yourself, "Do I find it necessary to explain why I have things or want things? Do I act on impulse and justify it later? Do I desire something and then seek the reasons why I should have it? Is my mind, in other words, engaged in the task of rationalizing, justifying that which my emotions desire?"

3.And then the third question, which lies in the realm of the will, is perhaps the most revealing of all, because if we answer this honestly it will show us whether we have been deceiving ourselves in the other two areas. Let us ask ourselves this question. "Would I honestly exert the same effort to snatch up a spiritual opportunity as I would to take advantage of material one?"