Having Food and Raiment...

Having Food and Raiment... 

6 Now godliness with contentment is great gain. 

7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. 

8 And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. 

9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. 

10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows

I believe God gives riches and wealth. Many rich people can testify to this, how some opportunities they didn't bargain for met with their diligence and proactive efforts. I believe God always has His purposes for giving each of us talents; by the way, talent means money. I'm sure also that God judges between His purposes and the pursuits which we engaged the potentials He has bestowed upon us in.

But our purposes won't require all of us to be managers of stupendous physical wealth, riches and possessions. Many of us will only enjoy the basic providence of God in His faithfulness to meet our basic needs and to be able to show some love to others. Not all of us will be millionaires as believers for instance, but the basic things He has promised will not fail most of us.

But that still depends on being on same page with Him when it comes to the issue of personal possessions. You can't study around what Jesus Christ taught about personal possessions and not notice His tilt towards contentment, not being covetous, relying on God in faith, not trusting in nor worrying about money, and seeking the kingdom of God.

It's good for a good disciple to go into the gospels to mine those things Jesus Christ said and did about finances, money, cares of this world and so on...there we can find good balance and stability on the matter of the Christian and money and we can develop lots inner peace. 

This is crucial and apostle Paul knew it in giving instructions to his son in the gospel, Timothy. He had written to him about the purpose for which he had left him at the station, basically to stop people from preaching things contrary to the truth of the gospel, that's in chapter one. In the second chapter, he reminded him to intercede for all men, particularly for kings and those in authority. He went on to tell him some local church policies about orderliness in the conducts of men and women in the church he was pastoring. The third chapter was mainly about the qualifications and the conducts of local church leaders under him, he mentioned briefly the mystery of godliness at the latter part of the chapter. The fourth chapter was about Timothy himself, his ministry, his personal development and how to be a good minister of the gospel. The fifth was about how to relate with and to different categories of members in the church as a leader, how to relate to young men, young women, older men and older women, how to care for widows, the church and the family responsibilities to widows, and also the protocol for disciplining elders and so on. 

In chapter 6, he told him about his relationship with money and with rich people in the church. A close study of these things will tremendously help a minister who truly want to please God.

One primary instruction Paul gave in the sixth chapter is for Timothy to withdraw from those who think godliness is a means of gain or profit. These set of people must have been ministers themselves and church influencers whose focus for ministry was to make money and who judge their successes with how much money and materials they've accumulated.

He told him that godliness with contentment is great gain. We didn't bring anything into this world and its definite that we won't take anything out but if we have food and clothing, we should be therewith content...

I'm sure this is where he would have problems with lots of people who aren't yet properly discipled. In a world where the bigger the better, the more the merrier, staying with only food and raiment shouldn't make you content...all you can have is all you can have and its all you should have...

But in that liberal thought lays the foundation of the greed and covetousness we grapple with in the body of Christ today in support of the worldliness in society.

God didn't say all He could afford was food and raiment, Jesus Christ even said, the Father knows we have need of those things the world seek, and they shall be added as we seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness.

However, God wants His children to learn contentment. We should let little be sufficient to us. Jesus warned us against covetousness, when two brothers came to him over their rightful inheritance they wanted him to help share, He warned them against covetousness, saying a man's life doesn't consist in the abundance of what he possesses. Apostle Paul was echoing the same to his young minister protégé.

When we make life all about what we have, nothing else will matter in our pursuit of wealth. It becomes the ultimate goal of pursuit, it becomes the definition of life's success as if that's all we came to the world to get. We won't mind sacrificing others and their well being in pursuit of our greed and lack of satisfaction. People become part of the collateral in achieving things we don't really need.

And some ministers who Apostle Paul described as having their bellies as their God in his letter to the Philippians chapter 3, won't mind taking advantage of people's greed to satisfy their own.

It may look as if contented people are 'visionless', it isn't so, they may not have personal ambitions, which we don't really need in the pursuit of purpose. But many don't even know the difference between the nature of life's purpose and having wealth and so they adopt having wealth as life's purpose, as if what was meant to keep us alive is also the reason to be alive. The fuel in the car isn't the reason for the existence of the car, or is it? We don't live to eat, we eat to live. We must seek the higher purposes!

So the Apostle told Pastor Timothy, what happens to those who make getting rich as their goal and pursuit, how they fall into various snares and to the danger of being pierced through with many sorrows leading to perdition. Remember that word 'perdition' and Judas Iscariot?

This is very instructive for ministers of the gospel.

One thing I have noticed is that every time, the apostles spoke about ministers greed, the repercussions is always swift destruction, aside this letter to Timothy, 2Peter 3 and Philippians 3 also say same thing. I wonder how we often don't see it.

The reason I see for this is that we look for scriptures out of the context of Christ that support our greed and we use them to psych ourselves into thinking contrary thoughts to what Christ has said to us. We can't do that and be faithful or honest. 

The result is the way the world see us as thieves, usurpers, and lazy people who are only out to milk people in the name of religion. The insult don't really bother me, it is the response to the truth that gets at me. 

People now openly desecrate the gospel and the word of God and treat it as scam because of the greed of some of those who preach it. It's almost making us think twice about preaching and teaching the truth about giving because people won't know what our motivations are for teaching. I know ministries that won't ask for offerings and tithes, even if they believe it should still be part of our worship, others who take won't talk about it or ask for it at all...not just because it's the modest thing to do but to keep minds at rest to listen to God's word first because of those who have made godliness a means to profiteering and merchandising the people. 

It will do us a lot of good in our walk with God to be contented with food and raiment as we pursue higher purposes in our life's endeavors as believers in Christ. You can become anything God wants you to be and rise to the heights of humanly possible life's positions and achievements but it won't be for the purpose of wealth gathering but to be a blessing and a shining light for God and for His Christ. 

Later in that sixth chapter, Apostle Paul still went ahead to give Timothy an instruction for those who are rich in this world...meaning, all he said wasn't that we can't be rich but we must understand the technicalities surrounding how to manage our faith when we have great possessions and not to live like the rich fool, who had a great harvest but didn't live to enjoy any of it, not knowing how to handle it. 

Folks, God will never endorse or promote our covetousness and greed, that's why we pray and don't get positive response when our desire is to spend those things we ask for on our lusts according to James chapter 4. So, a believer must check again, if those things being spent on our lusts are truly the blessings of God or the snares of the devil to trap us away from Christ. 

We are safe, when we see godliness with contentment as great gain and not see godliness as gain but to be content with the basics of life...even when God has purposed to entrust us with great riches and wealth! 

We become vulnerable to sin and to ridicules when we won't be happy with whatever we have trusting God!

Hebrews 13:5 Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said,

“Never will I leave you;

never will I forsake you.”

Philippians 4:12 I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. 

13 I can do all this through him who gives me strength.

Can you?

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