How To Be Rich

HOW TO BE RICH

TEXT: 1 TIMOTHY 6:6-10, 17-19

THEME: YOU ARE RICH SO ACT LIKE A RICH PERSON.

It was a terrible day. I remember this day too well because of the feeling I had. It all started in a positive way. Uncle Ernie was up from South Carolina. He was there with his family and Nick, his two boys, and me went down to the brother-in-laws to watch the Tennessee Volunteers against the South Carolina Gamecocks. The game was not a positive experience, but soon the game became second in my mind. See, I was getting super hungry. John, the brother-in-law told us that we could eat some of the food but Uncle Ernie would not let his boys eat anything. So I felt bad in eating all the stuff in front of them. So I went with nothing for hours to be nice. Of course I was thinking that we would eat something after the game was over. But we all loaded in the car and headed for home. Home was about a two hour drive. So I started to hint around at stopping at Wendy’s or some pizza place for supper. But uncle Ernie would not stop and kept saying that the women at the house will have supper ready for us. I knew in my heart that this was a big lie. It was nine o’clock. The women were not sitting around waiting for us to arrive home to cook us a feast. This was ridiculous. But he kept saying that they will have supper cooked. So Ernie would not stop. Not even to buy pizza. I know he thought that he would have to chip in for the 14 dollar pizza. In fact, I would have bought the huge pizza if he would have just stopped. But Ernie is cheap. He is the cheapest man I have even met. There is nothing wrong with not wasting your money. But when you are about to pass out because of hungry, you need to stop for some food. But he would not. What really made me mad was that I was making like 16,000 dollars a year and he was making over 60,000 dollars a year. He could have pitched in 4-5 dollars for pizza. But he was too cheap. Too cheap to stop. He had the money, but he was too cheap.

At that moment, I realized something. I do not want to be like that. I do not want to be cheap in a bad way. You know people like that. They have never given you anything before. People who never give to the church even though they have money at the end of the month. You know people who watch every penny, every nickel, making sure they are never taken advantage of. People who never tip or provide some extra money for good service. People who are terrible when it comes to money. People who are always worried about what you are making or people who are worried that you might have a nickel more than them. People who are so jealous of others because they have a nicer car. You know cheap people. The people who give cheap people a bad name.

Personally, I have struggled with this problem. I have not been as giving as I needed too. I do not mean that being the opposite of cheap as someone who buys everything they want. Someone that spends money on themselves. I do not mean this. I mean someone that is cheap is someone that is not giving even though they have been blessed. They have extra but they hoard it to themselves. But I have a problem with this. I rather stick my money in the IRA or saving them to give to others. Maybe you have this problem too. You are not as giving as you need to be or should be. You are always worried about having enough money for the rainy day or for the next week. You are constantly being cheap towards others because you feel this gives you security in life.

The reason that people who are rich act cheap is because they do not believe they are rich. Everyone is always looking to someone else as the true rich people. It is impossible for us to even admit that we are rich. There is this sense of guilt or denial to this confession. You are not the rich one, the other person is richer than you. In fact, there was a study done on people and wealth. Did you know that every group of people considered the next group to be the rich ones. Those who made 15,000 believed that if they made 30,000, then they would be rich. Than those who had a household income of 30,000 believed that if they made 60,000 than they would be rich. On this went, the people who made 100,000 believed that those who made 200,000 were the rich ones. It seems like everyone will never admit that they are rich, it is always someone else. In fact, according to studies, those who have a 30,000 a year income are in the top 4 percent of the riches people in the world. Those who make 40,000 household income are in the top 1 percent in the world. In America, we are rich.