Debt Free
II Kings 4:2-7
Have you ever made a purchase and then felt bad or depressed afterwards? Have you ever bought anything that you ended up never using? I just found one of the greatest pullover sweaters in my closet and said, "Where did this come from?" It still had the tags on it! I remembered buying it in Boston and it got lost in my closet. Have any of you ever had those kinds of experiences? Have you ever said to yourself, "Wow, if I had all of the money I’ve paid in interest . . ." "If I could have just the interest from all of the cars that I have ever purchased . . ." On January 1, 2006 credit card laws change. The government is helping all the corporations that are suffering because so many Americans are going bankrupt, so come January 1 whatever minimum payment you’re paying against your credit card debt doubles. The Bible says in Proverbs 22:7, "The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is always slave to the lender." Debt is about slavery. Jesus didn’t come to earth just to keep you out of hell. Jesus came to set you free from anything that keeps you in bondage. Galatians 5:1: "It’s for freedom that Christ has set you free, do not submit yourself again to the yoke of slavery." Debt is always about slavery.
We want to talk about how we can live debt free. There is hope. One of the disciplines critical for us to practice in order to live debt free is to look beyond the immediate. You have to stay focused on God’s promised future. Debt is always about the immediate; it’s always seeking relief or immediate gratification. I call it the demonic distraction. Anything that’s good takes going through the wilderness; you have to go through hard times to get there. That plastic credit card is so tempting because it’s instant gratification. The Spirit led Jesus through the wilderness. You say, "I can’t live on what I make right now. It’s too hard." The Spirit will lead you through the wilderness, and it’s not until you learn to live faithfully in the wilderness that God will take you to the next place. Jesus was in the wilderness, following his future purpose, and the devil showed up. The devil took him up on a hill and showed him the world and said, All of this is mine and it can be yours, Jesus, right now. You don’t have to go through all that discipline, delayed gratification, all of that counter-cultural stuff. You can have all the splendor of this right now." "What’s it cost?" "We’ll talk about that later. You can have it right now and we’ll settle later." Have it now, pay later - that is the demonic distraction. If you’re going to look beyond the immediate and keep this future focus, you have to prepare for the unexpected.
In our Scripture today, the woman was not prepared for the unexpected. Her husband suddenly died and they were not prepared financially. That’s what got her in trouble. You know that little bumper sticker "Dung Happens"? It does. It is just a fact that it’s going to happen.
Story of our air conditioner going out. So we had to cover the cost of restoring our finished basement, new carpet and all. Guess what? Dung happens.
Here’s the key if you’re keeping this future focus: you can’t live at your means. When you live at your means, you’re spending everything that comes in. You also can’t live on credit. That is spending what you don’t have, and that’s called living beyond your means. You have to live continually below your means. Here’s what’s going to happen if you don’t. When we mortgage our future, we jeopardize our children’s future. In 2 Kings 4:1 the woman said, "My husband has died, and I’m out of money. I can’t pay all this debt. We were a two-income family; now we are a one-income family and the creditors are coming after our children."
This is why you keep a future focus. Every day you’re trying to position your children for success. The average child coming out of college in America graduates with $20,000 in college debt (student loans). That does not count their credit card debt. So immediately, our 21-year-olds are starting out in a cycle of slavery. Some of you are saying, "Well, that’s okay. I don’t have any kids, so I’ve got more money to spend." No, as followers of Jesus, we’re responsible for all of God’s children.
The devil is always trying to get you to go for the instant, the immediate, because the devil’s purpose is to kill, rob and destroy. So if the devil can get you to buy now and pay later he robs life from your future. It’s not just about positioning our own biological children for success, but positioning all of God’s children for success in the world. We exist to be channels for God’s blessings in the lives of other people. I love what Paul said in Romans 13, "Owe nothing to anyone but love. Let no debt remain outstanding." Debt is not our friend. Seek to be debt free except for the continuing debt of love to one another. Biblically, loving other people is not, "Oh, I feel good about you; I have these warm feelings." Love is the action of sacrifice to meet the needs of other people, and you cannot have actions of sacrifice to meet other people’s needs if you’re in debt. You can’t be a giver if you’re a borrower.
I love the question Elisha asked the widow in verse two. She was saying, "I can’t believe I’m in this situation. My husband died, and my husband was a godly man; he was from the house of prophets." Yes, bad things happen to good people. "Now we have mortgaged my children’s future. They’re coming to take my children into slavery." Elisha asked her, "What do you have in your house?" "Well, I don’t make enough money, that’s the problem. If I just made more money then I wouldn’t be in this situation." Whoa! Getting out of debt isn’t about making more money, it’s about spending less than you make. You can’t always control how much money you make, but you do have control over how much you spend. How many times have you run into the house and said, "Look, I saved money! I got this for 50% off." You would have saved 100% if you had never gone to the store in the first place! You save 100% if you never go in the store anyway. The key is: you have to use what you already have in your hands, not what you don’t have in your hands. God’s not going to trust you with more until you prove faithful with what you already have. The whole purpose of the work of the Holy Spirit is to form the character of Christ in you. That’s why you have to go to the wilderness to reach God’s place or promise in your life.
The first thing the Spirit is going to teach you is called contentment. You have to learn to be content in whatever situation I’m in." Paul said he had learned to be content in good times when the money is really flowing, and in bad times when it’s not. Until you learn "Contentment 101," God’s not going to move you to "Blessing 202." Abundance is an inside-out proposition, not an outside-in. As long as I think the abundant life comes from the outside, I’ll never attain it. God wants to develop in me an attitude of gratitude. An attitude of gratitude is demonstrated when every day I can identify what I’m thankful for, not what I desire and want. I want to ask you right now, what are you thankful for? Name some things right now that you already have that you’re thankful for. Sometimes we sit around and are not thankful for what we have. Today I started naming what I am thankful for: "I’m thankful for my wife, not someone else’s wife. I’m thankful for my children, not someone else’s children. I’m thankful for my job, not someone else’s job." I went through a whole list. It’s this attitude of gratitude and the practice of being content with what I have that I need to learn in order to be debt free.
Now, for me and for anyone else for whom shopping is an addiction… Shopping is a way we medicate boredom. And don’t just think that it’s a woman’s problem. According to a study in the latest issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry, men and women are almost equally likely to suffer compulsive buying disorder — a condition marked by binge shopping sprees and financial debt. Shopping is a way we medicate depression in our life.
We’re going to talk more about delayed gratification next week, but your attitude is critical to learning to be debt free. It is an attitude of nurturing great expectation. So Elisha said to this woman. "Go out and collect as many containers from your neighbors as you can collect. Don’t ask for just a few." If you trust God with what you have in your hand, you have what you need for the miracle that God wants to produce for your life. And God wants to do great things with it. Every time we go to the plastic we’re saying, "I don’t trust that God can do great things just with what I have in my hand." You already have in your hands what God needs to create the miracle. But the moment you step out and attempt to use what you don’t have in your hand, there’s no miracle. There’s no God-support in that.
We also see here that we have to seek the support of the community. Elisha told the widow to, "Go to your neighbors." If you’re going to get out of debt, you can’t do it by yourself. You need accountability from other people around you. You need the knowledge of other people around you. You’ve got to learn to budget. I’m shocked at how many people here have told me that they don’t know how to budget. We’re going to start "Get out of Debt" classes right here on this campus. You can’t do this by yourself, but you can with the support of the community.
Mike Slaughter: There is no greater indicator of your true values and priorities than what you do with your money. You release it, God will increase it. He rewards faithfulness and hard work. Give God charge of this household and trust it to his care – everything you own. No matter how far in debt you might be, you can get out from under it. Here’s the key. Look at verse five. "They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring." What does that mean? She kept working! How did God provide for the woman? Did he wave his wand? "There’s the money, you won the lottery. No more debt." He provided a job. She created an industry. We have to change our stinking thinking. Work is not an inconvenience. Work is God’s means to supply your miracle. Work is the means that God supplies to deliver our needs and to supply our miracles.
Maximize the opportunity. I always noticed in this verse that when all the jars were full, she said to her son, "Bring me another one." But he replied, "There’s not a jar left." Then the oil stopped flowing. God’s picture is always bigger than ours. What if she had collected more jars? She didn’t maximize her opportunity. The Bible says, "Whatever you do, do it with excellence." Whatever you do, become an expert in the work you do. We’re known by our work. What you need to do is keep pouring and see your job for the potential of the miracle that it can be and become a master, an expert, at whatever your job is. If you’re the best toilet scrubber in the world, people are going to pay you to write books on toilet scrubbing. You’re going to be doing workshops on cleaning toilets. It’s amazing what God will do when you keep pouring and maximizing your opportunity.
Jesus didn’t come just to keep you out of hell. Jesus came to free you from everything that oppresses you. What is so critical is how you see what Jesus did on the cross. Most Christians see that Jesus died on the cross for them. But here’s the key to freedom: it’s seeing you dying on the cross with Jesus. This is what being out of debt is all about. The key to freedom is seeing yourself dying on the cross with Jesus. Someone said to me the other day, "Mike, you know when you all went to the Sudan, you could have died. How did you make that decision?" I said, "It wasn’t really too hard of a decision because I already have died." And when you make a decision to die on the cross with Jesus, you are free to truly live! You don’t have to medicate with BMWs. Before that BMW, I saw Jesus as dying on the cross for me. Since then, my life has changed by seeing myself as having died on the cross with Jesus.
Our action plan this month is simple: from November 1, the first ten percent of everything that comes into your hand you give first to God. We’re going to test God and see. For the month of November, you’re not putting one thing on plastic. We live debt free in the month of November.
Jesus took the loaf and broke it and said, "This is my body broken for you. Take and eat it, and remember that I died for you." He lifted the cup and said, "This is my blood shed for you, my blood of a new covenant. Take and drink, and remember I live for you." Amen.
