Purchasing products and services that undermine the gospel at home or abroad lacks Christian integrity as does purchasing things that take you away from regularly reading your bible, praying, and building deep accountability relationships with at least a few Christian brothers or sisters within your local church. Such purchases are sinful or lead to sinful activities or are weights that stunt your spiritual growth. For example, purchasing pornography is clearly sinful and should never be done, yet purchasing a large flat screen television is not sinful. However, when you do not faithfully discriminate against watching programs that may lead you to immoral beliefs and behaviors or to spend low or no time with the Lord, that television is an ungodly weight to you that should be avoided until you can rightly utilize its programming. Purchase products and services that will help you walk along the path the LORD set for you and that will lead to godly growth for you and your loved ones. Tame purchases that tempt you to not let your light shine, that hinder your witness for Christ and your ability to make disciples.
Stop making purchases to impress others with the material things you have accumulated. Also, stop making it a priority to keep up with or exceed the Joneses. Making purchases with such mindsets will inevitably lead you to take on debt in the short-term to get more stuff than is reasonable. Such indebtedness is insidious and before you know it you are subject to taking on more and more debt until it becomes a long-term burden, begins to strangle the life out of your finances, and makes you feel as if there is nothing you can do to release yourself from financial bondage.
Regarding purchasing other people’s possessions, ask the LORD whether you could be a better witness by helping the person retain such possessions instead of buying them. Buying items from a person that he / she no longer needs might help him / her obtain money to pay for items that are truly necessary. However, if the items are things the person truly needs even though he may be in a tight financial situation then it is best to give him what you can afford, rather than seeking to capitalize and make your life more comfortable and pleasurable by taking possessions he truly needs.
Tame your purchases by writing out and following a giving, saving, and spending plan (budget) that identifies the reasonable portion of disposable income you will spend on wants / desires. In so doing, you will set yourself up to see the devourer rebuked in your life, be released from financial bondage, and live abundantly on earth, by regularly and proportionately tithing and giving to help evangelize and disciple many other people.
This process will organize your situation to set aside a meaningful emergency fund and to apportion ten percent or more of your gross income to save and invest in no-load, low expense stock index mutual funds and other worthwhile investments that usually produce double-digit annual growth. Those who fail to tame their purchases usually wind up in financial shackles that produce many headaches and heartaches in their lives.
Please pray for this ministry and email me with any questions. May the LORD bless you richly as you follow His plan!
Proverbs 22:16, 1Corinthians 8:9, 1Corinthians 10:23-24, James 5:1-6
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