Let's talk about something that a lot of us do not like to talk about. Why? Because it's triggering. It reminds us of what's going wrong in our lives, and at the end of the day, we just don't want to deal with this very true fact that either has been our reality in the past or currently is right now. And that my friend is being broke. Let's talk about being broke. Matter of fact, let's dive deep into why you might be struggling with being broke, living paycheck to paycheck, and not figuring out how in the world to get out of this cycle that makes you feel trapped, stuck. And financially enslaved. Whew. I know, I know. Okay. It's a tough topic, but you know, or if this is your first time listening to these episodes, you're about to know that this audio show. Is about being real. It's about being honest. It's about creating a safe space of vulnerability because why the facades? Why the surface level stuff? Why the norms. Let's go deep. Let's talk about the real stuff. Let's get to the real issues so that we can work through it, find solutions in God first and foremost, and grow into this beautiful version of ourselves that God does desire for us to grow into. Now I don't just wanna talk about the concept of being broke. I specifically wanna talk about why Christians. Are struggling with being broke. I'm not saying that it is a trend that Christians are broke. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just specifically talking about the reality of being broke and you being a Christian. And the reason why I want to specify this topic, because we're gonna talk a lot about Jesus today. We're gonna talk a lot about God today, and we're gonna talk about some biblical truths. And biblical misconceptions when it comes to money. Let's dive in. There is a lie that I think whether it's intentional or unintentional, that a lot of Christians are feeding into, and that lie my friend is. It's ungodly to achieve wealth. You either might. Straight up believe word for word that it is ungodly to achieve wealth, or you might not necessarily believe that word for word. You might believe that God does want us to achieve wealth, but your actions are saying otherwise. The way that you act, the way that you respond, the way that you do or do not put effort towards certain things, is you unintentionally subconsciously believing. That wealth is ungodly or wealth should not be pursued, so let's talk about that. I think keyword think okay. Because something that I am really intentional about is making sure that you listening to this episode know that I am in the same journey with you. I am learning just as much as you are learning as well. My purpose is to simply come on these podcast episodes. Teaching of things that I've experienced, that I've been learning to help you too, or things that I am currently experiencing or currently learning so that we can help each other, we can learn together, we can overcome. So I think that a lot of Christians feed into specific Bible verses. That make them believe or act as if they should not, or cannot or will not achieve wealth in their human life here on earth. And I believe that those reasons stem from a few places, one. The Bible tells us that the love of money is the root of all evil. This gets misinterpreted a lot because in Timothy six 10 when that scripture says, the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil. It isn't saying that money is evil. It says the love of money is evil, and I don't know why we miss that. This is something that. Is really essential when it comes to reading scripture and applying it to your life. You can't just skim it. You can't just read it. You need to do a deep dive into what that verse is actually saying. What did that mean in the context of the historical times back then, and what does that mean in the context of your very own life right now based off of how God wants you to live and how he wants you to perceive certain things in this world. So a lot of times when Christians see that verse of money and evil being in the same sentence. They might unintentionally correlate that with money being evil when that's not the case, money is not evil. It's the love of money that is evil. But you misinterpreting that and thinking that money is evil or money is ungodly, could be the reason why you are broke living paycheck to paycheck and are not achieving the wealth that God very well could want for you. We'll talk about that more in a second, so stick with me. I also think that biblically we are taught to be content with what we already have, rather than constantly chasing after futuristic things that we do not have yet. It's good to be content. We absolutely should be content no matter where we're at financially. But being content doesn't mean that you. Don't put in effort to become better, that you don't put in effort to work towards certain goals. It's that while you're putting in effort, while you're putting in certain goals, you're trusting God in where he has you and where he might bring you, and you are contend in that whole journey. So I also think we need to be careful with the word contentment. Do not disguise content with laziness, content with not moving forward. Content with just flowing, and I don't need to work towards that. No, do not disguise contentment with that. Instead, look at contentment as an attitude that you should have as you pursue what God is calling you to do. Another reason why I think Christians could be in a state of being broke or feeling broke, living paycheck to paycheck is because we're taught biblically to be service driven, not money driven. If you look at the life of Jesus, he was nowhere near money driven. He was all about service, and the Bible teaches us to put on the attitude of Jesus to live like Jesus. He's the ultimate roadmap to our everyday lives. So even though yes, you should absolutely be service driven, not money driven, that does not mean that you should just treat money or your current financial situation as it is what it is. I'm just going with the flow, whatever. No, God calls you out of that, and I'm going to talk about that here in a second. So again, stick with me. All of those reasons that I just mentioned could be keeping you in a poverty mindset. I know that that's hard to hear. God calls you to get. Out of that, not to remain in it. So what does it look like to break these misinterpretations? To break our thinking behind wealth God's way, and instead fully understand the truth behind wealth God's way so that we can pursue it. hear me correctly here so that we can pursue it with the right heart posture. Now in order to get in the right heart posture of pursuing wealth, no longer being broke, no longer being a slave to your finances, no longer living paycheck to paycheck. There's a couple of things that I wanna say. First off the truth. We talked about the lie, right? Which was that it's ungodly. To be wealthy or that it's ungodly to pursue wealth. Let's talk about the truth. God could want you to be wealthy. But it is how you view your wealth and how you steward that wealth that matters. Yes. God wants you to be service driven. Yes. God wants you to be content. Yes. God wants you to not have the love of money in your heart because it can lead to all kinds of evil and sin that you won't even see coming. He wants all of that. We should be living by those standards, but God wanting wealth for you starts with you viewing that wealth in a certain way and stewarding that wealth in a godly way too. That being said, let me be extremely clear to you listening to this episode. It is not ungodly to be wealthy. It is not ungodly to desire wealth. It is not ungodly to pursue financial freedom as a goal in your life. What is ungodly is when the wealth you seek becomes your God that my friend is where it gets dangerous. And the scariest part about that is, to be honest with you, is a lot of us are there. A lot of us subconsciously make money, financial freedom. Financial goals, wealth. We make it a God and we don't even realize it. That is where the problem is and that's what we need to fix. Matthew 6 24, I wanna read this scripture because it is one of my favorite ones. And it's a good one to hold dear in your heart to help keep you from making money a God in your life. Matthew 6 24 says, 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. You cannot serve both God and money. I want you to ask yourself. Which 1:00 AM I serving? Because it's written here that you can't serve both. You might be thinking, oh, well, I feel like I'm serving both. I serve God, but you know, I'm chasing after my financial goals. Truly ask yourself if you are chasing after financial goals, what is your heart's posture in that? Because if you feel enslaved to it, if you are constantly worrying about it, if you are constantly thinking of it and prioritizing the effort and the tasks that it takes to get to your financial goals over a connection and a relationship with God, him himself, then my friend, you are serving money over serving God. Listen, I struggle with it too. Okay? There are so many times where I have to check myself day by day, right?'cause it's a daily battle on am I serving money today? Am I doing a little too much of that, and am I not serving God enough? Okay. Heart check. Let me flip it. What does it look like for me to take action? To flip it right here, right now, to make sure that God stays on the throne of my heart rather than money and my financial freedom goals and my wealth goals remaining on the throne of my heart based off of my actions, based off of my worries, based off of my thoughts? How do I make sure that God. Is strongly sitting on the throne of my heart. Now here's what I've learned. There is a difference. Between worldly wealth and spiritual wealth. And I believe that in order for us as Christians, as believers, to go from being broke to being wealthy, God's way is to first understand the difference between what is wealth in the world and what is wealth in the spirit. So what I did, I was thinking about this. And I found a few definitions of wealth just by Googling it, and of course a lot of those definitions reference money, but there was one definition that said plentiful supplies in a particular resource. I prayed about it and I said, you know what? Spiritual wealth, same sentence structure, different message, and that definition of spiritual wealth is, I would say plentiful supplies provided by the source. Let's compare the two worldly wealth plentiful supplies in a particular resource. Spiritual wealth, plentiful. Supplies provided by the source. What is the source? God. Wealth is trusting God to supply, to provide for you. And this could mean in every way. You could be wealthy financially through God. You could be wealthy mentally because of God. You could be wealthy spiritually because of God. He is the source he can provide. Holistic wealth into your life if you allow him to, if you have the right heart posture in pursuing wealth God's way. So in summary, I truly believe that wealth God's way. Riches in God's eyes for you can mean financial freedom, mental freedom, and spiritual abundance, and I believe that these three can absolutely be achieved in your life. If you live according to God's word and kept your heart in the right posture. So I wanna talk about those three areas of wealth and how you can achieve them in a godly way because yes. Can God provide this for you because he is the source. Absolutely. But life my friend, your journey, my friend with God is a partnership. You need to move with God. You need to take action. You need to put in effort, you need to have the faith. God will be right there by your side leading the way. So if we know that God's job or responsibility is to provide, to be the source to produce outcomes, then that means that our job, our responsibility is to put in effort towards these things And to have trust in God all along the way. So let's talk about how you can achieve wealth God's way. How you can stop living in the reality of being broke or living paycheck to paycheck and start working towards wealth God's way, starting with the first area, financial freedom, one that. All of us. Okay, let's be real. All of us want. The thing about financial freedom is a lot of us think that it's about us figuring out how to make more money. Is it a part of that? Yes. We're gonna talk about that in a second, but one of the things that we tend to skip over when it comes to financial freedom is where in our finances are we a slave? Meaning, where in our finances do we owe money? Think about your debts. Your student loan debt, your credit card debt, your home debt, the people that you owe money to, anything. The IRS that you owe. Okay. I've been there. Okay. Money at the end of the day that you owe to someone else. Financial freedom. God's way. Is ensuring that you are actively working towards getting out, no longer being a slave to the people that you owe money to. And if you're like, is that really biblical? Is that God's way? Let me read it to you. In Proverbs 22 7, it says, the rich rule over the poor and the borrower is slave to the lender. And Dave Ramsey, who is a Christian financial guru, took that verse and simply put it like this, if you owe someone money, they'll control your life until you pay it back. If someone is controlling your life because of money, that is a situation that God would call you to get out of. Another example, and I don't have this specific verse pulled up right now, is when. Jesus's disciples in the New Testament. Were asking him about taxes, asking him if they should even be paying taxes, and Jesus replied and said, Give to Caesars. What is Caesars? And give to God. What is God's? If you owe money, give it. If you borrowed money and you're in debt, actively work towards paying that off. A lot of times we bypass that as a way of getting financially free. Financial freedom does not just mean making more money. It also means managing your current money well enough to get out of the debt that you owe, to not be a slave to the lender. God wants you to be free of that, but are you prioritizing it enough? I had to check myself on that because who am I to sit here and say, you know what? Let me figure out how to make more money when I haven't even paid my student loan debts. I've been outta school for, um, let's see, seven years, I deferred those student loans okay. It wasn't until this past year that I was like, you know what? I am falling victim to being a slave to the lender by not actively making these payments or even on my credit cards. If I am making the minimum payment, can I increase it a little bit so that I can work towards no longer being a slave to the lender? That is also me working towards financial freedom. Now I mentioned financial freedom is getting free of debt, right? Financial freedom is also learning how to make more money so that money does not control you. This is also biblical when you have the right heart posture behind it. The story that I always love to refer back to, to talk about this is the beautiful story of the talents. I'm just gonna read this off, so stick with me here because it's good. Tune in, listen and try to absorb in your spirit what it is that I'm reading biblically in Matthew 25, verse 14, Jesus says, it will be like a man going on a journey who called his servants and entrusted his wealth to them, to one, he gave five bags of gold to another two bags and to another one bag each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received five bags of gold went at once and put his money to work and gained five bags more also the one with two bags of gold gained two more, but the man who had received one bag went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money. After a long time, the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received five bags of gold brought the other five master. He said, you entrusted me with five bags of gold. See, I have gained five more. His master replied. Well done. Good and faithful servant. You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's. Happiness. The man with two bags of gold also came master. He said, you entrusted me with two bags of gold. See, I have gained two more. His master replied. Well done. Good and faithful servant. You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share in your master's happiness. Then the man who had received one bag of gold said, master. I knew that you are a hard man harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and I went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you. His master replied, you wicked. Lazy servant, so you knew that I harvest where I have not sewn and gather where I have not scattered seed. Well then you should have put money on deposit with the bankers so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest. So take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has 10 bags, for whoever has will be given more and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have even what they have will be taken from them and throw that worthless servant outside into the darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Whew. I know it's a long one. But I had to share that entire story so that you could feel the effects of it. There is meaning depth to what I just read to you. The biggest takeaway from this scripture is how essential it is to invest wisely in the money that God gave you. From your job, from your clients, from your business, from your projects, how are you using that money to invest it, to spend it wisely? A lot of times we take the money that we've earned and we might save a little too much of it because we're scared. We might use it on ourself a little too much because we're unintentionally or intentionally being selfish. But what does it look like to instead, take that money, pay your bills, do what you need to do, budget, all that stuff. But take that money, a good portion of that money, and invest it wisely. Invest it in places, resources, ventures, investments. Projects that will make you a return, meaning it will multiply your money. What does it look like to take that money and to spend it wisely in places like tithing in the church and giving God back, minimum 10% of what he blessed you to have? Even putting it towards getting out of debt so that you are no longer a slave to the lender. These are things that we need to do a better job at taking into consideration, your money is not just about paying bills. It's not just about spending it on yourself. What does it look like to instead view your money as not yours, but God's and he entrusted you with that money? To invest it wisely and multiply it. You doing that consistently, financial freedom is on its way to take that money and have a generous heart in tithing it and giving some of that money away and helping people. You doing that? Financial freedom is on its way because God sees that he can trust you, but when welink tight to it, when we're so worried about money, when we just don't know money, then. Is your God, and that is where you need to be careful. At the end of the day, God desires for you to steward your money well. When he sees that you can steward it well by how you manage it, how you invest it, where you spend it. He can trust you with more and because he is the source he can and he will provide you with more on his timing in his way for your life. And the result of that, my friend, wealth God's Way. So how do you achieve that? How do you work towards that? Well, you work towards paying off your debts. You tithe, you work towards better financial management. You work towards money working for you rather than the other way around. By building the knowledge and the skill sets of investing in ventures, in projects, learning profitability strategies, and keeping your heart's posture upright with God as you do. Now the challenge in this is that as you're pursuing financial freedom, as I mentioned before, it can easily take the throne of your heart. Check yourself on that. Every day is money on the throne of my heart today. If it's a yes, flip it. Put God back on the throne of your heart. Daily battle and one that you should be entering into every day. If you wanna reach financial freedom, if you wanna reach wealth when it comes to the financial aspect of your life, but doing it God's way. Alright, that was just one. We talked about wealth. When it comes to financial freedom, let's go to two. Which is wealth when it comes to mental freedom. God wants for you to not be controlled by your mind. Your own emotions, the chaos of thoughts that produce anxiety, that produce depression, that produce insecurity, that produce overthinking, that produce doubts. God does not want you to be controlled by these things, and because our mind, our human brain is oftentimes so loud, we end up unintentionally. Being controlled by our mind. God calls you out of that. How can you achieve it? How can you get out of that and reach wealth, mentally, self-control, my friend, self-control. One of the beautiful fruits of the spirit that is produced when we live God's way. When we put on the character of Jesus. Having self-control in a way to where your mind is no longer controlling you means being aware of your triggers, having better control over how you respond and how you act, communicating in a healthy way. All of these things are skills, habits that you absolutely can develop with effort and with time. I. Being okay with getting the help that you need. Talk to people in your community, your friends, your family members, people in your community that you trust about what you're mentally struggling with. Get help, get advice, get encouragement from people. Seek therapy. It's okay to seek therapy. I myself, am just now getting back into therapy. It's okay to get professional help if you feel that you need it. And then of course, prayer. A lot of times we kind of look at prayer as like, oh, okay, let me just say my daily prayers. Let me pray over this meal today. That's great, but where is the strong, victorious warrior type of prayer? The kind of prayer where you got your hands raised up, you are boldly proclaiming with strength and with faith, and this extreme competence in what God can do and asking God to help you become mentally free and no longer being held down by the anxiety, depression, or insecurities that you are dealing with now. We talked about how you can achieve wealth through mental freedom, right? But here's the challenge. The challenge, to be honest with you, my friend, is that it is easy to be a victim of your mind rather than being a victor over it. It's just easier to play the victim. Being a victor takes a new version of yourself that you have to work on. Stepping into a version that's bold, a version that's confident, a version that puts in effort, even when you're tired, even when you don't feel like it, you still work towards becoming mentally free because you know that that is what God would want for you. And you are ready to absorb and to receive all that God has for you. Lastly, number three, achieving wealth via spiritual abundance. God wants you to be strong in the spirit, so filled with God's word, God's love, and his roadmap for you in this life. That you are standing on such a strong foundation that nothing, absolutely nothing can tear you down, can make you waver, can make you fall, can make that foundation break nothing. That is the level of the spirit that God wants you to exist in. And let's be real. This is tough. It's hard to build up such a strong foundation to the point where nothing can break you. You know how many times I felt broken, whether it was crying over something, whether it was feeling defeated, whether it was me wanting to give up, whether it was me feeling like I'm not good enough. So many moments where my foundation shattered and it wasn't to blame myself. Of that foundation shattering. It was more so to be aware of the fact that my foundation shattered because I was not as strong as God wants me to be in the Spirit. How can I work towards being so strong in the spirit to the point where my foundation is unbreakable? How can you Work towards being so strong in the spirit to the point where your foundation is unbreakable. I have learned that how we do that is using our spiritual weapons. The Bible tells us what our spiritual weapons are. It says that we are not fighting against. Flesh. We're not fighting against worldly things, even our worldly emotions and people and circumstances. We're not fighting against things that we see or feel. We are fighting against hidden spirits, the spiritual realm, and in order to fight that, we have to use the spiritual weapons, not worldly ones. So what are those? Some of you might know, which is great, but maybe you need a reminder. Some of you might not have any idea. Let's work through that together. In Ephesians six, chapter 14, it says, stand firm then with the belt of truth buckled around your waist with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God, and pray in the spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. I wanna point out the words that emphasize the armor of God, a part of your spiritual weapons to fight the right fight, to have spiritual abundance fully. Those words are truth, righteousness, gospel of peace, faith. Salvation, word of God and prayer. What does it look like to take these words and to fight with them leading the way so that as we do, we are so filled with the spirit, we are so bold in the spirit that nothing can take us down. Our foundation is unbreakable. That my friend is spiritual wealth, achieving wealth, through getting spiritually abundant. Now, here's the challenge with this, because it's one thing to know how to achieve it, but if you really wanna learn how to achieve it, you have to be prepared for the challenge that's up ahead. This challenge is something that I pulled from Priscilla Schreyer who gave this incredible sermon that I watched on YouTube, and she said, the enemy will attack you and will disguise himself behind surface level life problems to do it. Meaning problems in your life right now. Financial problems, problems at work, health problems, problems with people, problems in your marriage, problems with your kids, problems in your business, problems within your creativity and what you're trying to pursue, whatever it is. A lot of those life problems look like life problems when in actuality. It's the enemy hiding behind those things as a method to attack you, and it can feel so difficult to overcome those attacks, but you're aware of that upcoming challenge now. So what does it look like? That when the next problem hits you, the next time you're worrying about a specific problem, you tell yourself, you know what? This isn't just my problem in my life. This is the enemy trying to attack me. And you know what? I'm going to fight the right fight. I'm going to put on the armor of God. I'm going to use my spiritual weapons. I'm gonna stand up and be bold and confident and bright and trusting in the Lord that I serve, to the point where the enemy trying to hide behind this problem cannot break my foundation. I am standing on the strong foundation with faith, with trust in God, with contentment, knowing that there are brighter days ahead, knowing that I will be more than okay. That is the level of spiritual abundance that God wants us all to have. To wrap up this episode, my friend, I wanna read a paragraph that. Blew my mind. That is sticking with me right here, right now. This paragraph is coming from the book, A Purpose-Driven Life by Rick Warren. It is so good. If you have not read this book yet, highly recommend it. The paragraph says there are two kinds of people, kingdom builders, and wealth builders. Both are gifted at making a business grow, making deals, or sales and making a profit. Wealth builders continue to amass wealth for themselves no matter how much they make. But Kingdom Builders change the rules of the game. They still try to make as much money as they can, but they do it in order to give it away. They use the wealth to fund God's church and its mission in the world. I want you to think about that. Which one are you, as you pursue wealth? Are you a kingdom builder or a wealth builder? Both pursue making more money. Where it's different is the heart posture. Where is your heart posture? How can you better pursue wealth God's way to the point where being broke, living paycheck to paycheck is no longer your reality because you broke the norms that the world tells you when it comes to achieving wealth, and you decided to completely go God's way when it comes to achieving wealth. What does that look like for you? Something to think about, my friend. I hope that this episode was powerful to you. I hope that it was uplifting for you. I know we went deep. I know we talked about a lot, but my prayer is that everything that I shared in today's episode doesn't just go in one ear and out the other, that it doesn't just sit with you as inspiration for today, but it is a seed planted to help you change your life as you pursue wealth. Now if you're looking for more help, more insight, more step-by-step strategies when it comes to wealth in building a business, I got you covered with a free course that you can access right down below. In this free course, you get three videos from me, each touching on a core component to building a successful, profitable business God's way. We talk about mindset, we talk about marketing, and we talk about money all pursuing it God's way and the strategies that you can leverage to do so. You can get it right down below if you're interested. Thanks so much for tuning in. What a pleasure to have you join us today and I'll see you next week for another episode.