“He who
loves pleasure will be a poor man; He who loves wine and oil will not be rich”
(Proverbs 21:17)
One of the
fundamental keys to successfully managing your finances is successfully
managing your personal character. Wealth is not merely a matter of how
much money you have, but what kind of person you are. Give a man who
loves pleasure one dollar and it will be spent on what a dollar can buy.
Give him one hundred dollars and one hundred dollars will be spent. He
says give me a million and I shall be satisfied. So give him a million
and he will spend a million dollars before he knows it.
A person
who loves pleasure will always find new pleasures to spend their money on until
it is gone. A poor person will only go broke at a higher level if you
give them more money because they haven’t yet mastered themselves. If you
give him $500 per week, $1,000 per week, $4000 per week or more, it will be
gone just the same. An amazing thing happens to a person who is ruled by
his love for pleasure: no matter how much he gains, he finds a way to spend it.
A person
who has not acquired wealth in his life will often say, “if only I made this
much money, I would be able to save and have no financial worries.”
However, as time goes by and his pay increases, he finds that he has no more
money than he did before. All that has happened is that his expenses have
increased to match the increase in pay. In the world, we have those who
make little and those who make much. No matter how much a person makes,
if he loves pleasure, the money will be spent to the full and he will be poor.
There is
no secret in this regard to those who acquire wealth. If you spend all
the money you make you will have none to invest and work for you. The
wealthy know that pleasures are fleeting, that their benefits are short lived,
but that assets, lands, businesses, and investments produce returns and income
that can provide wealth for them and others.
Having a
lot of money or a little money is of no consequence to God, but being a man of
wealth or poverty is. The rich man learns what the poor man rejects, that
wealth comes as a result of discipline, wisdom and patient character. The
poor man spends his money on whatever pleasures he can buy today. The
rich man invests his money in the things which will return wealth to him.
We live in
a society suffering from terrible poverty. Not poverty in terms of
possessions and pleasures, but poverty in terms of character and
discipline. Millions go bankrupt in this country every year because they
love pleasure. They spend all they get and they spend what they don’t
have running up huge credit card debts and liquidating all the wealth they had
acquired in their homes. The problem isn’t with the money, but with the
character of the one who manages his finances based on his lusts and desires
for more pleasure.
How a
person manages his money is a symptom of how the person thinks in his
heart. If he loves pleasure and allows his lusts to be satisfied at every
turn, he will certainly be without money or means. However, a man who
through discipline realizes that the greater rewards of wealth come not by
loving pleasure and taking ease, but by diligent labor and wise investment of
his funds for the future will be the man who becomes wealthy.
Are you a
person of wealth or poverty? Do you save and invest a portion of what you
earn or do you spend every penny? The answers reveal much about your
character and about how much you love pleasure.
2 Timothy 3
1 But of this be assured: in the last days grievous
times will set in. 2 For
men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, haughty, profane. They
will be disobedient to parents, thankless, irreligious, 3 destitute of
natural affection, unforgiving, slanderers. They will have no self-control, but
will be brutal, opposed to goodness, 4 treacherous,
headstrong, self-important. They will love pleasure instead of loving God, 5 and
will keep up a make-believe of piety and yet live in defiance of its power.
Turn away from people of this sort.
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Written by David Liesenfelt Copyright © 2004
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