"You are going to let the fear of poverty govern your life and your reward will be that you will eat, but you will not live."
George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)
"It is not the rich man you should properly call happy, but him who knows how to use with wisdom the blessings of the gods, to endure hard poverty, and who fears dishonor worse than death, and is not afraid to die for cherished friends or fatherland."
Horace (65 BC - 8 BC), Odes
You have a deep rooted sense of inferiority
God created you to be a wonderful and amazing person. Sometimes through past failures or terrible upbringing we lose our belief and the ability to succeed. As Christians we are to be “Hope Merchants” to people. This is an abundant God who blessed you with an amazing ability. You are amazing! You are no less than anyone else.
Perceived Inadequacy
This characteristic does so much harm. It causes you to slow and limit your abilities in things like communication.
Lack of Money
Have you ever met someone who no matter what risk they take or chance they pursue just can’t get ahead and they always use the excuse I don’t have enough money to do that? If you always put limitations on yourself you are seeking problems and resistance instead of solutions. There are people in the world with money. Use your creative ability and tap into the infinite knowledge in spirit and find those people who can help you.
Hoarding Mentality
This can be both wealthy and poor people, someone who accumulates stuff. Random stuff that is not necessary for anything. And the reason they always say is, “I might need this one day, just in case such and such happens.” knowing that it will more than likely not even ever happen. Give it away. Don’t sell it. Just give it away. You don’t need to hoard things. The more you hoard the less faith you have in God’s ability to provide for you in time on need. All you are doing is cluttering your life. Like women who gain 40 pounds and keep dresses 15 sizes smaller than them, oh one day I might need this again. No! You are fat! Get rid of it and when you lose the weight buy a new dress.
Insecurity Regarding the Future
Don’t misunderstand me here. You should always be prepared for the future but you don’t have to worry about it. I find it funny that people no matter how good things are going for them at the moment, they can’t enjoy it because they are too freaking worried about the future. Stop and enjoy the moments you have now.
Hopelessness
This one is hard. It is not mentioned one single time in the bible that you should be hopeless. You have to know things go in cycles. Life has ups and downs. My pastor always says that Paul said “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,” It did not say, “I am going to camp here in the valley.” You have to understand circumstances won’t last. If you have no optimism, you are drowning yourself and don’t need to read this to know that. I love James 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Look at Lazarus. The dude was dead for 4 days and God said, Laz, Come forward. Crazy things can happen in life. God can work miracles. There is hope and as Christians we should be the message of good news for hopeless people.
Victim Mentality
I wrote a blog earlier about being a victim or a victor. If you haven’t read it, find it…its pretty good I think. I heard a story about Dr. Phil from my pastor that this lady was saying, “Oh, I’m a victim! My husband has beaten me for 13 years!” Dr. Phil replies, “Lady, let me assure you, you are not a victim, after 13 years you are a volunteer.” If you have a victim mentality again you lose the ability to come up with solutions because all you are focusing on is the fact that it’s not your fault, it is someone else’s fault. Again, this keeps you from figuring a way out of it and sucks you into the trap. It’s not my fault I stabbed someone and I am in prison cause he’s dead now, because my daddy beat me as a child and I learned that violence handles problems. I’m a victim. That’s crap! Period.
Self-Centeredness
This is something most people are affected by. With this affliction it becomes very difficult to give, almost impossible to give without the thought of something in return. I just read a devotional that dealt with this. Jesus gave us authority to minister to people in Matt. 10:8. God sent an epileptic boy for healing to his disciples but they failed miserably due to them being self-centered and losing their belief because they thought they had no position to heal. All they cared about was moving up the ladder and gaining that new higher position (Matt. 9:32-35). Jesus responded to them with his hardest words calling them “unbelieving” and “perverse” and questioned how much longer He had to endure them. You have a mission on this earth to minister to those in need. Don’t lose sight of the ultimate calling, to bring people into the love of God. Church is not about believers, it is for unbelievers. It is not “My will be done.” It is “Thy will be done.”
Generational Transfer of Attitude
Yes, I believe some things are hereditary, but it has become an inexcusable amount of people relying on the fact that their parents were alcoholics that make them that way. I am fat because it’s genetic. No you are fat because you don’t exercise and you eat too much crap. The best one I think is how parents tell their kids they hope their children turn out just like them. Yes, kids can be tough, but what a demeaning thing to say to a child. Even jokingly. In (Exodus 34:7) “maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation." But with the new covenant and sacrifice of Jesus we break this curse. Be the first in your family to break the cycle.
Rationalism for Inappropriate Behavior
Always finding an excuse for why you did something that was wrong. “It’s not my fault I turned out to be a mean, naggy witch. My momma was one too, so I learned it from her.” I used to do this a lot. Blaming others for the hurt I caused them. Well, if you had not had done this or that, I would not have done it to you. How poor minded is that. Accept responsibility for your actions and change you, don’t do it so that others will change to, although it would be nice, but that should not be the purpose of you bettering yourself cause chances are they wont.
In summary, God will provide for you in down times. Look at Elijah. He prayed earnestly and knew God would come through. Sometimes he only brought a meesly crow for him to eat, but he provided him with what he needed at that moment. Don’t be lazy and think you are better than people to not work. My pastor says, “If you don’t work, you should not eat.” God doesn’t perform unbelievable miracles in your life every time you need him to. He is not going to split the Red Sea at your demand or send Angels to protect you all the time. If it is what you need and in His purpose for you He will. Sometimes he provided you will a crusty, old, dirty bird like a crow to eat. Don’t think you are too good for that. You aren’t. You are no better than anyone else on this Earth. In fact, God loves choosing unbelievers and what we think are terrible people to do miraculous things. He touched the hearts of clean and unclean. Rich and poor. Don’t look at wealthy people as bad people. Money is just a commodity. Some people say, “That money is sinner money and I don’t want any bit of it because of how you made it.” Who cares how someone made the money, the question is can you use the money to do good will with it now that you have it? Yes! The devil uses godly raised money to do terrible things and God can use ungodly raised money to do righteous things too. He is an unlimited resourceful being. He will supply you in ways that you may not be open to receive. That is you, not God nor the bible. You may never know how God uses his means to move you. It could be fire that sets you free. Burns your house down or maybe he sends Katrina, the vicious hurricane women to flood your neighborhood to bring you to do his will. Have faith in Him and His will and learn to cast your nets elsewhere. Learn to focus on what you do have and stop worrying and focusing on what you don’t. You read this right? You have eyes and a computer so you are richer than 98 percent of the world. Just a start. It is amazing to me that this is just the beginning. Poverty can either keep you down or raise you up. I love this quote by Aristotle.
"Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime."
Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC)
There is more crime in poverty. Yes crime occurs in wealthy neighborhoods, but not as frequent. There is also huge transformation and change that occurs from poverty due to peoples drive and desire to make this world a better place. You can either make a change in the world or become a slave to it.
