Deuteronomy 28:7-14 A common meme is the snowball rolling down a hill. It starts out small but as it rolls down the hill it gets bigger and bigger. In the same way, our Christian walk starts out small but through the years we become stronger in and closer to the Lord. What often isn’t mentioned is that as the snowball rolls down the hill it can hit obstacles. Sometimes the snowball will keep on moving but it has lost some snow, maybe it gets a little misshapen. Sometimes the snowball picks up an obstacle, marring its’ beautiful white surface and causing it to have a bumpy ride. Sometimes the obstacle can even stop the snowball. There are things that are obstacles in our Christian walk as well.
One of those obstacles is finances. Money can really ruin our lives. Most normally this comes from spending more than what we can afford. We get into debt and it burdens us down. We get enslaved to repaying that debt. In biblical times this could end up being literal slavery (e.g., Deuteronomy 15:12). Even today, debt puts us into virtual slavery to our creditors.
Debt keeps us from being able to do things for God. Debt is an obstacle that can slow us down or even stop our growing in Christ. We need to avoid debt. When we are encumbered to debt we need to rid ourselves of it as quickly as possible while not accruing additional debt. Debt is an obstacle.
But even when we are not in debt, if we are so focused on accumulating money that it is the only thing we consider, we have hit an obstacle. Our Christian walk takes a hit. We need to see our finances as a tool to further the kingdom of God. Money isn’t the goal, money is something that we can use for the real goal, kingdom building.
A corollary to a focus on acquiring money, we find we have no time. Our time becomes enslaved to acquisition. A lack of time becomes an obstacle to walking the path Christ would have us walk. When we change our mindset away from acquiring stuff to following Christ we will find we have time to actually follow because God’s way is the great way. Jesus said His way is restful and a light burden (Matthew 11:30).
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