“When Satan Attacks Our Finances” – Part 1 – 1 Timothy 6:6-10

I have a test for you. I’m going to ask you some questions but I don’t want you to answer out loud. I don’t want you to share you answers. I just want you to think about what you would do. Let’s say you go out to eat this afternoon and as you are sitting at the table, the waitress walks by and accidentally drops a $1 bill right next to your chair. No one is looking. There are no cameras. No one will ever know. You pick up the dollar and…what do you do with it?

Do you put it in your pocket, knowing that the waitress will never know? Or do you give it back? Now, same scenario, but it’s a $10. What do you do? Lastly, it’s a $100 bill. Does that change anything for you? Knowing that nobody will ever know, what do you do?

Now, here’s how to score yourself on this test. If you kept the money in all three instances, you are just a jerk and I give you a score of 50. But if you returned the dollar bill but kept either the 10 or the 100, then, especially for a Christian, there is something terribly wrong with you and I give you a zero.

I give you a zero because you put a price on your integrity. Giving back the one but keeping the others shows me that you know it’s wrong but if the price is right, you would do it anyway. It shows me that you put money above your relationship to God and scripture says that you will regret that bitterly ever after. (1 Tim. 6:10 The Message)

If I were to ask Christians anywhere if they put money above God, I doubt if anybody would ever admit or even realize that it was. Surely none of us here today make money an idol. That’s ridiculous. We are mature Christians. Why, we graduated from Christ Fellowship Boot Camp last year. We know better than that. Right?

Well, I want to warn you that it is always a temptation. Satan loves to attack us financially and scripture talks a lot about how we are to use our money. Jesus talked a whole lot about money so it must be a pretty important topic. It must be a pretty good barometer of who we really are and what our relationship to God is like if there is so much attention paid to it.

Partly because scripture addresses it so often and partly because I see the need so often, not just in our church but in our community, I want to spend a little time talking about it for the next few Sundays. We saw last year as we went through Boot Camp and on into Combat Training and Specialty School, etc., how Satan attacks us physically and mentally and spiritually. I want to start 2019 off by continuing to look at how Satan attacks us financially.

To start us off, I want to look at an overview of money. We need to make sure we have a good handle on what money is and isn’t and the consequences of not realizing the truth of it. So, turn to 1 Timothy 6 and let’s see what Paul said about it to his young preacher boy, Timothy.

The book of Timothy is in the New Testament after Colossians and Thessalonians but before Titus and Philemon. In most of the Bibles in the pew it is on page ??? 1 Timothy is considered one of the Pastoral Letters that Paul wrote along with 2 Timothy and Titus and he wrote these to instruct these men on how to be the kind of pastor their churches needed for them to be so you can imagine Paul brought up the topic of money.

I got a call the other day from a woman in the community who said her cat had died and she asked me if I would do the funeral for it. I told her that we don’t do cat funerals around here and maybe she should call the Methodist Church in Bridgeport. She said she would and she said that was a good idea because they could probably use the $10,000 she was going to pay the pastor for doing it. I said, “Now wait just a second. You didn’t tell me the cat was a Baptist!”

Turn to 1 Timothy 6 and let’s see what one pastor told another pastor about money. Starting in verse 6 through verse 10, it says, “But godliness with contentment is great gain. ⁷For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. ⁸But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. ⁹Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. ¹⁰For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.”

Let me ask you a question before we dive into this passage. We are starting a series on how to respond when Satan attacks our finances. Well, how do we know when it is Satan attacking? Because sometimes, like in every aspect of our lives, we make bad decisions and bad things come from those bad decisions. That is not Satan attacking.

Sometimes, as we saw last week from John 15, God prunes us to help us be more fruitful and that pruning is often painful. That is not Satan attacking. Then, sometimes bad things happen to us because we live in a sin-sick and fallen world. That’s not a direct attack by Satan either. So, we have to make sure that we are close enough to God to make good decisions through the peace that the Holy Spirit gives and so we know when He is pruning us to make us more like Him.

I’m afraid that when it comes to finances and having stuff and collecting material goods, we sometimes feel like Satan is attacking when really we should just be content with what we have. Maybe Satan is not necessarily attacking your finances so much as he is attacking your desire for more stuff.

Look at verse 6 again. “But godliness with contentment is great gain.” What is “godliness”? The word means literally to be like God; to share some of the attributes of God. And what does God want? What does God desire? What is His greatest wish? Do you think God wishes He had a new bass boat? Do you think He is up there checking His bank account and thinking, “You know, since I own the cattle on a thousand hills, I better sell a few head so I can get that new iPhone X that just came out.”

I doubt it. God only wants to have a relationship with you. He already owns everything so He is content and we can be content just having a relationship with Him. Everybody wants to be content but there is a trick played on you when you try to be content with more stuff because more is never enough. So how do we become contented? Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 3:5, “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God.” (KJV) That “sufficiency” is the same as contentment. What we have in God is sufficient and we are content.

Again, Paul said in Philippians 4:19, “And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.” He said in Philippians 4:11 (that Philippians 4 is packed full of good stuff, isn’t it?) that he can be content in whatever circumstances he was in. How? Because he said we can do all things through Him who strengthens us. (4:13)

Here are some quotes from some people besides Paul: I have made many millions, but they have brought me no happiness--John W. Rockefeller. 

The care of $200,000,000 is enough to kill anyone. There is no pleasure in it--W.H. Vanderbilt. 

I am the most miserable man on earth--John Jacob Astor. 

I was happier when doing a mechanic's job--Henry Ford.

Millionaires seldom smile--Andrew Carnegie.

Source Unknown.

When your desire is for more money and stuff, you lose your contentment. Also, when your desire is for more money and stuff, you are concentrating on something that is temporary. Look at verse 7 again. ⁷For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. Job said something similar in his first chapter (1:21), “Naked I came from my mother’s womb and naked I will depart.”

Jesus had a lot to say about storing up temporary riches. In Matthew 6:19-20 He said, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.”

Now, we all know it is wise to prepare for the future. You should have some kind of plan for retirement and old age or kids going to college. I know, some of you are just trying to make it to Friday but you need to have a long-term plan. It’s foolish not to do that. In the Old Testament, Joseph was a great model for doing that when he stored up grain in the prosperous years for use during the coming famine when he was in charge of Egypt. (Genesis 41)

But in the passage I just read, Jesus said not to store up treasures for yourself. So, it seems to give conflicting messages. Well, skip down to verse 10 of our main passage in 1 Timothy 6. Verse 10 says, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” It talks about the love of money and being eager for money. It is an issue of the heart.

I was looking back at that story about Joseph in the book of Genesis. I love that story. Some day we’ll do a sermon series just on Joseph and all that he went through. But maybe you remember that Joseph was in prison and he interpreted some dreams for a couple of guys. God gave Joseph that ability several times in his life and sometimes it worked out well and sometimes it didn’t.

In Genesis 41, Pharaoh calls for Joseph to come out of the prison and interpret a dream he had. In verse 15, Pharaoh says, "I had a dream, and no one can interpret it. But I have heard it said of you that when you hear a dream you can interpret it." Now, if you were Joseph, having been put in prison under false pretenses for several years, what would you say to Pharaoh?

I think I would have said something along the lines of, “Well, first let’s talk about my living conditions, big boy, then we talk dreams.” Right? Or maybe, you would just be honest and say, “Yea, I can interpret dreams.” But Joseph did something different. It’s like he heard my sermon from last week and he knew what his one job was or something. (Probably read it online. Maybe he got hold of a CD or something. I don’t know.) Listen to how Joseph responds. 16"I cannot do it," Joseph replied to Pharaoh, "but God will give Pharaoh the answer he desires."

Boom! He made God look good. Did you see that? I can’t do it. But God can. That was his first response and God blessed it. In this instance, Pharaoh made him second in command over all of Egypt. And because God is God and His ways are higher than our ways, maybe He does the same for you. You might not even want to be second in command of Egypt but one thing I know He will do: He will give you contentment with what you have.

That’s the secret. Make wise choices. Plan for the future but be aware that none of us are guaranteed another breath. There’s nothing wrong with being rich. There is nothing wrong with being poor. The problem comes when we are discontented with what we have and we start to focus more on the money than our relationship with God.

If you have a job, you should be thankful for it and be the best worker your boss has. But if your job keeps you out of church, what is that telling God? “God, I know you own the cattle on a thousand hills. I know you created all things. I know you own all things and you are loaded but…I have to go to work instead of being with my family at Christ Fellowship. I have to provide for my family. I have to do this and I have to do that, oh almighty, all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving God.” It sounds ridiculous when you put it like that, doesn’t it?

Or what about when you worry about finances? What does that tell God? “God, I trust you…pretty much…sorta…except with my money. That part I’ll take care of. God, I want you to be Lord of my life…except for my finances. I’ll be the lord of that but I will ask for your blessings while I do it.”

Philip Parham tells the story of a rich industrialist who was disturbed to find a fisherman sitting lazily beside his boat. "Why aren't you out there fishing?" he asked. "Because I've caught enough fish for today," said the fisherman.  "Why don't you catch more fish than you need?' the rich man asked.  "What would I do with them?" "You could earn more money," came the impatient reply, "and buy a better boat so you could go deeper and catch more fish. You could purchase nylon nets, catch even more fish, and make more money. Soon you'd have a fleet of boats and be rich like me." The fisherman asked, "Then what would I do?"  "You could sit down and enjoy life," said the industrialist.
"What do you think I'm doing now?" the fisherman replied as he looked placidly out to sea. Our Daily Bread, May 18, 1994.

"Content makes poor men rich; discontent makes rich men poor."  Benjamin Franklin.

And where does contentment come from? It comes from God and when we make God look good, Satan can attack all he wants to. We will be content in whatever circumstance we are in.

God is concerned about your finances. He’s not worried but He is concerned and He knows it takes money to buy food at Walmart and it takes money to put gas in the tank and He knows the money pit that kids and I’m sure He wonders like I do why people don’t have dogs instead of kids, but I digress.

God knows you need some money and some stuff to live but Jesus said in Matthew 6:33, “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” You make Him look good and God will take care of you. But you can only be taken care of like He wants to if He is Lord of all of your life and that starts with confessing your sins to Him and asking Him for forgiveness. Admit to Him that you are a sinner in need of a Savior and that it is your belief that Jesus died on the cross to provide the punishment that we couldn’t pay for those sins. Then make Him Lord of all of your life and allow Him to start changing you, molding you, guiding you and giving you all these things as well. Do it right now as the music plays.