Job 21:7-18 “’… the wicked live on, growing old and increasing in power … their homes are safe and free from fear … they spend their years in prosperity … they say to God “leave us alone … what would we gain by praying to Him?” … their prosperity is not in their own hands, so I stand aloof from the plans of the wicked … how often are they like straw before the wind, like chaff swept away by a gale?’”
Job was rich, influential, and successful one day and poor the next. Apparently, he had observed the same circumstance happen to others.
Principle: Highly successful people who reject God vainly hope for no change.
Rich, successful people may be very happy and may live to be a hundred years old. If they have rejected God, they should reconsider that decision. Those who pay any price for financial success find out it is too expensive. Riches and success are always temporary.
In America, the rich and poor are not static groups. In a pulsating, churning economy things change for people. In a recent study of the poor, 30% of the bottom poor were in the average income bracket fifteen years later and another 29% were in the top income bracket. Only 5% of the poorest poor were still there fifteen years later. 35% were somewhat better off.
In that same fifteen-year period about half of the very rich remained the same, 25% rose slightly, and 25% dropped income considerably.
After death, the rich and poor are even – financially.
The trade-off of a Godly relationship for riches is a bad deal. To conclude that God is not the source of prosperity is a mistake. He is the source. He allows prosperity and poverty into lives for His own good purposes.
Don’t try to figure it out. Just continue to enjoy your relationship with God. Do not envy or covet another’s position. If you are in Christ, pray for the rich to come to Christ so they will move where you are – the richest man in the world.
Discussion:
1. Recall a swing in your financial status.
2. What were the obvious causes of the swing?
3. What were some of the lessons learned from the swing?
