How to Be Rich

One of the most practical miracles Jesus ever performed happened at a wedding. The feast in John 2 had run out of wine, and quietly, without fanfare, Jesus turned ordinary water into the best wine anyone at the table had ever tasted. It is a picture of what happens when the infinite God steps into the world of finite people: divinity meets our humanity right at the point where we come up empty.

Because we are human, we will always reach a place where we run out. You will run out of strength, no matter how strong you are. You will run out of answers, no matter how wise you are. You will run out of love, of money, of time. But here is the good news that changes everything: you serve a God who never runs out. So when you run out, it does not have to be the end. When Jesus has been invited into your life, the moment you run out is the moment He is just getting started.

Your problem is His opportunity. Your point of need is His invitation to an encounter. And the only thing He asks of you is what Mary told the servants at that wedding.

His mother said to the servants, Do whatever he tells you.

John 2:5

Rich on Paper, Poor in Practice

Many of us know the promises. We know God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing, that He is our provider and our sustainer. And yet, day to day, we feel poor. We feel like we never quite have enough, like we are always one paycheck or one bad week away from disaster. The promises seem so near and yet so far. Why? And how do we actually come to live under God's provision instead of just believing in it?

Paul gives Timothy the answer, and it is worth reading slowly.

Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share.

1 Timothy 6:17-18

In these verses Paul names three heart postures. Two of them will keep you living poor even if you are rich. The third one unlocks everything God has already provided. The first is arrogance. The second is trusting uncertain riches. The third, the healthy one, is a settled confidence in the God who richly gives.

The First Trap: Thinking You Earned It

Arrogance here is a works mentality, a merit mindset about how and why God blesses you. It whispers, You get it because you earned it. You earned it, so you deserve it. That sounds humble and hardworking, but it quietly moves your confidence off of God and onto yourself: your credentials, your work ethic, your contacts, your abilities.

It is the spirit of Babel. On the plain of Shinar the people said, Let us build a city and a tower, and let us make a name for ourselves. God does not bless you simply because you worked hard. In fact, if you begin to think your blessing is the reward you built with your own hands, do not be surprised if God comes down and scatters it, just as He did at Babel. Your business is not thriving because you put in more hours than your neighbor, and it is not struggling because you put in fewer. To believe otherwise is to trust your own mind above God's Word.

Scripture keeps pulling us off that ledge. The race is not to the swift, nor wealth to the wise; it is God who lifts one up and sets another down (Ecclesiastes 9:11). And Paul asks the sharpest question of all: What do you have that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as though you did not? (1 Corinthians 4:7). The other side of that same coin is just as deadly. It is the voice that says, I cannot do this, I will never make it, I do not have what it takes. Both the boast and the despair make the same mistake. Both put too much weight on you and too little on God.

The Second Trap: Trusting What Cannot Hold

The second thing Paul warns against is putting your hope in uncertain riches. The moment you believe that more of anything in this world makes you safer, you will never actually live rich, no matter how much you accumulate. It might be money, but it might just as easily be a marriage, a diploma, a house, a career, or a full bank account you glance at to feel secure. Proverbs describes exactly how this drift happens.

The wealth of the rich is their fortified city; they imagine it a wall too high to scale.

Proverbs 18:11

Do you see the danger? Slowly, without deciding to, you let money or possessions stop being a means to an end and become the end itself. You start living for them. You pray so you can have more. You give so you can get more. You even fast so the money comes faster. And in the process you spend your life, your family, and your closeness to God just to gather more stuff. You can pay off every debt, own every car you want, be rich in the eyes of the world, and from heaven's view be completely bankrupt.

Jesus said it plainly: a person's life does not consist in the abundance of their possessions (Luke 12:15). Your life is not measured by the abundance of what you have. It is measured by the abundance of the One who has you. Guard your heart, Paul is saying. Make sure it is God, not your savings; God, not your marriage; God, not your children or your job, who holds you.

The Third Way: Confidence in the God Who Provides

So how do you know your trust is actually in God and not quietly in your bank account? Paul gives a simple test. When God asks you for something in your possession, you will not hesitate to give it. You are ready, at all times, to do a great deal of good. You never feel like you have given enough. You are generous and willing to share.

Here is why generosity is the tell. If you are arrogant, you will hold on because you remember how hard you worked for it. If you are trusting uncertain riches, you will panic when God asks, because you have decided you need a certain amount to feel safe. But when you truly know that it is God who richly provides, then even if He asks for your Isaac, you can hand it over and say, I can give this up, because I still have the One who gave it to me. That person is rich. That person lives rich, acts rich, and actually enjoys the life God has given.

A Boy, Five Loaves, and Twelve Baskets

No story captures this better than the day Jesus fed the crowd. Facing thousands of hungry people, Jesus turned to Philip and asked, Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat? He already knew what He would do; the question was a test, meant to reveal what was in His disciples' hearts. And Jesus is still asking that question. Where will we find people to pray? Where will we find time to reach our neighbors, to follow up with newcomers, to pay the rent, to staff the food pantry?

Philip did the math and gave up: even a small fortune would not buy enough. Andrew found a boy with five small loaves and two fish, then added, But what are they among so many? Like many of us, especially those who have been believers a long time, they failed the test. Their hearts had drifted into the very traps Paul described, and so they lived poor in the middle of an opportunity for abundance.

But notice who passed. A child. Someone new and unguarded, still burning with simple trust. The boy did not give Jesus part of his lunch. He gave all of it. And when he made his little available, God made it valuable. Jesus took what looked like almost nothing, gave thanks, and fed everyone until they were full. Then they gathered twelve baskets of leftovers from one boy's lunch. That boy walked home richer than anyone else on the hillside that day.

That is the principle at the heart of it all. The value of a thing is not in the thing; it is in whose hands it is in. Little in your hands stays little. Little in God's hands becomes mighty. As Paul told the Corinthians, God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work (2 Corinthians 9:8).

Learning to Live Rich

God has to change how we think about wealth. Wealth is not the number in your account; it is the life you actually get to live. If you have money but must work punishing hours every day and week to protect it, if you own a house you never enjoy and children you rarely see because you are always chasing more, something is off. You may be rich on paper and impoverished in practice, all because pride sits in your heart and your hope is fastened to scarce, uncertain things.

So live rich. Give more of your time to the Lord and to your family. Spend more of yourself in fellowship with God and with His people. Give away more of your money. You will not die. Instead you will discover that God so multiplies what you release that it seems you always have more to give.

• Refuse to live, act, or think like someone who is poor, because your source is unlimited.
• When God asks for something, do not clutch it. Make it available to Him and watch Him make it valuable.
• Measure your wealth by the abundance of the One who has you, not the abundance of what you hold.

Because here is where the principle of leftovers leads. You may never learn that Jesus is all you need, and more than all you need, until you reach the place where Jesus is all you have. Give Him your life. Give Him your time. Give Him your money. And when you have handed it all over and find that all you have left is Jesus, you will suddenly realize He was never merely enough. He is more than enough. What is left over in your hands will be greater by far than the little you gave up. That is how God has ordained for you to be rich.