Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Deuteronomy 6:4-9
In our series on covenantal fatherhood, I am sharing godly lessons I learned from the way my father lived his life before me. As the passage in Deuteronomy 6 reminds us, God expects parents to teach with their life as well as their words. In this post, I will share how my father’s example in life and ministry taught me to beware of the love of money.
In 1 Tim 6, the Apostle Paul warns of false teachers who suppose that godliness is a means of gain. On the contrary, godliness with contentment is great gain. Then, in 6:9-11, Paul issues this warning:
People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. 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. But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.
The Apostle wrote this message almost two millennia ago but it is as fresh today as it was the day it was penned. The love of money has been a prevalent problem within the church throughout history. Fallen human nature has always had a love relationship with money and the illusion of power and independence it affords. As this passage reminds us, the love of money is often the mark of false teachers and those who have made shipwreck of the faith.
My father was raised in church by a God-fearing man. Through his teenage years, several ministers told my father that the Lord had called him to the ministry. He wanted no part of it. In his early adulthood, he left the church to pursue a career in “Rock and Roll.” However, God put one obstacle after another in his way. Finally, when my grandfather passed away in 1963 at the age of 53, my father surrendered to the call of God. In those early days he worked with several evangelists. After a few months of traveling with them, he discovered that a number of them were no more than charlatans. Before the meetings, they would talk about how to manipulate the people into giving generous offerings. They would plan to work the people up emotionally and then “take the offering,” striking while the iron was hot! After the meetings they would sit around and laugh at some of the people and revel in how effectively they had duped the congregation. My father was repulsed by this. He experienced a temporary crisis of faith, wondering if anyone in the ministry was genuine.
This so affected him that, when he began his ministry as an evangelist, he worked extra jobs to purchase the equipment and cover all expenses. He would not receive an offering in his meetings. After what he had witnessed, he believed the sacrifice of his integrity was a cost too high to pay.
The Lord eventually sent other ministers across his path who genuinely loved God and His people. They were equally offended by those who would turn the Gospel into a profiteering enterprise. Yet, the Scriptures explicitly teach that those who minister the Gospel should receive their living from the Gospel (1 Corinthians 9:16) for, you don’t “muzzle the ox that treads out the corn” (1 Timothy 5:8). This is the economic system God ordained. While those who preach the Gospel should have their needs cared for by those who sit under the ministry of the Gospel, it is not a means of getting rich. Those who minister the Gospel should never resort to manipulation and exploitation to line their pockets. That is detestable. The biblical principle is quite clear. We should be content with the necessities of life. When God does bless someone with wealth, it is for sharing with others, not hording to oneself (1 Timothy 6:17-19). How much more should this be demonstrated by those who are specifically called to set an example?
I learned from my father that the lives of those who preach the Gospel should never even hint that godliness is a means of worldly gain. The Gospel is too precious. As talented as my father was, he could have pursued wealth and, no doubt, obtained it. But he chose to live a much more meager existence to preserve the purity of the Gospel and keep his integrity intact.
