You have a choice to make when you hear about the wealthy place: you can receive or reject it.
One time when I was preaching on wealth, I had a supernatural revelation that some people in the room deliberately had not brought money to church because they were afraid I was going to ask for a special offering. They were afraid God would tell them to give their money away.
That’s a sign you’re living in a lower level of financial blessing. It shows the mindset of someone who is not living in the wealthy place but in a place of mediocrity and lack.
Picture it this way.
You live in a room that’s boring and bland. It’s the room of mundane, mediocre living. Your needs are met, and they always will be in this mediocre room.
You get up, go to work, get your paycheck, make your house payment or pay your rent, make your car payment, your stereo payment, and your furniture payment. Then you scrape up enough to put in the offering at church. If you don’t have enough that week, you take a dollar bill and fold it up into a little square, so nobody knows it’s only a dollar. Then you go back home to the mediocre room. It’s not a fun place to be.
Right next door to you is a much better room called, “the wealthy place.” You peek under the door and see how nice and luxurious it is. Soft, soothing music is playing, and there’s a whole lot more space than you have in the mediocre room. It’s a place of peace and plenty.
You try the door handle, but it’s locked, and you have no idea how to open it. Then you spend hours wondering how to move from your mediocre room into the nice room next door. You always think, “If only I could get into that wealthy place, I’d have it made.”
Sometimes you stick your finger under the door or fashion a coat hanger to bring over some of the stacks of money you see sitting there. Now and then you snag a dollar or maybe a five out of the wealthy place. But that door is locked. The wealth and luxury never fully come into the room where you’re living.
Living in that mediocre room breeds stinginess, fear of losing money, even greed. It can lead people to reject true wealth’s principles. It’s the opposite of the way God wants you to live! He does not want ANY of His children to live in the mediocre room. And yet some do. Why? They refuse the key.
The Key to the Wealthy Place
God has given you the key into the wealthy place in His Word. Jesus paid for your sins; He purchased your salvation, your healing, and your deliverance from poverty. He has given you the key to the wealthy place, the concierge level of life, but most people don’t know it.
You may be thinking that God’s promises of wealth in the Old Testament don’t apply under the new covenant. But God doesn’t remove blessings when He adds more.
He’s a God of increase and multiplication, and every time there’s an Old Testament promise, there’s a New Testament scripture to verify it. If it says in Genesis that God made Abraham rich with livestock, silver, and gold, then what He did for Abraham, our father in the faith, He’ll do for us. God gives the seed, Isaiah 55 says. He gives the power, Deuteronomy 8:18 says. God gives the increase, 1 Corinthians 3:7 says.
But you and I have to activate it through faith and action which equals obedience!
“Give $100”
Years ago I was sitting in a meeting at Oral Roberts University, and they were having a situation and needed to take an offering. God told me to give a hundred dollars, but I said, “I only have $5 I can give,” because I brought $300 to buy a new suit. He said to give $100 of my suit money. So I did. Now I had only $200 left for a suit.
I was bummed. We left Tulsa, and I didn’t have any new suits. Driving back home, we got to St. Louis and my wife, Mary Jo and I saw a big sign that said Men’s Slack Outlet. Mary Jo pointed it out, but at first, I said, “Nah, I don’t want to get off the highway.”
Then I thought better of it and got off, and there were all these suits, Hugo Boss, brand name, beautiful suits and sports jackets that came to the clearance center because they were missing a button or something. They had tailoring right there, and I bought five beautiful designer suits for less than $200. I was shouting hallelujahs all the way back to Lansing.
That’s the way it works when you start to get into the wealthy place! Now, do you think I wanted that $100 offering back? Of course not. Listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit and always respond.
