My son Taras’s face burned red, his eyes welling with tears. “But Dad, I moved a lot of big logs this time.”
We stood in the neighbor’s side yard beside a pile of firewood. Our family had a lot of firewood we no longer wanted, so I paid Taras to move our logs to the neighbor’s wood pile. He’d been chipping away at it for a few days.
I tousled his hair. “$4 is a good amount for those pieces. Why are you so upset?”
“Because, I needed $5.”
“For robux?”
Robux is in-game currency for an online game system called Roblox. $5 is the minimum purchase amount. This wasn’t the first time we’d hit the $5 barrier, but it was the first time he’d been this upset about it.
He nodded. “You said you’d play with me today, and I was going to buy robux for you so we could play Waterpark Tycoon.”
Buy them for me? Suddenly it was my eyes that welled with tears. Moving logs is probably his least favorite odd-job – except maybe weeding. He’d come outside on this cloudy, miserable afternoon to what he liked least so that he could give me what was most precious to him.
I hugged him. Everything in me wanted to give him that extra dollar. But he’s learning about work and the value of money, so giving him the balance would have hurt him more than it helped. In the end he took money he’d already saved to get to the $5.
I may not have paid him more money, but you’d better believe that $5 was going to get him more robux, gametime, and other privileges than he could even imagine. I simply couldn’t help myself. The word “floodgates” came to mind.
The voice of God thundered over me. God didn’t have to say a word or make a sound, but I got the message.
A decade ago my friend and I had started a company, and it was struggling. We had one employee who helped with administrative stuff. Month after month when payday came, my partner and I would pay her, and then see if there was enough to pay us anything.
The bible is full of promises, and a lot of them are about money. Jesus even said to seek him first and all these things (food, shelter, clothes) will be added. I spent a lot of time on my knees asking him why he hadn’t fulfilled his promise.
One morning the book of Malachi chapter three shouted at me. “You are under a curse.” I swallowed hard. Yeah, it sure felt like it. Then the passage explains why. The first portion of my money is sacred, it belongs to God. I hadn’t given it to him for a long time. I barely had enough money to survive and now I’m supposed to give more? It would make a lot more sense if he’d bless me first so I had enough to give. But that’s not how God’s economy seems to work. God values obedience. I obey first, then he blesses.
The words jumped off the page at me again, “‘Test me in this,’ says the Lord Almighty, ‘and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.’”
That is not an ambiguous promise. But I knew a lot of poor Christians, so I wasn’t sure I believed it. Yet, “Test me in this” rang in my ears.
“Fine.” I pouted toward heaven. I’ll try it.
My late wife, Sheree, wasn’t on board and it took some convincing. It was October and I suggested we try it for three months.
At work, it wasn’t like the clients suddenly flooded in, but when pay day arrived in October we had enough money to cover payroll. I was grateful but skeptical; one month is not a trend. In November we had enough money to cover payroll again. I was getting excited. In December, just in time for Christmas, we were short $1000.
I couldn’t believe God let me down. I still believed in him, but his promises left a lot to the imagination. I tested. He failed. I stopped tithing.
The following February, our admin person gave her notice. She was pregnant and wanted to just be Mom for a while. She helped my partner and I clean up the paperwork before she left. “Don’t forget to take care of this.” She plopped a piece of paper on my desk.
It was an unpaid invoice from the previous December, for $1500. Wow. Hurray! I almost leapt to my feet, then my heart sank. I felt God standing beside me. “Even when you are faithless, I will remain faithful.”
He hadn’t failed at all. The reason it seemed like he had failed was because I’d messed up the paperwork. I let out a long breath. “I’m sorry. I promise I’ll never doubt you again – no matter how bad it looks.” The sacred portion of what he’d given me would always go back to him.
That December was the last time our business didn’t have enough for payroll. We grew steadily from that point forward hiring two to three employees a year, giving raises, moving into new offices, etc. until we eventually sold the company. Looking back, the word “floodgates” comes to mind.
I write a lot about getting what you want from God. Will giving money to God really open those “floodgates”? I’d obeyed that section in Malachi plenty of times earlier in my life and the “test” never worked before.
That’s because it’s not about the money. It’s about the heart.
Taras couldn’t buy my goodwill with $5. I don’t want this money. In fact he literally can’t imagine the resources I have as compared to him. Besides, how did he get that money? I gave it to him along with every opportunity to get more. It was his heart that stole mine – the fact that I was more precious to him than his money and his time.
Is it that different with God?
I want God to open the floodgates of blessings in my life, but I don’t have anything he needs. Do I really think I can fake generosity so that he’ll return the favor? So how do I change my heart so when it comes to blessing, God simply can’t help himself?
Time with him.
Many years ago I created a habit for life. I carved a hole in my schedule and didn’t put anything in it. I scheduled everything else around it; if someone wanted to make plans, I’d tell them I was busy during that time. It was in those hours that God changed my heart.
God didn’t tell me I was wrong and had to change, he just did it and surprised me. I remember the day giving money became easy, even exciting. I was hungry to do it.
The real mind bender was when I realized he doesn’t really change what I want as much as carve away the superficial parts of me until we reach the core of what I’ve always really, really wanted. – I just didn’t know I wanted it. Does an alcoholic really want another drink? Does the porn addict really want just another picture? Do I really want that fancy car and expensive house? Or are we all hoping for real love and acceptance, real respect, and deep impenetrable peace while living out our destiny?
“Floodgates” isn’t only about physical things. Plenty of rich people are miserable. I’ve come to believe that to be really, really happy, I have to step out of what I think are my dreams and into God’s dreams for me. I’ve discovered that his dreams are actually my dreams come true.
Did Jesus really mean what he said below or was he just using hyperbole?
“Ask Whatever You Wish and It Will be Done for You”
― Jesus (John 15:7)
“Discipline is choosing between what you want now and what you want most.”
― Abraham Lincoln
For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.
― Yahweh (Jeremiah 29:11-12)