davidbowerkingwood

What if we Ran Our Family Finances the Way the Government is Running the Nation’s Finances?

I can recall, as a young husband and father, the agony I felt when we ran out of money before we ran out of month. I can remember the soul searching my wife and I would go through as we tried to determine what options were available to try and hold our family finances together in those difficult and frustrating times.

Fortunately those times were short lived because we both came to the same conclusion; nothing whatsoever was worth the price that kind of problem generated in our lives! To try and make sure we wouldn’t have to go through those times again we lived simply and frugally and made do with what we had. At times we both worked, at other times I had two jobs and worked very long hours but we were determined that we were no longer going to run out of money before we ran out of month! The Lord blessed us with the health and determination to do that so those times became nothing more than a painful memory.

Lessons from Life

The lessons we learned, as a young married couple, my wife was 17 and I was 19 when we got married, have continued to stand us in good stead; although we have been greatly blessed by the Lord, we still live a relatively simple and frugal lifestyle and are perfectly content with what we have.

I see our contentment as a blessing from the Lord and am reminded of Paul’s statement in Philippians 4:11-13 where it is written, “¹¹ I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. ¹² I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. ¹³ I can do all this through him who gives me strength.”

By no stretch of the imagination do we compare ourselves to Paul, but we are in the process of learning and have made some progress, by God’s grace.

The Norm for Most Families

I want to re-emphasize the key place God’s grace and mercy has had in our efforts to maintain a balanced family budget; I am fully aware of the devastating impact that bad health, injury or any of a countless number of other calamities can have on a family’s finances; our family too has experienced a number of those kinds of events.

Despite the unexpected, however, most families manage to attain and maintain a workable financial equilibrium by means of hard work, restraint, and most importantly, God’s grace and mercy.

Under Control or Out of Control?

Let us now consider the subject of our nation’s finances; by any rational standard it is seriously out of control. Every family that has achieved a reasonable financial balance would be horrified to suddenly be placed in the financial predicament being faced by our nation. How and why did our national leadership get us into this mess in the first place and why does there seem to be so little interest in extricating our nation from this mess?

I hasten to add, at this point, that I am neither an economist nor an international banker and make no pretense of understanding such things. I do have some common sense which tells me if you don’t have the money to spend you don’t spend it anyway. I recall how the United States Government was compared to a drunken sailor spending money but the analogy was considered unfair to the drunken sailor because when he ran out of money he just went back to his ship.

Why are we Spending Our Nation Deeper and Deeper into Debt?

There are a number of theories that suggest answers to our out-of-control spending but I’ll limit my observations to only one. It has long been observed that the financial health of the United States has been a major obstacle to one-world government. While there are a number of well intentioned intellectuals who see political unification as the answer to many of the world’s problems, we know from the Bible that the final form of world government will be under the influence of Satan.

We also know, from the Bible, that the United States is conspicuously absent from the world scene when that final one-world government becomes operational under the leadership of the antichrist. What I see, as I look at the United States and the rest of the world, is the heavy hand of God beginning to more overtly move in the affairs of men and nations.

Although I know, from the Bible, that this must take place, it is still hard to watch it happen. I believe we are watching God at work in the affairs of this nation as well as the world to bring world events and circumstances into conformity with His plan for the End Times. I have no idea how much time is left, how long it will be before the ranks of the church are finally complete.

The Lord is hard at work, bringing in those last sheep that are part of His flock into the fold that they may join the rest of the sheep at the time all are called home.

^“20 He who testifies to these things says, “Yes, I am coming soon.”

Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.

²¹ The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s people. Amen.”

Revelation 22:20-21