Marriage and Money

One of the many aspects I love about God’s Word is that it is so practical.

I wrote a couple of weeks ago about needing to get a log out of my eye. The primary solution is simply relationship with God. It’s letting His living water flow through me and cleanse me on a daily basis.

Lest I sound too “spiritual,” let me clarify: it’s constantly talking to God about the nitty-gritty, real problems I face and asking for His help. Not asking for Him to remove the problem, but asking Him to help me with it, in the same way I used to ask my dad to help me with my math homework (it never occurred to me to ask my dad to simply make the math problem go away).

“For he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we can confidently say:

‘The Lord is my helper;

I will not fear;

What can man do to me?” (Hebrews 13:5b-6, ESV)

Notice how we say because He has said. The only way we can respond appropriately to any problem is by first knowing what God has said about it. And the only way to know what God has said is through prayer and the reading of His Word. As we relate to God through prayer and Scripture, we truly get to know Him. The intimate knowledge that He is our Helper sinks deep into our soul to form a rock-solid foundation in the midst of trouble. That’s when we confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear.”

And what kind of trouble is God talking about in these verses? Is He talking about first-century Middle Eastern trouble? Is he talking about mystical, vague, or hypothetical trouble?

Take a look at the context:

“Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. Keep your life free from the love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ (Hebrews 13:4-5, ESV)

It sounds to me like He’s talking about the most practical kinds of trouble there are: marriage and money.

God isn’t our helper only for the “right” kinds of problems. He’s our helper for the real kinds of problems.

His help is practical. It’s readily available through relationship with Him. We don’t get the help without the Helper.

It starts with relationship.

What are we waiting for?