Posted on 04/18/2022 6:00:36 PM PDT by Pilgrim's Progress
“Wealth maketh many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbour” (Proverbs 19:4).
“The rich man's wealth is his strong city: the destruction of the poor is their poverty” (Proverbs 10:15).
If a man has wealth, people will try to proselyte him quicker than they will a poor man. Why? Rich people pay the bills. It is better to have 100 people all giving $10.00 out of their poverty, than one rich man writing a $1,000 check and thinking that he can run the church because of his money. Many churches have been split to pieces because of a few that wanted things run their way rather than the Lord’s.
What this verse deals with is real segregation and it is expounded upon by James: “For if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a poor man in vile raiment; And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool: Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts?” (James 2:2-4).
Segregation in the Bible is not racial. Segregation has to do with rich and poor. Separation has to do with true and false, as with doctrinal truth. Having respect to rich people while disrespecting the poor is true biblical segregation. The poor are really the people that Jesus came to preach to (Luke 4:18).
If you run around with good, Christian people, you are going to find out that the majority of them are poor. They are not going to have a whole lot of what this world has, or what this world considers important. They just don’t get into all those new cars and new boats. They are simple and content with such things as they have. Most Christians are more interested in supporting their church, and sending their kids to a Christian school, and doing what they can to further the missionary program of overseas evangelism. Worldly people just spend a whole lot of money on things that are foolish.
Most wealthy people are interested in wealth, not in God. They are not interested in winning people to Christ.
When J. Pierpont Morgan, the American financier, the multimillionaire, died (1837-1913), it was found that the year before his death, he had made his will. It consisted of about 10,000 words and contained 37 articles.
But we are left in no doubt as to what Mr. Morgan considered to be the most important clause in his will—nay, the most important affair in his whole life.
He made many transactions—some affecting such large sums of money as to disturb the financial equilibrium of the world—yet there was one transaction that evidently stood out in Mr. Morgan's mind as of supreme importance:
I commit my soul in the hands of my Saviour, full of confidence that, having redeemed me and washed me with His most precious blood, He will present me faultless before the throne of my Heavenly Father.
I entreat my children to maintain and defend, at all hazard and at any cost of personal sacrifice, the blessed doctrine of complete atonement of sins through the blood of Jesus Christ once offered, and through that alone.
In the matter of his soul's eternal blessing, his vast wealth was as powerless as the beggar's poverty. In this he was as dependent upon mercy as the dying robber at Calvary.
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True that.
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