All of our cars have indicator lights – lights that come on to serve notice that something else is wrong. When the light comes on, the problem is not with the light. The light is letting you know that there is a deeper problem.
Not too long ago, a light came on in our nation serving notice that a much deeper problem was going on. This light showed up under the heading of several different names: recession, economic downturn, bailout and others. What this light revealed is that a certain level of financial irresponsibility had caught up with us as a country. Not only that, but it had caught up with – and is still catching up with – many of us as individuals as well.
There is no more poignant way that this stronghold is being realized today than in the debt level of God’s people. Many in the body of Christ are living in economic slavery to the consumer debt that controls their lives. Someone once said that there are the have’s, have-nots, and have-not-paid-for-what-you-have. Another person said, “Money talks – and it regulary says, ‘Good-bye!’” Many of us, like the Seven Dwarfs, leave every morning singing, “I owe, I owe, so off to work I go.” Americans are drowning in a sea of debt, and until we address the spiritual stronghold behind the physical reality – we will remain that way.
But to understand what victory over a debt stronghold really looks like, we first need a point of reference of understanding what living in financial blessing looks like.
A blessing is your capacity to enjoy the goodness of God in your life. It is not merely having stuff. A blessing is the ability to enjoy the stuff that you have. A lot of people have houses that are not a blessing because their houses are not homes. A number of individuals have cars that are not a blessing because they hate driving their car to a job that they do not feel satisfied and fulfilled in. A lot of people have clothes that are not a blessing becaue they are miserable while wearing them.
Blessings involve much more than mere external things. A blessing is your capacity to enjoy what God has given you with a spirit of contentment, ease and satisfaction. When a person is no longer free to make life choices apart from how they are going to be able to continue to pay 18%, or more, on credit cards or make their mortgage or car payment while perpetually making no progress toward lessening the mountain of debt that they are under, that is no longer a blessing. That is a form of slavery, as Scripture says, “And the borrower becomes the lender’s slave.”[1] [1] Proverbs 22:7