242 - Faith Over Fear & $500
God is often at work nudging people toward a path they THINK they aren’t gifted for. It’s easy to say, “That’s not MY gift,” when it might actually BE your gift while you remain totally unaware of it. That was MY story. Is it yours? Tune in to THIS bizarre story and some of my life events that helped me see this truth: GOD knows what you’re gifted for, so head in the direction He nudges you even IF you think it’s “not your thing.”
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0:00 Well, hello and welcome back to Battle Planned, a podcast on spiritual warfare. I'm Steve Himpill and our website is active-faith.org. Today we're going to talk about faith over fear and $500. Let me start with Exodus 4 verse 10. Moses pleaded with the Lord. Oh Lord, I'm not very good with words. I never had been. And I'm not now. Even though you've spoken to me, I get tongue-tied and my words get tangled. Was that true?
0:40 No, it wasn't. Acts 7-22 reveals the truth. Moses was taught all the wisdom of the Egyptians and he was powerful in speech and action. He was a great speaker. He just didn't want to do what God was nudging him to do. Now let me share Matthew 19-29 in the LT. And everyone who has given up houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or property for my sake will receive a hundred times as much in return and will inherit eternal life. A few months ago I was up north in the Iowa part of the United States of America doing a four-day seminar.
1:29 And we did it in a neutral spot in a rented facility on the Mississippi River. And the first evening we did a Sunday afternoon lesson and then the Sunday night lesson on spiritual warfare and then I was going to do Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. The first evening there were a lot of people there that were not from the church who sponsored the event. And I mentioned that if anybody needed a book or stakes or any of my spiritual warfare materials but they couldn't afford it to feel free to go ahead and take it at no charge. That I told them God had always taken care of me and I was never there focused on the money. So a bunch of people did that.
2:10 They took me up on it to meet. They went and got a handful of books and stuff they wanted and walked out. Didn't say thank you. Didn't say here's five dollars even though I owe you a hundred. They didn't say anything. And some of the leaders, one particular leader of that church came up to me and he said, I'm worried about you. And I said, why are you worried about me? He said, well, you don't charge to come speak. You don't have a salary. You only make money to pay your bills when you sell stuff. And yet you offered free stuff, people that couldn't afford it tonight and they went in and took a bunch of stuff. Didn't even say thank you. And I said, let me tell you something. Don't worry about me. I quit worrying about that money kind of stuff a long time ago.
2:54 And I'm just telling you, God has always taken care of me. It's going to work out. Sometimes they pay me more than I'm worth and sometimes I give away stuff to the people that need it and can't afford it. In fact, it's very likely somebody woke up to me the next, you know, tomorrow morning and say, here's $500 for all those books people took yesterday. And he shook his head and walked off the next morning. A guy walked up to me and he said, I'm a plumber. I came to your thing last night and I'm going to pay you $500 for those books everybody took last night and didn't pay for it. I said, thank you. He gave me $500 bills. That night I looked up that church leader and I said, you remember last night when I said to you, somebody might walk up to me tomorrow and give me $500 for the books people took.
3:39 He said, yeah. And I said, this morning, somebody walked up and gave me $500 bills for the books those people took last night. I told you, God takes care of us. It works out. He shook his head and walked off. So in light of today's thoughts, let me suggest part of your personal battle plan might be to stop worrying about what you'll get out of focusing on God's kingdom above your own because he will reward you much more than you sacrifice. You might pray like this. Lord grant me the faith I need to follow your nudging in my daily life without worrying about whether or not it'll be worth it financially.
4:22 In Jesus name. Amen. And I'm going to remind you to keep praying because prayer works. God loves you and I love you. Have a great day.
