Material Wealth

You cannot compete on the world's playing field and win; your heart isn’t in it. You do not really believe that money and possessions are an accurate measure of worth, and so you will never be truly competitive in this arena. If you had a million dollars in your own name—or five million dollars—you would not be ‘out from under’ the type of oppression that you fear. You would not spend your money as ‘they’ would, and so you would still be vulnerable to judgments. The fear of being judged is the true oppression here; the bitter hurts of having been weighed and measured and found lacking still corrupt your heart.

And now I will show you the most excellent way (1 Cor. 13)...Love is a strategy of war, if you wish to think of it in that way. It is a weapon the enemy does not possess.

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever. 1 John 2 15-17