Prosperity Is More Than Money: 7 Keys to a Prosperous Soul

Sermon outline

Prosperity is far more than money: it is God helping you all along the way, and it flows from a soul that prospers through friendship with God and a disciplined, well-managed life.

1. God's original intent: you were not made to struggle

   God created everything first and then placed Adam and Eve among provisions that were already made, with dominion and authority to rule and enjoy life. Sweat and toil only came after the fall, and Jesus came to give life until it overflows. Yet people come into church with traditions, philosophies and mindsets that make them reject the prosperity message, not because they are insincere but because their minds have not changed.

   Illustration: As a young Christian he became so angry during a prosperity message that he walked out of the service. The preacher was not wrong: he had measured the message against his own tradition and theology.

   “We don't reject it because we're insincere. We reject it because we have not changed our minds.”

   • 3 John 2
   • John 10:10

2. Prosperity and health depend on a prospering soul

   The verse holds three keys: prosper, be in health, and even as your soul prospers, and the first two depend on the third. The church is hooked on entertainment and stuck in inspiration, but a person on the wrong road needs education and then revelation. Wanting what others have without changing your thinking is covetousness, driven by greed, and God is looking for a man or woman who will change their thinking so that he can work with them.

   Illustration: If somebody is on the wrong road, inspiration will only take him further down the wrong road.

   “You're going to prosper from the inside out.”

   • 3 John 2
   • Proverbs 23:7

3. Draw near: God wants a friend, not more fasting

   Sincere people think more prayer and fasting will bring them closer to God, but God simply says draw near to me and I will draw near to you. Adam learned what he knew through daily communion with God, Abraham was God's friend, and Enoch walked with God while raising a family. Fellowship is conversation, the language God understands is his Word, and he does not want your mess or your condemnation to keep you away, because he has already dealt with it in Jesus.

   Illustration: He acts out a conversation. God says, 'Hey everybody, I'm God', and the believer asks whether to pray more or fast more. God says no, I just want to be your friend. When the believer protests that God does not understand the mess he is in, God answers that because of the mess he sent a message, carried by a messenger named Jesus.

   “Because of your mess, I sent a message.”

   • James 4:8
   • James 2:23
   • Genesis 5:22
   • John 15:15
   • Hebrews 4:13
   • Matthew 11:28

4. Prosper means help along the way

   He teaches that the Greek word for prosper in this verse means to help along the way and to make your journey a success, so God is saying he wants to help you from the beginning of your walk with him until eternity. He reads the verse in several translations. Much of our prayer, he says, is religious duty with no fellowship: after you have spoken, let God talk back, because he may tell you whom to meet, phone or email so that you are in the right place at the right time.

   Illustration: He acts out a typical morning prayer: no weapon formed against me shall prosper, the blood over my family, car, business and workplace, doors will open. Duty done, but there was no fellowship, because friends talk.

   “Beloved, I want to help you all along the way.”

   • 3 John 2
   • Isaiah 54:17

5. The full scope: prosperity is not only money

   Money in the bank is only part of prosperity, which takes in the entire scope and spectrum of life: walking with God, hearing him and being helped along the way. Making money your god is the spirit of mammon, which he calls the Babylonian system. That is why God asks for the tithe, which is for your benefit and keeps his house supplied, and it is only a tenth, compared with the 40 percent taken in tax.

   Illustration: When he was newly born again, having come from Hinduism, Pastor Zubeda would seal their tithe and offering in an envelope at month end. On Sunday morning he would slit it open with a butter knife, count the cash and take half out, saying it was too much to give to God. He says it was his soul that had not yet prospered.

   “Prosperity means I'm successful. It's the entire scope and spectrum of our lives.”

   • Malachi 3:10
   • Psalm 75:6-7

6. Key 1: Manage your emotions

   He gives seven keys to how the soul prospers. Begin by studying, reading and practising the Word, then manage your emotions. Delay your anger, because nine times out of ten what you were mad about will no longer matter, and learn to display your emotions wisely in the way you talk and interact. People manage their tempers well enough in front of the boss or a traffic officer, because there is a motive.

   Illustration: Nobody insults the boss on Monday morning, because of the salary cheque. He tells of talking on his cellphone while driving a car with no hands-free kit, seeing a Metro police car and dropping the phone at once.

   “It takes a fool to have an emotional outburst. It takes a wise person to control the emotions.”

7. Keys 2, 3 and 4: Manage your time, your priorities and your energy

   Church time is church time, prayer time is prayer time, family time is family time and work time is work time. Some relationships need to be cut off because they have you on a hundred treadmills, unfocused and unable to hear God. He names priorities and energy as keys without enlarging on them.

   “Some of you are running in 100 different directions, not being focused, and God can't speak to you.”

8. Keys 5 and 6: Manage your thinking and your words

   Most emotional outbursts begin with how we think about what someone did. Your words transact and create, so what you see today is what you spoke yesterday. Do not curse your job, your car or your life: bless what you have, and if your work is humble, pick up the mop and sing yourself to the top.

   Illustration: On the highway, a bad driver gets a very different reaction when he turns out to be a bodybuilder with biceps bigger than your thighs than when he is a skinny man. He tells people to call an old car blessed and to speak a Porsche spirit and a Ferrari spirit into it.

   “What you see today is the words that you spoke yesterday. What you will see tomorrow is the words that you will speak today.”

   • Psalm 103:1

9. Key 7: Manage your personal life

   Manage your finances: walk past some shops as if they did not exist, because reckless spending gives to the world the money the kingdom needs. Manage your eyes, as Job did, and be faithful to one spouse. Manage your appetite, because you cannot eat fast food every day and then bind the calories in prayer. He came to live what he calls a fasted life, keeping a handle on eating, spending and conduct every day, instead of a long fast followed by a feast.

   Illustration: He confesses to a Magnum ice cream after supper every evening and six cinnamon buns at a sitting, which he jokingly puts down to a sugar demon, until a lady from the church brought him health muffins and he learned to manage his appetite.

   “Where my eyes go, my money go.”

   • Job 31:1

10. One last secret: don't lend money

    You are not the bank, and if the bank does not trust someone, why should you. Lending between church members destroys relationships until both stop coming, and when family cannot repay you, you lose your peace and cannot pray. If someone asks to borrow, give a smaller amount as a gift and do not ask for it back. Many of his own cries of 'why, God' came from his own mistakes, so read a chapter of Proverbs each day and check people out carefully, because swindlers dress the best.

    Illustration: A man in the church borrowed a couple of hundred thousand rand from him, promising to repay it with interest, and then disappeared from the church together with his family.

    “If you read the book of Proverbs, you become a very wise person.”