“Poor people can’t afford cheap things.”
It’s because cheap things tend to be short-lived. Low quality or limited usefulness will turn a short-term blessing into a long-term curse. It is desperation that drives these unwise purchases. Thus, knowledge is key, and a good old fashion cast iron resolve is the only way to prepare for such times.
Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Mt.5:3). The first step to be taken on the road to the kingdom of heaven is acceptance of our bankruptcy—our Spiritual bankruptcy. Jesus told us to pray: ‘Our Father,…forgive us our debts’ (Mt.6:12). He was not speaking about an overdue car payment. The debts are our sins against our Holy and Just God. Paul says we were ‘dead in our sins’ (Eph.2:1; Col.2:13). So captive were we that someone had to ‘free us from our sins’ (Rev.1:5). Humanity’s sin-debt was beyond human reconciliation. It had to be repaid or we would suffer under the Law of Sin and Death: ‘If you sin you die.’ It had to be paid in blood by a perfect (sinless) sacrifice, that is, ‘the just for the unjust’ (1Pet.3:18).
Who could pay this impossible amount? Praise be to God: “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich” (2Cor.8:9). How did he cancel our debt? “And He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed” (1Pet.2:24). Remember, ‘you have been bought with a price’ (1Cor.6:20), redeemed “with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ” (1Pet.1:19). Satan is the expert counterfeiter. He offers countless self-forgiveness schemes to make us feel better in our spiritual destitution. His are the ‘cheap things’ that ‘The spiritually poor people can’t—and must not—afford!’ “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;” (Eph.2:8). Claim it!
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