A Year-End Encouragement to Those in Debt

One of our goals for 2009 is to get out of credit card debt.  Over the past few years we have, like everyone, often incurred unexpected expenses.  Expenses like having to fly the family from one place to the next or having to pay for residency cards or hospital bills and a host of other necessary things.  Living by faith is easy until one is confronted with real numbers staring at you from your monthly credit card statement.  So that being said, God is faithful.  Recently we were once again reminded of His goodness and faithfulness to us when we received an unexpected year end blessing from someone which will cover most of our debt.  God is good - all the time!  And all the time - God is good!

So with that being said, I began to think about the unfortunate propensity of Americans to incur debt.  So many of us are living under huge burdens of debt and, I'm sure, struggle with hopelessness and despair about ever being able to repay these debts. Our lives become a month-to-month, paycheck to paycheck, hand to mouth existence.  This is not one of my anti-consumerist rants...my point here is to encourage those who, like us, have struggled with repaying large debts incurred not by extravagant, fancy living but rather by the normal pressures and demands of life which we all face.  I want to remind you that, yes, living by faith is a difficult endeavor and that, yes, at the same time, God is faithful.  As I go back and read Jesus' Sermon on the Mount (Matthew chapters 5 - 7), I see how much Jesus talked about the connection between money and worry.  He sums it all up with:  "Why worry about these things (food, drink, clothes, housing, everything!)?  Do you not think that God the Father doesn't know that you need all these things?  Therefore primarily attend to God's Project and also concern yourself not with secular, humanistic ethics but rather with His righteousness and justice which come along with pertaining yourself to His Project.  And so then, once you've gotten that all straight, all these things you tend to worry about (clothes, food, housing, everything!) will be provided."  (my paraphrase of the idea contained in Matthew 6:25-34).  It's nice to get a fresh reminder of the perspective we should take when thinking about our debts!