Category: Bible Knowledge

9 scriptures that teach principles on investing The Bible is not just a book filled with old stories, but is also packed with truth and revelation that is relevant to present day issues and situations. The Word of God is complete in that it gives light and insight to every area of life. From relationships, work issues, character development, leadership and even finances. In fact, there is a strong Biblical emphasis on handling and making use of money. That’s because God is a God who wants to stay relevant so as to guide us in everyday living. It is not God’s intent to leave you hanging on a thread and blindly figuring out principles of money, but to graciously give us principles and ideas to use finances to benefit from and to bring glory to Him. In His ministry, Jesus spoke about money and financial management. The wise king Solomon also gave instruction and counsel on how to handle money and how to put in investments. For those who want to go into investments and passive income, the Bible covers that topic as well. Here are nine scriptures that teach us a thing or two about the best practices of investing. Proverbs 21:20 | The wise store up choice food and olive oil, but fools gulp theirs down. Proverbs 19:2 | Also it is not good for a person to be without knowledge, and he who hurries his footsteps errs. Luke 14:28-30 | “For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it—lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish’?” 2 Corinthians 9:6 | The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Proverbs 16: 9 | In their hearts humans plan their course, but the LORD establishes their steps. Ecclesiastes 11:2 | Invest in seven ventures, yes, in eight; you do not know what disaster may come upon the land. Proverbs 13:11 | Dishonest money dwindles away, but he who gathers money little by little makes it grow. Proverbs16:8 | Better is a little with righteousness than vast revenues without justice. Luke 16:10 | He who is faithful in a very little thing is faithful also in much; and he who is unrighteous in a very little thing is unrighteous also in much.

A horned viper of the kind that may have bitten the Israelites. TE Lawrence – Lawrence of Arabia – was one of the great heroes of the First World War in the Middle East. He helped to raise the Arab tribes against the Ottoman Empire, lived among them and was involved in daring raids against forts and railways. During his exploits he travelled by camel and lived rough. In one of his books about his experiences,Revolt in the Desert, he writes of travelling through a particular region. He says: “…the plague of snakes which had been with us since our first entry into Sirhan, today rose to a memorable height, and became a terror.. .this year the valley seemed creeping with horned vipers and puff-adders, cobras and black snakes. By night movement was dangerous: and at last we found it necessary to walk with sticks, beating the bushes while we stepped warily through on bare feet… they got so on our nerves that the boldest of us feared to touch the ground.” Terrifying stuff; and that was what the Israelites faced in the same area nearly 3,000 years before. Numbers 21:1-9 tells of the people facing a plague of snakes after they complained against Moses because of the hardships of the journey. They even complained about the manna: “We detest this miserable food!” When the snakes began to do their work, though, the Israelites turned their attention to them, instead. “Pray that the Lord will take the snakes away from us,” they asked. God’s remedy was for Moses to put a bronze snake on a pole, so that anyone who was bitten “can look at it and live”. Nowadays anyone travelling in that region would take plentiful supplies of snakebite antidote with them. But this isn’t medicine, it’s miracle. So what is God saying through the story? 1. He doesn’t stop us behaving stupidly, but he offers a way out. We’ve all done things we regret. In the Israelites’ case it was childish moaning about the hardships of their lives. For us, it might be anything from petulant behaviour to serious sin. But the lesson of the bronze serpent is that God is gracious and we can “look and live”. 2. The snake was a transfigured representation of what caused the pain. We don’t get over hard times, whether we see them as the consequences of sin or just things that happen because life’s like that, by ignoring them. Instead we have to confront them, acknowledge them and learn from them – and we find that God meets us with grace even in our darkest times. 3. People weren’t healed by looking at the snake. The snake was only the symbol of the power of God. In the ‘Wisdom of Solomon’, a book in the apocrypha, a Jewish commentator writes about this story and says: “If a person looked at that symbol, he was cured of the snakebite – not by what he saw, but by you, the saviour of all mankind… They were bitten so that they would remember your commands, but they were quickly rescued, in order to keep them from forgetting you completely and depriving themselves of your kindness. No medicine or ointment cured them. They were restored to health by your word, O Lord, the word which heals all humanity” (16:7, 11-12). 4. The snake prefigures the Lord Jesus Christ. In John 3:14 Jesus says: “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.” There’s a similarity, but also a contrast: the Israelites were given life through looking at the snake, but when someone “looks” at Christ – and the implication is that the “look” is a plea for help and a trust in his grace – they’re given eternal life. The contrast is the same as in John 4:14 when Jesus tells the woman at the well, “whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 5. The snake became a snare. The bronze snake was preserved by the Israelites as a treasured reminder of what they had experienced in their wanderings. But by around 700 years later it had become more than that. The people had given it a name, Nehushtan, and begun to worship it. King Hezekiah broke it in pieces when he destroyed the other idols that the people followed (2 Kings 18:4). The snake was a means of grace that became an object of worship. The people forgot the Creator in favour of the creature. God speaks to us today in different ways – great preachers, perhaps, or songs, or Christian conferences. We can give these things too much weight; they matter simply because they point us to him.

A couple from Scotland have been named as the winners of half of last Saturday’s record £66m National Lottery Mr and Mrs Martin from Hawick in the Scottish Borders have announced some noble causes they intend to support with their new-found wealth, including helping their local town which has been badly affected by recent flooding. Christians often wonder whether money is a good or bad thing. You can do a lot of good with wealth but it can also cause a lot of harm, and Jesus seemed to have some pretty harsh words for rich people in his day. But is it as simple as all money and wealth is bad? More often than not, what God actually says is that money itself is fine but it is the love of money that is dangerous and wrong. Here are ten Bible verses to help you think about what God says about money: Matthew 6:19-21 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Philippians 4:19 “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” Malachi 3:10 “‘Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,’ says the Lord Almighty, ‘and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.’” Hebrews 13:5 “Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’” 1 Timothy 6:10 “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” Acts 20:35 “In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’” Luke 12:33-34 “Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” Proverbs 13:11 “Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it.” Proverbs 22:7 “The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender.” Exodus 22:25 “If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor, you shall not be like a moneylender to him, and you shall not exact interest from him.”

10 Bible verses about forgiveness Reuters It’s one of the hardest things to obey, but Jesus was clear in his teaching that Christians must forgive others – it’s even in the Lord’s Prayer. The good news is that God also forgives us. Here are 10 Bible verses to remind you of His mercy, as well as his call on us to forgive others, too. Psalm 103:8-12 “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbour his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” Acts 10:42-43 “He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.” Ephesians 1:7-10 “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfilment — to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.” Isaiah 43:25 “I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.” Colossians 1:13-14 “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” Ephesians 4:31-32 “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” Matthew 6:14 “For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.” Psalm 130:4 “But with you there is forgiveness, so that we can, with reverence, serve you.” Isaiah 1:18(b) “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” Isaiah 53:5 “But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.” via 10 Bible verses about forgiveness | Christian News on Christian Today.

People drift away from God for different kinds of reasons. American evangelist Billy Graham has become familiar with all these reasons in all his years of preaching the Gospel. However, he is certain that God still loves even those who drift away from Him. More often than not, Graham has noticed that people distance themselves from God because they have become too preoccupied with other things. Sometimes it’s simply because people are trapped by their own sins and way of living and they refuse to give it up. “I often think of one of Jesus’ parables in this connection,” he shares in an article written for the Kansas City Star. The parable can be found in the Bible verses Luke 8:4 to 15. “In it Jesus told about a farmer who sowed seed in his field, hoping it would grow and mature. Some seed landed on good soil and produced a bountiful crop, but other seed didn’t; it fell on hard or rocky ground where it couldn’t grow. Still other seed landed among thorns, and for a time it sprouted and looked like it might prosper. But the fragile plants didn’t last; the thorns overcame them.” This is the same thing that can happen to people if they insist on living their lives without God, Graham says. And even though people hear God’s word and it starts to take root in their souls, over time it gets “smothered” by other things. This is what Luke 8:14 says: “As they go on their way they are choked by life’s worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature.” “Perhaps this is what has happened to you,” says Graham. “But listen: God still loves you, and he wants to forgive you and welcome you into his family. Don’t look back at the end of your life and realise you missed all that God had for you. Instead, turn to Christ and confess your sins and your need of him today. He wants to welcome you home.” via God loves even those who have drifted away from Him, says Billy Graham | Christian News on Christian Today.