Page 13 - MyFaithMag MAR 2018

FINANCIALLY SPEAKING 13

WE NEED TO ENERGETICALLY FACE

ALL OF OUR OBSTACLES WITH A

QUIET CONFIDENCE THAT WE ARE
ACTUALLY IN CONTROL OF THEM.

feel like I am in a hole with no light at the end complex problems or abstract dreams. In
of the tunnel. Everything is just too much. I our lives we need to pause and allow God to
I feel like I’m under so much pressure. How do help us make sense of our present conditions
I get my monthly budget to work? It can wait and then actively implement our attempts
until tomorrow. Do these statements sound at a solution. Procrastination simply will not
familiar? Perhaps too familiar? work. We need to energetically face all of our
obstacles with a quiet confidence that we are
We are living in increasingly difficult times, actually in control of them. Take stock of who
politically, economically and spiritually. One you are in the first place and how wonderfully
of the obvious results is mounting financial you have been created.
pressure on each of us. This is particularly
acute for those of us who fulfil the role of head Joseph was also consistently prepared to
of our particular households and, indeed, our publicly explain his solutions. This implied that
businesses. I have found that we can draw a he had a solution in the first place and had
lot of inspiration and lessons from the life of sufficient clarity to articulate his understanding
Joseph, who became the executive premier of the problem and his methodology to solve it.
of all the land of Egypt of old, second only to This is an important lesson because, too often,
the president of that time, Pharaoh. Egypt was we can see our obstacles, such as worsening
faced with looming economic difficulties and economic times, but we simply do not know
Joseph’s brief from Pharaoh was quite simply how to react and therefore do not... to our
to solve the problem. He was not given much peril. There is always a solution. We just need
more detail than that. These lessons, I firmly to find it!
believe, will help us all in these challenging
times. In the next series of articles I would like Nowhere in the account of Joseph’s life is
to focus on some of these. Although they may there any suggestion of timidity. Let’s face it,
not all be strictly financial in nature, I believe he was placed before some powerful people
that their application will have, as one result, a and yet he was prepared to speak his mind,
positive financial effect. albeit with diplomacy. This implies that under
pressure situations, he was confident that he
One of the basic tenets of Joseph’s success was correct. He knew, and was prepared to
was the bold and diplomatic application of publicly admit, that his wisdom came directly
Godly wisdom in his life. He seemed to display from the throne-room of God and this was
an ability that nobody else had. He was always a fundamental building block of his personal
prepared to provide a solution to seemingly success in his future.