Walking through Financial Fires

By Danna Demetre

The front door slammed and I heard the familiar sound of my husband, Lew’s footsteps on our stone entryway at the unfamiliar hour of three in the afternoon. I wondered why he was home so early. He walked into the kitchen as I was drying my hands. His furrowed brow and slumped shoulders betrayed his emotions before a word left his lips. He sighed heavily and asked, “Do you want the good news or the bad news first?”

“Give me the good news first”, I replied hesitantly.

“The good news is that I love you madly. The bad news is that my boss says the company’s financials have gone south and I may lose my job in the next week. They hardly need a marketing guy when the product has failed to perform. We have nothing to sell.”

Complicating the stress of a potential job loss was the fact that we were living in Lugano, Switzerland at the time, thousands of miles from our home in San Diego. We had no means to move all our worldly possessions across the ocean. On top of that, it was more than a little difficult for Lew to begin a job search in the states from so far away. This was certainly not good news.

When the rug of life gets pulled out from under you, how do you process the trial you are experiencing? Do you wring your hands in worry and obsess over all the worst case scenarios? A decade ago, I would have done just that.  In fact, my most recent book, What Happened to My Life grew out of the lessons I’ve learned dealing with the difficult and sometimes devastating circumstances of life. But, fortunately God did not waste any of my hardships. Instead he molded me (sometimes painfully) into a woman of faith who can almost always find passion, purpose and joy no matter what life delivers.

So, I sent up a quick prayer, gave Lew a huge hug and then shared words I hoped would comfort him – words I believed were absolutely true. “You know what, Babe? One thing I know for sure is that our love can survive anything. I know for a fact, we’ll never starve or be homeless like so many people around this globe. If we lose everything, God must be preparing us for a really important assignment!” As I finished my sentence, I could visibly see his face brighten and his countenance relax. He replied, “I’m so glad you’re my wife.” My heart soared.

In that moment, I knew God would guide us through this new season. We both had amazing peace despite the fact that Lew would not have a secure job for over fifteen months. Thankfully, we didn’t know the future, so we simply took one day at a time and trusted God to “give us this day our daily bread”!

How much do we really trust God?

If we can trust the God of the universe to cancel our entire debt of sin and secure a place in Heaven when we receive his free gift by faith, then we can certainly trust Him to handle something as temporal as our financial needs. The question that nags at us is this: “Will God respond to my prayer requests in the way I want, or will He allow me to encounter a long and difficult trial?”

We fret and worry so much about what the future may hold that we lose all of our joy in the present. Stress and anxiety paralyze our creative thinking and send us on a downward spiral of despair. Instead of “setting our mind on things above” and relying on wisdom from the One who is in complete control, we focus on our own inadequacies and fears.

The Apostle Paul addresses the problem of “stressing out” in Philippians 4:6 saying, “Be anxious for nothing”. No caveats, no loop holes…simply nothing.  (Easy for him to say.) But fortunately, he did not stop there. He tells us what to do instead of worry by saying: “but in everything (again no exceptions) through prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”

When anxiety causes a churning in our gut, we need to use it as a trigger to start praying. That simple change of focus changes everything. If we believe God is true to his word, we know without a doubt that he hears the cries of our heart…and he cares. We can make our requests and trust that while we don’t always get exactly what we want, we always get what we need. God never wastes an opportunity to mold us into his image and grow us for service to others.

Another essential element in Paul’s exhortation is thanksgiving. He reminds us that our prayers and petitions must come from a grateful heart. Being thankful in difficult times is not easy. Yet, practicing an attitude of gratitude can transform our perspective and give us renewed Christ-confidence. When we count our blessings, especially from an eternal perspective, we realize that all of life’s pain is very temporary. This is not the “power of positive thinking” brainwashing us into acceptance, but rather the “power of positive trusting” that allows us to “walk on water” emotionally – as long as we keep our eyes on Jesus. It is in those moments you realize that you are choosing to walk in the power of God’s Spirit rather than the weakness of your own flesh.

But wait there’s more!
While Paul’s guide for dealing with life’s unwelcomed stresses does promise us that God will answer all our prayers exactly as we request, he does conclude with a powerful promise void of any exceptions. In verse 7 he says, “And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” Peace. Isn’t that what we really want? It is certainly what we really need. You can take God’s promise to the bank and it is far more valuable than any currency a job can pay.

Danna Demetre is a Christian life coach, speaker, writer and author of several books, including What Happened To My Life? (Revell, 2010) Dannademetre.com