Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

I was the least likely person to know anything about the charismatic world until God ripped me out of my Baptist comfort zone and placed me right in the middle of it all. He did this not just to make me a massive charismatic but to bring truth and balance to a movement that lacked both. Let’s be honest. The charismatic world has been known for a lot of strange fire over the years, especially when money and materialism were involved, and God has not been pleased with it. Now that I’ve stood on both sides of the spectrum, I see what the Lord is doing with me.

He took me out of a movement that was all truth and no spirit and thrust me into a movement that was all spirit and very little truth. First the Lord raised up my platform. Then He said, “Let me tell you what your job is, Son. Preach spirit and truth to all the church—preach My heart—and help them finally see why I’ve given them so much.” I believe the Lord raised up my ministry for such a time as this to say, “You know what? We want to see the miracles, signs, wonders, and especially the masses of salvations that marked the Acts church in the Bible, but we also want to see the selfless generosity that made it all flourish.”

I know influential pastors on both sides who couldn’t cast a demon out of a poodle and couldn’t successfully pastor an outhouse, but they have ten thousand people in their church and millions of dollars in the bank. They run massive Christian-lite social clubs, and they’re simply the main attraction. Meanwhile, very few of their people truly study the Bible, and even fewer obey God’s commands. These ministries are a cancer in the body of Christ and a disgusting joke to the lost and dying world we’re called to reach. God sees them the same way (Rev. 3:16).

If we can get the church back in balance, in spirit and in truth—starting with our biblical generosity toward others—we can change all of that in an instant. I’ll revisit this later, but brace yourself for a shocking statistic: less than 2 percent of Christians obey the commands of biblical generosity, and that holds true on both sides of the church—cessationists and charismatics alike. Meanwhile, most of the failures in the church and in our personal lives can be traced back to this single tragic shortfall. After all, where your money is, there your heart will be also (Luke 12:34). Knowing that God requires 100 percent of our hearts, is it any wonder why the body of Christ is so lukewarm and demonized in these last of the last days?

I think the Lord wants people to understand that it’s time for the body of Christ to quit playing games and simply obey the Bible—especially where generosity is concerned. God is thinning out the ranks and raising up an army, and He wants people who will lay down the selfish, lukewarm, casual approach to the Bible and simply obey, in spirit and in truth.

Want to start your generosity journey? Go to MyCharismaShop.com to grab a copy of Greg Locke’s The Generosity Journey.