We know that money is not everything, but we cannot ignore the fact that everything costs money. And so we acknowledge the reality that money is important. While we live in a society that measures success with dollars and cents, position and authority, we must be careful not to let money become more important than our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Today, the worldly measurement of success has entered the church. Pastors and preachers are preaching the prosperity gospel, a gospel that equates God’s blessings with material blessings. They preach, “The more God favours you, the more He blesses you with material blessings. In other words, God is blessing you when your bank account has grown, your property value has doubled, your new car is bigger, etc.” Is this biblical? What is true success according to God? Joshua 1:8 writes, “ This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. ” These are God’s words to Joshua as he takes over from Moses to lead the children of Israel. Joshua does not need money to be prosperous and successful. All he needs is God’s Word to help him. God defines success with His written Word. In other words, only Christians can achieve this success. And this success is obtained only by the believer’s obedience of the Word of God. Does this surprise you? You and I must re-evaluate how we consider success or failure in our lives. It may be that our concept of the value of our life is completely wrong! Ask yourself: Do you feel you are a failure because you did not become a millionaire by age 30? Do you feel you are a big zero because you are still single, and everyone else is married? Or that having no stable income, car, family, a house of your own makes you a big failure? The world may consider the lack of all these material things as failures. But you should be more concerned about what God considers as failures. Sometimes the problem with many of us is we do not feel miserable when we sin against God, or when we compromise our faith for fear of the rejection by men.

Dear friends, our life is more than just the things we possess on this earth. We are not here to please men or ourselves. In fact, our purpose of living is more than giving ourselves and our family happiness, a comfortable life or an outward show of a godly family. Our life is to be centred on God, how we may glorify Him and enjoy Him forever. Where is God in your life right now? Have you failed to put Him on the throne of your life? Get back to the right path with God. Let Him and His precious Word show you the direction for your life. Following Joshua 1:8, we are to “m editate” on His Word day by day. This would be our Quiet Time. We are also to “do” what we have meditated in His Word. And the returns are guaranteed and promised to all who faithfully meditate upon and do God’s Word: “thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.” Do you believe?

No matter how important money is, let us not be money-minded but Christ-minded, especially during this Chinese New Year holiday. Let us bear a Christ-minded testimony for our Saviour and may others be able to see the spiritual prosperity and success we are enjoying so that they too will be drawn to Christ and find salvation in Him. Amen.