Sid: We want everyone everywhere to be out of debt, we want everywhere walking in supernatural gifting to acquire wealth for the precise purpose of being involved in the greatest wealth exchange in history because we’re at the end of the end. As the rabbis say in Israel, We are in the footsteps of Messiah.” We can hear the Messiah ready to return to earth; they wouldn’t say return but they just don’t know, we’re waiting for the footsteps of the Messiah; Yeshua Jesus to return to earth. But there is a counterfeit approach to money, supposedly Christian and there is an authentic approach to money which is Christian. My guest Craig Hill founder of “Family Foundations International” in Littleton, Colorado has come out with a book and a CD series dealing with money. Craig, the Bible talks a lot about money, tell me when you first started getting interested in this subject.
Craig: You know it is amazing thing Sid I just found in the New Testament there are 215 verses on faith, 218 verses on salvation, and 2,084 verses on money and finances. I first discovered that back in about 1994 or about 1995, and that’s when I really started getting interested in it personally because the Lord specifically spoke to my wife and me that we were to get out of debt. And so we took that seriously. What I find is that a lot of times people hear words from the Lord, they don’t take them seriously and you look five, ten years later nothing has actually changed. We took that seriously and began to take some steps to get out of debt and it actually happened for us by 2001. We were able to eliminate all of our debt including our house mortgage. You know what I find so many times Sid, people are paralyzed when they look at what they don’t have and what they can’t do. But when they begin to look at what they do have and what they can do and they begin to do the natural things God steps in to do supernatural things for them.
Sid: Now I personally have met people that have benefited from your seminar on “Wealth, Riches and Money,” but tell me what feedback comes from people that either attends your seminar or read your books and your CD’s.
Craig: Well, we found especially with the seminar that something changes on the inside. We found that the biggest problem have is not that they don’t know what to do; the biggest problem have is an inability to do what they know. Most people have a desire to get out of debt, most people have even gone to seminars, they have even engaged in some feeble attempt at wanting to do it but the problem is on the inside they’re not able to do it. And what we’ve have found is there are spiritual factors and emotional factors that impact people. This is what we here coming out of the seminars. Specifically is that something changed on the inside that broke the power of spiritual forces that were keeping them back from doing what it was that they knew to do.
Sid: And now many Christians have been watching in churches or on Christian television and they all seem to now have the same approach towards fundraising. Many Christians have been so turned off they’re throwing away the baby with the dirty bath water. Comment on this.
Craig: You know I think that the primary problem is that often times the means and the end are mixed. God is supposed to be the end, we should be perusing God; money is a means, it’s a tool that can be put in our hands to accomplish a kingdom purpose. But what I find coming out of a lot of television Christian television, and maybe other places, is that it’s not the money is a tool to accomplish God’s purpose, it’s actually God is a tool to get you money. And money becomes the goal, money becomes the end, God becomes the means. And what I see in the Bible God is not going to be a tool in anybody’s hands to do anything. God is the goal, He is the purpose, He is the end. I think that when we pursue Him, seek after Him, not use Him or even use principals to get money but that our purpose is to seek after God then money becomes a tool in our hands to accomplish Kingdom purpose.
Sid: You know we’re not going there, but I just want to speak a parallel thing about what you’re saying. Many people say to me because they know I’ve been investigating the supernatural in particular miracles and healing for many years and they say “What is the best method to get healed?” And the answer is the same that you’ve just said Craig, it’s not a method it’s knowing the truth and the word of God and having intimacy with God. From this intimacy God will show you uniquely what you have to do to get healed. To me if you need a formula that’s the formula, intimacy with God.
Craig: I think you’re absolutely right about that Sid and that’s certainly applies to money and finances. You know I got a revelation from Matthew chapter 6 verse 24 and 25 where you know we commonly read that and hear that, that’s the one where Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters either he’ll hate one and love the other or else he’ll be loyal to one and despise the other you cannot serve God and mammon; therefore I say to you do not worry about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink or about your body what you will put on is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?” And what I find with a lot of Christians what they are spending a lot of time doing is exactly what Yeshua said here not to do which is worrying about their life. And He goes on and gives us a picture of his concept of provision. In other words, Yeshua is saying here, “Let Me show you how provision is supposed to come.” And the thing that was a shock to me, a revelation, I had always thought the provision would come through sowing and reaping.
Sid: By the 100 fold return of course!
Craig: Yeah, you know if you’re really in trouble that the way financially that you fix that is sowing and reaping. Then when I read this Yeshua gives His model of how provision is to come and He says, “Look at the sparrows or the birds of the air,” and then He said a really interesting thing, “They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns yet your heavenly Father feeds them, are you not of more value than they?” And the revelation that came to me Sid, I suddenly realized that when I was trying to get my financial needs met through sowing and reaping what I had actually done was I had made God’s provision a matter of my works; in other words if I sow then God will provide, if I don’t sow then God won’t provide.
Sid: Listen, under the Old Covenant we needed formulas, but under the New Covenant His children don’t need formulas they just need God.
Craig: Well, you know here’s an interesting little poem that I found that goes right along with this about sparrows about birds. It said the sparrow to the robin, “I would really like to know why these anxious human beings rush about and worry so.” Said the robin to the sparrow, “I think that it must be that they have no Heavenly Father such as cares for you and me.” You know when I read that I thought “Boy, we as believers need to at least get as much faith as the birds.” The birds actually believe in their heart that the reason they will be provided for is because their Father loves them; but I found that most people don’t believe that and because in the debts of their heart they really don’t believe the Father loves them and the Father will care for them. Then they get involved and actually fall into all kinds of traps of things that people are telling them, “If you give to this ministry, if you do this, if you do that, if you send your money here, or if you invest in this or that, then that’s how God’s going to provide for you.” And I definitely believe in giving, I definitely believe in investing, but I believe that that is not the foundation and basis of our provision.
Sid: And isn’t another problem and you actually point this out in your book we’re living in instant America, and they don’t understand the difference between a healing and a miracle or getting your money little by little. They want instant fixes, quick fixes.
Craig: Yeah, people have no understanding of process. They want everything instantaneous and people are not willing to wait, and I think really the bottom line in many of our hearts is that there is a deep rooted distrust toward God. I think people remember back to their childhood when maybe they heard their parents say things like “Oh you have to be careful save for a rainy day, you never know what’s going to come in the future.” And those are really words that nullify God’s provision that say “Well, God isn’t going to be there for you you better do something to take care of yourself.” And the truth is God does love us, He does want to be there for us and He will direct us, He will lead us. As you said earlier, that requires an intimate relationship with Him to begin to experience His supernatural power.
Sid: Craig you don’t have to be a prophet for whatever anyone reading the newspaper sees we know that the big shaking is coming financially. Is it too late…
Craig: I think that it’s never too late Sid; it’s often times we can look in the past and say “I wish I would have or I should have,” but you know God can do such incredible supernatural things. We’ve had numerous people when they calculated how long it would take them maybe seven, eight, nine years and I’ve had many people report that when they simply began to do what it was that the Holy Spirit showed them to do they found themselves completely out of debt in two, three, four years. And there’s no way that that could happen without the supernatural intervention of God.
Sid: And you know one of my concerns I know you do marital counseling and marital seminars. Young people such a serious tearing in their marriage when they get into debt.
Craig: Well, that’s absolutely true and I think that a lot of times married men feel like, my wife just doesn’t appreciate what goes into me generating this money the hard work, and many woman feel like that well you put me in a prison if I spend $3 buying a Starbucks it’s like I violated something. And conflict arises and I think…
