Join Ashley and Carlie Terradez for God Wants You Rich Part 5. In this episode, prepare to have religious traditions and myths debunked! Go deep into God’s Word as Ashley and Carlie prove how Jesus was rich while He lived on earth. Furthermore, He wants you to be rich too!
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The primary scriptures explored in God Wants You Rich Part 5 are 2 Corinthians 8:9, Proverbs 10:22, and Luke 9:57.
Transcription
Ashley:
2 Corinthians 8:9 says Jesus was rich. That’s the truth. And today, we’re going to start doing some myth debunking, praise God, and I’m going to show you evidence that proves, through the word of God, that Jesus actually was rich while he was on earth.
Carlie:
Why live a normal life when you could be living the abundant life? Welcome to the Abundant Life Program with Ashley and Carlie Terradez.
Ashley:
Hello and welcome to the Abundant Life Program with Ashley and Carlie Terradez. We’re so glad you’ve joined us today here in the lounge. And hey, we’re excited today because we’re going to be teaching something that’s going to bless you. Amen.
Carlie:
It’s myth busting.
Ashley:
Myth busting.
Carlie:
Myth debunking, I don’t know if I’m ready for debunking. Is it going to hurt?
Ashley:
We’re going to look at some things here and it won’t hurt, don’t worry. Well, it may hurt your religion, and it may hurt… this is a warning, I’m going to put a little warning out here, you may get upset because you may be, “Oh,” but just remember…
Carlie:
We have another whole course on offense that you can-
Ashley:
Yeah, that you can read it.
Carlie:
Listen to that-
Ashley:
Just remember, I’m going to show you the Bible today. I’m going to be preaching from the Bible, from the word of God, New Testament. Okay? So, any ideas that are contrary to what you already believe, where did you hear them from? Most of the time, when I first heard this type of stuff, I got offended. I was like, “This can’t be right,” but you know what, what it was, was it was religious churches that taught me these things. It was traditions of man. The traditions of man make the word of God noneffective. So I’m telling you, what we’re going to look at today is the truth. It’s from the word of God, and I’m telling you if you can hold on, hold on…
Carlie:
Hold on.
Ashley:
Hold on, praise God. You’re going to learn something today that’s going to really bless you.
Ashley:
So, our key scripture today is 2 Corinthians 8:9, 2 Corinthians 8:9 says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, though he was rich…” Okay, let me stop right there. This is in the middle of 2 Corinthians Chapter 8 and 2 Corinthians Chapter 9, Paul’s talking about finances. This is a financial verse. Don’t take this out of context. The word rich here is talking about substance. It’s talking about money. It’s talking about finances. So, “Though he was rich,” he was saying Jesus was rich, “Yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might be made rich.” This series we’re talking on, we based it on Proverbs 10:22, it says, “The blessing of the Lord makes one rich. And he adds no sorrow to it.”
Ashley:
I mean, we’re talking about how it’s God’s will for you to prosper. Now, here’s one of the problems. I believe a lot of the body of Christ believe that it’s godly to prosper. Now, there’s a lot of the body of Christ that don’t believe that, but a lot of the body of Christ believe. And if you’re watching this Abundant Life Program, the fact that it’s called Abundant Life and you’re watching…
Carlie:
The hint is in the title.
Ashley:
The hint’s in the title. Of the job. You probably believe that it’s God’s will for you to prosper, but there’s a big hindrance to your prosperity. And that is, that you want to be like Jesus. Imitate me as I imitate Christ. 1 Corinthians 11:1, the apostle Paul says, “Imitate me as I imitate Christ, follow me as I follow Christ.” You want to be like Jesus, but here’s the thing. Your picture of Jesus is probably of someone who’s poor, homeless, wearing shabby clothes and walking around and hoping to make it, trying to find somewhere to sleep for the night, not quite sure he can make it and people have got to give him handouts and he’s basically poor. That’s the perception of most people when they see a picture of Jesus.
Ashley:
They see these pictures of him and things and they think he looked poor. He looked like a homeless person walking around a lot at the time. And some of that is cultural because back in the day, the clothes they would have worn and the things they would have done back in the day… they didn’t have cars, they didn’t have airplanes, they didn’t have houses like we have now and things like that. So, he could have looked poor, but I think it’s more than that. I think religion has made out that Jesus was poor and made out that when Jesus was on earth he had nothing. He was just about getting by and he was scraping by.
Carlie:
People present poverty as being holy.
Ashley:
They do. And therefore, they make poverty to be holy and we’ve already looked at that in a previous program. The fact that poverty doesn’t equal holiness. It’s not holy to be poor. It’s not godly to be poor. In fact, to be prosperous is a blessing and it’s actually God’s will. We’ve looked at many, many verses about how it’s God’s will for you to prosper, but today in particular, I want look at what happened to Jesus while he was on earth. How did Jesus live on earth? Because if we see that Jesus has been poor on earth, then how are we going to imitate him? We’ve got this type of struggle going on, this tension of well, I think God wants me to prosper, but I also see Jesus and he was poor.
Ashley:
He had nowhere to lay his head. He couldn’t even afford his own tomb, all these things. All these things that we learn through traditions and through people’s wrong ideas.
Carlie:
Misconceptions.
Ashley:
Misconceptions, there you go, that’s the word I was looking for, and things like that. So, we’re going to debunk some of these things today and look at the word of God. So, we know in 2 Corinthians 8:9 that he was rich. Now, what I used to do sometimes, I’ll just be honest, this is the confession hour now, when I preach this verse I say, “Well, whether he was rich on earth or not isn’t really the issue. He was rich in heaven.” We can all agree on that right? So in heaven, there’s no lack. So, Jesus came from heaven, amen, and then he came to earth and he experienced poverty on earth.
Ashley:
That’s not the truth. This verse is saying he was rich on earth. Okay? It’s saying though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor. Just like Jesus was righteous, just like he was healthy, just like he was at peace, praise God, he was rich when he was on earth. He fulfilled his father’s will. He was rich when he was on earth. He was of the lineage of Abraham, praise God. He had those covenant rights to be rich on earth. And let’s look at some of these things. Some of the reasons why I believe Jesus was rich on earth and some of the scriptures we’re going to have to share with you to show you this for yourselves.
Ashley:
The first thing is when Jesus was born, okay, he was born and so we said well they couldn’t even afford a hotel. Jesus’ parents were so poor-
Carlie:
He was born in a stable.
Ashley:
They were so poor they couldn’t even afford a hotel. They couldn’t even afford an inn. Now, they tried to get an inn, Mary and Joseph went to the innkeeper and there was no room in the inn.
Carlie:
Yeah, why?
Ashley:
It wasn’t money.
Carlie:
It was Christmas. They were booked up.
Ashley:
It was Christmas. It was busy, they were booked up because it’s Christmas. That’s right. That’s why there was no room at the inn.
Carlie:
Right? It makes sense, doesn’t it?
Ashley:
The reason there’s no room in the inn is because there’s a census going on, the whole town, and lots of people came back to their home towns and Bethlehem was full at the time. But Mary and Joseph went to try and pay for an inn. They couldn’t pay for an inn, that’s why they ended up in a stable. It’s actually symbolic because he was born in the place where they bred the sacrificial lambs.
Carlie:
Yep, it was, in Bethlehem.
Ashley:
So, he was actually born, yeah, he was born like a lamb in a stable. It was powerful symbolism.
Carlie:
He’s called the Lamb of God.
Ashley:
That’s right. It wasn’t because Mary and Joseph didn’t have the money. In fact, Mary had purple on. Mary and Joseph had money at the time when they made that journey to Bethlehem. Then, along come a caravan of wise men. Okay? There wasn’t just three wise men. There was three gifts, three types of gifts, but there wasn’t just three wise men. Wise men sought him out. And at the time he was probably a toddler, he was probably one or two years old.
Carlie:
It was a fulfillment of prophecy. They’d been journeying for a long time.
Ashley:
And guess what they brought him? They brought him gold and frankincense and myrrh. They gave him valuable gifts. So, Jesus got given valuable… he got given gold and valuable gifts. And he got given so much, some people, they’ve studied this out in today’s equivalent purchasing power, they’re talking about those gifts that Jesus was given adding up to millions, tens of millions of dollars, those gifts that Jesus was given. In fact, a lot of people believe that Mary and Joseph used that money because they moved to Egypt to get away from Herod. So, they moved to Egypt. Joseph wasn’t able to work at that time. They used that money to live on. So, there was a lot of money given to Jesus right there when he was just a toddler. So, there’s one reason, right?
Carlie:
God supplies for his kids.
Ashley:
Amen. He supplies for his kids. When he had his ministry, what about this, he had his ministry, he had a treasurer. Judas Iscariot was his treasurer.
Carlie:
And we know that Judas stole from the treasury.
Ashley:
He stole from the treasury regularly.
Carlie:
And there was a period of time before anyone noticed.
Ashley:
That’s right. So, if you have a treasurer, what do you need? Some treasure. If you don’t have any money, you’re not going to have a treasurer. So, he had a treasure that held on to the money and that treasurer kept account of the money and he stole decent amounts of money from the treasury before anyone noticed. So, you better have some decent amount of money in the treasury if you’re going if your treasurer is going to steal from you and you don’t even notice. So, he had a treasurer. Okay? We’re talking about Jesus was rich on earth not just in heaven. He was rich when he came down to earth. He was given gifts when he was born early on in his years.
Ashley:
He had a treasurer. He also traveled. In them days if you traveled, you had to have money to travel with. You couldn’t just travel without money. So, you had to have money to travel with. He told the disciples, one time he said don’t take no money bag, that was to show them that God was their provider. But another time he said take money bags, make sure you take extra provisions. If they didn’t have provisions, how could they take provisions with them? The people he called to follow him were businessmen, successful businessman, tax collectors.
Carlie:
The were already busy people doing things, funny enough.
Ashley:
Amen. Owning their own businesses, they own their own fishing boats, they owned their own fishing businesses. They were tax collectors who were notorious for being rich because they often collected taxes. Praise God. And we don’t know if Matthew and people like that were honest tax collectors or not at the time, but they had money because you got paid well to be a tax collector. So, the people that followed Jesus, his disciples, had money. Okay? Let’s carry on. What about his clothes? He had nice clothes.
Carlie:
They were so nice that the soldiers actually drew lots for them when Jesus was crucified. They didn’t tear them up. They wanted to auction them off. They wanted to take his clothing. They wouldn’t do that if the clothing wasn’t nice and expensive.
Ashley:
That’s Right. It was a seamless garment. It was a specially wove seamless garment. In the equivalent nowadays, it would have been a designer suit or designer clothes. And I know people get offended, ” Oh, Jesus would never wear nice clothes.” He wore nice clothes. So nice, like Carlie said, that the guards actually drew lots to who was going to win his clothes. If they were just rags, they wouldn’t have drawn lots for who’s going to get his clothes. They wouldn’t rip them. It was a garment with no seam woven in one piece. Praise God. So, he had nice clothes. What about this? He had nice transportation. He had nice transportation.
Carlie:
He had a new colt.
Ashley:
He knew he had a brand new colt. We had a brand new donkey, never ridden before.
Carlie:
Some people’s heads are going tilt.
Ashley:
I know, right? I might be coming at them too hard, it’s okay, you can watch it again later. In John 19:23 it says, “Take the colt that has never been ridden before.” This is a brand new vehicle.
Carlie:
He didn’t want a used colt.
Ashley:
No, it wasn’t a used colt. It wasn’t a used donkey. It was a brand new donkey. It was a brand new baby donkey that had never been ridden before, a valuable mode of transportation. And only people with money, with wealth, would be able to ride on a nice donkey like that. He had a brand new unused donkey, that would have been a brand new car. Jesus would have had a brand new car. Tilt. Now culturally, if you’re watching this somewhere where they don’t… Maybe it was a brand new scooter. Maybe, who knows, whatever continent you’re watching from, but he had nice transportation. He had nice clothes, nice transportation. He had a treasurer to look after his money. And then, people just came and gave him gifts. Mary came to him and she broke the alabaster jar. She gave him a year’s worth of salary in one go.
Ashley:
She spent money on him. People gave him offerings. There was women, a band of women that traveled with him who ministered to him, who looked after the offerings that came in and ministered to him. So really, we can see there’s lots of reasons why we’ve got evidence from the word of God that Jesus actually had money.
Carlie:
Favor attracts money.
Ashley:
Now, this one is going to make people go tilt. Did you know that according to scripture, there’s more evidence to say that Jesus had a house than he didn’t have a house. There you go. People say, “No, Jesus didn’t have a house.” What about-
Carlie:
That makes sense, he was a carpenter.
Ashley:
He was a carpenter, it makes sense he had a house. But people say, “No, no, Jesus didn’t have a house. What about that verse where he says I have nowhere to lay my head?” Let’s look at that verse. This is in Luke 9:56. So Luke 9:56 he says, “For the son of man did not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them. And then they went to another village.” Okay? So, they’re traveling village to village. Okay? And verse 57, “Now it happened as they journeyed on the road,” so are you getting the picture, they’ve left one village they’re journeying on the road to another village. “As they journey along the road, someone said to him, ‘Lord, I’ll follow you wherever you go.'” I was talking about this the other day, about how if you’re a pastor, we love pastors, if you’re a pastor and someone says to you, “Pastor, I’ll follow you wherever you go. I’m going to be with you to the end,” that’s usually a red flag.
Carlie:
And they’re leaving.
Ashley:
Yeah, and you won’t see them next week, that type of thing. Okay? But this person came up to Jesus, “Jesus, I’ll follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus was giving him some healthy resistance because talk is cheap. People say, “I’ll follow you wherever you go,” well show me some fruit, actually come and follow me. Why don’t you actually follow me and actually serve me and see what happens? This person came to Jesus and said, “Jesus, I’ll follow you wherever you go.” Jesus gave him some healthy resistance here. And he was traveling from one village to another village along the road, basically some of these places they were traveling to took more than a day’s journey. So guess what? If you’re traveling from one village to another village and it takes more than a day’s journey, what does that mean?
Carlie:
There’s not a motel on route?
Ashley:
That means you’re going to be spending the night somewhere that’s not a house or an inn. You could be sleeping on the side of the road. You could be sleeping somewhere you have to make a temporary accommodation. He says right here, he said, verse 58, “Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.'” He said, look, I’m traveling to the next village. I’m leaving this village and headed to the next village, I’m a traveling minister is what I do. I travel around. Sometimes I don’t even have somewhere to lay my head. Sometimes I don’t even have somewhere to call home, because he’s on the road. That does not mean he didn’t have a house. If we look here in Mark Chapter Two, this is where people get the idea that he didn’t have a house, from the foxes have holes to live in and the birds have nests to stay.
Ashley:
And that’s where they get the idea of well if he says that then he can’t have a house. But look at this in Mark 2. This is Mark 2 verse 14, “As he passed by he saw Levi,” also Matthew, Matthew and Levi are the same person, “who was sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, ‘Follow me.’ So Matthew, or Levi, arose and followed him.” Okay? So get this picture, Jesus said to Matthew, “Come and follow me.” Matthew got up, left his tax office and followed Jesus. And now, Matthew is following Jesus.
Carlie:
Where’s he going?
Ashley:
It says he followed him to his house. Now, how could Levi follow, or Matthew, follow Jesus to Matthew’s house? No, he was following him to Jesus’ house. It says here, verse 15… I’m in Mark 2 verse 15, Mark 2 verse 15 it says, “Now it happened, as he was dining in Levi’s house.” Now, depending on your translation, Carlie has the Modern English translation. You could look up Mark 2:15 for me. Mark 2:15. I’ve got the New King James. I usually use the New King James. I like the King James translation, the New King James translation, I also use the Amplified and Young’s Literal. I use a lot of different translations to try and put things together. We have lots of different translations.
Ashley:
I know everyone fights for the one they like and everything else, but the New King James, which has come from the King James, one thing they did with the New King James from the King James, is when they inserted a word in that wasn’t in the original text they italicized on purpose to show we added this in. This was not in the original text. So, right here where it says in verse 15, Mark 2:15, it says, “Now it happened, as he was dining in Levi’s house.” In actual fact, the word Levi there is italicized. In the New King James and the old King James it’s italicized, and it was not in the original text. The original text read, “He was dining in his house.”
Carlie:
And the Modern English doesn’t even have Levi’s name here.
Ashley:
Read it in the Modern English.
Carlie:
Which is taken from the King James as an accurate translation. It says, “As Jesus was at supper in his house.”
Ashley:
“As Jesus was at supper in his house.” So, there’s not conclusive evidence. This could well have been Jesus’ house. I believe personally this was Jesus’ house that they were dining in, and that’s why people were so mad that he had sinners at his house dining with him. So right here, there’s no evidence to say that Jesus didn’t have a house. I actually believe, if you study the scriptures, honestly, there’s more evidence there that Jesus had a house. Now, he didn’t spend all his time in his house because he was traveling, but he had a house. It says that he came out to speak to them. That reference, came out to speak to them, if you study out, it means that you left the building to come and speak to them. There’s oftentimes the story that when the paralytic was lowered through the roof-
Carlie:
The paralytic man, yeah.
Ashley:
The paralytic man was lowered through the roof with the four crazy friends, I love that story, there’s a lot of evidence to say that was Jesus’ house they tore the roof off, and they knew it was Jesus’ house. That’s where the crowds were there and everything else. So, there is no evidence to say that Jesus didn’t have a house. It’s inconclusive. I happen to believe that Jesus did have a house and the verses that people use here, if you study them out, do not support that Jesus did not have a house. So, so far we’ve got Jesus had lots of gifts come to him when he was a kid, he had a treasurer who stole from him, so he had money in the treasury. He traveled, he rode a brand new form of transportation. He had such nice clothes they gambled for them and they argued over them and they wouldn’t rip them up.
Ashley:
He most possibly had a house, and we’ve got some more yet. So, don’t go anywhere. We’ve got some more evidence to show you that Jesus was rich while he was on earth. Now, he didn’t stay rich. Here’s the key, he didn’t stay rich. He died a death, and when he died on the cross things changed very quick. I’m going to be looking at that right after this next thing. We want to share some things with you from our ministry. We’ve got some exciting news we want to share with you. These things are going to empower you in the promises of God. So, let’s watch these together
Speaker 3:
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Ashley:
All right, praise God. We’re looking at the fact that God wants you rich. In Proverbs 10:22, it says, “The blessing of the Lord makes one rich and he adds no sorrow to it.” And we’re halfway through the lesson here. We’re talking about how Jesus was rich on earth. In 2 Corinthians 8:9, it says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, yet though he was rich, yet for our sakes,” for your sake and for my sake, “he became poor that for us through his poverty might be made rich.” And we look here at this statement because a lot of people see Jesus as poor. They see Jesus, when he was on earth, he was just walking around poor, barely getting by, living handouts almost like a homeless person, just about making it through. And what happens is, we start reading the scripture, we start believing well maybe God does want me to prosper.
Ashley:
Maybe prosperity is godly. Maybe it’s right that I should have an abundance so I can help more people, so I can be a giver. And they struggle with this because their picture of Jesus is that he was poor and he walked around without a house, without anywhere to lay his head. He walked around with no money, with tattered clothes and these types of things. And what we’ve been looking at in today’s program is the fact that that is not true. That’s traditions of men, that’s religion. That’s people’s misconceptions about Jesus. When Jesus was on earth, he was rich. It says in the scripture he was rich. We looked at some of these things. We looked at the fact that he was given gifts. The wise men came and gave him gold and frankincense and myrrh.
Ashley:
We looked at the fact that he had a treasurer who stole from him. That means he had to have money to have a treasurer. Other people came and gave to him. Mary came and gave to him. Those women that ministered to him regularly, gifts. He also had such nice clothes that the guards actually fought over his clothes and drew lots for his clothes. It was a one piece seamless garment, which is like a designer piece of gear. It was like some sort of designer suit, I’m telling you. It was nice clothes. He had nice transportation. He rode a brand new donkey, a brand new colt. We get all this from scripture. This is all straight from the word of God. So, we know these things. We even have evidence to show that Jesus had his own house.
Ashley:
So, we’re looking at some of these things and realize, you know what, our picture of Jesus being poor is not correct. When he was on earth during his earthly ministry, Jesus had enough and extra. He was a blessing to people and he was a giver and he had finances. He had money and he walked around, he traveled around and he had money to give and to fund his ministry and to help people. But here’s the deal. What happened was, was then he became… When he died on the tree, when he went to the cross, he became a curse for us. In Galatians 3:13 it says, “Cursed is anyone who hangs on a tree.” So what happened was, is Jesus took the curse of the law. Jesus took on the curses. If you went to Deuteronomy 28 and read from verse 15 all the way through 60, I think it’s 64, you’re going to see all the curses, all these terrible things that happen to people that are outside the will of God, that are outside of the relationship with God.
Ashley:
These are the things that were the curses. Deuteronomy 28… No, yeah, Deuteronomy 28 one through 14 are the blessings, but Deuteronomy verse 15 onwards are the curses. And Jesus, when he went to the cross, took on those curses for me and you. It’s so powerful. In 2 Corinthians 5:21 it said, “God made him sin.” Jesus became sin on the cross. Did he ever sin or ever have sin in his life while he was walking the earth? No, he was perfect. Jesus did not sin. He was perfect. There was no sin, but when he went to the cross, God made him sin. Was Jesus sick and had disease or experienced pain? No, he became a curse when he was on the tree. He actually experienced sickness. He took stripes on his back and he experienced sickness when he died on the cross.
Ashley:
So what happened was, is during his earthly ministry he lived the perfect life, but when he died, that’s when he became cursed. And that’s when these things happened to him and these things came upon him. So, that’s what happened in 2 Corinthians 8:9, yet though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor. Jesus on the tree died a death of poverty. So, here’s the thing. Jesus was poor, but that was when he was on the tree. That’s where he was at the cross. That’s when he was cursed. And before that time, he was rich. He lived a rich life on earth. He lived a life where he had money, had abundance, he had possessions, he had things. And then when he died, he became poor. And there’s a number of things we can see about his death on the cross.
Ashley:
When he died on the cross, well, he didn’t have his own tomb. Now, some people say this could be before the cross because people would have owned tombs. So they say, “Well, if Jesus was rich, he would have owned a tomb ready for him to die.” So, even before he went to the cross, he should have owned his own tomb. Here’s why I think Jesus didn’t own his own tomb. I think it was just good stewardship because if you’re only going to use a tomb for three days, why buy it?
Carlie:
It’s not worth buying one.
Ashley:
It’s not worth buying it. They don’t do like VRBO tombs.
Carlie:
Airbnb for tombs.
Ashley:
They don’t do Airbnb tombs. You can’t rent a tomb, so he borrowed Joseph’s tomb. That wasn’t because he didn’t have the money to buy a tomb, that was because of just good stewardship. Or you could look at it that because he was cursed when he died, he didn’t have his own tomb. So either way, that’s how you can read that verse. That verse does not mean he didn’t have the money to buy a tomb. It was either his choice or it was because after he died, that was part of the curse, not having a tomb. But the other things people look at is, when he died on the the cross, the cross that he was given was like a government issued cross. And that cross was given to him. That’s the only time Jesus took handouts from the government. It’s the only time he basically took a government issued thing was the cross.
Carlie:
It’s the point of crucifixion.
Ashley:
The point of crucifixion, he became cursed so he didn’t even have his own cross. The cross was the government issued cross. And then, here’s the kicker. They say that poverty… they do this research around the world and stuff and research what true poverty is, and poverty can be relative. Being poor can be relative. We’re broadcasting this show from America. We have offices in Europe. We have offices in South Africa. We travel the world literally spreading this gospel. And we’ve seen all sorts of poverty and some people in the Western world, England… we’re from England originally and now we live in America. England and America very similar in the fact that what we call poverty here is very different to poverty in some other continents like Africa and Asia and South America.
Ashley:
So, we’ve been to places, we’ve been to places in Asia where children are being raised on rubbish dumps, on trashy heaps literally. We were talking about that’s how they find their clothes. That’s poverty. Here in America, someone might say I’m poor, I can’t afford the payments on my second car. That’s not really poverty compared to poverty, but it’s relative. Okay? But what they’ve done is that they’ve done world research and what they say is true poverty, so the worst type of poverty, poverty that it doesn’t matter what country you’re from and what content you’re from, this is true poverty, the worst state of poverty you can get is nakedness and thirst. If you’re naked and thirsty, that is true poverty. It doesn’t matter if you’re in Africa, Asia, South America, Europe, or North America. If naked and thirsty, that is the worst type of poverty you can experience.
Carlie:
It’s true. And the thing that strikes me is when Jesus died on the cross, he changed everything. He changed everything. The moment that Jesus was crucified, it says that the veil in the temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom. And the thing I love about that is, the reason it’s so significant when it comes to abundance, if you like, is that Jesus taught poverty too. He taught poverty and he gave us access to the glory of God in that moment. By the veil being torn in two, he gave us full access to the glory of God. In Exodus 33 Moses said, “Lord, show me your glory.” Verse 18, Exodus 33, “Lord, show me your glory.” Another word for glory is riches and abundance. When the veil was torn at the moment of crucifixion, God gave us access to his glory, to his riches and abundance. That happened when Jesus died in abject poverty, everything was taken away from him so that we might have access to his riches.
Ashley:
It really does sum up 2 Corinthians 8:9, our key scripture, the fact that he became poor so that us through his poverty might be made rich. And that’s what happened to him on the cross. Jesus on the cross was not only naked, he died naked, they took his clothes off. He died on the cross without any possessions. He died naked. He was also thirsty. It even said this in, I believe it’s in Mark 19, he says that he was thirsty. He said, “I thirst.” And if you’re thirsty, he said… this is in John 19:28, he said, “I thirst.” Jesus called out from the cross and said, “I thirst.” So, he was naked on the cross and he was thirsty and they ended up giving him some bitter wine, some gall.
Ashley:
So, that represented total poverty. So Jesus, on the cross, experienced total poverty for me and you, just like he experienced sickness and he experienced pain, just like he experienced sin and the effects of sin on the cross because God made him sin. Just like experienced torment and anguish so that we could receive his peace. He experienced total poverty on the cross so that me and you could receive his riches. We could be made rich. We could receive those glorious riches that God has for us. So, I want to tell you today, ladies and gentlemen, God wants you rich. The blessings of the Lord makes one rich and he adds no sorrow to it, Proverbs 10:22. And Jesus paid for it. Jesus paid for it in the most radical way, in the most extreme way. He was rich while he was on earth.
Ashley:
He gave all that up and became ultimate poverty on the cross, experienced total poverty so that me and you don’t have to experience that poverty anymore. We can experience his riches. We can be made rich. And I’m telling you, that’s God’s will for you today. Wherever you’re watching this from, God’s will for you today is to have enough and extra. His will for you is 2 Corinthians 9:8. 2 Corinthians 9:8. He’s able to make all grace abound towards you, that you have in all sufficiency and in all things may have an abundance for every good work. God wants to meet your needs and have extra so you can bless others. He wants to bless you and make you a blessing. And Jesus made it possible by dying a death of poverty on the cross. Praise God. And that’s the truth, that’s the gospel truth. Jesus died so that you could live a righteous, holy, healthy, peaceful, and prosperous life. Praise God. That’s what he did for you and me. And that’s the gospel truth.
Carlie:
Amen. I mean, that’s the good news.
Ashley:
I want to pray for you before we let you go. Father, I thank you for everyone watching and listening today. Lord, I thank you. Your will for us is to live a prosperous life in every area. And I thank you, Jesus. Lord, we thank you for paying that price. We thank you for experiencing that terrible poverty for us so that we don’t have to. And Lord, we receive your abundant blessings in Jesus’ name. We receive those blessings through the power of Jesus. Thank you for what you’ve done in our lives. In Jesus’ name, amen. Amen. Praise God. That’s the good news.
Carlie:
That is.
Ashley:
Amen. Thanks for being with us today. Thanks for joining us. We’ll be back real soon, but remember until next time, don’t just settle for living a normal life when you could be living the abundant life. We’ll see you soon.