Episode 17 – Lasting Prosperity Part 1

Jacob Paul: Welcome to the Truth in Love podcast with your hosts, Kimberly Faith and John Mac. The Truth in Love podcast seeks to present God’s timeless truth through the lens of his remarkable love.

Kimberly Faith: Welcome back to the Truth in Love podcast with Kimberly Faith and John Mac. We’re so glad that you joined us for the first podcast of 2025. Dad, are you excited?

John McLarty: Oh, my. It’s hard to believe it’s 2025. But, yes, I am excited.

Kimberly Faith: Do you remember Y2K when we all thought the world was going to end? 

John McLarty: I did. Exactly. 

Kimberly Faith: Well, I mean, we didn’t necessarily think the world was going to end, but everybody was freaked out about the computer crashes and everything. And here we are 25 years later.

John McLarty: Yeah. There’s definitely a lot of changes in store in 2025.

Kimberly Faith: Absolutely.

John McLarty:  At many levels. 

Kimberly Faith: Absolutely. And I think that this choice that we’ve been guided by God’s spirit to make to start off in a year about biblical prosperity is such a good way to start, at least it has been for me studying this.

John McLarty: Absolutely. New Year’s resolutions, goals, thoughts, ponderings.

Kimberly Faith: Right. Because if you think about it, all the New Year’s resolutions that we’ve ever made have something to do with a degree of prosperity in our life, whether that’s a facet of prosperity that involves our health or our wealth or our family or, you know, whatever, because prosperity just means making something, having something more. 

John McLarty: A lot of them are that way.

Kimberly Faith: Right. Right. 

John McLarty: That’s the norm.

Kimberly Faith:  So we’re going to talk about the mother of all prosperities. Right? I mean, or the father. That’s kind of a word.

John McLarty: The fountainhead.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. The fountainhead of all of all prosperity. So I think the first question, you know, I like to do when I’m in the practice of law anyways, we ask what is prosperity according to God’s word. We talk about what it’s not first. What do you think about that?

John McLarty:  Exactly.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. So what do you think, if you were to tell somebody what it’s not, what do you think you’d start with?

John McLarty: Well, I would say most people think of prosperity as financial success, material success, having everything you need and more, and saving up for having no needs in terms of your physical well-being and your goals.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And what’s interesting to me I think you’re a 100% right  because we have you know, we hear a lot about the prosperity gospel, right, and people who equate, being having a lot of worldly goods with being a spiritually intact Christian or a spiritually prosperous Christian, But if that were the standard, all we need to do is look to the life of Jesus to know that’s not the standard because by all means, he was the most successful person that ever walked upon the face of the earth, but he died with nothing

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: In a pauper’s grave, in a borrowed grave

John McLarty: True.

Kimberly Faith: Not a pauper’s grave, but a borrowed grave, and he died I mean, he was penniless. He was a convicted criminal, you know, by the world’s standards, but yet he purchased the richest gift by his death than any of us, ever have owned.

John McLarty: Right. And the apostle Paul, he wrote so much of the New Testament.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty:  Ended up just in destitute, imprisonment, house imprisonment, needing, you know, needing help

Kimberly Faith: Needing help. Yeah.

John McLarty: For material needs.

Kimberly Faith: It kind of goes back to the first beatitude, being poor in spirit. 

John McLarty: Right. 

Kimberly Faith: This attitude of being completely dependent upon God. So we’re going to dig into this today. You know, we need to first understand that physical prosperity, wealth, even health, really, is not indicative of spiritual prosperity because we see too many Christians who, I think of Joni  Erickson Tada. You know, she was 19, drove off a, you know, cliff into the ocean or the lake.

John McLarty: It was a swimming pool. 

Kimberly Faith: Oh it was a swimming pool? Oh, I totally got the story wrong. And she’s had this ministry that she would have never had.

John McLarty: Became a quadriplegic.

Kimberly Faith: Right. And, she probably would have never had that ministry if that hadn’t happened. So I think the enemy’s definition of prosperity has infiltrated our Christian culture, and I think it’s important. I think it’s important that we, you know and this is why I was motivated to study this because I have a lot of friends who kind of equate that. They may look at me and say, oh, you’re a lawyer. You have all this money or you have this and this. I’m like, no. None of it belongs to me. That’s the attitude I want to have. Not let my possessions possess me because that’s not indicative of prosperity. So, what do you think is a good indication when you talk to somebody, what is a good indication of where you think they think prosperity lies?

John McLarty: When I talked to, just a normal person?

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. 

John McLarty: The worldly definition. Just, you know, material well-being and security.

Kimberly Faith: Isn’t it kind of what you love?

John McLarty: It’s what you love.  It’s what you focus your life around.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: Which we just say it pretty pretty bluntly, money. 

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. 

John McLarty: You know, which provides all these other things.

Kimberly Faith:  Right. 

John McLarty: Supplies. You know, I remember back to our back to the land lifestyle. Actually prosperity for us wasn’t money per se, but if you can recall back to your teepee days, we were surrounded by food. We had 50 pounds of beans, 50 pounds of rice, 50 pounds of lentils.

Kimberly Faith: Right. 

John McLarty: And I considered that prosperity. We had what we needed.

Kimberly Faith:  Right.

John McLarty: Shelter and feed ourselves. Simplified version of the same thing.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And we’re kind of talking about the difference between physical prosperity and spiritual prosperity, which, you know, we’ve always emphasized the design of man. We have body, soul, and the spirit, and instead of focusing on the physical part of us, this podcast has kind of taken us to the spirit man, our soul and spirit, and producing or having a life of spiritual prosperity because that’s the only thing that’s going to last forever. And that’s what I really enjoyed about doing this study was that we’re going to look at the benefits of spiritual prosperity in order to get God’s perspective, the perspective he’s trying to give us in the his word so that to encourage people to have that focus because it’s our physica,l our flesh, is so loud, you know? It’s so needy.  It’s so demanding that we tend to focus on.

John McLarty: A life changing perspective. 

Kimberly Faith: Yes. 

John McLarty: So I just thought of a lead off verse here. It’s the apostle Paul, and it’s very interesting. It’s in, Philippians, 4:11. A lot of people know this verse. And, Paul says, not that I speak in respect of want, for I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content. I know both how to be abased and I know how to abound. For everything, I am instructed to be full and and to be hungry, both to abound and suffer need, but I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me. That’s interesting because Paul realized that in what the world would consider lack or prosperity, he could be content. But if we have wealth,  or do not have wealth,  we can have our spiritual needs met. 

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: Americans have their own set of struggles. 

Kimberly Faith: Right. 

John McLarty: And it’s like we’re not, you know, out just scraping for our next meal every day, most of us. Some are.

Kimberly Faith: But you’re scraping to pay that mortgage you can’t really afford, you know, or whatever the next thing you’ve been driven by or to possess. And the incredible thing about spiritual prosperity, since we’re kind of dividing this into 2 categories, is physical prosperity leaves you always needing more. Physical prosperity  and you lose it when you die. Right? Spiritual prosperity satisfies the deepest need of your soul man, which is who you really are, and feeds your spirit. It’s like God is feeding you, so you’re being fed directly from God. And it also gives you eternal rewards, and it takes care of the physical because you’re like, that verse you read, Paul said, to be content with whatsoever state you’re in. He was sold out for Christ, and he thrived on spiritual prosperity, spiritually being fed and feeding others, which is the hallmark, really. You’re building eternal treasures. Right? You’re not building physical treasures. He was building eternal treasures, but he was enjoying those eternal treasures on this earth.

John McLarty: He could literally be in a jail cell singing praises to the Lord.

Kimberly Faith: Right. Which I think is a great misnomer, I think, for myself. I mean, for years, I didn’t surrender my life to Christ for life. I had surrendered to him for salvation, but not for life because I thought I was going to miss out. 

I was going to be cheated out of something because if I serve the Lord, he may make me be a missionary or whatever. And that’s a lie the enemy had sucked me into, and I really didn’t believe the words of Jesus where he taught us exactly how to be spiritual spiritually prosperous when in, Matthew 6, he said, don’t lay up treasures for yourself on earth because that’s where moth and rust destroys and thieves break in and steal, but lay up treasures in heaven where moth and rust don’t destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. And then he says these words that are, so I hate to use the word magical, but they’re so transformational if you really believe them. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And for years, my treasure, my heart was on attaining physical wealth, manifestations of physical wealth, physical health, prosperity for having a healthy family, all these things. And, sure, they’re great, but there is never enough. Whereas now, the Lord has shifted to discipleship and evangelism and teaching and, you know, sharing the gospel. And along the lines, Jesus is saying he’s saying, hey. You know what? I can and he, of course, has also provided the physical stuff.

I’ll give you an example. When the Lord challenged me about 6 years ago, maybe it’s been 5 or 6 years ago now, to not take any more divorce practice in my law practice, which was 75% of my income, I fought against that for probably 2 years. I found other ways around it. Like, I hired another attorney, and she could do it, but then she left. You know? Hired more staff. They could do it. No. Long and the short is when I finally said, okay. You know?

And the whole reason was I know the reason now was the nature of domestic law is it eats away your soul, basically. I mean, you’re working 60 hours a week because you’ve always got that phone call. No. They  wouldn’t let me have my kids. You know? And I loved helping my clients when I was supposed to be there. But to walk away from 75% of your income and just cold turkey, Well, finally, I just threw my hands up and said, Lord, you know what? This law practice is yours and walked away, I mean, cold. And, you know, it wasn’t like he sent a $1,000,000 case the next day. No. I had a couple years of, it was, are we going to pay the bills this month? But that was good for me. That was good, and I was experiencing people being saved in my office.

John McLarty:  That’s great. That’s exciting. 

Kimberly Faith: Yeah.

John McLarty:  I remember that change in your life.

Kimberly Faith: And so the Lord just it was like he finally just let me flip that switch and see what life could be like. And but there was a large degree of faith that went into that, and I had to follow my faith several times. And kind of one of the big lessons I took away from that was, you know, God’s trying to make us spiritually prosperous, but we get all tangled up in the world’s definition of prosperity, which leads us into a harder path if we just pay attention the first time. 

John McLarty: Right. 

Kimberly Faith: We all have areas that eat away at our time. You don’t have to be a lawyer to have that. You know, it could be your yard.

John McLarty: I had a big revelation this year about how to spend our time, and it involved prayer, intentional prayer. So I’ve always been more of a bible teacher and reading the bible for doctrine, and then,  I think I’ve shared this with you in previous podcasts. I’ve just been spending more time in the word. But we were in Houston, in  a church that your sister, our daughter Tanya, goes to. And we were challenged, a visiting preacher, David Gibbs, about prayer. Because I’m always like, yes. I need to pray more. Well, he got real specific. And he said, I think he said, do you have a prayer list? A written prayer list. And he had everybody raise their hand that did. Well, I couldn’t raise mine.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. Me either.

John McLarty: And I just thought, I have “to do”  lists. I live off my to do list, and I transfer them one to another, and I cross things off. And it’s all about mow the yard, you know, do this, pay this bill, go do this thing  there. And I went, how pathetic that I don’t have a prayer list. So I started one that day. And now, I spend more time in prayer because it’s more directed. I might finish up my bible reading and well normally I have a prayer that might last, you know, indeterminate, 2 or 3 minutes. Now I go through my prayer list. So it’s intentionally spending more time in prayer.  It’s a tool. 

Kimberly Faith: Right. It’s a tool. And we’re talking  about some of those tools today. 

John McLarty: It’s exciting.

Kimberly Faith: Well, and I’m glad you brought that up because,

John McLarty: And I’ve been a Christian for over 45 years. It was just pathetic. 

Kimberly Faith: Right. Here I am. 

John McLarty: And I just want to point out, God didn’t just show me this 1 on 1 through his word.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: I was in a good church. 

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty:  Even, you know, I was visiting a good church, and this preacher of the word of God challenged me. 

Kimberly Faith: Right. 

John McLarty: And it’s changed my life for the better.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. You bring up prayer as one of the tools. We’re going to talk about some of the tools of prosperity, and prayer is definitely one of them. But, you know, I was thinking when you were talking about this, how crazy would it be? We’ll just use a physical example. How crazy would it be if you were trying to prevail in war. Right? And, you had a unit on the ground, and they weren’t listening to their intelligence. They weren’t tuned in to the command.

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: I mean, they would be willy nilly. Right? They wouldn’t know where the enemy was hiding. They wouldn’t know what the next hill to take, just to use a World War 2 example. And without prayer as a tool, you know, your prosperity is limited. Your spiritual prosperity just let’s just talk about spiritual prosperity. What is spiritual prosperity? Let’s just define that at this point so we aren’t talking esoterically to our listeners.

John McLarty: I would say spiritual prosperity is the richness of our relationship with God. Lynn and I were discussing this the other day. I think that manifests in 2 major ways that we can kind of measure. That’s winning souls to Christ. You know, the number 1.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty:  And then encouraging fellow Christians that are involved in that same mission. So that enriches us, that’s prosperity to me. If you’re involved in, so basically, that’s leading  souls to Christ. One, and two,discipleship. So that others are encouraged to do the same thing, win souls to Christ. 

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. I think that’s a great commission.

John McLarty: That brings enrichment to our life. To me, it’s prosperity. And then, but I have to add to that. So that’s winning souls to Christ,  our relationship with our brothers, our brethren, and then that richness of that hearing the voice of God. Hearing God speak to us. 

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. That’s good. 

John McLarty: Prosperity.

Kimberly Faith: That’s manifested. The way that we can measure that, and I totally agree with you, is that the when you when you see someone who is spiritually prosperous, they’re going to  manifest the fruits of prosperity, which are the fruit of the spirit, you know, and that fruit,  along with the fruit of the spirit are going to be people. I mean, the fruit of the spirit doesn’t mean much if there aren’t people to show those things to. Right? It’s not like you sit there and enjoy a big, tray of fruit by yourself. You’ve got to share it.

John McLarty: Just being in a cave with joy and rejoicing , and who are you going to love?

Kimberly Faith: Right. Right. Who are you going to love or show peace?

John McLarty: That’s a good point.

Kimberly Faith: The best thing about love is sharing it. There’s no, it’s impossible to love by yourself. You know, you can love God, but, you know, unfortunately or fortunately, I think God was brilliant designing love this way. We can only experience his love, which is selflessness, by being selfless. Well, to be selfless, you have to have somebody more than self to do it with. Right? 

John McLarty: Right. 

Kimberly Faith: And so, what’s interesting is that God is so generous. I think one of the greatest ways, maybe the greatest way we manifest our love for him is by obeying him, which is multifaceted. It’s an example to other people. It’s part of the great commission. Right? And so the proof that you’re a spiritually prosperous person is in the souls that you brought to Christ or even the seeds you planted to bring souls to Christ. Right? Discipleship and, and this relationship that you have is undeniable. I heard a pastor say one time, one of the best proofs of the scripture are the testimonies of a person’s life. That’s the best proof that the truth is the truth, is the changed person. You can’t argue with somebody who says, I was a drug addict and God freed me from that.

John McLarty:  Right. 

Kimberly Faith: You can’t argue with that. What are you going to  say? Oh, that’s not true. Well, their life is proof that it is true.

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: You know, and in practice of law, the best arguments, and the best, the best testimony for persuading somebody of a particular idea are examples, you know, like Jesus taught. Right?

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: So, anyway, did you want to share a story?

John McLarty: Yes. There’s the idea that you ‘ve just been talking about sharing our love toward others.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: Made me think of,  it’s in Philippians. It’s funny how so many of these verses are out of Philippians. But it says, in Philippians 2:3, let nothing be done through strife or vainglory, but in the lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves.  Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be you in you, which is also in Christ Jesus. I really think about that. I personalize that. Like, when we wake up in the morning, like, I have a cousin, you know, cousin George that just needs fellowship and encouragement. 

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty:  And how often do I wake up thinking, what can I do for George today? We don’t normally think like that. That’s just not our normal thinking.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: But that’s spiritual prosperity.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: It’s like, I need to

Kimberly Faith: You don’t want to keep it to yourself.

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: Right. Yeah. That’s good. And I think, you know, another thing about spiritual prosperity, kind of as we’ve hashed this out, define this for the listeners is it’s not like physical prosperity and that it can’t be destroyed, can’t be taken from us. You know,  if, you know, that we had a country come and a communist country take over our country today, You know, we lost all of our rights as citizens of the United States, and we lost they our all of our wealth was confiscated, and we were pretty much just left with the clothes on our back. I mean, we would have a great sense of loss. Right? But Paul, like you said earlier, Paul said in prison. He hadn’t lost anything. He has learned to be content.

And I always go back to his prayer for the Ephesians that they would have more than they can ask for or imagine. Well, these 1st century Christians were not wealthy people by and large. They were working people.

John McLarty:  Right.  

Kimberly Faith: What we would call blue collar. Right?

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: And, you know, having our family having lived in both the blue collar circle and the more white collar circle circle, we kind of have seen both. And the degree of prosperity has zero to do with your feeling of joy and satisfaction. But like you said, spiritual prosperity produces this satisfaction of the soul that when it’s missing, it’s devastating. It’s worse than a coup. It’s worse than a hostile takeover of a nation because it’s your soul satisfaction. And that’s what we want to kind of talk about today is some of the tools to attain that soul satisfaction, which is true biblical prosperity. So what do you think? We’ve talked about prayer, a very important tool. And, what would you say are your most effective tools for growing your spiritual prosperity?

John McLarty: I think, spending more time in the word and recognizing God’s voice, we won’t go there, but I think it’s in John 10. It’s what Jesus says, my sheep know my voice.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And hearing that voice and then understanding this kind of fine tuning your soul. I can tell in the spirit when I’ve made a decision, maybe a selfish decision, like, oh, I’m going to  do my to do list today and not go visit brother George.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And I actually feel this is significant. I know we sin all the time.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: But there’s times when God wants me to do something, and if I resist, it’s like a dagger. It’s like I can’t, and I can’t. It’s so uncomfortable. Then if I ignore it and say even go an entire day, I just set it aside,  it’s still a lingering bad thought. Like, oh, how could you, it’s so uncomfortable  grieving the spirit.

Kimberly Faith:  Right.

John McLarty: So I’ve learned more and more, and like I said, I’ve been a Christian for over, you know, 45 years.  But in the last 5 years, I’ve become more attuned. So this is one of the tools 

Kimberly Faith: Right. 

John McLarty: Is to grow accustomed to that. You call it the path of peace.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: That we’re listening to God and we’re obeying God. We’re following him.

Kimberly Faith: The path of peace is my way of saying the holy spirit’s presence.

John McLarty: The holy spirit. Not grieving the spirit, but having the spirit. That’s what I consider one of the great, what would you call,  landmarks of Christian prosperity is to learn to recognize his voice.

Kimberly Faith: And isn’t it interesting how patient God is? I mean, you just said you went 45 years or 40 years without really understanding what that’s supposed to feel like.

John McLarty: That very one on one relationship.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. 

John McLarty: I was just more of a bible teacher,  studying doctrine, and

Kimberly Faith: Right. 

John McLarty: Serving God in a lot of ways.

Kimberly Faith: Our own relationship with our children. You know, what if it was a very didactic relationship where you just kind of went to the mechanics, but there was never that connection of, gosh, I know mom’s not happy right now because I know she wanted me to do this, but instead, I did that. Right? I know mom wanted to go shopping with me, but I didn’t want to  piddle around in Dillard’s, you know. I love shopping with mom because she, I have to tell y’all, my mom actually taught me to shop and I love the way she shops because when we shop together, it’s we tiptoe and look around.

If there’s nothing we see right away, we leave. But if mom were the kind of shopper that piddled around all day, I would probably not want to do that. But if I knew she wanted me to do that without her saying a word, but I did it anyway, that’s the kind of relationship that we want to  have with the Holy Spirit, which is an amazing tool for spiritual prosperity, because what it does is it opens up opportunities for to first to minister to people.  I was getting gas the other day in a small town in Missouri, and there was a man who kind of had longer hair. He had  his overalls on. He was bent over his pickup truck with his head on the bed while his gas was pumping. And he just looked sad. And I’m just pumping my gas. I’m trying to get, you know, to get on the road. You know, you’re in a hurry. And, I mean, the holy spirit was knock, knock, knocking, and I’m like, you know, no. He’s this guy, he may you know, what if he’s a criminal? What if you know, you have these justifications.

John McLarty: I know exactly what you’re saying.

Kimberly Faith: Right. And so I get in my car to go, and the Holy Spirit’s like, man, you have just you are just missing out. I mean, he’s just like now he starts lecturing me. Right? So I okay, fine.

So I get one of my tracts and I get out of the car, and I go over. He’s still got his head on the side of his truck bed, you know, and I put my hand on his shoulder, and I said, Excuse me, sir. Are you okay? And I could feel the Holy Spirit just start talking through me. And I’m not talking about, you know, I’m talking about English, okay?

And I said and he goes, do you raise his head? Okay, he looks at me, he just, he was it’s almost like he was so surprised anyone even noticed that he did not look okay. He goes, oh, yes, ma’am, and he had the kindest eyes. And so we got into this discussion. I said, well, you know, I said, the Lord sent me over here to make sure you were okay, so I’m going to give you my story about how Jesus rescued me.

And he just looked at that, he goes, thank you so much. He said, bless you for even caring. And, we probably had a 30 second conversation, and I said, alright. Well, I just want to make sure you’re okay, and I think the Lord wanted me to give this to you. And I walked away, and I was getting ready to get in my car, and he comes running over. And he said, can I just give you a hug?

John McLarty: Oh wow!

Kimberly Faith: And I said, well, of course. And he’s and he just you could just tell it touched him so much. And I don’t know whatever became that, but it’s that seed. You know? I was told to go plant that seed. I was trying to resist it and get down the road on my to do list, right, instead of paying attention. But those kinds of things, if we are spiritually aware because we understand. Not because we’re trying to make ourselves prosperous, but because we know the satisfaction, the soul satisfaction that comes from walking in the spirit.

John McLarty: I have to tell a similar story. 

Kimberly Faith: Okay. 

John McLarty: So I was, and I’ll try to be quick. Same thing happened to me. I was on the Fayetteville Square, and I was doing errands, and I was in a hurry and needed to get to the post office.

And there was this guy on the square that was in a chair, and, you know, had a sign, you know, as the homeless. And he looked a little, maybe he was yelling at people or glaring at people, and it made me a little nervous actually, you know. So I left. And as I drove off the square, a dagger, it’s like, John, you’re supposed to go give that guy a tract.

So I tried to talk myself out of it. Went all the way to the post office, and it was so,  I thought  I can’t go the rest of the day without going back there. Went and parked, and I was just praying. And then at that point, I’m like, I hope he’s still there. I hope he’s still there.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And he was there, and he lit up like a light bulb .

Kimberly Faith: Oh. 

John McLarty: So I went  over and talked to him, and he wanted to know all about our, you know, our life story track. 

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty:  And I thought I can’t just give him a tract  and not put,  you know, a little money in there. So I sat and talked to him. And he just wanted to tell me his story and hear our story. And it was it was, and at this I’ve learned, like, because I’ve learned the other I’ve had the other experience where I didn’t do that.

Kimberly Faith: And then you wonder.

John McLarty: And, like, several days later, I’m still feeling like, oh, you missed an opportunity. And Satan wants to accuse you and make you feel bad forever, but I thought, no. That’s going to be a lesson.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And you’re going to pray.

John McLarty: When God prompts you do it. Don’t walk away.

Kimberly Faith: It’s funny. I have a story about that. I know we’re going on with stories, but these are good stories. We were at a, I was at a restaurant with, it was one of these kind of sports bar restaurants where everybody’s kind of packed in, and we were sitting facing,  it was my daughter and I, Grace and Claire and I, we were facing this couple, and so we got to know them kind of across the the little it was a little open thing at entryway. And, of course, Claire, you know, charms everybody.

Well, I didn’t have a track with me. I wanted to give them a track when I was leaving, but I didn’t have one. And the Lord was saying  you go out there to your car and you get one and you come back, and it was across a busy street and, you know, all this, and I was like, so I got out of the car and totally forgot about it until I started the car and we were leaving, and the traffic was terrible. I was like, well, I’m just going to start praying. You know?

Lord, it’s obvious you wanted me to minister to these people, and I’m going to start praying right now that you send somebody else to intercede and to give them the gospel. We drove down the road, and we were in another store, a leather shop, and we came out, and who was on the sidewalk? But these same people, and the Lord said, okay. Hello. Did you ever put another tract in your purse?

You know? And so my car was right there. So I said, oh my gosh. I said, I’m so glad that you’re here. I said, God was telling me to give you my story and I didn’t do it, and I prayed, and here you are, and they’re just looking at me like, who is this crazy woman?

And so I ran to the car and got one. I said, this is the story about how Jesus came into my heart, and of course, you know, it has the picture of us on the teepee in the front and everything. And they were just so grateful. They’re like, we enjoyed meeting you all so much, and thank you for taking the time to do that. And so we didn’t really have a big conversation, but it was the Lord.

It was a good lesson for me. You know, even when I fail, the Lord is gracious. Right?

John McLarty: That’s right.

Kimberly Faith: And so we’re talking about tools, and you’ve mentioned prayer. And so we’ve used some examples of prayer and the Holy Spirit guiding us. Obviously, we just go through our toolbox kind of like we have prayer. We have the holy spirit. We have, we’ve talked about our own testimony, right?  Which is such a powerful tool in our toolbox. And then, obviously, we have the word.

John McLarty: Right 

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And none of this would happen without the word. Right? And so, you and I have had a lot of discussions about, you know, honing our skills in the word so that we can answer the hard questions for people. That’s been such a tool for me.

Like, somebody says, well yeah. One of the discipleship groups I teach.  The other day, one of the girls asked, well, how do you answer this question? In the book of Isaiah, it says that God created evil. And it does say that, you know?

And so, man, that made me study. I know there was an answer, but it was, you know, it was a whole discussion. And I saw, you know what? Let’s talk about that, and next week, let’s make that our time. We’re going to  get off of our concept study and we’re going to talk about this because this is a question that’s important.

And it was interesting because even with that, God brought us back to the concept study. But my point is that the word, it is, you know, Hebrews 4:12, the word of god is quick, powerful, sharper than any 2 edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of souls and  flesh and blood or,  The dividing asunder of soul and spirit

John McLarty: Soul and spirit.

Kimberly Faith: And is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And it’s funny how when you start using God’s word as your own, you know, and talking with people, that you don’t even have to figure out what they’re thinking about because the spirit and the word come together, and they,  I get asked this all the time, how did you know to ask me that question? Or how did you know this is exactly what I need to hear? I said, well, I didn’t, but the holy spirit in me did. And a matter of fact, I had a lady the other day just email me.

I get these emails all the time. I feel like when you’re writing these devotionals, you’re looking at my window. And it’s really easy for me to say, no. God’s looking at my window because the word is a common application to all of us. Doesn’t matter how long you’ve been saved.

You can still learn that you need to pray. Absolutely. So we’ve got the word prayer. We’ve got our own testimony of salvation, the holy spirit, and what else? 

John McLarty: The brethren.

Kimberly Faith: Church.

John McLarty:  Church. 

Kimberly Faith: Right? Do you think people downplay the role of the church today because of all the failures?

John McLarty: I do, but I have realized how important those relationships are. I think I’ve shared this with you. When Paul signed off in Colossians, he named 11 men who were like dearly beloved brothers to him.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And, you know, he would pray for them and, you know, their fellow servants and just he was very, surrounded.

Kimberly Faith: Yes.

John McLarty: By brothers and sisters that ministered to him, and he ministered to them.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: So I thought of that in my life and how much of my spiritual growth has been, like, this, David Gibbs.

Kimberly Faith: Right. Attributable to the church.

John McLarty: Attributable to the church. I heard that message in church, and now I have a prayer list.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And I’m so excited about it. But I don’t think I would have just been in a cave, and the Lord would say, you need a prayer list.

Kimberly Faith: Well, throughout scripture, God has used the institution of the, like, I mean, the Israelite, the nation of Israel, and the church of the New Testament. And even in just plain old, you know, humanistic elements like an army or, you know, that sort of thing. We’re stronger together. There’s no question about that. And the church, of course, is to preserve the truth just like Israel was the house of witness. And you think about it, the typical complaint with the church is so lame, like, oh, well, this pastor failed me or this priest failed me or whatever. This person that was a deacon 

John McLarty: Didn’t say hi.

Kimberly Faith: Didn’t yeah. Whatever. Trivial to the horrible. Okay? But the fact is we don’t we don’t not brush our teeth because our dentist doesn’t brush his teeth.

John McLarty: Correct.

Kimberly Faith: And if God says this is what we’re supposed to do, we only don’t, we only choose not to do that if we think we’re smarter than God.

John McLarty: And  the church is this assembly of believers.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And you just cannot read the New Testament and not get that Jesus said he’d build his church.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And then here’s the church all through Acts and Paul’s ministry is not just spreading the gospel. He’s building the church. Empowering and ordaining elders in the church. He just you can’t honestly read the new testament

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. 

John McLarty: And not come up with, you know, forsake not the assembling of yourselves together in the house of God.

Kimberly Faith: Right. And it’s and it’s you know,  when I have, people ask me, well, I can’t find a church that I fit into or a church that I like, my response to that is you are supposed to be part of a church, and your job isn’t to be, to like it or to fit in. Your job is to make it better.

John McLarty: You go make it the way it should be.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. 

John McLarty: You go minister.

Kimberly Faith: In a true church, you’re going to be  just like an army unit. You don’t join the army to be fed, to be clothed, to be, you know, catered to, you join the army to go fight.  And you join a church to be part of the process. We’re in a spiritual warfare, we’ve talked a lot about spiritual warfare, we have a video on spiritual warfare. We’re in a fight, and the church is not a hospital for sinners. There’s a hospital wing because we need a hospital wing, but that’s not the point of a church. It’s not a country club for Christians either. It’s a unit that’s supposed to be carrying out a battle, and we talk about spiritual prosperity.

Man, we’ve talked about what our purpose is according to God’s word. Our purpose is to glorify God. That’s the ultimate purpose. And he says, yeah, you’re going to glorify me, and guess what? You get to prosper while you do that.

And your prosperity is the kind you can take with you. And, oh, yeah. And by the way, you can also really enjoy it here on earth. You know, we just spent a whole, you know, couple days as a family hanging out together and, it’s amazing the difference between a family that is centered in the life of Christ and a family that’s not. Because love, joy, peace, goodness, kindness, gentleness, meekness, those things are going to be your focus.  Even playing games. I mean, you know, we are a very competitive family, and we played a two  hour game last night. It was pretty competitive. But there was no name calling, there was no, you know now there could have been, you know, but it’s because we’re so competitive.

John McLarty: Good fellowship.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. Good fellowship. And so these tools we’re talking about are great tools for, for basically carrying out spiritual prosperity.

John McLarty: Just an area of this prosperity in the church that we’ve just experienced. And we go, some people just endure church. Lynn and I, we love church. 

Kimberly Faith: Yeah.

John McLarty: We just love our church. And I know there’s churches where you just go and you need to minister and, you know, it’s not quite what you want it to be, but we’re just blessed. So we’re in church for the Christmas day service. And, you know, it’s a family. You know the Hardens.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And so here’s, so you have Tom Harden and then you have Paul Harden. He’s married to Shelley. So it’s their 2 little kids, Ethan and Ellie. So it’s like a 7 year old boy and a 5 year old girl. They got up and do a special.

Kimberly Faith: Oh. 

John McLarty: And she played the piano, and it’s away in a manger.  She played the piano and he sang and it was just, you talk about enrich your life. And it wasn’t just some random two kids.

Kimberly Faith: Right. 

John McLarty: It was kids of kids of kids.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: You know? I mean, Tom Harden and us, we were, you know, kind of charter members. He was there a little bit before us. 

Kimberly Faith: It’s like seeing your own family do something like that.

John McLarty: Right.  It’s just we were just full of the Holy Spirit. You know?

Kimberly Faith: That’s a great example because, you know, the church, I think, is undervalued in our culture where there’s just I mean, you had all the scandals in the Catholic church. Right? You had all these and you had the whole, who was the preacher that ended up in jail? His wife had the makeup that ran down her face. You know what I’m talking about?

John McLarty: Oh, yeah. Jimmy Swaggart?

Kimberly Faith: Is it Jimmy Swaggart?

John McLarty: Baker. Tammy Faye Baker and Jim Baker.

Kimberly Faith: Right. And, you know, I’m not saying anything bad about these people. I’m just saying that it is you’ve had these scandals that have rocked the whole institution of a church. Right? But the fact is, the church is supposed to be family. They’re your spiritual family. And, you know, it’s perpetual. I’ve used this example before. It’s like a trust. Trust is something you put your assets in so that when you die, it doesn’t go through probate because the trust is a living trust. Yeah. The church is a living church.

John McLarty: It’s supposed to be a carrier of the gospel.

John McLarty: And as in Ephesians, for the perfecting of the saints.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. For the perfecting of the saints, for the glory of God.

John McLarty:  For the work of the ministry.

Kimberly Faith: Right. So, so anyway yeah. So the church is obviously an important tool. Well, okay. So we’re rocking right along here, dad, but we are at the end of this podcast time, and we’ve talked about our tools. But I think, what I want to  do is go ahead and do a part 2 on this podcast. Okay.

John McLarty: We need to.

Kimberly Faith: I think we should too, and, we’re going to talk about next time how to use these assets to become prosperous and what that looks like. So, thank you for joining us. You’ve been listening to the Truth in Love podcast, and we’ll look forward to joining you next time. Are you joining us next time? However you want to look at it for part 2 of biblical prosperity.

Jacob Paul: You’ve been listening to the Truth in Love podcast with your hosts, Kimberly Faith and John Mack. To discover more answers to the big questions in life, visit us at gofaithstrong.com.