In today's dollars, David would have been considered a billionaire or a multi-billionaire.
So his son, Solomon, increased this wealth by tenfold.
Solomon grew the financial foundation that David had started.
He invested trade, commerce, gifts from foreign entities, tribute money, and taxes.
All right, so next guys, we're going to hop into our next point.
And that is that there are countless individuals in scripture that were extremely wealthy.
Let's start with the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
So many biblical scholars and archaeologists point towards the fact that these patriarchs
were extremely wealthy.
A few key points on this, scripture says that they were skilled merchants working on transporting
trade around different parts of the ancient world.
Now this type of work in the merchant world is one that was not fully understood, but is
considered very lucrative in nature.
And this was an area that was largely focused on transporting goods all over the world,
and that's largely where the Silk Road came into being in the ancient world.
So starting with Abraham, though, it says that there were 318 skilled servants for battle.
That is a large force, and that's what he used to bring back Lot when Lot was captured.
So this is not someone who didn't have a good amount of money to be able to have that.
And so Abraham had a lot of financial success.
It also says that Abraham passed his skills down, market skills down to Isaac.
So this is Genesis 26, 13, and 14.
It says, quote, the man Isaac became rich and his wealth continued to grow until he
became very wealthy.
He had so many flocks and herds and servants that the Philistines envied him.
Think about that.
An entire people group envying someone's wealth.
That is some serious financial success.
So these patriarchs were very successful.
Now let's do another kind of scriptural analysis related to the conquest of the Promised Land
by the Israelites.
So to start on this, scripture says that the Israelites took the wealth of the Egyptians
when they were leaving Egypt.
This is very important.
So they come in wealthy, they go into the Promised Land, and there's more monetary blessing
that occurs.
So after a brutal campaign of the land, the land is portioned out to different tribes
of Israel.
Joshua, the leader of the conquest, says the tribes were then supposed to split things
up.
So he said, this is a quote, go home, you're going home rich.
Great herds of cattle, silver, gold, bronze, and iron, huge piles of clothing.
Share the wealth with your friends and family.
All this plunder from your enemies.
So within this military campaign, there's this entire transfer of wealth of the ancient
world in that region.
And the Israelites stand on top because God's blessing them.
So the final example, and probably the most famous of all Old Testament characters, is
David and Solomon.
So when David becomes the king of Israel as a young man, he becomes very wealthy just
due to the status of where he's at.
On top of this, though, because of the amount of conquests that occur and tributes that
are created, he starts to accumulate large amounts of tribute money.
In today's dollars, David would have been considered a billionaire or a multi-billionaire.
So his son Solomon increased this wealth by tenfold.
Solomon grew the financial foundation that David had started.
He invested trade, commerce, gifts from foreign entities, tribute money, and taxes.
So Solomon's total net worth in today's dollars reaches literally into the trillions of dollars.
He's considered by many as the wealthiest person literally ever to live.
So imagine living in those times.
So these are countless examples.
I mean, there's many, many more examples of Christians, of prior to Christianity, biblical
characters that accumulated these large amounts of money.
But here's the main point.
The majority of these biblical characters became wealthy because they walked closely
to God.
Now, this isn't a prosperity gospel that I'm preaching.
But when you follow Christ, and whether or not you're trying to become wealthy or not,
when you're doing the right thing and living by strong morals, indirectly that leads to
monetary success, especially today where we see that going out the window.
of your ethical, moral, hardworking, most likely today, you're going to see financial
success.
All right, guys, the last point I want to cover today is Proverbs 13, 22.
It reads, a good person leaves an inheritance for their children's children, but a sinner's
wealth is stored.
up for the righteous. So this is the point. God wants to remove money from the
unrighteous and put it into the hands of the righteous. So first of all, let me
break this down. How many times have you felt that there are people that have a
lot of money doing bad things? I know I can think of several. I'm sure all of us
can, but judgment is God's job. But we can feel the weight of this when people
aren't doing money for good. But we can be rest assured that God wants to change
that narrative. So God gives people time to repent of unrighteousness, time to
stop the the behavior they're doing, but Scripture points over and over that if
they do not, there will be a point of no return with God. And we can we can rest
in that. And so when the Israelites left Egypt, they left wealthy. When they entered
the Promised Land, they took the accumulated wealth from the tribes and
kingdoms of those areas because God had cast judgment on those tribes. So
this is the ultimate example of what I call biblical karma. Those that do the
right things, treat people right, do right and good hard work, they're gonna be
blessed. And then those that don't, who take shortcuts, will lose what they have.
So my boss in the financial services industry, one of my favorite quotes he
says is, the only shortcut is doing things right the first time. So from
David to Jesus, this is how God works. For those that walk with God, there's massive
amounts of blessing. That doesn't mean that life is is perfect, there's hard
things that come, but God does shift the money towards those that will be good
stewards of it. The backside to this though, is if you claim to be a Christian
and you were lazy, you know, not doing the right things, not being righteous in
the way that we're taught to, the ramifications aren't good. So this is
true still today. God blesses his people monetarily, spiritually, relationally when
we do the right thing.