As Long As He Sought the Lord...

I've been listening to the Daily Audio Bible on iTunes lately. It's been interesting. The guy who puts it up reads from a different version of Scripture each week, and this week is my personal favorite translation: the English Standard Version. At the risk of sounding like a Scriptural elitist, I prefer the ESV to other versions because it has always been closer to the original when I have translated from the Greek. Unfortunately, I don't know Hebrew nearly as well, so I can't say the same. Anyhoo....

Part of today's reading comes from 2 Chronicles 26, and verse 5 really stuck out to me as I was listening. "He (Uzziah) set himself to seek God in the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear of God, and as long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper" (2 Chron 26:5).

I have some serious problems with the so-called "prosperity gospel." It's the idea that if you follow God, you will be blessed... materially. Of course, the logical conclusion of this is that if you have "things" then God has blessed you, and if you live in poverty, then God has not blessed you. What a horrible, horrible approach to the gospel. As I read through Scripture, more often than not, it is those who are most faithful that go through the most difficult times. However, I don't think that this particular verse supports the prosperity gospel.

What I see here is what happens when we truly seek after the Lord. When we seek after the will of God, we are blessed. When we seek after the Lord, material possessions do not matter as much because we have everything in its proper perspective. When we seek the Lord, the Lord will take care of our needs, and we have to trust in Him to provide. Maybe He will provide abundantly, but maybe, just maybe, He will only give us enough to make it through the day. Either way, our focus needs to be on Him. As long as we seek the Lord, we will prosper.