First Gentleman with Wilson Orhiunu
Email: babawill2000@gmail.com Twitter: @Babawilly
Money is the ultimate yabis guy. He would make fun of you and ridicule you no end.
The rich have a lot of it and hear a lot of promises. Money in its sweet and deceitful voice promises to be loyal and never disappoint. “I will never let you down,” it says. It promises to go out and attract relatives to reside in your vault just for the love it has for you. Soon the vault gets crowded and the rich in turn fall in love. That is when the money sprouts wings and flies away. As the lover gazes at his beloved money flying into the sunset, all he hears is laughter. The truth is money is a lover that would not stay forever. Love it, lock it up, give it all your day and even embrace insomnia for it. It goes and if it doesn’t then you go and it refuses to go with you.
Money is exactly like your dearest ones. They would all cry at your death bed, but once you die you sleep in the mortuary alone. At best you get a shining coffin (the best that money can buy) and a befitting burial, but the family keeps the change. The loved ones cry at your funeral and the money laughs at you, saying, you are on your own. Money has no visa to heaven or hell.
Jesus spoke about the deceitfulness of riches as a distraction from faith. Money is truly a force that sets to mislead and but for the grace of God we would all be crazy with confusion over money.
The poor also are deceived into believing that money will cure all their problems. Some worship money more than the rich who have it. The problem here is that as soon as money comes, they urgently try to remove any visible trace of poverty from their person. They rush to the stores and try to mimic the image of the rich people they have seen. They become poor people dressed in expensive clothes and are pleased for a season till the clothes fade. Not all ‘poor’ people are the same. Some people have a poverty of knowledge, confidence and even dignity. Some just lack only money. Buying a designer hat to wear seems nice to the eyes but a book might have been better if one is poor in knowledge.
A study of many poor people who come to sudden wealth through winning the lottery, musical or sporting careers show that they are poor 20 to 30 years down the line. These are the ones who say “I used to have money before.”
In 2008 the news broke of a few Nigerians who had murdered their wives due to domestic arguments or divorce. The main contentious issue was never child custody or infidelity. It was simply money or property. These men had now believed that the money being made by themselves or their wives was the most important thing in their mutual existence and if the cash flow was threatened in anyway, then life was not worth living any more.
I have read of cases where a guy lost a house worth under $200,000 and decided to kill his wife and spend the rest of his life in prison.
These men have had the hope extracted out of them. They believe that the money or property lost will never or can never be replaced.
“I have lost everything I have worked for” and “How can I start again at my age?” are the kinds of statements these killers make.
Money and all manner of riches are deceitful. They make promises both ways. While in your embrace they vow never to leave and you are seduced into falling in love. When they fly away, they laugh, jeer and shout to you, “You will never see my type again till you die.”
The hearer then says to himself, “I might as well die now and I am not going alone”.
The truth is we will all leave the money or even the debts behind one day. Enjoy your life and never fall in love with wealth.
Work hard for it, spend sensibly, invest wisely but don’t kill yourself if the stock market plummets or the house prices crash.
A man or woman is much more than what he or she possesses. If our identity is tied to just our saving accounts and investment portfolio and we begin to worship them with underlying love, then the poison chalice will be on our lips is our investment is lost.
I once worked on a ward where a billionaire was dying; I had only seen him in the papers and on the television before that. Being younger then all I could think of was why he should die and leave billions of pounds behind. Unfortunately, he had an illness that had outsmarted the best medicine money could buy.
Faith can help
Jesus called a man a rich fool for storing up wealth for himself to enjoy till he dies and not being “rich towards God”. Proof that loving wealth is not wise.
He also commended a widow who donated to the temple two pennies and He valued her gift more than the rich people who gave out of their abundance into the temple offering box. This shows that one might be poor financially but have a generous and rich heart. Money indeed is not everything.
The Christian faith teaches that one should put ones trust in God and not in uncertain riches. If someone takes your coat, don’t kill them. Let them have your waist coat. You can always buy better clothes new week. That is the way to overcome the deceitfulness of riches.
