I was accustomed to skimming books and hitting the highlights. It dawned on me about halfway through the first book that I was not going to receive the fullness of the anything that way. I went back to the beginning and started again. This time I read slowly and purposefully.
I changed my reading habits. I started meditating and studying what I had read. I was no longer going for quantity, but rather quality. One day as I was speaking in tounges and meditating on what I read, the Holy Spirit showed me five different types of prosperity. This was news to me;
- Evil prosperity– money made in the exploitation of others.
- Workingman’s prosperity– where most of the world and many Christians live their financial lives; they educate themselves, they work, they save, they invest and their wealth grows. This group takes the credit for their prosperity. “My power and the wealth of my hands have gotten me this wealth. (Duet 8:17) This is toiling.
- Blended prosperity– the man who wavers between trusting God and his own ability. Tries to trust God, but really doesn’t have enough Bible truth within him to stand against financial adversity when a crisis comes. They fall back upon themselves when the pressure is on. Between their faith and actions, they get enough relief to maintain, but never truly step into God’s prosperity. They receive a measure of God’s prosperity, but never experience a true breakthrough. (This is where we found ourselves for so many years.)
- Prosperity through the Covenant– the group who have spent the time studying, meditating, praying and confessing God Word for long enough that they have built within their heart an unshakeable scriptural foundation concerning Gods will to prosper. When temptations come to fall back into the natural to relieve financial pressure they do not bow. Financial pressure us one of the strongest pressures we face. Most never make it to this level because the pressure is great. It can be very uncomfortable, embarrassing and even inconvenient.
- Superabundant revelation and supply -It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to go to heaven. We have misunderstood this scripture. It is metaphorical. God’s definition of rich is super-abundant supply; developing cities and regions as Abraham did. There are very few men living who have lived who attain this level of prosperity. There are just a few on the earth now. Bishop Oyedoepo, Ken Copeland, to a degree Mac Hammond, Bill Winston, and others are rising. Their influence is far greater than a local church. It affects the region’s economy. They have great influence on their world. They are like Abraham; “exceedingly prosperous.”