Financial Policy: Opposites

This week I discovered a letter I wrote, which coincided with a period in ministry where variant approaches to finances were an issue. In fact they were particularly acute, so that this excerpt reveals a classic opposition of ministry. I was writing at a time of prosperity: "We actually had a complete opposition  of approaches -- me saying that God will provide, stop majoring on the minors, express some confidence in Him -- others saying that we need to go into maintenance mode and man the barricades, and all that the minister suggests by way of vision and expansion is so that others can do his work for him.  But maintenance mode means decline and death, to me.  I was in fact minister when cheques were bouncing -- while the bank kindly suggested that we didn't have an overdraft facility." OBSERVATION: I didn't make that last point explicit. It was, I think, to emphasise that God will provide, on the first approach, in spite of worldly appearances -- and that was my own experience even in extremis.