Life gets so difficult at times. sorry I am so late posting this just seemed to get off track. I inquired and have permission to post out of what Herb Miller has as part of this study. The addition of his info should promote and invoke more thought. WaynO
III
Scriptures are Matt. 19.16-24 and Luke 20. 19-26

Questions
1. Do you agree or disagree with the interpretation of Jesus's teachings that says prayer offers more security than money?
2. What warnings would you want to give people who operate their daily life on the conviction that prayer provides greater security than money?
3. Have you been closely acquainted with people who seemed to live out the belief that prayer is our most important source of security? If so. how did that seem to affect their emotional and behavioral patterns? What do you think caused those patterns to develop in their personality?

As for what Herb has to say I will include it a bit at a time.

II. The Bottom Line Comes from Above
Two psychiatrists were having a drink at a convention.
"What was the most difficult case you ever had'1" one asked.
"A patient who lived in a fantasy world." the other replied. "He insisted that he had a rich uncle in South America who would soon die and leave him a fortune. Even day he waited for a letter from an attorney. I treated him with psychotherapy three times a week for eight years."
"Did you cure him?" the other psychiatrist asked.
"Yes and no." the first psychiatrist said. "Just as I was making progress, that stupid letter came."
Some of the statements Jesus made about money sound like that story. We try to force his teachings into rational, scientifically verifiable thought patterns. But some of Jesus's words will not fit into those categories. At the point of financial security, for example. Jesus sounds more radical than rational. In the Sermon on the Mount, he lists several of life's material necessities and talks about the anxiety we sometimes feel with regard to these basics. Will we earn enough to attain them? He concludes that discussion with this paradoxical statement. "But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well" (Matthew 6:33).
While that statement rnav not fit with our normal rules of logic, it does fit with the other things Jesus said about money. Note what the Gospel of Matthew reports Jesus saying just before he makes that radical statement. He has just finished teaching his disciples the Lord's Prayer, among whose verses we find "Give us this day our daily bread" (Matthew 6:11). Then, early in the next chapter, Jesus says, "Ask, and it will be given you: search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you" (Matthew 7:7). "If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!" (Matthew 7:11). Jesus's listing of the basic necessities of life proves that he does not live in a fantasy world. He knows that we need food, doming, and shelter. But he says our financial security does not come by accumulating money; it comes through our daily prayer relationship with God. For Jesus, the bottom line of the family budget comes from above—not by adding the list of anticipated expenses. Jesus says the bottom line of our financial security comes from God. To get the bottom line balanced, we must look up. but much higher up than our rational thinking suggests.
The question implicit in Jesus's teaching about financial security is one that all of us ask every da\ of our lives: Will I try to achieve financial security through money or through prayer? As we answer that question, each of us tends to both believe and resist believing what Jesus said is the only appropriate choice. On one hand, we see that Jesus is right. On the other hand, we are constantly tempted to think and behave as if Jesus were wrong on this issue.

I hope this is not too much to get in one blog. Waiting to hear from you all. WaynO