My wife and I were tithers and givers, my family lived well, and my business was prosperous. But our income just about matched our outgoings, tithes and offerings and we had a sizable mortgage on our home and a large bank loan I had used to start my business with.
In October 2008 the economy crashed and in the same month my bank changed my lending terms requiring extra payments from me equivalent to 75 percent of what my family and I had been living on. The logical thing to do was to discontinue all our tithing and giving, especially as people predicted my business would suffer greatly in the recession. But I meditated on how Isaac sowed in a time of famine and reaped a hundredfold. So instead of cutting back on our partnerships and giving, we asked God to show us how we could sow even more.
Although at first it looked impossible or at best unsustainable, God provided “seed for the sower” showing us how we could convert our monthly pension contributions to continue to pay, and in fact, increase our tithes and giving to God’s work. We filled our hearts with the Word and spoke what overflowed from our hearts.
Now, over two years later, having lived our normal lifestyle each month, my business has increased its profits and my wife and I have been able to clear all of our loans and give the equivalent of a full year’s pre-recession earnings to God’s work, over and beyond our normal tithes and giving! And all of this was during the worst recession ever. Surely that represents exceeding, abundantly beyond all we could ever ask, desire or imagine.