Chapter 28
Prosperity in the Home
“Peace be within thy walls,
And prosperity within thy palaces.” (Psalms 122:7)
1. There need be no poor homes. Every home can be prosperous. You can prove this by getting busy along the right lines. Every visible item of wealth in the world today can be traced to its invisible source. Food comes from grains. Grain is planted in the earth; but who sees or knows the secret quickening that touches the seed and makes it to bear a hundredfold? No one. That is all carried out in the invisible source of things; but the result of an unseen force acting upon the grain is food for the multitude.
2. The physical substance which we call the earth is the visible form of the spiritual substance that pervades all things. The grain is put into the earth; the quickening thought that runs through the spiritual universe causes the life germ to start and to take hold of the physical substance that nourishes it.
3. The word is the seed. The word is dropped into the spiritual substance. It germinates. It grows. It brings forth after its kind. “Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?”
4. You who farm, and you who garden, choose the seed for next year’s planting from the finest specimens of this year’s crop. You reject every defective seed that you detect. If you think that your own harvest does not give you the right seed for the coming planting, you send out for the best to be had. In this way you make sure of the nature of your coming crop.
5. If you want prosperity in your home, you will have to exercise the same intelligent discrimination in selecting your word seed that the farmer uses in selecting his seed.
6. When you talk and talk “hard times,” you are sowing “hard times” seed. By the sure law of growth and yield, what kind of harvest will you reap? If a farmer sowed thistle seed, and then complained that his field did not yield him wheat, you would say: “The foolish man! If he wanted wheat, why didn’t he sow wheat?”
7. You can begin now to bring prosperity into your home. The first thing for you to do is to discard the words that have in them the idea of poverty, and then select carefully the words that hold the idea of plenty. Never make an assertion, no matter how true it may look on the surface, that you do not want continued or reproduced in your home. Do not say that money is scarce; the very statement of such a thought will send money fleeing from your fingers. Never say that times are hard with you; these words will tighten your purse strings until Omnipotence will be powerless to loosen them.
8. Begin right now to talk plenty, think plenty, give thanks for plenty.
9. The spiritual substance out of which visible wealth comes is never depleted. It is right with you all the time. It will respond to your faith in it. It will yield according to your demands upon it. It is never affected by your ignorant talk about hard times, but you are affected because your ideas govern your demonstration. The unfailing resource is always willing to give. It has no choice in the matter; it must give, for that is its nature. Pour your living words of faith into substance, and you will be prospered though all the banks in the world shut their doors. Turn the energy of your thought upon “plenty ideas,” and you will have plenty, no matter what people about you are saying.
10. Another thing: You are not to take your prosperity as a matter of fact. You are to be as deeply grateful for every demonstration as you would be for some unexpected treasure poured into your lap. You are to expect prosperity because you are keeping the law, and you are to give thanks for every blessing that you gain. This will keep your heart fresh. Thanksgiving for good may be likened to the rain that falls upon the ready soil, refreshing vegetation and increasing the productiveness of the soil. When Jesus Christ had only a little supply from which to feed a multitude, He gave thanks for what He had, and that little grew into such an abundance that all were satisfied, and much was left over.
11. Blessing has not lost its power since the time when Jesus Christ used it. Try it and prove its efficacy. The same power of multiplication is within it. Praise and thanksgiving have within them the quickening spiritual power that produces growth and increase.
12. Never condemn anything in your home. If you want new articles of furniture or clothing to take the place of those which may be at the point of giving out, do not talk about what you have as being old or shabby. Watch your ideas; see yourself clothed as befits a child of the King, and your house furnished as pleases your ideals. Use the patience, the wisdom, and the assiduity that the farmer employs in his planting and cultivating, and your crop will be as sure as his.
13. The truths that are here spoken are energized by the living Spirit. Your mind and heart are now open and receptive to the ideas that will inspire you with the understanding of the potency of your own thought and word. You are prospered. Your home has become a magnet, drawing to it all good from the unfailing, inexhaustible reservoir of supply. Your increase comes through your righteousness.
