Just imagine a generous God one day decides to give every single person in the world billions of US dollars. You know what will happen? Since the sole motive for working is to get money – like most people think – no one will turn up for work. As a result, there will be no products in the market because no one will be out there serving them. For instance there will be no food because no one will be willing to sell or serve, there will be no transport, no TV no anything.
We need to work to serve needs not just for the sake of making money. This is because we need more than money to live; we need what money can buy – products. If money is plenty and yet, there are few or no products to buy there will be a problem. We can live without money, but we can’t live without serving one another.
Money simply serves as the store of value and as a medium of exchange of products (goods and services). At its best money can only facilitate business not as the principal product by itself. This is what has been the case since time immemorial.
Experts tell us that before money was introduced around year 12,000 B.C., people did business by exchanging product with another product, for example, a bag of rice for a bag of beans. This is called barter trade. Gift economy is another traditional form of meeting our needs. In a gift economy, valuable goods and services are regularly given without any explicit agreement for immediate or future rewards. Some consider this to be a form of reciprocal altruism- for example, the sharing of food in some hunter-gatherer societies, where food-sharing as a safeguard against the failure of an individual’s daily foraging. (Read more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money)
Primarily then, we don’t need money to live; we need what money can buy – products. If money is plenty and yet, there are few or no products to buy there will be a problem. We can live without money, but we can’t live without goods and services. Depending too much on money is like building a house of money, it will never sustain life.
The value of any currency is determined, primarily, by the volume and value of trade done (or material wealth) within the country. When the government prints more money than the availability of products it creates an economic crisis called inflation. This simply means people have more money in their pockets than the products to be bought. As a result, the price of those essential products becomes extremely high. But when trade is allowed to boom products become readily available and, as a result, prices are driven down; hence leading to a cheaper cost of living.
Business is the only reliable way of meeting our needs. Without it, life will be brought in to a halt. We are expected to work not just for the sake of making money but, primarily, to serve needs.
To enjoy services without paying for it is cheating. To expect others to serve you while enjoying a life of plenty is selfishness. Aware of these perverted attitudes God set a law that says the quality of life on earth is directly proportional to the service one gives to the world. Those who serve more enjoy more wealth and live a fuller life. It is that simple!
The only purpose for our creation was working – to take care of each other and the world. The Bible says God created the world – mountains, rivers, precious metals and other creatures. Then He created a human being to manage it for Him. (Genesis 1:26- 31, 2:5-15).
To succeed in business, one must find a problem and solve it. Prosperity is a direct product of the quality of service rendered. If you wish to succeed in this life you must find a problem that everybody’s got and come up with a solution for it. Figure out a way to supply a product or a service better, cheaper, faster or easier. Clemmons Wilson saw that there was a need for hotels that could accommodate families that were travelling, and he started Holiday Inns. And Holiday Inns has since become one of the most successful hotel chains in the world.
Please remember: Work is for life and life is for work. We come here to work and we work to live.
“Let us realize”, says David McKay, “that the privilege to work is a gift, the power to work is a blessing, the love of work is success”
Dreamlife Mission 