REMEMBER, DON’ T USE GOD AS A S PA R E T I R E IN BUSINESS AND LIFE By Bill Warren
Things were going along smoothly in the jewelry store we’d just opened back in 1993. Our first year had come off nicely and my wife Angie was ready to quit her job and start helping me in our store. I’d basically grew up around the business and felt very confident I could handle most anything....but then... Well into our second year, I tried to grow too fast and made some terrible inventory buying decisions. We had all of this gorgeous jewelry and guess what...it kept sitting in our showcases and the bills kept coming due! Of course, we had lines of credit which I quickly maxed out. Power bills, insurance, staff plus the inventory bills all came due and it looked like things would crash around us.
18 | ON M AG A Z I N E N ACORNER ME FAITH EVERY
One morning my wife told me that if we didn’t have X amount of dollars by the end of the day, it was all over...we’d have to shut things down. So I looked at her and said, “Let’s talk to God about it like we should have in the first place!” We both knelt down to pray in the backroom of our old store location and asked God to forgive us for not seeking “His” direction before we made these terrible buying decisions. It’s funny how we’d asked him about everything else but we’d grown overconfident in our own abilities by the second year and didn’t seek his guidance. We finished our prayer, got up and with tears in our eyes, gave each other a big hug knowing that whatever happened, God would be there to bring us through. We also knew we’d accept whatever his judgement brought. And then it happened... The phone started ringing, people we’d never met all of the sudden started showing up at our door to do business. By the end of the day, we had exactly the dollar amount we needed plus extra. It taught us both a lesson about seeking God’s will first in not only business but all areas of our life. God showed us his mercy that day...he could just as easily have let the whole thing collapse. Friends let me encourage today, put God first in all things, seek his guidance to light your path. Don’t use him as a “Spare Tire”....yes, he can show up and rescue you from your bad decisions but wouldn’t it be better if you asked him about things first and avoided making the bad decision to begin with? Blessings to all...
