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Arthur Marara Point Blank

“One day the widow of a member of the group of prophets came to Elisha and cried out, ‘My husband who served you is dead, and you know how he feared the LORD. But now a creditor has come, threatening to take my two sons as slaves.’ (NLT) 2 Kings 4:1.

Imagine you are a grieving widow, and before you are even done mourning for your spouse, someone is coming and saying “your husband was owing me, and I am going to recover the debt from taking your children and making them as slaves.”

In other words, they will be working to pay for their father’s debts.

Literally, they will not be making any money for themselves. If you are not organised in your life you will cause inconvenience to the lives of other people.

There is obvious curiosity about who I am and what I do.

I am an attorney by profession, an author by passion, and a speaker by calling.

These three facets of life have taught me how fundamental it is to be organised in life.  I have committed my life to coaching people about greatness, and I have even written books on it.

I have also had the opportunity, and I still do to represent all types of clients, and have a full appreciation of what people are experiencing in their daily lives.

I therefore treat issues from a practical and legal perspective because of the exposure I have gathered over a period of time.

The story of Elisha is of significant importance to me, and I will take some points if interest and expand, but before that, the following might be enlightening:

Visit to the auction floors

I walked into one auction floor earlier this year following up on the position of one of my client’s property which had been attached.

What I saw dumbfounded me; every type of household furniture scattered throughout the whole yard. When I went to the enquiries desk, I saw beautiful fridges, microwaves, bedroom suites inside.

Out of curiosity I asked the source of this property, only to be told that it had been taken by the Messenger of Court or the Sherriff as part of execution of judgments.

What further shocked me were the prices which these items were sold for.

Property worth thousands of dollars was sold for a few hundred dollars or even less. Not only that, the property accrues storage charges daily. That is the horror of execution! This can all be traced to debts.

The dishonest “Pastor”

The author of II Kings 4:3 opens with the story of a widow who is pleading for intervention as the children were about to be committed to slavery over the debts of the husband who also happened to be a son of a prophet.

In contemporary days, you will equate this person to a Pastor. There are two interesting things in this story;

1. i) the Pastor feared the Lord but did not fear DEBTS, (there are many people like this. You may even be reading this now)
2. ii) The Pastor had the audacity to incur obligations without even the knowledge of the wife or at least advising the wife of the existence of such an obligation, (there are many people like this as well who live double lives)

You can believe in God and be a debtor.

It has often been said that 80 percent of Zimbabweans are Christians. Being born again or subscribing to any from any form of religion does not absolve you from debts.

You can be a believer at any stage, and still live and possibly die in debt.

The gentlemen in this particular case was no ordinary individual. He was part of the sons of Prophets, and these were connected to the prophet himself.

If you have studied the Old Testament, you might be aware of how exceptional Elisha was as a prophet.

The challenge with many people today is that they are living in debt.

Sometimes, the debts are incurred even for very small things.

If you go to the courts, the majority of the cases pertain to debt collections.

You can be high standing in society yet living borrowed life.

Do not live a life of secrecy

This might shock you; many people have secret obligations in their lives.

Some people are paying maintenance for children born out of wedlock secretly; some are paying for money borrowed without the knowledge of the other spouse.

The widow in the above case was actually taken by surprise when creditors came because in so far as she was concerned all she was supposed to be working on was her grief.

Little did she know that the husband had incurred obligations whose purpose she was not even privy to?

 How honest are you as a person?

Does your spouse know the commitments that you have incurred behind their back? If you are keeping it a secret, until when are you going to do that?

Some few meters away from the home that I grew up, a wife woke to the news that the house that she had contributed and toiled so hard to build had been sold to some people because the husband had borrowed some money from some loan-shark and he had defaulted. Imagine!

Interrogate the quality of your decisions

There is a tendency to spiritualise everything when people are faced with situations.

If you borrow money and don’t pay it back, there is no spiritual attack when summons come to you.

It’s a different case when you are being sued for no apparent reasons (because you can literally file an exception or take a special plea and prosecute your rights).

There are people who are living from one debt to another, using one debt to pay another debt. Borrowing is not the solution. You need to address the reason why you want to borrow in the first place.

Look closely at your lifestyle and how sustainable it is. Many of our problems can be traced to the quality of our decisions.

We live to impress people who are busy with their own lives, and we end up depressed.

Churches in Zimbabwe are living in debt, they owe salaries to their employees, churches that have businesses are sometimes not remitting statutory deductions, and service providers are not even paid by some ministries.

If we do not look at the quality of our decisions, the quality of results will never change.

Strive for financial freedom

We are living in a very difficult economic environment, but it is still possible to live a financially free life.

I can do a full article on Financial Freedom, but I will not do so in this one.

Read my latest book “Toys for Adults” and learn how to develop multiple streams of income.

Live within your means, stay away from debt, and if you are in debt already, commit to clearing the debts in a way that will not suffocate you, increase your streams of income, enhance your capacity to generate income, engage people who can help you stretch your earning capacity, develop a culture of serving (try the 52-week money challenge), walk away from what you do not need, and invest in what you need. These are all basic keys among others which can help you stay financially free.

Leave better legacies

One person once said, “A person is remembered for two things, problems they have caused and problems they have solved.”

What problems are you solving for your family? I often say if you are not solving problems, you are causing problems.

Be a hero for your family. Even if you were going to pass on today, you can give them a better start to life. Is your house in order? What will happen to your family if you pass on today?

Will creditors come to a mourning widow on your account? The choice is all up to you. What are you choosing today?

Join me on Star FM on Wednesdays (09:40am-10:00am) for some moments of inspiration on the Morning Galaxy with V Candy.

Arthur Marara is a corporate law attorney, keynote speaker, corporate and personal branding speaker commanding the stage with his delightful humour, raw energy, and wealth of life experiences. He is a financial wellness expert and is passionate about addressing the issues of wellness, strategy and personal and professional development. Arthur is the author of “Toys for Adults” a thought provoking book on entrepreneurship, and “No one is Coming” a book that seeks to equip leaders to take charge. Send your feedback to [email protected] or Visit his website www.arthurmarara.com or contact him on WhatsApp: +263780055152.