Richard Roberts wants to share something with you. I remember Mr. Beale, my first banker, and the enormous influence he had in giving me a practical demonstration of God’s financial laws in the secular world. The Lord brought him across my path at the right time to help me better understand the revelation which God inspired me to call Seed-Faith. I’ll never forget the day Mr. Beale sat me down in his office and said, “I have a story I want to tell you that I believe might help you in your life and ministry.”
Winter Night Crisis
He went on to tell me that one winter he was returning from another city when his car had a flat tire. It was late at night and very cold. As he got out to fix the flat, he discovered that he didn’t know how to use the jack or remove the wheel. He tried to flag down other cars, but no one stopped. So he got back in his car and turned up the heater. He soon realized that he was dangerously stranded and his life could be in serious trouble. But almost out of nowhere, a big 18-wheeler drove up and stopped. The driver got out and said, “Are you in trouble?”
Mr. Beale said, “Yes, I am,” and when he told him his problem, the driver said, “I can fix your flat in 10 minutes.” And just as he said, in about 10 minutes, the tire was fixed. When he finished, Mr. Beale offered to pay him. Amazingly he replied, “Oh, no, that was my good deed for the day.”
Mr. Beale said, “Wait just a minute.” He wrote him a receipt for $200. As he handed it to him, he said, “You don’t know me, but I’m a banker. If you ever have need for $200, you just bring this into my bank in Tulsa. You’ll find this amount deposited to your account.”
The receipt is a wonderful thing to think about if you ever need it, but the real power is not in the receipt itself—it’s when you cash it in.
How nice it is to have a piece of paper that says you have money in an account if you ever get desperate.
But, oh, what a huge difference it is in having that nice piece of paper in times of need, and you can get the actual money to pay the bill. Mr. Beale said, “A few months later, I heard a discussion between one of my cashiers and a man I recognized as the trucker who had helped me, and possibly saved my life.
“The cashier had the receipt I had signed for the man. She asked him if he had an account in this bank. He replied, ‘All I know is that the president of your bank signed this receipt for me, and said if I ever needed $200, to come to this bank and cash it.’ “Immediately I said to the cashier, ‘Mrs. Jones, that’s my signature on that receipt. He has an account with me, and I personally put the $200 in his account, so please give him the money.’”
A Valuable Lesson
That day, I learned a very valuable lesson about seed and harvest, and holding on to a receipt that is honored by the most available power behind it. I thought of Philippians 4:13-19 KJV. God tells us we have a heavenly account, according to verse 17: Not because I desire a gift: but I desire fruit [or resources or provision] that may abound to your account. I’ve told this story many times. Still, it continues to remind me that each time I give, God Himself is writing out my receipt on the “bank” He heads in heaven. It’s directly connected on earth to my Christian walk with God—and it’s connected to every one of us, as we give to God.
Richard Roberts I believe that right now you can start a new life with God meeting your needs and challenges that may not otherwise be met. And I believe this principle can be applied in every area of your life, beginning at this moment.
