CHAPTER 1-THE MYSTERY OF THE KEYS
My journey to finding the keys of success started one night while sitting across the table from my wife, Nathalie, in our first home. It was in that moment that I realized that if we paid our tithes, we would not be able to pay our bills that month. We were broke. FLAT BROKE!
The year was 1997. We were newlyweds, married for just over a year at that point. We were living in a house, exchanging rent for the work I was doing to fix it up. I had just started a business and was desperate because work was hard to find. Thankfully, Nathalie and I had established some good financial habits and we were generally on the same page when it came to our finances. That night, we had dinner, then sat together and balanced our checkbook, like we had done many times before.
Sitting at that table with Nathalie, I did not know that God was setting me up for one of the most transformational moments of my life. What I did know was that I was frustrated. I was overwhelmed. What I was doing was not working. I was upset with myself. I understood that God had great things for us and that success was meant to be ours in this life, but I also felt I was constantly banging on the door of success, yet it was not opening. It was a door to which I did not have the key. A door that was keeping me from reaching the success I knew God wanted me to have. I felt locked out! I didn’t lack the faith to believe that God was good and that He wanted to bless me. I just couldn’t figure out how to access it.
We lived in a town where the average income was $14,000 a year in the early 1990s. I had a stable job at Walmart as a department manager of sporting goods and automotive. When God told me to leave my steady job and start a business, I was certain I had heard Him clearly. I had done what God told me to do, but something was not working!
This was extra frustrating for me because I felt like I should have figured it out by now. I had graduated from one of the most prestigious faith colleges in the world. I had heard everything about faith and prosperity.
I had read the books, studied my Bible, prayed the prayers, and confessed faith till I was blue in the face. Even though I had not grown up with much, I thought I had worked through those limiting beliefs and I was ready for success. More accurately, I thought I should be successful by now. Was I really that slow of a learner? It was disturbing. I could see God’s desire for my life, but at the same time, it felt out of reach. It was locked behind that door, and I didn’t have a key.
The understanding of our dire financial situation was unsettling for both of us. But for me, I felt the additional pressure of being the provider. This amazing woman sitting across from me had left her home in France to marry me and start a new life in the United States. This was not the life I had promised her. Nathalie didn’t give me any signs that she was wavering. But my own fears of failure, of letting her down, of what others would say, were overwhelming me. The list of questions racing through my mind were gut-wrenching: What are we going to do? Is this the moment where my life begins to completely unravel? Am I really just an imposter? Is this where everyone who said I wouldn’t make it is proved right? Will our love be strong enough to survive if I don’t figure this out? Why hasn’t God come through? Why hasn’t my faith worked? What am I supposed to do now?
Disappointment was trying to fill my heart and my mind. When we consistently do not reach our goals, the Scripture says that we become disinterested and spiritually lazy (Hebrews 6). Our hearts begin to lose hope and joy. It’s a recipe for disaster. That’s where I was at, and I was fighting against spiraling downward. I went to
