Becoming Wealth Blessed With Author Elizabeth Brickman In this powerful episode of the Kingdom Revolution Podcast, host Kristin Dronchi welcomes Elizabeth Brickman, author of "Wealth Blessed: Why Good People Lose Everything and Why You Don't Have To." Elizabeth shares her remarkable journey and insights on developing a healthy, biblical relationship with money and wealth. From Wealth to Poverty and Back Again Elizabeth Brickman's journey with money began in childhood abundance. Born into a wealthy family, she experienced financial security until age nine when her family lost everything. "First we lost the housekeeper, and then we lost the house. And all the contents," Elizabeth recalls. This dramatic shift from comfort to struggle planted a seed in Elizabeth—not for wealth itself, but for financial security. She developed a passion "to not ever be so at risk or to lose everything." What makes Elizabeth's perspective unique is that, unlike many success stories we typically hear, hers begins with wealth, transitions through loss, and returns to abundance with a transformed relationship to money. Her experience provides a rare and valuable lens through which to view our own financial journeys. Money: Neither to Love Nor to Hate One of the most powerful insights Elizabeth shares is her balanced view of wealth. She challenges the notion that holiness requires financial struggle: "We're not allowed to love money, but we don't need to prove our holiness by hating money." Elizabeth explains that rejecting opportunities to use our God-given gifts (Ephesians 2:10) prevents us from stewarding what God has ordained for us. She poses an important question: "If Christians all decide it sounds holier to be poor, eventually all the wealth will go into the hands of unbelievers. Will those unbelievers support our churches, our ministries? They will not." Instead, Elizabeth advocates for a middle path: "We're not going to love money. We're not going to hate money. We're going to use money as the tool, God's tool to live our fullest life in Him and to help prosper the church, ministries, kingdom causes." Preparing for Wealth Before It Comes Perhaps the most counter-cultural concept Elizabeth introduces is the importance of preparing ourselves for wealth before it arrives. She uses a powerful analogy: "You would never give a lobster to a baby, not because the lobster is bad, but the baby couldn't handle it." Similarly, Elizabeth suggests that God, as our loving Father, may withhold financial abundance until we're prepared to handle it wisely. When wealth comes to the unprepared—whether through business success, inheritance, or other means—it can become destructive: "The money intended to answer our prayer becomes the tempter of our sin.""The money intended to strengthen our relationships becomes the issue that spoils those relationships.""The money intended to heal our past can end up becoming a billboard that advertises our shame." Elizabeth emphasizes that being "wealth blessed" isn't about net worth—it's about "net trust" and preparation. It involves equipping ourselves spiritually and emotionally to handle abundance before it arrives. God's Financial Therapy: Healing Your Money Wounds At the heart of Elizabeth's message is the concept of "God's financial therapy"—a process of identifying and healing the wounds that shape our unhealthy financial behaviors. "Most of us, if not all of us, carry wounds from our life," Elizabeth explains. These wounds might come from childhood experiences, a teacher's comment, or even innocent parental actions misunderstood by a child. The danger comes when these unresolved wounds drive our financial decisions: "Instead of money expressing our godly values, which we do have, the money ends up expressing the wounds." Elizabeth has identified nine common "pain points" where people misuse money to punish, prove, or please others in unhealthy ways. The solution? "We need to take our wounds, examine our own hearts, bring those to the altar and ask God for His financial therapy." Elizabeth shares that God's financial therapy works in three dimensions: Healing your past (childhood wounds)Healing your present (current financial struggles)Healing your future (preparing for prosperity) Common Money Wounds and Their Solutions Elizabeth highlights several common financial wounds that can sabotage our relationship with money: 1. The Wound of a Poor Childhood Risk: Merging past, present, and future into one limiting financial identity ("It will never work for me") Solution: "Lord, I know my soul is my most important asset. I am rich in Christ. I have come far and I am going far." 2. The Wound of Past Mistakes Risk: Becoming judge and jury of ourselves, wearing past mistakes like a permanent badge Solution: Seeking forgiveness from God rather than carrying unending guilt 3. The Wound of Shame Risk: Making financial decisions based on "bad intel" filtered through shame Solution: Replacing shame ...
