First of all, don’t skimp on your giving. Because your giving acknowledges God’s provision for what you do have.

Secondly, don’t skimp on your mortgage payments and your property taxes. You don’t ever want to get behind on those things.

Third, don’t skimp on your utilities. Don’t get behind on your utility bills. That will affect your credit rating.

Don’t skimp on car maintenance. You may drive this car and probably should drive this car that you have a lot, lot longer, and it will perform a lot better if you don’t skimp on the car maintenance.

Don’t skimp on health insurance; that is something that you really need. You don’t want to be without health insurance.

Don’t skimp on fun times with your spouse and your children. Those you need, especially in tough economic times. It doesn’t mean that you have to spend money on those things; it does mean that you want to make sure that you get them into your calendar and if you do need to spend a little bit of money on them, don’t skimp on that really important activity.

Don’t skimp on patience and long-term vision. This too shall pass. I do know where I am headed eternally. Don’t skimp on your patience. Ask the Lord to give you the right perspective on all that is going on. You need the right perspective right now dealing with patience and also the right perspective as to the eternal destiny of all of us.

Lastly, don’t skimp on Bible reading and prayer. It’s the only place that you can get the right perspective. As a matter of fact, that may be where you want to invest a lot more time is in your Bible reading and in your prayer. I would suggest to you that it is impossible to read your Bible and experience fear.