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Secrets of the Kingdom Life  /  Chapter 22: The Three Types of Obedience in Real Life  /  Discussion Questions
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Question 10
The chapter connects costly apparel to “wasting God’s money,” even calling needless spending “stolen from God and from the poor,” and it applies the principles equally to men and women; if your group took that claim literally for one month, what concrete changes would you make to clothing/beauty spending, and what fears or identity-loss would those changes expose?
Another way to ask: If your group treated the chapter’s view of costly clothes as “wasting God’s money” for one month, what would you change about spending on clothes and beauty (for men and women)? What fears or sense of losing your identity might those changes bring up?

Direct Answer Taking the chapter literally would mean cutting “needless” spending on cosmetics, fashionable/upscale clothing, and status-signaling appearance upgrades, then redirecting those savings to “clothing the naked” and meeting the poor’s needs; it would likely expose fears of losing admiration, status, or a carefully managed image.

Support from Transcript:

  • The Lovejoys see costly apparel as “waste of God’s money,” contrasting Jesus with “decking Himself out in expensive clothing.”
  • Lydia cites massive spending on beauty: “women spend an enormous $426 billion every year on beauty products,” and adds that clothing spending makes the sum “staggering.”
  • Wesley gives a concrete alternative: “Every shilling which you save from your own clothing, you may expend in clothing the naked and relieving… the poor.”
  • He intensifies the claim: needless spending is “in effect, stolen from God and from the poor.”
  • Motive is exposed: ornaments are bought not “to please God… but to please your own fancy or to gain…admiration.”
  • Luke applies it to men too: “Vanity is vanity… whether it’s in a man or a woman,” and wasting money is “no different for a man.”
Discussion Follow-ups The transcript doesn’t list your group’s specific budget changes, but it implies identity-loss centers on craving to “be admired” and on living before people rather than before God.

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