Cultivating Your Best Relationship with Money
Raymond Ziemkowski
July – August 2024 • Vol 4, No 11
In 1955, Christian mystic Flower A. Newhouse wrote a short pamphlet titled, “Aspiring Toward Good Stewardship.” This 23-page booklet offers profound instruction on abundance, Providence, supply… all things related to our relationship with money.
Flower shares that “a seriously mistaken concept most persons have is the belief that their security was mainly dependent upon finances.” To that, she firmly writes, “our only security is God.” And that “our outward income depends upon values that are God-given. These values consist of good health, useful knowledge, creative resourcefulness, and good mental and spiritual development.”
She offered four symbols and modes that portray mankind’s general attitude and stewardship towards money. These four are:
- The Closed Hand
- The Sieve
- The Measuring Containers
- The Ever-Renewing Pool
In her pamphlet, she writes in the voice of her Christian Mystic Ministry on each of these symbolic representations in the order above. As you might intuit, she teaches that the fourth symbol, the ever-renewing pool, is ideal. And she discusses the limitations and restrictions that are inherent in the preceding three modes and attitudes toward money.
Whether we are responsible for just our personal and family finances, engaged in business pursuits, or on a board of a nonprofit or charitable organization, our relationship with money requires our attention in today’s challenging times. Flower’s voice and message on this topic is as profound today as it was in the 1950s. Enjoy! —Raymond
The Closed Hand
Flower wrote, “The hand has always expressed service and sharing in religious symbolism. A closed hand denotes the repressing or withholding of giving or sharing.
“Those who are afraid to spend money either possess excessive fears in regard to their security, or they are victims of a compulsive neurosis in regard to saving. Neither of these states is good from the standpoint of normal, psychological well-being.
“Persons with a savings complex need to learn to open their hands, their hearts, and their minds where money is concerned. Because their hold upon money’s outgo is so obsessively tight, their income and general attractions from life are consequentially limited. Their lack is the creative result of their wrong attitudes and practices.
“Reminding themselves of what their negative conduct is called in the terse, forthright terms of the world should help such persons to drop these un-wholesome habits. Smallness, meanness, greediness, stinginess, and hoarding are associated with this first type. Their characteristics are the opposite of kindliness, faith, and outgoingness.
“Let those who find it hard to deal trustingly with money devote themselves to a deliberate, sustained cultivation of faith in supply. They should form the new, constructive habit of investing in happiness every day. Smallness can only be mastered by large-heartedness persistently applied.”
The Sieve
Flower wrote, “Those who are inclined to emulate sieves where money is concerned are the very opposite of the first type. Their emotions lead where their minds should be in charge. Here we find desires unchecked and out of control.
“There are two types of extravagant spenders. One kind splurges consistently on anything that delights or benefits him. The second kind is not as lavish on himself as he is with others. An extravagant individual’s trust is fool-hearty, because it is not tempered by discrimination, patience, and wisdom. These spenders think only about the moment at hand and so, will purchase temporary pleasure at the cost of meeting tomorrow’s rent or the monthly bills. They are indeed ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul.’
“There is nothing wrong with this second type’s trust in Divine Provision. To their faith they must add qualities of good stewardship—self-control, accountability, and self-denial—wisely exercised.
“As a means for overcoming imprudent spending, the sieve type should practice the best qualities of the budgeter—the third symbolic type. These good traits are wise self-denial and objective patience.”
The Measuring Containers
Flower wrote, “The symbolic outpicturing of the third type of steward is that of measuring containers, such as pint, quart and gallon jars. The one who lives within his income intelligently, frequently does so because he budgets his earnings to cover his monthly needs and investments.
“A budgeter realizes the value of practicing self-sacrifice in the present moment in order to achieve a reserve, which will ease and benefit his living in future months or years. He is honest and discriminating. He does not buy what he cannot afford at a time when there are not funds. He
purposefully and creatively does without extras now in order to be in a better position to afford them when the time is favorable. Because there is a plan behind his self-denial, the budgeter does not suffer from self-pity or a case of imagined martyrdom. He makes interesting use of the time, materials, and utilities he now enjoys. From an inner viewpoint, we would say that the budgeter is involved in learning how to handle finances capably.
“As admirable as most of the qualities and characteristic of this stage are, a worthier concept or realization is yet to be attained. The third type needs to guard against cultivating negative tendencies during his budgeting stage. Budgeting itself can be-come a rigid habit. If it tends to make one inflexible in his attitude towards money, then there is danger of the budgeter becoming too narrow, circumscribed, and cautious in financial matters.
“A good steward needs the enthusiastic faith of the sieve type, plus the self-control and patience of the budgeter type. Yet he needs even more development before he is worthy to be a trusted steward in the House of his Lord. He must advance to the stage where consciousness is diligently maintained as an ever-flowing, creative pool in the center of Being.”
The Ever-Renewing Pool
Flower wrote, “A pool fed by an everlasting spring symbolizes the fourth type of steward. Man’s pool of consciousness, in order to be clear and pure, requires the continual circulation of spiritual currents, powers and ideas.
Since every person’s Pool of Consciousness is fed by God’s Inexhaustible Spirit, his resources are limitless and are composed of infinitely varied combinations of opportunity. Like a natural pool that both receives from the larger stream and returns to it the overflow of its contents, man needs to share eagerly and willingly of his ever-inherent plenty.
“Most spiritually interested persons tithe regularly. They find it a remarkable experience in ever-deepening awareness of appreciation for God’s countess blessings. The practice enables them to participate in the enriching events of supporting the Work of Christ in the outer world. Few things are so satisfying as to witness the progress of a spiritual movement one has helped with his tithes. The building of a church, the broadcast of truth through the spoken and written word, and the widening arc of Light-radiant lives are benefits that follow the faithful support of sincere spiritual movements.
“One, who has achieved the stage of stewardship designated as the ever-renewed pool, always realizes a generous sufficiency for all his needs, as well as his desires. He has learned the secret of purposeful containment and of giving gladly from his overflow.
“This fourth type possesses no money complexes, fears or compulsions, because his renewal is continually realized. He is not spend-thrifty, since he understands that he is as responsible for maintaining steadfast reserves as he is for the constant circulation of overflow. He is beyond smallness and meanness, just as he is above devious or calculated giving. This symbolic type reveals an ever-widening source of knowledge. His is a productiveness that is stimulating and original. The beauty by which he is surrounded is keyed to purest simplicity and is devoid of artificial sophistication. Few contain such a zest for gracious living or for wholesome enjoyments as this kind of steward.”
Flower A. Newhouse (1909–1994) founded, with her husband Lawrence (1910–1963), the Questhaven Retreat and Christward Ministry in San Marcos, CA in 1940. She is a well-known, twentieth-century Christian mystic who wrote and lectured extensively, reawakening humanity to the reality of the Living Christ, the Inner Worlds and the Angel Kingdom. Today, Questhaven continues to offer visitors a quiet and sacred space for worship, study and renewal as a Christ-Centered Spiritual Retreat and Nature Preserve, located on 655 acres of pristine wilderness nestled among the coastal hills of San Diego County. You can investigate their books and many offerings at Questhaven.org.
In the Hearts Center Community, we are committed to spiritual practices that support and create true alchemical changes in ourselves first and then outside at large in the greater community. Through meditation and the science of the spoken word (prayers, songs, chants and decrees), we draw upon subtle spiritual energies and technologies as we transform ourselves and our planet. We hold the space of Aquarian Love in our hearts and send it out into the world to bless all of life. Visit: The Hearts Center Community.