I have never been a follower. That is simply not the way that the Creator has made me. So, I’m not interested in being a part of any movements towards black economic empowerment just for the sake of the movement in and of itself, whether they be initiated by those in secular circles or ones with religious foundations. While I am a part of the diaspora and understand these aspirations – most come from noble places — they both seem to be missing something that is fundamental to the true nature of prosperity, and it is this — there is a work that each of us is born to do, and in the absence of discovering, nurturing, and performing that work nothing of any real value, temporal or eternal, can be sustained.

It is your natural gifts, talents, and innate desires that, when acted upon, will lead to success — and that individual success may not look anything like achieving the “American dream” or progressive variations of it that we have seen in recent generations. It is not the pursuit of money for the sake of material gain – not even the pursuit of money for sake of obtaining items needful to self-sufficiency in uncertain times that will gain us favor with the Creator. It is the use of our divinely apportioned talents that will gain us the success, security, and approval that we seek.

We find an allegory in the Bible that best explains my point. Matthew 25:14-30 has been dubbed the Parable of the Talents. Recorded in red are the words of Jesus the Christ – Yahushua Ha Mashiach – who is explaining what the kingdom of heaven is likened to. In the illustration, talents have been given to three servants in varying degree’s according to the abilities that each one had. It is of utmost importance to note that the one with the least amount of talents was judged most harshly. The reason is simple – the servant knew His master and what His expectations were of him according to his abilities, yet he did nothing. In fact, the Word says that fear of acting upon the knowledge that he knew of both his talent and the expectations of the Master caused him to bury it in the dirt. In other words, He buried his talent and tried to give the Master dirty money when he came back to inquire about the value of His initial investment. In this allegory, talent and money are almost synonymous! Perhaps a study in etymology on the word “talent” may help to expound this a bit.

We get the word talent from its Greek parent talanton (5007 in the Strong’s Concordance). Telanton deals with the weight of something – not a coin but that which is being weighed to give a monetary value. Comparing this word to the parable we understand this to be the measure each person receives as per their capacities.Talenta and talentum (plural) are the Latin variations of this word which deal with both weight, money, natural inclinations, will, and desires. The definition of talent as it is used today “a capacity for achievement or success; ability” (www.dictionary.com).

The education system generally works to keep us from nurturing or having the time to discover our talents – which is the reason we have so many that are unhappy in fields of work that may afford a lot of money, but no personal fulfillment – or worse, those that lose themselves to it altogether and never engage the question of why they exist on this earth to begin with. This world causes us to vie for money, houses, cars, fame, and the recognition of men when the word tells us that it is our gifts that will make room for us…and bring us before great men (Proverbs 18:16) – no movements, fraternities, sororities, endless striving, or grasping for the wind necessary (Ecclesiastes 1:14).

In our pursuit of good money for (seemingly) good purposes we are often times doing it at the expense of our talents – that which we have to give an account for one day. While it is often times necessary to do jobs that have no real connection to our life purpose, we need to always be mindful to never allow a job to overtake and consume our work – that talent that we’ve been given. We must strive to never allow the job to deplete us of all of our energy to the point that we have nothing to give towards discovering and/or nurturing our talent. Biblically speaking, everyone has at least one. Painter’s should paint. Writer’s should write. Etc. If we don’t engage these gifts on a regular basis in some meaningful way we run several unthinkable risks: having our talents taken away and a double portion given to another, being deemed as both lazy and wicked by the One who gave them to us, andin some instances being cast away – clearly an indication of the causative end of extreme disregard and disobedience to the will of Yah (God) for one’s life.

In an ideal situation, our jobs should serve us towards gaining valuable skills that will build upon on our talents, and when that purpose has been exhausted, we must move on.It’s an old cliché, but it is true nonetheless: all money isn’t good money. In fact, when riches are gained outside of the will and purposes for one’s life that money could very well be called dirty money.