Debit or Credit

I can vaguely remember from my Accounting I & II classes in high school seeing two columns, one associated with 'credit' and the other associated with 'debit'. I was always a little confused by the relationship between these two because (please correct me if I'm wrong because I certainly could be) 'debit' = good because it was money coming in and 'credit' = bad because money was going out. So what's the deal with being asked the question, "Is that debit or credit?" when making a purchase? As far as I know they both take my money, hence the confusion but that's neither here nor there...

In preparing to wrap-up our study of Philippians this Sunday I came across an interesting thought, well at least to me. Paul uses a couple interesting words in the closing passages of his letter to the Philippians that stood out to me for one reason or another: giving and receiving (4:15), credited (4:17), account (4:17), received full payment (4:18). So in this passage (4:14-19) Paul uses a few "commercial" or "business" kinds of words and that made me curious to see what these words looked like in the Greek, so I started to check them out. The words that I found most intriguing weren't any of the words I highlighted above but instead in verse 19 the words meet and needs (reading from the NIV).

meet: the idea of filling or making full, to supply
needs: a necessity; duty, business or a debt

All of this Accountant lingo got me thinking...maybe "all the needs" Paul was talking about in verse 19 are the debts we owe as a result of our sins and that God has filled that debt through the glory of Christ Jesus. If nothing else it proved to be a great reminder to me that the debt I could never repay has been covered in full.