The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 5

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 5

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

Well, we are going to get started. I'm going to switch places with you here because I can steal your notes. This is our last week on this series and we have been in the Lost Art of Generosity series. Okay, I'll get my own notes. I guess he's taking my notes. Oh, I thought that was us. All right, I'll grab my own. We have spent several weeks talking about the idea of being generous and we've really talked a lot about the why. Why should we be generous or even why do we struggle with the idea of being generous? Why is that hard for some of us? But then why we as Christ followers should be generous. We really dive deep into that. First, we talked about that there's more joy in giving than in receiving. And then we went into the idea of being on the lookout, the importance of being on the lookout for greed because it sneaks up, especially when you're trying to be generous. When you're making that effort, it just kind of sneaks that greed in and he wants to derail that, those efforts. And then we dug into how everything we have belongs to God. And for some of us that may be a hard concept to get, but for others that could be really freeing. It's like, well, it's all God's anyway, so why not be generous, right? And then last week we talked about being generous to the poor. What that looks like, why should that be a value for us and the importance of that. So today, we're going to be diving more into the how. How should we put this into action? We've learned a lot, we've talked about a lot, but now how do we actually put feet on this and go do something with what we've learned? So today we each have some practical steps for you that we want to share with you as you journey on this generosity practice, as you make it a practice, a regular thing in your life. Now, we want to acknowledge too that practicing generosity does require a measure of faith. It can be hard, especially if you're really just trying to get started, that can be really difficult, and it does require faith. Faith that God's going to provide for you when you're being generous to others. Faith that God is going to use whatever you are giving, however he sees fit.

But we actually, in our preparation for this series, we heard this one quote from John Timber, he said, "Faith is spelled R-I-S-K." And sometimes, taking those risks and stepping out in faith does reap huge rewards. And we believe that as you practice generosity, as you implement these things, you're going to witness miracles. God loves to show his hand when it comes to generosity and moving mountains and providing for his people. So when we give, we become these vessels, these conduits for God to show his love to other people. We get to be a part of that. And so, we just want to encourage you that as you endeavor to do this, it will be risky, it will take a measure of faith, but he is good to show up, to be generous to us as we show generosity to others. The reality is though, living a generous life, it requires a plan. It'll happen spontaneously occasionally here and there, but it's not going to be a consistent practice for you if you don't plan. So the reality is that the foundation you need is your budget. What does that look like for you? Creating some sort of plan to give. We will have some practical things for you, but none of those are going to happen really well or consistently if you haven't created margin in your life and in your budget for giving, for generosity. So that's kind of the foundation that we want you to start with. If you have never practiced generosity, or at least on a consistent basis, start there. Start by creating a line item for giving. Create space, margin in your life, in your budget to give. We want to help you build a life of generosity, just like an architect has blueprints for a house. Creating a budget with generosity in mind will be a blueprint to practice generosity consistently.

Yeah, so to integrate some of these biblical practices that we've been talking about, I want to ask a couple questions on behalf of us that are important for us to think about. And the answers to these will help us again lay that foundation. So the first one is maybe one that you've already been asking yourself, which is when should I start to give? And the answer is pretty simple. It's now. You may be saying, "But I don't have enough," or "I'm not there yet. My budget..." Again, take what Lauren was saying. But the answer is now. It's easier to give a little now than when you think you'll have more in the future. Proverbs 23, 4 through 5 says, "Don't wear yourself out to get rich, because you know better. Stop. As soon as your eyes fly to it, it disappears. It makes wings for itself and flies like an eagle to the sky." Wealth is uncertain. There is no guarantee that you will be able to give later on. If you don't let your heart be formed in generosity now through practicing it, you may not have the heart later to be able to practice generosity. Even though you're going to tell yourself that. You're going to be like, "Hey, when I have more, that's when I'll be generous." If you don't start now, it's like a muscle that we work out. You won't be able to do that when you have more on your plate. You need to start now. We might have thoughts that say, "I don't have the wealth to give away." Honesty is for those who have more than I do. But did you know that the most generous demographic of people in America are working-class Christians? Because there is a deep value and belief in what Jesus teaches that speaks to us and our need to give like Jesus gave. So, again, some of the lies are that the more people get, then the easier it is to give. So really, the more people get, the less they are to-- they tend to be less generous. So don't be a statistic or a person who makes more just to spend more. Start now, even if it's very small, but go on this journey of a lifetime of being generous. So that's the first question. When? Well, the answer is now.

Secondly, where should I give? We answered this throughout the couple weeks, but we're going to come-- this is where we're going to spend most of our time today, but just really quickly, the answer is where you want to give to the poor, to the church, and to the advancement of the gospel. We'll talk more about those in just a second.

Lastly, again, this is maybe a question that you've asked throughout this series, is how much should I give? Pastor Andre, Pastor Chris, Pastor Andrei, I need a number. Give me that number. We don't have a number for you. Jesus and the New Testament do not have an equation that tells us, "Input this and this, and at the end you will get the exact number that you are to give." That would be very easy. That would make it, again, just a lot easier, but it would kind of take out the faith. It would take out the belief and why we're doing it. Paul talks about the need to listen to the Spirit in what you are to give. Don't just base it off of what you think. Your heart is sinful. Your heart is selfish. Listen to God. Pray to God. Go before Him and ask for help in discerning how much to give. And this is going to look different. It's not the same for everyone in this room. A high school senior who just got a job and they're giving is going to look different than someone who's retired in a different stage of life. A person who makes so much and another person who makes maybe a lot more, the giving is going to look different. And that is okay. And we're not here to judge other people's giving. But we are here to be obedient to God. We want to be coming before Him in prayer and saying, "God, how much do you want me to give?" And another way of saying this, too, is that question that we asked a couple weeks ago, "God, how much do you want me to keep?" So those are some questions that maybe you've been wondering about, and those are the answers that will help us. We look at this art of generosity and begin to really dive into specifically where there are things we are to give to.

I love what it says in the Word of God when He talks about in Deuteronomy, there's this concept in this ancient biblical theology practice called first fruits. And the basic idea here is that whenever we receive income, we immediately give a portion back to God. And traditionally, a lot of this has been seen as in Deuteronomy, as the Old Testament or in the life of the Israelites, that that house of God to God was seen specifically in the temple of God. And so when Jesus, when God was setting up the Israelites and He brought them out of slavery in Egypt, He's establishing them as a people group, He begins to give them some rules of life of how to live and the rhythms and practices that He wants to see in their lives. And the first of which of that He talks through is the first fruits. And so the question in this is, we give to God our first fruits with special attention to the poor, the gospel, and specifically the church. And this happens right away. This doesn't happen after we've paid all of our bills or when we finally bought everything on our wish list or we have an empty Amazon card. It happens and it's giving the first portion. It's not the leftover, it's the good stuff. It says in Deuteronomy specifically where the currency of the time was grain, it was oil, it was the things that they grew, it was even down to the shearing of their sheep. The first wool of the sheep would be given to God for the use in the temple for the Israelite people. And maybe in this, this first portion is something new for you. Maybe you've never heard of something like this before. My wife, Lauren, and I, we practice this by the first thing that we spend money when a paycheck comes in is a check to the church. It's the very first thing that we spend our money on. When it comes in, it's the first thing that goes out. And it's hard. This is really hard because you think about it, you go, "Okay, God, am I going to have enough this month?" And I'll tell you, the times where I've thought that and I've held back wasn't enough. But those times that we were faithful in our first fruits to give the first the best, there was always enough every single month. And maybe for you this is a percentage that you give, maybe it's in the tithe, maybe it's a little less, maybe a little more. But what matters, the amount that changes in situation to situation, praying about it in God, but it is the first. It is the very first. And so then the question becomes, as Andre asked this morning, it's like, "How much? How much are we supposed to give? Is there a perfect mathematical equation in Scripture?" There isn't, but we have some different Scriptures that talk about some key elements in that, and that would be, "How much do we give?" The first answer would be, "At least some." At least some. That is the starting line.

And when we look in the Scripture in Malachi 3.10, it says, "Bring the whole tithe," maybe you've heard that word before, "into the storehouse or the temple, that there may be enough food in my house." These are the words of God himself. And this word here, tithe, means masar in Hebrew, and it actually means a tenth, one tenth. And this is the ancient practice in the Israelite people of giving 10% of our income away to God. And I've heard so many conversations with this in the church. The question of, "Is it gross? Is it net? Does it have to be exactly 10%? Is this still a mandate or a prerequisite or a requirement for followers of Jesus today? Does it get divided up? Does it only go to the church? Does 10% get split how I want to see it split?" And many followers of Jesus for a very long time have found this practice of tithing as a baseline for a lifestyle of generosity. And frankly, I know some of you, you're doing some numbers in your head right now, right? You know what your paycheck is and you think about the 10% and you think, "Pastor Chris, there is no chance." You seen the cost of eggs and bananas lately? We had a sign out here that said, "How can this be the cost of living when Jesus paid it all?" We were making fun of like, "The reality of life is expensive right now, right?" And all the looming tariffs and oil refineries shutting down and everything like that, gas could be $15 in California. Like, we don't know what tomorrow is going to bring, but you know who does? And so for some of us to start our tithing journey in generosity, it may start with 1%. It may start with having to take a real hard look at what we spend our money on every single month. And we had talked about this before, it beginning to create margins. And for some of you, cutting 10% is easy. Pastor, I can give it to you right now, no problem. And I think for some of us, if you're in that boat, 10% isn't enough. And we see this baseline in scripture that this isn't the end all be all. You go, "God, I gave you my 10%, I'm good to go, I don't have to do anything else, I'm done." But for some of you, it needs to be like you're talking about faith being a risk. You got to step out in faith. There's months where I cut that child check for 10% and it's like, "That's good, it's easy." And there's other times I'm signing my name at the bottom of that check going, "God, I'm going to need you to show up. I need you to be there." Because this 90% in my math right now in my mind ain't going to happen. I've heard incredible stories of people who start working towards a 10% and maybe every year they add a percent. And so every year they get there and then they find themselves at the 10 mark and they go, "I'm not going to stop." And they continue to go on in 11 and 12 and 13 and 14. I've heard stories of people giving 80% away because all they need is 20% to live on. And like Andre said, this is going to look different for every single one of us. But what we need to do is step out in faith and trust God and what He is calling us to. There's a principle here in the New Testament when they had the early church that as their income increased, they gave more and increased their percentage of giving. The more you make, the more you're able to be generous with God.

An example of this might be something called a generosity fund, where you begin to in your budget put away 50 bucks maybe. And you have that ready to go and Lauren and Pastor Andre are going to talk about some other ways to be kind of like spontaneous generous with people. But the idea here maybe is to take 1% above your tithe and to set aside as a blessing fund just to bless people. Wouldn't that be amazing? That each and every one of us had 1% of our budget in our income just sitting around to just bless people. Man, that would be absolutely incredible.

But this takes practice. This isn't something we learn overnight. It isn't immediate. It takes time. It takes faith. It takes daily decisions. It takes risk. You have to completely change the way that we spend our money every single day, week, month, and year. That's just how it happens. And as you step further into your walk with Christ, not just in trusting Him and saying, "I trust you God in word," but trusting God through our actions and managing what He has blessed us with the way that He wants us to. For some it might be you have to start packing lunch to work. You might have to change the subscriptions you have every single month. You might have to cook more food at home. You might have to drive your paid off car rather than trading in for a new one that comes with a payment. You might have to stay where you live right now and not upsize your house or apartment. You might have to wear the same clothes that you've worn for a couple years instead of buying brand new ones, or you might need to simplify your wardrobe. You might just have to be in a season of just saying no to things because you're saying yes to generosity in God and going, "No, not yet." I'm telling myself that right now. There's a couple things I've been saving up for. I've been saving for a truck since 2018. I'm still saving. Price of trucks are going up faster than my savings. And I see them on the freeway all the time and go, "Oh, that would be sweet in one of those babies." But I know God's like, "Not yet. I need you to trust me." And so I continue to trust God. Because when we live under our income or under our means, there is capacity and margin for us to give more away. I want to be known as a person who is generous with everything that they have. Christ was ultimately generous with His life, right, on the cross for us. So we too, in turn, can be generous as well. Some of the most generous people I know are the most joyful, carefree, happy, cheerful people in the church. And I don't think it's a coincidence that it's tied to how they handle their finances. The life that Jesus calls us to is one that He promises hope, joy, peace, and freedom. And the world promises the gathering of more things, right? Just empty promises and failed promises. I want to be people who are known by their generosity and by people who change the world with what God has blessed.

All right, well, Pastor Chris covered about giving locally to the church and bringing our tithes to the storehouse. But I'm going to dive into giving to the poor. And I know we touched a lot on this last week. We talked about why we give to the poor and that we do it because one, it's an expectation of Christ's followers. It's just an expectation that we have. Two, it supports the body of Christ. When one of us is in need, someone else can meet that and that supports the body. And then three, because Christ gave to us first. And that's ultimately why we give is because we received. We were the poor that were received from Christ. And so out of that, we are generous to others. And as I said earlier, making a plan is going to be pivotal to this. I think a lot of us genuinely want to give. We want to be generous with what we've been given. But it may not just come naturally. And so I asked this last week, what is stopping you from being generous to the poor? Specifically, what is stopping you from being generous to the poor? And I hope that you took that to heart. But I really do think that I would offer that one of those reasons is that we don't have a plan for it. And so as we take this to God, as we seek Him and what He wants for us and how we choose to be generous, I would encourage you to seek Him in how you can plan for it. What does this look like? How can you divide up your generosity fund in order to include the poor in this?

First John three, 16 through 18 says, "This is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down His life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need, but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and in truth." We can express love through words, but someone is going to fully experience our love and God's love through actions. When we can actively show love through our generosity, He is going...when we meet their needs. All right. Oh, it's still going. It's a little dance break. Okay. When we meet the needs of people, the poor specifically, we are going to show God's love. Like I said, we are those conduits for Him.

So real quick, just some practical ways that you can give to the poor. And this is something you can start right away. So real quick, number one, keeping cash on hand, or maybe if that is hard for you, maybe go purchase some gift cards that you can keep gift cards on hand. Gas, groceries, fast food places, whatever you feel the need to. You get to pick the denomination, but keeping some of those in your car or your purse or your wallet that you can meet a need as you encounter it. Number two, giving to an organization consistently. Maybe you set up auto pay so you know what's coming out every month, but you can give to an organization. One that we love is World Vision, and they help people who are in poverty. They are meeting their needs. And so that is something that you can participate in by giving to an organization. Similarly, but slightly different, is sponsoring a child. There are some great organizations that connect you to a kid, usually in another part of the world, who needs help. And World Hope is one that we would recommend, and they are actually really focused on providing education and getting rid of barriers to education for children. And so when you are connected to a child, you sponsor them, you help them get what they need in order, uniforms, books, ways to get to school, all of that, you help them. Number four is donate to a local food pantry. Feeding the foothills, it was formerly Plaster Food Pantry, but feeding the foothills is a local thing that you can give to. You can even be generous with your time and serve there as well. But donating to those who are right here in Plaster County who need some extra help. And lastly, this is kind of a more fun one that I think is fun, you can do it as a family, is making everyday essentials bags. And this is just maybe a gallon-sized bag, so big if you want, but start with a gallon-sized bag, fill it with everyday essentials that someone perhaps on the street or really struggling could need. Toothpaste, toothbrush, bar of soap, washcloth, granola bars, water, a poncho, whatever the season might call for, and keep it in your car. And as you encounter someone, you don't have to give them money in that case, but you are still giving generously because you purchased those things. So do that, assemble them with your family, maybe get together with some other families and pool your resources and create these bags so that you have something really tangible that you can help meet the needs of the poor right in our area.

Again, the reality is we live in a consumeristic culture with marketing that tells us to get more when we have real needs right around us that we can meet, we can participate in that. So I want to just wrap up my time here with a verse that you are all probably pretty familiar with. Matthew 6:19-21 says, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and vermin destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven where moth and vermin do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

So far you've heard a couple places where to give your money to the church, to the poor. I'm going to end with talking about giving to the advancement of the gospel. Traditionally in the church, money has been given for the sake of spreading the gospel. Paul in the early New Testament would deny money for himself, but would accept money for helping him plant churches and spreading the gospel around the known world at the time. Today we do so in a similar way by giving to missionaries, those who are going out into the world, into the unreached places to spread the gospel. I want to spend this morning specifically highlighting an organization called Wycliffe Bible Translators. Maybe you've heard of them. They do just that in the name. They work to translate the Bible into all the languages that are needed around the world. And so a couple facts for you. As of late last year, October 2024, around the world there are 7,300 known spoken and signed languages in the world. As of last year, 980 languages begun translation for the very first time. Last year, Wycliffe was involved in 2,146 language translations. And 1.8 billion people in 103 countries are being served through active projects. Currently there is Bible translation being done in more than 4,000 languages worldwide. This is an extensive project, one that is, it takes a really long time. I don't know if any of you are bilingual, have worked on translating, but an unknown language on top of that is just work. You have to go there. You have to begin to understand. Then you have to, once you understand, the Bible as a book is a whole other thing. You have to capture the nuances, the words that are used at that time that aren't used anymore. You have to figure out how to best say that in their language. And so it is just a slow, tedious process. And on top of that, we want to make sure that the Bible is accurate, right? Accuracy is very, very important when it comes to scripture. And so again, I'll have to say that it is slow, difficult work. And really, the translation world has come a long way in the last 20 years.

A New Testament translation in 1999, it was on pace to take decades to complete a New Testament translation. And for all the languages that were known at the time, Wycliffe projected that it was going to take another 150 years for Bible translation to just start on the languages that were left that had not begun to have a Bible in their language. But from May 2019 to May 2021, a new language was being engaged every 120 hours. That's pretty quick. That's a lot faster pace than it was decades ago. And then from 2021 to 2023, a new language was engaged every 30 hours. And today, on average, a new language is engaged every 14 hours. Now engaged, you might be wondering, what does that mean? That is as simple as going to a place with a new language and just beginning to understand, engaging in their language. And oftentimes, Bible translators don't just say there, "Hey, I need words. Give me words. Help me understand." They're already introducing the gospel in different ways, maybe a VBS or teaching biblical principles once they can speak and communicate in that language. And so engaging these other cultures with these other languages, engaging scripture, a New Testament is still far, far away, but they're starting to understand the teachings of Jesus. So about Wycliffe specifically, they made a bold decision in 1999 to have a translation program in progress and that every language still needing one would have one by the year 2025. And I'll share this really quickly. That 131 countries have achieved that vision that every language in that country has a Bible, a New Testament begun, not finished, but it has begun. Forty-three countries have one remaining language. Twenty-four countries have two to five remaining languages. And 16 countries around the world still have six or more languages that need to be engaged with the Bible.

So it's a lot, but we can also praise God for the work that he's doing, that that many people are going to be hearing about God. And this stems from, I'll just read a couple of verses. Psalm 86: 9-10 says, "All the nations you have made will come and worship before God. They will bring glory to your name for you are great." Revelation 7:9 says, "And there before me was a great multitude that no one could count from every nation, tribe, people, and language standing before the throne of God." We are working as a church and specifically the Wycliffe organization and other translation organizations are working to see that heavenly picture come to fruition. That every person from every tribe, nation, and tongue would be there in heaven praising God. So we share all this with you today. I want to let you know that you heard a lot of different places. You can get an email at the sometime today with links to all the organizations that we mentioned. We encourage you to go click on that link. If there's one that's specifically stirring you, we know that not everyone can give to all of these things. So we encourage you to give to the church. And then if you have that margin to give elsewhere, consider maybe God's stirring you that you want to be a part of what he's doing around the world in taking care of the poor. Or maybe Bible translation really speaks to you. You want to be a part and partner with the work that is being done. You'll have an opportunity to click those links later.

So we have a really quick question that we want to ask that you guys is the last chance around tables. And so Pastor Chris. Yeah, we got two more questions. We're going to spit fire through these, but we want you to talk at your table. What is your biggest takeaway from these past few weeks on generosity? And then what next steps do you feel God is leading you towards being generous financially? So we're going to take one or two minutes around the table. Let's go real quick and share and then we'll be back to close out.

All right, I hope those conversations have been good and you we pray that God is stirring and will continue to stir in you next steps for generosity. You want to end by saying a prayer, a guided prayer for the practice of generosity. So if you've done guided prayer, you know this is if you haven't, I'm just going to lead us and you can just reflect on the words that I'm going to be praying for us. If you guys want to bow your heads right now, encourage you to listen and submit your heart. Lord, when our hearts have shrunk and are giving with them, Holy Spirit come. To the fears that restrain us and our anxiety for material things, Holy Spirit come. To our other blindness and the busyness that causes it, Holy Spirit come. That we may overflow in abundant generosity, Holy Spirit come. That our giving may transform the world, the poor, the church and us, Holy Spirit come. That we may know you greatly through the expansion of our offering, Holy Spirit come. Father, you are the embodiment of giving is better than receiving. We want to be like you. We praise and love you, honor and desire you with all our being now and forever. Amen.

Well, I'd love to send you guys out with a benediction this morning. This comes from the word of God. It says, "May God bless you abundantly so that in all things at all times you may have all that you need. May you freely scatter your gifts to the poor. May God who supplies seed for the sower and bread for food also supply and increase your store of seed and enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. May you be enriched in every single way so that you may be generous on every occasion. And may your generosity result in thanksgiving to God." Thanks for listening. And if you would, please take a moment to subscribe and leave an encouraging review to help others find our podcasts on whatever platform you are listening on. We hope you have a wonderful day. We'll catch you next week.

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 4

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 4

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

If you haven't been around or maybe you've missed a week, just a reminder we are in our Generosity series. We called it The Lost Art of Generosity and I kind of love this title. I didn't come up with that so I can say it. I really like this title because I think that generosity in our culture has gotten a little lost and it really is like an art form. It's how we give, where we give, how much we ... All of it, it plays into it and it's a very nuanced conversation. I love that we are talking about this and trying to regain this lost art. I know so many generous people. Even in our time here at Spring Valley, I've just been blown away by ... It is just a church filled with generous people. Our family just alone has been the recipients of your guys' generosity. I think that while maybe many of us are naturally generous, there are parts of this conversation that perhaps we struggle with and we could use a refresher because the reality is we live in a world that is a consumer culture. We have multi-million dollar marketing campaigns and we have influencers and we have social media and it is all about getting more. We are told that we need more, that we don't have enough. I think this whole conversation, this whole series is such a good refresher for us. As a reminder, we have gone over. The first week we talked about how there is more joy in giving than in receiving. If you have generously given, you've experienced that, that there is more joy in giving than receiving. Next week we talked about being on the lookout for greed and how in our world of telling us we need more, greed can just be so sneaky that we don't feel like we have enough and we need more. We've got to be on guard against greed. Then last week we talked about how everything we have belongs to God. It is all from Him and so therefore we can be generous because it's His anyways and He can do with it and have us in obedience do with it whatever He pleases.

If you've been here, we've had some discussion questions. We're going to circle up at our tables here and have one more discussion question. Our question for today is how has our Western culture and even the American dream impacted how we practice the art of generosity? Circle up, chat about it a little bit, share your thoughts.

I'm going to call us back together. I hope your discussions were good and fruitful. I'm actually, I mean, I'm very interested to hear what you guys came up with so come tell me after service. But one answer that I felt like I came up with for me in answer to this question was that our culture, our Western culture and even the American dream can really limit us in our generosity to the poor specifically. So that is our topic today is how and why are we generous, should we be generous to the poor? If you're like me, maybe you hear the topic of this and you're like, I mean, I know we're supposed to be generous to the poor but how are we going to have a whole sermon on this? Well, let me tell you, the Bible has a lot to say about it. Just a quick Google search on scriptures about generosity and about specifically caring for the poor were seemingly endless. I could just stand up here and just read scripture to you the whole time. I won't but I could because there's so much that the Bible and that Jesus has to say about it. Jesus encouraged generous living but he also encouraged his followers to care for the poor. But the idea of this didn't start with Jesus in the New Testament, it started in the Old Testament. If we look back on the Old Testament and when God was creating the nation of Israel, he instructed Moses to teach the people how to live generously. In Deuteronomy 15:10 it says, "Give generously to them and do so without a grudging heart," it's important, "then because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to." So right off the bat, he's creating the nation of Israel and he's like, "You're going to live generously." But then if you continue on in the Old Testament, there are Proverbs and Psalms and in the prophets they talk more and more about caring for the poor. I'm just going to do a little rapid fire here. Proverbs 21:13, "Whoever closes his ear to the cry of the poor will himself call out and not be answered." Proverbs 21:25, "The craving of a sluggard will be the death of him because his hands refuse to work. All day long he craves for more, but the righteous give without sparing." Proverbs 11, "Whoever brings blessing will be enriched and the one who waters will himself be watered." When we are blessing, we will be blessed. Proverbs 14, "Whoever is kind to the needy honors God." I could go on and on, we'll just stop there for now. But there's so much packed into the Word of God because God is generous. It is part of who he is. It is his heart for the widow and the orphan and the one who is in need. I think most, if not all of us, desire to be generous.

We want to have a heart of generosity, but putting it into practice, I think, can be a struggle for some of us. And if that's not a struggle for you, praise God. I love that for you. I want all of us to be like that, but I think that it can be really hard for some of us. There can be some resistance. Maybe it's because of how we grew up, maybe how we were taught about money. Maybe we have this idea of the American dream, like you pull yourself up out of your bootstraps and you earn your way and that's yours. Or maybe it's just you don't know where this money is going to go. If you give to someone on the street, you don't know how they're going to spend it. And that can be really hard for us to relinquish that control. And we have to be wise in how we give. We have to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit to be sure. But we can't let these limitations or these hindrances stop us from being obedient and giving to the poor. So whether this is a tough topic for you or not, I pray that this time together will be encouraging and it'll be a good refresher for all of us. So really our overarching question today is why should we give to the poor? I think we all kind of know this intellectually, but I want to dive deep in why specifically we as Christ followers should be giving to the poor. But before we really get into the nitty-gritty of that, we have to answer the question, who are the poor? It's the first question. Who's the poor? Who are we talking about? Who are we talking about? So let's answer that question first. Well, thankfully for us, the author of Luke, it also authored the book of Acts. And so we're going to look at Acts 4. I'm going to actually jump to verse 34. And it says, "For from time to time, those who own land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet. And it was distributed to anyone who had need." So the poor, Luke tells us, is anyone who had need. Earlier, it says that there were no needy persons among them. So it was the poor were needy persons or someone who had need. This could be just about anybody in different circumstances. But if there is anyone who has need around you, then there is work to do. As a Christ follower, we have work to do. This person who is in need could be kind of the natural person that comes to mind, maybe someone who is in a third-world country, who doesn't have access to maybe clean water or food regularly. It could be someone you've encountered maybe on a missions trip. It could be homeless or someone who is in need through seeking rehabilitation for addiction or maybe they're seeking help for an unplanned pregnancy. These can be kind of some of those people who are in need that we naturally think of. And those are. Those are the poor and the ones in need that Jesus is talking about and that the scriptures talk about. In the US, I did a little research for us, in the US, nearly 16% of children live in poverty. And food insecurity affects around 33.8 million people, including over 9 million children. That's just in the US. And we're a wealthy nation. So that's crazy to me. Globally, over 828 million people go to bed hungry every night and nearly 2 billion people lack access to safely managed drinking water. 2 billion people. That is a wild statistic to me.

So maybe it is those people that we think of when we think of the poor or those in need. And maybe it's someone that you are close to. Maybe it's a friend or a family member that is struggling. Maybe they're in between jobs or just got laid off and they need help paying the bills or getting some groceries and putting some food on the table. Maybe they're going through a really tough season and they could just really use a good cup of coffee and a listening ear. Maybe you have a neighbor who is elderly and physically can't care for their lawn or you could cook them a nice meal and take it to them. Because they are in need of that. They are in need all around us. And please hear me, this doesn't mean you individually have to meet every single need. But we are all called to do something. We are all called to give to the poor.

So back to our first question. We know who the poor are now, but why should we as Christ followers give to those in need? We give to those in need because one, it's an expectation of those who follow Jesus. At first I didn't really like this word expectation. I was like, oh, it feels like cringey to me. But the reality is it is. It is an expectation of those who follow Jesus. Second Corinthians 9:6-11 says, "Remember this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver." There it is again. "And God is able to bless you abundantly so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written, they have freely scattered their gifts to the poor. Their righteousness endures forever. Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food, God, will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion. And through us, your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God." There's a lot packed in here, but what I want to focus on is that it's an expectation. It's an understanding. Paul here is writing assuming that the church, the people he's writing to, are already giving, that this is already a thing that they're doing. He says, "Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart." They've already decided what they're going to give. It wasn't a matter of if, it was a matter of how much. It was already an expectation that the people of Jesus were going to live generously. They were going to give. Even though we know and we see that generosity and caring for the poor is a command in scripture, it is an expectation of God's people, it's not out of this compulsion or erode obedience. It is out of an overflow of a surrendered heart. Paul expects that the people are giving and that they're doing it with joy, that they're a cheerful giver, that they're doing it freely, not out of compulsion, and that they're doing it because of who they are in Christ. Because God is generous and we were made in His image, that was also put into us. We are made to be generous. Paul is not questioning whether we will give, just how much. He also assures us in this passage that God will provide for our needs. He will enrich us to continue the kingdom work He's already called us to do. Giving to the poor is expected and it will bring glory to God. He will take care of our needs as we live generously. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion. He's not going to call us to be generous to the poor and then leave us hanging. But it's an expectation of all of us who call Jesus our Lord.

We give to those in need because it supports the body of Christ. We're going to go back to our Acts 4 passage and read a little bit longer because this is the early church. This is talking about the first church and how they lived. So I'm going to read this for us again. All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God's grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet. And it was distributed to anyone who had need. The government at this time, the Roman government at this time, didn't have any sort of system in place or programs to care for the poor. And as far as I understand it, it wasn't like even on their radar. Like this was not something they were worried about or looking to solve the problem of. So it wasn't, to them, it wasn't a government responsibility or political responsibility. And so if the poor were going to be taken care of, it was going to be done by the church, by the people of God, those who follow Jesus. But the beautiful thing is that they lived in such a way that they were able to meet those needs. They didn't claim their possessions as their own. They lived in community. They served one another. They made sure everyone had what they needed. And it was by God's grace. It says God's grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. So it was God's grace, His all-sufficient, all-powerful grace paired with their obedient communal living where they distributed as anyone had need. And there was no needy among them. That is so wild to me that they were able to do that, that everyone had what they needed. I love this verse, though, too, because, or this section of scripture, because a lot of our reasons for not giving to the poor are addressed here. I think the main two reasons are that we have a desire for more. We want to keep for ourselves. Maybe we just want to store up for ourselves or make sure our family is provided.

Or two, it is out of fear of lack or scarcity. And so this verse, or these verses fly right in the face of that because we're not meant to just consume. We're not meant to only gain for ourselves. We are meant to share. We are meant to be generous. And we have no reason to fear because the scripture says that by God's grace, we will have all that we need. So those two arguments are null and void if we live by what the word of the God says. When we give generously to those in need, it builds up and it supports the body. It allows kingdom work to continue. Because the reality is when a part of the body is hurting or in need, the whole body is less effective. I think of like our physical bodies. When we have something that is wrong, an injury or maybe a chronic issue, I get occasionally, thankfully it's not very often, but occasionally I will get these headaches that take me out. And I need to like lay down. I need a hot pack. I need some medicine. I need some water. I need to close my eyes. And I basically become useless at parenting, at taking care of the house, at cooking. I just need a minute to lay down. And I become virtually useless because I am so focused on my current need. So when there is someone in the spiritual body of Christ who has a need, we all are crippled in a way. We become less effective. And so then when we as a church meet that need, not only are we being the church and being obedient to what God has called us to, but then we allow that person to also become effective because they no longer have that need. It has been met. And they can be effective once again for the kingdom. One statistic I read said that if all Christians, all of those that follow, claim to follow Jesus, gave 10% of their income, there would be over $1 trillion available annually to tackle global issues. That's a trill- trillion. Annually, just year over year, it would be another trillion the next year. If every Christ-following believer just gave 10%, whether that's to the local church or to an organization or a cause, to maybe sponsoring a child, whatever that looks like, gave 10%, there would be over a trillion dollars available to tackle some of these issues we talked about earlier. I'm no math whiz, but I feel like a trillion dollars would do some damage, right? Taking care of some of these people who need some water. That would be amazing. And that's not even counting the non-religious groups that are contributing to the solution of the problem. God wants us to be generous to those in need.

Lastly, and probably most importantly, we give to those in need because Christ gave to us first. One of my favorite passages in scriptures, Philippians 2, starting in verse 3, it says, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility, value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests, but each of you to the interests of the others. In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus, who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God, something to be used to his own advantage. Rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross." Jesus gave up the wealth of heaven to be generous to us. He had everything at his fingertips. As the creator of the universe, he lacked nothing. And yet he came to earth, he took on human form, he humbled himself, and he gave so abundantly and so generously to us. When we operate from that truth, when we start there and operate from the fact that Jesus gave to us first, it not only compels us, but then it propels us to be generous to the poor because we were the poor. We were the ones in need. We were the ones who need saving. So we give out of love because we were loved first. I want to be clear, we don't give to the poor out of pity or some savior complex that we think we can save them or save the world that they even need saving. That's Jesus's job. We give out of love, out of compassion, out of a heart for generosity because we have a savior that loved us and came to us, that gave up the wealth of heaven for us. So maybe our question today isn't so much why should we give to the poor. Maybe the question we need to wrestle with is what's stopping me from giving to the poor generously, or giving more if that's something you already do. What is stopping me from giving to the poor more generously? I encourage you to reflect on this question this week. Talk about it with a friend or your spouse. Bring it to the Lord. Ask Him to bring up anything in your heart that is resisting this idea. Ask Him to give you a heart of generosity because we know it's clearly commanded in scripture. It's obviously an expectation of Christ's followers. We understand how it can meet practical needs and we can see how Jesus so generously gave to us first. So what is holding us back? What is stopping us? Ask the Lord to reveal that to you and to give you opportunity to serve and to give generously to those who are in need.

Pray with me. Jesus, we thank you for who you are. We thank you that you were generous and loved us first and that out of that love we in turn can go be loving and generous to others. God help remind us of the gift that we have received to be so consumed with gratefulness for it that we turn around and in turn out of a surrendered heart to you we go and we give to anyone who has need. Help us to trust you. Help us to be courageous in this and be trusting you in this and guide us in where and how and how much you want us to give, Lord. We praise you for who you are in your name. Amen.

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 3

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 3

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

We are continuing in our generosity series. And again, our prayer is that through this series and the work of the Spirit, in your lives you begin to discover the joy of generosity. Not just the good feeling of giving something away, but truly the joy that comes from partaking in the inner life of God, as the God that we serve is the most generous God. In previous weeks, just a reminder that in this series and all that we're covering of generosity, each week is kind of like a spoke in the wheel. And it's important, it helps support this whole practice of generosity. And so, so far what we've covered is that there's more joy in giving than in receiving. Last week Pastor Chris talked about the need to watch out for greed. And he emphasized contentment and what we already have.

And today we're going to ask the next natural question, which is, how will we use what we have? And in answering that question, we want to look at the Bible to see what it says about what we have, because how we view all that belongs to us has a direct correlation with how we use that, how we use what is ours. So there's this truth that's woven throughout Scripture from the very beginning in Genesis that says that everything in the world belongs to God, and we are stewards of all that he puts into it. It's from the very beginning, all throughout Scripture, everything in the world belongs to him, and we are stewards of all that he has put into it. Now if you have been in the church, you've probably heard something like this before, it's not necessarily new. But sometimes we go amiss at that second part. The first part we recognize, it's easy, God is the maker, creator, yes, give him all the credit for that. But our role as stewards can easily be forgotten. We can view ourselves in a way that God never intended us to view ourselves. God reminds us often in the Old Testament that he is the creator, and that he made the whole world, and that it is his. And then Jesus comes along in the New Testament and still has a lot to say about this. And so this is reflected in what we know of Jesus' teaching, that 25% of Jesus' teachings are on money and generosity, and that just a little bit less than 50% of his parables specifically are on stewardship. So we're going to take a look at one of those parables today.

We’re going to be in Luke 12, verses 35 through 48, and in this chapter, in the middle of this chapter, which is one of the longest sections of Jesus' teachings in the Gospels, there's a verse that you might be familiar with. It says in verse 33, "Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." And these truths, these teachings are bookended by two parables. The parable of the rich young fool about a man who builds bigger storehouses to hoard all of his stuff, and a second parable, the parable of the faithful servant. And these two are parables of a compare-contrast teaching method of Jesus, helping us to understand his point of generosity. The first is a negative story, a rich young man who is evil and hoards everything that he has. The second is a positive story of a servant who serves a good master. We're going to look at that second teaching this morning. So if you're in your Bibles, you can follow along on the screen. Verse 35 says this, "Be dressed, ready for service, and keep your lamps burning, like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks, they can immediately open the door for him." The disciples of Jesus, Jesus saying that the disciples of Jesus are to be like servants of a wealthy aristocrat, but with a twist. Verse 37 says this, "It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. Truly, I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will help them recline at the table, and will come and wait on them." Do we notice this part about Jesus, who is, or God, who is the master serving the servants? This is that upside down part of Jesus's kingdom. The master takes the role of the servant, and this is Jesus's vision of God. God is like a rich, generous master who takes the place of a servant to his servants and lets them recline at the table and serves them. Verse 38 says, "It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready, even when he comes in the middle of the night or toward daybreak. But understand this, if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You must also be ready, because the Son of Man will come in an hour when you do not expect him." These verses express the importance of living a life of obedience to God, living righteously, not just when being watched, not just when we know we will be judged, but all the time. In the midst of our larger conversation with generosity, it's about practicing generosity with integrity. You don't know when Jesus is returning, and so the point is we must be ready at all times. And we shouldn't hear that in a way that we just get tired of like, "Man, that's so much effort. We have to be ready all the time." We should hear that and say, "All right, that's my reason. I don't know when, so I am just going to be ready all the time. That's just the life that I have to live." Let me come to verse 42. Peter asks, basically, "God, what are you talking about? Jesus, I don't understand." So Jesus says in verse 42, "If the servant does a good job stewarding his master's house, God the master..." Oh, sorry, I've been reading my own notes. Verse 42, let me read God's words first. "The Lord answered, 'Who then is the faithful and wise manager whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns. Truly, I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. So if the servant does a good job stewarding his master's house, God the master will give him even more.’"

Now an important piece to understand is that of the crowd listening to Jesus at this time, the majority of them would have been people who are servants, considered servants, hired work. They do not have estates of their own. They are on the other end of this parable, working for people. And that's sometimes different than how we read this. We read this in our cultural Western mindset as principal owners of a lot of things. And so we read this often and say, "I got to take care of my stuff." We put ourself in the shoe of the master sometimes. But Jesus would have been speaking to those who clearly understood they were the servants in this parable. We'll get to that more in a second. Verse 45 says, "But suppose the servant says to himself, 'My master is taking a long time in coming,' and he then begins to beat the other servants, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk. The master of the servant will come on a day when he does not expect him, and in the hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him in a place with the unbelievers." That sounds very harsh. But the point is, to be wasting this time, to be acting selfishly, to assume the role of the master leads to a terrible ending.

Two things. First, the servant and the role of the master is not what the servant should be doing. The servant makes for a bad master. I think this speaks perfectly to situations where in life we try to be like God. Because of our sin nature, we will end up hurting people, causing pain and division, showing favor to some but judging and hating others. We were not meant to be in the role of God, the role of the master. And secondly, again, our motivation shouldn't be to try to earn something, but to live righteously when we think—or it shouldn't be to try to earn something or to only live righteously when we think it matters. Because, again, knowing the end date, we will never know that end date. We don't know when Jesus is coming back. And so we need to be serving God all the time, partnering with his kingdom, and participating in this inner life of God 24/7. Verse 47 says this, "The servant who knows the master's will and does not get ready or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows. But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded. And from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked." I think that last verse is so important. From everyone who has been given much, much more will be demanded. And from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked. This radical idea that Jesus is talking about in this passage is this idea of stewardship. I want to give us a definition this morning that we can take with us. This idea of stewardship is this. The active and responsible management of God's creation for God's purposes. This call to stewardship was just as radical in Jesus's day as it is for us today. And if you picked up on it, this parable that we read is similar to other parables in scripture about stewardship.

And so from these parables and from the one this morning, we can surmise a few things about stewardship. Number one, three components. Number one is that God is the Lord of the world. Three components, number one is that God owns it all. In Jesus's day, there were primarily two different views of wealth. Non-ownership, it is no one's. This was evident in Plato's Republic, this mythical utopian society where the rulers owned nothing. Also in a more common day example would be the indigenous peoples of America also held this view. It is no one's. The other view is ownership, absolute authority. This was the Roman view at the time and the dominant view of our culture today. If you own something, you have 100% authority to do whatever you want with it. It is yours. The view of scripture is neither of these, but instead a third way. Stewardship, caretakers, that active and responsible management of God's creation for God's purposes. God is the owner. We are the caretakers. We see this all the way at the beginning in Genesis 1 where God creates everything. He makes a garden. And in Genesis 2, 15 says, "The Lord took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work and take care of it." So from the very beginning, God is setting this tone that it's mine. You're helping me take care of what is mine. The theme of caretaking again is all throughout scripture. I'm going to hit you with a couple of verses really quick. Leviticus 25, 23 says, "The land must not be sold permanently because the land is mine and you reside in my land as foreigners and strangers." Deuteronomy 10, 14, "To the Lord your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it." Psalm 50 verses 10 through 12, "For every animal of the forest is mine and the cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird in the mountains and the insects in the fields are mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell you for the world is mine and all that is in it." These are just a few after the tens and tens and tens of verses in the Bible that God is saying, "It's mine. I created it. I am the creator." This idea in the library of scripture right up until Jesus' teachings in Luke 12 is that God owns it all. And again, as I was preparing this sermon, I was thinking it's very easy for us to acknowledge that God is the creator of everything. We have a harder time remembering and acknowledging that everything in creation still belongs to Him. I think we often just get this idea that God created it and kind of took a step back and let humanity take over. That's what happened, but that's not what God intended. We tend to view things as given to us, that we have 100% authority over what has been given to us. And again, that's not the view of scripture. We are caretakers, not owners, as is our second point.

Number two, we are entrusted by God with His resources to do good. God has entrusted you and me with what He has, and we are to take care of it. John Mark Comer, who's the pastor and author, whose content much of our sermon series is based off of, he says this, "We live often with the assumption that whatever money we receive from our jobs or an inheritance, we are free to spend in whatever way we want to consume that money in whatever way we choose, but scripture says otherwise." When I was a kid, maybe late elementary, early junior high, my parents, along with some other family friends, there's a bunch of us families that took this financial class for kids taught by a very well-known Christian financial guru. And it was extremely helpful. It helped instill the idea of like, "stay, spend, give." But one of those takeaways that I, from that and for many years, what I understood was that 10% was God's and the rest was mine. I do my tithe, God wants me to do that, and the rest of it, I get to choose what I want to do with my money. I think that it took a long time, by the way, for that to not be true of, to unpack that. All of it belongs to God. Evidence of the fact that we think like this is that many of us live above our income. Our expenses are higher than the money that we take in. We should be living with some breathing room in our budget to practice generosity and to live at peace without the stress of trying to make things and to try to thread this needle of our finances. This idea of living with breathing room is kind of a radical idea, and that may mean for those living with just a little by the world standards, that you may need to live with even less so you too can have breathing room to be generous, to practice giving. We don't often realize that not all of our money is for us. Some of it is for us to live, to put food on the table, to pay bills, to enjoy life. I don't want to preach this and you think that there is no joy in life. I cannot afford a happy life anymore. No. 1 Timothy 6, 17 says, "Those who put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment." God wants us to have joy in life. He is not a stingy investor, but a generous father. However, not all of the money that we receive is for us to spend on ourselves. Some of it is to live, some of it is to give to the church, to the gospel, to the poor, and some of it is to build a business or a family. But we are entrusted by God to put every dollar to the right place. We are stewards.

The third point about stewardship is this. God blesses us not just to have more, but to give more. Those who steward well are given more, to keep doing what they are doing. Paul says this in 2 Corinthians 9, verses 8, he says, "And God is able to bless you abundantly so that in all things, at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written, they have freely scattered their gifts to the poor. Their righteousness endures forever. Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion. And through us, your generosity will result in the thanksgiving to God." I love that Paul hits the nail on the head over and over again. I love that last part. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion. You need to hear that to understand why God is blessing us. This is such an important factor of God's heart of generosity. It's not for us to have more, but for us to continue to give more. I want to take a moment to address something known as the prosperity gospel, a uniquely cultural Western belief, by the way, and it's a fallacy because we hear Paul's words, and some of us may think, "Oh, if I give, then I get more in return." And all of a sudden, the mind starts turning and you're like, "Oh, well, this is great. I know how to make more money." And this is the prosperity gospel. Again, a false gospel. At its most radical, it is the belief that you give to get. If you give to God, he will give more back to you. And if you do this, and that is our goal to increase our profit in a way from God, it means that ultimately our motivation is greed and selfishness. Now, what makes the prosperity gospel so difficult is that it's not based on a complete lie. It's based on a half truth. When we are good stewards, God often does give us more. But the purpose is, again, is not to make us rich, but to make us more generous. Randy Elkhorn, who's an author and kind of an expert on biblical generosity, in his book, The Giving is the Good Life, he writes this, "God blesses us to raise our standard of giving, not our standard of living." That's hard to hear. That's not very American. That's not very Western, where we are always striving to do more, to get more for ourselves, for us, for our future. This is pretty radical to think that God's giving me more to give more. I want to take this one step farther. The question is less, how much do I give? And it's more, how much should I keep for myself? Do we see the change there? The heart posture that's changed? The mindset is still focused on stewarding, not about hoarding and about greed, but about contentment and joyful living. This is the way of scripture.

Usually, when it comes to money, there are two camps. There are savers and spenders. And maybe in your marriage or your couple, you kind of know, like, "Well, I know this person is this, and I'm the one that's trying to keep us on track." Or maybe you're the other person who's like, "Man, I always want to just feel they won't let me give what I want to give and buy what I want to buy." But savers and spenders, savers are often motivated by fear, spenders motivated by greed. And in the middle is what God has called us to, is a steward, one who is acting to channel God's resources for good, motivated by God's love and generosity. And being a steward leads us to ask a bunch of questions about what it means to be a good steward. How much do I tithe? How much do I keep? How much should I give away? What's an appropriate standard of living? What's that line between enjoying life and wasting money on luxuries? What kind of car should I drive? How many clothes should I have? You get the point. The list goes on and on. And these are the right questions to be asking, to be wrestling with. The New Testament doesn't spell it out for us, but leads us to practice discernment. And we should be constantly asking God, "God, what do you want me to do with what you have given me?" And depending on the Holy Spirit to guide us and provide these answers. A great example of this is John Wesley, the very John Wesley who our doctrine and church are based off of. He practiced what is now called a lifestyle cap. Early on in his ministry, he prayed and discerned that God wanted him, led him to a number, and he said, "I'm going to live off of only 28 pounds a year." Now, this was in the 17th century. Yeah, not today. And apparently in his lifetime, there was no, hardly any inflation. So by the end of his life, it was only up to 30 pounds. That was the new number that he had come to. And so anything over that that he made, he made a promise to God, "I'm going to give that away." In his first year, he made 30, so he gave two pounds away. In his second year, he made 60 pounds, so he gave 32 pounds away. Then it was 90 and then 120. At the peak of his ministry, he was making 1400 pounds a year. And living off of 28, he gave the rest of it away. He said, "This is all I need to live. The rest God has given me so that I can give to others." Now, that's an incredible model and a testimony of giving. And it's radical. I really cannot comprehend. I don't know anyone who does that. And I think that is just, that'd be hard. I'll be honest. I don't know if I could do that. But he came up with this saying, "Gain all you can, save all you can, and give all you can." He lived the radical life of generosity. All right. Now, I want to shift gears a bit. I know that you're thinking, "Hey, we got away with not answering a question today around tables." Well, it's happening now. I want you guys, there's a prompt on the screen. After we've heard our message and heard God's word, here's our question that you guys can have five minutes to discuss around tables. It says, "What emotions surface in you as you consider Jesus' parable of the faithful and wise manager? And how does it encourage you? And how does it challenge you?" Why don't you guys go ahead, five minutes, I'll gather us back up, and you're done.

I hope that your conversations were encouraging and thought-provoking. And if there is a lot stirring, that's a good thing. That means that God is working your heart and maybe convicting in some areas that need to be just thought over. And so, continue to pray for each other. I want to end with six giving encouragement. These are really quick. I know you hear six and you're like, "This should be over really quickly." These are from Paul in his letter to the Corinthians. These are six things about giving and maybe tithing specifically, all right?

Number one is that tithing should be regular. First Corinthians 16 verse two says, "On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income." So Paul speaks to the regularity. It shouldn't be sporadic. It should be regular.

Number two, it should be proportional. In that same verse, "Each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income." Meaning, the more money you make, the greater percentage you should give. The general principle is the more you make, the more you give.

Number three, it should be sacrificial. Second Corinthians eight verse two, it says, "In the midst of a very severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty weld up in rich generosity." Guys it should hurt to give. Pastor Lauren and I were talking about this at the beginning of Youth Group this past week. Just talking about how more often we are prone to give only when we have extra because it doesn't hurt us that much. We're like, "Well, I already have this. I already have what I need, so now I can give." And it's just like, "Oh, it doesn't hurt." But we, again, in the cultural West are adverse to pain and things that hurt us, so this is uncomfortable. It goes against the values that we have inherited, like take care of yourself and then take care of others. No, Jesus says to give even when it hurts. There should regularly be things that we may not buy in order to have enough to give to someone else, in order to give and be generous.

Number four, it should be voluntary. Second Corinthians nine verse seven says, "Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion." There shouldn't be a guilt trip about giving, but we have to pray about what is in our heart. And hopefully there's a desire because there's, again, this desire to be generous like God is generous.

Number five from second Corinthians nine verse seven says, "For God loves a cheerful giver." We're to give joyfully. It should be a joy to give and the joy that we have should outweigh the pain. It's going to hurt a little bit, but the joy of giving should be greater than the pain. It should be joy in participating in the inner life of God and being generous like he is and knowing that we are honoring him and worshiping him in how we give.

And then lastly, number six, it should be motivated by apprenticeship to Jesus. Second Corinthians eight verse nine, "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich." It's being like Jesus. He modeled it for us in the most ultimate sacrificial way and we should be willing to do so on much lesser grounds and lesser means. Giving is not a religious duty. It's a part of following Jesus and being an apprentice to his way of life. I'll let you know that our elders, our staff, we are praying for more givers in our church. Not givers out of obligation and not because we just want the money, but because it's evidence of people who are being transformed by God, who God is working in them and pulling them to be more like him. That's what we are praying for. So while these are guidelines, these six things are guidelines to follow because there isn't a spreadsheet. How nice would it be to open up your Bible and just to see your number of income and be like, "All right, God wants me to do exactly this. Here's how much I'm supposed to give exactly, and here's how much to give to this, this, and this." No, we don't have that. The Bible doesn't give that, but he gives guidelines. And again, we are meant to be praying, constantly praying, coming before God and asking, "Father, thank you for these resources. What do you want me to do with them?”

I want to ask, do you do this? Do you listen to God about your money? We took a survey right now. You don't have to answer out loud. Don't raise your hands, but which one would you be? First, I do not listen to God. I listen to God, but not about money and generosity, or I listen to God about my money and generosity. Keep that up there for just a second. I think if we're honest, many of us are that second option. I listen to God, but not about money or generosity. We're scared of what he may say, because we're still believing the myth that more money equals more happiness. And if God is asking us to give away our money, he's asking us to give away that source of happiness in our lives, and we don't like that. And so we're just like, "God, I'd rather not ask. I'm just going to do my thing. I hope I'm going to be in obedience to you. I'm going to do my 10 percent." But we don't necessarily have this active conversation with God. We don't yet believe that God is an abundantly generous Father, which is why Jesus says in Luke 12, verse 32, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom." Just as Pastor Chris preached last week, it's worth repeating, because we need to hear this so badly. He has given us everything that we need. Everything. Not what the world says we need, but everything that we truly need, God has given us. And it can be found in him. Let me close with just a few more words from John Mark Conroy. It says, "God is not a stingy investor out to maximize his profit margins, but he is a loving Father who wants to bless you and form you into a daughter or son who is like he is, full of generosity and joy." So this week, I want to challenge you. Take time to radically rethink your relationship with your resources and your money, not as an owner, not as a non-owner, but as a caretaker, as a steward of what God has given you. And begin this lifelong journey of listening to the call of our generous Heavenly Father and where he might be wanting you to give and partake with him in a generous life.

Let's pray. God, thank you again for your word. And thank you for this call to be radically different because the world needs it. And we know that we have been called to be partners with you, participating in your ministry, God, in your kingdom. And we pray that you would help us to reevaluate our relationship with what you have given us. Help us in our hearts and minds to have this shift of seeing ourselves as stewards, that you have given us something and we are to care for it in the best way. Maybe spending some of it for ourselves, maybe keeping some of it to build our family, our businesses, and then also to give. You have given us things to give away. God, I pray that through your spirit, you would help us to see clearly opportunities this week to be generous with our time, with our money, with our relationships, with our influence, with whatever you have given us. I pray that you would put in front of us opportunities to give it away and that we would feel joy in that, God. True joy. Yes, it will hurt. Yes, we're going to say, "Oh, you know what? I was saving that for this," or, "I could really use that." But God, I pray that you would help us to feel the joy of when we participate in being generous like you and giving it to those who need it. We trust you, God. We love you. We pray this in your name. Amen.

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 2

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 2

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

We are in week two of our Lost Art of Generosity series and I hope you guys enjoyed last week and some discussion around the table. We're going to have a little bit more today as part of the service today. But last week, Pastor Andre opened up our series talking about some words directly from Jesus himself. Specifically talking about how there's more joy in giving than in receiving. And that the foundation of a life of generosity is this idea that the more that we have that we give away, the greater our life becomes. And this is totally counterintuitive to life, right? While generosity is more than just giving our money, it is actually not less. And that we ourselves, as it says in scripture, we are created in the image of God and God is a happy, a joyful, a generous God. And when we practice generosity, we are actually living life according to the design and we tap into the joy of God himself. It says in Acts 20 35 that there is more happiness in giving than in receiving. And there's an author, Randy Alcorn, that we'll talk about through this series. He says that giving is the good life. And Jesus has an invitation for us in our hearts to kind of watch out, to be careful how we have our natural desires. Because when we truly begin to slow down and simplify the parts of our lives, it's all in a manner of creating margin to live a life of generosity. And Pastor Andre last week, he challenged us to think about a very simple, maybe small act of generosity that we could take before today. Maybe it was to pay for someone else's coffee, to maybe put $5 in our pocket and to pray every single day, "God, where do you want this $5 to go?" Or maybe it was the gift of someone of our time to maybe sit down and have a conversation, to have an act of service towards them or serve somebody in a practical way. Around our tables this morning, I got two questions for us that I want you to talk about. The first of which is, what challenges do people face when thinking about generosity? What are some of those challenges that maybe personally we feel or you see in other people? And then what new ideas of generosity have been growing in you this past week as we begin our series? So we're gonna play some just quiet music in the background, take about three minutes or so, begin to discuss around the tables those two questions.

I love, I was kind of overhearing some of the conversation in the room, but just give a shout out from your table. What were some of the things you guys talked about that are some of the challenges or things that really kind of things that people face when thinking about generosity? Not having enough. Not having enough. Yeah. Selfishness. Ooh yeah. Oh co-dependency, yeah okay yeah yeah. What else? What other challenges? Fear. Yeah absolutely 100%. What else? What other what other challenges? Anything else from your table? Control. Giving up control? Okay yeah yeah. You give up control? Okay yeah yeah. You give it away and then you just don't know what's gonna happen with it after that. Yeah that's fair that's fair. What other things that your table kind of popped up? Oh there you go. Getting people to accept the help. Okay. Yeah so you don't know whether it's it's where your money is going if or whatever it is is really going towards the the cause that they say it's going to. Yeah that's good. Yeah those are definitely some really real challenges when thinking about generosity. Anybody have any ideas of of new ways you're thinking of generosity maybe this week as we started the series? Is anybody able to do like the five dollar thing or pay for somebody's coffee and do anything give anything away this week? Time? Okay awesome. Yeah we had this week we actually had someone come come by the church and ask for some gas money and and for us here in Rocklin that happens maybe six months or so. And got to have a good conversation with a gentleman and you know it's it's interesting with those things where it's like begin to have kind of put in our mind and then God brings an opportunity by our way and we're like okay and honestly we what we tend to do here is we tend to have gift cards to Safeway down the street so they can get groceries or diapers or and what's nice is they have a gas station there too. But we were actually out all out of those. And so we ended up just handing over some cash and some of those real fears of like, is the guy really going to go buy gas? Does he need something like what is he going to go spend it on? But it was one of those things it's like God was like no, you need to be generous. You need to trust him and trust that he's listening to God in that. And so a very real practical way. We as a church are actually because of you guys are actually able to bless somebody this week.

And so have you ever been talking with someone about something specific? Maybe it's some new shoes or clothes or a kitchen gadget and new video game. Maybe it's something to do with your favorite hobby. Maybe something about Mother's Day coming up. Guys, one week warning, heads up. All right. Can't say I didn't tell you. But maybe it was a trip you want to take or something else that you want to buy. You remember having those conversations? I had one of these this couple weeks ago. I was meeting with my spiritual director, my shepherd, and we were talking about what we were doing this summer. And Lauren and I are a 17 year anniversary is coming up the end of this month. And yeah, we're excited about it. We're excited. And so we were talking about where we wanted to go. Maybe we wanted to take a flight somewhere or travel out of town. Maybe go to Tahoe. We weren't sure. And I'm having this conversation with my friend and all of a sudden literally a pop up notification on my phone. Southwest is having a early summer sale. And I was like, God, are you listening? Siri, are you listening? Like what's going on here? But it's just like this creepy moment just like what is happening? We didn't book any flights with Southwest. It was a little too creepy for us.

But experts say on average, we look at and we are exposed to and put in front of us three to five thousand ads every single day. That's just daily. That's not a week. That's not a month. That is daily we see that. And all of these are designed not for our rational brain because consumerism isn't rational at all. But all of these ads, they're amplified. They have all these algorithms. They spend billions of dollars every single year on advertising. And let me tell you, the executives of these businesses, they're no dummies. They don't spend this money if it's not working. But the reality is that all of these are designed to data mine our deepest fears, our insecurities, our questions, our hopes, our dreams. All by watching what we do and listening to us right from our pocket. A Harvard professor calls this the surveillance capitalism. But even before the era of digital manipulation, the human heart has long been prone to believe the myth of more. See that lie that just if we had a teeny bit more, then we would be happy. But the truth is, and it cuts across the spectrum of the entire human experience, no matter how much we get, it's never enough. No matter how much we possess, it's never enough.

And the writers of Ecclesiastes were very wise when they said this, "Whoever loves money never has enough. Whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income." See, the fact is that the more we get, the more that we want. Not just the reality. John D. Rockefeller, the oil tycoon, the first billionaire in the entire world, was famously asked, "How much money is enough?" And he responded with, "Just a little bit more." Psychologists actually call this the hadronic treadmill. The fact that desire only begets more desire and more desire and more desire, and it's like you are literally on a treadmill of life running and walking and chasing after something, but never arriving. Chasing the carrot at the end of the stick. But even worse, the more that we get, honestly, the more neurotic we actually become. And this is the encounter intuitive side of Jesus that really begins to stretch us and challenge our thinking because we think that money will make us happy. But often, not only does it not make us happy, it makes us even less happy than we were before. We become more anxious. We become more distracted. We become more discontent. We become more lonely. And as a result of us living here in the West in a very affluent generation of human history, many of us are wracked daily by fear, worry, greed, and unsatisfied desire.

And it comes to no surprise that the majority of Jesus' teaching on money are warnings about the danger of it. I want to look at a couple examples this morning. Jesus in Luke 12 says this. He says, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed." Greed is really similar to lust, but it's for things. It's this insatiable desire for the more that we have, the more that we need. And Jesus, He was right. There are all kinds of greed. There's more crass things of greed. A bigger house, a bigger TV, a bigger, faster, nicer car. Those bigger, better things that we're always chasing. But there's also a more bespoke type of greed. A greed for exotic travel. Maybe it's for eating out. Maybe it's for boutique fashion. Maybe it's for rare possessions. And we're all vulnerable to some level of greed. Hence why Jesus here says, "Watch out!" But why? Why is greed so bad and dangerous? Well, the next line from Jesus' word says this in Luke. It says, "Life does not consist in an abundance of possessions." It's just not where the good life is found. But not only that wealth can be dangerous, let's look at this next thing that Jesus says in Mark chapter 4. He said, "Some people like seeds sown among thorns hear the word, but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth, the desire for other things, come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful." Notice Jesus' language here. He says, "The deceitfulness of wealth." He doesn't say that wealth is evil, but rather it is deceitful. But why is that? Well, it promises what it cannot give. So wealth does. It says it will give you happiness, contentment, an identity, a false sense of safety and security. We all fall for the lie. Can we be honest here? We fall for that lie again and again and again and again. And yet this desire for wealth is often what is keeping us from the good life. Jesus continues in Matthew 19. He says, "Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." Again, I tell you, He's got to say this twice because it's so hard for us to understand. "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." So notice here that Jesus has to say it twice, right? It's so hard for us to comprehend or we so quickly forget it, right? That here wealth is actually an obstacle to the good life, not the path to the good life. But what I want you to hear here is Jesus saying it isn't impossible. It's possible to follow Jesus into the kingdom of God and carry wealth with you. But it is very hard to do. And we love to think to be, "I'm going to be the first one to do it, Jesus." "All those who have come before me did not have the faith and the relationship that I had with you, God. I can carry the heavy burden of wealth. Please bestow it upon me.”

But the reality is Jesus' warning is haunting. The financial success can equal spiritual failure. See, this is an idea that you rarely hear in society today, right? But it's profoundly biblical. Which is probably why the weight of Jesus' teachings are so focused and against and warning to greed. The thing about it is that very few of us think we're greedy, right? As a pastor, I've had, oh man, I've had people confess things to me. Whether it was abortion, whether it was adultery, pornography, all sorts of addictions, abuse. But I've never had anyone come to me and confess greed. Just never have. And we tend to unconsciously adopt the standard cultural norms of our day, right? We live in one of the most greedy materialistic cultures in history. Hence, we often, like the story of the frog in the water, we don't even realize what greed is doing to our soul. And in this series and in this thought of figuring out the lost art of generosity, our pastors, we were thinking about, could there be a way of Jesus that could set our hearts free from greed and form us into the people that Jesus so desperately and deeply wants us to be and happy and at peace. And yes, there is. It's the rhythm and the practice and the lost art of generosity. Jesus says this to the Pharisees in Luke 19. He says, "You Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness." See, wickedness is more of like a generic term, but greed is very specific. It's the one sin that Jesus calls out by name is greed right here. And then he says this, he continues on, "But now for what is inside you, that greed, that foul just ugh, ruining of your heart, but rather be generous to the poor and everything will be clean for you." If there was a silver bullet to greed, it would be generosity. And yes, it is true, the more we get, the more that we want. But the opposite or the inverse is actually also true. See, the more that we give, the more happy and at peace we actually become. The word here used by biblical scholars that would talk about this inner satisfaction would be the word contentment. Contentment. It's one of those most underrated virtues in the entire world. That if greed is this unsatisfied desire being wracked by want of more and more, contentment is the actual opposite. It is being deeply happy and grateful for what you have. It's being free from the desire for more. It is this way of living our lives with a heavenly perspective that frees us up and allows us to live without the weight on our shoulders.

Turn with me or flip or tap or whatever to 1 Timothy chapter 6 is where we're going to be for the majority of this morning. But I love what it says here talking about contentment. And it brings all of this stuff together. It says as Paul is echoing Jesus, so Paul isn't saying something different. He's echoing Jesus, but he's also giving us this idea and alternate pathway towards happiness. It says this in Timothy 6. Godliness with contentment is great gain. What does he mean by this? What he means is that true wealth is not having a lot. It is being happy in God and content with what you have. I've heard a wise person say this once. They said, "I may not have a lot of money, but I am rich all of the time." This is the idea of contentment. It continues on in 1 Timothy, "For we brought nothing into the world and we take nothing out of it." As the saying goes, you can't take it with you. A lot of people have tried. Wealth is temporary. Either you lose it all the day you die or you lose it all way before that point. It continues on in verse 8, "But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that." What does it mean by that? Well, the Greek word here for that word clothing actually translates to covering. So the idea is here, if we have food, we have clothing, we have shelter, and as long as we got God and each other, that's enough. There's no need for anything more than that. But he continues on. It says, "Those who want to get rich," or maybe translate this way, "Those who set their hearts on being wealthy, those who long to be rich, those who desire with their hearts on being wealthy, fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction, for the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil." This line is often misquoted, but if you read here, you pay attention to the love of money is the root of all evil that everybody says. The love of money is the root of all evil. No, no, no. That's not what the Bible says. The NIV translation here actually is really, really excellent. It says, "The love of money is a root, a root of all kinds of evil," meaning it's the evil underneath so many of the evils in our soul and society. Money itself is not evil. It's just not. It can do great good, absolutely, but it can also do great evil. And when I think of power of generosity, I think of a business in which to make the world an absolutely better place.

But at the same time, money isn't neutral either. It's very powerful. I think of nuclear power or nuclear energy. It can bring life or death. And it's very hard to steward this level of power well. I think of money like Frodo's Ring in Tolkien's classic Lord of the Rings, right? You guys have seen those series. I think of it and the idea that only the purest of hearts stand a chance at not being corrupted by its power. The whole movie series, all 300 hours of it, are all about the struggle to end the Ring, right? They do flashbacks to years before when kings wielded it and destroyed half the earth, and then it was gone and lost and hidden forever and then found again. And the whole journey of the fight to be able to figure out what to do with this powerful ring. And I think that's for us with money. That even then sometimes it's not a blessing as much as a burden to our soul, and it tends to deform our inner person. That money-love is far more dangerous than any of us realize. This is what it says in the next verse. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. Another way it's been translated, pierced themselves with many pains, have wounded themselves with many sorrows, caused themselves untold agonies of mind. In my life here on earth, whether you have more years than me and say I haven't been here very long or you have younger years than me saying you are super old, I've seen a lot of people gain wealth over the years. And I've seen what it does to their hearts and to their lives. And my experience is that the warning of Jesus and the scriptures are incredibly, incredibly true. Not only does money make most people happy, but it often is the root of all kinds of evil.

So what's Paul's solution to all of this and the problem of greed? Contentment. The writer Randy Alcorn defines contentment as being satisfied in who's you are, who you are, and what you have. Those who love and serve Jesus can be truly content, but those who love and serve money can never be. To be content is to realize you have enough. But even more so is be happy with what you have been blessed with. See, my problem is, you guys probably don't struggle with this, is that I think I'll be content when I get a raise or when I buy that home or when I get through just this season of life. Then I'll be content. But that's not how contentment works. It's not. The truth is, though, but we can be happy here and now through practicing the lost art of generosity. See, there's, I see this as two facets of this discipline, kind of maybe like two sides of a coin. The first of which is going to be the most obvious one. So if we have generosity, the first side would be to give. To give our resources away. Which we're going to talk about this more later, but the reality is this isn't ours in the first place. It's solely God, and so we freely share. Giving is like God's antidote to greed. It's like the prescription to fix the greed in our lives. And the more that we give away, the less control that money actually has over our hearts. The other side of that is to simplify our life. To edit down everything to the essentials of what really matters. And see, both sides are critical. J.K. Chesterton famously said this, "There are two ways to get enough. One is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less." Paul puts it this way, that there's two ways to be rich. Earn more or want less. That's it. I think the second one, want less, is a little bit easier to attain in life.

But the discipline of pursuit of less has at times been called simplicity or simple living. Or in the Christian tradition, different words. Or maybe you've heard the secular term minimalism. But there's so much more to be said about simplicity. First, I want to get this straight. Simplicity is not the same thing as poverty. Sometimes we just throw the baby out with the bathwater and go, "I'm just going to be poor." But I don't think that's how God wants us to live our lives. Because if you're poor, you don't have anything to give away, right? But the reality is that the definition of simplicity is this. Limiting the number of our possessions, expenses, activities, and social obligations is a level where we are free to live joyfully and generously in the kingdom with Jesus. And it reframes the question of, "What else can I get?" Framing it into the question of, "What can I do without?" Thinking in our mindset. And see, this question only makes sense inside of a worldview like that of Jesus. See, the reality is, to live a generous life, we need to have margin. We need to have margin in our finances so we have budget in the room to share. We need to have margin in our schedule for rooms for interruptions from people who need us, for times for rest, for times of delight in the Lord. We need margin in our relationships. But see, the problem is most of us live at overcapacity, not under capacity. See, for Jesus, or for us who are apprentices of Jesus, disciples of Jesus, we should live our lives where the people should look at us and how we spend our money, and they should assume we actually make less money than we do. This is really hard. Imagine this, if you would with me, I'll put this on the screen, of a line of our income and our expenses and a level of indebtedness. Most of us in the world around us, this is reality, we live above that debt line. We're maxing out our capacity. Jesus calls us to actually live underneath that level, in the bottom. Because in the area above, we find ourselves with anxiety, with misery, with stress, with worry. But when we live below that line, we find contentment. We can live out generosity. We find joy and happiness. And this is the exact opposite of our culture.

We live in California, we live in a very affluent area in California, but the reality is when people drive in the luxury cars, living in the giant homes, living in their lifestyle with their clothes, everything like that, they are still living paycheck to paycheck, teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. And I don't see how this is the way that Jesus calls us to live our lives, to just live the opposite. Did you get what Paul said there? He said, "We will be content." The Greek word here, content, implies a resolve of the heart, that we will not give into greed, but be happy with what we have. There will come a time in your life where you will have to draw a line in the sand and say, "Enough is enough. I don't need any more." But here's the hard part. This practice looks different for all of us. And it will look different based upon your stage in life, based upon your income level, whether or not you have children or dependents. You may be struggling to put food on the table, but Jesus' warnings about greed are not just for the rich. It is a call for all of us to be content in what we have.

I love what it says in Hebrews, we're going to close out, it said, "Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have." Keep your heart free. See, our heart is like a GPS. I think we've all used GPS on our phone before, right? We can pull that up and the world tells us, "Just follow your heart's desire." But that's like opening up Google Maps and just driving. We'll just go wherever, right? There's no direction, there's no final destination, there's no place that we're trying to head towards. We're just out there freewheeling it. And I think the reality is that if we were to just let our heart's desire just lead us, we'd probably end up in some really bad places. What Jesus is trying to teach us here is we have to put in the address of heaven into our heart GPS in life, because then we're going to the right destination. And then every turn has a purpose, every direction makes sense. We're headed towards a certain place. And if we just let ourselves go, we won't get to where God wants us to be. See, that is the goal. The Jesus way is not riches or poverty, but it is freedom and generosity. This is what it says in that second part of Hebrews 13. Just keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have. And then he says, "Because God has said, 'I will never leave you, I never will forsake you.'" Because ultimately what we've been doing is we've been searching for, what we are searching for in money can only be found in God. What we have been chasing after to fill that in ourselves, money and wealth never will. It's only to be found in God. Whether it's peace, happiness, safety, security, identity, desire. We think we just get a little bit more, right? Then we'll be content. But what we're searching for in money can only be found in God. The good news, the gospel is that we already have everything that we need. We already have it all. We have access to the kingdom of heaven. God is our king provider and he will never leave you and never forsake you. Right here, right now, we have everything that we need to live a happy, joy-filled life in God.

Pray with me. Jesus, thank you for who you are. God, thank you for your son, your gift and sacrifice on the cross. Jesus, we have everything that we need. You've blessed us with everything. You've given us exactly what we need for today and for tomorrow and for the day after that. You have it all figured out. So God, I pray that we wouldn't worry about that, but that we would be focused in the moment here and now. That we would have contentment to push back against the greed that creeps into our lives every single moment of every single day. And Jesus, we would live a life that is honoring and glorifying to you with our finances. Being a witness to others to point people to you, Jesus. In everything that we do and say and schedule and work with our hands and take care of our time. God, it would all be directed to bring you glory in this world until we see you face to face in heaven. We thank you, Jesus. We love you. Amen.

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 1

The Lost Art of Generosity: Part 1

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

Well, we are, as you can see, around tables today and there is no lunch afterwards and you're probably like, what is happening right now? Was this just for Morning Blend? No, though it does help. We wanted you guys to sit around tables for Morning Blend but we are going to be around tables to encourage and provide opportunity to prime the pump, to ready your hearts and minds, to engage with this series and to do so in community. So we're gonna be around tables for the next four weeks, this week and four more weeks. I know some of you are like, oh my goodness, will I not be here for the next four weeks? Oh, I love that. Some of you are like, yes, this is the best. Yeah, we need to. We're gonna have time either before the message or after the message, maybe during the message, where we're gonna give you each week a prompt or a question that you are gonna discuss around your table. And so as much as it is an individual faith that we have, we also recognize that it's a communal practice that we live in Christ together and we wanna encourage that with this. And so in our series, we are starting the series, The Lost Art of Generosity. While generosity is present in our world today, generosity as Jesus lived it and taught it, practiced it, that's harder to come by. And so this series is gonna take a look at Jesus's words about generosity. From a distance, generosity sounds like a difficult practice to embody regularly every day, and it is at first, but it quickly becomes one of the most joy-filled of all of Jesus's practices. And so our prayer for this series in the coming weeks is that you discover the great joy that Jesus is referring to, not just the good feelings that occur when we are generous, but the deep joy that comes from participating in the inner life of God himself, who is the most generous being in all the universe. I'll continue to share more about our series in just a moment, but let's pause right now to have our first discussion moment. So here it is, it's on the screen, we'll give it to you. Whether you were the giver or the recipient, share about a time when you experienced the joy of generosity. Whether you were the giver or the recipient, share around your table. So we have like three to five minutes. We won't have time to go into your full story, so maybe keep it short and just say, "Hey, in this moment in time, this guy did this for me, "and I really loved it, and it was amazing." It can be that short. If you're around a table with just the two of you, feel free to share your whole heart if you want to. But introduce yourself if you haven't. Be really quick, three to five minutes, and then I'll gather us back up. Ready, set, go.

We're gonna start in verse 19. It says this, this is Jesus speaking. It says, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth "where moths and vermin destroy "and where thieves break in and steal, "but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven "where moths and vermin do not destroy "and where thieves do not break in and steal." Notice here that Jesus doesn't speak against storing up things. Are there any collectors in here? People who love collecting something, maybe? Yes? Okay, I see a couple hands raised. Good. I'm curious about what those are. I have some collectors in my family. My grandpa was a huge collector. He collected stamps and coins. I didn't know, I was a kid when I really found out about this and didn't come to appreciate it 'cause he passed away when I was younger, but he was kind of an expert, and people would send coins and stamps, mail 'em over to him and be like, "What do I have?" And he would go through people and give them estimates. So he was really into stamps and I think foreign coins. On my other side of the family, my cousin, this was also when I was little, I remember walking into, he had a two-bedroom house, and I kid you not, from floor to ceiling, you could not see a wall. It was covered in action figures. Like the biggest collection I've ever seen. The whole two-bedroom house was just for the collection. He was living by himself. But he had, it was amazing. And as a kid, I was like, "This is awesome. "This is better than a toy store. "Look at all these toys." But I learned that I couldn't play with them. They were all boxed up and graded and everything.

So those might be some extreme sides of collecting, but there is an innate desire in us to store things up. Jesus doesn't rebuke that. Rather, he speaks to where we should store things up. He says, "Not on earth, where moth and rust destroy, "where everything can be lost so quickly, "but store up your treasures in heaven." Now, we read that, and we think, "Eternal treasure storehouse." Of, hey, when I, the way I live my life as a Christian, one day when God, the Bible says I get my own house, he's building a house for me, I'm going to have a treasure room somewhere, and there's all these treasures that I've accumulated from being a good Christian. Maybe you don't think that, but we can kind of think that way. Of, hey, I got this place, I am getting all these things in the future. It's a future investment. And that's not necessarily wrong, but that's not the whole picture that Jesus is saying here. You see, this phrase, "in heaven," at that time as Jesus meant it, is also saying, "in God and what he is doing on earth." Store up your treasures in God and what he is doing on earth. That paints a little different picture. That helps shift our mindset from a future that we cannot see and may not feel responsible to interact with. That's a future, it's over there, I'll get to that one day when I die, get to experience all these treasures in heaven. It shifts that to, this is a future that I get to participate in. Storing up my treasures in heaven and what God is doing right now on earth. It's more present, it's more tangible for us. And it can change our heart towards stewarding what we have and giving what we have. Because for Jesus, money is all about our hearts. Verse 21 says, "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." According to Jesus, our hearts follow our money. We often think of it the opposite way, that our money follows our heart. And that can be true, that we can spend money on what we love. But Jesus is saying it works both ways. We come to love, maybe even obsess over or be controlled by what we spend our money on. This one can be tricky, it doesn't start necessarily as an obsession. Maybe it can be slower developing and we can obsess over something that is a good thing but it becomes too much and it takes the place of God in our hearts. Maybe it's something like, hey, you bought a house. That's amazing. But all of a sudden, all the money that you're pouring into that house, that thing can become an idol over God. You care about that house more than you care about God. That takes up more of your time, more of your heart. You are more controlling and acting out of fear and greed over that than listening to God. When we store up on earth, two things become key motivators and get a hold of our hearts, fear and greed. Our hearts are racked by fear because we know that we could lose it all in a moment. Or our hearts are motivated by greed because we feel like we may never have enough.

So we want more and more and more just in case, if I just have more, I'll be that much more safe, that much more able to provide for my family. But Jesus, he never wants us to operate out of fear or greed. And he has an alternative way of storing things up in heaven or with him and what he is doing here on earth. And in order to do that, we need a certain perspective. It says in verse 22, "The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness?" What is Jesus talking about here? Do we all need to have surgery to have 20/20 vision so we can all see perfectly? No, though that is helpful at times. "The eye is the lamp of the body." In the Greek here, these phrases, the people would have understood this, a healthy eye means you are generous. An unhealthy eye means you are stingy. Jesus is saying there are two ways of looking at the world. This is the crux of our message today. There are two ways of looking at the world. Again, in the old world, they would have said good eye, bad eye. Today, we would say something like the abundance mindset and a scarcity mindset. In an abundance mindset, we see God as Father, a provider. We see ourselves as His child. We see life as a gift given to us. We see that in this world, God has provided more than enough. It says elsewhere in Jesus' teachings, "Look at the lilies of the field, the birds of the air. If God has given them what they need, how much more will He give us?" The result of this is that we are grateful towards God and generous towards our neighbors. If we see the world in this way, we see God as our Father who provides for us, we are His children, He's going to take care of us, life is a gift, and this world has more than enough, then we are grateful, and we are able to be generous to other people because we know and trust that God is good and He will provide. Now, the other mindset, scarcity mindset, that God is not our Father and not our provider, that you are on your own. It's a dog-eat-dog world out here, and you better do what you need to do to take care of yourself. It does not matter what it means to other people. That life on earth is a dangerous place and that there are scarce resources. There's not enough to go around, so I've got to take care of mine. And again, it doesn't matter because there's not enough, so I better take care of... It's responsible. We can even guise this in wisdom and say, "God has told me to provide for my family. I'm sorry if that means it's not providing for your family, but I've got to take care of me." The result of this is a heart that is consumed by fear and greed. I want to keep this up here for a second. In the old world, they're using this healthy eye or unhealthy eye, right? The healthy eye, an eye of abundance. We see the world in this way. We live in this way. We are free to live in this way. With the unhealthy eye, you can see how that person is consumed by fear and greed, and there is no room for God in there. We want to have a healthy view of this world. And the scarcity mindset, this unhealthy eye, is an unhealthy view of the world. You know, the church isn't immune to this temptation or exempt from dealing with this. As a church, we must be a place that fights to have an abundance mindset, which can't be hard. We as a church have, you may not know this, but Spring Valley has bills to pay. We have to keep the lights on, the air conditioning, the heat in the winter, and we can be prone to be stingy and have a scarcity mindset. "God, there's not enough. There may not be enough this month. What does that mean? Maybe we can't do this ministry. Maybe we can't love these people like we're supposed to." Those thoughts are just because we're pastors, doesn't mean that we totally see it, we totally get it, we're good, we're locked in. It is hard. We can look to the future with this fear and greed and say, "I don't know, God. I don't know if there's going to be enough." And all of a sudden, we're operating ministry out of fear and greed. Instead of looking at our situation, trusting God that he will provide and there's abundance. And to be very real with you, in times of economic uncertainty and things like inflation, tithing is often the first thing to go. People sacrifice their tithing because, again, they view, "I got to take care of me first. God, you'll take care of the church. You'll figure that out, but I got to figure out me first." And I'm not saying that--again, I struggle with that too. So what I'm saying is to share that we have to fight against this mentality, this scarcity mindset.

We cannot view generosity in those moments when things get tough. Like tithing, we cannot view it as optional or extra because it isn't. These two mindsets, the good eye and the bad eye, they aren't necessarily determined by what a person has either. Let's take this a step further. Two people can have the same exact situation, the same job, the same income, the same family responsibilities, same bills and everything, but see the world in radically different ways. That can be true of two people who make very little by the world's standards and struggle to pay everything, to, again, by the world's standards, struggle to live. But there can be a person in that situation who has an abundance mindset, who is thankful and sees God as providing for their every need, even if it's just enough that God is providing. There can be a person who is in that place and is struggling, saying there's not enough and living in a scarcity mindset. It can be true of two people who make a lot by the world's standards, who have more than enough, who have never known what it is to need anything, and they can still struggle with having a scarcity mindset. So let me ask you, church, how do you see the world? How do you see the world? If you had an absolute assurance that God would provide enough for you, how would that change your relationship to money and generosity? If you trust God's vision of abundance and see Him as your Father provider, how would that change things? If you live like that, let's flesh out this concept a bit more. If you have a healthy eye, and you believe that there is abundance in this world, and Jesus' teachings start to make sense when He says, "Don't worry. There's no need for anxiousness. I have you. I've got you." Seek first the kingdom of God. Again, not seek first making sure your life is good and then seek the kingdom of God. No, seek first the kingdom of God. If we have an abundant mindset, that makes sense. If it says, "Give and it will be given to you," if we have an abundant mindset, that makes sense too. If we have a scarcity mindset, that verse does not--we don't understand that. But at the end of an abundant mindset, we are free to be generous. In the scarcity mindset, Jesus' teachings sound foolish in today's world. All that He talks about generosity and money, they do not add up. That is not what the world says. And at the end of a scarcity mindset is being enslaved by fear and greed.

And this leads us to how Jesus finishes this teaching, which is why He says, verse 24, "No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money." Jesus is even more clear by posing this question, "Who will you serve? Money or God?" The word here for money is the word "mammon," which is an ancient Syrian god of wealth. So this is Jesus' way of saying money is like a rival god. Which god are you going to serve, the god of money or the god of the universe, the king of kings, Yahweh? We want so badly to believe that money is neutral. And technically, it is, but it's kind of like nuclear energy, capable of great good, but also devastating destruction and absolute evil. For Jesus, wealth is powerful, and the sway it has in our hearts is a work in influence of the enemy. The god of mammon is behind so much in our world. Whole industries are run by the worship of mammon, the worship of money. War, racism, ecological devastation, sexual exploitation, to name a few.

As we look at the words of Jesus in verse 24, he is informing us that it is impossible to serve both God and money, because mammon will take over our hearts. So how do we resist? How do we resist this temptation that money has, the sway over our hearts? How do we have that healthy eye and live out the abundant mindset? This is what Jesus is teaching his disciples here. And Jesus, you guys know this, is a brilliant communicator and teacher. So in just these short verses, he is teaching on three different levels. He's teaching at the head level, the knowledge, the ideas that he's saying, our heart, he's addressing the feelings that we have, and he's also teaching our hands, what to do, our behavior. So the first one, what he teaches us to understand is how to see God and our lives in his world. He's telling them where good life is to be found and who God is. You see, biblical generosity doesn't start with tithing or giving to the poor. We'll get to those. Those are good practices. It starts with who God is. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, the Trinity, a Trinity of self-giving. Our God is a heavenly Father. I talked about earlier the idea of a heavenly Father who provides. For those of you who have kids, or even if you were a kid, you had an age where you didn't worry about certain things. Our kids don't worry about food on the table, medical bills. They're not worrying about like, "Hey, Mom, Dad, we have a medical bill showing up for my six-month appointment," whatever. They don't worry about those type of things. Why? Because they trust that as parents, we are providing for them.

It's the same way that God takes care of us. We see the triune God, and there's generosity woven throughout Scripture. From day one of creation, God is giving, is blessing. All the way up to Jesus. God gave his only Son. Jesus gave his life. God and Jesus give the Holy Spirit to us. We serve a generous God, the most generous God. And do we trust him? Do we live free to give as he has given to us? That's the idea. That's the head knowledge. Secondly, our hearts. He's teaching the disciples about the architecture of our hearts. He's telling us, if we get our relationship to money right, it will set our hearts free. If we follow Jesus and live like him, it should change our whole view on money. That's why it's more than just tithing or radical acts of generosity. Really good things, but it's more than that. It's also about the freedom to buy coffee or a meal for a friend. About having people over and providing them dinner. About being quick to forgive, as forgiveness is an expression of giving, of generosity. It's not just about our behavior. It's about our inner nature being formed to be like Jesus. Our hearts being shaped like his. And then thirdly, it's about the practice of generosity. Listen, the generosity that Jesus lived, that he calls us to live, is just that. It's a life. It's not a one-time thing. It's not a random, "Hey, I did that last year. I was super generous to that one person. I'm good for a while." It's not just when we have extra, and so we're like, "Hey, I have some to spare. Now I'll think about being generous." It is a practice. It needs to be a regular practice, a lifelong practice. Practicing generosity will make you into a more generous person.

Here's the reality. You can't leave today and instantly remove all the fear and greed that you face. Like, "Oh, I just learned about abundant mindset and scarcity mindset. I'm no longer going to be afraid." It just doesn't work that way. That fear and greed is still in you. You have to work that out with God. But you can, after leaving today, you can sponsor a child. You can buy someone lunch this week. You can give away a regular amount of your monthly income with special attention to the poor and the church and the gospel. You can practice being generous. And as you practice being generous on a regular rhythm, that grip that greed and fear has in your heart will begin to dissipate. And through this practice, God can change our hearts and habits. John Mark Comer, he says this, "Generosity is a practice by which we index our hearts from scarcity mindset to the abundance mindset of Jesus." We turn from fear to trust. As we give, this is what happens, we turn from fear to trust. We turn from worry to peace, trusting, knowing that God has provided for us. We turn from desire to enjoyment, always wanting more and never being satisfied to enjoying what God has given us. We turn from grasping to gratitude, and we turn from misery to joy. I know that all of us in this room, we want to be on that right side of things. And that comes through a regular practice of generosity. I want you to think of the most generous person you know. I know this from the story that you shared this morning around the table. But let me ask you this, were they joyful? Are they generally a joyful person? I think, yes, it's almost safe to say that, I'm not guaranteeing that every one of your people is joyful, but it's pretty common that people who are living a generous life are also a very joyful people. It's been said that it will cost you, literally, it will cost you to put Jesus' teaching into practice, but you will get more back than what you put in, because there is more joy in giving than in receiving. I'd encourage you this week to begin exercising that muscle of generosity. Put it into practice. If you need something practical, here's something small. Set aside maybe like $5, or pray about that amount. Maybe you can give more. And ask God this week for an opportunity to bless someone. Put that money in your wallet and just be praying, "God, show me somewhere, somebody this week, that I can give this $5." And then just keep your eyes open. See what opportunity God brings your way. We're not trying to solve global poverty or be heroic in any way. We're just trying to tap into that flow of the spirit of living a generous life, being more ready to give than to be stingy. If you need some ideas, again, keep money in your pocket, or buy someone in line behind you a coffee or a lunch, pay for someone's bill anonymously, drop off groceries or gift someone that you know who is in need, send cash digitally to help a friend with medical bills or expenses that they can't currently pay, buy a gift for someone just to encourage them and bless them, or give away something that you have. But spend time this week reflecting on how you see the world and what might need to change in order to see God as your Father provider, and having a good eye and living a life with an abundant mindset.

Let’s pray. God, thank you for your words and your instruction. As difficult as they may seem to live out, God, we know that this is the life that you would call us to. And God, we want to pray this. As our provider, you hold all things in endless, fearless supply. Help us to live in that trust and rest in your extravagance. Help us to know that we can freely give in the manner that we have received, selflessly, daringly, and lovingly. We recognize that all we have is from you, and we know that you are an abundant God. Help us, free us from that grip that fear and greed has on our hearts, and help us to be an expression of your love by giving to those around us. Pray this in your name. Amen.