Giving Because He Gave | Sermon 05/26/2024

All right, if you would please turn with me in your

Bibles to 2 Corinthians chapter nine, 2

Corinthians nine. We'll read through five to 15 in 2

Corinthians. Okay, starting in verse five of the letter to the

Corinthians, here now the inerrant and fallible words of a living and true

God. So I thought it necessary to urge the brethren that they would go on ahead of you and arrange beforehand your previously promised bountiful gift so that the same would be ready as a bountiful gift and not affected by covetousness.

Now this I say, who who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.

Each one must do just as he is purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

And God is able to make all grace abound to you so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed.

As it is written, he scattered abroad, he gave to the poor, his righteousness endures forever.

Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.

You will be enriched in everything for all liberality, which through us is producing thanksgiving to God.

For the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints, but it is also over many thanksgivings to God.

Because of the proof given by this ministry, they will glorify God for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ and for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all.

While they also, by prayer on your behalf, yearn for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you.

Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift. Thus ends the reading of God's holy and magnificent word.

Let's pray once more as a church body if you would join me. Lord, we come before you today as your people seeking to know more of you, to know more of Christ and to know more of your word.

We pray, Holy Spirit, that you would do that for us. We need not just knowledge,

Lord. We need not just information, although those are good. We also need transformation,

Lord. We need this word to come in through our ears and affect our brains and affect our hearts and affect our hands and affect our feet,

Lord. That this very word would affect our whole lives, God, as it already has through the gospel.

And so, Lord, please help us today to be focused on you, to hear your word and to be challenged with the presuppositions and traditions that we come to with it sometimes.

So, Lord, please be with us and teach your people and edify and encourage us all today in Christ's name.

Amen. Well, church, as I told you last week, your leaders here have decided early on that in between our expository series,

James, John, we're gonna be going into Ruth and 1 Corinthians, during these expository verse -by -verse sermon series that we would take the liberty to go through various topics that many don't cover in the

Christian church in America. I told you we've covered everything from formal church membership to biblical fasting, and now we are talking about giving.

We talked about it last week. We're gonna talk about it one more time today, and then Pastor Andrew will be preaching next week on family integration, family -related worship towards God, and then we'll be starting

Ruth, and that'll be great. So we will not, I promise you, we will not shrink back from covering anything that's in the

Bible. It's profitable for us if it's in the word of God, and a good group of you even stayed with me late after service last week, and we were talking about this topic and the various aspects of tradition that we've seen even in our own churches we grew up in or maybe in our context here with Mormonism, and it was great, great conversations.

I'm glad that it has spurred you on to consider more of this topic. So just as a recap, during that sermon, we covered multiple principles.

First, that everything and everyone belongs to God. Deuteronomy chapter 10, verse 14, behold, to the

Lord your God belong heaven and the highest heavens, the earth and all that is in it.

All the beasts, all the trees, all the fruit on the trees, all the silver, all the gold, and every single individual made by God, everything, and everyone belongs to God.

We talked about that. And then Deuteronomy 8, 18 said, but you shall remember the

Lord your God for it is he who is giving you the power to make wealth. We talked about the fact that therefore, since God owns everything, and he's the one who gives us the ability to make wealth, all the money and all the things that we even produce by our own labor, or things that we sell, everything is

God's. And because it's his money, we're stewards.

Paul said that in Corinthians, all of us were stewards as we use his money.

And so then we found out if it's all God's, then he has a say as the owner of it all on how we ought to spend it, what he commands, how we ought to use his money.

He has a say in that. He has all the say in that. And so we saw what do we use money for?

We saw that we are to spend money to care for one's own household. We are to save for times of emergency, the

Proverbs said. Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, to wisely invest.

God even commands we pay taxes. Romans 13 and other places.

He lets us even spend money on proper forms of entertainment for merriment and enjoyment of what he's given us.

We saw that he told the Israelites, go use the extra money to buy more animals and slaughter them and eat them and get the figs, get the dates, get the strong drink, the wine.

You enjoy this feast unto the Lord. And so there's proper ways to even use our money to celebrate and use it for entertainment.

But then we also saw that God expects us to be a giving people, to give back what he's given us through charity and generosity for the needy, for the church.

We saw that even for the full -time evangelists and shepherds who have left their jobs, they need support.

And then we talked about how the fact that Father Abraham provided us an example.

The first one, one of the first ones, the children of promise. He gave us as the children of promise, that faithful example of giving to Melchizedek.

And then in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus presupposed his disciples would be a giving people saying, when you give, do it this way.

And so many at that time were giving to get the praise of man.

Instead of, and instead of abrogating charity and getting rid of it, Jesus corrects the issue.

He corrects the heart issue and outlines how we are to rightly give. And then our

Lord addressed that idolatry of money that so many have. He said, where your treasure is, there your heart is also.

Where your pocket book goes, where your money goes, says a lot about what you care about.

Then we saw the apostle Paul, his defense against the super apostles, the ones who attacked his character, you're doing this for money, and he wasn't, he wasn't.

He outlined for us that those who give up everything, vocation, home, inheritance, whatever, he said the words have the right to receive support for the work they do in the kingdom.

And that's to come from the church body. And really the overarching theme of all of it is that we are in an infinitely better covenant than those who are in the old.

We're in the new covenant and that changes everything. We now have a better inheritance than just land.

We have more family in Christ, more brothers and sisters than we did in the old.

Christ lets us enjoy heaven and earth forever with him. And that ought to result into an overflow of gratitude in us.

And gratitude doesn't just sit in someone like a warm feeling, you know.

Gratitude acts, it manifests externally. And so as Christ sacrificed for us, we also ought to do anything for him and his people.

And so in the end, anything I leave my child is worth little if I have not sought to build the gospel of the kingdom.

I could give my daughter all the riches of the world and leave it to her when

I die. But if I don't leave this world with building the church of Christ in this world and spreading the gospel, if I don't consider that and seek to put my talents and time and energy and even money into that, then it doesn't matter how much

I give her. It will all fall short. Excuse me.

So keeping with this theme today, we'll talk about generosity, some more sacrificial giving in the

Bible, errors related to this subject and even obstacles to faithfulness.

So let's get into it. If you want, get to Exodus 36 real quick or pull out your print out.

I've been reading through Exodus lately in my morning devotion time.

And one great example of generosity stands out in Exodus. Exodus 36.

You see, by this time the people have heard the law recited, they've received the 10 commandments in chapter 20, and they've heard all that the

Lord intends to do for them. And what does he ask? The Lord asks for a tabernacle, a house in which he may dwell with them wherever they go.

And after Moses gave the instructions on how to build it and what they needed, all of a sudden when the people considered how

God rescued them from slavery in Egypt, and even then how he brought them safely through the wilderness and rained down manna and cracked open rocks and gave them water.

And God provided all that time when they consider all these things in the promised land that he intends to give them.

It says in chapter 36 and 35 as well, that their hearts were stirred and everyone whose spirit was moved brought a contribution for the

Lord. And think about it. They hadn't labored for months. In fact, they were in slavery.

So it's not like they had businesses. They were not laboring during this time. They had been wandering in the wilderness.

They had just only the possessions that they had in Goshen in Egypt.

And then the plunders of Egypt. They had what they had in their homes and they had the plunders of Egypt, but they didn't have anything else.

And so here they decide to give back quite a bit of what

God had given them. Look at verse three through seven in Exodus 36. They received from Moses all the contributions with the sons of Israel had brought to perform the work in the construction of the sanctuary.

And they still continued bringing to him freewill offerings every morning. And all the skillful men who were performing all the work of the sanctuary came each from the work which he was performing and said to Moses, the people are bringing much more than enough for the construction which the

Lord commanded us to perform. So Moses issued a command and a proclamation was circulated throughout the camp saying, let no man or woman any longer perform work for the contributions of the sanctuary.

Thus the people were restrained from bringing any more for the material they had was sufficient and more than enough for all the work to perform it.

And honestly, if you read through Exodus, what do you see a lot? You see them complaining.

You see them grumbling. You see them upset. They're like, we should just go back to Egypt because at least they fed us meat sometimes.

You're letting us die out here in the desert Lord. And they come whining to Moses and Aaron all the time.

And I really think that these verses demonstrate repentance, turning around.

They tested the Lord their God often and yet here we see an act of contrition.

Their hearts were stirred to give back to God as they considered all that he had given them.

Moses literally had to announce a command. Hey, everyone, we've got enough.

Stop bringing contributions. We're good. And that's an amazing thing, you know.

I don't know if a lot of pastors would be like, hey, we have enough. Go ahead, use it for other ministries.

And that's kind of sad to think about, honestly. But that's amazing, you know. You don't really hear something like this where it's like, boy, we've got everything and an abundance over what we need.

And so he makes this command that they would stop doing that. But what this shows is that giving is a congregational act.

You see the weight of your giving is inflated by the giving of your brothers and sisters.

You know, the fact is, a lot of us can think that we have too little to bring.

What can I present before God? I don't have much to give.

And so then when we have that mindset, we don't give it all. If the

Israelites thought that they had too little to bring, then God would not be glorified in this spectacular way. Then the house of the

Lord wouldn't be built. And I think that translates to the fact that the global church as well are giving, even if small sometimes.

It's a congregational thing. It gets built up together. Here's another example of generosity for you in Acts chapter nine.

Go there if you want. Acts chapter nine and go to your printout. We have the story of Tabitha, woman also by the name of Dorcas.

And she was being raised from the dead by Peter, okay? And being raised from the dead here is absolutely the heart of the story.

But one thing that people often pass by is the testimony of her life.

Listen to this. Acts 9 .36 through 39, it reads, "'Now in Joppa there was a disciple named

Tabitha,' which translated in Greek is called Dorcas. "'This woman was abounding with deeds of kindness "'and charity, which she continually did.

"'And it happened at that time that she fell sick and died. "'And when they had washed her body, "'they laid it in an upper room.

"'Since Lydda was near Joppa, "'the disciples having heard that Peter was there, "'sent two men to him, imploring him, "'Do not delay in coming to us.'

"'So Peter arose and went with them. "'When they arrived, they brought him into the upper room.'" This is where her body was.

"'And all the widows stood beside him "'and they were weeping and showing all the tunics "'and garments that Dorcas used to make "'while she was with them.'"

Now, this is an amazing woman. "'To be known in the Bible,' it says here, "'for charity and kindness.'"

That's her, that's Tabitha. And as a testimony of her generosity, all those women in the upper room where Tabitha's body lay presented all these tunics and scarves and garments that she had made and given freely to everyone.

Christians who had nothing, Christians who are now clothed by a woman who would spend her money on thread and put it together and make clothes for people, make these tunics, and it's amazing.

Her giving even touched people after her death. And so how can we follow this kind of example?

Generosity is not just in giving money, it's also giving in ourselves, it's giving in our talents.

It's using time and talents to help those in need, whether it's sewing clothes, cooking, bringing a meal to someone in need, fixing vehicles or any skill you have.

We use it to help others with what God has given us. Here's another example, go to Luke 19.

Luke 19, we're gonna go over the story real quick of Zacchaeus. Another example of generosity, verse one in Luke 19.

Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through and there was a man called by the name of Zacchaeus.

He was a chief tax collector and he was rich. Zacchaeus was trying to see who

Jesus was and was unable because of the crowd for he was small in stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree in order to see him for he was about to pass through that way.

When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down for today

I must stay at your house. And he hurried and came down and received him gladly.

And when the people saw it, they all began to grumble saying, he has gone to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.

And Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, behold Lord, half of my possessions

I will give to the poor and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much.

And Jesus said to him, today's salvation has come to this house, he too is a son of Abraham for the son of man has come to seek and to save that which is lost.

Do you see what happened to Zacchaeus? Jesus said in the Sermon on the

Mount, no one can serve or worship God and mammon or God and money.

And in this account, Zacchaeus removed his faith and trust from riches and placed them into Christ.

Place it into Christ. The Lord said, you shall know them by their fruits.

The Lord's brother James said that a living faith has works, a dead one doesn't.

And so the faith of Zacchaeus manifested in not only righting his wrongs.

He was a tax collector, the chief tax collector and he would come to people and he would steal from them.

He would ask for too much. He would take from people. And he said,

I'll give four times back as much as I stole and then beyond that, beyond that, he freely gave 50 % of what he owned.

In Luke 12 and Matthew 18, Jesus commanded the rich young ruler, what? Sell all your possessions, all your possessions.

Not just 50%, sell all your possessions. Give the money to the poor and come and follow me.

And we know that the rich young ruler walked away sad, having been one who loved money.

He loved his money instead of Jesus. And you see, it's not about the figure.

It's not about, whoa, Zacchaeus did 50%, but then he asked the rich young ruler 100%.

It's not about the figure. It's about the fact that Jesus won't have split faithfulness.

He won't have split attention. He wants all devotion on himself. He wants full fidelity and full worship.

And so true faith in Christ wrought a heart change in Zacchaeus that led to real generosity and repentance in the area of money hoarding and stealing.

So my admonishment to you with that example is to clothe yourself with the humility necessary to acknowledge and rectify past wrongs.

Even if it means making significant sacrifices, who have you wronged before?

Who has given to you without ever asking for it back? And maybe you know they're in need now.

Could you help them? Let that kind of love and kindness of Christ lead you to repentance as well, to grant you to have the same gratitude that would extend not just in word, but in deed.

So those are some examples of generosity in the Bible. Now I'd like to talk a little bit about the biblical idea of sacrificial giving, okay?

One image that we have of sacrificial giving in the Bible is what's called the first fruits.

You ever heard of the first fruits idea? That term first fruits and the idea and its commands are outlined in Leviticus 23 and Deuteronomy 26.

You see a glimpse of it in Proverbs chapter three. It says, honor the Lord from your wealth and from the first of all your produce.

So your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine.

You see, the Israelites were not allowed to start the grain harvest in the spring until the first fruits were given unto the

Lord. And the first fruits weren't like this pagan idea that in pagan cultures where they would take grain offerings and they would sacrifice them or take them and burn them or do whatever with them to an idol and to appease the idol so that the idol would give them a great harvest.

That's not what this is. This was a test of faith. This was a test of faithfulness, an act of faith.

And so when the harvest first started before anyone plucked a single grain, they would go to the wheat field and they would gather an offering and they would take these first fruits and they would give them to God.

They would give them to God. And the idea, it's kind of like saying,

Lord, I don't know how the rest of the harvest will go. I don't know if pestilence will come and remove the rest of the wheat.

I don't know if invaders will come and burn my field. I don't know if maybe a late frost could come and ruin all the grain.

I don't know. I don't know what could happen to the rest of the field. You see, in our modern day, you take all of it.

You take all the fruits. You take all the wheat. You take all the grapes in our society. And then you go, maybe

I'll give some to God. But here in this first fruits mentality was like, I don't know how it's gonna go.

I don't know what's gonna happen, but I'm gonna take what we first have. And this may be, this bushel may be the only thing we get from this because it could get ruined, but it's for God.

It's for God. And so that's the first fruits mentality. They would even do this with the sheep. When the sheep were giving birth to their lambs, they would take the very first one.

They didn't know if miscarriages or stillbirths or disease would follow killing the rest of the lambs.

But the first lamb before any other lamb would come, they would sacrifice to God.

This is an act of faith. Lord, you are the provider. We're relying upon you for the harvest.

And that's sacrificial. That's sacrificial. We'll speak on it more in a bit, but lack of trust in God is one of the biggest obstacles to faithful generosity.

Here's one example of another form of sacrificial giving. It's very, very much well -known.

Mark chapter 12, verses 41 through 44. It reads, and Jesus sat down opposite the treasury and began observing how the people were putting money into the treasury.

And many rich people were putting in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which amounted to a cent.

Calling his disciples to him, he said to them, "'Truly, truly, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury, for they all put in out of their surplus, but she out of her poverty put in all that she owned and all that she had to live on.'"

So once again, Jesus' point here isn't about amount. It's not necessarily about the greatness of amount that one can give.

It's a lesson on sacrifice. It's a lesson on faithfulness. It's a lesson on trust in God.

In other words, the way that the others were giving, giving out of their surplus and pouring into the treasury had no significant impact on them.

This was easy. They came and brought their offering to the treasury. No problem.

It didn't affect them. It didn't affect the bottom line. They still had all their ventures and all that they were able to do with the rest of their money.

It didn't impact them. But this widow, this woman who had no provider, this impacted her.

This affected her. She gave out of her need, not out of her surplus. And one thing we know about Jesus' lessons in the gospel is that although action is important, right motivations, right heart attitude, proper inner man condition precedes action.

What do I mean by that? The Pharisees did all the right actions externally, but they had the wrong heart attitude.

In fact, what does Jesus say in Matthew chapter 23? When he delivers his woes, he says, woe to you.

And he condemns them. He says, you tithe mint, dill, and cumin.

You even find ways to tithe from your herb garden. But you neglect justice and mercy and faith.

These things you ought to have done without not doing the others. Here in Mark 12, we see

Jesus celebrate what he sees in the widow to be a complete trust in God for provision.

And God honors sacrifice. God is pleased with sacrifice. God is the

God of sacrifice, is he not? And our bodies are to be living sacrifices to Christ.

The scripture says that our lives would point to the ultimate sacrifice that was given, the

Lord Jesus Christ. So all this to say, does following Jesus ever cost you?

Does following Jesus ever cost you in different ways? And I would argue that it should. The Bible says that it should.

It should cost you. He says that there's a price. Comes with a cost.

Discipleship comes with a cost. He warns people who come to him. Comes with a cost.

Whether you're mocked while doing evangelism, whether you're beaten for your beliefs, betrayed by others you love due to the gospel, or even left in a more difficult state after giving to someone in need.

Do you ever feel it? Do you ever feel the sacrifice of this

Christian life? Does it ever cost you? Now this passage can be abused by the way this widow, the widow's mite, and we'll address that in just a little bit.

But I wanted to give you one last example of sacrificial giving. Go to 2 Corinthians chapter eight.

2 Corinthians chapter eight, print out our Bible. Verse one, it reads, "'Now brethren, we wish to make known to you "'the grace of God which has been given "'in the churches of Macedonia, "'that in a great ordeal of affliction, "'their abundance of joy and their deep poverty "'overflowed in the wealth of their liberality.

"'For I testify that according to their ability "'and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord, "'begging us with much urging for the favor "'of participation in the support of the saints.'"

So what's going on at this time that he wrote this letter? The church and the brethren in Jerusalem were experiencing great hardship at this time.

In Jerusalem, the epicenter of Christianity, and then it spread outward, there's been persecution, there's been seizing of homes, seizing of property, people have been losing family, inheritances, houses, animals.

We're talking, it's really hard. The first century was hard for the

Christians in Jerusalem. Very difficult, very difficult persecution by Jewish zealots and such.

Romans, of course, as well. And so the brethren in Jerusalem are having a hard time, and Paul approached the

Gentile churches, all of them, and told them that they will be taking an offering for the brethren in Jerusalem.

And here, he boasts to the Corinthians about the churches in Macedonia. Why would he boast to give glory to God, and also to spur the

Corinthians on to give likewise, and he does that in the next chapter, okay?

And he said God's grace was evident in Macedonia because God's grace caused these believers to give with great joy.

And an abundance of joy came over them that out of their deep poverty, they gave to help the

Jerusalem church. You see, the Macedonian churches were poor themselves. The Macedonians were poor.

They didn't have much, but Paul reports here, they gave according to their ability and beyond.

They begged to give, it says. Paul supplies us with an image kind of like Moses with the

Israelites, like, look, you've probably given enough, you don't wanna put yourself in a terrible position, and they go, okay, but actually, we're fine.

We want to give, we're begging to give more, we're begging to help. They believed

God would care for them. If they did this, if they helped the Jerusalem brethren, they believed

God would give to them and help them, and the apostles said that it was beyond their expectations.

One commentator puts it this way, three lessons he says, number one, true giving requires giving of oneself, not just giving money.

The gospel is not about what we can get from God, but what God has given to us so that we may give ourselves to others.

Number two, we can give out of extreme poverty, and one can give out of measureless riches.

Those who are disinclined to be generous when they are poor are not likely to become suddenly generous when they are rich.

And lastly, number three, giving is related to the grace of God experienced in Christ.

The recipients are not required to have done anything to merit the gift, except to be in need.

That's all that's required, to be in need, like we were in need when we were dead in our trespasses and sin, and so grace abounds for us.

Grace is the heart, grace is the motivation of giving, and the givers are made generous because of God's grace working in them, through them, and on them.

Grace is the motivation of our giving. And so we just talked about examples of generosity, we've talked about examples of sacrificial giving.

Another principle I wanted to impart to you is that giving is not about what you don't have, but what you do have.

What do I mean by that? You see, we often say, if I had more,

I would give more. We might even tell that to our friends, people in our small group, we might even talk to our spouse that way, we might talk to God, God, look, if I had more,

I'd give more. That's often not the truth, that's often not the truth, because many have gotten more from that point, and they've only used it for themselves.

Dr. John MacArthur speaks about, one time he read this book, he read of a preacher who went to a farmer, and the preacher says to the farmer, hey farmer, say you had $200, would you give 100 of it to the

Lord? And the farmer says, I would. Then the preacher says, farmer, if you had two cows, would you give one of the cows to the

Lord? And the farmer says, I would. Finally, the preacher asked the farmer, farmer, if you had two pigs, would you give one of them to the

Lord? And the farmer said, now that's not fair, preacher. You know I have two pigs, one cow, and $100.

Do you see? The farmer had $100, but in this imaginary situation, if he had two, he'd give away 100, and he'd keep what he had already.

He already has 100. Hey, if you had two cows, would you give one away?

Well, he already had one. Sure, I can imagine giving one away. Would you give two pigs?

He already had two pigs. And he's like, no way, I'm not giving one of my pigs away. He's thinking about, he puts it off and puts generosity away from him, going, if only

I had more, I'd give. But he doesn't even think about giving what he already has right now.

Right now. And in these what if scenarios, we always say if we had this imaginary thing, we'd give it, look, oh, people jest with pastors even.

Pastor, you know if I won the lottery, I'd give like half of it to the church.

Sure you would, buddy, sure you would. No, I'm just kidding. But people have said that.

People have said that. And I'm sure it could be true of many. But that's often not the case.

We can give this imaginary abundance in our minds all day long. Oh, Lord, be pleased with my imaginary giving.

If I had a million, I'd give 100 ,000 right now. Oh, Lord, be pleased with this imaginary generosity.

But what do we have right now? It doesn't matter what we give in our imaginations to God when we're not generous with what we actually have at this moment.

Jesus said in Luke chapter 16, verses 10 through 11, he who is faithful in a very little thing is also faithful in much.

And he who is unrighteous in little is also unrighteous in much.

Therefore, if you have not been faithful in the use of unrighteous wealth, who will entrust the true riches to you?

Church, we're not waiting to become millionaires, to be generous. God's asking us to be generous as Christians right now.

Right now. Now let's go over some of the errors surrounding giving in the correct biblical understanding to combat them, okay?

Let me talk about a few errors. The first error, and I've mentioned this a lot,

Pastor Andrew even said in his prayer, Lord, we're not giving to get. And that's the first error, is you give to get.

You give to receive back. Proponents of this make giving to the church or to someone like buying a lottery ticket.

You know, it's an investment and I'll get tons of money back. They'll even quote a lot of the verses that I've given you last week and even today, using them to fuel this view.

You give to get. If you go to TBN, and I realized by the way, when

I say that, TBN, more and more people don't know what I'm talking about. But when

I was growing up, it was channels 20 through 23. It started with one

TBN channel, then multiple, kids' TBN, and that was the

Trinity Broadcasting Network. You probably, if I showed you a picture of the lady with the big pink hair, you'd know what

I'm talking about. These televangelists giving what we know to be called the prosperity gospel.

You have men like Benny Hinn, you have Creflo Dollar, you have T .D.

Jakes. By the way, Creflo Dollar is the preacher's name. I can never get over that.

Creflo Dollar, you know that's not his real, I don't think that's his real name. That's like a stage

Christian name, you know? Who does that? Creflo Dollar, T .D. Jakes, Paula White, Joel Osteen, Kenneth Copeland, Jesse Duplantis, Joyce Meyer, John Hagee, just to name a few.

These are people who have used the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, the free gospel of grace for sordid gain, for personal gain.

And I don't say that flippantly. I wouldn't call out people flippantly.

These are people who have been shown to use the gospel for personal wealth.

Personal wealth. People with far more experience than I have looked into this, it's incontrovertible.

And they don't make their living from the gospel like Paul said to do. Paul said, if you leave your vocation, he says, don't we have the right to take along a believing wife?

Don't we have the right to get the support from the gospel? Doesn't the ox who tread the grain have the right to eat some of it while he treads it?

It's not that, they're doing something else. It's not to make a living, because making a living is to live, but what they're doing is to live in so much excess riches at the detriment of their congregations or the

Christian church in the world. And I'm not saying a pastor has to live poorly. It's hard for pastors to ever say that, but there's kind of this weird pietistic view that a pastor has to have nothing and be in rags.

So I'm not saying that either, by the way. Although again,

I don't think that they have to have these people, these mansions, and these airplanes, these personal jets, and multiple vacation homes, and things like that.

Nevertheless, they will take the biblical concept of sowing a seed, that's language used in the

Bible, sowing a seed, and they'll make it about you getting rich. You getting rich, but who's really getting rich when they say, hey, hey, sow a seed of faithfulness and you'll get rich.

Who's really getting rich when they say that? Them, they're the ones getting rich when they say those things and do those campaigns.

They are. Now, I wanna be very clear though, very clear on this.

I don't wanna leave any of you confused. There are Bible verses and principles showing that generosity from you will beget generosity to you.

We're gonna go over those in just a minute here. But the main reasons why this give to get concept is wrong are because number one, it turns giving to the

Lord into like a loan system. You give to God what you think is yours already and now

God owes you. God, I gave 100 bucks. You owe me 200.

At least double it. You owe me, God. And so it puts God to the test and we are not to tempt the

Lord our God. It's against scripture. Number two, it relegates giving to a slot machine or buying a stock on the up and up, which means number three, that the motivation behind giving this way is to receive as much as or more than you gave.

That's the motivation. It turns giving into a game of greed and covetousness because the motivation behind giving is true generosity and true love and real grace.

Jesus didn't give his life for you and me so that we would give him something in exchange.

It would no longer be grace. Jesus didn't give his life going after I do this, when

I come off this cross, when I rise again, I expect for you to give me all this as payment for what he did.

We can't make payment for our own sins. Only he can, only he.

And lastly, number four, this give to get scheme often causes innocent and ignorant donors to give recklessly and thoughtlessly, which is against the word we read it.

Don't give out of compulsion, purpose it in your heart.

Even if you do the online giving and you click some buttons, think about it. Even if you have the, where it's automatically taken out of your account, when you see the email go through God, use that for the needs of our church and to get the gospel out.

Don't be thoughtless about it, but that's what this does. It makes people give in ignorance, recklessly, thoughtlessly.

Remember all the ways that God tells us to use money, caring for our families, saving for emergencies, investing properly, paying taxes and enjoying right forms of entertainment.

While some will ignore these biblical ways of using money, God's commands on how to use money, they'll ignore them and they'll put everything in the give to get lottery.

And they'll lose everything. And I'm not saying that what the widow did, giving her last mite was wrong.

I'm not saying what Zacchaeus did in giving 50 % of what he owned is wrong.

Each person must do what God has purpose in their heart. But these false teachers breed on this type of ignorance.

Put everything you got in the give to get scheme and you will be rich.

Now, here are the verses that support the very real fact that God often rewards faithfulness.

And that may be in both physical, hear me out, both physical and spiritual ways.

Luke 6 38. Jesus says, give and it will be given to you.

It will pour it into your lap, a good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over.

For by the standard of measure, it will be measured to you in return. Remember, this is with the right heart attitude.

This is not treating giving like a lottery. This is not putting God to the test. This is not giving with greed.

This is not giving with hasty neglect. Second Corinthians nine, we read it at the beginning.

Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly.

That just makes sense by the way, right? If you have a field and you only throw seed in one corner, you're only going to reap from that corner.

That's the mentality. You seed, if you sow seed in the whole field, you may just gain from the whole field.

Then he goes on to say, he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must do just as he is purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion for God loves a cheerful giver.

Paul goes on to say, if you do this the right way, with grace as your motivation, the seed you sow in this gift will quote, increase the harvest of your righteousness.

If you're generous, it will increase the harvest of your righteousness.

You'll just be pulling righteousness to yourself. And that ought to be our hope. God, let this sacrificial giving of mine result in righteousness and personal holiness and reform and maturity in me.

And he ends with saying that our giving is produced by a genuine thanksgiving to God. That's what it is.

Grace and thanksgiving to God, not giving to get. Proverbs 11 verse 24 through 25 says, one gives freely and yet grows richer.

Another withholds what he should give and only suffers want. Whoever brings blessing will be enriched and one who waters will himself be watered.

You know, these travelers were going through the wilderness. They were coming in from the cities and you know, it was such an act of humility to go to your well and to fill your cup with water and give your cup and that cold water to someone in need.

And he who waters will himself be watered. That's the principle here. And I want to tell you right now, every one of these verses is true.

This is all true. It's all from God's word. While all at the same time, the give to get scheme is not true.

This is all true, while give to get is not true. The next error in giving is legalism.

The work of Christ, what Christ did on the cross, plus your giving, plus your tithe, the perfect tithe, that plus what

Jesus did on the cross, that package will give you salvation. That is false.

That is damnable heresy. That sends people to hell. That is not true.

As Paul says in Romans chapter three, by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified in God's sight.

No one, no one can be made right with God by how much they give. It's a fool's errand.

And yet there are people in the Bible belt, especially in people where we live, who will empty the truckloads and dump loads of giving.

And people who own big businesses, business owners, will come to the church twice a year and give their quarter million for gift of the year.

And they go, I've got salvation. I've got it. Paid purchase.

I've got the receipt. That's what they think. And it's despicable. That will not save them.

That will not save them. God will only accept one payment, the blood of his son. The next error of giving is when churches use emotional manipulation, okay?

I definitely think it's fine to celebrate and it's great to show the fruit of labors of a ministry, to give newsletters, emails, pictures.

Absolutely, we should be celebrating these things and give glory to God in that.

And that may supply reason or conviction to give, but it should never be through manipulation, never.

Do you know what churches and ministries are doing right now? In fact, they've been doing it for decades.

They're using now scientific, they're going to scientists and psychologists on how to get people to give more.

They're going to the world and finding out what ways they can say things, present things to get you to empty your pockets completely to these ministries.

And it's sickening to think about, okay? They want to produce emotional and compulsive giving.

And you've seen this sort of stuff already, you know? You hear that song, you know, like in the arms of an angel or something like that.

I know that's for the dogs typically, but you know, they play this sort of sad music and you can get a letter or you see a video and there's an orphan starving in the letter.

And the letter says, this little boy may be dead from starvation by the time you read this.

He may be dead. Please give to help these orphans in this country or this area or wherever.

Please give to feed more, to feed him and to feed more like him. And I'm not even kidding.

I'm not kidding. It's been found out that some of these children on these letters or in these videos are dead already by the time they've gotten, by the time you've gotten the letter or the time you've seen the video.

For years, they've been circulating dead children on photos to get you to give.

They're already dead. It's sick. It's sick. Just to get you to give more donations, those sorts of things,

I have to question it. Does that gift even better the lives of the children in the video?

Does it, these organizations that even really have little to do with the gospel because the gospel is just as important as that provision, okay?

It's not one without the other. It's not either or it's both and. And what this has done, and you already feel it.

What this has done is bred mistrust in well -meaning donors as they want their gift to positively impact those in true need.

And so then they've learned to withhold, to withhold because they can't trust.

They withhold from their local church. They withhold from a good ministry due to skepticism. And I get it.

I get it. And yet we see in the Bible that the giving from everyone, selling their things, were laid at the apostles' feet in Acts.

The gift to Jerusalem was collected by Paul and his delegates. The weekly distribution,

Paul says, is to be brought before the elders by the deacons of the church according to the New Testament.

And I'm not saying that the only way to give or to have generosity is through the local church, but it's a big one.

It is a big one. And so how do you combat emotional manipulation?

How do you find out if what you're giving is actually going to righteousness? You belong to a solid and biblical

New Testament church. You become a member. You become invested. You go to the budget meetings.

Do they have a budget meeting? Are the numbers transparent? Are their finances transparent?

Do they have a benevolence fund for the needy in the church? Do they have a section of that reserved for the poor in their neighborhood?

If they have an abortion mill ministry or a women's clinic, will the money actually go to the mothers who choose life?

Do they give to national organizations for missions that are tested? You know, that's a big one.

There's so many churches who have been giving year after year to the same campaign, the same missionary organization, but they've never even actually found out if what that money goes to impacts people with the gospel.

To do your due diligence. Give to a missionary society that puts the money to work for Jesus and for the saving of lives.

And so really what it is is we don't do away with this.

We don't do away with generosity because people have abused it. Like Jesus didn't abrogate giving.

He says, when you give, don't give this way. Likewise, in this way, don't stop giving.

Don't stop doing a good thing because other people have abused it. Another error in giving is a belief that the state can do what the church is supposed to.

The state can't do well what only God sanctioned the church to do. We see that today.

We see that in our welfare system today. We're forced to give, we're forced to give multiple tithes to the government.

We give our children to the state. We hope to collect a social security fund and a check when we're near dead from the state.

We perpetuate fatherlessness, obesity and laziness through our welfare system.

And what happens when one or more of these systems fail? And I would argue that they're failing. They are failing.

There's gotta be a better way. God has sanctioned the church to be the ones to care about the fatherless, the widow, the needy.

You see these people on perpetual cycles of welfare and they're obese and they're sickly and they're lazy and they won't work.

And I'm not trying to make a hasty generalization, but sometimes generalizations are helpful because it represents data.

And that's what, I'm so happy that some of our taxes can actually really help people in need.

But I'm not happy when you have a veteran who served our country, who's dying in the street and can't get healthcare.

And then there's, guys, it's irrefutable. There are illegal immigrants who commit crimes who are let out the next day for rape or whatever, burglary, and they're put into an embassy suites for weeks.

It's wicked, it's evil. And so what does God say about this? Isaiah chapter 10. Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees and the writers who keep writing oppression to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their rights, that widows may be their spoil and that they may make the fatherless their prey.

What will you do on the day of punishment in the ruin that will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help and where will you leave your wealth?

That's the state. The church is supposed to handle these things. They've taken it from us.

And I would argue that the church often in many cases willingly let it up, okay?

The final error I'd like to correct on giving is something often used by those who don't want to be generous.

They just simply don't wanna be. These people will say this phrase, you may have heard it before.

Well, I just do as the spirit leads me. I just do as the spirit leads me.

And I'm telling you as a pastor under that banner, a man or a woman may commit many sins of commission and omission.

I do as the spirit leads me. What does that mean? That has a certain,

I understand that that phrase can be useful in certain contexts with certain things and liberties and convictions and stuff like that.

But ultimately there's even false religions built upon I do as the spirit leads me.

Does what the spirit lead me comport with scripture, with the word of God?

It's using the Holy Spirit as a scapegoat. And so let's just ask it out loud, okay?

Let's ask it out loud. Is it really possible that the Holy Spirit, the third person of the blessed

Trinity has impressed upon someone that they may see someone in need in their church or they know their church is having difficulty and the

Holy Spirit has come into that person and you see someone in your church in need and the Holy Spirit says, don't give, don't help them.

That's what the spirit does. The spirit tells us not to have generosity.

The spirit tells us to hoard, to be stingy, to withhold, to not give.

How could that be? The quote from passages like 2 Corinthians 8 or 9 that I've already talked about, the

Macedonians gave according to the will of God, okay? What's the will of God? And then right there it's like they gave.

No, but it's the will of God, which means I don't have to give, no. One gives as they've purposed in their heart.

Ah, see, they give as they purpose in their heart. How could one purpose that God calls him to give nothing?

God purposes what I give in my heart. Right there, those statements presuppose giving.

God has purpose in your heart to not help anyone, right? These very scriptures presuppose giving if the

Corinthians had no, listen to this, if the Corinthian church had no financial gift prepared for when

Paul arrived, he said, have it ready, I'm gonna take it back to Jerusalem. If they didn't have anything ready, and they're like, look,

God, you told us not to give out of compulsion. You told us to give what is

God's purpose in our hearts, and God has purpose in our hearts to not help the Jerusalem church. Paul would go, you misunderstood my letter.

Are you kidding me? You don't understand this section of my letter, plain and simple, okay?

Well, those are the errors of giving, and I'm gonna finish this sermon on common obstacles to generosity and how to overcome them.

We're almost done. One of the biggest obstacles we think is in our way to give faithfully is lack of money.

We don't have enough of it. Well, I already spoke about sacrificial giving and how

God is pleased by that. I spoke on how we have thought, if I just have more,

I'd finally give some to God, and how that's likely not true. Someone who gives a little bit, and they're not doing great financially, when they're doing better financially, they will give.

I'm not saying, by the way, repentance is possible, because I'm gonna tell you a personal story of mine pretty soon here, where God gave me repentance, but I'm not saying it's impossible.

All things are possible with God, but that, again, there's a stronghold there. A lot of this obstacle of,

I just don't have enough money, comes down to our priorities, which really come in the form of overspending and debt.

Because we are often living beyond our means to spend like there's no tomorrow, but there's always a tomorrow for the

Christian. And so Proverbs 23, 21 says, for the heavy drinker and the glutton will come to poverty.

Proverbs 21, 17, he who loves pleasure will become a poor man.

He who loves wine and oil will not become rich. You see, we used to be a people who pulled out our wallets, or my dad would pull out his checkbook, and he'd look, and he'd see where they were at, and we would track our money, wouldn't we not?

We'd track our money, and really, forever, we've told our money where it goes.

Okay, dollar, you go here, dollar, you go there. Okay, we've told our money where it should go. Now, now, we open our online banking apps, and our money tells us where it's gone.

Hey, I left, I went over here, I went over there, and it tells us where it goes.

No time in history, I'm telling you, no time in history has that taken place until now.

Only ridiculously wealthy people can have no regard for their money.

Only ridiculously rich people could have a card and swipe it and not know what's in the account.

But we're acting wealthy, we're acting wealthy in our spending, but we have finite resources, and when you do that, you have finite resources, but you're spending like you're a wealthy aristocrat.

You'll find yourself in debt or poverty, one or the other. Debt is a form of poverty.

You see, we have a discipline problem, friends, not a money problem. How can someone be a faithful slave to Christ, as scripture tells us to, when we have to become slave to the lenders?

We have to make our lenders the priority. There are some people who have been

Christian their whole lives, and they've given more money to Visa and MasterCard than anyone who's ever been in need.

That's crazy. Laziness can lead to a lack of funds, to not only giving, but even the other categories of spending.

Proverbs 21, 25 says, the desire of the sluggard puts him to death, for his hands refuse to work.

All day long, the sluggard is craving, while the righteous, here it is, while the righteous gives and does not hold back.

This word in Hebrew, craving, is literally desiring desire.

Because look, the sluggard doesn't have anything, so he can't satisfy his desire.

So in the Hebrew, the word is, he's desiring desire. He can't fill it.

So he just continues desiring and desiring desire. He's lusting over things, coveting over things that he doesn't have.

And since the lazy man's hands refuse to work, they also refuse to give. Since the lazy man's hands refuse to work, the lazy man's hands also refuse to give.

All the while, the righteous give and do not hold back. Being hardworking lends to a great ability to give back to God.

Now, there's so much more that I could expound on as obstacles to giving, and I think you even heard it throughout the sermon, but this last one,

I think, is the biggest one. Not trusting in God to provide.

Not trusting in God to provide. Thinking, look, if I'm, pastor, if I'm faithful here with what

I've got, if I'm faithful with giving, how do I know that God will provide for me?

This is hard. If I give, how will I be taken care of?

Do you know who our creator is? Do you know how he clothes the lilies of the field, provides for them?

Do you know how even the sparrow, aren't you more than a sparrow? He will provide.

He will provide. Some of us have been infected, infected, that could be a good word, affected by this inflation, and it's really hurt us.

And I get that. I think all of us feel that. But multiple times,

Jesus says in that Sermon on the Mount, do not worry, do not worry about tomorrow. Do not worry about your clothes. Do not worry about your food.

He provides, he provides, he provides. That's the idea. And I'm not saying this is easy.

But I've lived it. So I wanna share a story with you, and this won't be emotional manipulation.

This won't be a tactic. I won't end this by holding out envelopes or a list, putting your name down to give.

I just wanna tell you something anecdotal, something that I've experienced with this particular area.

It's not scripture, but I wanna share it with you anyway. I really, I was praying about whether or not

I would share it with you. Years ago, before we even thought about planting this church in Utah, I spent most of my adult life, even as a

Christian, supplementing my income with tons of debt, tons of debt.

Credit cards, personal loans, you name it, I had it, we had a lot of debt.

And in 2013, I landed my first corporate business job after being a shift manager at a grocery store for a long time.

And I got this corporate business job, and I made the most money

I had ever made up to that point in my life. I made $32 ,000 in 2013, and it blew my mind.

And I don't say that to make a mockery of 32K. I'm telling you, we were like jumping up and down at the offer letter for 32K.

I made 15 .34 an hour, I think it was. And I was just like, God, you provide, you provide.

But what did I do? That didn't help with the issues. Now I lived on more debt.

I got more, I spent more, you guys. I didn't live off of that 32K.

I got a car loan that we couldn't afford. I maxed out credit cards even more after that for things on a house that I just bought.

I got, this was the stupidest thing. I got a loan for solar panels.

And I'm telling you, I was so bummed. They did almost very little to affect my energy bill.

And we lived in Phoenix, Arizona, where it's like sun shining all day. I'm like, this doesn't pay for everything.

Now I have this payment to this loan company for my solar panels. Guys, I was swimming upstream.

There were times where I would go out to my car on my break and I would just, and my wife didn't know,

I would just cry. Like, Lord, how am I gonna get out of this? I had over, I think it was close to $1 ,500 a month in debt payments, anywhere from 1 ,200 to 1 ,500 in just sending money away.

And it was killing us. And I didn't know how to get out of it.

It's like, God, help me. And what did I think? I think like everyone else, God, give me more,

I thought. Just give me more. But that already happened. I already did that. I already went through that.

And so I told a brother in Christ my predicament. His family was over for dinner.

And he said, well, first thing you should do is probably go grab your credit cards and cut them up.

And I was like, yeah, I totally will do that. And then he stopped talking and he was sitting there and he was like, well, go get them.

And I was like, okay. And then I thought in my head, I thought this is one of those things where you talk about doing the right thing but you don't actually do it, you know?

And so I just thought he was gonna, you know, I was like, are they gonna leave soon? You know, the food's over.

And he's for real. He's telling me to grab my credit cards and cut them up. And I'm telling you,

I went and I even, oh, this is evil. I even thought about not grabbing them all. I grabbed all the ones in my wife's wallet.

I grabbed all of mine in my wallet. There were some also on my desk or in a drawer. I grabbed every credit card

I had. I think it was like six to eight or something like that, credit cards. And I'm telling you,

I started shaking because I had always supplemented my income with credit cards and I was shaking as I started to cut them.

And he was like, dude, don't just cut them into two pieces. You might put them into amazon .com

by putting them back together. Cut them up this way too. And I was like, ah, you know, cut them up completely.

And in that moment, all of a sudden, a gift of repentance that I didn't even know

I needed washed over me and I realized that I had trusted more in debt and more in money than I had in God.

I was the one in the Sermon on the Mount who trusted more in his riches than in God, who worshiped money more than God.

That was me. And it was like an act of worship. That's all I can express was like, okay,

God, you've really got to take care of us now because I've got all these debt payments.

I've got a family, I've got a mortgage, I've got car payments, I've got all this stuff.

I've got student loan, what am I gonna do? And so I got accountability after that.

I started paying down debt and God helped us to do what I really thought was impossible.

And I made a budget for the first time in my life. And since then, I'm telling you, before I was saved,

I used to quit a lot of things. I'd start this, I'd quit it. Man, ever since God saved me, I just can't quit the things that God has shown me.

And I'm not saying that to boast, by the way. It's just like when he shows me, it's real. And so I made a budget and to this day, years later, even to this day,

I track every penny that comes in and out of our home. I know where the penny's going. I know, I'm telling it where to go.

It's not telling me where it's gone. And so all that happened to me. And the first thing

I started with was, I read Dave Ramsey and I know some people have,

I even see issues with some of the ways he says to invest. And whether you love him or not, the guy has some good principles on getting out of debt,

I would say. And so I acknowledge what he said and I was like, I'm gonna put aside now a portion in my budget for the church, for God.

And previously, I would sometimes get a bonus through the year.

I'd get this bonus in the year and I'd give from that bonus, that's the only time I'd give.

I get the bonus, oh, we got extra. And then I'd give out of our abundance, not out of our need.

And I wanted to be faithful now. And so I made it a priority. Again, I'm not saying this to boast.

I don't want my left hand to know what my right hand is doing. I have a point, I think it's gonna help you.

I told you we don't give to get. I told you that, right? But my wife and I saw something happen.

And on paper, it didn't make sense. We even called the representatives from Dave Ramsey's.

We showed them our budget. We showed them the monthly income. We showed them the debt payments. We showed them everything.

And they're like, this is the one time you actually don't make enough to pay, to come up even, even.

You are negative every month and you don't have enough. You need to get a second job.

You need to do something. And I was trying to finish seminary.

I was trying to serve in the church, wanting to become a pastor. By the way, I now believe that if you're a man aspiring to the office of elder and you've got loads of debt, boy, you need to deal with that first, repent from that first.

How can you serve the household of God, handle the giving in the church, spend the church's money wisely if you don't do it in your own home?

So that's something else. But on paper, it didn't make sense. My Excel spreadsheet was telling me that if we prioritized giving generously to people in need or giving to the church and getting rid of debt, it wouldn't work.

Not on that 32K a year. But I can't believe it.

Like, man, we were never in the negative. Every month it would come in and we didn't know how.

I'm telling you, we didn't know how. And there were times people would, like, bring money and put it on our doorstep and they didn't even know.

They didn't even know we were in need. And the church saw that I couldn't even get a lot of gifts for my daughter and they gave us a check for $500 so we could have

Christmas. And they didn't know. And I'm telling you, I've seen it. I've seen it.

I've seen it happen. And we started, it was like the oil with Elijah, man.

You know, it just kept coming. And even in the midst of that, when we prioritized generosity, like, we started paying off this credit card and this credit card and this loan and this loan and it was working and it shouldn't have worked.

And I'm not saying this as a gimmick. And I'm not, again, I'm not saying my story is scripture.

I'm just telling you that I saw the impossible happen when generosity, when

I repented from being not generous. And I've heard other stories like it. And so you trust in God to provide.

He will, he will every time church. What did Paul tell Timothy? Tell them not to fix their hopes on the uncertainty of money, but on God who richly supplies us with all things.

He says, do good, be rich in good works, be generous and ready to share.

And you will be storing up the treasure of a good foundation, storing up treasure in heaven. That's what he says.

And that's it. That's it for now. That's two sermons on giving. And I know it was broad brush and I know it was general.

And I know you have questions about tithe and Old Testament stuff and is there continuity?

And that's for another time. That takes real critical research. What you should get away from these two sermons was just that the

Bible presupposes from Genesis to Revelation, old to new is that God's people will be a giving people.

And that's what I hope that you got out of it. As he gave to you so lavishly, as he gave to you the life of his son, as he gave you his righteousness that money could never purchase, as gratitude flows inside of you, may you consider that is worthwhile to be generous to the brethren and to the church to see this gospel go out and save more people and to bring people home.

That's what it's about. That's what it's about, okay? You and I will have all we need in a short time.

And we won't have it just for this little bit, but we'll have all we need for all eternity. You see,

God has opened up limitlessness to us, endless provision in Christ.

And so how could we not give when he has given us so much? That's the end. Let's pray.

Lord, thank you for this message. Thank you, Lord, for your word. God, I pray that our church and the leaders of this church would never be the abusers and error makers that we talked about in this sermon.

God, may we always seek to serve you and worship you rather than money.

God, may we never create carnivals or circuses or bow down to big donors just because they're giving.

Lord, may we always simply be faithful to you at all costs, even at the cost of the livelihoods of the leaders here, of this building we'll meet outside,

Lord. Let us never venture into these errors that we've talked about, Lord. Help us to be righteous and true, but God, all at the same time,

I really do pray, Lord, not because Pastor Wade says so, not because of a struggling church budget or anything like that,

Lord. I pray because of you and your word, we would be a giving people, we would be a generous people because we have all the right and wonderful reasons to give.

Lord, storing up treasure in heaven where rust and moth don't destroy. As we came into the world with nothing,

Lord, we will leave this world with nothing, all but that you have given us. So God, please help us to repent in this area as I've talked about debt or laziness or hindrances to generosity.

Lord, help your people as you help me. God, maybe someone here is just struggling with making enough.

God, provide for them. Help them, Lord. God, help our church.

We don't want, as the proverb says, we need neither riches nor poverty.