Good Works Are Multiplied

Please turn your Bible to 2 Corinthians chapter 9. Preaching today will particularly be in verse 10, 2

Corinthians chapter 9. When you have that, go ahead and stand for the reading of God's Word, beginning in verse 6.

The point is this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.

Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.

As it is written, he has distributed freely, he has given to the poor, his righteousness endures forever.

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'll be enriched in every way, to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.

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

By their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ.

And the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others, while they long for you and pray for you because of the surpassing grace of God upon you.

Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift. Amen. You may be seated.

Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you today for your Word. We thank you that you supply seed to the sower and bread for food.

We ask that you would, by your Word today, multiply our seed for sowing and increase the harvest of our righteousness.

In Jesus' name, amen. You may recall that earlier in this series on good works, particularly when we were going through various passages that talk about how salvation empowers us for good works, we looked at verse 8, and God is able to make all grace abound to you so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.

One of the things I pointed out there is that the word all is being used repeatedly such that you could even translate that last part, you may abound in all good works.

Just all, all, all. God has equipped us greatly. Today we are going to be looking at verse 10.

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.

Our emphasis lately has not been on so much on how salvation empowers us for good works, but the productivity associated with good works.

In the previous two weeks, we looked at the different halves of the one -to -one correspondence between fruitfulness and good works, first, that good works are the only fruitfulness one might have, and secondly, that all good works are fruitful.

So, having established that one -to -one relationship, now we need to look at how fruitful are good works, and the answer is they are very fruitful.

Good works are multiplied. God ensures that there is a cascading of righteousness.

This should stir up the heart to be excited to serve God. Once again, by good works,

I do not mean simply those grand deeds of philanthropy that someone might do.

I don't mean just the most charitable things that you might imagine. I mean all ways of serving

God, all ways of obeying Him, all ways of remaining faithful to Him and not giving in to temptation, all ways of denying yourself indulgences and pleasures that He would not have you to have, any kind of snare that would keep you from serving

God as fully as you ought. Why is it that you should obey

God wholeheartedly? Well, in part, the answer is because good works are multiplied.

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.

In the context of this passage, what is taking place is that Paul is putting together what is known as the

Jerusalem collection. There were many poor in Jerusalem. There was a famine in Jerusalem, and so they were struggling to get by.

And Paul, in a desire not only to help the church in Jerusalem, but also to unite

Jews and Gentiles together, stirs up the various Gentile churches to give to Jerusalem in order that the church can be united, in order that the church can be edified, and furthermore that there would be a cascading of righteousness as we will see in this passage.

Now that is the context for this. Just to define a few of these terms here, these concepts that he's using in verse 10, he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food.

Seed to the sower is the very initial parts of harvest.

You make the very initial parts of the whole farming enterprise, right? You place the seed in the ground.

What is the bread for food? That is the very final part of the whole enterprise. After the seed grows up, and then it is harvested, and then it is ground up, and then it is prepared, and cooked, etc.,

finally, at the very end of that process, you get the bread. So Paul is talking about everything all the way from the seed to the bread.

God supplies both of these things. He says He will multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.

God not only gives you the capacity to do whatever He may call you to do, to obey

Him in whatever way He may have called you to obey, but likewise, He ensures that your obedience results in all the things that it should result in.

He gives you the seed and also the bread. There is one passage that is alluded to here and another that is directly quoted, and I think it would be helpful for us to look at both of them, in part because they may seem like obvious applications, but when you see how

Paul often uses the Old Testament, he does so in a counterintuitive way to make profound points that really don't seem that profound unless you realize how he is using the passage in a very different way than it may have initially appeared to be intended.

The first of these is Isaiah 55. If you go ahead and turn to Isaiah 55, when it talks about Him supplying seed to the sower and bread for food, we will see that there,

Isaiah 55, and you may be familiar with this passage but just not have realized that this is what

Paul is alluding to in 2 Corinthians. In Isaiah 55, verses 10 through 11,

Paul says, excuse me, not Paul, Isaiah says, "'For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.

So it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which

I sent it.'" So here it is at the end of verse 10, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater.

Now one thing that makes this passage very surprising is you may also know how this chapter opens.

The chapter opens with, "'Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money, come buy and eat.

Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and labor for that which does not satisfy?

Listen diligent to me and eat what is good, and delight yourself in rich food.'"

So this passage is speaking about God freely giving to His people, and they can come and have

His righteousness without money, without price. What is

Paul calling the people to do and to give of themselves? He's calling them to give money.

He's calling them to give money to Jerusalem. And so he's using this passage, which is about not needing any money, in order to implore the people to give their money.

And so he's making a very profound point that it…and in the context of 2

Corinthians 8 and 9, it is evident that the reason that this is appropriate is because God has given them what is sufficient.

He will stir up generosity within them, that what they are giving of themselves ultimately is something that God has given to them, and that what they need is not a certain quantity of money in order to give.

Paul tells them that if they lack, that does not count against them. Rather, it is generosity.

And where does generosity come from? Generosity doesn't come from yourself, perhaps like your money might be said to.

Generosity comes from the Lord. And so even though the Lord supplies finances in a sense, there is an even more direct sense in which

He is supplying the generosity to you. So how is it that Paul can apply this passage that's about not needing money, not giving money to telling the people to give money, because ultimately what he is calling for them, what he is hoping to see in them is not something that is strictly financial.

He wants to see in them the generosity that only God can give, and God will increase that generosity as needed.

He will supply them all the needed generosity, and likewise, He will increase it. Now one of the ways you might, this analogy is frequent through Scripture.

You see it in Galatians 6, you see it in 1 Corinthians 9, this sowing seed.

Now you might know that term from televangelists, right? This is something televangelists like to say, just sow a seed into my ministry and God will increase it tenfold.

So what they're saying is, well, if you give $100, you're going to get $1 ,000 back. What is being increased here?

Now, there is a sense in which you can count on God to supply everything that is needed for further good, and that may involve actual finances, that may involve actual finances, but it definitely involves spiritual growth.

It definitely involves increased generosity and joyfulness in giving, and this is what

God guarantees to increase. There are many things that may be needed that God may increase as they are needed, but the one thing that is certainly needed is maturity before Him, and He will increase that.

Now, the other passage that Paul quotes here in verse 9, he says, Where is this from?

This is from Psalm 112. Please turn to Psalm 112 because I'd like you to look at this passage as well.

Once again, he is using this in a counterintuitive way to make a profound point.

Verse 9 is the quoted verse. He is distributed freely. He is given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever.

His horn is exalted in honor. Now, verses 3, excuse me, verses 1, let's just start at verse 1.

You will see this is not actually talking about the Lord. In 2

Corinthians 9, Paul is using it to speak of the Lord. The Lord gives freely. His righteousness endures forever.

In Psalm 112, it's talking about the man who fears the

Lord. Praise the Lord. Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in His commandments.

His offspring will be mighty in the land. The generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches are in His house, and His righteousness endures forever.

Light dawns in the darkness for the upright. He is gracious, merciful, and righteous.

So you see that? He has wealth and riches. He has righteousness. He is gracious, merciful, righteous.

All these things are kind of combined additively. There's not really a relationship that's described between them yet exactly.

It is well with the man who deals generously and lends, who conducts his affairs with justice, for the righteous will never be moved.

He will be remembered forever. He's not afraid of bad news. His heart is firm, trusting in the

Lord. His heart is steady. He will not be afraid until he looks in triumph on his adversaries.

He distributes freely. He's given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. Okay, so this is describing the man who fears the

Lord. And not only that, what is the relationship between his wealth or his freely giving?

He's distributing freely, giving to the poor. What is the relationship between his giving and his righteousness? Well, one is constituting the other.

His righteousness is the fact that he freely gives. Okay, he's righteous because he's a generous man.

That is his righteousness, is this overflow of goodness from him.

But now, in 2 Corinthians 9, it's pretty clear that this is being applied not to the man who fears the

Lord, but to God himself. It says in verse 8, And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.

As it is written, He has distributed freely and has given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever.

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.

Who is the one giving? Who is the one freely giving here? It is the

Lord who is. And so, verse 9 is being applied not to the man who fears the Lord, but it's being applied to God who gives to the man who fears the

Lord. Now, on top of that, what is the relationship between giving and righteousness here in this passage?

Is one constituting the other? Is his righteousness the fact that he is generous in giving? He has distributed freely and has given to the poor.

His righteousness endures forever. Not really. When you see that it's distinguishing between the seed and the bread, and then it explains later on in verses 11 and following that as they are generous, it produces thanksgiving, it produces righteousness in others.

What you see is not the giving being constituting righteousness.

Rather, giving is provoking righteousness, or it is the means by which righteousness is accomplished.

And so, as God gives freely to people everything that they need in order to do the things that he calls them to, his righteousness comes out through them, and then not only through them, but even to the ones who are given to by them.

Those that God gives to have the capacity for righteousness, and they are righteous. And then as they give to others, have a new capacity for righteousness, for thanksgiving, etc.

And so, righteousness exudes from them as well. And so here, this giving is not the righteousness itself, but the giving is the means by which those who are given to have a capacity for righteousness.

So Paul uses both of these passages, and this is not the only time he does this kind of thing.

This is kind of a very frequent way that he uses the Old Testament, is in unexpected ways that are counterintuitive to the way that you would have originally read it in that context.

And he's saying that…and this is not a…let me just explain. This is not a rhetorical trick of a vain philosopher.

Okay, Paul, of course, inspired by the Spirit, he is accurately using these things. The man who fears the

Lord is one who emulates God. Okay, so if it describes the man who fears the

Lord, of course these things can be said of the Lord. And then there is enough in that passage to let you know that the nature of the relationship between giving and righteousness does not need to be limited to it constituting righteousness.

So Paul is…he's applying all these things appropriately. He is just doing so in a counterintuitive and profound way.

So let's talk about the bread, and let's talk about the seed. For the seed, what is the guarantee that God has given?

He will give you everything that you need to do the things that he has called you to do. Now once again, that may involve certain things.

That may involve material things. If he calls you, just very plainly, if he calls you to give $100, he will ensure that you have $100.

God is not going to call you to do something that you do not have the capacity to do or that he won't give you the capacity to do.

That's just not going to happen. He will give you that capacity. But what is guaranteed is that he will give you the spiritual maturity to be obedient.

He will increase your capacity to follow him. In this context, that term is generosity.

But it could be anything. It could be patience. It could be courage, whatever the case may be. He will give you the virtues necessary in order that you would be able to serve him completely.

Now, what is the symptom that results when someone feels that the burden is on them to supply the seed?

You know, the farmer, you see this frequently in Scripture. The farmer is concerned not just about getting fruit every year. He's concerned about having enough seed to be able to even farm.

In Isaiah 35, 36, 37, there's somewhere in there there's passages about the people not having enough seed, so they would have a very small harvest, and the next year they have enough seed to have a larger harvest, and the next year enough seed to have a larger harvest, et cetera.

If you think that the burden is on you to have enough generosity or to have enough patience such that you need to supply these things of yourself as though they wouldn't be given by God, what's going to happen?

You are going to be idle. You are going to wait to obey the Lord and determine that right now is not the right time to obey the

Lord. There may be a later time to obey the Lord. But God tends to give the seed necessary for sowing in the context of one who is ready to sow, not having those things yet, knowing that God will grant them.

Now, you can think of all kinds of examples where this may be the case.

Someone might say, well, I'm a very timid person. I can't handle a lot of new people.

I'm going to stay away from the gathering of the saints because God just hasn't equipped me for that just yet, and I'm going to kind of stay isolated, and maybe at some point

He'll grow me enough that I could go spend time with the saints. This is how a lot of people address things like this.

And so they wait on obedience because they think that they don't have enough to be obedient yet and that that excuses disobedience.

That's not how it works. God will give you everything that is needed as you follow Him, as you step out in obedience.

Someone might say that they are a very anxious person, so they cannot do the thing that God has called them to do.

Someone might say, I'm not patient enough to handle whatever it is that God is calling them to.

Maybe some relationship that they would have, whether it be with a loved one, a family member that they should care for, whether it be children, whatever the case may be.

Someone might say, well, I don't have enough patience for that. I will wait until God gives me enough patience. Then I will serve the

Lord the way that He is calling me to serve Him. The Bible gives us commands to hospitality.

Someone who might have all the material things necessary for hospitality might have this excuse as well.

Well, God just hasn't given me that heart of hospitality. I will wait until He gives me that heart of hospitality, and then

I will serve Him. Do not go about these things in this way.

Now certainly there are some things that are not matters of obedience that you should wait for God to give you everything necessary.

Teaching is one obvious example. The Bible explains that no one should think more highly of himself than he ought in the context of teaching.

It is not stepping out of obedience to go and teach in a capacity that you are not equipped for.

It is also not obedient to give of yourself in ways where God has not equipped you materially in order to give.

For example, if you were to give by going into debt, this is almost certainly not something that God would call you to.

But a lot of people will do that kind of thing. They will get in their mind that they need to be obedient in ways where they are not distinguishing between these things that God is certain to give and God is not always going to give.

God will always give you the maturity necessary to obey Him. But if something materially is lacking and He has not provided it, then this is not some kind of obedience that He is calling you to, unless there is something just outstanding that would dictate that it will be supplied and that you can count on it.

You need to be able to distinguish these things to know what God is calling you to. So what's the experience of someone who has this mindset that they have to supply the seed themselves?

It's cowardice. It's cowardice. Revelation 21 .8 says that the portion of the cowardly is the lake of fire.

Cowardice is not a small thing. It is a very significant thing in the eyes of the Lord. Now what about the other end?

Bread. God supplies not only the seed, not only the beginning, but He also supplies the end.

He supplies everything that is needed, but He also supplies the results. Just like Paul says in 1

Corinthians, I planted a pollis water, but God gives the growth.

Okay, so in all these cases, God is giving the growth. God is producing it from beginning to end.

God will bring results. Now once again, there's need for a caveat. This does not mean it will be the results that you are expecting.

It does not mean it will always be the results that you want. And it does not mean that it will always be results that you can see.

Those are not things that are guaranteed, but it is guaranteed that it will always have good results and great results.

What is the symptom that follows after someone who thinks that they need to be responsible for the result?

It is anxiety. Okay, so someone who is going to be idle and timid and not do things because they think they need to supply the seed, someone who is going to be anxious about some task that they are doing if they think that it's their responsibility to provide the result or to ensure the result comes out a certain way.

The Bible says that the thief should no longer steal, but should labor with his hands so that he might be able to provide for himself and have something for those who are in need.

So if someone realizes, okay, well, I need to serve the Lord by looking for a job in order that I can do that, but then that search for a job is not materializing, but you are being faithful in the search for it, provided you are truly being faithful in the search for it, that does not mean that that is failure in the

Lord's eyes. That does not mean that you are not successfully doing what He commands in Ephesians 4 and putting on Christ.

Similarly, with marriage, you might see that God is calling you to marriage given the things it says in 1 Corinthians 7 and the one who was called to marriage.

He has desires because of temptations of sexual immorality, etc., all the commands, all the statements about the goodness of marriage in Scripture.

And as that is not coming to fruition the way that you would hope it to, but if you are being faithful in it, that does not mean it is not producing the right results because the results are largely results that are in you, but also ones that are outside of you, just not necessarily in the way that you may think.

And the same is true in evangelism. If you go about serving the Lord and sharing the gospel with others and you think that the burden of evangelism is on you so that you would produce the conversions, you'll be very anxious, you'll be very disappointed, you'll go into it very excited, you'll come out of it very depressed when you don't see the particular results that you think that you are supposed to, by your own effort, be producing.

The Bible says that the battle belongs to the Lord. The battle belongs to the Lord. So the experience of someone who has this mindset is going to be very bipolar, for lack of a better word.

It's going to be manic depressive, you know, just really excited about something and then as you don't see results, just really depressed about it.

It's going to be a rollercoaster of emotions if you think that you are responsible for producing the results.

So if you think you're responsible for producing the seed, it's going to end up in cowardice. If you think that you're responsible for producing the results, it's going to end up in anxiety and just a rollercoaster of emotions.

There are a number of Proverbs that speak to this that are very counterintuitive about how

God gives to those who give of themselves. Proverbs 3, 9 -10

Proverbs 11, 24 -25 Proverbs 19, 17

Proverbs 22, 9 Proverbs 28, 27

Now, first of all, these are all spoken in financial terms, but they apply to any kind of giving of yourself that you would do for the sake of the

Lord. And this is the opposite of the way that most people think of themselves. They think, well, I have this limited capacity and so as I give of myself, it means that I will have less.

But they don't recognize God's role in this process because He is infinite.

He has all things. And so as you are united to Christ, as you are in the vine,

He will supply everything that is needed and the result will not be that you will have less as you give of yourself as you follow the

Lord in obedience. The result is that you will have far more capacity to do so. And this is a cascading righteousness that it describes here in this passage.

In verse 12 it says, This is the mindset that most people have.

When I do some good thing, it is just for that immediate purpose and nothing else. Okay, if I give to the poor, it is just to put them in a better condition.

That's the end of it. He says it is not only for that. What will you be thinking if you think that's the only purpose of giving?

You will think that that's supposed to be the effect and then perhaps if it doesn't turn out the way that it should, perhaps they are not able to do with it as much as you thought, then it will feel like maybe that wasn't good of me to be generous, etc.

If you have this mindset, all kinds of things could happen where you will be disappointed in the results.

And even when you get good results, you will not be able to see all the results such that you would be as blessed by obedience as you should be.

Just a few more examples of a very results -oriented mindset. For example, if you go to the abortion clinic in order to proclaim the gospel and you think that the metric is saving babies, number of babies saved, well, as you see the results you want to see, you're not going to see the other things.

And as you don't see the results you want to see, then you're going to be very discouraged in that work.

But if you realize that the Word always accomplishes its purposes, like it had said in Isaiah 55, the

Word always accomplishes its purpose and never returns void, you won't have that problem.

Now, consider the trajectory that Paul gives here.

Let me give an illustration of this real quick. I don't know if you've ever heard about this, and just economic theory.

There's a lot of people who think that in every economic transaction, if you've got two things that are being exchanged, maybe you're bartering, maybe you're giving money for something, there's one party that's losing.

Because one of those things actually is worth more, and so there's a loss that's always happening and a gain that's always happening.

That's the way a lot of people think about financial transactions. But the reality is that value is personal, and so someone may value something more than the other person for very good reasons.

Someone may very much need food while the other person does not need the food that they're giving. Someone may need whatever resource that they're exchanging, etc.

And so the reality is if everything's on the table properly, then both parties are winning in that transaction.

And this is just different than most people think because if you're not thinking about value being different per person, you wouldn't realize that.

The same is true with what is being described here in this passage, that you might think, okay, well,

I'm going to give to this other person, and so this is only good if it's at least as valuable to them as it is to me.

But it's missing all the other good that comes from it, that every transaction of obedience, every time you give of yourself, it is growing into much, much more.

So he says, like I said, he said in verse 12, for the ministry of the service is not only supplying the needs of the saints, it's doing something much more than that.

In the previous verse, he said, you'll be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.

Okay, so this is the summary statement that gives the whole trajectory. You will be enriched.

That will go through us. Who's us? Well, Paul is with Timothy. Titus is with the

Corinthians and will be joining Paul and taking the money to him. So you will be enriched.

That will flow through us, and then it will go to Jerusalem and produce thanksgiving to God.

Okay, so that is the whole of the trajectory. Now consider the different ways that it produces righteousness.

So it says, for the ministry of the service is not only supplying the needs of the saints, but it is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God.

All right, thanksgivings is primarily talking about those in Jerusalem. Those in Jerusalem, when they are on the receiving end of the

Corinthians' good works, particularly this one act of generosity, they will thank

God. Okay, so it produces in them a joy, a joy which is a righteous joy because they should be thanking

God and they have another reason to thank God. And so that is one that is focused on them and their selves.

Okay, them and their selves, there is a righteousness there. Then it goes on in verse 13.

It says, by their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ.

And the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others.

Okay, so then after the thankfulness, they glorify God. Now what is this talking about?

This is talking about not them just recognizing that God is good, but them bringing others to recognize that God is good.

So now this righteous recognition of God's goodness is spreading not just from themselves and thankfulness, but to others through their glorifying of God.

And then it goes further. Verse 14, while they long for you and pray for you because of the surpassing grace of God upon you, thanks be to God for His inexpressible gift.

So while they long for you and pray for you. So now the blessing is not just in them as they're thankful to God.

The blessing of righteousness is not just in others as others are glorifying God because they are glorifying

God, right? They're telling others that God is good and the others are recognizing that God is good, whether they be believer or unbeliever.

But now then they also pray for the Corinthians. The saints in Jerusalem will pray for the Corinthians.

So it blesses the Corinthians as well. And so this is

Paul's point here, is if you think of this very narrowly, you're not going to be stirred up to the kind of generosity that you should be stirred up.

If you think about the fruit of your obedience very narrowly and the direct thing that it's supposed to accomplish, you're not going to desire to obey

God. Your heart's going to be very stingy in its desire to walk along the path that God has called you to walk if you are seeing so myopically.

But if you see that this is not only just to relieve their needs, but to produce thankfulness in them, glorifying

God in them for others to glorify God, and then also prayers for you, then you will realize, oh, this is expansive.

This is a cascading righteousness. This is a multiplying righteousness. He distributed freely, and he's given to the poor.

His righteousness endures forever. He gives, and then through that giving, as others give, his righteousness is growing.

People are growing in righteousness, declaring God's goodness. And this is the mindset, this is the understanding that is needed in order to obey him fully.

A lot of people think that they should just obey because God says to, and you should.

But you will not have the needed motivation. This is what the

Bible is acknowledging. You are a weak creature. You are not a strong creature. It is not enough for you just to know what is right.

He has blessed you by showing you many ways. Now, there are many that are hidden from you, but he, in understanding your weakness, has told you about all the ways it is good so that you would have what is sufficient in order to know that he will give everything that is sufficient.

This is the relationship between faith and obedience. No one obeys apart from faith. But if you have faith in what

God says, and moreover, all the things he says, including these things about the way that his righteousness cascades through obedience, you will have sufficient motivation, which is why we're doing this whole series.

The more that you understand these things, the more that your heart will overflow in a desire to obey God because you will see all the blessing that comes from it.

And it will not feel like something that you have to do begrudgingly or stingily because it is just, it is something where you lose in the matter and you don't see the gain that takes place.

You don't see the gain in others and you won't see the gain in yourself. But he will increase your goodness, your capacity for service to him, and he will bless the whole church through your service to him.

Now, if you have a debit card, you use it carefully because you don't want to expend the funds. This is like having a debit card that increases every time you use it.

You would be eager to use that just as often as you can. You'd be, you know, as you go through the checkout aisle, you're just grabbing all the random packs of gum and everything, you know, just trying to produce charges.

Once again, I'm not saying that the guarantee here is a financial one, even though I'm using financial analogies, right?

The guarantee is that God will increase your capacity for giving of yourself in obedience, and he will increase your joy in the matter.

Rely on the Lord. The Lord grants a seed and he grants the bread. Do not be timid, thinking that the seed belongs to you and that you must produce it in yourself, that you've got to wait until you churn that up in order to begin obeying him.

Just obey him now, and he will supply everything that's needed. Moreover, don't think that you have to ensure that the bread comes out of the oven correctly.

Now, you should be faithful that as long as you are faithful, he will produce whatever results he intends to produce from it.

Don't be anxious about the matter. And learn to discern the things that are necessary in order to know how to obey

God. Discern in yourself what your gifts are, what truly are those limited capacities where they would constrain what kinds of obedience

God is calling you to. Once again, that example of teaching. Learn to understand, okay,

God really has limited me in this way where there's no guarantee that I'm going to be supplied with what is needed in order to do these kinds of activities.

But then in other ways recognize, well, this is simply a lack of maturity that he does guarantee, a lack of holiness that he does guarantee he will give as needed in order to pursue these things.

And so I should pursue them knowing that he will supply everything that is needed.

Learn to distinguish between those. And then also learn to look for the right results.

Don't be looking for results that God has not guaranteed. Look for primarily the results within as you see yourself growing capacity and enjoy the results as you see yourself growing.

Also, look for the results as it would grow in others giving thanksgiving to God as it results in others glorifying

God, not just in the very small, narrow way that you are obeying and its immediate effect.

Don't be like the Corinthians who are tempted to think that all that their gift would be doing would be supplying the needs of the saints.

It's doing much more than that. Then learn to see those results when they come, not just what you should be looking for, but when they come.

And also know that you're not going to see all the results. And this is part of the joy of getting to see these things eventually is the one who labors in private and does not see the work of his hands will have a greater reward on that final day as Jesus intimates in Matthew chapter 6.

Now, relying on the Lord and discerning what you should discern about the seed and the bread, you should also practice this.

You should practice this. Clearly, I'm calling you to obedience, but one of the best ways to practice is simply what is spoken of here.

It's financial giving. It really does. Pretty much all things in life are wrapped up in money in some way or another.

In Ecclesiastes, it says that money answers everything. There is a way where when you give of yourself financially, it is training all the other kinds of ways that you would give because it is such a visceral way of giving of yourself.

Jesus said you cannot serve God or you cannot serve both God and mammon. Why? That's not just a random example of something that you might feel a dichotomy between.

He picks mammon in particular because it is the thing that summarizes all kinds of ways that you would be serving yourself.

If you think of mammon as just a word, that word means money by the way, if you think of that word as just referring to currency as one thing among many, it's referring to it as the representative of many.

It is the representative idol of all the other things because it is gain.

You might serve some different kind of gain that isn't particularly currency oriented, but really all things are summed up in some way or another in this notion of mammon.

One of the best ways that you can practice this is giving of yourself. As you have the capacity to give, do so.

Step out in faith knowing that the Lord will give you the generosity, even if you don't feel like denying yourself the kind of pleasures that you would have to deny yourself in order to do it.

Trust the Lord that He would supply you with everything that is necessary. Finances, if the finances truly be necessary, but likewise, and more importantly the generosity in order to do so and that He will increase your generosity, that you be joyful in it.

I remember when I was, I was a very stingy person growing up, I still am in some ways, but I was a very stingy person growing up because I'd say penny pinching, you know, not necessarily stingy because that implies relationship with others.

Very penny pinching, but that led into stinginess because, you know,

I wanted to make sure I had enough. Sometime in college I had a friend who would occasionally take me out and pay for my meal, and I was just so blessed by that I realized how good it could be to give to others in that way.

Anyway, it's just yeah, it felt like my mind was opening up to realize just how good it could be to give.

And I didn't even understand all the ways that generosity could be blessed, but you will find the same thing.

And anecdotally this is just true, you ask other people who have trained themselves in various ways of giving, whether it be financial and other kinds of obedience, and as they have served the

Lord God has given them more and more capacity to. And now it's not just that it feels less painful, it has gone from being painful to being joyful.

Beyond practicing, rejoice. Rejoice. If you think of these matters that are not supposed to be in your control as things that should be in your control, you will be anxious, you will not rejoice.

You will be timid, you will not rejoice. If you think that it's up to you to produce the results, you are going to be very discouraged about things, especially as the results do not come.

It's not something that leads to joy. But as you measure these things properly, you will be able to rejoice in the matter.

And you should. There's a good analogy for this in Genesis 4 when it describes, excuse me,

Genesis 3, when it describes the woman's desires being against the man, but the man will rule over her. The way that reveals itself in marriages a lot of times is that when the man's been given authority over the home in certain ways that the

Bible has described, but the wife will feel responsible for the results, and she will be very anxious and want to in certain ways, whether she intends to or not, be trying to wrest power from him, even just in the anxious, whether it be anxious nagging like the

Bible describes the contentious woman or other things. Right? She would have this mindset where these things, she might ostensibly recognize that, well, this is under the husband's authority.

I don't have to worry about the results. But in reality what's going on is she feels that she does have to worry about the results.

So she grows in her anxiety. She's not having joy in the marriage, etc. Marriage is becoming worse to her than what it was just to be single because she feels that things should be in her hands that are not in her hands.

But the wife who learns that, well, if the husband has authority over these things, I don't have to worry about them, and he can just handle them, and I don't have to even concern myself with that.

It's a very joyful wife. You find a wife who's able to do this well, she's very joyful. And this is what it's like with the bride of Christ as well.

We are the bride of Christ. We are not supposed to have anxiety over the things that he is doing, over the things that he is responsible for supplying, the seed and the bread.

And that is the point of Psalm 112. Who is the man who fears the

Lord? That's the point of all these psalms. They're all pointing to Christ. While this passage speaks of God, and certainly it is the

Father who gives good gifts to his children, these things are coming through the groom. These things are coming through Christ who supplies everything.

And if we are to be a good bride, then we should not be anxious for the things that lie under the responsibility of the

Son. Instead, we should rejoice that he will do it all perfectly because he is the perfect groom.

Amen. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for the goodness that you have shown us in supplying to us everything that is needed and distributing freely and giving to the poor.

Your righteousness is forever. We pray that we would not be myopic, seeing only that which is most immediate in our obedience, seeing only the meeting of the needs of the saints.

Instead, we pray that you would help us to see more, how it overflows into thanksgiving, into glorifying you, and even into prayers for us.