This morning, especially if you are a visitor here, it is.
Good to have you with us. I have really been enjoying our
series on, who are we and getting a lot out of that and
God has a priest. A lot of things on me and
convicted me of lot of things. It's been really good, really
enjoyed that. We're going to take a little bit
of a break from it this week. We'll be back into it next week.
Kind of go go off on a little bit of a tangent this morning.
We're going to talk about what's in your hand.
That's the the title of this morning's message.
I think we all kind of have a desired only to want our lives
to count for something, right to to think that we can make a
difference. Right?
That when we there when we leave this earth, the world is a
better place than when we came into it, because we had some
impact in some way there. True.
Yep, and it's Christians in particular that we have
connected some people with their savior, right?
So who gives a hope and a purpose that you can't really
get anywhere else, right? But I think when we think about
that stuff, I think we kind of think that I like, on a big
scale. Like, you know, we wanted to
come in and impact this sort of, you know, have the sort of major
change and, and do incredible things, right?
But it's True. Right?
That you can, you can make or break a shop assistants day,
right? By the things you do.
Write a lot of times this impact stuff that's influence stuff
happens on Earth on a very small level, right in the little
things that we do each day. You can, you know, how you treat
that shop assistant, or what you say to your boss or, you know,
you can, you can impact attendance or your lawyer, or
your Barber or, you know, all you.
Didn't see teachers, you know, all the people that you come
into contact with you have influence on them, every time
you write an email, right? You're influencing somebody or
impacting somebody every time I take a photo, right?
Every time you give me time. I gossip to someone, right?
I'm influencing them. And so the question is, not
really. Am I having an impact?
The issue is, what kind of impact am I having?
I am I have an impact for good, or for bad for writer, for
wrong, for Christ or not for Christ, right?
What kind of impact am I having? And the Bible says that, you
know, we should, we should think about this.
And we should be more intentional about our impact.
God wants us to recognize where we could be an influence for
good. And for God, you know, I think
about your interests. What kind of person am I?
And how could I use? That to impact people in a
positive way. And if you think about you, your
job or your career, right? What I do is work, you know, how
can I use that for influence and then I should use the best of my
abilities for God, right? So the question sort of becomes
how, right? How do we do that?
How do we, how do we use? What we have two impacts people
towards the cause of Christ to influence some of that in their
Direction. 22. Possibly change things.
And so I'm going to try and answer that question this
morning with a question and it's a question that was asked of
Moses that God, God asked, Moses Moses, if you remember was a
murderer On The Run, he was a criminal and then God comes to
him. He's a fugitive.
And God says, to him, I want you to go back to Egypt and leave my
people out of slavery there right now.
If you remember the first time he tried that, it didn't go
well, right? They went about as bad as it
could go. He ends up getting a guy and
then fleeing and they didn't follow him.
Right? And so for lots of reasons,
Moses doesn't want to go back, right?
But then, 40 years later, right? He's out in the desert and he
sees this Burning Bush. And God says, Moses I want you
to go back to to Egypt and leave my people out.
This is a story where God gets his attention, right?
But you know, you imagine he's thinking what, how am I gonna do
this? They didn't.
It didn't go so well for me last time and God makes a statement.
Right. And in Exodus chapter 4 verse
number 2. The Lord said to him, what is in
your hand? And he said a rod, right?
A Shepherd stuff and he said, God said, cast it on the ground.
So he cast It On The Ground. Why did God asked Moses?
What was in his hand, right? Didn't he didn't even know,
right? Cause he knows he's God, right?
Because he knew what was in the same.
When God asked a question like that, it's for the benefit of
the person. He's He's asking, you know, not
for his own benefit, what's in your hand and he says a Shepherd
stuff. Now, if you are if you remember
depending on you know if you're of a certain age you want might
remember the Ten Commandments movie, right?
Charlton Heston and he's got the staff there and he throws it on
the ground and and it turns into a snake and and scares you know
Moses runs from it becomes alive it's kind of filled with power
and then he and then he says I want you to pick up the snake.
And he picks up the snake in. It becomes a staff.
Again, quite a cool Miracle, you know, that that kind of went on
the air. Why in the world did God do
that? Was it just to show off?
No God doesn't do miracles to show off, right?
Miracles. Are they were always done to
confirm to people that somebody had the authority to speak on
God's behalf, right? Because Moses, it was going to
be saying thus, says the Lord fried and and this miracle
confirmed that he had God's authority to say those things.
But there's also often a lesson or a Churchill truth, there's a
principle behind it. And here's what he was saying to
Moses. He says, Moses, what's in your
hand, right? And so Moses is a shepherd and
he has a Shepherd stuff. It's just a stick, but that's
staff kind of represented everything that that Moses was.
He's a Shepherd, right? So it represented his income,
that's how he made his living. Right?
It was kind of symbolic as of him as a as a ship.
That's that's where his money came from, you know, he tended
sheep not an easy job either for Moses because it says that he
was out. The Bible says, he was shipping
out on the backside of the desert, it calls.
It calls it. So you know, tough place to be
farming but that stuff represented as income it also
got a represented his identity when you saw someone carrying a
stuff like that you in our Shepherd kind of like, you know,
you see it. Men in uniform or nurse or
Soldier or something. You think it was kind of
represented, kind of his, his identity as a person.
And in a couple of weeks Peterson is going to take us
through. Who are we as individuals?
What does the Bible say about that?
It's a lot about our identity and it, but it also represented
his influence, that's those Shepherd stops.
That's what they're for, right? Get along little sheepy, right?
That's it. Kind of represented the
influence that he had. And so when he says, What's in
your hand? And Moses said, I've got the
stuff, you know, it's a Shepherd stuff, it represents his
identity, his income and has influenced.
And so God's kind of saying look Moses if you'll give me your
influence your identity in your income, I'll make it, come
alive. All Empower it.
I'll do miraculous things from it.
And so Moses when he presents that, right, when he puts it
down, when he when he throws it down, he's essentially saying
God, I'm giving you my identity, my income, my influence, and he
lays it down and become something of power.
Now, from that point on the staff was the staff that Moses
used for all those different Miracles, right?
And if you've seen all those different movies, you know, this
one's from the The Prince of Egypt, right?
It's an astonishing. Off that he used.
If you if you read through the scriptures to stop that, he used
to split the Red Sea. It's the same stuff that he used
to hold the water in the Nile and turn it into blunt.
And it's the same stuff that he used to strike the Rock and
water came out. It's the staff to do all the
Miracles. And in fact, from that point on,
it was never again, Called Moses staff.
But the Bible refers to it as the rod of God.
The rod of God, all of a sudden what had been a simple and plain
kind of crazy. Little stick thing.
God is using as a tool to do incredible things.
Alright so here's the point here, right?
Because Moses gave God, what was in his hand?
His identity is income as influence because God Moses gave
that to God. God used it as a tool to impact
history. All right, everybody knows, you
Moses fight exterior view, you don't go to church, right?
You didn't grow up in church, you're probably We heard of him.
You probably seen one of the movies, you know, he completely
changed history because he gave God what was in his hand.
He used those things that he had to influence for good and for
God and it was never the same again, right?
So this morning God is asking us the same question.
What is in your hand? What is in your hand?
Let's say, two weeks time. We're going to, we're going to
have a look at Peter's going to take us through.
Who are we as individuals? We're going to kind of look at
identity this morning, I'm going to talk about the income part of
this. The income part of what is in
your hand. Now, preaches, hate talking
about this, right? Pastors and teachers.
And, you know, we hate it, because it sounds like, give me
money right. Send money now and we're
probably all heard those sermons, you know, we're
somebody says, I give God some money and he'll multiply it back
to you, many times, right? In other words tie, then God
will make you rich, but they kind of twist things.
Little bit. You ever heard that?
See, ya, the few people nodding there, right?
We've probably all seen these kind of, you know,
televangelists, you know, and they just going to dripping with
jewelry saying, send money now. Yeah, yeah, I remember a friend
of mine went back in the early 20s and he had a satellite dish
and we've got the Satellite Dish hooked up and we were looking to
think it now will see, will be let it watch all this
International TV and there's all these Christian channels on
there. I thought this is going to be so
cool and I flicked through. And there was that and then that
and then they like, it was just people could send money now,
right? This kind of stuff.
Now, there is a Huge scope for abuse here, isn't it?
And that's part of a problem with this, right?
People can say what you don't love the Lord, if you don't do
this, right? I'm so this guy, Jimmy Baker.
You might remember him? That's his house there in the
background parts of his dog kennel with gold-plated.
Yeah, no joke. All right, send money now.
Right? This guy here are Roberts, are
all gotten up in front of his congregation.
He said, God's given me a revelation.
He's going to kill me on a certain.
Date, unless you donate eight million dollars and everyone
went on, I don't kill oral. We love viral right now.
They gave all their money and sold all this stuff and
whatever. Now they never got to the 8
million but you didn't die. Yeah.
But there's all this this kind of abuse, right?
So there is scope for abuse here and so we want to kind of look
at is that this idea of what is tithing?
What is that? Who does it?
Why would you do it, right? And so what we want to do is go
to the Bible and as much as we can forget, everything.
Thing else that we think we know about this stuff and see what
the Bible actually. Says, the first mention of it's
in the book of Genesis in chapter 14 and in verse number
18 and you can, you can go there, if you'd like, Genesis
14, 18, we will have a versus up on the up, on the screens, but
it is always good. If you can follow in your own
Bible in sort of see the context in the place of it.
So the bit of background here or long time ago, like 1700 BC,
right? There's this kind of Alliance of
Teams from over. And what we know is now is
Southern Iraq over here. So, in something like, there's a
sort of Alliance of Kingdoms and that's where Abraham was
originally from, from this area. And so right over the far side
there, we Babylon an error and all that down in that area and
this Alliance of Kings. They took an army and they made
the way around the federal, president came over into what.
We now know is Jordan and they conquered a bunch of cities in
their whole bunch of these cities in Jordan, right?
So they made their way. Right across the here anyway.
So they make their way into Jordan and they conquer a bunch
of cities in there. They took all this stuff and
then for 13 years, they made them pay taxes back to Iraq.
All right. So these Jordanian little
city-states if you like sort of Kingdoms had to pay taxes back
to Iraq and after 13 years they went, you know what, we want to
do that anymore, so they just stopped paying the tax and the
Iraqis went, let's see about that, shall we?
And so they sent the Army back again and the Army came back
into into. To Jordan there and reconquered.
These cities took all of their stuff and a whole bunch of
hostages and people as kind of, you know, sending a message.
Don't mess with us right now. Well over there they thought
let's a kind of expand this a little bit.
They cross the border over into Israel, towards the
Mediterranean Sea, their into Southern Israel.
And they took a couple of cities there as well, Sodom and
Gomorrah particular, which was quite big powerful cities in
those days and took all the stuff out of there as well as
well. Is took a lot of hostages and so
they are hitting hoo. They're heading back to Iraq
with all the stuff they've taken from all these cities plus a
whole bunch of hostages, and they're on their way back.
Now, Abraham lives a little Way north of where Sodom and
Gomorrah were in a different area but his nephew lot lived in
Sodom and and so lot, and his family are among the captives
that have been taken by these Iraqi Kings.
And so Abraham, by this stage, has this Massive, farming
operation going on and he has 318 employees who worked for him
as Farm hands. And so he prays hard about this
and then Abraham and his 318, farmhands go and take on the
Iraqi Army and in one of those amazing miraculous God, things
they win, right? And so not only do they win,
they get all of the loot that the, the Iraqi Army Iraqi kings
are taken from Jordan and the stuff they taken from Saddam
Sodom Gomorrah and they get all the people back.
Well, right? And so after winning this big
battle, Abraham and his and his, he's got a farming operation
staff hitting back home and then this happens, this is a in verse
number 18 here. It's Genesis would like to thank
you. That's on the screening Genesis
14. It says this then Melchizedek
king of Salem brought out Bread and Wine.
He was a priest of the god most high, right.
So we got this guy Melchizedek don't know a whole lot about
them but he He's a, he's a king who's also a priest of God most
high and he blessed him blessed Abraham.
And he said this blessed be Abraham of God.
Most high possessor of Heaven, and Earth, and blessed.
Be God, most high, who has delivered your enemies into your
hand and it says, and he Abram, gave him a tithe of all.
So the word tithe comes from a Hebrew word that just means
1/10. 1/10. Abraham voluntarily gave one
tenth of all the all the treasure that had that had got
back, you know, off the rocky Kings and he gave it to this
priest king. Okay?
So that's the first time we see it in the scripture the first
time. We kind of see this this ties
thing going. Okay, so next event is Genesis
chapter 28. So this is several Generations
later and Jacob is on the run after committing fraud against
his brother and his brother. Is an excellent expert Hunter
tracker and so Jacobs just running thinking he's coming
after me, right? Any minute now is just going to
come over the rise and bow and arrow and and it's all over is
expecting death at any moment. Thinking, it's all over thing
is, he's totally ruined everything by his bad decision
making and that there's no hope. And then at that God wouldn't
want anything to do with somebody like him.
He just kind of collapses in a heap exhausted and he falls
asleep. And he has a vision, right?
Of this ladder going up to heaven from where he is with
angels going up and down, right? God is at work in this place,
right? Things?
Things are happening, and God promises that he will be with
Jacob. And so Jacob wakes up from this
and he realizes that that God is still at work.
And he says this Genesis 28, 16 says Jacob awoke from his sleep
and he said, surely the Lord is in this place and I did not know
it and he was afraid and he said how awesome This place awesome.
There could also be translated as terrifying.
Terrifying. How awesome is this place?
This is none other than the house of God, and this is the
Gate of Heaven. Then.
Jacob Rose early in the morning and he took the stone that he
had put in his head and he set it up as a pillar and poured oil
on top of it and he called the name of that place Bethel, but
the name of that City had been low has previously.
Then Jacob made a vow say Saying if God will be with me cause
that's what God had told him and keep me in this way that I'm
going and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on because
again that's what God had promised them in the dream.
So that I come back to my father's house and peace, then
the Lord shall be my God. And this Stone, which I have
said as a pillar, shall be God's house and of all that you give
me. I'll surely give a test you.
Yep. So there is again.
Second time we kind of see that. So again, voluntary offering
10%, Abraham offered 10% of The Spoils of autumn to Melchizedek.
Jacob offers 10% of everything. Okay?
So, originally the examples, all that we have there, right?
Are of voluntary offerings around 10% and then came Moses,
right? And and the law.
And so, the law was given to Israel as a nation as a country,
right? It was to be their National
laws. For running their country once
they took position of it. Now it's very important to know
that we are not under that law, right?
There was a law given to Israel and Paul says the whole point of
the law was to show us that we're all lawbreakers.
Right? And we're in need of some
serious help. We need a savior, but in terms
of tithing, the law was kind of complicated for the Israelites.
They pretty much ran things on a seven-year cycle and depending
where on the on the, in that cycle, you were dependent on how
the tithing have the ties were, you know, And, and depending on
what ceremonies they had going on, depending on how the ties
were collected in and when they were given and that kind of
stuff. But let's just have a quick look
real quick. Look at one of those passages
from Deuteronomy 26 generally, 26 verse number 12.
This deals with year, three of the cycle.
And it says this when you have finished the side laying aside,
all the tithes of your increase in the third year, the Year of
tithing and they've given it to the levite, the stranger, the
fatherless and the No, so that they may eat within your Gates
and be filled. Then you shall say before the
Lord, I have removed the holy tithe from my house.
And I've also given them to the levite, the stranger, the
fatherless and the Widow, according to all your
Commandments. Would you have Commander me?
I've not transgress your Commandments, nor have I
forgotten them as 14. I have not eaten any of it.
When in mourning nor have I removed any of it for unclean
use nor given any of it for the dead over bade, the voice of the
Lord, my God, and I've done. According to all that you have
commanded me. Essentially tithing was a sort
of a legislated 10% tax on all food in Israel and because most
of their income came from, you know, farming crops and
livestock essentially it was a ten percent income tax is what
it amounted to. But what's important here in
this passage here is what it was to be used for right now.
It takes a bit of time to go through all that and for time
sake, we won't do that. But Um but basically it's kind
of a two things right to help the poor and those who are
unable to help themselves. Yeah and to provide for the
Levites and so God had set things up so that the tribe of
Levi was to be responsible for organizing worship.
A small subset of the tribe of Levi, were to be priests, right?
And a big part of their role was to teach the Bible and answer
questions about it, but the rest of them were responsible, kind
of for the grunt work, maintain the building's preparing, the
sacrifices organizing singers or all of that kind of stuff.
Now, when you remember that twice a year, every man in
Israel was required to go to a to his celebration, as well as
all the other things that they had going on.
This was a massive job, right, there was a lot of Evolved in
doing this. So Old Testament law, right?
Tithing was a mandatory 10% tax on all food.
It was used to feed the Levites and the poor who are unable to
feed themselves. And then we give voluntary
offerings on top of that. You see, when they, for example,
when they were building the Temple, they gave offerings for
the building materials and gave up their time to help build it.
Okay? So the sort of the question
becomes, why did God want them to do it?
Why did he, what did he want them to do that?
Because we, you know, might put it out this morning, right?
God doesn't need anything sound 50 here, you know?
God has a reason. So why did he want them to do
it? Well, it's the same Principle as
with their sacrifices, right? And Isaiah 66, is this as I said
this, God speaking for I desire Mercy, right?
Let me see means compassion and loving kindness and not
sacrifice and the knowledge of God, right?
That's, that's about understanding God, wrote about
relationship, more than burnt offerings, and you'll find that
lots of other places as well. So I'm chapter 40, another
place. Other places from there, right?
So if God doesn't need it, why did he ask them for it?
And now we didn't read it. But after, you know, Abraham
after he gave that 10% to Melchizedek, he gets back to the
king of Sodom and the king of Sodom says, don't worry about
the money Abraham. Keep the money.
Just give me the people back. And I remember him guys.
No, no, no, his, the money. He said, I don't want you to
say. Yeah, Abraham does a right
because I gave him a truckload of money.
He said, I want you to understand that, my God takes
care of me. I don't have to worry about this
stuff, right? Very different attitude to money
that Abraham had now, remember Abraham left his home back at
over in southern Iraq, there he had nothing.
God said, I want you to leave your home, he left when it had
nothing and it wasn't all plain sailing.
But years later now he's got This pig farming operation,
right? So he kind of understands this
concept, they look, God takes care of me.
God takes care of me. And so Abraham said to the king
of Sodom note, take the money is yours.
I don't want it. So God wanted Israel to
understand that. Everything they had came from
him and by giving the first 10% of the gross income even when
times were tough, they were acknowledging, I trust God for
everything even though I feel like this is Lot and this is,
you know, I'm gonna do this as an acknowledgement of my trust
in God to take care of me, right?
So that was kind of the plan that he set up now because the
Israelites were giving their tithes on certain days according
to the law, they ran into some logistical problems, right?
Because what would happen is there, everybody put their grain
out on the street and try the live stock up on the street and
all this sort of stuff waiting for the for the Levites to come
and collect it and it caused all these traffic jam.
He's and all kinds of issues, right?
So Hezekiah says, okay. We're going to fix this and so
he built. So these massive big storehouses
up by the temple and he said, take your time is up there and
store them up there, right? And so everybody would do that.
But then what happened was then it's kind of out of sight, a
little bit, people got a little bit slack right in the 10% just
kind of dropped off and when they gave animals that give the
one with a you know the sick ones or one with a bum leg or
whatever, you know and everything kind of just kind of
dwindle away to almost Nothing. They very seldom gave offerings
on top of their tires and when they did, they did it
begrudgingly and so, the prophet Malachi, pulls them up on this,
right? He quotes God and he says this
Malachi 3:8. He says, will a man rob?
God, I can somebody Rob God. This is yet, you have robbed me.
But you say in what way of we robbed you in tithes and
offerings Malachi tells them, this is your curse with a curse
for you. Have robbed me.
Wait. God tells them through Malachi,
you're cursed with a curse for you have robbed me.
Even this whole nation. Bring all the tithes into the
storehouse that there may be food in my house.
Try me on. This is like test me on this,
not very many times. You see, God, say that right,
says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open for you, the
windows of heaven and pour out for you such blessing.
There will not be room enough to receive it.
So God says, look, trust me on this test me.
If you'll trust me, it will have an impact on your whole.
Action. Our money is a very strong
indicator of our trust in God. There are roughly five hundred
verses in the Bible about salvation kind of direct ones
about 500 vs. About faith.
There are about 2000 verses about money.
Why is that? Because how we use our money
indicates that level of trust Matthew 25.
Jesus tells a parable about the master leaving some money with
three of his servants, remember that?
And then it goes away on business overseas.
He comes back and said, right, how'd you go with the money and
the first one says, why I invested, I made a lot and so
that's good. And the next one says why I
invested it? I made a little bit.
This is that's good. And the third one says why
buried it. Here it is.
And the muscle is really upset. He said it.
Could have at least put it in the bank.
Got some interest, you know, on it.
Let me tell you a true story. Let's fit a lot of too much time
on this, but this is hilarious. This guy's name is Timothy
Dexter. He's worth looking up.
If you look them up on Wikipedia or Timothy decks to live in a
Massachusetts in around 1750 and when he was 20 years old, he
married a widow. She was 31 and she was very
wealthy. And so he just all of a sudden,
has all this money and he's 20 years old and he thinks I should
invest this money. They didn't really know what to
do. So we just started asking some
wealthy people around town. Well, I started playing games
with him and they said, well, you want to do, is you want to
send some Bibles Down To Jamaica, right?
Knowing that, you know, the wind, many Christians in Jamaica
and those days. So he did that.
There was this huge big evangelism, kind of explosion
down there, all the Bible sold for profit.
So then the guy said, well what you want to do is you want to
send some mittens to Jamaica because, you know, people might
get cold down there now Jamaica's in that, you know, in
the tropics. It's pretty.
Hot place. He bought as many mittens as he
could, and he shipping to Jamaica.
Right? When they got there, these
Russian trawlers came through and they bought up all of the
mittens. He made a fortune.
So then people have that they were getting more and more
frustrated, they said, know what you want to do is send some
warming pans. You know, that like there's
little bronze pans. You put a fire in because they
they might need those. So you bought up all the bronze
pansy. Could he send them to Jamaica
and they sent for quite a long time and then after a while,
somebody realized that these pans will ideal for Like
molasses, which so making and all of all the pain sold at a
huge profit and it goes on and on and on and we won't go into
it, but it ends with them convincing him to send coals to
Newcastle. Send coal to Newcastle right
here of Massachusetts, you Castle was the coal mining
capital of the world, but he didn't know that, right?
He rented like, dozens of ships, filled them up with all the
coal, he could buy and sent them to Newcastle, en route to
Newcastle a minor strike broke out and you castle.
And there was no Nicole in all of England and we have, when his
ships arrived, he made a fortune, right?
It's an amazing story. He's worth looking up, Timothy
Dexter, is his name, right? What did I tell you all that,
right? The application here is Timothy,
Dexter wasn't particularly Savvy in what he invested in, but he
made money because he invested. Yeah, and Matthew 25 tells us
that God wants his people to invest what he's given them,
that's what they're Parables about.
But but God's idea of investing has different different from
your typical, you know, like Wall Street Wall Street
stockbroker or, you know, that kind of thing.
God isn't concerned about whether or not we make a killing
on the stock market. God isn't concerned about
whether we make a shrewd, business deals, and make
enormous amounts of money. And all that God simply wants us
to invest in the things that are important to him.
Yeah, he wants us to invest in the things that are important to
him. God statement to Israel was that
their attitude was to giving was a key indicator that they didn't
trust them. He said, change your attitude
with regards to how much you trust me and watch it.
Have a positive effect on this whole nation.
Okay, what about us? New Testament.
Tithing is not commanded in the New Testament.
It's not commanded in Matthew 23.
Jesus says, these are the Pharisees were very particular
about making sure. They tithe correctly and Jesus
said, you know, it was great that they were tithing and they
should be doing that, but it's a shame that they went.
So can so concerned about the other important things, like,
justice, and mercy and faith. Those kind of things.
So the New Testament pattern, is that it Moats voluntary giving
rather than compulsory tithing. But it seems to use that ten
percent of gross as a kind of a guideline minimum as it goes
through it. Hebrews 7 RI tells that story
about Abraham and Melchizedek and brings up that 10% several
times. Second Corinthians 9 verse
number 5, right? And so, a little bit of
background on this one, Titus had come in and Titus had told
the church family at Corinth, which is in Greece about Some
hard times that were affecting Christians in Unix, newly.
Planted churches in Macedonia. Is to look, these guys are going
through some tough times. And so the Corinthian Church had
promised that they would give some money to help with that
said yet we're will help them out.
The macedonians in the past had been very good at helping out
others when others were struggling and so that.
Yeah, they said, well how about that?
And Paul says, don't he says to the Corinthians he's writing to
me says, don't forget that you promised that right?
Because I'm going to turn up with some guys.
At some point, I'm going to turn up with a couple guys from
Macedonia to coming. Take the offering off you and
take it back to Macedonia and he says I've been bragging about
you all through Macedonia. And I've been saying a kaya
province is really the act on this.
They've been ready to go since last year, they're going to send
some some money to help and he says, I don't want to turn up
with some macedonians and say, hey we're here to pick up your
offering and you go and you know, you don't have it, you
know, he said, you know, that would leave kind of both us and
And you a little bit red-faced if there happened so he's
telling them that. Right?
So verse 5 Second Corinthians chapter 9 verse 5.
Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort or to encourage the
Brethren, to go to you ahead of time and prepare your generous
gift beforehand, which you had previously promised that it may
be really as a matter of generosity and not as a grudging
obligation because they turn these men, these pollutants up
these, macedonians they go hey we're here to get the offering
and Corinthian Church goes. Oh yeah that's right we must we
promised them some money for that I suppose we better give
them Look what he says verse number 6 is but this I say he
who sow sparingly will also reap sparingly and he who sows
bountifully will also reap bountifully, right?
You get what you get right? What comes around goes around.
So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, right?
No, set amount there, right? Let each one give as he purposes
in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity for God, loves a
cheerful. Cheerful Giver.
Right. This is about attitude.
It's not about the money, it's about the attitude.
So if you begin, if you give because you feel like you have
to don't bother Remember what Hosea said?
It's not the physical act of sacrificing that God wants, it's
the attitude behind it for the sake of time, we won't go and
look at it. But in the previous chapter and
verse 8 in chapter 8, Second Corinthians 8, Paul's telling
the Corinthians about met the macedonians and he said, you
know, these These are, these were fairly poor people
Macedonia. And he said they heard about a
need somewhere. They begged us to help.
They, you you wouldn't believe how much how much money they
gave to help with this issue, and these not wealthy people and
he said it was because they were With God and they understood
that Jesus was rich and he gave up everything for them and that
attitude just kind of affected the way they behaved.
And he says the Corinthians I'm telling you this to inspire you
right to inspire you guys. There's another time in First
Corinthians 16 did been a famine in Jerusalem and the churches
that are in galatia, which is sort of Northern turkey, and at
Corinth, down in Greece, were collecting money to send to
Jerusalem to help, and they collected the money every week,
and eventually they send it off, right?
To help write some other things that they to do with money in
tithing, the, in the New Testament.
First, Timothy 5:17 says this, let the elders who rule well, be
counted worthy of double honor. Especially those who labor in
the word and Doctrine for the scripture says you shall not
muzzle an ox, while it Treads out the grain, right?
So he says, look it's up foot to the church family to pay their
pastors. Whatever, you're paying them
that way. With double you don't starve an
animal while it's doing the work for you, that was an Old
Testament law, right? X 11:29.
This is where to feed the hungry.
James 1:27 wits, his way to help widows and orphans, right?
In other words, help those who for whatever reason are unable
to help themselves, okay? Summary?
Let me structure all that we can't go to all the business
because it because it's time constraints.
And I didn't want to spend another week on this, but but
here's how it goes right. God expects us to give.
Happily willingly generously. You'll see the stuff over and
over and also very important corporately as a church family,
I'll Testament law. Was 10 percent of gross income
compulsory giving to take care of worship and the things
associated associated with it as well as helping the poor and the
knee right then they gave other offerings on top of that right
now we are not under that law in the New Testament.
All all or giving us to be voluntary.
You know, this idea of churches sending bills to Well, that's
just garbage. It's all offering is to be
voluntary, but the pattern of giving 10 percent of gross plus
other offerings from time to time was followed by the, by the
early church, right? Money was collected weekly.
And then the church family decided how does how to spend
it? The choose found any is
responsible to fund its operation.
Pay pay its pastors plus give money to help the poor and the
needy, let's finish with this thought, right?
So, Imagine, if you you just inherit some money, right?
So you get a phone call from a lawyer, a letter from a lawyer
or whatever. And they say, hey, you just
inherited some money. It's a lot of money, this isn't
decent chunk of money. And so you think Mel, I need to
find myself a financial advisor, the figure out, you know, how to
invest this, right? And so you go down, there's one,
maybe a couple of doors down here on the street and you go in
there, fairly modest offices. But you talk to the people
there, they seem seem to know what they're talking about.
They seem very friendly and so you decide.
Yes. Can you It's my money for me.
So a year goes by you get a letter from them and it says,
I'm sorry, but your Investments didn't make any money this year
and you think they can't be right?
So you think, right? I'm going to go down and have a
talk to them about this, right? And when you go down there,
they're not there anymore, right?
They got new officers in this is amazing, kind of old mansion,
that's overlooking Hamilton Lake, you know?
And the guy comes out and he's in his Armani suit.
Shoot right. And he's got his Ferrari, is
parked out the front and it's very impressive set of sweets in
there, you know, we're the officers are all the equipment's
top-of-the-line and and the guy comes out to meet you.
What are you going to think? What are you going to think?
I know what I'd think. I'd be thinking this guy's been
using my money to make himself Rich at my expense.
And more than likely, he's not going to be my financial advisor
anymore. Alright, I'm going to take that
money away from him and I'm going to give it to somebody
that I can trust. Yeah, see the picture there.
Yeah. What's in your hand?
God gives us resources to
invest, right? How are we investing them?
How am I using my income? How am I using my identity?
How am I using my influence to impact?
The world around me? The way that Jesus did.
We want our lives to count, right?
We want to make a difference. That's our challenge.
That is our challenge. Let's pray, father, we thank you
for what you gave up and giving up your only son.
Lord is awesome in community just to focus on that this
morning. There was a huge sacrifice there
and Jesus, who was rich became poor on our behalf.
Lord. Um this is a challenging message
Lord, then. But Lord, we just pray that we
would be people who want to invest in the things that are
important to you that. And that's the lives of people
and the different ways that we can do that.
Lord, we just, yeah, burden us for the things that that burden
you. The things that that you want
changed. Put those on our hearts.
Lord, as a church family Lord, we want to do what you Let's to
do. We thank you for the huge
generosity that we see in the in the in the things that we're
able to do every week and the Ministries that are happening
that are changing lives changing, eternities, bringing
people closer to you is incredible to watch that.
Lord, thank you for the opportunity to be a part of it.
Lord, thank you for your word and the truths are in it.
Lord, we just want to people people who draw close to you and
thank you for a chance to win. Worship you today is.
Thank you. In Jesus name.