Finish Line or Starting Line?

So, if this is your first time with us, this might feel a little new to you, but it’s something that we’ve come to see is vital to the life of our church. We set aside a portion of every Sunday morning worship service just for prayer. We believe that if we do things in our strength, then at best we can get what people can create. And you look in the world and you see the goodness of what people can create. But if we pray to the Lord, then we get what God can do. And we want what God can do, not what people can do. So, we set aside a portion of our service every Sunday morning to do that.

So, what I’m going to invite you to do is to pray out loud with a neighbor if you haven’t already. Then you grab a neighbor if you’d be able to pray with. This whole month, we’ve been praying for the same thing: that God will provide a new music choir director for us. Carter did a great job this morning, but he is not our week-to-week leader. So, we are praying that God would make it abundantly apparent and clear who His set-aside leader for that is for us. So, you grab your neighbor and we’ll pray specifically for that need, and I’ll put a bow on it here in a second.

Thank You, Holy Spirit. Thank You so much. As we just flip through the pages of Scripture, we see time and time again that we have a holy and infinitely glorious God who loves to meet with His people, who has the resources of the universe at His disposal and loves to pour them on His people for their good and for His glory. God, if we look at the book of Acts, we would see time and time again how You provided leaders for churches. You provided funds for churches. You took care of needs. You gave miraculous healings and deliverances. We fully trust that You will provide a worship leader for us, God. To us, that feels like a very big thing. To You, God, it’s a pretty small provision, but we know that You delight in providing for Your kids. So, we ask You to do that. We ask that You would provide the next person that’s going to lead the music for our church.

Lord, I thank You for the volunteers that every week are handling this for us. And I’m going to thank You in advance for that leader. I don’t know who it is. Only You do. But I do know that You are trustworthy. We’re calling on You, God. I’m calling on You right now, not just for a worship leader, but also just for this sermon. God, I’ve been faithful to prepare this as best I can, and I really need You to show up. God, I have set out the wood for the fire, and I need You to rain Your fire down and do something with this so that we would all walk out of here saying Yahweh is God. Jesus is God. Not money, not stuff, not another person, not circumstances, not the markets, not even our sin and the darkness that we have and we harbor. But You are God. And before You, every knee one day will bow. So until that time, Jesus, when You come back, we get to say, “What a friend we have in Jesus.” And in Christ alone, our hope is found. Right now, let us be like deer that pant for water, and we thirst for Your Word. Please, God, we love You. Thank You for loving us. It’s in Your great name that we pray. Amen.

Amen.

I want to introduce you to some friends of mine and Becca’s. For the sake of protecting anonymity and protecting various folks, I’m going to change some of their names. We’re going to call my friend Jessica. Jessica and her husband Mike. I’m going to try to keep all these fake names straight and not slip with the real names. Jessica and Mike are mine and Becca’s age. Becca and Jessica are best friends from high school. They got to meet each other in the lunch line whenever Jessica had just moved to town. All that. Okay. That’s not… No, doesn’t matter. Our friend Jessica, she serves in a ministry at her church where they get to love on moms who come by children, not necessarily planning it. And they get to love on these moms. They get to just provide a safe place for them to have Bible study and to just meet each other. They throw these moms baby showers. Remember these kids are born. They provide some support. It’s kind of like this really cool ministry. Our friend Jessica and her husband. There was a particular mom that they felt particularly burdened for. You see, this lady, she was coming out of an abusive situation. And our friend Jessica, she knew if we don’t step in and do something, then our friend and her child are going to continue to suffer. So what they did, they said, “Hey, what would it look like for us to put a home on our property where Jessica or where this other mom—I’m going to drop that—where the other mom and her baby not just hide out for a little bit. Maybe they could just live here with us.”

You see, when they were processing through all this, our friend was talking with her little boy, and the boy said, “Hey, do you know who God is? Like, do you really believe this stuff we read about in the Bible? Do you really believe what we’re learning about at church?” And our friend said, “Yeah, of course. This is like the most true thing in the world. How could I not trust that God is who the Bible says He is? I’ve seen Him time and time again.”

The next day, our friend and her husband were looking at that tiny house, all $85,000 of it just for the house, and they realized they were going to have to just buy it outright. They couldn’t finance it. And my friend was confronted with her son’s question. Do I believe who God is? Do I trust Him? If I’m going to step forward in faith, do I believe that God is going to meet me there and take care of the needs? Well, as you could see, our friend, they trusted the Lord. That mom got to take up residence in that tiny house. And because of that, that precious child that our friend is holding in that picture gets to have a childhood of safety instead of one of abuse.

Man, isn’t that incredible? I look at their life and I look at how incredibly generous they are and I ask myself, what in the world would inspire them to do that? What could inspire such a life? What could inspire such lavish generosity? And it’s this. It’s the joy of Christ in them. The joy of Christ in them overflowed into generosity. They knew that the point of their lives is to not be a beautiful retention pond in the backyard with the water feature. The point of their lives is to be a stream so that living water would flow from the source through them into the lives of other people, creating life and creating an oasis wherever they are. That is how our friends view life. And that same joy, that same reality, and the same fruit of your generosity can also happen in your life, too.

Today, we’re going to study how you can practice that type of generosity out of 2 Corinthians chapter 8. If you’ve got a copy of the Bible, you go ahead and open up now 2 Corinthians chapter 8. If you’re still learning the road map of the Bible, you just cut it right in half. You’re probably in the Psalms. I want you to take a right on past all the funny sounding names like Obadiah and Malachi. And you’re going to end up in the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. You go to Acts, the book of Romans, 1 Corinthians, and then 2 Corinthians. 2 Corinthians chapter 8. If you’re really learning how the Bible works, eight is going to be the big number on the page. And we’re going to start at the little one right beside it. 2 Corinthians chapter 8.

We are in a series on generosity. We don’t do this all the time, but fully believe that for us to be fully formed, healthy disciples of Jesus, then everything in our lives has got to be submitted to Jesus. God is an all-or-nothing type of God. He’s not cool with getting 50% of your life and the other 50% you get to keep. It’s not like God only wants Sundays and occasionally Wednesdays, but you get the rest of the days. God’s like, “Hey, give me the whole week or you don’t get to any of me at all.” So, we’re talking about things that are a little offensive and uncomfortable because one, God deserves it, but two, you desperately need this. The world’s already telling you how to spend your money. From the ads you slot you scroll past on your phone to the commercials on TV to what you listen to on the radio. If any of us still listen to the radio in the car, the world’s already going to tell you how to spend your money. Man, I think that church ought to we ought to be first in line to wade into these things.

So, we’ve been going through this over the past couple weeks. Week one, we just looked at how if God is who He says He is, then we ought to love Him totally and we ought to love other people sacrificially. Last week, we looked at some of the realities of generosity when we use our money to pursue God’s purposes, what happens in our life. This morning, we’re actually I’m finally going to give you some practical advice and biblical guidelines on how to use your money. So, what we’re going to do this morning, we’re going to walk through this passage out of 2 Corinthians chapter 8 and look at what God has for us specifically in the area of tithing, being lavish in our generosity. Hopefully, you get something out of this like I’ve gotten out of it this this past week.

You see, here’s what I believe. It’s that you want to be generous. I don’t think there’s a person in the room that wants to be stingy. I don’t think anybody in the room wants to hoard everything for themselves. But we want to be generous. However, we also assume that some circumstances need to change in order for us to be generous. We might need more money, just a higher salary. Or maybe you think that you need more stability once your life is a little more normal. Then you could be generous. Or maybe you just need more margin. You feel like, man, I’m just it’s too much too much month at the end of the check and if I had more margin, then I could start giving money to the church. But what we’re going to look at this morning is that that is not true. In God’s wisdom, generosity begins with less, not with more.

Let’s look at this this incredible example of grace giving. And I’ll define that in a minute. This is 2 Corinthians chapter 8 verses 1-5. An example of grace giving. Paul’s speaking here to this church in Corinth. We want you to know, brothers and sisters, about the grace of God that was given to the churches of Macedonia. During a severe trial brought about by affliction, their abundant joy and their extreme poverty overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. I can testify that according to their ability and even beyond their ability, of their own accord, they begged us earnestly for the privilege of sharing in the ministry to the saints. And not just as we had hoped, instead they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us by God’s will.

Man, just like my friends at the beginning of the message and this passage right there, an incredible example of grace giving. Paul starts with this phrase, the grace of God. Here’s a biblical word that you need to know. Say it with me. Caris.

Caris. Caris is this word in the New Testament Greek, the original language that none of us, I don’t think, unless you’re a scholar in the room, are reading out of. Caris means God’s favor to you regardless of what you do with it. God has caris for you. Five times in the passage I’m preaching this morning, Paul is going to reference caris. Only once though in verse 9 is he using caris for God’s gift to us. The four other times this morning we’re going to look at it. It’s the Macedonians response to God’s grace.

Let me put it this way. The churches of Macedonia that we just read this example about responded to God’s caris with their own caris despite their severe trial. They did not just receive God’s caris. They flowed with God’s caris. God’s caris flowed through them. And that was despite or maybe because of their severe trial. Paul says the Macedonians faced a severe trial in their world. In the ancient Greek world when the church was first being established to follow Jesus meant stepping away from financial opportunities. It meant losing standing. And obviously, as some of us know, to follow Jesus meant to accept or embrace at least the possibility of persecution. Man, people lost their life for this. People lost their jobs. They lost their families. They lost their social networks. And in this particular situation, the churches of Macedonia, verse one, they experienced deep severe pain for following Christ. Yet their poverty and that pain was key to God’s formula of generosity in them. You see, for us, we wrongly think that generosity is ease plus wealth plus the right time. Man, if my life is a little easier, if I’m a little wealthier, and if the opportunity is right, then I’ll be generous. That’s how some of us approach our new year end of year giving. That’s how some of us approach how we give gifts to our family and our friends. We assume if I make a little bit more money, if my life is a little easier, then that’s the right time for me to be generous.

But here, what the Macedonians show is that God’s math does not work like ours. God’s formula for generosity. Instead of that, it is joy in Christ plus affliction plus poverty. In God’s math, you do not need an easy life. You need joy in Christ. In God’s math, you do not need wealth. You need poverty. In God’s math, you do not need the right time. You actually need affliction. To be generous, you’ve got to be weak. To be generous, you’ve got to be under pain. To be generous, you’ve got to be under duress in some way.

And it’s a real like brighten the the mood sort of a message. Here’s what I know. The light of a generous life shines the brightest in the dark room of adversity. Man, it’s easy to be happy. It is easy to be carefree. When life is easy, it’s when life is hard and you make an intentional step towards sacrifice, man, that’s when it shines.

Our friends that put that tiny house on their property for that single mom and her kid, this is not an easy time for them to be generous. My buddy, he just started his own business. He stepped away from a really good career under some terrible leadership and management. They are strapped for cash. 85,000 is what they had, guys. It’s what they had. They weren’t drawing off of tons of excess and reserves. They spent all they had in this midst of a situation. He doesn’t know his company’s going to work, but they knew this was what they needed to do. And God through them has man blessed that mom and her child.

See apparently generosity like I said requires weakness not strength. It requires joy not generational wealth. Generosity requires pain not ease. My question do you feel weak today? Did you come in this morning feeling weak? Maybe just like ragged with the world. You are just so tired of difficult parenting situations or a hard job situation financially. You feel like the world is kind of laying on you. Do you feel weak this morning? Are you in pain today? If that’s you, do you if you feel poor today? If you’re wondering how in the world am I going to feed these kids? How am I going to set the Thanksgiving table? How am I going to do presents for my family? If that’s where you are, then I’ve got news. You are in the perfect position for God’s generosity to flow through you.

However, if you have come in this morning feeling strong, feeling ease, I’m not so confident God’s going to use you to be generous. It takes difficulty, not ease. You see, when these elements combined for the Macedonians, they gave beyond their ability, literally above their strength. This is how we know God worked through those churches in Macedonia because they did what they can’t do.

You see, God’s work in you is like adrenaline. You know the hormone that’s like this performance hormone like whenever you’re in a crisis moment, maybe you’re afraid of something or if you’ve played a sport, you’ve got to make the best play to save the season. Or if you’re at work and you’re delivering like a a presentation like I keep finding myself doing every Sunday morning at 11 o’clock and you have this hormone adrenaline that courses through your body and it heightens your senses and it it allows you to do what you cannot normally do. That’s what God’s power does in you. God’s power is like adrenaline. It does in and through you what you cannot do.

You see, listen here. doing in and through you what you cannot do is God’s plan for you. Do you remember what Jesus promised in John chapter 14 before he left? He said, “Truly I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and he will do even greater works than these because I’m going to the father.” Or maybe this promise out of The book of Ephesians we studied earlier this year in chapter 3, verses 20 and 21: “Now to Him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ever ask or think according to the power that works in us. To Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.” God’s prerogative is to do in you what you cannot do by yourself. The Macedonians were a prime example. Our friends back in Lexington, prime example. When God gets a hold of your life, He starts doing things you cannot take credit for. Like using you to bless a single mom and her kid who need to get out of a domestic abuse situation. Man, sending a bunch of shoe boxes to like 450 homes where they’re going to hear about the love of Christ expressed in that gift. When God gets a hold of your life, I mean, just watch what He does as He channels His love and His grace through you.

Here’s the main thing I actually want you to take away from the message this morning. It’s that joy in Christ empowers grace giving. We’ve talked a little bit about power. It’s like this God’s power. It’s like adrenaline through you. And joy in Christ is what puts this power in you. But I’m also using this new term, grace giving. Joy in Christ empowers grace giving. I want to explain that for a moment. Grace giving.

You see, in the Old Testament, God’s people gave a tithe. Literally, that’s one tenth. So for the people of Israel, every time they would receive something, whether it be money or a flock of animals or maybe even a bushel of wheat or something like that, they would take 10% right off the top and they would donate it. This was not optional. It was part of the covenant economy for how Israel worked. The tithe sustained the temple. The tithe took care of the poor. The tithe was a command by God.

This is what Leviticus chapter 27, verses 30 through 32 says: “Every tenth of the land’s produce, grain from the soil or fruit from the trees, it all belongs to the Lord. It is holy to the Lord. If a man decides to redeem any part of this tenth, he must add a fifth to its value. Every tenth animal from the herd or flock which passes under the Lord’s rod will be holy to the Lord.” God was serious about this. Everything you got, one tenth of it went straight back to God to care for the temple and to care for God’s people.

Now, naturally, the people of Israel would have some questions. “God, we are living hand to mouth. God, how are we going to take care of this? How will you provide for us?” Well, God tells us in Malachi chapter 3, He says this: “Since the days of your ancestors, you have turned from my statutes. You have not kept them. No. Return to me and I will return to you, says the Lord of armies. Yet you ask, how can we return? Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. How do we rob you? You ask. By not making the payments of the tenth and the contributions. You’re suffering under a curse. Yet you, the whole nation, all of Israel are still robbing me. Bring the full tenth into the storehouse so there may be food in my house. Test me in this way.” I’m going to say that again. Test me. Test God. Put God to the test. “See if I will not open the floodgates of heaven and pour out a blessing for you without measure.” God was serious about this. Every time you received something, 10% goes straight back to Him.

That’s the Old Testament. Jesus comes on the scene. And does He abolish the law? I’ve got some good Bible scholars in here. You know the answer. Does Jesus abolish the law? No. Jesus fulfills it and He takes the standard and He raises it. Like in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, “You’ve heard it said, anybody who commits adultery will be punished.” Jesus said, “No, it’s not just committing adultery. It’s looking at a woman with lust in your eyes.” Jesus said, “You’ve heard it said, anybody who murders will receive a punishment.” Jesus said, “No, it’s not just murder. It’s whenever you think poorly of somebody and you got anger against them.” Jesus does not take the standard of the law and lower it, making it easier to cross over. No, Jesus raises the law, which makes it impossible for us to fulfill. That’s why Jesus had to come to fulfill the law for us. But when He came, Jesus in His grace did not abolish our effort. He just abolished our need to earn God’s grace. You see, when Jesus came, the tithe, it became a starting line, not a finish line. For the Old Testament people, the tithe functioned as a finish line. God said, “Give me a tenth. If you’re feeling extra frisky, give me a free will offering as well.” For us who follow Jesus now, the tithe is where we ought to start, not where we finish.

You see, look in the book of Acts later this week. If you don’t trust me, whenever the Holy Spirit comes on the scene and people are infused with the very power and life of God in their souls, what they start doing is selling everything, bringing all the proceeds to the elders and saying, “We trust you. Just use this to meet some needs in our church and our community.” In fact, one time in Acts chapter 5, there were some people that came and they only brought 50% of what God had given them through selling their property, but they lied and said it was all they could do. And you know what God does to them? Strikes them dead. They gave 50% of their income. God killed them because they were withholding from Him.

Jesus does not abolish the standards. He does not lower the standards. He raises the standards. New Testament Christians, for us, the tithe is a starting line, not a finish line. And I got to be real, most of us don’t actually tithe. I referenced some statistics in week one of this message. Man, this is like the most awkward this room has ever been. Let’s put the stats. We just put them all the way up. This is American giving studied. It’s a couple thousand people over five years, which means this is statistically consistent with Charleston and perhaps even with Sauldam Baptist. 44.8% of Americans give away less than $1 a year. Another 41.3% give away less than 2% of their income. 9% give away between 2 to 5% of their income. 3.1% give away 5 to 10% of their income. And 2.7% of Americans give away 10% or more.

Let’s say those numbers mostly hold true for us. And let’s combine those bottom two categories. Let’s say 4% of us give away 3.1 plus 2.7. You’re right, babe. That’s fine. Thank you. I appreciate that. I shouldn’t do math on the fly. Thanks. 5% of us tithe. I don’t know how much you give. I love the fact that I’ve got no clue how much you give. I don’t ever want to know. Statistically speaking, 5% of us are doing the bare minimum. And I don’t know if that’s you. I don’t know how much you give.

My invitation to you this morning is to view a 10% tithe as a starting line. Because here’s what I know. When Becca and I were at a church and we were challenged to actually tithe, man, that was one of the most demanding transitions of our life, yet continues to be one of the most fruitful practices we could ever do because it forces us to put our money where our mouth is.

I want to invite you to do something. Don’t, you’re not, you’re not passing this in. You’re keeping this to yourself. If you’re married, you’re keeping this with your spouse. If you got a piece of paper and a pen, you can get it out real quick. You’re being a little too awkward. Get out a piece of paper and a pen. Most of y’all got a bulletin on your way in. Maybe this is a subtle reminder. Grab a bulletin on your way in. It’s got tons of great information for you.

I want you to write down your annual income. If it’s a fixed income, you write that down. If you work like in the service industry and it fluctuates because of tips and stuff, you write down the average. If you’ve got just a normal salary, you write that down. Best of your ability. Again, you’re not, you’re not passing this in. This is not a test. I don’t actually care. You write down your annual income pre-tax and then write down 10% of whatever that is. What’s 10% of your income? Now look at that number and ask yourself, do I give this much to SAM or to other Christian agencies that are spreading the gospel? This is between you and the Lord and your spouse if you’re married. I don’t want that piece of paper. I trust there are a few people in this room that see a gap between how much they give and what 10% of their income is. If you want to close that gap, then Wednesday night six o’clock with Scott Lester, come to the formational meeting for Financial Peace and learn some principles that will help you snowball some healthy habits so that you can come up to the starting line. You write that down. Wednesday 6 PM, just learn about Financial Peace University. If you want to sign up for Financial Peace, you should have a slip in your bulletin that has a little Financial Peace graphic on it. Put your name and your email, and I’ll get more information to you this week, and you put that in the offering plate on your way out today.

I know it’s a little heavy, but like I said at the very beginning, if we don’t talk about money here, man, I’m not doing my job as a pastor. I’ve got to fly through the second half of this. We return to the passage. You see Paul, he’s noting the Macedonians’ example of how God empowered them to give by grace. And he’s starting to call the Corinthians to the same example. Look at verses 6-10 with me. This is Paul again.

So we urged Titus that just as he had begun, so he should also complete among you this act of grace. Caris, now as you excel in everything, in faith, speech, knowledge, and all diligence, and your love for us, excel also in this act of grace. I’m not saying this as a command, rather by means of the diligence of others. I am testing the genuineness of your love. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus. Though He was rich, for your sake He became poor so that by His poverty you might become rich. And in this matter I am giving advice because it is profitable to you who began last year not only to do something but also to want to do it.

Paul is calling the Corinthians to joy in action. The Macedonians were an incredible example of grace giving. He’s calling the Corinthians, hey, put your joy in action. Complete what you began. Let’s make this thing happen. Paul’s charge to the Corinthians, and I think to Saul this morning, is let’s do it. Let’s put God to the test. Let’s give God a full 10%. Let’s excel in this act of grace.

The church at Corinth was excelling in so much, man. They excelled in faith. They would follow God and do for God incredible things. They excelled in speech. They had dynamite Bible teachers that could just preach the paint off the walls. They excelled in knowledge. They understood the gospel and how to refute error. Yet despite all of that excellence, Paul is calling on them to excel in this act of grace, too. Paul this morning, God through His word is calling us. Let’s excel in generosity. Let’s excel in being extravagant to the Lord and toward other people. But remember, it’s your joy in Christ that will empower your grace giving.

Paul knew that the Corinthians would need to be reminded of the ultimate act of grace. So he takes them there in verse 9. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Though He was rich, for your sake He became poor so that by His poverty you might become rich.

You know Jesus, His life did not begin around AD 0. Jesus, His existence, His life predates all known human history where He has forever ruled as the rightful heir of a universal throne and kingdom from the Father. Jesus is rich beyond measure. Jesus could create galaxies like that. Jesus could create the wealth that we just pine after and we yearn after like that. For Jesus, it is nothing to create an entire group of people and to call them by His own name. For Jesus, He was rich not just in material stuff. He is rich in righteousness and holiness. Never once ever making any error, never once sinning, never once falling out of perfection.

Yet for your sake, Jesus traded His throne in heaven. And He traded His spotless perfection for our poverty on the cross. When Jesus took on us the wages, the earnings of our sin. You see, all of us have fallen short of the glory of God. Every single one of us has sinned. We have all earned debt against a perfect and holy God. And God did not look down from heaven at us and say, “I hope they get themselves out of that mess because they got themselves into it.” No. Jesus said, “I will cross the gap. I will cross the chasm. I will give them my all so that they can give themselves back to me.” Jesus on the cross took our poverty and our sin so that we could receive His perfection and His righteousness, and we get His incredible benefits. May you go back online to our website and look at how Al Carter and I preached through those spiritual riches and blessings that we have in Christ in Ephesians chapter 1. These incredible riches of God’s kindness toward us. That’s what God has for you. He does not want you to give out of drudgery or even diligence. He wants you to give out of joy. And true joy does not spring from a self-help manual. True joy does not spring from a social media post. True joy does not spring from a picture-perfect family that you’re going to send Christmas cards about to your other people. True joy only is found in Jesus. And when you have Jesus, your life, like I said earlier, becomes a stream of joy where the living water that Jesus promised flows through you into the lives of others.

The question is, do you want to be a stream of living water? Do you want that? Yes. Yes, we do. We want to be streams of living water. And for us to do that, then God gets everything, including our wallets. You see, the world measures profit by what you can make in this life, which means the return on your investments is king. However, when you give because of God’s gift to you, that is true profit. If you want to live a profitable life, then stop living for your next pay raise. Stop living for the next bank statement. Stop living for a bigger house or an upgraded vehicle. If you want to live a profitable life, then start living for eternity by how you use your treasure.

Now, man, I think about Brian who installed a security system for a single mom in our community who needed to be protected in a bad situation. I think about another family that sold a home and wrote Saul the entire check of what they made because they knew that Saul needed it more than they did. I think about Michael and Claudia Cordre donating food to the church for us to enjoy on Wednesdays and for us to give to people in the community. And I think about those 435 Operation Christmas Child boxes. That is profit. That is worth living for. A bigger house, a nicer car is not worth living for. You know what happens to your treasure when you die? Eventually, it ends up in a landfill. Yeah, Rick, some of it’s going to go to the kids, but man, the kids are just going to decide what gets thrown away and what gets kept, and then their kids are going to have the same conversation.

Do you want to live for something that lasts? You spend your time and your money investing into God’s work. Now, >> earthly treasure is going to lose value soon. And we know how the story ends. We know that one day Jesus Christ is going to come back and set everything right, and our opportunity to tell people about Jesus is over. Is that what you live for? If it is, then how you use your money will reflect that.

To help convince the Corinthians, Paul gives them the logic of giving, and he basically just says it’s about personal eagerness, not relative wealth. Look at verses 11 through 15 with me as I start to close. “Now also finish the task so that just as there was an eager desire, there may be also a completion according to what you have. For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have.” You see, what God loves ultimately is a cheerful giver, one who gives with some eagerness. When God looks at how much you give to Saul or to other Christian organizations, what God is looking at is ultimately your eagerness. He’s not looking at somebody else’s financial capability and measuring you by it. He’s not looking at the wealthy people that you live around and saying, “Well, so and so doesn’t make as much as they do. Are they really giving like they should be?” No. God looks at you in the state of your heart, and God’s asking you, “Are you eager in your giving? Are you joyful in your giving? Or is giving a matter, sorry, a matter of drudgery for you?”

Man, if the tithe is a starting line, not a finish line, I’m curious, how do you feel when you hear Me say that? Ultimately, my real question is, is your relationship with Jesus prompting deeper generosity in your life? It did for the Macedonian church. And Paul is calling the Corinthians to practice that. And this morning, God is calling us to consider that as well. If you have joy in Christ, let it be shown by how you give.

I want to invite everybody to what I just call open hands prayer. You know, if you put your hands on your lap, palm facing up, it’s both the posture of giving God your best, your gifts, and it’s also the posture of how you receive a gift. And I want to invite you just to pray. God, I give you me. Help me to receive your assignment as well. God, I give myself to you. God, I give my finances to you. You pray that for by yourself. You ask Him, God, how much am I supposed to give back to you? For some of us that might create some fear and you say, “God, I give you my fear. Help me to have your power.”

Or maybe you don’t have that that much money. Maybe you’re on a fixed income. Maybe you don’t even have a job right now. But you’ve got some time and you’ve got some stuff. Would you also say, “God, I give you my time and my things. Tell me what to do with them.”

Holy Spirit, I I trust you’re speaking. And I pray for the person in the room right now that doesn’t know you as Lord and Savior. And I’m asking that you would call them to yourself. I’m asking that you would draw them home. Maybe money is their God. Would you please help them see that? You please help them to see how only you satisfy. Would you help all of us to be more generous to you? God, would you help all of us to approach the tithe as a starting point for our giving, not the finish line? Thank you Lord. Amen.