Truly This Was the Son of God

How do people react to Jesus?

As we saw in last Sunday’s sermon, in Matthew’s account of the crucifixion, once Pilate condemns Jesus to death, all the people who speak mock Him:

  • The soldiers bow before Him, saying in mockery, “Hail, King of the Jews!” They spit on Him and beat Him.
  • Those passing by deride Him, calling on Him to save Himself, to come down from the cross if He is the Son of God.
  • The religious leaders also mock Him, saying He cannot save Himself, and claiming they will believe in Him if He comes down from the cross. They also say, “He trusts in God; let God deliver Him now, if He desires Him. For He said, ‘I am the Son of God.’”

Where are those who followed Him? Where are those who acclaimed His entry into Jerusalem just a few days previously? Will no one speak for Him? Will no one see Him for Who He is?

Yes. Someone will. Yet, as is so often the case in Matthew and, indeed, throughout Scripture, those who speak are not the ones we would expect.

About noon, unexpected darkness covers the land. The mocking evidently stops – none of the Gospel accounts record any further mocking after the darkness falls.

Jesus yields up His spirit.

Suddenly there is an earthquake. Rocks split and tombs open.

And then someone speaks up. Someone speaks for Jesus. Someone sees Him – at least partially – for Who He is.

The centurion and the others soldiers say: “Truly this was the Son of God!”

The very ones who had nailed Jesus to the cross, the very ones responsible for ensuring His death – perhaps the very ones who had spit upon Him and beat Him a few hours before – now see what the religious leaders cannot see. They see what those who had read the witness to Him in the Hebrew Scriptures cannot see: He is the Son of God.

Those passing by had said, “If you are the Son of God,” laughing at the idea. The religious leaders had mocked Jesus’ claim to be the Son of God. But these Roman soldiers proclaim: Truly. Truly. Jesus is the Son of God.

Surely none of these soldiers would have been able to explain the doctrine of the Trinity. It seems likely when they made this confession they were still polytheists, believing in many gods. But here at the cross, seeing what has happened, they say with certainty: “What this man said about Himself must be true.”

This statement by the soldiers, in my opinion, is a major highlight in Matthew’s account of the crucifixion. All builds to this point. After all the mocking, all the suffering, all the tragedy, these Gentiles proclaim Jesus to be the Son of God. And they are the firstfruits of those from every tribe and tongue and people and nation that will worship Him forever and ever.

Johann Sebastian Bach also saw this confession as the highlight of Matthew’s account. In what may be his greatest work, St Matthew’s Passion, Bach has the entire passion account of Matthew sung by soloists and chorus, interspersed with responses to the record of Scripture. The entire Passion takes around three hours to perform, but I urge you to listen to the seven minutes that include verses 45 to 54 of Matthew 27. In this 1971 recording – which includes subtitles since the singing is in German – this section runs from 2:46:30 to 2:53:36. The only addition to the words of Scripture is one verse of a chorale sung to the tune we use for “O Sacred Head Now Wounded.” See how Bach builds up to the confession of the centurion and then renders those words in painfully beautiful but understated music.

Ponder this confession prior to this Sunday morning. Then join us as we look in more detail at the words of the centurion. May we all together proclaim: Truly Jesus is the Son of God.

“His Blood Be On Us and On Our Children”

Last Sunday’s sermon text includes these verses:

So when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.”  And all the people answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!” (Matthew 27:24-25)

In the sermon we focused on Pilate’s guilt, despite his proclaimed innocence. But we also saw that Pilate could be forgiven, the same way that you and I can be forgiven: By grace through faith in the death and resurrection of the man He crucified. Furthermore, we saw that, beginning in the 2nd century, some church traditions say that Pilate did indeed come to faith.

However, there’s an ugly side to that tradition. In the church’s early decades, the great majority of believers were Jewish in ethnicity. By the late 2nd century, that was no longer the case. Rather, there was considerable animosity between Jews and Christians. Many Christians then began to use Matthew 27:25 as justification for hatred of Jews. You see, they would argue, the Jewish people as a whole are willingly accepting blame for the death of Jesus. And that blame continues through all future generations, since they accept it on behalf of their children.

This horrible distortion of the text has continued over the centuries, leading to persecution and hatred of Jews time and again.

Why is this interpretation a distortion? Because it is inconsistent both with the story surrounding this text, and with wider biblical teaching.

First look at the surrounding context. Jesus entered Jerusalem a few days earlier to the acclaim of the Jewish crowd (Matthew 21:7-11). The crowd in chapter 21 holds him to be a prophet (Matthew 21: 46). The crowd in the next chapter is astonished at His teaching (Matthew 22:33).

The crowd in front of Pilate in Matthew 27 has to be persuaded by the chief priests and elders to turn on Jesus (Matthew 27:20). We don’t know how these leaders persuaded them, but given the accusations against Him in His trial before the High Priest, it seems the religious leaders were able to convince the crowd that Jesus had committed blasphemy. That would explain why so many in the crowd now think He deserves death.

But many Jews have been following Jesus, and, of course, all the disciples are Jews. They don’t believe He should be crucified!

So (a) this crowd is not representative even of those in Jerusalem at this time, much less of all Jews everywhere; and (b) the crowd, stirred to a frenzy through the manipulations of the religious leaders, calls out for blood without understanding what they are doing (as Jesus Himself says in Luke 23:34).

Thus, at most the crowd takes the guilt of Jesus’ death on their own descendants and not all Jews. But given their lack of understanding, we should question even this.

When we look at wider biblical teaching, we see that even this limited understanding of the guilt of the crowd’s descendants is wrong. First, a few weeks later at Pentecost many who were in this crowd – and even some religious leaders – come to faith in Christ and are forgiven for all of their sins, including this one (Acts 2:36-41, Acts 6:7). Second, Scripture is clear that while sin does often have a multi-generational impact, children are not condemned by God for the sins of their parents other than Adam (Ezekiel 18, Jeremiah 31:29-30; for Adam, see Romans 5:12-21).

So, no: This text does not teach anti-Semitism. Nobody is saved because of their ethnicity. And no one is condemned because of their ethnicity. All have sinned, Jew and non-Jew. All deserve God’s just condemnation.

Who, then, is responsible for Jesus’ death? Who crucified Jesus?

Many individuals were responsible. Judas. Caiaphas. Annas. Pilate. Others.

But in a larger sense, I crucified Him. You crucified Him – if you trust Him as Savior and Lord. For He paid  my penalty. And, if you are in Christ, He paid your penalty.

As Johan Heerman wrote 400 years ago:

Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon Thee?
Alas, my treason, Jesus, hath undone Thee.
’Twas I, Lord Jesus, I it was denied Thee!
I crucified Thee.

And yet He died so that those in the crowd before Pilate, so that their descendants, so that you and I, murderers that we all are, might live in union with Him as beloved children of God for all eternity.

So away with all anti-Semitism. Away with all semblances of ethnic superiority and hatred. Before God we all are equal – equally guilty. And before God, by His grace through the death of His Son, we all can be equally loved.

 

Love, Suffering, Obedience – and Resurrection

What is love?

There are a thousand answers to that question, since we use the word “love” in so many different ways. So let’s narrow the question down:

What is God’s love? And what does it look like when we love with God’s love?

In a recent book – A Loving Life: In a World of Broken Relationships – Paul Miller argues that this type of love is a one-way covenant; we step out in love without needing or even expecting a response. This makes us vulnerable, and often leads to suffering. We rightly cry out in lament over such suffering. But faith holds on to God’s covenant love in the midst of suffering, so that we continue to walk in obedience – we continue to love. In this we are following the path of Jesus’ life – love, suffering, death. But Jesus rose from the dead. And as God raised Jesus, He similarly will bring about a form of resurrection in us.

Miller masterfully brings out these truths from the book of Ruth, following Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz through their journeys of love, suffering, lament, obedience, and resurrection. Consider these selections – and may we follow the path of love.

Love and Covenant

[We learn through the storyline of Scripture that God’s love is a one-sided covenant, His determination to do good to His people, to redeem them, to make them His, despite their rebellion and disobedience. Thus, God’s love is also covenantal. Our love, if it is to be like God’s, must also be covenantal. The Hebrew word most often used of God’s love for His people is hesed. Paul Miller sometimes uses this word as an adjective to clarify that he is referring to that type of love.]

[There is a] modern myth that says, “Love is a feeling. If the feeling is gone, then love is gone.” Hollywood has no resources to endure in love when the feeling is gone. Actually, that’s the point when we are ready to learn how to love. 285

Ruth walks into the city ignored and, in effect, alone. One of the hardest parts of a hesed love is that you can love others, but there may be no one to love you. The very act of loving can make you lonely. . . .

But that loneliness, that dying, instead of being the end of you, can display Jesus’s beauty in you. The moment when you think everything has gone wrong is exactly the moment when the beauty of God is shining through you. True glory is almost always hidden—when you are enduring quietly with no cheering crowd. 809

The question is not “How do I feel about this relationship?” but “Have I been faithful to my word, to the covenants I am in?” As Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, “If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” (Matt. 5:46). In other words, if I love only when I feel like it, then I’ve really not understood love. 923

[After Ruth goes to Boaz’s field:] If you are bent on pursuing personal freedom, you remain frozen hunting for the perfect field, the perfect person. You never land. You have to commit to make love work. We don’t love in general. We love someone, somewhere. Setting our affections on someone always means narrowing down. Election and love are inseparable. This goes against the spirit of our age, which prizes independence and perfection. . . . Often our difficulties with love are simply that we react to the constriction that accompanies love. But that constriction is inherent in love. To love is to limit. . . .

Ironically, the experience of love, of narrowing your life, broadens and deepens your life. The narrower your life, the broader your soul. . . . Love always involves a narrowing of the life, a selecting of imperfection. 1072

Life is a path or pilgrimage. It is lived not in isolated moments, but in trajectories of reaping and sowing. Everything we do now creates the person we are becoming. We do not live in an impersonal, rigid world in which obedience mechanically dispenses reward; we live in our Father’s world, a richly textured world organized around invisible bonds that knit us together. All of life is covenant. 1319

[Consider covenant as a kind of limitation:] Repentance often drives the journey of love. It moves the story forward. Because Naomi returned home, God’s grace will be unleashed in her life. Repentance involves a returning to the box, to the world of limits, that my Father has given me. I stop creating my own story and submit to the story that God is weaving. . . .

Life is like a beautiful garden with a tree whose fruit I can’t touch. That “no” defines and shapes my life in the garden. So my relationship with my wife is like a wonderful garden with a solitary “no”: I cannot touch or develop emotional intimacy with another woman. That “no” narrows and limits my life. It provides a frame for my love to Jill. I am keenly aware that I can destroy a forty-year marriage in five minutes. That limiting, instead of boxing us in, lets the story come alive. 852

Love and Suffering

Suffering is the crucible for love. We don’t learn how to love anywhere else. Don’t misunderstand; suffering doesn’t create love, but it is a hothouse where love can emerge. Why is that? The great barrier to love is ego, the life of the self. In long-term suffering, if you don’t give in to self-pity, slowly, almost imperceptibly, self dies. This death of self offers ideal growing conditions for love. 221

Self-pity, [that is,] compassion turned inward, drives this downward spiral. Instead of reflecting on the wounds of Christ, I nurse my own wounds. Self-as-victim is the great narrative of our age. . . . Enshrining the victim is so seductive because you have been hurt. But self-pity is just another form of self-righteousness, and like all self-righteousness it isolates and elevates. It elevates you because it says you are better than the other person; you are the victim. It isolates you because you live in and are nourished by your interior world, which can’t be criticized. 1677

Suffering and Lament

[We often do our best to hide our suffering. Indeed, sometimes we confuse laments over suffering with lack of faith. But Paul Miller argues that Scripture is full of laments, and that lamentation is a necessary step on the path to hesed love.]

A lament puts us in an openly dependent position, where our brokenness reflects the brokenness of the world. It’s pure authenticity. Holding it in, not giving voice to the lament, can be a way of putting a good face on it. But to not lament puts God at arm’s length and has the potential of splitting us. We appear okay, but we are really brokenhearted. (emphasis added) 693

Listening to a lament is a powerful way of loving someone who is suffering. By being present, by not correcting or even offering our own unique brand of Christian encouragement (“It’s going to be all right – God’s in control”), we give those who are grieving space to be themselves.

This doesn’t mean that Naomi’s judgment of God is correct. God is good and just. He will answer her frustration with more goodness. Naomi was interpreting God through the lens of her experience.

She stopped in the middle of the story and measured God. A deeper faith waits until the end of the story and interprets experience through the lens of God’s faithfulness. Is this something we tell Naomi? No. It is what we tell ourselves. Good theology lets us endure quietly with someone else’s pain when all the pieces aren’t together. It acts like invisible faith-glue. 706

The opposite danger of not lamenting is over-lamenting. Dwelling on a lament is the breeding ground for bitterness. Bitterness is a wound nursed. Our culture’s emphasis on the sacredness of feelings often gives people an unspoken theology of bitterness. They feel entitled to it.727

Faith, Love and Obedience

[Difficult situations compel us to conclude:] You simply do not have the power or wisdom or ability in yourself to love. You know without a shadow of a doubt that you can’t love. That is the beginning of faith—knowing you can’t love. Faith is the power for love. 617

Unlike the Israelites who wanted to return to Egypt, Naomi is obeying, doing the right thing by returning to the Promised Land. Her feelings were all over the place, but she put one foot in front of the other as she returned. We can summarize her response this way:

Bitterness openly expressed to God + obedience  => a raw, pure form of faith

Bitterness openly expressed + disobedience => rebellion

Through a sheer act of will, Naomi continues to show up for life. In C.S. Lewis’s Screwtape Letters, the senior devil, Screwtape, warns his junior devil of the danger of this obedience.

Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause [the Devil’s cause] is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending to do our Enemy’s will [God’s will], looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys. 747

Ruth’s act of loving put her at the bottom of society, but she doesn’t push back on her lowered status. She accepts the cost of love. Like Jesus, she takes the lower place. Love and humility are inseparable.

When serving is combined with humility, the serving becomes almost pleasurable. You are thankful for any gift given you. In contrast, pride can’t bear the weight of unequal love. . . . ride makes others’ joy, or even the possibility of our own joy, feel phony. It is an odd sort of authenticity where we demand that others be as depressed as we are. 1393

Jealousy is extraordinarily deceptive. It is by far the most destructive sin in communities and organizations that I’ve been a part of, and yet, I seldom hear it mentioned or confessed. It always masks itself as something else, creating a hidden chain of slander that drags someone down. A multiheaded hydra, it begins with an inability to rejoice with another’s success, leaks out as gossip, and finally erupts as slander. Jealousy seeks to gain by destroying others, while hesed  [love] loses by giving itself. One is the heart of evil. The other is pure gospel.  1494

Many Christians get stuck trying to grow their faith by growing their faith. They try to get closer to Jesus by getting closer to Jesus. Practically, that means they combine spiritual disciplines (the Word and prayer) with reflection on the love of God for them. But that will only get you so far. In fact it often leads to spiritual moodiness where you are constantly taking your pulse wondering how much you know the love of God for you. Or you go on an endless idol hunt trying to uncover ever deeper layers of sin. Oddly enough, this can lead to a concentration on the self, a kind of spiritual narcissism. Ruth discovers God and his blessing as she obeys, as she submits to the life circumstances that God has given her. So instead of running from the really hard thing in your life, embrace it as a gift from God to draw you into his life. 2095

Obedience and Resurrection

[Miller discusses how the life of loving obedience often follows the shape of a J-curve: Our love and obedience leads to suffering, and so our life seems to get worse. But God brings about the upward slope of the “J” – in ways that we cannot know ahead of time, following trajectories that we never expected.]

[God teaches] us to love by overloading our systems so we are forced to cry for grace. God permits our lives to become overwhelming, putting us on the downward slope of the J-curve so we come to the end of ourselves. I encouraged my friend to embrace the downward path, not to push against it or worry about where his feelings were with his wife. Jesus said, “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. . . . No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” (John 10:11, 18). Seeing the gospel as a journey remaps our stories by embedding them in the larger story of Jesus’s death and resurrection. His normal becomes our normal. 1004

Here’s what I have learned going through the J-curve:
1. We don’t know how or when resurrection will come. It is God’s work, not ours.
2. We don’t even know what a resurrection will look like. We can’t demand the shape or timing of a resurrection.
3. Like Jesus, we must embrace the death that the Father has put in front of us. The path to resurrection is through dying, not fighting.
4. If we endure, resurrection always comes. God is alive! 1021

We can do death. But we can’t do resurrection. We can’t demand resurrection—we wait for it. 1032

 May we love, suffer, lament, believe, obey – and see resurrection!

[Paul Miller, A Loving Life: In a World of Broken Relationships (Crossway, 2014). Numbers after the quotations are Kindle locations.]

 

Those in the Kingdom are [the Body of] the King

[Sunday’s sermon included eight statements summarizing Jesus’ teaching, as it culminates in the story of the sheep and the goats:

  1. Jesus is the King
  2. Your Eternal Destiny Depends on Jesus
  3. Those in the Kingdom are Blessed by God
  4. Those in the Kingdom Inherit the Kingdom
  5. Those in the Kingdom Walk with the King
  6. Those in the Kingdom are the King
  7. Those in the Kingdom Love Those in the Kingdom
  8. Those Not in the Kingdom will Suffer with Satan

The sixth statement is easily misunderstood. A more accurate summary statement would be “Those in the Kingdom are the Body of the King.” Here is an expanded and clarified version of that point – Coty]

 ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

(Matthew 25:40)

What is Jesus saying here?

First, let’s clarify who “my brothers” are.

Some time previously Jesus’ mother and half-brothers came to see Him. While He was teaching, someone informed Him of their presence. Jesus replied:

“Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?”  And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers!  For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” (Matthew 12:48-50)

Jesus says those who are disciples, those who obey the Father, are in His intimate family. These are His brothers.

Similarly, in Matthew 28 the risen Jesus speaks to the women at the tomb, saying, “Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me” (Matthew 28:10).  Jesus isn’t instructing them to tell everyone they see, or every Jew they see, or His physical half-brothers to go to Galilee. Rather, Jesus is calling those who follow Him, those who obey Him, to go to Galilee. These are His brothers. These are the people Jesus identifies with so closely that whatever you do to one of them is done to Jesus.

Our Lord makes a similar statement in Matthew 10, when He sends out His followers to proclaim that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand: “Whoever receives you receives me” (Matthew 10:40). Someone who welcomes and shows hospitality to Jesus’ followers is indeed receiving Him.

Furthermore, recall what the risen Christ says to Saul (soon to be renamed Paul) on the road to Damascus:

“Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?”  And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.” (Acts 9:4-5)

Who was Saul persecuting? As far as we know, Saul never encountered Jesus during His earthly life. However, we learn in Acts 8:

Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. (Acts 8:3)

Saul is persecuting the church, the followers of Jesus – and Jesus says, “You are persecuting ME!” As Saul did it to one of the least of these, Jesus’ brothers, he did it to Jesus.

So Jesus’ followers not only take on His character. They not only are welcomed into the Kingdom. They not only are His subjects. They not only are His agents, His ambassadors. They are His Body (1 Corinthians 12:27, Ephesians 1:22-23, 5:29-30). And as His Body, a good deed done to them is done to Jesus. Harm done to them is harm done to Jesus.

Now push this a little further. Each part of the body has an ability and a responsibility to serve the rest of the body. The eye can see, helping the foot know where to step. The digestive system breaks down food into nutrients the entire body needs.

If you follow Jesus, if you treasure Him, if you see Him as your Savior and Lord, you are part of Him, part of His Body. And because of that identity, because of the blessing of what God has done for you by grace, you now are able to meet some needs of the Body of Christ – and so to serve Jesus, who has no needs in and of Himself.

  • So when you visit your sick brother or sister in Christ – you are ministering to the Body of Jesus.
  • When you provide food to a hungry follower of Christ – you are feeding the Body of Jesus.
  • When you help your persecuted fellow believer – you are aiding the Body of Jesus.
  • And, when you are hurt or sick or hungry or persecuted for His sake, and others minister to you – they are ministering to the Body of Jesus.

Marvel at these truths – and then step out to love your brothers and sisters, because He first loved you. Love like Jesus. Love the Body of Jesus.

 

Light and Darkness

Consider some of the images of light and darkness in Scripture:

  •  Genesis 1:1-4  In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.  The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. . . .  And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.  And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness.
  • John 1:1-5, 9-12  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.  In him was life, and the life was the light of men.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. . . .  The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.

In verse 2 of Genesis 1, darkness covers the world. There is no light. There is no life. Then God speaks, and light shines in the darkness, penetrating the darkness, overcoming the darkness.

In John 1, the physical darkness at the beginning of Genesis 1 becomes a picture of spiritual darkness in a world opposed to Christ. He is the light – the only light – of men. He shines in the spiritual darkness, bringing the light of true life into the world, and, as in Genesis, the darkness cannot overcome Him.

Yet the darkness does oppose Him. The very world created through Him, the very people chosen as His own, reject Him. Indeed, they crucify Him. Darkness seems, indeed, to have overcome Him. We see this again and again in the book of John:

  • And this is the judgment (or “condemnation”): the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil (John 3:19)
  • When about to heal a man who has never seen light, Jesus Himself says: “We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work.  As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” (John 9:4-5)
  • In His last public statement before His arrest, Jesus says, “The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake (this is the same Greek word translated “overcome” in John 1:5) you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going.  While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.” When Jesus had said these things, he departed and hid himself from them. (John 12:35-36)
  • When Judas leaves the Last Supper to betray Jesus, John tells us, “And it was night” (John 13:30)

There is thus a battle between light and darkness. Darkness is trying to overtake, to overcome those listening to Jesus. He is there, He is the light, He is shining in the darkness, He is opening blind eyes so that they might see the light – but those who do not want their works exposed, those who love the darkness – that is, those who think they are in control, who think they know where they are going – reject the light, and thus remain lost, without hope, without true life.

Indeed, the serpent’s temptation to Eve in Genesis 3 is an invitation to come out of the darkness, out of her supposed blindness, into light, so that she might truly see: “God knows that when you eat of [the forbidden fruit] your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:5). Satan, a “liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44), calls darkness light, and light darkness. Thus the battle began, and thus the battle rages to this day.

But the outcome of the battle is certain. In Revelation, as John describes the future kingdom, the new Jerusalem, he tells us, “And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 22:5).

So where are you? You were created by the One Who is the Light of the World. In that light is life – and nowhere else. Are you holding on to the darkness, thinking that what you know is safe and secure? Are your eyes accustomed to the darkness, so that you find the Light painful? Do you think you have the spiritual equivalent of night vision goggles, so that you don’t need the true Light?

There is only one light. All else is darkness. All else is condemnation. All else is death. Jesus said, “I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness” (John 12:46).

Believe in Him! Receive Him! And you will be sons of light, children of God, who will shine for all eternity as the Light of the world shines through you.

 

 

Entering the Kingdom of Heaven

Who will enter the Kingdom of Heaven?

In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus speaks explicitly five times about entering the Kingdom. Let’s look at these verses plus some context to help us answer the question.

Matthew 5:17-20, 48  “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.  18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.  19 Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.  20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. . . . [Jesus then elaborates on the true meaning of the Law. He concludes this section:] 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Matthew 7:21-23  “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.  22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’  23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’”

Matthew 18:3 “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Matthew 19:23-26   And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven.  24 Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”  25 When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?”  26 But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

Matthew 23:13 “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.”

The Pharisees expected the promised Kingdom to come, in which their Messiah would reign (Luke 17:20). They rejected Jesus as that Messiah – but they believed they would be in the coming Kingdom.

In these verses, Jesus makes at least 11 points about entering the Kingdom:

1)      “Salvation” and “entering the Kingdom” are at least very similar concepts – perhaps identical, according to Jesus (Matthew 19:23-26).

2)      Those in the Kingdom do not rejoice in shutting out others (Matthew 23:13).

3)      Entrance to the Kingdom does not come about through external obedience to a set of rules. The Pharisees were experts at such obedience (Matthew 5:20).

4)      Nor does the entrance to the Kingdom come about through calling Jesus ‘Lord,’ or through speaking in His name, or through performing great deeds in His name (Matthew 7:21-23).

5)      The rich have no special access to the Kingdom – on the contrary, there are tremendous barriers blocking their entrance, seemingly impossible to overcome (Matthew 19:23-24).

6)      Jesus is the ultimate arbiter of who enters the Kingdom (Matthew 7:23).

7)      Anyone can enter the Kingdom (Matthew 19:25-26).

8)      Entrance into the Kingdom is a result of God’s work, not ours (Matthew 19:26).

9)      We must humble ourselves like children if we are to enter the Kingdom. We cannot think we deserve to enter, or that we can earn the Kingdom if we just work a little harder. We must look to Jesus as our hope, our joy, and long for relationship with Him (Matthew 18:3).

10)   Thus, Jesus’ conception of the Kingdom is markedly different from the Pharisees’ conception, and if they continue in their ways, they have no hope of entering the true Kingdom (Matthew 23:13). Jesus teaches that we enter into the Kingdom by God’s grace through coming to our Savior humbly, confessing our sin and seeking His favor.

11)   The Law is a reflection of the character of God – and if we are citizens of His Kingdom, if we are His children, we are to take on this character through being transformed by His power (Matthew 5:17-48, in light of Romans 8:29).

So: Enter the Kingdom!

Invite others to join you in the Kingdom!

The invitation is to all. The joy is for all.

The glory is all His.

Giving? How?

How much money should a Christian give away?

Some Bible teachers argue that we are obligated to give God a tenth, a tithe of our income. These teachers say that Christians should give that much away. They may give more; above that is voluntary.

In this present series – Where Do You Find Identity, Security, and Joy? A Scriptural Understanding of Money, Giving, and Material Possessions – we’ve seen that biblical teaching on money goes far beyond the percentage of our income that we give away. Indeed, we’ve noted several times that we can give away 100% of our income and assets and still be disobedient:

If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. (1 Corinthians 13:3)

So surely we can give away 10% of our income and be disobedient.

Consider in this regard the rich young ruler, in the story told in Mark 10 as well as in other gospels. He runs up to Jesus and asks. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus says he lacks one thing: He is to go, sell all his assets, give the proceeds to the poor, and come, follow Him.

And the rich young ruler walks away.

This man was outwardly following all the Old Testament Law. He certainly was tithing. He probably was giving away 25% or more of his income. And yet he valued his possessions more than he valued Jesus, more than he valued eternal life.

Thus, the answer to the question, “How much should a Christian give away?” has to be more complex, more nuanced, than “10% of his income.” If that’s the teaching you hear, it’s easy to give a tithe, and think, “I’m ok with God now – I’ve fulfilled my obligation,” when all the time you’re just like the rich young ruler, with a wrong attitude toward your possessions.

So let’s turn again to 2 Corinthians 8 and 9 to learn more about true Christian giving. We’ll first review what we’ve already learned from this passage, then highlight five additional lessons from 2 Corinthians 8:10-9:15, and finally discuss how to become a true Christian giver.

True Christian Giving: A Review of Earlier Lessons

We first looked at this passage in a sermon on contentment. 2 Corinthians 9:8 includes the phrase, “having all sufficiency in all things at all times.” The Greek word translated “sufficiency” actually implies an inner attitude of contentment: knowing that however much or little you may have, you have enough. You can be content.

If we know our identity as Christians – children of God, adopted into His intimate family, heirs of God; if we know that He will never leave us nor forsake us, that the sovereign, loving God will hold us secure in His hands;  if we see Him as the greatest joy, and thus see that nothing can ever take away our supreme joy – then we are content. Then we are satisfied. Then our circumstances do not determine our attitude.

In our second look at this passage, we focused on the word translated “generosity.” We saw that the word focuses not primarily on the amount given, but on the inner attitude that motivates the giving. That inner attitude is one of sincere concern or love.

The Macedonians exemplify this attitude:

For in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity (sincere concern) on their part.  For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means, of their own accord,  begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints–  and this, not as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord and then by the will of God to us. (2 Corinthians 8:2-5)

What is the main motive for this type of generosity, this type of sincere concern?

  • The main motive is not gratefulness to God
  • The main motive is not to do some great work for God
  • The main motive is not to build up an institution
  • The main motive is not to get recognition, such has having a building named after you
  • The main motive is not that you will receive more money in return

The main motive is joy in God – the Macedonians gave out of their joy, after giving themselves to God, after receiving His grace.

In giving, we are displaying the gracious character of God that we have as His children.

Just like the Macedonians, we are to cultivate such joy, we are to beg for such sincere concern for others, to beg for the privilege of giving.

Then, we saw in chapter 9 three results from this sincere concern:

  • It leads to thanksgiving to God – not primarily thanksgiving to us
  • It leads the Jewish recipients to glorify God, as they see that these Gentiles are truly believers in Jesus, are truly their brothers and sisters, in partnership with them
  • It leads to love from the church in Jerusalem toward the givers. This is the currency that the givers receive in return.

Thus, money is the vehicle used for the gift, but money is secondary to all that is going on. The Macedonians and Corinthians are not thinking, “Ok, I need to give certain percentage of my income – now, what will I do with it?” Instead, their giving is the result of having their hearts transformed by God. Their identity, security, and joy are in Him. They are content in Him. And so they delight to live to His glory – whatever that may entail.

In the most recent sermon that considered this passage, we looked at 2 Corinthians 8:1-9. We emphasized again that

1)      True Christian giving results from the overflow of joy in God

2)      True Christian giving is motivated by sincere concern/love

Then we added:

3)      True Christian giving results from grace given by God

4)      True Christian giving begins not with giving money but by giving yourself to God

5)      True Christian giving results from taking on the character of Jesus

Because Jesus was rich in his relationship to the Father, He made Himself poor in His becoming man, in His suffering, so that we through that poverty might become rich in relationship to the Father.

We are to be like that: Knowing we have relational riches in being loved by God, being in His family, being secure in Him, we give out of that abundance, out of sincere concern for others.

So, true Christian giving is not an obligation you have to an institution. It is not a requirement you have to fulfill in order to maintain membership. It is not even primarily a budgeting decision.

Rather, as Romans 8:29 says, if you are in Christ, God predestined you to be conformed to the image of His Son. True Christian giving is a result of that work – the result of a life transformed by God, a life conformed to the image of Christ, so that He might be the firstborn among many brothers.

Five Further Lessons from 2 Corinthians 8:10-9:15

These five lessons flow directly out of what we’ve already discussed:

1) True Christian Giving is Individual

That is: No one pattern will hold for everyone. Look first at a phrase in 2 Corinthians 9:7: “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart.” That necessarily implies a difference among the Corinthians both in the amount they give and in the percentage they give. All biblical giving will be the result of God’s grace – but that grace will manifest itself in different ways. God’s grace led the Macedonians to give way beyond their means, beyond what Paul had any reason to expect (8:3). But Paul doesn’t expect the Corinthians to do the same. As he says in verse 12:

For if the readiness is there, it is acceptable according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have.

Because of this verse, some teachers, including me in the past, have said giving is to be proportionate to our income. I no longer think that’s the most accurate word to use. Paul is not telling the Corinthians to give the same proportion of their income as the Macedonians gave. Instead, they are to consider the generous giving of others, including the Macedonians, and use that to inspire them, to help them imagine what God might do. But they are not competing with the Macedonians to see who can give the most. Rather, they are to follow the Macedonians’ example of Christlikeness, not necessarily their example in terms of the proportion of their income they gave.

If we have sincere concern, if we are giving out of joy in God, if we are giving like Jesus – then we will give generously, and our giving will be biblical. We should expect that such biblical giving will manifest itself differently in different churches, and in different individuals.

So true Christian giving is individual. There is no set amount, no set percentage, that will characterize all Christian giving.

2) True Christian Giving is handled with honor in the sight of men

In 2 Corinthians 8:19-21 Paul describes his plans for taking the gift to Jerusalem. Paul is careful not even to give the appearance of impropriety. He arranges matters so that no one could possibly accuse him of absconding with the money, or misusing it for personal gain. He says, “We aim at what is honorable not only in the Lord’s sight but also in the sight of man” (2 Corinthians 8:21).

We well know that money can cause divisions in the church. We know that money has often been misused by churches and pastors. We must handle it carefully, and have procedures and mechanisms in place that make clear to any observer that the money given to the church is used appropriately.

3) True Christian Giving is not forced

Paul writes:

So I thought it necessary to urge the brothers to go on ahead to you and arrange in advance for the gift you have promised, so that it may be ready as a willing gift, not as an exaction. (2 Corinthians 9:5)

Where the ESV has “not as an exaction,” the NET reads “[not] something you feel forced to do,” and the Holman Christian Standard reads “not an extortion.”

Note that Paul asks for all the money to be collected before he arrives. This is exactly the opposite of how many churches and parachurch organizations in the US tend to raise money. We often bring in a well-known person to draw a crowd and raise a lot of money. But Paul implies that he will not operate in that way. It seems he thinks his presence could be seen as forcing people, embarrassing people into giving, and he doesn’t want people giving out of that wrong motivation.

Verse 7 elaborates on the idea. We are not to give reluctantly (or, in other translations, “grudgingly,” “under compulsion,” “out of necessity”). Thus, we are not to raise money by manipulating emotions, or by promising financial returns, or by shaming people into giving, or by highlighting tax advantages. True Christian giving is never forced, in any sense.

4) The True Christian Giver gives blessings

We have to delve a bit into translation to see this point.

In 2 Corinthians 9:5, the word translated “willing gift” is the normal word for “blessing.” Then in the next verse, Paul uses the same word again in the plural. The ESV here translates it “bountifully.” The translators use that word because Paul is drawing a contrast with giving “sparingly.” But the English reader then misses both the link with verse 5 and the connotation of the gift as a blessing from God. As we saw in the previous sermon in this series, in this passage Paul emphasizes again and again the different currencies of giving and receiving. The primary currency here is blessings.

So let’s re-read verses 5 and 6, using “bountiful blessing” for this Greek word:

So I thought it necessary to urge the brothers to go on ahead to you and arrange in advance for the bountiful blessing you have promised, so that it may be ready as a bountiful blessing, not as an extortion. The point is this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows with bountiful blessings will also reap with bountiful blessings.

The Apostle says: God has given you a grant to be used for His glory. You are to be a conduit of God’s blessing to others. You are to be a means God uses to bless others. If you are not sowing blessings from God, you will reap no blessings of joy, of love, and of prayers on your behalf.

The true Christian giver gives (and receives) blessings.

5) The True Christian Giver is cheerful

The rest of chapter 9 elaborates on and supports this idea.

We could infer that we should be cheerful givers from the first few verses of chapter 8: If the Macedonians are giving out of their overflow of joy in God, if they beg Paul for the privilege of participating in this partnership with the church in Jerusalem, if they are taking on the character of Jesus, loving with His love, sowing His blessings, all the while glorifying God, then surely they are giving cheerfully. But Paul highlights this point in 2 Corinthians 9:7:

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

Then in verse 8 Paul says God will make all grace abound to them – and that must include the grace of giving (8:1) – so that they can abound in every good work. So we will have whatever we need to be conformed to the image of Jesus outwardly as well as inwardly.

In verse 9, the Apostle quotes Psalm 112:9. Note that “he” refers not to God but to the blessed man:

He has distributed freely, he has given to the poor; his righteousness endures forever.

The key phrase “his righteousness endures forever” appears also in Psalm 112:3. Using New Testament terminology, this means: “What he does in conformity with the character of Jesus will have an eternal impact.” Who is this true of? Verse 1 of the psalm tells us: “Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, who greatly delights in His commandments.” This is the person who knows who he is before God because of the work of Christ, who finds his identity, security, and joy in God.

I encourage you to read the psalm in its entirety, and to look for ways that the psalmist makes clear that the “blessed man” has his identity, security, and joy in God. For our purposes today, however, it is sufficient to see that Paul quotes the psalm because the blessed man has great joy as he sees his giving as part of God’s plan of blessing.

Turn now to 2 Corinthians 9:10:

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.

Paul here alludes to Isaiah 55:

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; 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. (Isaiah 55:10-11)

God supplies both the inputs into the production process – seed – and the outputs of that process – not just wheat, but bread (what the wheat becomes after it is dried, ground, kneaded, and baked). Just so, He will give you what you need in order to glorify Him, and will see to it that He is indeed glorified as you give of yourself, your time, and your resources in accord with the character of Christ. Your righteousness will endure forever, to God’s glory among the peoples.

Then 2 Corinthians 9:11

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

That is: You will be enriched in every necessary currency so that you can show sincere concern in every way. And this, as we have seen, produces thanksgiving to God, glory to God, and love for the givers (verses 13 and 14).

Paul then concludes in verse 15: “Thanks be to God for His inexpressible gift.” This is what all Christian giving is about. We are showing what God is like, as Jesus showed us what God is like. This is the source of our joy. This is why we can give cheerfully. We are displaying His character. We are accomplishing His purposes. We are actualizing what our Creator intends us to be.

Becoming a True Christian Giver

You may say: “OK, Coty, I understand the conceptual point: My identity, security, and joy must be in God. The greatest gift is indeed His gift to us. And I realize that even my giving is a grace from Him. So, with all confidence in His future grace, I must give myself to God first, and then take on the character of Jesus and cheerfully give blessings to others. Furthermore, from the sermon on spending, I understand that I must set aside for giving a portion of all I receive up front, before I spend anything else, so that I am not giving out of my excess, but out of all that comes in. And I even get the idea that giving must be individual – I know you can’t tell me to give a certain percentage or a certain dollar amount.

“But still: I have to decide. I have to budget. What do I give? Everything? A tithe? If so, a tithe of what? Of my income? Of my assets? You’ve said that biblical teaching has to be more nuanced than ‘give 10% of your income.’ Well, it’s time for some nuance.”

That’s a good question. Here are my suggestions, built on what we have seen in Scripture:

  • First: Consider and meditate on the question in the sermon series title: Where do you find identity, security, and joy? Repent of dependence on anything other than God in these areas.
  • Second: Acknowledge to God verbally and, if it helps you, in writing, that all you have – your income as well as your assets, your Iphone as well as your home equity – is a grant from God to be used for His glory.
  • Third: Consider the institutions and people around you – around you locally, and around you across this globe. Think of the many opportunities you have to glorify God, to display Jesus, to spread the Gospel, to spur church planting movements among the unreached, through giving of time, money, and love.
  • Fourth: Pray, asking God, “What percent of my income should I commit to giving for the next few months?” And pray specifically, “Should I give more than I have been giving?”
  • Fifth: Decide. Designate that amount for giving as soon as you receive any income.
  • Sixth:  When you have given away all that you have planned and other needs arise, don’t immediately say no to those needs. Pray again. It may be right to take money out of other budget categories to meet this need. Indeed, some of us set aside another percentage of our income specifically to be able to respond more rapidly to such unforeseen opportunities.
  • Seventh: A few months later, prayerfully reconsider what has happened since the last time you determined how much you would give. If you increased your giving, ask: What has God done with that additional amount? And ask again: Should I commit to more, to a higher percentage? Should I include giving from my assets?
  • Eighth: Repeat this regularly for the rest of your life.

Do you see how this relates to tithing? Tithing is one small part of this process, only relevant in steps four and five. If you are not tithing now, certainly do pray specifically: Should I begin to give 10% of my income now? Many people think they cannot possibly give that much. But as Randy Alcorn asks: If your income went down by 10%, would you die? If the answer to that is “no,” then you can indeed tithe.

So if you’re not tithing, that can be a good place to begin. Consider that. But if you have been giving very little, and you faithfully go through these steps, and you decide to give 6% of your income – praise God! Be faithful to that commitment. I am confident that when you get to step seven, you will have such joy in God that you will increase your giving further.

Just so, if you are already tithing, don’t think you’re exempt from this process. Keep going through the steps. If we all do this, I am sure the great majority of us will end up giving much more than a tithe.

For each of us must always remember:

God has made all grace abound to you. He created you for His glory. But you – and indeed all humanity – turned your back on Him, thinking you knew better than He how to arrange your life, how to obtain joy and fulfillment. Having rejected the very purpose of your creation, you deserve God’s punishment.

But God showered you, and all of us, with grace by the sending of His Son into this world to live as man. He lived the life you and I should have lived. He died a horrible death on the cross on your behalf. He rose victoriously, and now always lives to make intercession for us. And He will come again to usher in His Kingdom.

This risen Christ calls out to you, rebel that you are: Come be part of My bride. Come be My joint heir. Come, be reconciled to your Creator, and He will be your loving Father forever.

So give yourself to Him.

Follow hard after Him.

Know who you are, what He promises now and in the future.

And so live as to show who He is – through your love, through your sincere concern, and through your giving of money, of time, and of yourself.

Thanks be to God for His inexpressible gift!

 

 

The Currency of Giving and Receiving

Jesus says, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).

What does He mean by that?

How does He exemplify that?

Consider what He says to His disciples in Mark 10:29-30. Jesus has just told the rich young ruler to sell all he has, to give the proceeds to the poor, to have riches in heaven, and to come and follow Him. The ruler instead walks away. Peter, astounded that poor fishermen are more obedient than this rich man, has just said, “We have left everything and followed you.”

Jesus replies:

Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel,  who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life (Mark 10:29-30).

What does He mean?

There are those who say, “Just read it to see what it means: ‘100 times more in this life.’ So if you give $1000, you will get $100,000.” Then, when you give the $1000 and don’t receive the $100,000, they will suppose that there is some sin in your life, or some lack of faith, that keeps God from fulfilling His promise.

But we only have to look at these disciples listening to Jesus to know He could not have meant, “Give in one currency and you will be sure to receive a hundred times more in the same currency.” James, for example, gave up all to follow Jesus, as Peter just said. But one of the Herods kills James (Acts 12:2). He never received a hundred times more goods than he gave up.

So:

  • When I give, what am I giving?
  • When I receive, what am I receiving?
  • Why is giving so blessed?

2 Corinthians 8 and 9 is very helpful on this point. We’ll see that when we give, we are not primarily giving money.  When we receive, we are not primarily receiving money.

Indeed, this mistaken conception of giving as primarily concerning money or material goods distorts much of our thinking. For we tend to think that the person who has an excess of money is the person who is able to give the most. He’s not losing much proportionately. He doesn’t have to give up much else in order to give to others. That is, the opportunity cost of giving is lower for him. So such a person can give with joy. But if I’m just barely paying my bills, I can’t give much of anything – I have nothing to spare! It would be too costly for me to give. So I can’t give with joy.

That view is not Scriptural view at all. Of the many errors in those thoughts, we’ll highlight one today: It misunderstands the currency of giving and receiving.

About fifteen years ago I was in the Philippines on a business trip.  This was when ATMs first became available for foreign transactions in southeast Asia. I inserted my card, and magically Philippine pesos came out. The machine then gave me the option of checking my balance.  Curious to see how much Beth had spent in my absence, I punched the button.  The machine gave the balance: about 200,000.

Startled, I wondered: Where did all this money come from?  I even checked the account number to see if perchance the ATM had linked me to the wrong account.  After seeing that it was indeed my own account, I finally realized that the machine was giving me my balance not in terms of US dollars but in terms of Philippine pesos.  And at the time, the exchange rate of pesos to dollars was about 40-1, which made the balance of the account not $200,000 but $5,000; about what I had expected.

If you’re checking your bank balance, you need to know the currency of the balance. Just so: In every biblical passage that concerns giving and receiving, you need to know the currency the author is speaking of. Indeed, even within one verse, sometimes different currencies are used.

With that in mind, let’s turn our attention to 2 Corinthians 8. Recall that at this time, the church in Jerusalem was quite poor, partly as a result of persecution, and partly as a result of a famine and economic downturn in the region. So in general, the new Christians in Greece and in what is now Turkey were better off financially than the believers in Jerusalem. So the Apostle Paul arranges to collect money from these new, Gentile believers for the Jerusalem church. He mentions this collection in 1 Corinthians 16, asking them to set aside money on the first of every week. Evidently that collection started well but then slowed down. Here in 2 Corinthians 8 and 9 he asks the church to complete “this grace.” His wider discussion is invaluable for understanding true Christian giving.

True Christian Giving: Four Observations

Let’s read the passage in a literal, rather wooden translation, which I hope will help you to follow Paul’s argument. I’ve used English words with the same root when Paul uses Greek words with the same root. Note also that I’ve translated a Greek word you may know, koinonia, as “partnership.” Because verse 8 is something of a parenthesis, I’ve left it out here:

We make known to you, brothers, the grace of God given in the churches of Macedonia, for in the midst of a great testing of affliction, the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their sincere concern. For according to their power and, I bear witness, beyond their power of their own accord with strong appeal they begged us for the grace and partnership of ministry to the saints. And they went beyond what we had even hoped: They gave themselves first to the Lord and to us by the will of God. So we appealed to Titus, that just as he started, just so he might complete this grace among you. But just as you abound in all things – in faith and in word and in knowledge and in all diligence and in our love for you – abound in this grace also. . . . For you know the grace of our lord Jesus, that for you he became poor, being rich, in order that you by his poverty might become rich.

For our purposes, the biggest difference with common English translations is found in verse 9. Virtually all English translations render this, “Though he was rich, he became poor for you.” The Greek has no word for “though,” instead just using a participle, as rendered above: “being rich, he became poor.” We’ll consider below the common translation, “though he was rich,” and suggest an alternative, which is equally possible grammatically, “Because He was rich.”

But first, four observations on true Christian giving from verses 1 to 7:

1) What is the first gift Paul mentions?

Not the gift the Macedonians give to the church in Jerusalem. Instead, the grace given by God to the Macedonians. They received grace from God  and then they gave. After verse 1, Paul repeats the word “grace” in verses 3, 6, 7, and 9. Look at verse 7. What does Paul want the Corinthians to excel in? “This grace.” (Note that the words “act of” are added by the ESV, and the words “of giving” are added by the NIV).

So the first observation: True Christian giving results from grace given by God. True Christian giving is the result of God working in us – not the result of pressure tactics, of emotional appeals, or of making people feel guilty.

2) Did the Macedonians give out of their abundance?

Be careful here! The answer is both yes and no.

In financial terms, they gave out of their poverty, not out of their abundance. They did not have an excess, and then decide to give that extra since they didn’t need it. Paul even says they gave out of their “extreme poverty.”

But they did give out of an abundance – an abundance of what? Verse 2: An abundance of joy! Their identity was in God, their security was in God, their joy was in God – and so they gave generously of their meager resources.  So the second observation: True Christian giving results from the overflow of joy in God.

3) What overflowed from this abundance?

Be careful again. Look at verse 2. Paul does not say, “Their abundance of joy overflowed with their giving lots of money.” Verse 3 implies they gave more money than Paul ever thought possible. But his main point is not the amount of money. What did overflow? In the ESV: “A wealth of generosity.” Two months ago we looked in detail at the meaning of the word the ESV translates “generosity,” and saw that it has rather different connotations from the English word. If a billionaire gave $100,000 to DGCC, that would certainly be a generous act according to the definition of the English word. But we would have to discern the inner motivation for the gift in order to apply the Greek word to the act. We saw that the Greek word here means, “sincere concern, with no ulterior motives.” The word is thus related to love. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:3:

If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

So the third observation: True Christian giving is motivated by sincere concern, by love. We are not giving in order to get out of an awkward situation; we are not giving in order to get our names on a building or to impress others. We are motivated by sincere concern.

4) What did the Macedonians give first? Again, the answer is not “money.” Verse 5: The gave themselves first. They gave up their own selfish, individualistic goals. They offered their bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God. They were transformed through the renewing of their minds. Thus, their identity, security, and joy were in God and in His work. They were so completely devoted to Him, that they begged Paul for the privilege of being a part of God’s work.

So four key principles:

  • True Christian giving is a grace of God.
  • True Christian giving results from the overflow of joy in God.
  • True Christian giving is motivated by love, by sincere concern.
  • True Christian giving begins by giving yourself to God.

Again and again Paul goes out of his way to emphasize he is not primarily talking about money.

There are other currencies of giving and receiving here, other interactions between believers and other believers, between believers and God.

Jesus’ Example of Giving

Now let’s walk through verse 9 more slowly to understand what Paul says here. We’ll do this in four steps:

1) How does verse 9 support Paul’s command in verse 7?

Verse 9 begins with the word “for,” indicating Paul is supporting an earlier statement – the command that concludes verse 7, “Abound in this grace also.” However we interpret verse 9, it has to answer the question: Why should the Corinthians abound in this grace?

2) Jesus’s poverty

Paul says that we become rich through Jesus’ poverty. What aspect of Jesus’ poverty makes us rich?

Not His material poverty. He was poor materially – but we don’t have riches because He owned very little. Rather, we benefit because He humbled Himself – He became man, He was mocked and beaten, He was crucified dead and buried. That aspect of Jesus’ poverty makes us rich.

3) Our riches

What kind of riches does Jesus gain for us?

There is a sense in which we gain material riches; the New Testament calls us heirs of the world! But the emphasis in the New Testament is never on those material riches. Yes, the streets of the New Jerusalem are said to be paved with gold – but who ever pays attention to the pavement, as long as it supports you? What is central in the New Jerusalem is God dwelling with His people in their midst.

So the riches Jesus gains for us are relational riches – the riches of being adopted into His family, of being His beloved children. Even when we think of ourselves as heirs, the emphasis is not on, “Oh, boy, I’m an heir – think of all the material goods I will inherit!” but rather, “I am so loved by Him that He provides an abundance of all things for my good.”

And there is more: We have the relational riches of being God’s children, and the relational riches of being united with all those in the body of Christ. He has broken down the “dividing wall of hostility.” He has made one those from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.

We saw this in microcosm last night as we said goodbye to our friends Sunil and Jerlin. There were close to fifty people present, from seven different countries; fewer than one-third of us were white Americans. And, as all present will attest, there was real relational richness in that room.

So now let’s take what we’ve learned, and apply these lessons to verse 9, substituting these ideas into the verse:

For you know the grace of our lord Jesus Christ, that for you he became poor – in becoming man, suffering, dying on cross . . . in order that you by his poverty might become rich relationally: that is, so that you might be adopted into God’s family, so that He might be Abba, Father to you, so that you might be His heir, so that you might have relational riches with others as part of His body.

That seems to make sense. We seem to be on the right track.

There’s one more point we need to investigate to fill out the verse.

4) The link between Jesus’ riches and His poverty

In what sense is Jesus rich?

Of course, all things are His!

But what means most to him? What constitutes His true riches?

Surely the primary answer is: His relationship with the Father.  And the secondary answer is: His relationship with His Bride, the church.

That is, Jesus’ riches are in the same currency as ours: Relational riches with God the Father, and relational riches with His people.

So what is the link between Jesus’ riches and His poverty? That is, what is verse 9 saying?

Let’s consider the traditional translation of the verse. That is, for “being rich” substitute “though He was rich.” But then substitute what we’ve seen about Jesus’ riches and poverty: His riches are relational, and His poverty is becoming man and dying on the cross:

Though Jesus was loved by His Father, he humbled himself and died on the cross, so that we by that act might be loved by the Father.

That doesn’t make any sense. “Though” is not an appropriate way to understand the participle when you substitute what type of riches Jesus has, and what type of poverty makes us rich.

“Though” makes sense if His riches and poverty are in the same currency, since we don’t expect a rich man to give away all his money and become poor. But when we see that Jesus’ riches and poverty in this verse must be in different currencies, the translation “though” makes no sense.

Furthermore, “though” makes no sense as an explanation for why the Corinthians should strive to “abound in this grace” (verse 7).

But now think of the command at the end of verse 7 together with verse 9. And let’s substitute “because” for “though. ”

We’ll do this in two stages. First, let’s just add the idea of different currencies:

Abound in this grace also. . . .  For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that for you he became poor [in one currency] because he was rich [in another currency], so that you by his poverty might become rich [in that same currency].

Now that makes  sense. Paul tells the Corinthians to abound in the grace that is so clearly manifest among the Macedonians, the same grace that we see manifest in the Lord Jesus Christ.

So now let’s replace simply the idea of different currencies with the currencies of Jesus’ riches and poverty that we’ve already identified. Paul tells the Corinthians:

Abound in this grace also. . . . For you know the grace of our lord Jesus, that because He was loved by the Father, he became man and died on the cross for you, so that you thereby might be loved by the Father.

So do you see how verse 9 supports Paul’s command? Paul is saying: “Be like Jesus! Be full of grace! Show sincere concern!”

That is: Know who you are in Christ! Know you have all joy in Him. United with Him, you are rich relationally, so give yourselves first completely to God, and then give of yourselves out of sincere concern for others. Give like Jesus – knowing that even if you give away all you have, even if you give up all your time, even if you give up all your emotional energy, you always have the Father, you are always His child, you are always in his intimate family.

Lessons for True Christian Giving

Clearly Paul’s main point to the Corinthians and to us is not, “Give more money” or “give more time.” We may need to end up doing so. But that’s not his main point.

We’ve already noted the four observations from verses 1 to 7:

  • True Christian giving is a grace of God.
  • True Christian giving results from the overflow of joy in God.
  • True Christian giving is motivated by love, by sincere concern.
  • True Christian giving begins by giving yourself to God.

What lessons can we draw particularly from verse 9?

True Christian giving results from our taking on the character of Christ.

True Christian giving is one aspect of becoming Christlike. Like Jesus, we are to have such confidence in our identity in Christ, in our security in Him, we are to have so much joy in Him, God’s surpassing grace is to be so manifest in our lives, that we love, we have sincere concern, and so we give.

True Christian giving is not an obligation you have to an institution. It is not a requirement laid on you to maintain membership in an organization. It is not primarily a budgeting decision.

Rather, as Romans 8:29 says, if you are in Christ God predestined you to be conformed to the image of His Son.

True Christian giving is a result of that work – the result of a life transformed by God, a life conformed to the image of Christ, so that He might be the firstborn among many brothers.

Thus, clearly true Christian giving concerns not only money, not even primarily money, but love.

Conclusion

Jesus says, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

And He says:

No one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, . . . will not receive a hundredfold now in this time.

What then is the currency of giving?

On the surface, giving may be in the currencies of money, of goods, or of time.

But underneath, true Christian giving is always in the currency of grace, of love.

What then is the currency of our receiving?

No, we don’t give $1000 and have a guarantee that we will then receive $100,000. Instead, we receive something much more valuable than $100,000 – we receive returns in a much more valuable currency.

We receive joy. When we give material goods, we receive at least 100 times more joy than we would have received by selfishly holding on to those goods. We receive love. We receive relational riches. We receive our identity in Christ.

This is the Gospel, my friends. We had none of that. We rebelled against our Creator, and, separated from Him, we were strangers to all true joy. But Jesus – because He was rich relationally with His Father – became poor. That is, He humbled Himself, He submitted to mocking, scourging, and crucifixion. He died, taking on Himself the penalty you and I deserve, so that you by that poverty might become rich. You, by His work on the cross, might become what God created you to be: Filled with His joy. Conformed to the image of Christ. A giver of grace – like Jesus.

We’re not here to tell you, “Give more so we can build a building. Give more so we can increase our budget.”

God the Father offers you relational riches and joy beyond imagining through Jesus. Come to Him! Give yourself first to Him!

And then: Live out what He is like – to His glory and for Your joy.

 

 

Joy is the Serious Business of Heaven

[This Sunday we consider Paul’s statement in 1 Timothy 6:17 that God “richly provides us with everything to enjoy.” No one has influenced my understanding of this phrase more than C.S. Lewis. What follows are excerpts from chapter 17 of his Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer (if this sounds familiar, I included about two-thirds of these excerpts in a post last fall honoring Lewis on the 50th anniversary of his death). Ponder these ideas – and then make every pleasure into a channel of adoration. – Coty]

It’s comical that you, of all people, should ask my views about prayer as worship or adoration. On this subject you yourself taught me nearly all I know. . . .

You first taught me the great principle, “Begin where you are.” I had thought one had to start by summoning up what we believe about the goodness and greatness of God, by thinking about creation and redemption and “all the blessings of this life.” You turned to the brook and once more splashed your burning face and hands in the little waterfall and said, “Why not begin with this?”

And it worked. Apparently you have never guessed how much. That cushiony moss, that coldness and sound and dancing light were no doubt very minor blessings compared with “the means of grace and the hope of glory.” But then they were manifest. So far as they were concerned, sight had replaced faith. They were not the hope of glory; they were an exposition of the glory itself.

Yet you were not – or so it seemed to me – telling me that “Nature,” or “the beauties of Nature,” manifest the glory. No such abstraction as “Nature” comes into it. I was learning the far more secret doctrine that pleasures are shafts of the glory as it strikes our sensibility. As it impinges on our will or our understanding, we give it different names-goodness or truth or the like. But its flash upon our senses and mood is pleasure.

But aren’t there bad, unlawful pleasures? Certainly there are. But in calling them “bad pleasures” I take it we are using a kind of shorthand. We mean “pleasures snatched by unlawful acts.”  It is the stealing of the apple that is bad, not the sweetness. The sweetness is still a beam from the glory. That does not palliate the stealing. It makes it worse. There is sacrilege in the theft. We have abused a holy thing.

I have tried, since that moment, to make every pleasure into a channel of adoration. I don’t mean simply by giving thanks for it. One must of course give thanks, but I mean something different. How shall I put it?

We can’t – or I can’t – hear the song of a bird simply as a sound. Its meaning or message (“That’s a bird”) comes with it inevitably-just as one can’t see a familiar word in print as a merely visual pattern. The reading is as involuntary as the seeing. When the wind roars I don’t just hear the roar; I “hear the wind.” In the same way it is possible to “read” as well as to “have” a pleasure. Or not even “as well as.” The distinction ought to become, and sometimes is, impossible; to receive it and to recognise its divine source are a single experience. This heavenly fruit is instantly redolent of the orchard where it grew. This sweet air whispers of the country from whence it blows. It is a message. We know we are being touched by a finger of that right hand at which there are pleasures for evermore. There need be no question of thanks or praise as a separate event, something done afterwards. To experience the tiny theophany is itself to adore.

Gratitude exclaims, very properly, “How good of God to give me this.” Adoration says: “What must be the quality of that Being whose far-off and momentary coruscations are like this!”  One’s mind runs back up the sunbeam to the sun.

If I could always be what I aim at being, no pleasure would be too ordinary or too usual for such reception; from the first taste of the air when I look out of the window–one’s whole cheek becomes a sort of palate – down to one’s soft slippers at bedtime.

I don’t always achieve it. One obstacle is inattention. Another is the wrong kind of attention. One could, if one practised, hear simply a roar and not the roaring-of-the-wind. In the same way, only far too easily, one can concentrate on the pleasure as an event in one’s own nervous system—subjectify it—and ignore the smell of Deity that hangs about it. A third obstacle is greed. Instead of saying, “This also is Thou,” one may say the fatal word Encore. There is also conceit: the dangerous reflection that not everyone can find God in a plain slice of bread and butter, or that others would condemn as simply “grey” the sky in which I am delightedly observing such delicacies of pearl and dove and silver. . . .

One must learn to walk before one can run. So here. We-or at least I-shall not be able to adore God on the highest occasions if we have learned no habit of doing so on the lowest. At best, our faith and reason will tell us that He is adorable, but we shall not have found Him so, not have “tasted and seen.” Any patch of sunlight in a wood will show you something about the sun which you could never get from reading books on astronomy. These pure and spontaneous pleasures are “patches of Godlight” in the woods of our experience. . . .

I do not think that the life of Heaven bears any analogy to play or dance in respect of frivolity. I do think that while we are in this “valley of tears,” cursed with labour, hemmed round with necessities, tripped up with frustrations, doomed to perpetual plannings, puzzlings, and anxieties, certain qualities that must belong to the celestial condition have no chance to get through, can project no image of themselves, except in activities which, for us here and now, are frivolous. . . . It is only in our “hours-off,” only in our moments of permitted festivity, that we find an analogy [to the joys of heaven]. Dance and game are frivolous, unimportant down here; for “down here” is not their natural place. Here, they are a moment’s rest from the life we were placed here to live. But in this world everything is upside down. That which, if it could be prolonged here, would be a truancy, is likest that which in a better country is the End of ends.  Joy is the serious business of Heaven.

From Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer (Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1963-64), chapter 17, p. 88-93. Italics are in the original; boldface is my emphasis.

Spending to the Glory of God

Imagine that you are 18 years old, and have just graduated from high school. You are part of a loving family, and have great respect for your parents.

You father comes to you and says, “Your mother and I have decided we’re going to change our plans for the next four years. As you know, we planned to spend $30,000 per year on college to prepare you for the future. But we’ve decided instead to give you a grant of that amount: $120,000. This grant is for you to use over the next four years or longer to set yourself up for the future. You may choose to attend the college we planned on. But if you think there is a better way to prepare yourself, choose it. With this money, you can travel. You can start a business. You can pay your expenses while you work as an intern in a business. You’re welcome to seek my counsel along the way if you wish, but I won’t require that. I only ask that whenever you pay more than a hundred dollars for something, you let me know what you spent it one. But the money is completely under your control. Indeed, I’ve already transferred it to your account. If you like, you can spend it all today on a (used) Ferrari. I can’t stop you.”

Put aside whether or not the father would be acting wisely. Just ask yourself: If you were in that position, if your father said that to you, how would you make decisions? What would spend the money on? Would you buy the Ferrari?

What God has done for us is somewhat similar to what the father in the story did for his child. All we have is a grant from Him to be used for a purpose. But the purpose in this case is to glorify His Name. He created us for His glory. And we are most satisfied when we fulfill that purpose.

Like the child in the story, we now have a grant, given to us for a purpose.  So we’re faced with a question: How do we decide how to spend it? What does Scripture tell us?

The Biblical Motivation for Spending

Let’s look first at possible motivations for spending – both unbiblical and biblical. We’ll see that the key concepts we’ve focused on throughout this series – identity, security, and joy – should motivate and guide our spending.

a) Don’t spend in order to establish your identity

That is: Don’t spend:

  • To keep up with others
  • To show off
  • To assuage your guilt
  • So that others think you are something you are not
  • To make you feel important or loved

Why not? Because if you are in Christ, you have an identity. You are adopted in to God’s family, you are His child, His heir. And you need do nothing to establish your identity. It is already granted to you.

b) So: Spend in a way that is consistent with that identity

Spend as a beloved child of God, as joint heir with Christ, in ways that show who God is and what He is to you.

c) Don’t spend in order to establish your security

That is:

  • Don’t save to establish your financial security,
  • Don’t enter the lottery in an attempt to gain financial security,
  • Don’t fail to give in order to maintain your financial security.

Why not? Because if you are in Christ, you are secure already. God will never leave you nor forsake you. Nothing will separate you from the love of God that is yours in Christ Jesus.

d) Instead: Use the money God puts in your care wisely and prudently

Guard it and protect it not to establish financial security but because it belongs to someone else. It is His.

e) Don’t think you must spend money on _______ in order to have joy.

Don’t ever think, “If only I could buy a car or a house or the latest fashions or a college education or some piece of sports equipment I would be happy.”

Why not? “In His presence is fullness of joy, at his right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11). If you are in Christ, already have the greatest joy possible.

f) Instead, cultivate joy in the privilege of being a conduit of God’s blessings, in spending in such as way as to deepen your joy in God, others’ joy in God, joy in one another, joy in your family.

Thus, we spend out of contentment rather than in order to gain contentment. As we saw several weeks ago, the Apostle Paul writes:

I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.  I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:11-13)

Satisfied with God now, confident in God’s continued watchcare over us tomorrow, having all our needs met in Him, we can spend for His glory out of sincere concern for our families and for those around us.

Four Key Ideas That Govern Biblical Spending

With those biblical motivations, we will spend to God’s glory. Four key ideas help to channel that spending rightly. The first is an idea we’ve already mentioned:

a) All you have is a grant from God

This truth colors every spending decision. The money in my possession is not mine to use any way I choose. As in the opening story, God has put in my control for a specific purpose. And that purpose is the glory of His Name.  That does not necessarily mean we should give away all that we have – though it might mean that for specific individuals. But having our identity, security, and joy in God, knowing what we have is a grant from Him, we hold loosely what God has given us. Furthermore, knowing that it all belongs to Him, we guard it carefully. We protect it. We don’t waste it, we don’t squander it, we protect it from thieves.

b) Opportunity Cost

While this term comes from economics, the underlying Idea is simple. Think back to the opening example. If the child in the story buys the Ferrari, how much will he have left to spend on anything else? Nothing. So the cost of the Ferrari is not just the sticker price. The cost is also the joy, the education, the experience he gives up by not spending those dollars on something else.

So if I give $100 to missions, I give up the opportunity to spend that money on food. The opportunity cost is (at a minimum) the joy and satisfaction of eating $100 worth of food. If I spend $100 on clothes,  I give up the opportunity to give that $100 to a friend in need. The opportunity cost is (at a minimum) the joy I would receive from giving, and the joy my friend would get from receiving the gift and filling his needs.

Every expenditure has an opportunity cost, because money is limited. If every time I snapped my fingers a $100 bill would appear in my hand, my expenditures would have no opportunity cost. I could replace whatever I spend immediately by creating more cash. But as long as our income and assets are limited, every expenditure has an opportunity cost.

c) Budgeting & Monitoring Spending

Because there is an opportunity cost of every expenditure, we have an allocation problem. God has given us a grant to be used for His glory. How much should we give away? How much should we spend on housing? How much should we spend on food? Presumably more than zero!

If every time you make a purchase, you have to ask yourself, “Is this best way to glorify God?” you’ll drive yourself crazy. How then can me make these tradeoffs between categories of spending so that we glorify God with our grant?

That’s the role of a budget. A budget is a tool to help you glorify God with your money without driving yourself crazy. Once you have decided on those major tradeoffs between categories, you have freedom to spend up to your budgeted limit, without having to ask questions about every five dollar purchase.

How do you set up a budget to glorify God with your grant?

The first step of budgeting is to keep track of what you are spending now. The budget does you no good unless you monitor what you spend, and abide by your budget limits. Decide on a set of major categories of spending, and track your spending in those categories.

The next step is to pray. Ask God for wisdom concerning how best to use His grant for His glory.

Then plan ahead for the next six months to a year. In light of the opportunity costs of spending in different categories, decide how much you will spend in each, so that you glorify God through what you spend on food, on clothing, through what you give away.

After keeping track of your spending and living within your budget for a while, reassess it. How can you adjust it so that you use this grant for God’s glory even more effectively?

Now, we can’t say there is a biblical mandate to have budget and live within it. But personally I can’t see how I could use the grant God has given Beth and me for His glory without one.

In the weeks ahead, we will discuss helpful tools to use in this regard, and will post some of those on the blog.

d) Diversity

In deciding how to spend money, we all share some similarities:

  • All of us receive a grant from God to be used for His glory
  • All of us have to decide how to best use this grant for God’s glory
  • All of us are faced with opportunity costs for every purchase we make

But in other ways, we are quite different. God calls some to give away all they have. Others follow Him wholeheartedly and give away much less.

For example, in Mark 10 and parallel passages, a man runs up to Jesus and asks, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus eventually tells him, “Go, sell all you have, give it to the poor (you will have treasures in Heaven) and come, follow me.” Note that Jesus tells not only to give away all his income; He also tells him to give away all his assets.

But in Luke 19 Zaccheus comes to faith, and immediately gives away half of his assets. Jesus then says, “Salvation has come to this house” even though Zaccheus has not done what Jesus asked the rich man in Mark 10 to do.

And then the Apostle Paul, in 1 Timothy 6:17-19, speaking to the rich, tells them not to set their hope on the uncertainty of riches, to be generous and ready to share – but he does not tell them that they must give away all or half of their assets; he doesn’t even tell them to give away a certain percentage of their income.

Personally, I have known people who regularly gave away more than 80% of their income. I’ve never done that myself – I’ve never come close to that.

The point is this: We are different. God calls us in different ways. Our love for Him and His glory will be manifested in different ways.

So be careful here. Don’t be proud if God calls you to some extraordinary step of giving, and you obey. Don’t look down your nose at those who haven’t done something similar. Don’t assume that simply because someone else is spending much more than you, that he is immature, or not a genuine believer.

In light, then, of the biblical motivation for spending and these four key ideas, let’s consider four areas of spending:

How Much If Any Should I Spend On:

a) Giving 

We will consider giving in more detail in the weeks ahead. But from what we have said so far, it is clear that, if we are to glorify God with the grant He has given us, we will give away a considerable proportion of our income, and perhaps a considerable proportion of our assets too.

Giving cannot be an afterthought. It cannot be the result of having a little left over this month, and then giving that excess away. We must decide upfront the minimum from our income that we will give away, and budget that amount before we spend on anything else.

b) Enjoyment

As we have seen, we are to find joy in God, to be satisfied with Him. We are not to think, “If only I could buy that iphone I could be happy!” So it might seem as if we are not to consider our joy when making spending decisions.

However, Paul says that God “richly provides us with everything to enjoy” (1 Timothy 6:17). One way I glory God is by enjoying the good gifts He has given me. That’s a true, biblical statement. Yet it’s also quite a dangerous statement, that can be, and has been, misused. So we will examine this issue also in more detail later. But for now, simply note: A normal Christian’s budget will include spending on enjoyment.

c) Insurance

Some have argued: If my security is in God, why should I buy insurance?

Insurance as we know it did not exist in biblical times, so there is no explicit command in this regard. But there is in Scripture the general command to be careful with the assets you have, to be prudent in guarding them and managing them.

Consider in this regard Proverbs 22:3. Though this verse doesn’t refer directly to money, it is in the middle of a longer passage that predominantly discusses money and finances.

A sensible person sees danger and takes cover, but the inexperienced keep going and are punished. (HCSB)

Insurance is one way to live that out. We see the possible danger to God’s grant from calamity, disease, or death, and sensibly guard against the possibility of loss through paying a relatively small premium for insurance.

Now, we certainly can have wrong motivations in purchasing insurance (as we can have in purchasing any other good or service). Our security must not be in our insurance. Our hope must not be in our ability to guard against loss. But it can be wise, prudent, and sensible for us to insure God’s grant against loss – even while other believers, in the diversity of God’s church, may decide they will not spend on insurance, but are called to trust God even for such protection.

d) Saving and Investments

We said every expenditure on one item has an opportunity cost of not spending on another item. That same idea holds across time. Every dollar I spend today is a dollar I won’t be able to spend tomorrow. Indeed, the cost is more than a dollar, since I can invest the dollar or put it in an interest bearing account, and have more than a dollar to spend in the future.

So in the opening story, you, the child, have the option of buying a used Ferrari today for $120,000. You also have the option of spending $30,000 on your education and living expenses this year, and then next year having more than $90,000 to spend, if you properly and safely invest the $90,000.

Furthermore, the education itself can work in a similar way: If that education makes me a more valuable and productive worker, or a more effective entrepreneur, I will be able to make more income in the future than I would have had I spent that money on the Ferrari.

Just so with the grant God has given me. I can give it away and spend all of it now, or I can invest it and get more to use for His glory tomorrow.

As with insurance, in biblical times there were no banks as we know them today; there was no stock market. However, people did save and make investments. Consider the owner of a vineyard who gets income through selling grapes and wine. He can spend and give away all of that income now, or he can take some of that income, and use it to plan grapevines on more of his land. Then he can do what the man did in Jesus’ parable recorded in Mark 12: “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower.” That looks a lot different than buying a mutual fund, but the underlying idea is the same: It’s an investment, taking money that could be spent today, and instead using it in such a way that it will generate a greater amount in income in the future.

Throughout history, including in biblical times, people have saved and invested. Such saving and investment is part of biblical stories; it is normal human activity.

The decision of how much, if any, to save or invest is similar to all other budgeting decisions. The question is one of opportunity cost: Is there a compelling use for God’s glory now for all of the grant God has given me, or should I save and invest part of that grant so that there will be more money available in the future to be used for God’s glory.

Once again, we need to remind ourselves of the key ideas that govern our spending. We are diverse. God will call some to invest much. Others, equally with God’s glory in mind, will invest none. So don’t assume that those who make different decisions than you are unwise an imprudent, or are failing to trust God and are finding security in their investments.

And, once again, we must check our own motivations: Are we saying that we are investing so that we might have more to spend for God’s glory in the future – but in reality we do find security in those investments?

Conclusion

God has given you a grant to be used for His glory among the nations.

  • That grant does not lead to security – He is your security.
  • That grant does not lead to joy – He is your joy.
  • That grant should not be the source of your identity – you find your identity as His child.

We by nature are objects of His wrath, having rejected Him. But if we are in Christ, we are “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession” (1 Peter 2:9).

This is our security, our joy, our identity. And God gives us this identity for a purpose: “that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light”

We are God’s people, God’s family. We were in darkness. But by His grace He forgives us through the sacrifice of His Son on the cross. He call us to Himself and gives us this grant of time, of life, of money, so that we might proclaim and display His excellencies, so that we might glorify the One who called us out of darkness.

How will you do that – with money? It’s all under your control. The grant is in your hand. And it’s all given to you for a purpose.

How will you fulfill that purpose?