Pastor Dan Eddy

2 Corinthians 8:1-9

Managing well what God gives you

10-2-11

Let us pray: Lord God, Heavenly Father, from Whom all blessings flow to us. Instill in us a sense of wisdom in knowing how to be better stewards of Your grace so that we can live our salvation with more true joy through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

I. Introduction – Mismanaging my paycheck

I will never forget my first paycheck I received with my first job as a full-time employee after graduating from college. I was working as a broadcast engineer-technician for television station WTVO in Rockford, IL. I was so proud to be making over $9 an hour based on 1987 dollars, getting paid every two weeks. What a joyful feeling of accomplishment after four years of schooling, studying and hard work.

I was so excited to receive my first paycheck until I realized in less than a week it was all gone. “What happened to it,” I thought. I didn’t even have $5 to put into the offering plate at church. I got so mad at myself that when I received my second paycheck, I took out a piece of paper wrote down the amount of that check and anytime I spent money I saved the receipt and marked it down and subtracted it from the paycheck to see how much money I had left. Soon it became very apparent where my money was going.

Have you ever had this challenge? Some of you may be thinking, “Every week Pastor Dan. Every week.”

It was after that I began learning how to better budget and manage the money God had given to me. A lesson I am still learning to this day.

You see biblical stewardship is about a lot more than offerings given to the Church. It’s about managing all the blessings and gifts God has given you and me.

II. Background of text

Stewardship in the Church at Corinth was a huge problem as this morning’s Epistle reading from 2 Corinthians 8 shows.

No, it wasn’t that the Lord hadn’t blessed them. They were a wealthy congregation with many talented people who had benefited greatly from the faith in Christ God given to them through His proclaimed Word. They were resourceful, knowledgeable Christians. The Holy Spirit had done incredible things through Paul, Titus and others. In many of these ways Christ Lutheran in Scituate mirrors the Church at Corinth.

But, Paul and many of the Apostles were trying to collect money to give to the Christians living in Jerusalem. That church had seen much oppression from the Roman government and from the Jewish religious leaders who rejected Christ as the Messiah. So, as Paul and others traveled, establishing churches all over the known world at that time, they were encouraging congregations to collect money and other valuables to help this Jerusalem church. One congregation located in Macedonia went way beyond the call for help. They joyfully gave so much that Paul tried to restrain their generosity, but to no avail. The Macedonian church was no monetarily wealthy congregation. They were strapped economically, and they, too, were under persecution.

But, I imagine they identified with the economic poverty of the Jerusalem church and were moved by the Holy Spirit to give generously…to show how much they appreciated the grace God gave them by faith in Christ Jesus that saved from perishing for eternity. It’s the same grace you received at your baptism. The same grace that will be affirmed in the Lord’s Supper this morning. The same grace you are receiving in God’s proclaimed Word, right now. The same grace that forgives you of your sins.

So like a person who was just saved by another through CPR, the Macedonians were joyfully showing Christ Jesus how much they appreciated being saved eternally by Him.

The Macedonians were an impoverished church giving like they were wealthy. Meanwhile the wealthy Christian, the Corinthians, were giving like they were impoverished. Actually at this point Church at Corinth has given nothing, even though they had promised Paul repeatedly they would.

You see in many respects this was a management issue, because at the heart of Stewardship is not checks put into offering envelopes. Rather, it’s managing well what the Lord has given to you and me.

In the Bible Jesus said in Luke 12:48 (ESV): “Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required…” Why? Because all we have is not ours…we don’t own our houses, cars, clothes, food…Oh, I know we have the mortgage, the deeds, and the receipts that say otherwise. But, all we have is given to us by God…to manage well so we can help others so He can be glorified. And when He is glorified then more people put their trust in Christ Jesus, because of the loving witness we speak and show through the gifts He has given us to pass onto others.

Paul wasn’t commanding the Corinthians to give. He wasn’t guilting them. He was encouraging them based on how well they had been blessed by God.

It would be like if we kept promising to help the work of Capstone Ministry in Kenya, who take homeless abused kids off the streets and reunite them with their families…and we did nothing. Meanwhile the Lutheran Church of Uganda sent Capstone a check for $5000. Or it would be like the Lutheran Church of Brazil helping Haitians with thousands after the 2010 Earthquake and we still hadn’t even passed the offering plate to help with hundreds.

It’s amazing how much more the poorer churches give richly and how poorly rich church give to the poor. Talk to some African missionaries. Many will tell you about joyful singing and dancing during the native worship services while the offering plate was being passed two and three times during the service, not for their own benefit but to support the western missionaries who visited their congregation. And then the congregational leaders would apologize afterwards because the thousands they gave from their improvised coffers just didn’t seem like much to them, but were an incredible witness of generosity to the western visitors.

III. Application to today

In this text, giving from our wealth means to we give whatever is leftover. But when we give from our poverty that means you give back to Christ as a first priority.

Giving from wealth is thinking about me first or my family first. Giving from poverty is thinking first of other people that God wants you to help.

Christ gave from His poverty because we, the undeserving human race, were first on his list when He died to redeem all of creation. He did not give us from his wealth. If He did, He wouldn’t have died on the cross, and we would be doomed to Hell for eternity.

Good stewardship is more than having enough resources left over for your family and for yourself. Good management of those resources is having enough to give to others and letting that be a first priority. And when that is done God blesses your effort to give from your poverty.

If I realize that everything given to me in life: my time, my talents and my treasures comes from God that alone should be the difference in how I manage versus if I think everything that is given to me is my own. I realize this method of managing resources in our life is counter-intuitive to the world, but if you haven’t, try it, or try it again. There’s joy there; it’s liberating; it’s freeing. And it will show others just how genuine the love of Christ is in your life.

Managing from poverty forces us to make good, and sometimes difficult choices realizing that, what God has given us, we are responsible in giving an account of what we have done with what He has given.

It’s amazing that when we manage from our wealth we never seem to have enough to give to others. But when we manage from our poverty there always seems to be enough for our own lives after we help others. And remember this is about more than money…this is about time…time in prayer, time in thought, time in service. This is about talent…using the gifts God has given us…organizing, creating, managing, listening, singing, speaking, and doing.

And it just isn’t an individual thing…it’s a congregational thing, too. So just because we have some budgetary problems here in this congregation doesn't mean that we shouldn't also give outside of this church to organizations that are involved in proclaiming and furthering the gospel of Jesus Christ, like the Ruth House and Capstone Ministries, or to new congregations like Connecting Point in Marlboro or the Greater Boston Campus and Brazilian ministry or even to our local Scituate Animal Shelter.

I think Pastors Schipul and Schmelzer could share with you congregations in the rich United States with members whose income would eclipses 90% of the world…who only thought internally, who are now struggling to exist. And they promised to give to missions just as soon as they get enough money to pay the power bill. And on one level that seems logical and reasonable…but not to this text and not to God. Some of these congregations live on endowments to pay the everyday expenses until one day the money runs out. The contributing members die off and the congregation has dwindled to less than 30 or 20…and then they close their doors imploding from their riches, instead of haven given from their poverty.

When I lived in the Rockford area I knew of one congregation that thought that way. Their sanctuary had so many stain glass windows that you couldn’t see what was going on outside the church. That’s why I am glad we don’t have stain glass windows here. It’s reminds us there’s a world out there God has gifted us as individuals and as a congregation to serve.

Hey I know how easy it is to cut your time, talents and tithe in this economy when you face an enormous bills, individually, congregationally but it’s amazing when we put our trust in God’s incredible grace in Christ Jesus how the Lord blesses us our poverty to richly give to others, reminding us of how in Jesus’ gave from his poverty from His incarnation, to His earthly ministry, to His suffering and death on the Cross…how richly He has and continues to give to you and me today and forever. And when we see it from His perspective…giving becomes less of a burden and more of a joy.

In a moment we are going to present Pastor Schmelzer and Capstone Ministries with a check for $1000 from the donations made by many of you good people in Christ. And you know where the joy is in giving…is knowing that a 10-yearp-old child thrown out of his home to live on the street, addicted to drugs, violently and sometimes sexually abused will someday be reunited with his family…to not just return home…but return home knowing he is forgiven by God…returned to forgive his family. And for the family to know the Lord has forgiven them so they can forgive their child. That’s why God gives richly to you and me…so that we can lift others out of their poverty…not just economically or physically but spiritually…so they can know the joy of Jesus’ salvation.

Next year we, as a congregation, are considering changing the way we look at managing the gifts God gives us. The council is looking at integrating missions into the main church budget, rather than viewing it as a separate entity. We, as a congregation, would base the mission budget on a percentage of our income, 1%, 5%, 10%...it depends on how much joy we desire in helping others outside this congregation…how genuine will we show the love of God in Christ Jesus.

God’s blessing as we consider better ways to manage what He has given us to be better stewards equipped for more joyful abundant giving, based on the priceless grace given to us by faith alone in Christ Jesus. Amen.