There is a story from several years ago about a young boy who goes into the neighborhood restaurant to get some ice cream. The waitress came over and the boy asked her, “How much is an ice cream sundae?” “Fifty cents.” the waitress answered. The little boy carefully counted his money as the waitress, who had “bigger” customers to handle, stood impatiently by.
“Then, how much is just plain ice cream?” the boy asked. “Thirty-five cents.” said the waitress, with obvious impatience in her voice. “OK.” said the little boy, “Bring me some plain vanilla ice cream.” He handed the waitress the correct amount of money and she went and got him the ice cream.
The boy finished his ice cream, got up, and went on his way. But when the waitress came over to clean up the little boy’s table, tears welled up in her eyes. For there on the table were two nickels and five pennies. The waitress, who had been so sharp with the little boy, realized then that the little boy had had enough money to get the ice cream sundae he wanted for himself, but instead he had sacrificed the sundae so that he would have enough money to leave her a tip.
What a wonderful illustration of how God gives and how He wants us Christians to give. At this point, I need to apologize to you all. You see, I am charged by Jesus Christ, as His agent on Earth, to teach (primarily through preaching) not only how to attain salvation, but also what Jesus commands of His followers once they have been saved, and I have failed to do that. Please let me take a moment to illustrate my point.
Suppose there was a commandment from God that said He wanted all of His followers to wear a blue shirt or blouse the third Sunday of every month. Suppose He said that there would be special blessings for those who followed this command and there would be severe consequences for those who did not wear the commanded apparel on the assigned days.
Now, suppose that I, as your pastor, never taught you about that particular command. Maybe the reason that I didn’t teach it was because it was a “hard” command and I knew that it would upset you, because, well, you just didn’t like someone telling you what you should wear. So there we are one day, standing before the Lord and He begins to mete out the punishment for you having not obeyed His “Blue Shirt” command. You would probably turn to me and ask something like, “You knew about this command and never told me? You were my pastor and I trusted you to help me learn what the Lord required of His disciples. And worse, I thought you were my friend!” I tell you, I would feel very badly.
On top of that, the Lord Himself, who holds his ministers to a much higher standard than others, would turn to me and hand out my punishment for not obeying his command to “preach and teach” his total Gospel to the sheep of the flock that He entrusted me with. Well, as you can see, that is not the scenario that I wish to find you, or me, going through in the future.
Friends, the Lord has convicted me this week that I am indeed guilty of just such an omission. See, our giving this past year, and the year before, fell a little short of covering our basic operating expenses paid out. As a result, we had to once again dip into our savings to make ends meet. Through much prayer, the Lord has convinced and convicted me that I am responsible for this, due to my failure to teach you what it means to “give in the manner of our Father”, how God commands His followers to give, what the rewards are for those who give as God gives, and perhaps most importantly, what the consequences are for those who do not obey His commands in this area.
I ask your forgiveness and God’s forgiveness for my reluctance and failure to teach these lessons, and I will rectify the mistake immediately by endeavoring today, and next Sunday, to give all of you, through God’s Word, a thorough understanding of exactly what God expects and commands in the area of our giving, in order that we all understand what we must do to be obedient to Him.
The first thing we need to understand is how God gives. For eons and eons, God had it all, everything, to Himself. Then God created man. He did it not only to share His gifts with man, but also to use man to give away His gifts for Him. Scripture is chock full of examples of God’s giving through His people.
How exactly does God give? I believe one of the best scriptures to study in order to understand how God gives is John 3:16. Please recite it with me, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, so that all who believe on Him shall not perish, but shall have everlasting life.”
What does this verse tell us about giving God’s way? First, we see that our Father’s giving is motivated by love. “For God so loved the world…” Because God loves us, He gave and He keeps on giving. Love is what should motivate our giving. To give God’s way, we should give because we love others; we should give because we love God.
Next, we see that God gives sacrificially. “…He gave His only begotten Son…” Our salvation, although free to us, cost God a great deal. The Father had to see His Son, Jesus, suffer and die on the cross for our sins. A gift that costs little is worth little. That is why Jesus scoffed at the giving of the Pharisees and praised the gift of two small coins by the widow. The Pharisees gave out of their abundance. The widow gave out of her poverty. The Pharisees gave a small percentage of their income and wealth. The widow gave all she had.
Many years ago, the members of this community believed the community needed this house of worship more then they, themselves, needed the land and money necessary to make it a reality. Many of us believe that the children and others in this community need this church to be the hands and feet of God. In order to bring them His Word, we, as individuals, need to give the money necessary to make that happen, more than we need it for ourselves. So, to give like our Heavenly Father, we need to give generously and sacrificially.
Finally, we see that God gives unselfishly and with an eye on the future. “…that whosoever believes on Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” God gave so that everyone would have the opportunity to benefit. He gave according to the needs of others, not according to His own needs. Jesus gave sacrificially of Himself. Jesus met the needs of others in order to show them the Way to everlasting life. We need to give God’s way, unselfishly, not according to our own needs, but in order to build ministries so that whosoever may benefit from them – always with an eye on the future, so that we too can gain the opportunity to guide them to the Way of salvation.
Our Father gave the gift that keeps on giving. He wants us to give as He gives. He wants us to demonstrate His love. He wants us to show people that we indeed have faith and trust in our Lord. He wants us to show the world that we know that He will keep His promise to “open the window of Heaven and pour out blessings beyond measure” if we will take Him at His word and give as He gives.
He wants us to demonstrate in a very tangible way, through our giving, that when we say that “Jesus is our Lord”, we mean it and are not just blowing smoke. As individuals I must ask you, “ Is Jesus truly the Lord of your life? Is God truly your Father? Do you truly give as your Father gives?” Search your soul. God knows the truth. If the honest answer to any of those questions is “No”, you need to ask yourself, “Why not?”
Next week we will look at the practice of tithing. We will investigate: