In It To Win In It We Are Givers
Proverbs 11:18-23 Luke 19:1-10 10/30/2016
Once again we find one of our sports teams that is “In It To Win It” with The World Series. At the moment, the only problem is that there is a team called the Chicago Cubs who are likewise “In It To Win It. For their city.”
Sometimes, we grab a hope, a vision, or a dream for ourselves and we think “we are in it to win it”, until opposition arises which attempts to put an end to our dreams. We are all being opposed by a spiritual Chicago Cubs team that would like to defeat us.
In our series thus far, we have looked at, “We Are The Church”, “We Are One”, “We Are Triumphant” and today we look at “We Are Givers”. When you hear the word givers, “what is the first image that comes to you mind?
Some of you might think of Pastor Toby saying, “what time is it? It’s offering time”, some of you might think of a hand reaching out to help, some of you might think of a person giving a hug, and some of you might think of “oh no, what are we going to be asked to support this time.”
The most incredible giver of all is God. As a matter of fact, whatever God does, God gives in abundance. Who can name all the kinds of flowers God has given us to enjoy, or all the kinds of birds God has given us to admire, or all the kinds of food God has given us to taste.
Who can name all the kinds of gifts God has freely given in our church from music to service, to spiritual gifts. Who can even name all the blessings God has poured into your life many of which we take for granted. Nobody here goes to bed wondering if there will be enough air to breathe tomorrow, or enough water to drink, or if the sun will rise, or if the earth will suddenly stop spinning and all of us will go flinging off the planet into space. God has freely given us all these things, and God has done it in such a way that the supply keeps replenishing itself.
God has not only given us freely and abundantly in physical matters God has freely given to us in spiritual matters. God did not wait for us to deserve for Jesus to come and die for our sins. No, the Bible tells us that it was when we were messed up, banged up, with no hope of getting our lives together, that God sent Jesus Christ into the world to die for our sins so that we could be saved and put back into a right relationship with God.
Did you know that when God called you, God called you for a purpose. God did not save a single one of us, just to take us to heaven. He freely offered us a chance to literally escape having to go to hell to pay for our own sins, by giving us a salvation we could never earn.
Ephesisan 2:8-10 says Ephesians 2:8-10 (TNIV)
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
God saved us, to do good works. Those works involve becoming more like God. If God is a giver and God is generous, then it only follows that God’s children should be givers and should be generous. How many of you know there is no such thing as a stingy Christian? It is hard for you to think of such a creature without saying something is not right here.
Jesus has never been interested in just giving you just enough to make it. Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life, and have it more abundantly.” Do you know why so many of us do not have an abundant life? It is because we want to protect the life we already have and not trust God with our future.
We are not really “in it to win it”. We are more “in it to hold on to it.” It is very easy to become comfortable in a place that God wants us to move out of, so that we can experience His greater blessings.
People who go through life opening their hands enjoy a more satisfying life than people who go through life with tight fists. Proverbs put it this way, Proverbs 11:24 one person gives freely, yet gains even more; but another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty.
The person being described here is not necessarily a rich person but rather a generous person. You don’t have to have money to be generous and to be a giver. How many funerals have you been to in which it was said of the deceased, this person always had their home open to others and children in the neighborhood could stop by and hang out.
This person was one you could go to and talk to when you were having problems. Generous people and givers, make time for others, and finds themselves being blessed.
But the person who keeps number 1, number 1 doesn’t even help others when it is clearly within their powers to do so. They are waiting for someday to come so that they will be prepared for it, but because they are holding on to what they hae, they end up in poverty. Nobody visits them in nursing homes. Hardly anybody shows up at their funerals.
Provervs 11:25, “a generous person will prosper: whoever refreshes others will be refreshed.” God has your back and God sees when you choose to bless others. Sometimes we do not know how God is going to rewards us for helping someone else. So we do things without looking for a reward.
We opened our home to a young lady to help her get situated in school. She didn’t have money to pay for being with us. However two years after she left God used her to bless us. Both of our cars were in need of repairs. The red vehicle was going to cost $2500 to repair and the cream one was going to be $2200.0
We quickly made the decision to junk the red one and get a second estimate for the cream one. I told this person about needing a second estimate and she said, “why not try my mechanic.” I did. Her mechanic fixed the cream car for $569 and the red one for $479.00.
Now that was God being a generous giver to us, for us have been generous to her. When you are “In it to win it for God,” God is the one who keeps the score and decides when it’s time for you to get a check.
One of the great mistakes we make is to think that everything that God sends into our hands is for ourselves. The reality is that everything we have and receive is going to be given away. Most of the time God allows us to choose how it’s going to be given away and other times people are simply going to take it from us.
When you come to know Jesus, if you grow in him, the Holy Spirit is going to turn you into a giver and is going to make you more generous. It’s going to become a part of your nature.
In our New Testament reading in Luke 19:1-10 we met a guy name Zaccheus who was anything but generous and giving. He was in “it to to win it for Zaccheaus.”
You’ve got to understand this about Zaccheus. He was rich and he was hated by his own people. Zaccehaus was a Jew. In those days for a Jew to be a tax collector made him both a thief and a traitor. He was a thief because tax collecting was a job that went to the highest bidder. He could charge whatever fee he wanted to collect taxes. If your tax bill was $500, he could add on another $500 collection fee.
The Bible says not only was he a tax collector but he was the chief tax collector, and he was very rich. This means he was good at taking all of your money and there was nothing you could do about it because he got to make up all the rules. Zaccheus may have had plenty of money, but he was not a happy man.
One day he heard about Jesus from somewhere somehow. Maybe he heard about the time when Jesus had accepted another tax collector by the name of Matthew and made him a disciple. Maybe he saw how Matthew’s life had changed and that people loved and cared about Matthew the former tax collector.
Word had spread through the city that on the way into Jericho, Jesus had healed two blind men sitting by the roadside, one of whom was named Bartimaeus. When Zaccheus heard this he made his way to the road that goes on from Jericho to Jerusalem.
He wanted to see this guy Jesus for himself. Now he knew it was risky for him to go out into the crowd of the very people who would have liked to have beat the daylights out of him. He had been anything but generous.
But sometimes you come to a point in your life when you want a change so bad, that you’re willing to risk whatever it takes to make that change happen. Some of us here today, are afraid to reach out and take a risk and as a result we continue to be miserable. Life is passing us by. One day we will realize that what we were afraid of losing was not worth the cost of keeping it. Eventually it’s going to be gone anyways.
Zaccheaus couldn’t take his usual escort of body guards with him. He quit trying to be somebody big. He put on some ordinary clothes and went out to be among the crowd. He had to give up his special status if he wanted a true change of heart.
When he got to the road that Jesus was expected to pass by, the people were already lined up several rows deep. Now this presented a problem for Zaccheus. When he got to where he wanted to be, he faced a problem. He was too short to see over the crowd. Jesus could pass by, and he would never know it.
A lot of times we think, that if I make up my mind to serve God, things are going to just fall in place. No they will not. Satan is going to throw some road blocks in your path to get you to turn around and go back to what you’re use to doing. God is going to let him, so that you can make up your mind which way you’re going to go. Will you be “in it to win it”, or “in it so long as it is easy?”
Zaccheus wanted something real for his life. Do you know what the name Zaccheus means. “The Righteous One.” That’s like calling the local drug dealer “The Neighborhood’s Best Friend.”
The only way he was going to get to Jesus was to find a way to rise above the crowd. Some of you could experience life on a totally different level if you’re willing to rise above the crowd. Don’t be content hanging around with people with no vision for their lives or their future if you are in it to win it.
Zaccheus did not let his limitations set aside his goal. He didn’t say, “well I was born short, I guess God ought to do something special to get to me.” He didn’t wait for people to voluntarily move to the side so that he could get ahead.
Zacchaeus didn’t look down. He looked up, and when he did he saw a Sycamore tree with a branch hanging out over the road He forgot all about how dignified he was and ran to the tree. He started climbing that tree.
And he waited. He waited for Jesus to come along. Then it happened he could see the disciples leading the throng. No doubt Peter, James and John are probably leading the group out in front. Jesus is marching along and the crowd is so excited. And then Jesus gets right under the branch and he stops. He looks up into the tree.
Can you imagine how shocked Zacchaeus must have been. And then Jesus speaks and says, “Zacchaeus hurry down. I need to go to your house today.” Do you see how eager God is to accept you, even when everybody else thinks you are just awful. God is generous with grace and gives it freely. That’s how it is with the Lord. This is the Jesus you need to know.
Right at the tree, Jesus called him by name, and He reached out a hand and invited Himself for dinner. A change of heart begins for you, when God knocks at the door of your heart. He waits there for you to invite Him to enter your life.
In those days, for someone to go to someone else’s home and to share a meal was an intimate experience. So this was Jesus’ way of saying, “I want to be close with you. I want a friendship with you.” This was the voice of God saying to a man who felt way out on a limb, “Friend, let’s go to lunch.”
When Zacheus came down out of that tree a change took place in him. People said “look at him hugging on Jesus” “The nerve of that scumbag . He’s cheated so many people I want to hurt him myself.”
But Zaccheus shocked everyone when he said, “Lord right now, I pledge to give 50% of everything that I own to the poor and anybody that I have cheated I agree to pay back four times as much.
The moment Zacchaeus got “in it to win it with Jesus”, he went from a greedy and stingy man into generous giver. He didn’t need to have a message on tithing, a bible study lesson on giving, or a series on handling money. He simply became generous as a part of his outreach to others because he knew Jesus had been generous to Him.
I want you to notice that sometimes when you get saved, before you have the opportunity to tell others about Jesus, you need to allow God to turn you into a giver. Some of us need to go and offer some apologies to people we hurt. Are you generous with giving out apologies or do you always feel justified in hurting others.
Some of us need to give back things others knew that we took. Are you generous in giving back what does not belong to you? Do you borrow stuff and never get around to returning it or paying it back.
Some of us need to become more generous and giving with our forgiveness. We can all justify why we should not forgive but that does not change the word of God. We are commanded to forgive each other just as God in Christ has forgiven us. The only thing that keeps us from forgiving is not knowing how much of the ugliness inside of us, God has been willing to let go of to be called our Father.
For some of us, Jesus has stopped, looked up and called us by name. We’re hanging out of the tree. Jesus is “saying come down, I want to go to your home today. I’m going to transform you into a person of generosity. I want to make you a giver.”
We’re so close to responding, but for some reason we won’t come out of the tree.” There’s a danger in asking for a little more time. because you don’t know how much time you have left. If Zaccheus had of waited for the next time Jesus came to Jericho, he never would have seen Jesus. You see Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem and he will be crucified before the week is over.
God is tugging at your heart to get in it to win it.. But each time we don’t say yes, it gets a little harder to feel the tug. If we’re in it to win it, we will become more generous in responding to God’s call. There will be a lot more of Here am I Us me, or use mine, or use this. We all need to be willing, to be a little more like Jesus. Are we in it to win it, or just playing church.
