sermon on Acts 4:32-37 (the Believers share their posessions) and Luke 18:18-30 (the rich ruler)
Years ago, it was the custom for people to bring their gifts to the front of the church. A well known preacher was making an appeal to the people to give to a good cause. Many came to present their offerings of love. Among them was a young girl who marched right along at the end of the line. She pull a ring from her finger that had been given her by her grandmother. She placed it on the table and made her way back up the aisle.
After the service, an usher was sent to bring her to the preacher’s study.
The preacher said, "Honey, I saw what you did. It was beautiful. But the rest of the offering was so generous that we have enough to take care of the need. We don’t feel right about keeping your treasured ring, so we have decided to give it back to you."
To his surprise, the little girl vigorously shook her head in refusal. "You do not understand," she said. "I did not give my ring to you, I gave it to God!
[from sermon on this site by Jeff strite]
I think some people out there have the misconception that giving to the church is giving to the vicar. There was a character on Eastenders this week [an English TV soap opera] who made precisely that allegation. Well, actually, I quite like that idea. This is a very generous congregation, so if the more you gave, the bigger salary I got, I’d be happy. But of course that isn’t how it works. I get the same salary whether you give nothing or a million pounds. It is not about giving to me, or giving to the church wardens or giving to any other human being. As the little girl in the story understood, the giving is giving to God - saying thank you to God and enabling God’s work to take place in this place.
Generally speaking Christians take that on board. Survey after survey has shown that Church Goers are incredibly generous. For example - Research done earlier this year by the Market Research organisation Mckonkey Johnson showed that the average church goer gave three times as much away (whether through their church or other charities) than the average non-churchgoer. Other research showed that for Christians in churches that take the bible seriously, the average giver gives away a total of 11.5 % of their income.
2 Cor. 9:7 tells us "God loves a cheerful giver.” - and it’s clear that with levels of giving so high amongst church goers, that we must be talking about cheerful givers - People don’t give that generously because they are having their arm twisted or been lectured at, but because their faith in Jesus motivates them to do so.
That’s what we heard about in our reading from Acts. When in the earliest days of the church people gave their lives to Jesus, they encountered a radical community it was not just “easy” miracles like people being healed and prayers being answered. For a far greater and more difficult miracle took place: “there was not a needy person amongst them .... it was distributed to each as any had need” It was that Spirit of generosity that made the early church unusual. Of course it was not the only thing that converted people to following Jesus - the message and the miracles must have helped! But finding a fellowship of love where the needs of all were met, where everybody looked after one another and where “there was not a needy person amongst them” - well that was attractive to them - would it not be attractive to you?
No wonder that people like Barnabas responded so generously, selling his inheritance and donating the entire proceeds to the Christian project - a generous community is an attractive community. Generosity inspires other generosity - as people look after us, we in turn become more generous - we become the “cheerful givers” that God so loves. And of course, it is not only human generosity - it is God’s generosity - his giving of his very self to us, born for us a baby in Bethlehem, dying for us on the cross.
We at the moment are in the middle of a national - indeed international Financial crisis- a recession. Here’s a question for you. Is it easier to preach on giving in times of plenty or times of poverty? Of course, whether it’s difficult or easy, I have to tackle this topic. It is in the bible. Not only that, but the Church of England requests each parish preach on giving at least once or twice every year. So in obedience to our bishops, and in faithfulness to the scriptures, I have to tackle this topic. But - Is it easier to preach on giving in times of plenty or times of poverty?
That’s not an obvious question to answer.
You all probably remember the photos that Eve [our former children’s worker] brought back from Zambia of bags of grain lying in church as people had brought a true tithe, ten per cent of their crop to give to God. People in Africa have very little and yet are very generous.
In this country surveys have revealed a similar result - that those on the lowest incomes are proportionately the most generous when it comes to giving to church and charity. Bill Gates may have given his fortune to help the poor, but among millionaires he is the exception rather than the rule. Millionaires may do impressive looking bank transfers with a lot of naughts on them, but proportionate to their income, they are positively stingy. It is those on the minimum wage or state pension who are often the most generous proportionately.
A very wealthy man came to his vicar and said, “Father, I’m having a problem with this tithing thing. You see I made £500,000 dollars last year. If I gave 10% then I’d have to give £50,000. I can’t do that.” And the vicar took him aside and said, “would you pray with me, “Dear Lord please reduce this man’s income so that he can afford to give.””
[from a sermon on this site by Ken Kersten]
I am very grateful for the people who (when I was an 18 year old student) taught me to tithe. At the time they had very little to get out of it - it was a church full of students. Students don’t have very much money - and 10% of not very much is ....not at all very much. Coupled with that, we were only there for three years, and then we were gone. So they were not going to get anything out of it in the long term. Yet they taught us the biblical principle of tithing - that started with Abraham in the book of Genesis, went through from Leviticus to Malachi and is reaffirmed by Jesus in the Gospels. And what they taught us was that it is very easy to get into the habit of tithing when you don’t have very much. Just like with that millionaire going up to his vicar - it is very hard to start to tithe when 10% of your salary is a very large sum. It is ironically much easier to learn to do it when it is a little sum. The church had nothing to gain by teaching us the blessings and benefits of tithing, yet selflessly they taught us that, and I am very grateful to them
Of course, talking about tithing may sound scary to some - especially in this time of economic woe. If you are not yet ready to do that, our God is a very patient God. God loves us - and like a mum who enjoys it when her little girl buys her a Christmas present, even though that present was bought with money that came from the mum, so God relishes every token of our love that we give back to him, however small they may be.
Everything we have comes from God:
ILLUS: A U.S. Congressman named Bob McCune, told the story of the time when he took his kids out to eat at a local fast-food restaurant. As he they sat down to eat, Bob smelled the fries in front of one of his sons - and reached over to get one.
To his surprise, the young boy grabbed his dad’s hand, pushed it back, and exclaimed, "Dad, Dad, don’t take my fries!" McCune was stunned. He sat in front of his son in silence and wondered, "What happened?"
Then the meaning of this "teachable moment" hit him. He thought, "My son doesn’t know where those fries came from. He doesn’t realize that about five minutes ago I went to the counter, put my hand in my pocket, pulled out the money and bought those fries for him. I am the source of those fries.
My son doesn’t understand that, if I wanted to, I could take those fries away from him.
He doesn’t know that I don’t even need his fries; if I wanted to, I could go over to the counter and buy my own.
He doesn’t realize that, if I wanted to, I could go over to the counter and buy a dozen orders and cover him with fries.
What I really wanted from my son was his willingness to share w/ me what I’d already given him”
In our two readings we hard first of the incredible joyous generosity of people like Barnabas in giving - and then of the angst riden guilt of the rich young man who can’t bring himself to give. As we all know from our own experience, we feel a lot better when we give than when we cling onto things. The times we are generous to other people or to charity leave us feeling good, the times we don’t leave us feeling a bit empty inside. As Jesus said “it is more blessed to give than to receive
There is a parable told about man in China who was bequeathed a rice field.
The first season the irrigation water ran through his field and made it productive and fruitful but it overflowed into the neighbor’s field and gave him blessings as well.
When the next season arrived, the rice farmer said to himself, ’Why should I permit all the waters to flow through my field into his? Water is wealth, and I need to keep it for myself.’
So he built a dam – he kept the waters on his field alone but the problem was, the waters great stagnant, and made his field into a swamp. It killed his crop because the water was only valuable to him as long as it was fresh.
[from a sermon on this site by Jeff Strite]
Amen
