God so Loved that He Gave
Christmas Sermon
John 3:16; Ephesians 5:1
INTRODUCTION:
Merry Christmas! How many of you have finished your Christmas shopping? Gift-giving is probably the first thing we think about as we see Christmas coming. Some folks think its lots of fun … others, not so much.
• You have to admit that our attempt at giving gifts sometimes feels more like a chore than a joy. Some gifts are well meant … but just not wanted … and all we can think is, What in the world IS this? Or, How soon can I re-gift this one!
• Sometimes gifts are your worst nightmare … (maybe you recognize Ralphie from my favorite Christmas movie, “A Christmas Story” Show slide of Ralphie wearing a pink bunny suit given by his aunt)
• Some gifts are… just not for you! … And some gifts are just a bad idea!
But none of that is going to stop us from giving Christmas gifts. The tradition of gift-giving at Christmas has been around a LONG time. It came from the story of the Wise Men bringing gifts to the Christ Child.
But the tradition of Christian generosity isn’t based on the Wise Men. Christians give generously – all year long. The reason we give is: because our God is the Great Giver. God gave His Son --- the greatest gift the world has ever received --- so that we could become the Children of God. As Believers, we are children of the MOST generous Father that anyone can imagine.
Ephesians 5:1 instructs us to be imitators of God, as dearly loved children. One of the most predictable characteristics of children is that they will imitate their parents! So I want to talk this morning about how we can imitate our Heavenly Father and become great givers… not just at Christmas, but all year long.
It’s an undeniable fact that Christmas is expensive. The gifts we give cost money! Lots of people save up for Christmas because they know major expenses are coming. I got something in the mail suggesting that I take out a holiday loan (at high interest, of course) so I can spend even more money on Christmas presents.
1. Because He Gave … we give lovingly
But when we give gifts, we tend to cut off the price tags. Why? Because the point of the gift is not the price. It’s the LOVE behind the gift that makes any gift precious.
The same thing is true when we give our offerings to God. We may be giving money, but these gifts are precious to God because of the love for Him that is represented in our offerings.
John 3:16 starts with the astounding phrase, God so loved the world that He gave … WOW! Stop and let that sink in --- God gave BECAUSE He loved. Not that He loved a certain nation, or a select group of extra-lovable folks. God loved the world at large. And yet, He loves each individual personally. As a third century Christian, Saint Augustine, said, God loves each one of us as if there were only one of us to love.
Because we are the dearly loved children of God, we are called to love the people of the world. I John 4:19 explains, We love because He first loved us.
God’s love compelled Him to give to us. Our love compels us to give back to God. The opportunity to give is one of the greatest privileges that our Father in Heaven has given us. The scriptures have a lot to say about how our giving should come from the HEART and be done with great LOVE and JOY.
In 2 Corinthians 9, the Apostle Paul is giving specific instructions to one of the early Christian congregations on how they are to collect their offerings for God’s work. The early church established the practice of collecting offerings every Sunday. In this case, these particular offerings were going to be taken by Paul to the persecuted Christians in Jerusalem when he next traveled through Corinth.
Look at what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 9 about the way we give our offerings to our God. Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. 2 Corinthians 9: 6-7
When Paul describes a “cheerful” giver, the Greek word he uses is hilarion --- which is related to our English word “hilarious.” I like hilarious better because cheerful comes across as so sedate. Hilarious is real FUN --- it’s not a little smile, it’s a belly laugh that goes on and on until your stomach hurts. Hilarious isn’t a chuckle; it’s rolling in the aisles.
In other words, offering time in the service should be happy time. Now, I guess we don’t really want people rolling in the aisles with hilarity during offering, but the offering time should be a worshipful celebration … a time when we can imitate the giving nature of our Heavenly Father by Giving the way He gives --- with lots of LOVE and with great GENEROSITY!
2. Because He gave … we give generously
Most of us remember how fun it is on a Christmas morning to watch the excitement on someone’s face when they open a gift that’s better than anything they were expecting. This is the same kind of joy we can feel when we give our gifts at church.
If your giving ever starts feeling like a duty or chore, then something is wrong. Giving generously is part of our worship because we are worshiping the God who so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son. God gave generously … and as His children, we have the hilarious pleasure of giving generously, too.
So why is it hard to give generously? We want to hold on to what we have because we aren’t sure we can afford to let it go. The bottom line is that we’re afraid God won’t take care of our needs. This comes from a complete misunderstanding about how things work in God’s economy! You see, God doesn’t invite us to give in order to impoverish us. He asks us to give as an act of faith, so that He, in turn, can pour even more blessing into our lives.
I’ll read just a couple of the promises for generous givers in 2 Corinthians 9: God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things, at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. …
You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. 2 Corinthians 9: 8, 11
I love those verses – it’s like God is saying, In case you don’t get what I mean, I’ll try to make it clear as I possibly can … in all things, at all times, having all that you need … enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion … The way you can give generously is simple. Just believe God will do what He has promised. If you have faith, generous giving will be easy --- in fact, it will be fun!
I’ve heard so many people testify to how God has come through on these promises when they gave generously. In fact, I’ve never yet heard a Christian complain that they’ve been impoverished because they were too generous.
If you want to read some amazing testimonies, just Google something like “You can’t out give God” and you’ll see a lot of testimonies to the amazing ways God has provided to those who give. Or … just ask some of the folks sitting around you today … because we have lots of generous givers in our church.
But today … since I’m the one with the microphone … I’ll testify about one of the first times I stepped out on faith with my giving.
Back when we were raising our little girls, we went through a time when our finances got really extra tight. Inflation was high. Interest rates were skyrocketing. It seemed like we’d cut out all our optional expenses, but we were still having a lot of trouble just paying the regular bills. Around that time I had a class on stewardship where a professor named Ralph Dornette suggested, “If you’re having financial troubles, try giving more and see what happens.” I decided, “Ok. Nothing else is working … why not give it a try.”
I was already giving a tithe every month. You see, when I was growing up, my dad taught me to give 10% and save 10%. So I’ve always tithed. But on this occasion, I decided to raise my giving from 10 to 12%. Not a very impressive change, but in this case it seemed big to me because I didn’t see how I could possibly do it. I was nervous about it, but at the same time, I was excited to see what might happen. I remembered reading a challenge God gave in Malachi 3:10: “‘Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse . . . and test Me now in this,’ says the Lord of hosts, ‘see if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.’”
This is the only verse in the Bible where God invites us to put HIM to the test. And this was the first time I took God up on this invitation to test Him. And I can tell you that within two months … after I stepped out on faith by increasing my giving … my financial troubles faded away.
I honestly can’t explain how that happened. Nothing I can point to had changed, but I was suddenly able to pay all the bills with a little money left over. After that experience, you can bet my faith was stronger, and besides that, I actually enjoyed giving … more than I had for a long time.
Do you want to increase your faith in the coming year? Then take God up on HIS challenge to you. Test Him in this. Step out in faith with your giving, and then wait to see what happens. I can testify … along with thousands of others… you can’t out give God!
You’ve heard the saying, “give until it hurts.” Well, that’s not Biblical. According to scripture, we should give until it feels GOOD. Give until you burst out laughing. Give until it feels hilarious. (Give until you feel like Emeril Legasse when that offering plate comes by – BAM!)
For Christians, giving is not a side issue. Because we are dearly loved children of the Greatest Giver, we discover that the gifts we enjoy giving the most are the gifts that cost us the most. Like our Father, we get the greatest joy when we give sacrificially.
3. Because He gave … we give sacrificially
Can you imagine giving a gift to your child on Christmas morning – a gift that comes from your deep love for your child – a costly gift that you sacrificed all year to save for – a gift that you know your child desperately needs and that will give your child lasting joy --- Can you imagine handing that gift to your child and having them toss it down and refuse to even open it?
It’s hard to believe that would ever happen, but this is the response our Heavenly Father sometimes gets from His children. Ephesians 2:8 says, For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— This amazing, costly gift of eternal life is freely offered to everyone. All we need to do is accept His gift in faith.
Our Heavenly Father freely sacrificed his ALL for us. Nothing could have cost the Father more than giving His one and only Son. And God didn’t send Jesus to a life of earthy power, to rule over the world He had created --- though that will one day happen at the Second Coming. Instead, God sent his Son to die for the sins of the world. He gave His son as a ransom for many, to reconcile the world to himself. .
God willingly sacrificed his Son in order to give us the gift of eternal life --- He offers us this gift because it is the gift we desperately need. To quote a famous saying that I got from Max Lucado’s blog: If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent an educator. If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist. If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist. But since our greatest need was forgiveness, God sent us a Savior.
CONCLUSION:
God sent His beloved Son --- the darling of Heaven --- the One who ruled in Heaven and through Whom all the world was created --- into the World so that the world could be saved. And God sent Jesus in the least intimidating way we could imagine … as a helpless infant, born to an obscure couple in a humble setting.
What could be more inviting … more appealing … than this unexpected gift? When you think back to the most special, joy-filled moments of your life, you’re likely to remember the first moment you saw a new-born baby. I know I consider my own children and grandchildren as amazing gifts from God. I can’t even imagine willingly giving one of them over to death. When God gave His one and only Son, he knew that we would understand the deep significance of such a Sacrificial Gift.
This Christmas, let’s remember God’s loving, generous, sacrificial GIFT - "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."
