The Malachi Test
1 Tim 6:10 -11, 1 Chr 28:2 - 3, 1 Chr 29:2-13, 10-17, 2 Cor 9:6 - 11, Mal 3;10-11, Heb 11:6
November 15, 2002
I. If you have not figured it out by now, I am preaching about some of the basic foundational principles of the Christian life.
A. Trust, worship, prayer, and ministry are basics of the Christian life, and the fact that I started by saying that is proof that there is another basic that I am going to talk about.
B. This is something that people think I need to talk about more.
C. The subject that I am talking about is giving and it is a very ticklish subject for churches today because of some unethical people who have abused it.
D. To the outsider it may seem like the church is all about money, but that is not true, money is a part of it for sure.
E. We all like having a nice building to meet in with comfortable places to sit, and the temperature at a nice level, and many other things, and those things are important, whether they should be or not in reaching other people, and the bottom line is that they cost money.
F. The church has operating expenses just like any other organization
G. But in the case of a church there’s more to it than just collecting money for operating expenses.
H. For the Christian, giving is an act of worship and an act of faith.
I. Giving says that God and His work are important and it says that the giver trusts God with his or her resources.
J. And giving our money is not the only way that we can give and we should give of all of the things that we have.
1. We are to give our time. Studies have proved that in our generation time is the most valued commodity that we have as a society and we should give of our time to God.
2. Time is something that is associated with giving of our talents and using our spiritual gifts for God, which we talked about last week.
3. And we are to give our money because in the type of society that we live in it takes money to keep anything operating.
K. How we handle our money is something that is important to God.
(1 Tim 6:10 -11 NIV) For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.
L. How we handle our money can greatly effect our lives. And, there are more parables in the gospels that relate to money than any other single topic. So apparently it is an important subject.
II. A mother wanted to teach her daughter a moral lesson. She gave the little girl a quarter and a dollar for church. "Put whichever one you want in the collection plate and keep the other for yourself," she told the girl. When they were leaving church, the mother asked her daughter which amount she had given. "Well," said the little girl, "I was going to give the dollar, but just before the collection the man in the pulpit said that we should all be cheerful givers. I knew I’d be a lot more cheerful if I gave the quarter… so I did."
A. The mother may not have agreed with her daughter’s reasoning, but at the heart of what she did is a fact, and that is that we, and the daughter give way we believe.
B. King David did that in I Chronicles. David believe that God was worthy of a nice place to worship and he led the people to believe in what they were giving to.
C. David believed that God deserved a nice place that people could worship him in, but God would not let him build it, because: David was a man of war & blood. That was not the type of man God thought should be building the Temple.
D. I am not sure I quite understand that, because David was a man of war because he had to be to do what God had called him to do, but I will leave the details of working that out up to God.
(1 Chr 28:2 - 3 NIV) King David rose to his feet and said: "Listen to me, my brothers and my people. I had it in my heart to build a house as a place of rest for the ark of the covenant of the LORD, for the footstool of our God, and I made plans to build it. But God said to me, ’You are not to build a house for my Name, because you are a warrior and have shed blood.’
E. Even if David was not the one that was going to actually build the temple he believed that it should be built, and he gave what he had to see that it was done.
(1 Chr 29:2 - 13 NIV) With all my resources I have provided for the temple of my God--gold for the gold work, silver for the silver, bronze for the bronze, iron for the iron and wood for the wood, as well as onyx for the settings, turquoise, stones of various colors, and all kinds of fine stone and marble--all of these in large quantities. Besides, in my devotion to the temple of my God I now give my personal treasures of gold and silver for the temple of my God, over and above everything I have provided for this holy temple: three thousand talents of gold (gold of Ophir) and seven thousand talents of refined silver, for the overlaying of the walls of the buildings, for the gold work and the silver work, and for all the work to be done by the craftsmen. Now, who is willing to consecrate himself today to the LORD?" Then the leaders of families, the officers of the tribes of Israel, the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, and the officials in charge of the king’s work gave willingly. They gave toward the work on the temple of God five thousand talents and ten thousand darics of gold, ten thousand talents of silver, eighteen thousand talents of bronze and a hundred thousand talents of iron. Any who had precious stones gave them to the treasury of the temple of the LORD in the custody of Jehiel the Gershonite. The people rejoiced at the willing response of their leaders, for they had given freely and wholeheartedly to the LORD. David the king also rejoiced greatly. David praised the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, saying, "Praise be to you, O LORD, God of our father Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O LORD, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all. Wealth and honor come from you; you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all. Now, our God, we give you thanks, and praise your glorious name.
F. David believed in the vision of what God wanted done and he gave of his resources to see it happen, and then the people gave freely and wholeheartedly to the new Temple.
G. And I think that the same thing has happen right here in this church in us being able to have the place to worship that we do. There have been many people who have given of their time and their abilities and money to see this come to be.
H. David was able to lead the people of Israel to be a part of a vision for the future because he had realized a very important thing, and that was that all that we have comes from God.
I. Anything that we can give to God as an act of our worship of him, we got from him, and we are not actually giving God anything, we are just returning to him a part of the many things that he has given us.
J. This church was only started seven years ago, and it is where it is today because people believed in a vision for the future that they were willing to give of their resources to, and it will only be in the future what the people that are here are willing to give of themselves to see it happen.
K. This church will only grow as much as the people here give of themselves, and the people here will only grow as much as they trust God.
L. If we can’t trust God enough to give back to him some of the time, talents and money that he has given us then we will never have the relationship with him that will allow us to grow as Christians, and as much as we might not like to here it what we give really says a lot about how much we trust God.
M. Flip Wilson was a popular comedian several years ago, some of you are old enough to remember him, and some are not.
1. But one of his characters was a Preacher at the "What’s Happening Now Church." In a skit that he did he told about this preacher.
2. He’d yell: "IF THIS CHURCH IS GOING TO SERVE GOD IT’S GOT TO GET DOWN ON ITS KNEES AND CRAWL!!!"
3. And the audience who was being prompted to be the congregation would yell back "Make it crawl preacher, make it crawl!
4. And then he would yell: "AND ONCE THIS CHURCH HAS LEARNED TO CRAWL, IT’S GOT TO GET UP ON ITS FEET AND WALK!!!"
5. And the audience would yell back "Make it walk preacher, make it walk."
6. Then he would say: AND ONCE THIS CHURCH HAS LEARNED TO WALK IT’S GOT BEGIN TO LEARN TO RUN!!!"
7. And they would yell, "Make it run, preacher, make it run!"
8. Then he would say, "AND IN ORDER TO RUN, ITS GOT REACH DEEP DOWN INTO POCKETS AND LEARN TO GIVE!!!"
9. And there would be a pause, and the people would say "Make it crawl preacher, make it crawl."
N. If we don’t give, we can’t grow like we should in our relationship to God. We will not grow, because giving takes faith, and if we don’t have faith we can’t grow in our spiritual relationship, and we will never be able to mature so that we can walk with the Lord in the way that we should.
O. And if we don’t walk with the Lord we will never get to the point that we can run.
P. And if we who make up the church, the body of Christ crawl spiritually then the church will crawl, and I want to make sure that we understand that our giving is not just about money and what we give is not just about supporting an organization, it is about faith, and commitment, and obedience and it is about us trusting God and growing in our relationship with him A Church can’t grow if it doesn’t give. And if it doesn’t give… it’ll crawl.
III. And a lot of people believe that when a preacher talks about giving it is more about the preacher than anything else, and sometimes it is, but not in this case, and that mind set is one reason that I hardly preach about this.
A. I think that I have preached about giving three times in seven years, but it is something that has to be said sometimes, because our giving is a part of our obedience and our growing in our faith and relationship with God.
B. But, when you give, you are not giving to me. You are giving to God, at least I hope that you don’t give to a building project, and you don’t give to the preacher.
C. I hope that when you give, you give to God, to Glorify Him and build up His kingdom.
D. Hopefully, you give with a vision that God is going to do something special because of your faithfulness.
IV. When David wanted to inspire people in their giving – he set the example. He said – this is what I’m giving. Then the leaders in the congregation stood up and they set the example.
A. So I am going to do something this morning that I have never done before in front of the church, and that is tell you what we give as far as money goes, I have looked at what we have given for the last few years and on an average we give somewhere between fifteen and twenty percent of our total income before taxes.
B. I am not saying that for anyone to say Oh look at what you do, I am saying that to say here is an example, just like David did.
C. And, I am doing it to say that I am not up here trying to wring money out of anyone or to ask you to do something that I am not willing to do myself.
D. And we give what we give, because we feel that God has given us so much that we should return some to what he is doing to reach people and change their lives for eternity, and because we believe that we can’t out give God, and he blesses us much more than we give.
E. If your leaders don’t at least tithe then why should you, so I want you to know I do, and I also want you to know that, I am sure that God has blessed us in a lot of ways because we do.
F. I have said this before, that once not long after we were married, me and Donna had a choice of having enough money to pay the rent, or giving what we normally gave to God which was 10% at that time.
G. We decided that we would give God his first and we would talk to the people about being late with our rent on Monday. Monday we got a rebate check in the mail from AT&T for enough to pay the rent, and I have never forgot that, because it was God’s way of saying if you trust me I will take care of you.
H. In I Chron. 29 David says something else about belief.
(1 Chr 29:10 - 17 NIV) David praised the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, saying, "Praise be to you, O LORD, God of our father Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O LORD, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all. Wealth and honor come from you; you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all. Now, our God, we give you thanks, and praise your glorious name. "But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand. We are aliens and strangers in your sight, as were all our forefathers. Our days on earth are like a shadow, without hope. O LORD our God, as for all this abundance that we have provided for building you a temple for your Holy Name, it comes from your hand, and all of it belongs to you. I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity. All these things have I given willingly and with honest intent. And now I have seen with joy how willingly your people who are here have given to you.
I. David said in his prayer that everything that he and the people were giving to the building of this temple was from God, and that they were giving what they were giving because they knew that God would supply and take care of them.
J. In other places in the Bible it talks about this kind of belief.
(2 Cor 9:6 - 11) NIV Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written: "He has scattered abroad his gifts to the poor; his righteousness endures forever." Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.
(Mal 3:10 - 11 NIV) Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit," says the LORD Almighty.
K. As soon as I read those passages I want to say before anybody has a chance to misinterpret them," Don’t give to God because you want him to make you rich."
1. God is not the lottery, and we are not give to him for the purpose of having him increase our investment. And, he might do that, and he might not.
2. The blessing that comes with our obedience may not be in the form of money or things, but they will be worth it.
3. There are some preachers on TV that I can’t stomach even watching. I have seen them talk about people giving as if it is a means to make those people rich, and that is not to be our motivation for giving and if we do that we might as well forget it, because God does not want us to be obedient to him and show him our love by our obedience for our own gain any more than we want our kids to, and he is not going to honor that.
L. We are to give because giving shows our faith in God to provide what we need, and our faith pleases God.
M. And considering all that God has done for us I think that pleasing him should be at the top of our list, and it is impossible to please God without faith.
(Heb 11:6 NIV) And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
N. Our faith is what saves us, and that will not change. Once we are God’s we are God’s and that’s it, but our the role of our faith pleasing God does not stop when we become a Christian, it is to be a part of our lives every day, and our giving of the things that he has given us back to him is a defiantly a part of that.
O. Do we believe that God will reward us if we are faithful in our giving? I asked myself that question very honestly when I was preparing this sermon, because every sermon I prepare is the process of God teaching me something so I can share it.
P. I really asked myself if I had the right to tell you that you should tithe? I asked myself did I really believe that God would bless you if you did tithe, and I believe that he will.
Q. So I have a deal for you. When I preach about something, I like to have a way to apply it. And, here is the deal.
R. Next week is the Sunday before Thanksgiving and thanksgiving is about giving thanks, so I want to ask you all to pray this week about giving a tithe next Sunday if you are not doing that now. If you are and you want to put it to the test give more than a tithe.
S. Put it to the test, and give it a little time, and if after you do it you don’t think that God has supplied for you or blessed you, because of it, just tell me and I will go and get back what you gave and give it back to you, and nobody but you and me will know about it..
T. It is the only way that I know of to offer a way to apply what the bible says about this, and you have a money back guarantee.
U. But I want everybody here to know that this is not about money, it is about obedience! It is about trusting God! It’s about having faith! It is about growing and having the relationship with God that we were created to have.
