-The elders read through various books together to help us grow in our understanding of God, the church, leadership, etc. Over the summer, Micah took them through the book that God used to call me into ministry called ‘Worship Matters.” The bulk of the book is taken up with what the author calls “Healthy Tensions” things that we need to keep in mind to have a healthy music ministry in a church. But as I’ve thought about that concept over my life, I think it applies to our Christian faith much more broadly, and these tensions prevent us from sliding into heresy. And I’ve thought of this through the lens of something they have at playgrounds. Any kids know what this is? A see-saw! Has anyone ever seen a seesaw sitting in its natural state perfectly balanced like this? No! It always leans 1 way or the other. And if you trace the history of Christianity, you can see the theological see-saw going back and forth. A few examples:

-Is Jesus God or a man? Yes! And if you start emphasizing one over the other you end up in heresy!

-Is God 3 or is God 1? Yes! 

-Are Christians for the world, or against the world? Yes! We’re for the world coming to know Jesus as the Savior of the world, but we’re against the world and it’s sinful desires!

-We could keep going, but the point is there are things about God that don’t make sense to our finite human minds. And generosity is one of those areas of living that doesn’t make any sense in our world. Why in the world should we give things that we work hard to acquire to someone else? In a purely materialistic world, being generous is honestly a dumb way to live!

-In April, I took a class at TEDS titled ‘Fundraising Principles and Practices.’ Not a class I was excited, not a class I really wanted to take, but it’s a class that really knocked my socks off! Because it connected some dots for me on how I (we) tend to approach money, but all the things we think are “ours.”

-I say “ours” intentionally, because what do you have that hasn’t been entrusted to you for a season? And what do you have here that you’ll take with you after you die? So I’ve spent the last 4 months sitting in this idea and praying about what it means for us to be a generous people.

-Book recommendation

READ/PRAY (pg. 1027)

1. Rich Through Poverty

-Background to 2 Corinthians: the upside-down way of living. One of my favorite descriptions of the early church is found in Acts 17. Paul is continuing to preach the gospel, arrives at Thessalonica (wrote a couple letters to them that we have later in our Bibles!), and the Jews become jealous and come before the officials and describe what’s taking place: turning the world upside down.

-A commentator put this summary of the book, just like the see-saw that I talked about earlier. This doesn’t make sense in our world! Paul is intentionally making these contrasts in this book that point to a cross-like way of living

-Paul making these contrasts that point to the cruciform (cross like) way of living, particularly in response to a group who claimed to be “super apostles” who proudly announced their accomplishments and pointed out all of Paul’s weaknesses. So Paul uses this opportunity to point out how these “super apostles” are only pursuing worldly recognition, which isn’t the way of Jesus.

-Think of Jesus in Matt. 10:39. In order to find your life, you must lose it. How does that make any sense? Until you understand the gospel message it doesn’t!

-This inversion leads to us being a people marked by generosity instead of hoarding, giving instead of taking, trusting instead of doubting.

-And I’ll put all my cards on the table here: this has been a stretching concept for me to engage, which probably means it’s exactly what God has needed to teach me! I don’t like talking about money, it honestly stresses me out! I’ve had to grow (a lot) in my engagement with money, in the ways I talk about money, and even in my own stewardship of money.

-I also don’t preach as someone who feels like they’ve arrived with this! I’m a pilgrim just like you, and just like many of you I preach far better than I practice! This is something I’m still working on and trying to grow in so that I can be better marked by generosity than hording. But I also know I’m not alone in this!

-And let me illustrate this by asking you a question: how would you feel if I asked to see your bank account, your budget, and your pat check? I’m not asking, and I won’t ask (unless you’re wanting to talk about it!) but why is it that we tend to feel comfortable talking about anything except money? I’ve had people share things with me that they’ve never told anyone else in the world, but those same people wouldn’t tell me what their annual salary is. And friends, I think that may be a way of revealing an area that we NEED to talk about. And I’ll make this personal, I think this is something I need to talk about, because I find myself cringing about this topic which I think is a way of God revealing an idol in my heart.

-I recently listened to a podcast from someone who said he has 2 guys go through his budget every year, and he calls them before he makes any purchase over $1,000. I’ve heard of other Christian guys who rented a house together out of college and literally pooled all their money together. Any purchase over $50 had to be approved of. 

-I don’t know about you, but I hear that and start to get uncomfortable! Why should anyone else have a say in MY money. And friends, there’s the problem. What is truly mine? Nothing! This is starting to get to the point where I think Jesus wants us to be, and (Matt. 6) why he says where your treasure is, that’s where your heart is. Jesus says you’ll build up treasures somewhere, where are those treasures that you’re building on?

-The theme verse for this that crystalized this topic for me is found in 2 Cor. 8:9. In this section, Paul is urging the church to give generously, and he summarizes the gospel message in a financial way. Jesus became poor to allow us to become rich. This richness isn’t limited either, and Peter picks up this idea in 2 Peter 1.

-I loved the way my professor talked about this in the class I took. What’s left out of “everything”? Well the opposite: NOTHING! So friends, what do we lack?

-The temptation for all of us is to operate out of a scarcity mindset, where there’s a limited amount of resources, so in order for us to ensure our survival it’s taken at someone else’s expense. But what if that’s a worldly way of living? What if we serve and worship the God who has made everything out of nothing? What if we really have been given everything we need, but it requires a shift in thinking and approaching the world from us? 

-We’ll get to this more in the Fall as we walk through 1 Tim., but look at how Paul describes the way Christians operate. What do we enter the world with? Our birthday suit! And you can’t even take that with you! But how many of you would honestly say you’re content with food and clothing? 

-I’m guessing many of the kids in here aren’t even content with the food they’re served each day! I know in my house we often get complaints that it’s food they don’t like, or we’re not getting it to them fast enough and they’re “STARVING.” 

-And noticed Paul doesn’t warn those who are rich, he warns those who WANT to be rich.

-Once again, as I say this, I feel the need to caveat, and it’s something I brought up in class: isn’t this prosperity theology? And once again, I think this brings us back to a tension point: because the opposite is also not true: poverty theology, and the Bible points us between those 2 extremes. See riches CAN be a root of evil, but it isn’t evil by itself. God blesses some people with material blessing so they can be a blessing to others. Think of Abraham or Joseph, men given material blessing so that they can in turn bless others. Or during Jesus’s ministry, when Luke tells us “many” were supporting Jesus and His disciples. Friends, riches isn’t a good barometer of either spiritual blessing or spiritual maturity. There can be mature people in poverty, and immature people who worldly rich, but the call for everyone who is in Christ is to grow in generosity. To grow in trusting God’s provision in your life.

• Taking Versus Trusting

-Scripture begins with a story of a generous God who creates everything out of nothing and provides everything necessary for his creation to flourish.

-Generosity comes with stipulations: don’t eat from 1 tree. Could also say: don’t live beyond your means. But instead of trusting in God’s plan, Eve takes from the tree. The relationship between God and creation is broken, moves in the next chapter to human relationships being broken where Cain murders his brother. Doesn’t say why Abel’s offering was acceptable, but it describes Abel’s as “some of the firstborn of his flock and their fat portions.” (Gen. 4:4) Abel gives the best, where Cain gives “some.” I think this is where we see that God expects people to be generous.

-And I also think this helps us understand a weird story in Genesis 6 about the sons of God “taking” the daughters of men. Instead of trusting God’s rules and laws for the structuring of the world, creation continues taking things that God has forbidden. In contrast to this is Noah who is described as righteous and blameless.

-Noah began trusting God’s rules, but then what happens to Noah? Noah takes from fruit of the vine in excess and becomes drunk. What was initially trust in God’s provision became abuse and excess.

-This rebellion against God’s ways of living climaxes in Gen. 11 with the tower of Babel. People had refused to obey God’s commission of filling the earth, so they build a tower in order to build a name for themselves, or TAKE a name for themselves instead of entrusting themselves to the one true name that matters: Yahweh. Their tower is their picture of human continually trying to take what is rightfully God’s, instead of trusting His good design, so God forces them to be obedient by confusing their language and spreading them across the earth. This unfinished tower serves as a picture for us of any human efforts to reach God, it will always fall short.

-Side note: story of a church building a pyramid in the lobby of all their “accomplishments”

-God’s story shifts from everyone in the world to 1 man: Abraham (studied his story in the Spring) Abraham’s life is meant to be blessed by God so that Abraham can turn and be a blessing to the whole earth. We saw this in the way Abraham blessed others, and those who were close to Abraham received blessing, and those that stayed far off didn’t.

-Genesis ends with God’s people in Egypt, where they are taken into slavery. Yet God still cares for them and raises up Moses to deliver them to a land full of abundance, God’s generosity continuing. 

-But even as God miraculously leads them out of Egypt, and his generosity continues in miraculously providing food for the entire nation, they don’t trust God. Each day God would send manna and quail for them, but as in the garden they were given stipulations: only take enough for that day. (Ex. 16:4) They were commanded to trust God’s daily provision in their lives, and how did they respond? They took more than they were supposed to, leading to their food spoiling. They took instead of trusting.

-After 40 years of God’s abundant provision of food, they finally enter the promised land that was supposed to have everything they needed, flowing with milk and honey, but they’re still not happy. They want to take a king to lead them just like the other nations, and what’s fascinating is God warns the people that a kind would take their kids and force them to serve the king! (1 Sam. 8:11, 13)

-Where God is generous, His people even the leaders aren’t so generous, and the rest of the history of Israel is people continuing to take for themselves instead of trusting God and being generous with their blessings.

-And then we get to the NT where God’s people are now subjected to life under a government that views taking as a normal way of life. If you’ve never read about the Roman empire, it was a BRUTAL place to live! And into that world comes Jesus who says it’s better to give than to get, better to turn the other cheek than lash back. And then went and lived that out, He trusted Himself to His Father instead of taking the honor and recognition that should have been His. 

-He modeled a truly generous life where He freely gives His status to anyone who would ask by taking our poverty on Himself. He became weak so that we could become strong. He stewarded His riches in a way that allowed others to be blessed through those riches. He didn’t horde it for Himself or hold anything back, He freely gave to anyone who would ask!

-THAT is the history building to what we see in 2 Cor. Jesus through his riches took on poverty to enable we who are poor to become rich, and then go from there to share our riches with others. Friends, this should completely change the way we view our riches! 

• Which Way Are You Living?

-Would you say your life is marked by taking or by trusting? Just a few chapters earlier in this book, Paul says that what should compel us, drive us forward it “the love of Christ,” 

-One of the markers of the love of Christ is growing in generosity. Is that modeled in your life? 

-One of the assignments I had to do for this class was to write down my history related to generosity. Who modeled generosity for me and how have I modeled generosity in my life? This was an INCREDIBLY helpful experience for me! And one of the things that stood out to me was how much being a part of the church affected my views (yet another reason it’s important for kids to be in here on a regular basis!) I remember passing the plate, seeing people drop their hard-earned money into it every week. That starts to affect your views of money! 

-Take some time this week to thing and pray through your history of generosity! Is your life marked more by trusting or taking? What would it mean for you to grow in this gift of generosity over the next month, 3 months, 6 months, year?