All right. Well, good morning, Grace. My name is Nate. I get to be one of the pastors here. So good to see you. Thanks for spending your Sunday with us. If you're new here and I haven't gotten the chance to meet you yet, I would love to do that in the lobby after the service. Before I just dive in, I just want to acknowledge that second song that we did today. That was Holly's first time leading a song by herself. She did fantastic. The biggest loser in the room is Mike, who's doing the announcements today. The disparity of talent in your union is on stark display this morning, as was mine last week when Jen made her announcement. I was joking with her before the service. If you were here last week, Jen, my wife made an announcement at the end of my sermon. I said, I'm looking forward to what you have to share at the end of this week's sermon. And she's like, I'll get in the car right now. We are in the third part of our series called the traits of grace, where we're going through what makes grace, grace. When we call ourselves partners, what does it mean to be a partner? And what do we expect of our partners? And the first week we said, we're step takers. We take steps of obedience, and that way we allow God to make disciples of us. And I've challenged each of us here to consider what step of obedience God might be pushing us to take. I believe everybody has one, and I've been pressing on you guys to take seriously, take more seriously, lean into with a greater level of depth and intent into your spiritual growth, into your personal holiness. Let's pursue that as a church. And we've given you guys a tool to do that in the discipleship pathways. And more of those are out on the information table and they're also online if you're interested. This week, we arrive at one that's not readily apparent when you read it. It's called Conduits of Grace, and it's kind of like, well, what is that? Conduits of Grace is the way that we think about the word authenticity. Authenticity is kind of the white whale of all organizations. All churches want to be authentic. Organizations want to be authentic. We want authenticity in our politics. We like candidates that seem authentic, that seem like what you see is what you get. We like this trustworthiness that I don't have to second guess you. I just believe that you're authentic and that this organization is authentic. And that's certainly something that we strive for here at Grace is to be an authentic group of people. And one of the things I hear most every now and again, God does me the favor of allowing me to hear positive feedback from other people. It's not often, but sometimes God buoys me by letting me hear it. And the first thing obviously is the depth of scholarship and wisdom that I offer on Sunday mornings. But right after that is humility. Thank you, Brad. Yeah, that's number two. What I hear more often than not is that if you like Nate, Nate's real. I'm just a real person, just a real human. Jen had lunch with a friend last week or week before last. And it was the first time they got the chance to kind of sit down together, no kids around, whatever. And one of the things her friend said is we enjoy Nate because Nate's real. He just seems to be himself. And I try my best to do that. But when people tell that to me, dude, you're just, you're, you're, you're real. You just seem like a, like a real dude. What you see is what you get. You're not trying to put on airs, you know, yada, yada, yada. I always say it is my, it's my spiritual gift to you to behave in such a way that it's very easy to not put me on a pedestal. I'm doing that to minister to you guys. So, but what I, what I really do say is, because sometimes I'll say, you seem authentic and you've done a good job of establishing that authentic nature and culture at your church. And I always correct them. I say the church is not authentic and comfortable in its own skin because I somehow brought that culture to grace. That culture existed long before my arrival and is one of the main reasons I chose to come to grace is because of how well the people of grace love one another, because of how accepting the people of grace are. I get to be my real self, my real person, because the people of grace who were here long before I am and who continue to come now insist on that from me. You guys would not put up with a pastor who tried to act like he was better than you all the time, who preached in such a way that says, I've achieved this level. You guys get on my level. We don't do that. That doesn't fly around here. No one walks around grace thinking they're any better than any other person. No one walks around grace thinking that they've got it all figured out, that they're nailing it. They've got their act together. They are really pursuing holiness well. And if everyone else would just be like me, they'd be better off for it. We don't put up with that kind of thing. And so here's the thing, if you're new, and I saw some new faces this morning as we were gathering in the lobby and coming in. If you're new, here's what I would tell you about grace that you should know, is we all of us know that we're screw-ups. Okay, we know that. We know that we don't have our act together. We know that we mess up. We offer grace for that. We love each other in spite of it. There's space for humanity here because none of us have our act together. And here's what we know about you, new people. You don't have your act together either. Okay, we already know you're messed up. We already know that. You don't have to pretend like you're not. We know, and it's cool. Come on. That's who we are, right? We are a church, I believe, of grace, and we are a church of unusual authenticity. And because of that, I think when we talk about this topic, the question really becomes, what is the source of grace's grace? What is the source of grace's grace? What makes us who we are? I mean, just last night, I was at a retirement party for one of our great partners, longtime partners of grace, and there was a bunch of people there, 60 or 70 people there, and I happened to be sitting in the living room in a circle of other folks watching the ball game, eating a little bit of food. And there was a younger lady sitting next to me who did not fit in with the old people that were there. And so I looked at her and I said, how do you know the person we're celebrating? And she said, well, I'm her niece. And I go, okay. And so we started talking. She goes, how do you know her? And I said, well, I go to church with her. And she goes, yeah, that's the answer that I'm getting the most. There's a bunch of people here from your church. I said, yeah, it's a good church. We show up for our people. We really love each other. And I said, well, one of my favorite things is the way that everyone's acting now is the same way we're going to act in the lobby tomorrow morning. We're just the same people wherever we go. And she goes, you know, I've been to a couple things, and your church always shows up well and always seems to support. You've got a pretty special thing going on. And I thought, yeah, yeah. Whenever I have anybody come in from out of town and they come to church with us, they always tell us, man, you've got some special people. You've got some people who seem to love well. And it's true, and we do. And so I think it's important to acknowledge why that's the case. So what's the source of grace's grace? As I was thinking about this question, I've told you guys that I preached this exact series two years ago in September and October of 2022. And so when it comes time to do the next sermon, I just go see what I preached about last time, tweak it, listen to it, what I want to take out, what I want to put in. What seems important. What doesn't. It's honestly kind of fun to get a second crack at trying to do a good sermon on these things. And I uncovered this stanza that I wrote to answer this question. And I'm really thinking about it as a confession. And I've been talking with Gibson about it. And I think we're going to try to put it up somewhere, maybe in here or in the lobby, so that we can see it and be reminded of it regularly, because it's one of those things that I want us to bring to the forefront of our attention with some degree of regularity. But if I'm seeking to answer the question, what is the source of grace's grace, here's what I would say, and I think this statement's in your notes. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. That's who grace is. That's who we are. And if there's any bit of authenticity in us, it's because we believe those things. If there's any bit of authenticity and acceptance and grace amongst the people of grace, it's because we start from this approach, from this posture of being guilty yet being forgiven, of being broken yet being restored, of being deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. We know that we're broken people. We know that we've messed up. We know that we have stories. We know that we are humans. And because we know that, we begin each day in our life with this posture of being overwhelmed by the goodness of God that he chose to save us and love us, that we are deeply flawed and God sees every single one of the crevices and cracks in our armor and in our character, and he fills them with love and he lifts us up. So we know what's the source of grace is grace. Well, the first thing is we start from this position of humility, knowing that we are broken and undeserving of God's love. And yet he lavishes it on us anyways. Then we acknowledge these things about the father, the son, and the spirit that we are only good because of the father. We know the scripture tells us that our righteous deeds are as filthy rags. We know that Jesus tells us in John 15 that we should abide in him and he in us. And if we do, we will bear much fruit. But apart from him, we can do nothing. So we know that it's God alone, God the Father who makes us good. And so we know if there's any goodness in us, if there's any progress in us, if there's any closeness to God that we're experiencing, if there's any spiritual maturation process happening in our life, if we are increasingly displaying the fruits of the Spirit that we find in Galatians 5.22, if we are progressively growing closer to God and developing character closer to that of Christ in the sanctification process, If there is any good in us, we know it is not because we white knuckled our way there. We know it is not because we are more disciplined than the next person over. We know it's not because we are smarter or more righteous or better prayers than any of the people around us or in the other churches around us. We know that anything good in us is from the Father and is a result of the love of the Father, most specifically through sending His Son to die for us, to suffer on our behalf so that we might spend eternity with Him and begin to experience heaven now on this side of eternity. That's why we say that we are not righteous except through Christ. We are only righteous because of Christ. Scripture teaches us that when God looks at us, once we become a Christian, once we confess and believe that Jesus is who he says he is, that he did what he said he did, and that he's going to do what he says he's going to do. Once we do that, God says that the Bible says that when God sees us, he does not see our sin and our unrighteous actions. He looks at us and it says that we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. It's that wonderful passage in Isaiah 1, verse 18, where we feel God put his arm around us. And he says, come now, let us reason together. Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow. That word righteous is best understood as right standing before God. We think of a court of law. We are in the right standing before God, not on our own merit, not because we deserved it, not because we've behaved our way to it, but because we are glad recipients of the grace and mercy of Jesus and his death on the cross. So we are only righteous through Christ. And then finally, we understand we are only wise because of the spirit. We are only wise because of the spirit. I think in the first couple chapters of Proverbs, when Solomon's talking about whatever you do, get wisdom. Whatever you do, pursue wisdom. I think that goes hand in hand with the Spirit, and that is the Spirit. The Spirit is the illuminator. The Spirit helps us understand what God is saying in the Scriptures. The Spirit helps us hear the voices in our life that we need to listen to. The Spirit gently convicts. The Spirit compels into obedience. The Spirit guides and illuminates and unlocks different things about Scripture and about the spiritual life. And so we understand, Grace, this is who we are, that if we have gained any biblical knowledge at all, if we feel like we have a deeper understanding of God now than we did five years ago, if we feel like we're walking more deeply with him, if we feel like we're able to teach a little bit, if we feel like we're able to lead a little bit, if we've made any progress in wisdom in the last three to five years of our lives, we readily acknowledge that is not our work, that is not our doing, that is not our effort. All we did is get out of the way so the spirit could grow us in wisdom. So when you ask what is the source of grace's grace, I believe it's this confession. That we are guilty yet forgiven. That we are broken yet restored. That we are deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. And that we carry with us every day an acute awareness. That we are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. And we are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. All of those things are God's grace. And so when we walk in light of that, when we spend every day aware of God's goodness in our lives, we spend every day aware of his grace, aware of our forgiveness in light of our brokenness. When we spend every day in light of that, we become these gleeful recipients of the grace of God. and that's what allows us to turn it out onto other people and make them recipients of the grace of God as well. I think it works like this. Follow along if you can. Being a gleeful recipient of freely given grace allows us to gleefully give the grace we freely get. The more gladly we receive the grace that God offers us, we acknowledge all the good things in our life as grace. Grace is something that we get that we do not deserve. Then the easier it is to pour that grace out to other people. I think of it in terms of this verse. I love this verse. I mention it with some regularity, John 1, 16. And from his goodness, from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. And from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. I see this verse every day. It's over my couch in between a picture of Lily and John. We have another frame that has this verse in it, Lily and John are our children. And it says, It's not a verse that I remind myself of enough. But it carries with it this idea of God so full of grace, he's overflowing with it. And if we'll position ourselves properly, we can be the gleeful recipients of that grace. And before you know it, it's going to fill us up so much that we're going to start spilling it on the people around us from his fullness, not from his, not from his dearth, not from his lack, not from his scarcity, not from his limited supply from his fullness. We receive, you could even put in that word, never ending, unending, unyielding grace upon grace. And it allows us to spill that out to other people in our lives as well. Think about this. And maybe you get nothing else out of the sermon, but to potentially do this in your life? What do you think might change in your mindset if you were to write that verse down and put it somewhere where you saw it every day? What if this week, this month, you said, you know what, I'm going to make sure that I allow God to bring that verse to my attention every day. And every day you saw somewhere, sometime, and from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. If you went into work aware of that verse, how much more gracious would it make you with your employees and with your employer and with your coworkers? How much more patient would it make you in traffic? Now, some of you would overcome and you'd still get mad and cuss in traffic, but it'd be harder, right? How much more patient would you be with your children, with your spouse? How much more gratitude would you walk in if you simply made yourself aware every day that from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. I don't think it could possibly be a bad habit to commit to doing that for a little while. And allowing God to bring that to the forefront of your thought every day. And see how he uses this gratitude for his grace to springboard into other people and be a conduit of grace to others. This is why at Grace We Say, we are conduits of grace. We are conduits of grace. And this is something we mulled over, workshopped a little bit, but here's what I like about this word conduit, even though it can be a little bit confusing. A conduit is nothing except a pathway from a source to a recipient. That's all it is. It's just a pathway. It's only job. The only job of a conduit is to stay plugged into the source and to stay plugged into a recipient so that the energy of the source can get to the recipient, so that the grace of God can get to the people who need it most. When I wrote this sermon a few years ago, Lily was six and didn't understand how electricity worked. Now I think she'd probably do better than this, although I've not quizzed her on it recently. We were in the playroom, and the vacuum cleaner was in there, and the cord was just kind of lazily on the ground, because you guys, I don't know how that goes in your house. But in our house, vacuuming is one activity. Winding the cord up is another activity that could take three to five business days. So it's sitting there. And Lily goes to step on it or around it. And she stops. And she freezes up. And she's trying to figure out how to get around. And I go, what's wrong, baby? And she goes, well, I don't want to get electrified. And I said, no, no, sweetheart. You're fine. That's not plugged into the wall. That cord's not plugged into the wall. There's no electricity in that cord. You don't have to worry about it at all. And it occurs to me that that's what a conduit is. If we're not plugged into God, if we're not receiving his grace, if we're not abiding in Christ, we're as good as a limp cord laying on the ground doing absolutely nothing. That cord has to be plugged into the wall before it matters at all, before it's remotely doing its job. And it's really only any good if it's also connected to the vacuum cleaner. If it's connected to nothing, then it's just an extension cord. And all we did is move the source of grace from there to here, but we're not doing anything with it if it's not plugged into a recipient. So it's our job as conduits of grace to remain connected to Christ. And we're going to talk about this next week. We talk about abiding in Christ and being people of devotion and then connected to the source where we are to spill out the grace that we are getting. And progressively in the Christian life, listen to me, progressively in the Christian life, and this is what we're going to talk about in two weeks when we talk about kingdom builders, which I think is the apex trait for us. Increasingly in the Christian life, we come to acknowledge ourselves as mere conduits. Nothing that we have is for us. All the gifts and all the grace and all the goodness that we're given is not for us. It's coming from the source and is intended to go to the recipients in our life, not sit here. If we just sit there and sponge it up, we do nothing. We don't turn it out at all. If we don't stay connected to the wall, if we don't stay connected to the source, we're useless no matter how many relationships we have, no matter how many people we're plugged into. It doesn't matter. So our job is to remain plugged into Christ, abide in Him. We'll talk about that next week. And plugged into our communities and the people around us so that we can be a conduit of the grace that God gives us walking in this humility. Now as we think about our job as conduits of grace, something I didn't talk about last time that upon thinking about it and talking with Gibson, he pointed this out to me. I think there's kind of two applications as I wrap up here on how we offer grace. And I think the way that we do that is we transfer productive and passive grace. As conduits of grace, people who stay connected to Jesus so that we might connect him to others, connecting people to Jesus, people to people. As we do that, there's really two ways to transfer that grace. We do it productively and we do it passively. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Here's a verse that Gibson pointed out to me in 1 Peter chapter 4 that I love and I thought fit in perfectly well. 1 Peter chapter four, verse 10. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. I'll read it again. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. In this verse, there's this idea that each of us have been given gifts. Some of us have hospitality. Some of us have leadership. Some of us are speaking. Some of us are just being generally attractive, charismatic people that draw others in, whatever your gifts are. We've all been given different gifts. And the longer we go in this Christian life, the more we realize that we were given those as acts of grace. If you're talented at something, that's God's grace on you. And he made you talented at that so that you might bring other people into the kingdom with you, so that you might be a conduit of that grace. And the grace is the gift. And so we ought to be looking for ways to apply our gifts to forward God's kingdom. That's why, again, we're going to spend a whole week on this, but it's that verse in Ephesians 2.10, we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works that he has prepared for us that we might walk in them. We have all received different gifts, and we proactively exercise that grace and be conduits of that grace by looking for places to use those gifts. He's made some of us, especially in this church, incredibly hospitable. I've always said, I started saying the last couple of years that at Grace, we lead the league in church ladies. We got the best church ladies of any church out there. And last night, they were on full display. We had this party going. Where we went was a house that some friends of ours bought in retirement. And the whole point was to host people. And then there was other people over there helping out with their gift of hospitality. And there was 60 or 70 people there. Half of them are from grace. And what that does is the other half of the people there get to experience grace, get to be around our community and see our love and see our camaraderie. And it pushes the needle towards Jesus. It absolutely does. Some of you, I mentioned Holly already, so I can pick on her again. She's been given a gift of raising her voice. God created that gift. So she's up here sharing it with us so that she ushers us to the kingdom together. She's also apparently got heck of a gift with muffins because they're out there on the information table and they're delicious. She shared those with us this morning. Some of you are excellent small group leaders. Some of you are excellent with the children. Some of you have hidden talents for announcements. We all have different things that we're good at. Those things are God's grace to us that we might exercise them in his kingdom. So that's how we pursue being a conduit of grace productively and intentionally is to use our gifts to transfer that grace. But we are also passive conduits of grace. And passive grace requires humble gratitude. Passive grace requires humble gratitude. And here's what I mean when I say passive grace. There's a verse in 2 Corinthians, I believe it's chapter 2 or 3, that I found years ago. And for whatever reason, recently, I feel like God has just kind of been bringing it back up. It's just something that I've been thinking about, chewing on. It feels so relevant. But in 2 Corinthians, Paul writes that we are led by Christ in triumphal procession. And that's a reference to Roman Empire. I'm not going to get into it and nerd out on history. But what a general would accomplish, would achieve a great victory in the field. They would come back to the threshold of Rome and they would wait with their army outside the city and the city would throw them what's called a triumphal procession. And the conquering general would enter first with all the conquered people and his armies behind him. It was this great thing of honor. You didn't get very many in your life, if any. And so Paul is hearkening to that when he said, Jesus leads us in triumphal procession. We are the ones he's conquered and claimed. And then he says this great phrase at the end of the verse, we are led by triumphal procession by Christ and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. You catch that? We are led by Christ in this triumphal procession through life. And as we go through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. And I love that imagery because fragrance is passive. It's just there. It just emanates. It just is. And it means that when someone moves into your presence, they're going to smell that. It's going to waft. When someone moves out of our presence, it's not there anymore. When someone moves into our presence, we don't have to say, hey, I showered and put on cologne today. They can just tell. You don't have to announce it. It doesn't have to be forceful. It doesn't have to be in your face. It doesn't have to be intentional. It's just passively. This is made aware to you. And I just think about this idea and how beautiful it is that it's possible for us to be walking in so much humility and so much grace and walking in lockstep with God so closely that when people move into and out of our life, that our knowledge of God is like a fragrance that passively passes on to them that they just experience as good. That's being a passive conduit of grace. And how do we do that? How do we live our lives so that through us spreads the fragrance and the knowledge of God so that we are passive conduits of grace to all the people that we meet and interact with and influence? I think it's by remembering this. Remembering this confession. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, and yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this morning. Thank you for a church full of people who love you, who are full of forgiveness and grace for one another. God, I pray that if there are people here who are visiting grace or might not consider themselves a part of us yet, that they would feel some of that. That through us would spread the fragrance of the knowledge of you. That this would feel like a place that's a little bit different, not because we're better in any way, but just because we love each other well and we walk in humility. God, would you please bring to our mind every day this week that from your fullness we have all received grace upon grace. Please help us walk in the humility of the realization that everything we have from you is good and undeserved. And God, would we spring forward in glad humility at your overwhelming generosity. God, be with us as we go. Him ascend behind and before. In Jesus' name, amen.
All right. Well, good morning, Grace. My name is Nate. I get to be one of the pastors here. So good to see you. Thanks for spending your Sunday with us. If you're new here and I haven't gotten the chance to meet you yet, I would love to do that in the lobby after the service. Before I just dive in, I just want to acknowledge that second song that we did today. That was Holly's first time leading a song by herself. She did fantastic. The biggest loser in the room is Mike, who's doing the announcements today. The disparity of talent in your union is on stark display this morning, as was mine last week when Jen made her announcement. I was joking with her before the service. If you were here last week, Jen, my wife made an announcement at the end of my sermon. I said, I'm looking forward to what you have to share at the end of this week's sermon. And she's like, I'll get in the car right now. We are in the third part of our series called the traits of grace, where we're going through what makes grace, grace. When we call ourselves partners, what does it mean to be a partner? And what do we expect of our partners? And the first week we said, we're step takers. We take steps of obedience, and that way we allow God to make disciples of us. And I've challenged each of us here to consider what step of obedience God might be pushing us to take. I believe everybody has one, and I've been pressing on you guys to take seriously, take more seriously, lean into with a greater level of depth and intent into your spiritual growth, into your personal holiness. Let's pursue that as a church. And we've given you guys a tool to do that in the discipleship pathways. And more of those are out on the information table and they're also online if you're interested. This week, we arrive at one that's not readily apparent when you read it. It's called Conduits of Grace, and it's kind of like, well, what is that? Conduits of Grace is the way that we think about the word authenticity. Authenticity is kind of the white whale of all organizations. All churches want to be authentic. Organizations want to be authentic. We want authenticity in our politics. We like candidates that seem authentic, that seem like what you see is what you get. We like this trustworthiness that I don't have to second guess you. I just believe that you're authentic and that this organization is authentic. And that's certainly something that we strive for here at Grace is to be an authentic group of people. And one of the things I hear most every now and again, God does me the favor of allowing me to hear positive feedback from other people. It's not often, but sometimes God buoys me by letting me hear it. And the first thing obviously is the depth of scholarship and wisdom that I offer on Sunday mornings. But right after that is humility. Thank you, Brad. Yeah, that's number two. What I hear more often than not is that if you like Nate, Nate's real. I'm just a real person, just a real human. Jen had lunch with a friend last week or week before last. And it was the first time they got the chance to kind of sit down together, no kids around, whatever. And one of the things her friend said is we enjoy Nate because Nate's real. He just seems to be himself. And I try my best to do that. But when people tell that to me, dude, you're just, you're, you're, you're real. You just seem like a, like a real dude. What you see is what you get. You're not trying to put on airs, you know, yada, yada, yada. I always say it is my, it's my spiritual gift to you to behave in such a way that it's very easy to not put me on a pedestal. I'm doing that to minister to you guys. So, but what I, what I really do say is, because sometimes I'll say, you seem authentic and you've done a good job of establishing that authentic nature and culture at your church. And I always correct them. I say the church is not authentic and comfortable in its own skin because I somehow brought that culture to grace. That culture existed long before my arrival and is one of the main reasons I chose to come to grace is because of how well the people of grace love one another, because of how accepting the people of grace are. I get to be my real self, my real person, because the people of grace who were here long before I am and who continue to come now insist on that from me. You guys would not put up with a pastor who tried to act like he was better than you all the time, who preached in such a way that says, I've achieved this level. You guys get on my level. We don't do that. That doesn't fly around here. No one walks around grace thinking they're any better than any other person. No one walks around grace thinking that they've got it all figured out, that they're nailing it. They've got their act together. They are really pursuing holiness well. And if everyone else would just be like me, they'd be better off for it. We don't put up with that kind of thing. And so here's the thing, if you're new, and I saw some new faces this morning as we were gathering in the lobby and coming in. If you're new, here's what I would tell you about grace that you should know, is we all of us know that we're screw-ups. Okay, we know that. We know that we don't have our act together. We know that we mess up. We offer grace for that. We love each other in spite of it. There's space for humanity here because none of us have our act together. And here's what we know about you, new people. You don't have your act together either. Okay, we already know you're messed up. We already know that. You don't have to pretend like you're not. We know, and it's cool. Come on. That's who we are, right? We are a church, I believe, of grace, and we are a church of unusual authenticity. And because of that, I think when we talk about this topic, the question really becomes, what is the source of grace's grace? What is the source of grace's grace? What makes us who we are? I mean, just last night, I was at a retirement party for one of our great partners, longtime partners of grace, and there was a bunch of people there, 60 or 70 people there, and I happened to be sitting in the living room in a circle of other folks watching the ball game, eating a little bit of food. And there was a younger lady sitting next to me who did not fit in with the old people that were there. And so I looked at her and I said, how do you know the person we're celebrating? And she said, well, I'm her niece. And I go, okay. And so we started talking. She goes, how do you know her? And I said, well, I go to church with her. And she goes, yeah, that's the answer that I'm getting the most. There's a bunch of people here from your church. I said, yeah, it's a good church. We show up for our people. We really love each other. And I said, well, one of my favorite things is the way that everyone's acting now is the same way we're going to act in the lobby tomorrow morning. We're just the same people wherever we go. And she goes, you know, I've been to a couple things, and your church always shows up well and always seems to support. You've got a pretty special thing going on. And I thought, yeah, yeah. Whenever I have anybody come in from out of town and they come to church with us, they always tell us, man, you've got some special people. You've got some people who seem to love well. And it's true, and we do. And so I think it's important to acknowledge why that's the case. So what's the source of grace's grace? As I was thinking about this question, I've told you guys that I preached this exact series two years ago in September and October of 2022. And so when it comes time to do the next sermon, I just go see what I preached about last time, tweak it, listen to it, what I want to take out, what I want to put in. What seems important. What doesn't. It's honestly kind of fun to get a second crack at trying to do a good sermon on these things. And I uncovered this stanza that I wrote to answer this question. And I'm really thinking about it as a confession. And I've been talking with Gibson about it. And I think we're going to try to put it up somewhere, maybe in here or in the lobby, so that we can see it and be reminded of it regularly, because it's one of those things that I want us to bring to the forefront of our attention with some degree of regularity. But if I'm seeking to answer the question, what is the source of grace's grace, here's what I would say, and I think this statement's in your notes. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. That's who grace is. That's who we are. And if there's any bit of authenticity in us, it's because we believe those things. If there's any bit of authenticity and acceptance and grace amongst the people of grace, it's because we start from this approach, from this posture of being guilty yet being forgiven, of being broken yet being restored, of being deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. We know that we're broken people. We know that we've messed up. We know that we have stories. We know that we are humans. And because we know that, we begin each day in our life with this posture of being overwhelmed by the goodness of God that he chose to save us and love us, that we are deeply flawed and God sees every single one of the crevices and cracks in our armor and in our character, and he fills them with love and he lifts us up. So we know what's the source of grace is grace. Well, the first thing is we start from this position of humility, knowing that we are broken and undeserving of God's love. And yet he lavishes it on us anyways. Then we acknowledge these things about the father, the son, and the spirit that we are only good because of the father. We know the scripture tells us that our righteous deeds are as filthy rags. We know that Jesus tells us in John 15 that we should abide in him and he in us. And if we do, we will bear much fruit. But apart from him, we can do nothing. So we know that it's God alone, God the Father who makes us good. And so we know if there's any goodness in us, if there's any progress in us, if there's any closeness to God that we're experiencing, if there's any spiritual maturation process happening in our life, if we are increasingly displaying the fruits of the Spirit that we find in Galatians 5.22, if we are progressively growing closer to God and developing character closer to that of Christ in the sanctification process, If there is any good in us, we know it is not because we white knuckled our way there. We know it is not because we are more disciplined than the next person over. We know it's not because we are smarter or more righteous or better prayers than any of the people around us or in the other churches around us. We know that anything good in us is from the Father and is a result of the love of the Father, most specifically through sending His Son to die for us, to suffer on our behalf so that we might spend eternity with Him and begin to experience heaven now on this side of eternity. That's why we say that we are not righteous except through Christ. We are only righteous because of Christ. Scripture teaches us that when God looks at us, once we become a Christian, once we confess and believe that Jesus is who he says he is, that he did what he said he did, and that he's going to do what he says he's going to do. Once we do that, God says that the Bible says that when God sees us, he does not see our sin and our unrighteous actions. He looks at us and it says that we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. It's that wonderful passage in Isaiah 1, verse 18, where we feel God put his arm around us. And he says, come now, let us reason together. Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow. That word righteous is best understood as right standing before God. We think of a court of law. We are in the right standing before God, not on our own merit, not because we deserved it, not because we've behaved our way to it, but because we are glad recipients of the grace and mercy of Jesus and his death on the cross. So we are only righteous through Christ. And then finally, we understand we are only wise because of the spirit. We are only wise because of the spirit. I think in the first couple chapters of Proverbs, when Solomon's talking about whatever you do, get wisdom. Whatever you do, pursue wisdom. I think that goes hand in hand with the Spirit, and that is the Spirit. The Spirit is the illuminator. The Spirit helps us understand what God is saying in the Scriptures. The Spirit helps us hear the voices in our life that we need to listen to. The Spirit gently convicts. The Spirit compels into obedience. The Spirit guides and illuminates and unlocks different things about Scripture and about the spiritual life. And so we understand, Grace, this is who we are, that if we have gained any biblical knowledge at all, if we feel like we have a deeper understanding of God now than we did five years ago, if we feel like we're walking more deeply with him, if we feel like we're able to teach a little bit, if we feel like we're able to lead a little bit, if we've made any progress in wisdom in the last three to five years of our lives, we readily acknowledge that is not our work, that is not our doing, that is not our effort. All we did is get out of the way so the spirit could grow us in wisdom. So when you ask what is the source of grace's grace, I believe it's this confession. That we are guilty yet forgiven. That we are broken yet restored. That we are deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. And that we carry with us every day an acute awareness. That we are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. And we are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. All of those things are God's grace. And so when we walk in light of that, when we spend every day aware of God's goodness in our lives, we spend every day aware of his grace, aware of our forgiveness in light of our brokenness. When we spend every day in light of that, we become these gleeful recipients of the grace of God. and that's what allows us to turn it out onto other people and make them recipients of the grace of God as well. I think it works like this. Follow along if you can. Being a gleeful recipient of freely given grace allows us to gleefully give the grace we freely get. The more gladly we receive the grace that God offers us, we acknowledge all the good things in our life as grace. Grace is something that we get that we do not deserve. Then the easier it is to pour that grace out to other people. I think of it in terms of this verse. I love this verse. I mention it with some regularity, John 1, 16. And from his goodness, from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. And from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. I see this verse every day. It's over my couch in between a picture of Lily and John. We have another frame that has this verse in it, Lily and John are our children. And it says, It's not a verse that I remind myself of enough. But it carries with it this idea of God so full of grace, he's overflowing with it. And if we'll position ourselves properly, we can be the gleeful recipients of that grace. And before you know it, it's going to fill us up so much that we're going to start spilling it on the people around us from his fullness, not from his, not from his dearth, not from his lack, not from his scarcity, not from his limited supply from his fullness. We receive, you could even put in that word, never ending, unending, unyielding grace upon grace. And it allows us to spill that out to other people in our lives as well. Think about this. And maybe you get nothing else out of the sermon, but to potentially do this in your life? What do you think might change in your mindset if you were to write that verse down and put it somewhere where you saw it every day? What if this week, this month, you said, you know what, I'm going to make sure that I allow God to bring that verse to my attention every day. And every day you saw somewhere, sometime, and from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. If you went into work aware of that verse, how much more gracious would it make you with your employees and with your employer and with your coworkers? How much more patient would it make you in traffic? Now, some of you would overcome and you'd still get mad and cuss in traffic, but it'd be harder, right? How much more patient would you be with your children, with your spouse? How much more gratitude would you walk in if you simply made yourself aware every day that from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. I don't think it could possibly be a bad habit to commit to doing that for a little while. And allowing God to bring that to the forefront of your thought every day. And see how he uses this gratitude for his grace to springboard into other people and be a conduit of grace to others. This is why at Grace We Say, we are conduits of grace. We are conduits of grace. And this is something we mulled over, workshopped a little bit, but here's what I like about this word conduit, even though it can be a little bit confusing. A conduit is nothing except a pathway from a source to a recipient. That's all it is. It's just a pathway. It's only job. The only job of a conduit is to stay plugged into the source and to stay plugged into a recipient so that the energy of the source can get to the recipient, so that the grace of God can get to the people who need it most. When I wrote this sermon a few years ago, Lily was six and didn't understand how electricity worked. Now I think she'd probably do better than this, although I've not quizzed her on it recently. We were in the playroom, and the vacuum cleaner was in there, and the cord was just kind of lazily on the ground, because you guys, I don't know how that goes in your house. But in our house, vacuuming is one activity. Winding the cord up is another activity that could take three to five business days. So it's sitting there. And Lily goes to step on it or around it. And she stops. And she freezes up. And she's trying to figure out how to get around. And I go, what's wrong, baby? And she goes, well, I don't want to get electrified. And I said, no, no, sweetheart. You're fine. That's not plugged into the wall. That cord's not plugged into the wall. There's no electricity in that cord. You don't have to worry about it at all. And it occurs to me that that's what a conduit is. If we're not plugged into God, if we're not receiving his grace, if we're not abiding in Christ, we're as good as a limp cord laying on the ground doing absolutely nothing. That cord has to be plugged into the wall before it matters at all, before it's remotely doing its job. And it's really only any good if it's also connected to the vacuum cleaner. If it's connected to nothing, then it's just an extension cord. And all we did is move the source of grace from there to here, but we're not doing anything with it if it's not plugged into a recipient. So it's our job as conduits of grace to remain connected to Christ. And we're going to talk about this next week. We talk about abiding in Christ and being people of devotion and then connected to the source where we are to spill out the grace that we are getting. And progressively in the Christian life, listen to me, progressively in the Christian life, and this is what we're going to talk about in two weeks when we talk about kingdom builders, which I think is the apex trait for us. Increasingly in the Christian life, we come to acknowledge ourselves as mere conduits. Nothing that we have is for us. All the gifts and all the grace and all the goodness that we're given is not for us. It's coming from the source and is intended to go to the recipients in our life, not sit here. If we just sit there and sponge it up, we do nothing. We don't turn it out at all. If we don't stay connected to the wall, if we don't stay connected to the source, we're useless no matter how many relationships we have, no matter how many people we're plugged into. It doesn't matter. So our job is to remain plugged into Christ, abide in Him. We'll talk about that next week. And plugged into our communities and the people around us so that we can be a conduit of the grace that God gives us walking in this humility. Now as we think about our job as conduits of grace, something I didn't talk about last time that upon thinking about it and talking with Gibson, he pointed this out to me. I think there's kind of two applications as I wrap up here on how we offer grace. And I think the way that we do that is we transfer productive and passive grace. As conduits of grace, people who stay connected to Jesus so that we might connect him to others, connecting people to Jesus, people to people. As we do that, there's really two ways to transfer that grace. We do it productively and we do it passively. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Here's a verse that Gibson pointed out to me in 1 Peter chapter 4 that I love and I thought fit in perfectly well. 1 Peter chapter four, verse 10. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. I'll read it again. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. In this verse, there's this idea that each of us have been given gifts. Some of us have hospitality. Some of us have leadership. Some of us are speaking. Some of us are just being generally attractive, charismatic people that draw others in, whatever your gifts are. We've all been given different gifts. And the longer we go in this Christian life, the more we realize that we were given those as acts of grace. If you're talented at something, that's God's grace on you. And he made you talented at that so that you might bring other people into the kingdom with you, so that you might be a conduit of that grace. And the grace is the gift. And so we ought to be looking for ways to apply our gifts to forward God's kingdom. That's why, again, we're going to spend a whole week on this, but it's that verse in Ephesians 2.10, we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works that he has prepared for us that we might walk in them. We have all received different gifts, and we proactively exercise that grace and be conduits of that grace by looking for places to use those gifts. He's made some of us, especially in this church, incredibly hospitable. I've always said, I started saying the last couple of years that at Grace, we lead the league in church ladies. We got the best church ladies of any church out there. And last night, they were on full display. We had this party going. Where we went was a house that some friends of ours bought in retirement. And the whole point was to host people. And then there was other people over there helping out with their gift of hospitality. And there was 60 or 70 people there. Half of them are from grace. And what that does is the other half of the people there get to experience grace, get to be around our community and see our love and see our camaraderie. And it pushes the needle towards Jesus. It absolutely does. Some of you, I mentioned Holly already, so I can pick on her again. She's been given a gift of raising her voice. God created that gift. So she's up here sharing it with us so that she ushers us to the kingdom together. She's also apparently got heck of a gift with muffins because they're out there on the information table and they're delicious. She shared those with us this morning. Some of you are excellent small group leaders. Some of you are excellent with the children. Some of you have hidden talents for announcements. We all have different things that we're good at. Those things are God's grace to us that we might exercise them in his kingdom. So that's how we pursue being a conduit of grace productively and intentionally is to use our gifts to transfer that grace. But we are also passive conduits of grace. And passive grace requires humble gratitude. Passive grace requires humble gratitude. And here's what I mean when I say passive grace. There's a verse in 2 Corinthians, I believe it's chapter 2 or 3, that I found years ago. And for whatever reason, recently, I feel like God has just kind of been bringing it back up. It's just something that I've been thinking about, chewing on. It feels so relevant. But in 2 Corinthians, Paul writes that we are led by Christ in triumphal procession. And that's a reference to Roman Empire. I'm not going to get into it and nerd out on history. But what a general would accomplish, would achieve a great victory in the field. They would come back to the threshold of Rome and they would wait with their army outside the city and the city would throw them what's called a triumphal procession. And the conquering general would enter first with all the conquered people and his armies behind him. It was this great thing of honor. You didn't get very many in your life, if any. And so Paul is hearkening to that when he said, Jesus leads us in triumphal procession. We are the ones he's conquered and claimed. And then he says this great phrase at the end of the verse, we are led by triumphal procession by Christ and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. You catch that? We are led by Christ in this triumphal procession through life. And as we go through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. And I love that imagery because fragrance is passive. It's just there. It just emanates. It just is. And it means that when someone moves into your presence, they're going to smell that. It's going to waft. When someone moves out of our presence, it's not there anymore. When someone moves into our presence, we don't have to say, hey, I showered and put on cologne today. They can just tell. You don't have to announce it. It doesn't have to be forceful. It doesn't have to be in your face. It doesn't have to be intentional. It's just passively. This is made aware to you. And I just think about this idea and how beautiful it is that it's possible for us to be walking in so much humility and so much grace and walking in lockstep with God so closely that when people move into and out of our life, that our knowledge of God is like a fragrance that passively passes on to them that they just experience as good. That's being a passive conduit of grace. And how do we do that? How do we live our lives so that through us spreads the fragrance and the knowledge of God so that we are passive conduits of grace to all the people that we meet and interact with and influence? I think it's by remembering this. Remembering this confession. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, and yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this morning. Thank you for a church full of people who love you, who are full of forgiveness and grace for one another. God, I pray that if there are people here who are visiting grace or might not consider themselves a part of us yet, that they would feel some of that. That through us would spread the fragrance of the knowledge of you. That this would feel like a place that's a little bit different, not because we're better in any way, but just because we love each other well and we walk in humility. God, would you please bring to our mind every day this week that from your fullness we have all received grace upon grace. Please help us walk in the humility of the realization that everything we have from you is good and undeserved. And God, would we spring forward in glad humility at your overwhelming generosity. God, be with us as we go. Him ascend behind and before. In Jesus' name, amen.
All right. Well, good morning, Grace. My name is Nate. I get to be one of the pastors here. So good to see you. Thanks for spending your Sunday with us. If you're new here and I haven't gotten the chance to meet you yet, I would love to do that in the lobby after the service. Before I just dive in, I just want to acknowledge that second song that we did today. That was Holly's first time leading a song by herself. She did fantastic. The biggest loser in the room is Mike, who's doing the announcements today. The disparity of talent in your union is on stark display this morning, as was mine last week when Jen made her announcement. I was joking with her before the service. If you were here last week, Jen, my wife made an announcement at the end of my sermon. I said, I'm looking forward to what you have to share at the end of this week's sermon. And she's like, I'll get in the car right now. We are in the third part of our series called the traits of grace, where we're going through what makes grace, grace. When we call ourselves partners, what does it mean to be a partner? And what do we expect of our partners? And the first week we said, we're step takers. We take steps of obedience, and that way we allow God to make disciples of us. And I've challenged each of us here to consider what step of obedience God might be pushing us to take. I believe everybody has one, and I've been pressing on you guys to take seriously, take more seriously, lean into with a greater level of depth and intent into your spiritual growth, into your personal holiness. Let's pursue that as a church. And we've given you guys a tool to do that in the discipleship pathways. And more of those are out on the information table and they're also online if you're interested. This week, we arrive at one that's not readily apparent when you read it. It's called Conduits of Grace, and it's kind of like, well, what is that? Conduits of Grace is the way that we think about the word authenticity. Authenticity is kind of the white whale of all organizations. All churches want to be authentic. Organizations want to be authentic. We want authenticity in our politics. We like candidates that seem authentic, that seem like what you see is what you get. We like this trustworthiness that I don't have to second guess you. I just believe that you're authentic and that this organization is authentic. And that's certainly something that we strive for here at Grace is to be an authentic group of people. And one of the things I hear most every now and again, God does me the favor of allowing me to hear positive feedback from other people. It's not often, but sometimes God buoys me by letting me hear it. And the first thing obviously is the depth of scholarship and wisdom that I offer on Sunday mornings. But right after that is humility. Thank you, Brad. Yeah, that's number two. What I hear more often than not is that if you like Nate, Nate's real. I'm just a real person, just a real human. Jen had lunch with a friend last week or week before last. And it was the first time they got the chance to kind of sit down together, no kids around, whatever. And one of the things her friend said is we enjoy Nate because Nate's real. He just seems to be himself. And I try my best to do that. But when people tell that to me, dude, you're just, you're, you're, you're real. You just seem like a, like a real dude. What you see is what you get. You're not trying to put on airs, you know, yada, yada, yada. I always say it is my, it's my spiritual gift to you to behave in such a way that it's very easy to not put me on a pedestal. I'm doing that to minister to you guys. So, but what I, what I really do say is, because sometimes I'll say, you seem authentic and you've done a good job of establishing that authentic nature and culture at your church. And I always correct them. I say the church is not authentic and comfortable in its own skin because I somehow brought that culture to grace. That culture existed long before my arrival and is one of the main reasons I chose to come to grace is because of how well the people of grace love one another, because of how accepting the people of grace are. I get to be my real self, my real person, because the people of grace who were here long before I am and who continue to come now insist on that from me. You guys would not put up with a pastor who tried to act like he was better than you all the time, who preached in such a way that says, I've achieved this level. You guys get on my level. We don't do that. That doesn't fly around here. No one walks around grace thinking they're any better than any other person. No one walks around grace thinking that they've got it all figured out, that they're nailing it. They've got their act together. They are really pursuing holiness well. And if everyone else would just be like me, they'd be better off for it. We don't put up with that kind of thing. And so here's the thing, if you're new, and I saw some new faces this morning as we were gathering in the lobby and coming in. If you're new, here's what I would tell you about grace that you should know, is we all of us know that we're screw-ups. Okay, we know that. We know that we don't have our act together. We know that we mess up. We offer grace for that. We love each other in spite of it. There's space for humanity here because none of us have our act together. And here's what we know about you, new people. You don't have your act together either. Okay, we already know you're messed up. We already know that. You don't have to pretend like you're not. We know, and it's cool. Come on. That's who we are, right? We are a church, I believe, of grace, and we are a church of unusual authenticity. And because of that, I think when we talk about this topic, the question really becomes, what is the source of grace's grace? What is the source of grace's grace? What makes us who we are? I mean, just last night, I was at a retirement party for one of our great partners, longtime partners of grace, and there was a bunch of people there, 60 or 70 people there, and I happened to be sitting in the living room in a circle of other folks watching the ball game, eating a little bit of food. And there was a younger lady sitting next to me who did not fit in with the old people that were there. And so I looked at her and I said, how do you know the person we're celebrating? And she said, well, I'm her niece. And I go, okay. And so we started talking. She goes, how do you know her? And I said, well, I go to church with her. And she goes, yeah, that's the answer that I'm getting the most. There's a bunch of people here from your church. I said, yeah, it's a good church. We show up for our people. We really love each other. And I said, well, one of my favorite things is the way that everyone's acting now is the same way we're going to act in the lobby tomorrow morning. We're just the same people wherever we go. And she goes, you know, I've been to a couple things, and your church always shows up well and always seems to support. You've got a pretty special thing going on. And I thought, yeah, yeah. Whenever I have anybody come in from out of town and they come to church with us, they always tell us, man, you've got some special people. You've got some people who seem to love well. And it's true, and we do. And so I think it's important to acknowledge why that's the case. So what's the source of grace's grace? As I was thinking about this question, I've told you guys that I preached this exact series two years ago in September and October of 2022. And so when it comes time to do the next sermon, I just go see what I preached about last time, tweak it, listen to it, what I want to take out, what I want to put in. What seems important. What doesn't. It's honestly kind of fun to get a second crack at trying to do a good sermon on these things. And I uncovered this stanza that I wrote to answer this question. And I'm really thinking about it as a confession. And I've been talking with Gibson about it. And I think we're going to try to put it up somewhere, maybe in here or in the lobby, so that we can see it and be reminded of it regularly, because it's one of those things that I want us to bring to the forefront of our attention with some degree of regularity. But if I'm seeking to answer the question, what is the source of grace's grace, here's what I would say, and I think this statement's in your notes. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. That's who grace is. That's who we are. And if there's any bit of authenticity in us, it's because we believe those things. If there's any bit of authenticity and acceptance and grace amongst the people of grace, it's because we start from this approach, from this posture of being guilty yet being forgiven, of being broken yet being restored, of being deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. We know that we're broken people. We know that we've messed up. We know that we have stories. We know that we are humans. And because we know that, we begin each day in our life with this posture of being overwhelmed by the goodness of God that he chose to save us and love us, that we are deeply flawed and God sees every single one of the crevices and cracks in our armor and in our character, and he fills them with love and he lifts us up. So we know what's the source of grace is grace. Well, the first thing is we start from this position of humility, knowing that we are broken and undeserving of God's love. And yet he lavishes it on us anyways. Then we acknowledge these things about the father, the son, and the spirit that we are only good because of the father. We know the scripture tells us that our righteous deeds are as filthy rags. We know that Jesus tells us in John 15 that we should abide in him and he in us. And if we do, we will bear much fruit. But apart from him, we can do nothing. So we know that it's God alone, God the Father who makes us good. And so we know if there's any goodness in us, if there's any progress in us, if there's any closeness to God that we're experiencing, if there's any spiritual maturation process happening in our life, if we are increasingly displaying the fruits of the Spirit that we find in Galatians 5.22, if we are progressively growing closer to God and developing character closer to that of Christ in the sanctification process, If there is any good in us, we know it is not because we white knuckled our way there. We know it is not because we are more disciplined than the next person over. We know it's not because we are smarter or more righteous or better prayers than any of the people around us or in the other churches around us. We know that anything good in us is from the Father and is a result of the love of the Father, most specifically through sending His Son to die for us, to suffer on our behalf so that we might spend eternity with Him and begin to experience heaven now on this side of eternity. That's why we say that we are not righteous except through Christ. We are only righteous because of Christ. Scripture teaches us that when God looks at us, once we become a Christian, once we confess and believe that Jesus is who he says he is, that he did what he said he did, and that he's going to do what he says he's going to do. Once we do that, God says that the Bible says that when God sees us, he does not see our sin and our unrighteous actions. He looks at us and it says that we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. It's that wonderful passage in Isaiah 1, verse 18, where we feel God put his arm around us. And he says, come now, let us reason together. Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow. That word righteous is best understood as right standing before God. We think of a court of law. We are in the right standing before God, not on our own merit, not because we deserved it, not because we've behaved our way to it, but because we are glad recipients of the grace and mercy of Jesus and his death on the cross. So we are only righteous through Christ. And then finally, we understand we are only wise because of the spirit. We are only wise because of the spirit. I think in the first couple chapters of Proverbs, when Solomon's talking about whatever you do, get wisdom. Whatever you do, pursue wisdom. I think that goes hand in hand with the Spirit, and that is the Spirit. The Spirit is the illuminator. The Spirit helps us understand what God is saying in the Scriptures. The Spirit helps us hear the voices in our life that we need to listen to. The Spirit gently convicts. The Spirit compels into obedience. The Spirit guides and illuminates and unlocks different things about Scripture and about the spiritual life. And so we understand, Grace, this is who we are, that if we have gained any biblical knowledge at all, if we feel like we have a deeper understanding of God now than we did five years ago, if we feel like we're walking more deeply with him, if we feel like we're able to teach a little bit, if we feel like we're able to lead a little bit, if we've made any progress in wisdom in the last three to five years of our lives, we readily acknowledge that is not our work, that is not our doing, that is not our effort. All we did is get out of the way so the spirit could grow us in wisdom. So when you ask what is the source of grace's grace, I believe it's this confession. That we are guilty yet forgiven. That we are broken yet restored. That we are deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. And that we carry with us every day an acute awareness. That we are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. And we are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. All of those things are God's grace. And so when we walk in light of that, when we spend every day aware of God's goodness in our lives, we spend every day aware of his grace, aware of our forgiveness in light of our brokenness. When we spend every day in light of that, we become these gleeful recipients of the grace of God. and that's what allows us to turn it out onto other people and make them recipients of the grace of God as well. I think it works like this. Follow along if you can. Being a gleeful recipient of freely given grace allows us to gleefully give the grace we freely get. The more gladly we receive the grace that God offers us, we acknowledge all the good things in our life as grace. Grace is something that we get that we do not deserve. Then the easier it is to pour that grace out to other people. I think of it in terms of this verse. I love this verse. I mention it with some regularity, John 1, 16. And from his goodness, from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. And from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. I see this verse every day. It's over my couch in between a picture of Lily and John. We have another frame that has this verse in it, Lily and John are our children. And it says, It's not a verse that I remind myself of enough. But it carries with it this idea of God so full of grace, he's overflowing with it. And if we'll position ourselves properly, we can be the gleeful recipients of that grace. And before you know it, it's going to fill us up so much that we're going to start spilling it on the people around us from his fullness, not from his, not from his dearth, not from his lack, not from his scarcity, not from his limited supply from his fullness. We receive, you could even put in that word, never ending, unending, unyielding grace upon grace. And it allows us to spill that out to other people in our lives as well. Think about this. And maybe you get nothing else out of the sermon, but to potentially do this in your life? What do you think might change in your mindset if you were to write that verse down and put it somewhere where you saw it every day? What if this week, this month, you said, you know what, I'm going to make sure that I allow God to bring that verse to my attention every day. And every day you saw somewhere, sometime, and from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. If you went into work aware of that verse, how much more gracious would it make you with your employees and with your employer and with your coworkers? How much more patient would it make you in traffic? Now, some of you would overcome and you'd still get mad and cuss in traffic, but it'd be harder, right? How much more patient would you be with your children, with your spouse? How much more gratitude would you walk in if you simply made yourself aware every day that from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. I don't think it could possibly be a bad habit to commit to doing that for a little while. And allowing God to bring that to the forefront of your thought every day. And see how he uses this gratitude for his grace to springboard into other people and be a conduit of grace to others. This is why at Grace We Say, we are conduits of grace. We are conduits of grace. And this is something we mulled over, workshopped a little bit, but here's what I like about this word conduit, even though it can be a little bit confusing. A conduit is nothing except a pathway from a source to a recipient. That's all it is. It's just a pathway. It's only job. The only job of a conduit is to stay plugged into the source and to stay plugged into a recipient so that the energy of the source can get to the recipient, so that the grace of God can get to the people who need it most. When I wrote this sermon a few years ago, Lily was six and didn't understand how electricity worked. Now I think she'd probably do better than this, although I've not quizzed her on it recently. We were in the playroom, and the vacuum cleaner was in there, and the cord was just kind of lazily on the ground, because you guys, I don't know how that goes in your house. But in our house, vacuuming is one activity. Winding the cord up is another activity that could take three to five business days. So it's sitting there. And Lily goes to step on it or around it. And she stops. And she freezes up. And she's trying to figure out how to get around. And I go, what's wrong, baby? And she goes, well, I don't want to get electrified. And I said, no, no, sweetheart. You're fine. That's not plugged into the wall. That cord's not plugged into the wall. There's no electricity in that cord. You don't have to worry about it at all. And it occurs to me that that's what a conduit is. If we're not plugged into God, if we're not receiving his grace, if we're not abiding in Christ, we're as good as a limp cord laying on the ground doing absolutely nothing. That cord has to be plugged into the wall before it matters at all, before it's remotely doing its job. And it's really only any good if it's also connected to the vacuum cleaner. If it's connected to nothing, then it's just an extension cord. And all we did is move the source of grace from there to here, but we're not doing anything with it if it's not plugged into a recipient. So it's our job as conduits of grace to remain connected to Christ. And we're going to talk about this next week. We talk about abiding in Christ and being people of devotion and then connected to the source where we are to spill out the grace that we are getting. And progressively in the Christian life, listen to me, progressively in the Christian life, and this is what we're going to talk about in two weeks when we talk about kingdom builders, which I think is the apex trait for us. Increasingly in the Christian life, we come to acknowledge ourselves as mere conduits. Nothing that we have is for us. All the gifts and all the grace and all the goodness that we're given is not for us. It's coming from the source and is intended to go to the recipients in our life, not sit here. If we just sit there and sponge it up, we do nothing. We don't turn it out at all. If we don't stay connected to the wall, if we don't stay connected to the source, we're useless no matter how many relationships we have, no matter how many people we're plugged into. It doesn't matter. So our job is to remain plugged into Christ, abide in Him. We'll talk about that next week. And plugged into our communities and the people around us so that we can be a conduit of the grace that God gives us walking in this humility. Now as we think about our job as conduits of grace, something I didn't talk about last time that upon thinking about it and talking with Gibson, he pointed this out to me. I think there's kind of two applications as I wrap up here on how we offer grace. And I think the way that we do that is we transfer productive and passive grace. As conduits of grace, people who stay connected to Jesus so that we might connect him to others, connecting people to Jesus, people to people. As we do that, there's really two ways to transfer that grace. We do it productively and we do it passively. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Here's a verse that Gibson pointed out to me in 1 Peter chapter 4 that I love and I thought fit in perfectly well. 1 Peter chapter four, verse 10. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. I'll read it again. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. In this verse, there's this idea that each of us have been given gifts. Some of us have hospitality. Some of us have leadership. Some of us are speaking. Some of us are just being generally attractive, charismatic people that draw others in, whatever your gifts are. We've all been given different gifts. And the longer we go in this Christian life, the more we realize that we were given those as acts of grace. If you're talented at something, that's God's grace on you. And he made you talented at that so that you might bring other people into the kingdom with you, so that you might be a conduit of that grace. And the grace is the gift. And so we ought to be looking for ways to apply our gifts to forward God's kingdom. That's why, again, we're going to spend a whole week on this, but it's that verse in Ephesians 2.10, we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works that he has prepared for us that we might walk in them. We have all received different gifts, and we proactively exercise that grace and be conduits of that grace by looking for places to use those gifts. He's made some of us, especially in this church, incredibly hospitable. I've always said, I started saying the last couple of years that at Grace, we lead the league in church ladies. We got the best church ladies of any church out there. And last night, they were on full display. We had this party going. Where we went was a house that some friends of ours bought in retirement. And the whole point was to host people. And then there was other people over there helping out with their gift of hospitality. And there was 60 or 70 people there. Half of them are from grace. And what that does is the other half of the people there get to experience grace, get to be around our community and see our love and see our camaraderie. And it pushes the needle towards Jesus. It absolutely does. Some of you, I mentioned Holly already, so I can pick on her again. She's been given a gift of raising her voice. God created that gift. So she's up here sharing it with us so that she ushers us to the kingdom together. She's also apparently got heck of a gift with muffins because they're out there on the information table and they're delicious. She shared those with us this morning. Some of you are excellent small group leaders. Some of you are excellent with the children. Some of you have hidden talents for announcements. We all have different things that we're good at. Those things are God's grace to us that we might exercise them in his kingdom. So that's how we pursue being a conduit of grace productively and intentionally is to use our gifts to transfer that grace. But we are also passive conduits of grace. And passive grace requires humble gratitude. Passive grace requires humble gratitude. And here's what I mean when I say passive grace. There's a verse in 2 Corinthians, I believe it's chapter 2 or 3, that I found years ago. And for whatever reason, recently, I feel like God has just kind of been bringing it back up. It's just something that I've been thinking about, chewing on. It feels so relevant. But in 2 Corinthians, Paul writes that we are led by Christ in triumphal procession. And that's a reference to Roman Empire. I'm not going to get into it and nerd out on history. But what a general would accomplish, would achieve a great victory in the field. They would come back to the threshold of Rome and they would wait with their army outside the city and the city would throw them what's called a triumphal procession. And the conquering general would enter first with all the conquered people and his armies behind him. It was this great thing of honor. You didn't get very many in your life, if any. And so Paul is hearkening to that when he said, Jesus leads us in triumphal procession. We are the ones he's conquered and claimed. And then he says this great phrase at the end of the verse, we are led by triumphal procession by Christ and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. You catch that? We are led by Christ in this triumphal procession through life. And as we go through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. And I love that imagery because fragrance is passive. It's just there. It just emanates. It just is. And it means that when someone moves into your presence, they're going to smell that. It's going to waft. When someone moves out of our presence, it's not there anymore. When someone moves into our presence, we don't have to say, hey, I showered and put on cologne today. They can just tell. You don't have to announce it. It doesn't have to be forceful. It doesn't have to be in your face. It doesn't have to be intentional. It's just passively. This is made aware to you. And I just think about this idea and how beautiful it is that it's possible for us to be walking in so much humility and so much grace and walking in lockstep with God so closely that when people move into and out of our life, that our knowledge of God is like a fragrance that passively passes on to them that they just experience as good. That's being a passive conduit of grace. And how do we do that? How do we live our lives so that through us spreads the fragrance and the knowledge of God so that we are passive conduits of grace to all the people that we meet and interact with and influence? I think it's by remembering this. Remembering this confession. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, and yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this morning. Thank you for a church full of people who love you, who are full of forgiveness and grace for one another. God, I pray that if there are people here who are visiting grace or might not consider themselves a part of us yet, that they would feel some of that. That through us would spread the fragrance of the knowledge of you. That this would feel like a place that's a little bit different, not because we're better in any way, but just because we love each other well and we walk in humility. God, would you please bring to our mind every day this week that from your fullness we have all received grace upon grace. Please help us walk in the humility of the realization that everything we have from you is good and undeserved. And God, would we spring forward in glad humility at your overwhelming generosity. God, be with us as we go. Him ascend behind and before. In Jesus' name, amen.
All right. Well, good morning, Grace. My name is Nate. I get to be one of the pastors here. So good to see you. Thanks for spending your Sunday with us. If you're new here and I haven't gotten the chance to meet you yet, I would love to do that in the lobby after the service. Before I just dive in, I just want to acknowledge that second song that we did today. That was Holly's first time leading a song by herself. She did fantastic. The biggest loser in the room is Mike, who's doing the announcements today. The disparity of talent in your union is on stark display this morning, as was mine last week when Jen made her announcement. I was joking with her before the service. If you were here last week, Jen, my wife made an announcement at the end of my sermon. I said, I'm looking forward to what you have to share at the end of this week's sermon. And she's like, I'll get in the car right now. We are in the third part of our series called the traits of grace, where we're going through what makes grace, grace. When we call ourselves partners, what does it mean to be a partner? And what do we expect of our partners? And the first week we said, we're step takers. We take steps of obedience, and that way we allow God to make disciples of us. And I've challenged each of us here to consider what step of obedience God might be pushing us to take. I believe everybody has one, and I've been pressing on you guys to take seriously, take more seriously, lean into with a greater level of depth and intent into your spiritual growth, into your personal holiness. Let's pursue that as a church. And we've given you guys a tool to do that in the discipleship pathways. And more of those are out on the information table and they're also online if you're interested. This week, we arrive at one that's not readily apparent when you read it. It's called Conduits of Grace, and it's kind of like, well, what is that? Conduits of Grace is the way that we think about the word authenticity. Authenticity is kind of the white whale of all organizations. All churches want to be authentic. Organizations want to be authentic. We want authenticity in our politics. We like candidates that seem authentic, that seem like what you see is what you get. We like this trustworthiness that I don't have to second guess you. I just believe that you're authentic and that this organization is authentic. And that's certainly something that we strive for here at Grace is to be an authentic group of people. And one of the things I hear most every now and again, God does me the favor of allowing me to hear positive feedback from other people. It's not often, but sometimes God buoys me by letting me hear it. And the first thing obviously is the depth of scholarship and wisdom that I offer on Sunday mornings. But right after that is humility. Thank you, Brad. Yeah, that's number two. What I hear more often than not is that if you like Nate, Nate's real. I'm just a real person, just a real human. Jen had lunch with a friend last week or week before last. And it was the first time they got the chance to kind of sit down together, no kids around, whatever. And one of the things her friend said is we enjoy Nate because Nate's real. He just seems to be himself. And I try my best to do that. But when people tell that to me, dude, you're just, you're, you're, you're real. You just seem like a, like a real dude. What you see is what you get. You're not trying to put on airs, you know, yada, yada, yada. I always say it is my, it's my spiritual gift to you to behave in such a way that it's very easy to not put me on a pedestal. I'm doing that to minister to you guys. So, but what I, what I really do say is, because sometimes I'll say, you seem authentic and you've done a good job of establishing that authentic nature and culture at your church. And I always correct them. I say the church is not authentic and comfortable in its own skin because I somehow brought that culture to grace. That culture existed long before my arrival and is one of the main reasons I chose to come to grace is because of how well the people of grace love one another, because of how accepting the people of grace are. I get to be my real self, my real person, because the people of grace who were here long before I am and who continue to come now insist on that from me. You guys would not put up with a pastor who tried to act like he was better than you all the time, who preached in such a way that says, I've achieved this level. You guys get on my level. We don't do that. That doesn't fly around here. No one walks around grace thinking they're any better than any other person. No one walks around grace thinking that they've got it all figured out, that they're nailing it. They've got their act together. They are really pursuing holiness well. And if everyone else would just be like me, they'd be better off for it. We don't put up with that kind of thing. And so here's the thing, if you're new, and I saw some new faces this morning as we were gathering in the lobby and coming in. If you're new, here's what I would tell you about grace that you should know, is we all of us know that we're screw-ups. Okay, we know that. We know that we don't have our act together. We know that we mess up. We offer grace for that. We love each other in spite of it. There's space for humanity here because none of us have our act together. And here's what we know about you, new people. You don't have your act together either. Okay, we already know you're messed up. We already know that. You don't have to pretend like you're not. We know, and it's cool. Come on. That's who we are, right? We are a church, I believe, of grace, and we are a church of unusual authenticity. And because of that, I think when we talk about this topic, the question really becomes, what is the source of grace's grace? What is the source of grace's grace? What makes us who we are? I mean, just last night, I was at a retirement party for one of our great partners, longtime partners of grace, and there was a bunch of people there, 60 or 70 people there, and I happened to be sitting in the living room in a circle of other folks watching the ball game, eating a little bit of food. And there was a younger lady sitting next to me who did not fit in with the old people that were there. And so I looked at her and I said, how do you know the person we're celebrating? And she said, well, I'm her niece. And I go, okay. And so we started talking. She goes, how do you know her? And I said, well, I go to church with her. And she goes, yeah, that's the answer that I'm getting the most. There's a bunch of people here from your church. I said, yeah, it's a good church. We show up for our people. We really love each other. And I said, well, one of my favorite things is the way that everyone's acting now is the same way we're going to act in the lobby tomorrow morning. We're just the same people wherever we go. And she goes, you know, I've been to a couple things, and your church always shows up well and always seems to support. You've got a pretty special thing going on. And I thought, yeah, yeah. Whenever I have anybody come in from out of town and they come to church with us, they always tell us, man, you've got some special people. You've got some people who seem to love well. And it's true, and we do. And so I think it's important to acknowledge why that's the case. So what's the source of grace's grace? As I was thinking about this question, I've told you guys that I preached this exact series two years ago in September and October of 2022. And so when it comes time to do the next sermon, I just go see what I preached about last time, tweak it, listen to it, what I want to take out, what I want to put in. What seems important. What doesn't. It's honestly kind of fun to get a second crack at trying to do a good sermon on these things. And I uncovered this stanza that I wrote to answer this question. And I'm really thinking about it as a confession. And I've been talking with Gibson about it. And I think we're going to try to put it up somewhere, maybe in here or in the lobby, so that we can see it and be reminded of it regularly, because it's one of those things that I want us to bring to the forefront of our attention with some degree of regularity. But if I'm seeking to answer the question, what is the source of grace's grace, here's what I would say, and I think this statement's in your notes. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. That's who grace is. That's who we are. And if there's any bit of authenticity in us, it's because we believe those things. If there's any bit of authenticity and acceptance and grace amongst the people of grace, it's because we start from this approach, from this posture of being guilty yet being forgiven, of being broken yet being restored, of being deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. We know that we're broken people. We know that we've messed up. We know that we have stories. We know that we are humans. And because we know that, we begin each day in our life with this posture of being overwhelmed by the goodness of God that he chose to save us and love us, that we are deeply flawed and God sees every single one of the crevices and cracks in our armor and in our character, and he fills them with love and he lifts us up. So we know what's the source of grace is grace. Well, the first thing is we start from this position of humility, knowing that we are broken and undeserving of God's love. And yet he lavishes it on us anyways. Then we acknowledge these things about the father, the son, and the spirit that we are only good because of the father. We know the scripture tells us that our righteous deeds are as filthy rags. We know that Jesus tells us in John 15 that we should abide in him and he in us. And if we do, we will bear much fruit. But apart from him, we can do nothing. So we know that it's God alone, God the Father who makes us good. And so we know if there's any goodness in us, if there's any progress in us, if there's any closeness to God that we're experiencing, if there's any spiritual maturation process happening in our life, if we are increasingly displaying the fruits of the Spirit that we find in Galatians 5.22, if we are progressively growing closer to God and developing character closer to that of Christ in the sanctification process, If there is any good in us, we know it is not because we white knuckled our way there. We know it is not because we are more disciplined than the next person over. We know it's not because we are smarter or more righteous or better prayers than any of the people around us or in the other churches around us. We know that anything good in us is from the Father and is a result of the love of the Father, most specifically through sending His Son to die for us, to suffer on our behalf so that we might spend eternity with Him and begin to experience heaven now on this side of eternity. That's why we say that we are not righteous except through Christ. We are only righteous because of Christ. Scripture teaches us that when God looks at us, once we become a Christian, once we confess and believe that Jesus is who he says he is, that he did what he said he did, and that he's going to do what he says he's going to do. Once we do that, God says that the Bible says that when God sees us, he does not see our sin and our unrighteous actions. He looks at us and it says that we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. It's that wonderful passage in Isaiah 1, verse 18, where we feel God put his arm around us. And he says, come now, let us reason together. Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow. That word righteous is best understood as right standing before God. We think of a court of law. We are in the right standing before God, not on our own merit, not because we deserved it, not because we've behaved our way to it, but because we are glad recipients of the grace and mercy of Jesus and his death on the cross. So we are only righteous through Christ. And then finally, we understand we are only wise because of the spirit. We are only wise because of the spirit. I think in the first couple chapters of Proverbs, when Solomon's talking about whatever you do, get wisdom. Whatever you do, pursue wisdom. I think that goes hand in hand with the Spirit, and that is the Spirit. The Spirit is the illuminator. The Spirit helps us understand what God is saying in the Scriptures. The Spirit helps us hear the voices in our life that we need to listen to. The Spirit gently convicts. The Spirit compels into obedience. The Spirit guides and illuminates and unlocks different things about Scripture and about the spiritual life. And so we understand, Grace, this is who we are, that if we have gained any biblical knowledge at all, if we feel like we have a deeper understanding of God now than we did five years ago, if we feel like we're walking more deeply with him, if we feel like we're able to teach a little bit, if we feel like we're able to lead a little bit, if we've made any progress in wisdom in the last three to five years of our lives, we readily acknowledge that is not our work, that is not our doing, that is not our effort. All we did is get out of the way so the spirit could grow us in wisdom. So when you ask what is the source of grace's grace, I believe it's this confession. That we are guilty yet forgiven. That we are broken yet restored. That we are deeply flawed and yet deeply loved. And that we carry with us every day an acute awareness. That we are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. And we are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. All of those things are God's grace. And so when we walk in light of that, when we spend every day aware of God's goodness in our lives, we spend every day aware of his grace, aware of our forgiveness in light of our brokenness. When we spend every day in light of that, we become these gleeful recipients of the grace of God. and that's what allows us to turn it out onto other people and make them recipients of the grace of God as well. I think it works like this. Follow along if you can. Being a gleeful recipient of freely given grace allows us to gleefully give the grace we freely get. The more gladly we receive the grace that God offers us, we acknowledge all the good things in our life as grace. Grace is something that we get that we do not deserve. Then the easier it is to pour that grace out to other people. I think of it in terms of this verse. I love this verse. I mention it with some regularity, John 1, 16. And from his goodness, from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. And from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. I see this verse every day. It's over my couch in between a picture of Lily and John. We have another frame that has this verse in it, Lily and John are our children. And it says, It's not a verse that I remind myself of enough. But it carries with it this idea of God so full of grace, he's overflowing with it. And if we'll position ourselves properly, we can be the gleeful recipients of that grace. And before you know it, it's going to fill us up so much that we're going to start spilling it on the people around us from his fullness, not from his, not from his dearth, not from his lack, not from his scarcity, not from his limited supply from his fullness. We receive, you could even put in that word, never ending, unending, unyielding grace upon grace. And it allows us to spill that out to other people in our lives as well. Think about this. And maybe you get nothing else out of the sermon, but to potentially do this in your life? What do you think might change in your mindset if you were to write that verse down and put it somewhere where you saw it every day? What if this week, this month, you said, you know what, I'm going to make sure that I allow God to bring that verse to my attention every day. And every day you saw somewhere, sometime, and from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. If you went into work aware of that verse, how much more gracious would it make you with your employees and with your employer and with your coworkers? How much more patient would it make you in traffic? Now, some of you would overcome and you'd still get mad and cuss in traffic, but it'd be harder, right? How much more patient would you be with your children, with your spouse? How much more gratitude would you walk in if you simply made yourself aware every day that from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. I don't think it could possibly be a bad habit to commit to doing that for a little while. And allowing God to bring that to the forefront of your thought every day. And see how he uses this gratitude for his grace to springboard into other people and be a conduit of grace to others. This is why at Grace We Say, we are conduits of grace. We are conduits of grace. And this is something we mulled over, workshopped a little bit, but here's what I like about this word conduit, even though it can be a little bit confusing. A conduit is nothing except a pathway from a source to a recipient. That's all it is. It's just a pathway. It's only job. The only job of a conduit is to stay plugged into the source and to stay plugged into a recipient so that the energy of the source can get to the recipient, so that the grace of God can get to the people who need it most. When I wrote this sermon a few years ago, Lily was six and didn't understand how electricity worked. Now I think she'd probably do better than this, although I've not quizzed her on it recently. We were in the playroom, and the vacuum cleaner was in there, and the cord was just kind of lazily on the ground, because you guys, I don't know how that goes in your house. But in our house, vacuuming is one activity. Winding the cord up is another activity that could take three to five business days. So it's sitting there. And Lily goes to step on it or around it. And she stops. And she freezes up. And she's trying to figure out how to get around. And I go, what's wrong, baby? And she goes, well, I don't want to get electrified. And I said, no, no, sweetheart. You're fine. That's not plugged into the wall. That cord's not plugged into the wall. There's no electricity in that cord. You don't have to worry about it at all. And it occurs to me that that's what a conduit is. If we're not plugged into God, if we're not receiving his grace, if we're not abiding in Christ, we're as good as a limp cord laying on the ground doing absolutely nothing. That cord has to be plugged into the wall before it matters at all, before it's remotely doing its job. And it's really only any good if it's also connected to the vacuum cleaner. If it's connected to nothing, then it's just an extension cord. And all we did is move the source of grace from there to here, but we're not doing anything with it if it's not plugged into a recipient. So it's our job as conduits of grace to remain connected to Christ. And we're going to talk about this next week. We talk about abiding in Christ and being people of devotion and then connected to the source where we are to spill out the grace that we are getting. And progressively in the Christian life, listen to me, progressively in the Christian life, and this is what we're going to talk about in two weeks when we talk about kingdom builders, which I think is the apex trait for us. Increasingly in the Christian life, we come to acknowledge ourselves as mere conduits. Nothing that we have is for us. All the gifts and all the grace and all the goodness that we're given is not for us. It's coming from the source and is intended to go to the recipients in our life, not sit here. If we just sit there and sponge it up, we do nothing. We don't turn it out at all. If we don't stay connected to the wall, if we don't stay connected to the source, we're useless no matter how many relationships we have, no matter how many people we're plugged into. It doesn't matter. So our job is to remain plugged into Christ, abide in Him. We'll talk about that next week. And plugged into our communities and the people around us so that we can be a conduit of the grace that God gives us walking in this humility. Now as we think about our job as conduits of grace, something I didn't talk about last time that upon thinking about it and talking with Gibson, he pointed this out to me. I think there's kind of two applications as I wrap up here on how we offer grace. And I think the way that we do that is we transfer productive and passive grace. As conduits of grace, people who stay connected to Jesus so that we might connect him to others, connecting people to Jesus, people to people. As we do that, there's really two ways to transfer that grace. We do it productively and we do it passively. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Productive grace requires selfless sharing. Here's a verse that Gibson pointed out to me in 1 Peter chapter 4 that I love and I thought fit in perfectly well. 1 Peter chapter four, verse 10. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. I'll read it again. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. In this verse, there's this idea that each of us have been given gifts. Some of us have hospitality. Some of us have leadership. Some of us are speaking. Some of us are just being generally attractive, charismatic people that draw others in, whatever your gifts are. We've all been given different gifts. And the longer we go in this Christian life, the more we realize that we were given those as acts of grace. If you're talented at something, that's God's grace on you. And he made you talented at that so that you might bring other people into the kingdom with you, so that you might be a conduit of that grace. And the grace is the gift. And so we ought to be looking for ways to apply our gifts to forward God's kingdom. That's why, again, we're going to spend a whole week on this, but it's that verse in Ephesians 2.10, we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works that he has prepared for us that we might walk in them. We have all received different gifts, and we proactively exercise that grace and be conduits of that grace by looking for places to use those gifts. He's made some of us, especially in this church, incredibly hospitable. I've always said, I started saying the last couple of years that at Grace, we lead the league in church ladies. We got the best church ladies of any church out there. And last night, they were on full display. We had this party going. Where we went was a house that some friends of ours bought in retirement. And the whole point was to host people. And then there was other people over there helping out with their gift of hospitality. And there was 60 or 70 people there. Half of them are from grace. And what that does is the other half of the people there get to experience grace, get to be around our community and see our love and see our camaraderie. And it pushes the needle towards Jesus. It absolutely does. Some of you, I mentioned Holly already, so I can pick on her again. She's been given a gift of raising her voice. God created that gift. So she's up here sharing it with us so that she ushers us to the kingdom together. She's also apparently got heck of a gift with muffins because they're out there on the information table and they're delicious. She shared those with us this morning. Some of you are excellent small group leaders. Some of you are excellent with the children. Some of you have hidden talents for announcements. We all have different things that we're good at. Those things are God's grace to us that we might exercise them in his kingdom. So that's how we pursue being a conduit of grace productively and intentionally is to use our gifts to transfer that grace. But we are also passive conduits of grace. And passive grace requires humble gratitude. Passive grace requires humble gratitude. And here's what I mean when I say passive grace. There's a verse in 2 Corinthians, I believe it's chapter 2 or 3, that I found years ago. And for whatever reason, recently, I feel like God has just kind of been bringing it back up. It's just something that I've been thinking about, chewing on. It feels so relevant. But in 2 Corinthians, Paul writes that we are led by Christ in triumphal procession. And that's a reference to Roman Empire. I'm not going to get into it and nerd out on history. But what a general would accomplish, would achieve a great victory in the field. They would come back to the threshold of Rome and they would wait with their army outside the city and the city would throw them what's called a triumphal procession. And the conquering general would enter first with all the conquered people and his armies behind him. It was this great thing of honor. You didn't get very many in your life, if any. And so Paul is hearkening to that when he said, Jesus leads us in triumphal procession. We are the ones he's conquered and claimed. And then he says this great phrase at the end of the verse, we are led by triumphal procession by Christ and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. You catch that? We are led by Christ in this triumphal procession through life. And as we go through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of God. And I love that imagery because fragrance is passive. It's just there. It just emanates. It just is. And it means that when someone moves into your presence, they're going to smell that. It's going to waft. When someone moves out of our presence, it's not there anymore. When someone moves into our presence, we don't have to say, hey, I showered and put on cologne today. They can just tell. You don't have to announce it. It doesn't have to be forceful. It doesn't have to be in your face. It doesn't have to be intentional. It's just passively. This is made aware to you. And I just think about this idea and how beautiful it is that it's possible for us to be walking in so much humility and so much grace and walking in lockstep with God so closely that when people move into and out of our life, that our knowledge of God is like a fragrance that passively passes on to them that they just experience as good. That's being a passive conduit of grace. And how do we do that? How do we live our lives so that through us spreads the fragrance and the knowledge of God so that we are passive conduits of grace to all the people that we meet and interact with and influence? I think it's by remembering this. Remembering this confession. At grace, we understand. We are guilty, yet forgiven. We are broken, yet restored. We are deeply flawed, and yet deeply loved. We are only good because of the Father. We are only righteous because of the Son. We are only wise because of the Spirit. And all of this is grace. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this morning. Thank you for a church full of people who love you, who are full of forgiveness and grace for one another. God, I pray that if there are people here who are visiting grace or might not consider themselves a part of us yet, that they would feel some of that. That through us would spread the fragrance of the knowledge of you. That this would feel like a place that's a little bit different, not because we're better in any way, but just because we love each other well and we walk in humility. God, would you please bring to our mind every day this week that from your fullness we have all received grace upon grace. Please help us walk in the humility of the realization that everything we have from you is good and undeserved. And God, would we spring forward in glad humility at your overwhelming generosity. God, be with us as we go. Him ascend behind and before. In Jesus' name, amen.
If you're like a lot of us, then this jar kind of looks like your life as we entered the pandemic. Lots of things in our life that are really important to us, big deals, things that we definitely want to prioritize, but maybe sometimes we have a hard time finding time for, and then other things in our life that are probably important, but maybe not essential, and we'd love to give our time to them, but we probably don't need to make big priorities out of them. But what happens in the end when we get so busy is that we don't have time for everything, right? But then with the pandemic, life, well it kind of hit the reset button. And we spent most of last year with nothing but time on our hands. And now, as we face moving back into what feels like normal, I think that we have this unique opportunity to reassemble our lives. And as we have this opportunity, I thought it would be appropriate for Grace to stop and really think critically about well, what are our big rocks? What are the things in our life that are the most important to us? What are the things that we want to prioritize above and beyond everything else and what would our life look like if we actually identified our big rocks and prioritized our time around those things? What if we put these rocks in first and made sure that there was space in our life for the things that were most important and then around those things we allowed all the other little things to kind of fill in the rest of our time and priorities? What would it look like if we were to hit the reset button on our life and reassemble it in such a way that we had time and space for what was important to us and we didn't have to worry at all about the other things that just at the end of the day, they're not nearly as big of a deal. What are our big rocks? And how do we make space for them as we enter into a new normal? Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I get to be the pastor here. A little confession, after we shot that video in the back corner, I was on my hands and knees for about 15 minutes picking up all those rocks. So I'm really glad we got it there on that first take, and I didn't have to do that again. Thank you for being here. Like I said, I'm the senior pastor here. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I would love to do that. We got a full crew here this morning. That is exciting and good. So thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us online, particularly if you're on vacation and you're still choosing to make this a part of your Sunday. We are grateful for that. I'm really looking forward to the rest of this series as we talk about exactly what I addressed in the video. This idea of coming kind of back to life, the world feeling normal again, or at least approaching it. If we can avoid this Delta variant, but that's a whole different conversation. But it feels like we're approaching that. And as we do it, we have this unique opportunity to kind of reconstruct our life around the things that are most important to us. And really, we have this opportunity to reconstruct our life around Jesus. So for the next four weeks, we're going to talk about what our big rocks are. What are the things that are the most important to us and how do we orchestrate those things around Jesus and around this pursuit of God the Father. And I said specifically that I'm looking forward to the rest of the weeks of the series because I'm not looking forward to this morning in this series. I did not wake up this morning excited for this sermon. Some Sundays I wake up and I'm really, really, I can't wait to share with you what God has laid on my heart. Last Sunday is a great example of that. This Sunday, I'm preaching about money. So when I got up this morning, it wasn't like, yes, the tithe, here we come. Nor did you get up hoping that this would be the Sunday that I talked about money. So listen, I'll just confess up front. I'm no more interested in preaching this than you are in hearing it. Okay, but we're here now. So this is what we're going to do. And really, the reason that we're talking about this is first of all, first and foremost, I don't talk about this very much at Grace. The last time we talked about this was in February of 2020, and I didn't even do it. It was Doug Bergeson, all right? So we don't do it a whole lot, but this topic is all throughout the Bible. Scripture is replete with instructions on giving about big rocks in life, if we're going to talk about the things that matter most to us and how to prioritize those around Jesus, then we have to talk about finances. We have to ask the question, what does God want us to do with our resources and with our money? And the Bible talks about it so much that it would be irresponsible as a church and I'd be irresponsible as a pastor if we didn't revisit it with some regularity. So we arrive at it this morning and as we arrive at it, I'm kind of approaching it like this. This is why I'm sitting down for this one at a table instead of standing and gesticulating and walking around wildly and trying to keep calm and not yell at you because I'm approaching this as if you and I could have a conversation about it. If you and I were able to meet for lunch or if you could come to the office or we meet somewhere and we could talk and your question was, what does the Bible have to say about giving anyways? Or maybe even, why does God want me to give? Then this is the conversation that I would want to have with you. So I'm staying seated to remind me that this is what I would like to say to each of you if we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about this together. And as we do that, I would even say to you this, that as I wrote and approached this sermon, I really had in mind the person who is new to church. Maybe you are someone who, for the first time in a long time, church is important to you again. For the first time in a long time, spiritual health is important to you again. And so maybe you're kind of trying to get reengaged spiritually. Maybe you haven't been in church a lot for the past five, 10 years, and so you're kind of starting to re-engage and maybe have never really thought critically about giving and what the Bible has to say about it. This is for the new and the non-believers, for those of us who hear that we should give in church, who probably understand that the Bible tells us to do it, but maybe we don't know all the whys around it and maybe we don't have a developed theology of why we should be generous. So this sermon in particular is for you. Now I know that at Grace, and I see the evidence of it over and over again, we have plenty of you who have a really good theology of giving, who understand tithing and being generous and why we do it. And so for you, I hope that we hit on some things that are encouraging, particularly the first point that I make. I think we should apply it to everything, not just giving. And so I hope that there's some encouraging ways to think about it. But this is really for folks who, if I sat you down and I said, what does the Bible say about giving or why should we give? This is for you if you feel like, gosh, I'm not sure how well I would answer that. So like I said, I'm approaching it as a conversation and I want to approach the conversation with what the Bible even has to say about it. And as I sought that out this week, you know, the Old Testament has a lot of very specific instructions that we are to give. The Old Testament introduces this idea of giving in generosity like a new idea. Leave the corners of your field for the sojourners, for the poor, for the widow, for the aliens, for the people who don't yet have a home. We're told to bring our tithe to the storehouse in the Old Testament. We're told there's a whole portion in Leviticus that tells us exactly, tells the children of Israel exactly how they are to give. So in the Old Testament, it's given as an instruction. It's introduced almost as a new idea. But what you find in the New Testament, if you want to read New Testament verses about giving, and the New Testament is simply the part of the Bible that comes during Jesus's life and after. And Jesus kind of changes everything. So what does the Bible have to say about giving once Jesus gets on the scene? Well, once Jesus arrives, the instructions about giving become a little bit presumptive, as if this is a thing that we already know. This is actually what Jesus says about it in the Sermon on the Mount. If you have a Bible, you can turn to Matthew chapter 6. I'm going to read you verses 1 through 4. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus' first recorded public address. It's the first time he talks. And he has performed miracles and those people began to follow them and then he begins to preach to them and he hits on myriad topics. But then he lands on giving for a different directions. But the interesting part to me about this verse, if you want to ask what does the New Testament teach about giving, is the two uses of the word when. When you give. When you give to the needy. Jesus is talking to the huddled masses. Talking to thousands of people in the middle of the day, presumably jobless folks for the most part. And he still assumes that they know, without ever introducing giving as a new idea, he assumes that they know that they should give. He assumes that they know that God expects them to be generous people. And so he says, when you do it, do it in such a way that you're not doing it in a showy way. Do it in secret. Be discreet about it. And there's a whole teaching there. But again, what's interesting to me is when you give, when you do it. And I bring that up because I think that that's how familiar a lot of us are with giving. We might not know why we're supposed to do it. We might not know what for. We might not know how we should be compelled to do it. We just know that we are supposed to. And so the interesting question is why? Why are we supposed to give? Why does God ask us in the Old Testament when he's setting everything up and then just assume of us that we know that we ought to in the New Testament? Why does God do that? And so we're going to spend the rest of the morning kind of answering that question, and this is the conversational piece of it. Why does God want me to give? The most important reason, the most important reason and most underrated reason we give is because God tells us to. The most important, and this is key, most underrated reason that we give is because God tells us to. Now, listen, here's why I say this. When my mom was growing up, she grew up in the 60s and 70s, and Linda, her mom, my mom, all wonderful woman, she ruled with an iron fist, man. This was back in the good old days, all right, when it was nice to be a parent. You rule with an iron fist. That was a funny slip. You ruled with an iron fist. Kids are to be seen and not heard. When the company comes over, you go upstairs. You do not interrupt. And when my mom would get out of line when she was told to do something, and she said, why? She had the audacity to say, why do I have to clean your room? Why? Because I told you to. Fire would burn in Linda's eyes, right? And mom would know. She better do whatever it was she was asked to do, even if it makes no sense at all to her, because there is going to be some serious repercussions if she doesn't. She saw the fire, and so she got right. And so when my mom grew up, because I told you to, was all the reason that a child needed. Well, when that's the only reason you get, that develops in you a little bit of resentment, right? This heart of resentment because my mom is kind and sweet and not rebellious like me and really was asking genuinely why I don't understand. Why do you want me to do that right now? It seems like I should be doing something else. Why do you want me to do that? But she wasn't allowed to ask that. And so that left her frustrated and resentful. So when she had children, she decided that because I said so is never a reason. I will always take the time to explain to my children why I'm asking them to do something. And to her credit, she did that. But when you're raising Nate, that becomes a real hassle. And I was always allowed to ask why. And I love that quote. There's some quote I picked up years ago that a reason is an invitation for an argument. And that's very true. And so I was always invited into that argument. Why? Go clean your room. Why do I have to do that right now? Go mow the grass. Why? And listen, if the why wasn't good enough, well, I didn't have to do it. In my head, if the why is not good enough, if it can't justify the request, well, then your request is dumb. And so what I learned in that environment is asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It manifests this idea of, okay, I understand what you want me to do, but I'm not going to do that until your reason justifies your request. And if it doesn't, if it falls short of King Nate's gauntlet of reasons, then you can forget it, buddy. So in our house, our response with Lily and then with John, which John can't talk yet. And I remember when Lily couldn't talk and people were like, just be grateful for these times. And I thought, you're jerks. You're not jerks. That makes sense to me now. John can't talk yet, but Lily can, and she likes to ask why. Lily's my daughter, for those of you who don't know me, not just some girl I talk about. But she likes to ask why. But the policy that we've adopted in our house is, first you obey, then you ask why. And this is gonna be what solves it forever. She'll have no issues when she's a parent. She'll replicate this exactly, right? But first you obey and then you ask why. First show that you're gonna be obedient. First show that you're going to submit. First show that the question is genuine and not an attempt to get out of it. And then come and we'll talk to you forever when you have a good attitude about the whys of why we should do something. And I bring this up because I think it's really important as we think about how we respond to the instructions of God. I know that very often when we are met with a teaching from Scripture that we should give, that we should read the Bible, that we should be selfless, that we should forgive as we are forgiven, that we should be generous to others, that we should turn the other cheek, that whenever it is possible for us, as far as it concerns us, that we should seek peace in others when peace is just not the thing that we want right now. Often in my life, and maybe yours too, we want to know the why before we offer our obedience. We want it to make sense to us before King Nate deigns to obey the instructions that I find here. And I will confess to you this, as I thought about this this week. This is not so much an indictment on your attitude, that's up to you, as it is sometimes an indictment on my preaching. Because when I preach and I give us instructions from the word, I always start with a why. Because I don't want to paint God as this ruthless dictator who sits in heaven giving you rules. I always want you to understand why it's what's best for you. But when we jump straight to the why before obedience, I think that begats in us this sense of entitlement. That if God's whys don't stack up for me, then I'm not going to engage in that behavior until they do. And I think it's important for us as believers to accept that the most important and underrated reason why we give is because our Father in heaven told us to. And I think this applies to everything. I think this applies to our quiet times. This applies to our grace with other people. This applies to any challenge that we would face. Anytime God's word tells us to do something, the first and most important reason we do it is because God told us to. Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I think that sometimes for me, I walk through life entitled as if I am owed a why, and God does not owe us that. So an important reason to apply to everything in our life is because our Father in Heaven told us to. Now once we accept that, and we adopt that posture of obedience, and I also want to be very clear, when I say that, I'm talking only to the Christians in the room. If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, you've never signed up for this. You've never said, I submit my life to God. You've never said, you're the Lord of my life. I'm second. I'm going to do what you want. You've never said that. And so to you, I wouldn't say that you even need to give. And I definitely wouldn't say it's because God told you to. You haven't signed up for this yet and said, I'm going to submit myself to God's word. But if you are a Christian, then you have. So first we adopt a posture of obedience. And what we understand in that posture of obedience is that God wants what's best for us. This is what we talked about last week. What we believe is the verse I preached last week, that God actually leads us to paths of life, that in his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand there are pleasures forevermore. We actually believe that our God in heaven wants what's best for us and takes us to the best possible places. And so if he tells us to do something, it must be what's best for us. So we trust that about giving too. So the question really becomes this morning, not why does God want me to give, but why is giving best for me? That's really the question that we are asking this morning. Once we adopt this posture of obedience and say, yes, Father, I am a Christian, and because I am, I am submitted to you, and I will be a person who is a giving, generous person. But I also understand that as I do that, it's what's best for me, and I'd love to understand why it's what's best for me. So I've got a few reasons for you that we're just going to kind of go through. The first thing I would say to you when you ask why is giving what's best for me, I would say it's because God is generous to the generous. God is generous to generous people. Now, I have to be careful with this because this is how you get to health and wealth, right? This is how you get to me preaching to you. If you give, God's going to give back to you a hundredfold. If you give to the church this much, God's going to give you this much. Meanwhile, I'm asking you to fund my private jet and you can't figure out how to pay for a civic, okay? So that's, I don't want to go there. I'm not preaching health and wealth. I'm not telling you that the more you give to God, the more money he's going to give to you. However, this principle that God is generous to the generous is unavoidable in scripture. Jesus talks about this in Luke chapter 6, verse 38, when he says this, give and it will be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Corinthians says, he who sows little reaps little and he who sows much reaps much. There is a principle in the Bible that is unavoidable, that God is generous to the generous. And I'm lying to you and dishonest as a pastor if I don't say that's one of the reasons it's what's best for you. Because when we're generous to others, God is generous to us. Now what it doesn't say anywhere is that God is generous to us monetarily. What it doesn't say anywhere is that the blessings that God is going to be generous with are ones that are going to fill up our bank account. It does not say that. It just says God will be generous to you. And God's generosity comes in forms that is so much better than money. You understand? When you are generous with your resources, God is generous with his. It's an unavoidable truth of scripture. So God's generosity looks like good, rich, and deep, spiritually nourishing, life-giving friendships. God's generosity looks like a marriage that's seen some seasons but is hanging in there and loving one another. God's generosity is good relationships with your children. God's generosity is a place to go every day that you don't hate. God's generosity is when you're walking through a hard season but you know that there is a good season coming because your God is good and you know that every day won't feel like this day. God's generosity doesn't always come in the form of money. I know a family, I know a couple who they have living with them right now, a family member, and this is a family member that should not be living with them, okay? They shouldn't be there. They should be able to live on their own, but they're not. And it is really, they are expressing a great deal of generosity to this family member. And one of their friends learned about this and happens to have a cabin, a nice one, and said, go, stay at our cabin for a weekend. You need that. That's God's generosity being expressed to someone who's being generous. Do you see that? It's not always a one-for-one reciprocal return of money, but God is generous towards the generous, and so it behooves us to be generous. The next thing I would tell you is that giving acknowledges stewardship. Why is giving what's best for me? Well, because when we give, we acknowledge this concept of stewardship. Stewardship, the whole sermon could be about stewardship. The whole sermon could be about all four of the points that I'm making. But stewardship in particular is this idea that once we are believers, we understand that the things that we have in our life are not our own. They're God's. And he's entrusted them to us. To use them for the purposes of advancing his kingdom in the most effective way possible. Back in May on Mother's Day, we did a child dedication. And we had 11 children that we dedicated that day. It was great, super exciting day for Grace. And part of the dedication of the children is for the parents to acknowledge, both literally and symbolically, that this child is not mine. He is yours. She is yours. We are raising them in our home, but they belong to you, God. They are your children, Jesus. And we are raising them the best we can in the way that they should go according to your standards. But these children are not my children. John and Lily do not belong to Nate and Jen. They belong to God. And he has entrusted them to us because he believes that we have a unique capacity to form them and shape them into who they need to be for Jesus so that they move through life advancing his kingdom. They're not our kids. They're God's kids. Your house is not your house. It's God's house. Your finances are not your finances. They're God's finances. And once we realize that, that we are stewards of the things that God has given to us, then it becomes incredibly important. The primary question we ask about all the things with which we have been entrusted is, Jesus, how do I use these to further your name? How do I use these things to bring attention to you? How would you have me organize this part of my life? And so when we give, when we write the check weekly or we click the button monthly or we set it up or whatever it is we do, when we are generous and we give, it reminds us. Every time we see that come out of our account or hit our credit card, whatever it is, that's a reminder. None of this is mine anyways. It's God's. It's God's to use as he sees fit. And if he wants more, he can have more. So giving reminds us that we are stewards, not just with our money, but in everything in our life. Another thing I would say to you is that giving allows us to participate in what God is doing by being a part of the body of Christ. Giving allows us to participate in what is happening in the church, in the kingdom, in the body of Christ by being a part of the body of Christ. I love 1 Corinthians 12. I've never preached on it here, and I need to do a whole series on it because I think it's just an amazing teaching. But in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul lays out this idea that the church is a body and that everyone who's a part of the church has a part to play. The body has arms and legs and feet and hands and it has all kinds of things that are incredibly important. It has lungs that nobody ever sees, but if we don't have lungs, then the rest of it doesn't work. And it all intricately works together to get things accomplished. And I love this teaching because it reminds me as a pastor, I'm just the mouth. That's it. But y'all are the hands that touch people who need it. Y'all are the arms that are wrapped around folks who are struggling. Y'all are the feet that take the good news of the gospel into work. Y'all are the lungs that make this thing go. None of us, none of us, not me, not an elder, not somebody who's been here 30 years, none of us are more important to what's happening at Grace than anybody else. We simply have our part to play. My part is to run my mouth. Sometimes I wish somebody else would take that part. Because maybe I'd like to be the ear sometimes. But everybody has a part. And I think our part of being in the body of Christ, a church in an affluent suburb is to use our resources to serve the greater body of Christ. And when we do that as a church, we get to participate in things going on just outside of grace as well. And so to me, it's a wonderful picture of why as a church we should want to have a generous heart. Right now, we give 10% of everything that we get to ministries going on outside the walls of grace. It is one of my big long-term goals for the church to see that percentage increase a lot so that we play our part in God's greater body and who we are. But not just as we think about reaching outside of the walls of grace, but as we think about what happens within grace and how when we give, we are part of the celebrations that God allows for us here. We are part of the victories that Jesus wins here. We participate in that by giving and doing our part and being a part of the body of Christ. I think back to October of 2017. That was the first time I got to go down to Reynosa to go see the folks at Faith Ministry. Colleen of Faith Ministry fame is with us this morning. Hello, Colleen. That's a ministry in Mexico that builds houses for people who otherwise would not be able to have them. And Grace has been partners with them since before Grace existed. So more than 20 years. And I got to go down there in October of 2017 to see it for the first time. And it was a really great experience. And I'll never forget, we're sitting there and I wanted to say it's the parking lot, but that's generous. It's the place where the cars go. And we're sitting in the van and we're waiting to pull out. And I hear a car crank up and and it was as if that poor thing was being tortured. Like, it did not, every noise it made was, please, please don't make me do this. Like, and I turn around, and the bumper is in shatters. It's being held with bungee cords, and to say that it was a beater is generous to beaters, and it was being driven by the pastor down there, a younger guy named Pastor Carlos. And Pastor Carlos, he works 10 times harder than me. I could not do what he does. I asked him one time what his weekly schedule was and just the Bible studies that he has and the different towns and stuff that he touches on and the different people in his orbit. He needs a good car. He's shuttling kids back and forth. He works so hard. This is not what he should be driving. And so I kind of leaned over to some folks that were on the trip and I said, hey, I think Grace could raise enough money to buy him a truck. Can we do that? And I talked to the folks at Faith Ministry. Would it be cool if we bought him a truck? He seems to need it. And everybody was good with it. And so I came back to Grace and I said, hey, this is, as we enter Christmas, this is the thing we want to do. We want to have enough money to buy a truck for Pastor Carlos. And we did. What kind of car did we buy him? Do you remember? Yeah, Ford Escape or Ranger or something like that. But it was nice and new and way better than what he had. And some of our folks from Grace got to go down and deliver it to him. And when I watched the video, I had tears in my eyes because he was so grateful. And so blown away by the generosity of the church. And it was a really sweet moment. And the next time I went down there, the first thing Carlos wanted me to do is come see his truck and say thank you again for it. Now listen, if you were here and you gave to that Christmas offering in 2017, that joy is your joy. That happiness is your happiness. That's not watching other people do a good thing like when we watch on the internet and our heart is warmed and then we scroll to the next thing. That's your joy. You did that. You participated in that. You made that possible. That was God using your gifts and your finances making you a part of the body of Christ so that you could participate in the good work that he was doing. That joy was your joy. If you give to grace, those 11 kids that were up here being dedicated, that's your joy. When we baptize somebody, that's your joy. When you see somebody come into the church, that's your joy. We have, I think, nine people coming to Discover Grace after church today coming out of a pandemic. That's your joy that those people are becoming a part of what we're doing here at Grace. Every win that Jesus claims here at this church, when we give, we are a part of that. Because those wins don't happen if we don't give. So we give because we are a part of the body of Christ. And that allows us to participate in the work that Jesus is doing, wherever he's doing work. The last point that I would make about why it's best for us to give is that giving invites us to mirror the generosity of God that's lavished upon us. It invites us to mirror the generosity that God has given us. Now, this too could be a whole sermon, and it was. The last time we talked about giving, Doug Bergeson, one of our elders, preached on it in February of 2020, and I don't do things like this, but it's the best sermon on giving I've ever heard. If you haven't heard it, and you'd like to explore this idea more, go back into the archives. It was Grace's Going Home series, February of 2020. Find the Doug Bergeson sermon. It's an excellent one on what I'm talking about right here, How we participate in God's generosity when we give. But what I would say to you this morning is simply this, that this is to me the most compelling reason to give. Because the longer you are a believer, the deeper you grow in gratitude to the Father. There's no two ways about it. You might think that if you've lived a life however you want it, in total selfishness, in total depravity, you've done all the bad things that anybody could do. You can check off all the boxes and and then at like 35, you come to know God, and you're amazed that he's wiped the slate clean, and he's accepted you into his kingdom, that that moment is maximum gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness. No, it's not. Because to walk with God is to understand that when you become a Christian, he doesn't just forgive you for all the stuff that you did up to that moment. He forgives you for all the crap that you're going to do too. He knows every terrible thought that you're going to have. When you get saved, whatever your lowest point is after that, whatever rock bottom looks like after you become a Christian, God was already in that moment whispering to you that he loves you and he forgives you and he wants you to come back to him. He's already in that moment. Whether that moment's behind you or ahead of you, God was in it telling you already, I've covered this too. So to walk with God and to fall short again and again and again, to arrive at that place that Paul arrives at in Romans 7 that is to me the most redemptive verse in scripture, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. To arrive there and be refreshed anew with God's overwhelming forgiveness and generosity to us. For it to hit us like a wave again that Jesus condescended, took on human flesh, lived with us in the muck and the mire, died on the cross for us, knowing that we would crud on that very death over and over and over again in our life only to require his forgiveness yet again and then he offers and then he goes about, once he dies for us, ascending to the right hand of the Father to advocate for us and to whisper in God's ear that, yes, I've covered that too. When we sit daily in the realization of the gospel and we let the waves of Jesus' forgiveness wash over us and God's generosity flood us, we cannot help but grow in our gratitude towards God. Whatever gratitude we experienced at salvation is the starting point for how it grows through our life. And so we give as an expression of that gratitude. We give because something so incredible is happening to us that we want to find a way to be conduits of that generosity that God has given us. God has given so much to me. God has given so much to us. God has enriched our lives so much that we can't help but want to desire to enrich the lives of others. We can't help but want to express the generosity that God has lavished upon us. And so giving in his best, most pure state is simply a reaction to the overflow of God's giving in our life. That's why Paul teaches in Corinthians that God loves a cheerful giver. Don't give out of compulsion, but give because you want to. And how can we grow our want to in giving? By focusing on the face of Jesus and remembering the generosity and the forgiveness that he offers us every day. And so giving is what's best for us because it reorients us to the gospel. It reorients us towards God's goodness in our life. God has been good to me and provided me this. I am going to give this portion of this, understanding that he can replace it or he can't, but God has been so generous to me that I want to be generous to others. That's why we give. I love this verse in 2 Corinthians 9-11 says, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. There's this part of the Sermon on the Mount that I find incredibly intimidating, where Jesus says, let others see your good deeds, see your good works, and shine for the Father so that your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your father who is in heaven. And I always think to myself, how do you act like that? A really easy way is to be generous. That's what Corinthians tells us. That God has enriched us. He's given us resources in every way. Why? So that we might enrich others. And then both you and them will turn that to thanksgiving to God. And it will point us back to the Father and our Savior Jesus. That's why giving is what's best for us. It's good for us. It develops a spirit of generosity that constantly, constantly orients us back to Jesus. So I would end this morning with a simple challenge for you. Trust God and give. Trust God and his word and give. How much should I give? Just a little bit more than you are. That's always the answer. 10%? No, that's an Old Testament thing. How much do we give in the New Testament? Just a little bit more than we are. Whatever that means for you. Who do I give to? I'll be the first to tell you. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that you have to give all of your giving to the local church. I've sat in churches, I've heard pastors say, your first 10% goes to this church and then on top of that, other places. That's not in the Bible. I'm not going to sit here and teach you that. I'm not preaching this as a self-serving thing for grace. If you believe in grace and what's happening here and you feel compelled to participate in the victories that Jesus is winning here, then give to grace. But you give wherever God is advancing his kingdom. Wherever God is working and Jesus is moving, you give there. Just give. Trust God and do it. I have never talked to a single person in my whole life who has said, you know what? I heard what the pastor said about giving and I decided to start being more generous. That was a huge mistake. I really regret it. Wish I could have that back. Never heard anybody say that. So this morning, it's simple. If you and I could have a conversation, I would simply end it by saying, just trust God. Obey Him. Be a person who's generous. Let's give together. Let me pray for us. Father, we do love you. We are so grateful for the goodness and the gifts that you've lavished upon us. God, I pray first and foremost that we would let those wash over us. I pray more than anything else that we would simply leave here increasingly overwhelmed with your goodness to us. Father, for those of us who need this, who need to think about this in our own lives, I pray that because you said so would be all the reason that we ever need. I pray that we would trust that and walk in that. Knowing that even when we don't understand obedience sometimes, that it is going to lead us to a path of life. God, give us the heart and the gratitude and the spirit to be people who are generous. I pray that each one of us would leave here determined to be just a little bit more generous than we were when we walked in today. And God, for those of us who are obedient and who respond and who give. Would we find you there, please? Would you show us yourself in that giving? Can we ask that through the generosity that you compel us to that we are brought closer to your son and so inspired and enlivened to continue to be generous. It's in his name, the one who died for us and who advocates for us, that we pray. Amen.
If you're like a lot of us, then this jar kind of looks like your life as we entered the pandemic. Lots of things in our life that are really important to us, big deals, things that we definitely want to prioritize, but maybe sometimes we have a hard time finding time for, and then other things in our life that are probably important, but maybe not essential, and we'd love to give our time to them, but we probably don't need to make big priorities out of them. But what happens in the end when we get so busy is that we don't have time for everything, right? But then with the pandemic, life, well it kind of hit the reset button. And we spent most of last year with nothing but time on our hands. And now, as we face moving back into what feels like normal, I think that we have this unique opportunity to reassemble our lives. And as we have this opportunity, I thought it would be appropriate for Grace to stop and really think critically about well, what are our big rocks? What are the things in our life that are the most important to us? What are the things that we want to prioritize above and beyond everything else and what would our life look like if we actually identified our big rocks and prioritized our time around those things? What if we put these rocks in first and made sure that there was space in our life for the things that were most important and then around those things we allowed all the other little things to kind of fill in the rest of our time and priorities? What would it look like if we were to hit the reset button on our life and reassemble it in such a way that we had time and space for what was important to us and we didn't have to worry at all about the other things that just at the end of the day, they're not nearly as big of a deal. What are our big rocks? And how do we make space for them as we enter into a new normal? Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I get to be the pastor here. A little confession, after we shot that video in the back corner, I was on my hands and knees for about 15 minutes picking up all those rocks. So I'm really glad we got it there on that first take, and I didn't have to do that again. Thank you for being here. Like I said, I'm the senior pastor here. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I would love to do that. We got a full crew here this morning. That is exciting and good. So thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us online, particularly if you're on vacation and you're still choosing to make this a part of your Sunday. We are grateful for that. I'm really looking forward to the rest of this series as we talk about exactly what I addressed in the video. This idea of coming kind of back to life, the world feeling normal again, or at least approaching it. If we can avoid this Delta variant, but that's a whole different conversation. But it feels like we're approaching that. And as we do it, we have this unique opportunity to kind of reconstruct our life around the things that are most important to us. And really, we have this opportunity to reconstruct our life around Jesus. So for the next four weeks, we're going to talk about what our big rocks are. What are the things that are the most important to us and how do we orchestrate those things around Jesus and around this pursuit of God the Father. And I said specifically that I'm looking forward to the rest of the weeks of the series because I'm not looking forward to this morning in this series. I did not wake up this morning excited for this sermon. Some Sundays I wake up and I'm really, really, I can't wait to share with you what God has laid on my heart. Last Sunday is a great example of that. This Sunday, I'm preaching about money. So when I got up this morning, it wasn't like, yes, the tithe, here we come. Nor did you get up hoping that this would be the Sunday that I talked about money. So listen, I'll just confess up front. I'm no more interested in preaching this than you are in hearing it. Okay, but we're here now. So this is what we're going to do. And really, the reason that we're talking about this is first of all, first and foremost, I don't talk about this very much at Grace. The last time we talked about this was in February of 2020, and I didn't even do it. It was Doug Bergeson, all right? So we don't do it a whole lot, but this topic is all throughout the Bible. Scripture is replete with instructions on giving about big rocks in life, if we're going to talk about the things that matter most to us and how to prioritize those around Jesus, then we have to talk about finances. We have to ask the question, what does God want us to do with our resources and with our money? And the Bible talks about it so much that it would be irresponsible as a church and I'd be irresponsible as a pastor if we didn't revisit it with some regularity. So we arrive at it this morning and as we arrive at it, I'm kind of approaching it like this. This is why I'm sitting down for this one at a table instead of standing and gesticulating and walking around wildly and trying to keep calm and not yell at you because I'm approaching this as if you and I could have a conversation about it. If you and I were able to meet for lunch or if you could come to the office or we meet somewhere and we could talk and your question was, what does the Bible have to say about giving anyways? Or maybe even, why does God want me to give? Then this is the conversation that I would want to have with you. So I'm staying seated to remind me that this is what I would like to say to each of you if we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about this together. And as we do that, I would even say to you this, that as I wrote and approached this sermon, I really had in mind the person who is new to church. Maybe you are someone who, for the first time in a long time, church is important to you again. For the first time in a long time, spiritual health is important to you again. And so maybe you're kind of trying to get reengaged spiritually. Maybe you haven't been in church a lot for the past five, 10 years, and so you're kind of starting to re-engage and maybe have never really thought critically about giving and what the Bible has to say about it. This is for the new and the non-believers, for those of us who hear that we should give in church, who probably understand that the Bible tells us to do it, but maybe we don't know all the whys around it and maybe we don't have a developed theology of why we should be generous. So this sermon in particular is for you. Now I know that at Grace, and I see the evidence of it over and over again, we have plenty of you who have a really good theology of giving, who understand tithing and being generous and why we do it. And so for you, I hope that we hit on some things that are encouraging, particularly the first point that I make. I think we should apply it to everything, not just giving. And so I hope that there's some encouraging ways to think about it. But this is really for folks who, if I sat you down and I said, what does the Bible say about giving or why should we give? This is for you if you feel like, gosh, I'm not sure how well I would answer that. So like I said, I'm approaching it as a conversation and I want to approach the conversation with what the Bible even has to say about it. And as I sought that out this week, you know, the Old Testament has a lot of very specific instructions that we are to give. The Old Testament introduces this idea of giving in generosity like a new idea. Leave the corners of your field for the sojourners, for the poor, for the widow, for the aliens, for the people who don't yet have a home. We're told to bring our tithe to the storehouse in the Old Testament. We're told there's a whole portion in Leviticus that tells us exactly, tells the children of Israel exactly how they are to give. So in the Old Testament, it's given as an instruction. It's introduced almost as a new idea. But what you find in the New Testament, if you want to read New Testament verses about giving, and the New Testament is simply the part of the Bible that comes during Jesus's life and after. And Jesus kind of changes everything. So what does the Bible have to say about giving once Jesus gets on the scene? Well, once Jesus arrives, the instructions about giving become a little bit presumptive, as if this is a thing that we already know. This is actually what Jesus says about it in the Sermon on the Mount. If you have a Bible, you can turn to Matthew chapter 6. I'm going to read you verses 1 through 4. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus' first recorded public address. It's the first time he talks. And he has performed miracles and those people began to follow them and then he begins to preach to them and he hits on myriad topics. But then he lands on giving for a different directions. But the interesting part to me about this verse, if you want to ask what does the New Testament teach about giving, is the two uses of the word when. When you give. When you give to the needy. Jesus is talking to the huddled masses. Talking to thousands of people in the middle of the day, presumably jobless folks for the most part. And he still assumes that they know, without ever introducing giving as a new idea, he assumes that they know that they should give. He assumes that they know that God expects them to be generous people. And so he says, when you do it, do it in such a way that you're not doing it in a showy way. Do it in secret. Be discreet about it. And there's a whole teaching there. But again, what's interesting to me is when you give, when you do it. And I bring that up because I think that that's how familiar a lot of us are with giving. We might not know why we're supposed to do it. We might not know what for. We might not know how we should be compelled to do it. We just know that we are supposed to. And so the interesting question is why? Why are we supposed to give? Why does God ask us in the Old Testament when he's setting everything up and then just assume of us that we know that we ought to in the New Testament? Why does God do that? And so we're going to spend the rest of the morning kind of answering that question, and this is the conversational piece of it. Why does God want me to give? The most important reason, the most important reason and most underrated reason we give is because God tells us to. The most important, and this is key, most underrated reason that we give is because God tells us to. Now, listen, here's why I say this. When my mom was growing up, she grew up in the 60s and 70s, and Linda, her mom, my mom, all wonderful woman, she ruled with an iron fist, man. This was back in the good old days, all right, when it was nice to be a parent. You rule with an iron fist. That was a funny slip. You ruled with an iron fist. Kids are to be seen and not heard. When the company comes over, you go upstairs. You do not interrupt. And when my mom would get out of line when she was told to do something, and she said, why? She had the audacity to say, why do I have to clean your room? Why? Because I told you to. Fire would burn in Linda's eyes, right? And mom would know. She better do whatever it was she was asked to do, even if it makes no sense at all to her, because there is going to be some serious repercussions if she doesn't. She saw the fire, and so she got right. And so when my mom grew up, because I told you to, was all the reason that a child needed. Well, when that's the only reason you get, that develops in you a little bit of resentment, right? This heart of resentment because my mom is kind and sweet and not rebellious like me and really was asking genuinely why I don't understand. Why do you want me to do that right now? It seems like I should be doing something else. Why do you want me to do that? But she wasn't allowed to ask that. And so that left her frustrated and resentful. So when she had children, she decided that because I said so is never a reason. I will always take the time to explain to my children why I'm asking them to do something. And to her credit, she did that. But when you're raising Nate, that becomes a real hassle. And I was always allowed to ask why. And I love that quote. There's some quote I picked up years ago that a reason is an invitation for an argument. And that's very true. And so I was always invited into that argument. Why? Go clean your room. Why do I have to do that right now? Go mow the grass. Why? And listen, if the why wasn't good enough, well, I didn't have to do it. In my head, if the why is not good enough, if it can't justify the request, well, then your request is dumb. And so what I learned in that environment is asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It manifests this idea of, okay, I understand what you want me to do, but I'm not going to do that until your reason justifies your request. And if it doesn't, if it falls short of King Nate's gauntlet of reasons, then you can forget it, buddy. So in our house, our response with Lily and then with John, which John can't talk yet. And I remember when Lily couldn't talk and people were like, just be grateful for these times. And I thought, you're jerks. You're not jerks. That makes sense to me now. John can't talk yet, but Lily can, and she likes to ask why. Lily's my daughter, for those of you who don't know me, not just some girl I talk about. But she likes to ask why. But the policy that we've adopted in our house is, first you obey, then you ask why. And this is gonna be what solves it forever. She'll have no issues when she's a parent. She'll replicate this exactly, right? But first you obey and then you ask why. First show that you're gonna be obedient. First show that you're going to submit. First show that the question is genuine and not an attempt to get out of it. And then come and we'll talk to you forever when you have a good attitude about the whys of why we should do something. And I bring this up because I think it's really important as we think about how we respond to the instructions of God. I know that very often when we are met with a teaching from Scripture that we should give, that we should read the Bible, that we should be selfless, that we should forgive as we are forgiven, that we should be generous to others, that we should turn the other cheek, that whenever it is possible for us, as far as it concerns us, that we should seek peace in others when peace is just not the thing that we want right now. Often in my life, and maybe yours too, we want to know the why before we offer our obedience. We want it to make sense to us before King Nate deigns to obey the instructions that I find here. And I will confess to you this, as I thought about this this week. This is not so much an indictment on your attitude, that's up to you, as it is sometimes an indictment on my preaching. Because when I preach and I give us instructions from the word, I always start with a why. Because I don't want to paint God as this ruthless dictator who sits in heaven giving you rules. I always want you to understand why it's what's best for you. But when we jump straight to the why before obedience, I think that begats in us this sense of entitlement. That if God's whys don't stack up for me, then I'm not going to engage in that behavior until they do. And I think it's important for us as believers to accept that the most important and underrated reason why we give is because our Father in heaven told us to. And I think this applies to everything. I think this applies to our quiet times. This applies to our grace with other people. This applies to any challenge that we would face. Anytime God's word tells us to do something, the first and most important reason we do it is because God told us to. Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I think that sometimes for me, I walk through life entitled as if I am owed a why, and God does not owe us that. So an important reason to apply to everything in our life is because our Father in Heaven told us to. Now once we accept that, and we adopt that posture of obedience, and I also want to be very clear, when I say that, I'm talking only to the Christians in the room. If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, you've never signed up for this. You've never said, I submit my life to God. You've never said, you're the Lord of my life. I'm second. I'm going to do what you want. You've never said that. And so to you, I wouldn't say that you even need to give. And I definitely wouldn't say it's because God told you to. You haven't signed up for this yet and said, I'm going to submit myself to God's word. But if you are a Christian, then you have. So first we adopt a posture of obedience. And what we understand in that posture of obedience is that God wants what's best for us. This is what we talked about last week. What we believe is the verse I preached last week, that God actually leads us to paths of life, that in his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand there are pleasures forevermore. We actually believe that our God in heaven wants what's best for us and takes us to the best possible places. And so if he tells us to do something, it must be what's best for us. So we trust that about giving too. So the question really becomes this morning, not why does God want me to give, but why is giving best for me? That's really the question that we are asking this morning. Once we adopt this posture of obedience and say, yes, Father, I am a Christian, and because I am, I am submitted to you, and I will be a person who is a giving, generous person. But I also understand that as I do that, it's what's best for me, and I'd love to understand why it's what's best for me. So I've got a few reasons for you that we're just going to kind of go through. The first thing I would say to you when you ask why is giving what's best for me, I would say it's because God is generous to the generous. God is generous to generous people. Now, I have to be careful with this because this is how you get to health and wealth, right? This is how you get to me preaching to you. If you give, God's going to give back to you a hundredfold. If you give to the church this much, God's going to give you this much. Meanwhile, I'm asking you to fund my private jet and you can't figure out how to pay for a civic, okay? So that's, I don't want to go there. I'm not preaching health and wealth. I'm not telling you that the more you give to God, the more money he's going to give to you. However, this principle that God is generous to the generous is unavoidable in scripture. Jesus talks about this in Luke chapter 6, verse 38, when he says this, give and it will be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Corinthians says, he who sows little reaps little and he who sows much reaps much. There is a principle in the Bible that is unavoidable, that God is generous to the generous. And I'm lying to you and dishonest as a pastor if I don't say that's one of the reasons it's what's best for you. Because when we're generous to others, God is generous to us. Now what it doesn't say anywhere is that God is generous to us monetarily. What it doesn't say anywhere is that the blessings that God is going to be generous with are ones that are going to fill up our bank account. It does not say that. It just says God will be generous to you. And God's generosity comes in forms that is so much better than money. You understand? When you are generous with your resources, God is generous with his. It's an unavoidable truth of scripture. So God's generosity looks like good, rich, and deep, spiritually nourishing, life-giving friendships. God's generosity looks like a marriage that's seen some seasons but is hanging in there and loving one another. God's generosity is good relationships with your children. God's generosity is a place to go every day that you don't hate. God's generosity is when you're walking through a hard season but you know that there is a good season coming because your God is good and you know that every day won't feel like this day. God's generosity doesn't always come in the form of money. I know a family, I know a couple who they have living with them right now, a family member, and this is a family member that should not be living with them, okay? They shouldn't be there. They should be able to live on their own, but they're not. And it is really, they are expressing a great deal of generosity to this family member. And one of their friends learned about this and happens to have a cabin, a nice one, and said, go, stay at our cabin for a weekend. You need that. That's God's generosity being expressed to someone who's being generous. Do you see that? It's not always a one-for-one reciprocal return of money, but God is generous towards the generous, and so it behooves us to be generous. The next thing I would tell you is that giving acknowledges stewardship. Why is giving what's best for me? Well, because when we give, we acknowledge this concept of stewardship. Stewardship, the whole sermon could be about stewardship. The whole sermon could be about all four of the points that I'm making. But stewardship in particular is this idea that once we are believers, we understand that the things that we have in our life are not our own. They're God's. And he's entrusted them to us. To use them for the purposes of advancing his kingdom in the most effective way possible. Back in May on Mother's Day, we did a child dedication. And we had 11 children that we dedicated that day. It was great, super exciting day for Grace. And part of the dedication of the children is for the parents to acknowledge, both literally and symbolically, that this child is not mine. He is yours. She is yours. We are raising them in our home, but they belong to you, God. They are your children, Jesus. And we are raising them the best we can in the way that they should go according to your standards. But these children are not my children. John and Lily do not belong to Nate and Jen. They belong to God. And he has entrusted them to us because he believes that we have a unique capacity to form them and shape them into who they need to be for Jesus so that they move through life advancing his kingdom. They're not our kids. They're God's kids. Your house is not your house. It's God's house. Your finances are not your finances. They're God's finances. And once we realize that, that we are stewards of the things that God has given to us, then it becomes incredibly important. The primary question we ask about all the things with which we have been entrusted is, Jesus, how do I use these to further your name? How do I use these things to bring attention to you? How would you have me organize this part of my life? And so when we give, when we write the check weekly or we click the button monthly or we set it up or whatever it is we do, when we are generous and we give, it reminds us. Every time we see that come out of our account or hit our credit card, whatever it is, that's a reminder. None of this is mine anyways. It's God's. It's God's to use as he sees fit. And if he wants more, he can have more. So giving reminds us that we are stewards, not just with our money, but in everything in our life. Another thing I would say to you is that giving allows us to participate in what God is doing by being a part of the body of Christ. Giving allows us to participate in what is happening in the church, in the kingdom, in the body of Christ by being a part of the body of Christ. I love 1 Corinthians 12. I've never preached on it here, and I need to do a whole series on it because I think it's just an amazing teaching. But in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul lays out this idea that the church is a body and that everyone who's a part of the church has a part to play. The body has arms and legs and feet and hands and it has all kinds of things that are incredibly important. It has lungs that nobody ever sees, but if we don't have lungs, then the rest of it doesn't work. And it all intricately works together to get things accomplished. And I love this teaching because it reminds me as a pastor, I'm just the mouth. That's it. But y'all are the hands that touch people who need it. Y'all are the arms that are wrapped around folks who are struggling. Y'all are the feet that take the good news of the gospel into work. Y'all are the lungs that make this thing go. None of us, none of us, not me, not an elder, not somebody who's been here 30 years, none of us are more important to what's happening at Grace than anybody else. We simply have our part to play. My part is to run my mouth. Sometimes I wish somebody else would take that part. Because maybe I'd like to be the ear sometimes. But everybody has a part. And I think our part of being in the body of Christ, a church in an affluent suburb is to use our resources to serve the greater body of Christ. And when we do that as a church, we get to participate in things going on just outside of grace as well. And so to me, it's a wonderful picture of why as a church we should want to have a generous heart. Right now, we give 10% of everything that we get to ministries going on outside the walls of grace. It is one of my big long-term goals for the church to see that percentage increase a lot so that we play our part in God's greater body and who we are. But not just as we think about reaching outside of the walls of grace, but as we think about what happens within grace and how when we give, we are part of the celebrations that God allows for us here. We are part of the victories that Jesus wins here. We participate in that by giving and doing our part and being a part of the body of Christ. I think back to October of 2017. That was the first time I got to go down to Reynosa to go see the folks at Faith Ministry. Colleen of Faith Ministry fame is with us this morning. Hello, Colleen. That's a ministry in Mexico that builds houses for people who otherwise would not be able to have them. And Grace has been partners with them since before Grace existed. So more than 20 years. And I got to go down there in October of 2017 to see it for the first time. And it was a really great experience. And I'll never forget, we're sitting there and I wanted to say it's the parking lot, but that's generous. It's the place where the cars go. And we're sitting in the van and we're waiting to pull out. And I hear a car crank up and and it was as if that poor thing was being tortured. Like, it did not, every noise it made was, please, please don't make me do this. Like, and I turn around, and the bumper is in shatters. It's being held with bungee cords, and to say that it was a beater is generous to beaters, and it was being driven by the pastor down there, a younger guy named Pastor Carlos. And Pastor Carlos, he works 10 times harder than me. I could not do what he does. I asked him one time what his weekly schedule was and just the Bible studies that he has and the different towns and stuff that he touches on and the different people in his orbit. He needs a good car. He's shuttling kids back and forth. He works so hard. This is not what he should be driving. And so I kind of leaned over to some folks that were on the trip and I said, hey, I think Grace could raise enough money to buy him a truck. Can we do that? And I talked to the folks at Faith Ministry. Would it be cool if we bought him a truck? He seems to need it. And everybody was good with it. And so I came back to Grace and I said, hey, this is, as we enter Christmas, this is the thing we want to do. We want to have enough money to buy a truck for Pastor Carlos. And we did. What kind of car did we buy him? Do you remember? Yeah, Ford Escape or Ranger or something like that. But it was nice and new and way better than what he had. And some of our folks from Grace got to go down and deliver it to him. And when I watched the video, I had tears in my eyes because he was so grateful. And so blown away by the generosity of the church. And it was a really sweet moment. And the next time I went down there, the first thing Carlos wanted me to do is come see his truck and say thank you again for it. Now listen, if you were here and you gave to that Christmas offering in 2017, that joy is your joy. That happiness is your happiness. That's not watching other people do a good thing like when we watch on the internet and our heart is warmed and then we scroll to the next thing. That's your joy. You did that. You participated in that. You made that possible. That was God using your gifts and your finances making you a part of the body of Christ so that you could participate in the good work that he was doing. That joy was your joy. If you give to grace, those 11 kids that were up here being dedicated, that's your joy. When we baptize somebody, that's your joy. When you see somebody come into the church, that's your joy. We have, I think, nine people coming to Discover Grace after church today coming out of a pandemic. That's your joy that those people are becoming a part of what we're doing here at Grace. Every win that Jesus claims here at this church, when we give, we are a part of that. Because those wins don't happen if we don't give. So we give because we are a part of the body of Christ. And that allows us to participate in the work that Jesus is doing, wherever he's doing work. The last point that I would make about why it's best for us to give is that giving invites us to mirror the generosity of God that's lavished upon us. It invites us to mirror the generosity that God has given us. Now, this too could be a whole sermon, and it was. The last time we talked about giving, Doug Bergeson, one of our elders, preached on it in February of 2020, and I don't do things like this, but it's the best sermon on giving I've ever heard. If you haven't heard it, and you'd like to explore this idea more, go back into the archives. It was Grace's Going Home series, February of 2020. Find the Doug Bergeson sermon. It's an excellent one on what I'm talking about right here, How we participate in God's generosity when we give. But what I would say to you this morning is simply this, that this is to me the most compelling reason to give. Because the longer you are a believer, the deeper you grow in gratitude to the Father. There's no two ways about it. You might think that if you've lived a life however you want it, in total selfishness, in total depravity, you've done all the bad things that anybody could do. You can check off all the boxes and and then at like 35, you come to know God, and you're amazed that he's wiped the slate clean, and he's accepted you into his kingdom, that that moment is maximum gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness. No, it's not. Because to walk with God is to understand that when you become a Christian, he doesn't just forgive you for all the stuff that you did up to that moment. He forgives you for all the crap that you're going to do too. He knows every terrible thought that you're going to have. When you get saved, whatever your lowest point is after that, whatever rock bottom looks like after you become a Christian, God was already in that moment whispering to you that he loves you and he forgives you and he wants you to come back to him. He's already in that moment. Whether that moment's behind you or ahead of you, God was in it telling you already, I've covered this too. So to walk with God and to fall short again and again and again, to arrive at that place that Paul arrives at in Romans 7 that is to me the most redemptive verse in scripture, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. To arrive there and be refreshed anew with God's overwhelming forgiveness and generosity to us. For it to hit us like a wave again that Jesus condescended, took on human flesh, lived with us in the muck and the mire, died on the cross for us, knowing that we would crud on that very death over and over and over again in our life only to require his forgiveness yet again and then he offers and then he goes about, once he dies for us, ascending to the right hand of the Father to advocate for us and to whisper in God's ear that, yes, I've covered that too. When we sit daily in the realization of the gospel and we let the waves of Jesus' forgiveness wash over us and God's generosity flood us, we cannot help but grow in our gratitude towards God. Whatever gratitude we experienced at salvation is the starting point for how it grows through our life. And so we give as an expression of that gratitude. We give because something so incredible is happening to us that we want to find a way to be conduits of that generosity that God has given us. God has given so much to me. God has given so much to us. God has enriched our lives so much that we can't help but want to desire to enrich the lives of others. We can't help but want to express the generosity that God has lavished upon us. And so giving in his best, most pure state is simply a reaction to the overflow of God's giving in our life. That's why Paul teaches in Corinthians that God loves a cheerful giver. Don't give out of compulsion, but give because you want to. And how can we grow our want to in giving? By focusing on the face of Jesus and remembering the generosity and the forgiveness that he offers us every day. And so giving is what's best for us because it reorients us to the gospel. It reorients us towards God's goodness in our life. God has been good to me and provided me this. I am going to give this portion of this, understanding that he can replace it or he can't, but God has been so generous to me that I want to be generous to others. That's why we give. I love this verse in 2 Corinthians 9-11 says, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. There's this part of the Sermon on the Mount that I find incredibly intimidating, where Jesus says, let others see your good deeds, see your good works, and shine for the Father so that your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your father who is in heaven. And I always think to myself, how do you act like that? A really easy way is to be generous. That's what Corinthians tells us. That God has enriched us. He's given us resources in every way. Why? So that we might enrich others. And then both you and them will turn that to thanksgiving to God. And it will point us back to the Father and our Savior Jesus. That's why giving is what's best for us. It's good for us. It develops a spirit of generosity that constantly, constantly orients us back to Jesus. So I would end this morning with a simple challenge for you. Trust God and give. Trust God and his word and give. How much should I give? Just a little bit more than you are. That's always the answer. 10%? No, that's an Old Testament thing. How much do we give in the New Testament? Just a little bit more than we are. Whatever that means for you. Who do I give to? I'll be the first to tell you. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that you have to give all of your giving to the local church. I've sat in churches, I've heard pastors say, your first 10% goes to this church and then on top of that, other places. That's not in the Bible. I'm not going to sit here and teach you that. I'm not preaching this as a self-serving thing for grace. If you believe in grace and what's happening here and you feel compelled to participate in the victories that Jesus is winning here, then give to grace. But you give wherever God is advancing his kingdom. Wherever God is working and Jesus is moving, you give there. Just give. Trust God and do it. I have never talked to a single person in my whole life who has said, you know what? I heard what the pastor said about giving and I decided to start being more generous. That was a huge mistake. I really regret it. Wish I could have that back. Never heard anybody say that. So this morning, it's simple. If you and I could have a conversation, I would simply end it by saying, just trust God. Obey Him. Be a person who's generous. Let's give together. Let me pray for us. Father, we do love you. We are so grateful for the goodness and the gifts that you've lavished upon us. God, I pray first and foremost that we would let those wash over us. I pray more than anything else that we would simply leave here increasingly overwhelmed with your goodness to us. Father, for those of us who need this, who need to think about this in our own lives, I pray that because you said so would be all the reason that we ever need. I pray that we would trust that and walk in that. Knowing that even when we don't understand obedience sometimes, that it is going to lead us to a path of life. God, give us the heart and the gratitude and the spirit to be people who are generous. I pray that each one of us would leave here determined to be just a little bit more generous than we were when we walked in today. And God, for those of us who are obedient and who respond and who give. Would we find you there, please? Would you show us yourself in that giving? Can we ask that through the generosity that you compel us to that we are brought closer to your son and so inspired and enlivened to continue to be generous. It's in his name, the one who died for us and who advocates for us, that we pray. Amen.
If you're like a lot of us, then this jar kind of looks like your life as we entered the pandemic. Lots of things in our life that are really important to us, big deals, things that we definitely want to prioritize, but maybe sometimes we have a hard time finding time for, and then other things in our life that are probably important, but maybe not essential, and we'd love to give our time to them, but we probably don't need to make big priorities out of them. But what happens in the end when we get so busy is that we don't have time for everything, right? But then with the pandemic, life, well it kind of hit the reset button. And we spent most of last year with nothing but time on our hands. And now, as we face moving back into what feels like normal, I think that we have this unique opportunity to reassemble our lives. And as we have this opportunity, I thought it would be appropriate for Grace to stop and really think critically about well, what are our big rocks? What are the things in our life that are the most important to us? What are the things that we want to prioritize above and beyond everything else and what would our life look like if we actually identified our big rocks and prioritized our time around those things? What if we put these rocks in first and made sure that there was space in our life for the things that were most important and then around those things we allowed all the other little things to kind of fill in the rest of our time and priorities? What would it look like if we were to hit the reset button on our life and reassemble it in such a way that we had time and space for what was important to us and we didn't have to worry at all about the other things that just at the end of the day, they're not nearly as big of a deal. What are our big rocks? And how do we make space for them as we enter into a new normal? Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I get to be the pastor here. A little confession, after we shot that video in the back corner, I was on my hands and knees for about 15 minutes picking up all those rocks. So I'm really glad we got it there on that first take, and I didn't have to do that again. Thank you for being here. Like I said, I'm the senior pastor here. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I would love to do that. We got a full crew here this morning. That is exciting and good. So thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us online, particularly if you're on vacation and you're still choosing to make this a part of your Sunday. We are grateful for that. I'm really looking forward to the rest of this series as we talk about exactly what I addressed in the video. This idea of coming kind of back to life, the world feeling normal again, or at least approaching it. If we can avoid this Delta variant, but that's a whole different conversation. But it feels like we're approaching that. And as we do it, we have this unique opportunity to kind of reconstruct our life around the things that are most important to us. And really, we have this opportunity to reconstruct our life around Jesus. So for the next four weeks, we're going to talk about what our big rocks are. What are the things that are the most important to us and how do we orchestrate those things around Jesus and around this pursuit of God the Father. And I said specifically that I'm looking forward to the rest of the weeks of the series because I'm not looking forward to this morning in this series. I did not wake up this morning excited for this sermon. Some Sundays I wake up and I'm really, really, I can't wait to share with you what God has laid on my heart. Last Sunday is a great example of that. This Sunday, I'm preaching about money. So when I got up this morning, it wasn't like, yes, the tithe, here we come. Nor did you get up hoping that this would be the Sunday that I talked about money. So listen, I'll just confess up front. I'm no more interested in preaching this than you are in hearing it. Okay, but we're here now. So this is what we're going to do. And really, the reason that we're talking about this is first of all, first and foremost, I don't talk about this very much at Grace. The last time we talked about this was in February of 2020, and I didn't even do it. It was Doug Bergeson, all right? So we don't do it a whole lot, but this topic is all throughout the Bible. Scripture is replete with instructions on giving about big rocks in life, if we're going to talk about the things that matter most to us and how to prioritize those around Jesus, then we have to talk about finances. We have to ask the question, what does God want us to do with our resources and with our money? And the Bible talks about it so much that it would be irresponsible as a church and I'd be irresponsible as a pastor if we didn't revisit it with some regularity. So we arrive at it this morning and as we arrive at it, I'm kind of approaching it like this. This is why I'm sitting down for this one at a table instead of standing and gesticulating and walking around wildly and trying to keep calm and not yell at you because I'm approaching this as if you and I could have a conversation about it. If you and I were able to meet for lunch or if you could come to the office or we meet somewhere and we could talk and your question was, what does the Bible have to say about giving anyways? Or maybe even, why does God want me to give? Then this is the conversation that I would want to have with you. So I'm staying seated to remind me that this is what I would like to say to each of you if we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about this together. And as we do that, I would even say to you this, that as I wrote and approached this sermon, I really had in mind the person who is new to church. Maybe you are someone who, for the first time in a long time, church is important to you again. For the first time in a long time, spiritual health is important to you again. And so maybe you're kind of trying to get reengaged spiritually. Maybe you haven't been in church a lot for the past five, 10 years, and so you're kind of starting to re-engage and maybe have never really thought critically about giving and what the Bible has to say about it. This is for the new and the non-believers, for those of us who hear that we should give in church, who probably understand that the Bible tells us to do it, but maybe we don't know all the whys around it and maybe we don't have a developed theology of why we should be generous. So this sermon in particular is for you. Now I know that at Grace, and I see the evidence of it over and over again, we have plenty of you who have a really good theology of giving, who understand tithing and being generous and why we do it. And so for you, I hope that we hit on some things that are encouraging, particularly the first point that I make. I think we should apply it to everything, not just giving. And so I hope that there's some encouraging ways to think about it. But this is really for folks who, if I sat you down and I said, what does the Bible say about giving or why should we give? This is for you if you feel like, gosh, I'm not sure how well I would answer that. So like I said, I'm approaching it as a conversation and I want to approach the conversation with what the Bible even has to say about it. And as I sought that out this week, you know, the Old Testament has a lot of very specific instructions that we are to give. The Old Testament introduces this idea of giving in generosity like a new idea. Leave the corners of your field for the sojourners, for the poor, for the widow, for the aliens, for the people who don't yet have a home. We're told to bring our tithe to the storehouse in the Old Testament. We're told there's a whole portion in Leviticus that tells us exactly, tells the children of Israel exactly how they are to give. So in the Old Testament, it's given as an instruction. It's introduced almost as a new idea. But what you find in the New Testament, if you want to read New Testament verses about giving, and the New Testament is simply the part of the Bible that comes during Jesus's life and after. And Jesus kind of changes everything. So what does the Bible have to say about giving once Jesus gets on the scene? Well, once Jesus arrives, the instructions about giving become a little bit presumptive, as if this is a thing that we already know. This is actually what Jesus says about it in the Sermon on the Mount. If you have a Bible, you can turn to Matthew chapter 6. I'm going to read you verses 1 through 4. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus' first recorded public address. It's the first time he talks. And he has performed miracles and those people began to follow them and then he begins to preach to them and he hits on myriad topics. But then he lands on giving for a different directions. But the interesting part to me about this verse, if you want to ask what does the New Testament teach about giving, is the two uses of the word when. When you give. When you give to the needy. Jesus is talking to the huddled masses. Talking to thousands of people in the middle of the day, presumably jobless folks for the most part. And he still assumes that they know, without ever introducing giving as a new idea, he assumes that they know that they should give. He assumes that they know that God expects them to be generous people. And so he says, when you do it, do it in such a way that you're not doing it in a showy way. Do it in secret. Be discreet about it. And there's a whole teaching there. But again, what's interesting to me is when you give, when you do it. And I bring that up because I think that that's how familiar a lot of us are with giving. We might not know why we're supposed to do it. We might not know what for. We might not know how we should be compelled to do it. We just know that we are supposed to. And so the interesting question is why? Why are we supposed to give? Why does God ask us in the Old Testament when he's setting everything up and then just assume of us that we know that we ought to in the New Testament? Why does God do that? And so we're going to spend the rest of the morning kind of answering that question, and this is the conversational piece of it. Why does God want me to give? The most important reason, the most important reason and most underrated reason we give is because God tells us to. The most important, and this is key, most underrated reason that we give is because God tells us to. Now, listen, here's why I say this. When my mom was growing up, she grew up in the 60s and 70s, and Linda, her mom, my mom, all wonderful woman, she ruled with an iron fist, man. This was back in the good old days, all right, when it was nice to be a parent. You rule with an iron fist. That was a funny slip. You ruled with an iron fist. Kids are to be seen and not heard. When the company comes over, you go upstairs. You do not interrupt. And when my mom would get out of line when she was told to do something, and she said, why? She had the audacity to say, why do I have to clean your room? Why? Because I told you to. Fire would burn in Linda's eyes, right? And mom would know. She better do whatever it was she was asked to do, even if it makes no sense at all to her, because there is going to be some serious repercussions if she doesn't. She saw the fire, and so she got right. And so when my mom grew up, because I told you to, was all the reason that a child needed. Well, when that's the only reason you get, that develops in you a little bit of resentment, right? This heart of resentment because my mom is kind and sweet and not rebellious like me and really was asking genuinely why I don't understand. Why do you want me to do that right now? It seems like I should be doing something else. Why do you want me to do that? But she wasn't allowed to ask that. And so that left her frustrated and resentful. So when she had children, she decided that because I said so is never a reason. I will always take the time to explain to my children why I'm asking them to do something. And to her credit, she did that. But when you're raising Nate, that becomes a real hassle. And I was always allowed to ask why. And I love that quote. There's some quote I picked up years ago that a reason is an invitation for an argument. And that's very true. And so I was always invited into that argument. Why? Go clean your room. Why do I have to do that right now? Go mow the grass. Why? And listen, if the why wasn't good enough, well, I didn't have to do it. In my head, if the why is not good enough, if it can't justify the request, well, then your request is dumb. And so what I learned in that environment is asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It manifests this idea of, okay, I understand what you want me to do, but I'm not going to do that until your reason justifies your request. And if it doesn't, if it falls short of King Nate's gauntlet of reasons, then you can forget it, buddy. So in our house, our response with Lily and then with John, which John can't talk yet. And I remember when Lily couldn't talk and people were like, just be grateful for these times. And I thought, you're jerks. You're not jerks. That makes sense to me now. John can't talk yet, but Lily can, and she likes to ask why. Lily's my daughter, for those of you who don't know me, not just some girl I talk about. But she likes to ask why. But the policy that we've adopted in our house is, first you obey, then you ask why. And this is gonna be what solves it forever. She'll have no issues when she's a parent. She'll replicate this exactly, right? But first you obey and then you ask why. First show that you're gonna be obedient. First show that you're going to submit. First show that the question is genuine and not an attempt to get out of it. And then come and we'll talk to you forever when you have a good attitude about the whys of why we should do something. And I bring this up because I think it's really important as we think about how we respond to the instructions of God. I know that very often when we are met with a teaching from Scripture that we should give, that we should read the Bible, that we should be selfless, that we should forgive as we are forgiven, that we should be generous to others, that we should turn the other cheek, that whenever it is possible for us, as far as it concerns us, that we should seek peace in others when peace is just not the thing that we want right now. Often in my life, and maybe yours too, we want to know the why before we offer our obedience. We want it to make sense to us before King Nate deigns to obey the instructions that I find here. And I will confess to you this, as I thought about this this week. This is not so much an indictment on your attitude, that's up to you, as it is sometimes an indictment on my preaching. Because when I preach and I give us instructions from the word, I always start with a why. Because I don't want to paint God as this ruthless dictator who sits in heaven giving you rules. I always want you to understand why it's what's best for you. But when we jump straight to the why before obedience, I think that begats in us this sense of entitlement. That if God's whys don't stack up for me, then I'm not going to engage in that behavior until they do. And I think it's important for us as believers to accept that the most important and underrated reason why we give is because our Father in heaven told us to. And I think this applies to everything. I think this applies to our quiet times. This applies to our grace with other people. This applies to any challenge that we would face. Anytime God's word tells us to do something, the first and most important reason we do it is because God told us to. Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I think that sometimes for me, I walk through life entitled as if I am owed a why, and God does not owe us that. So an important reason to apply to everything in our life is because our Father in Heaven told us to. Now once we accept that, and we adopt that posture of obedience, and I also want to be very clear, when I say that, I'm talking only to the Christians in the room. If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, you've never signed up for this. You've never said, I submit my life to God. You've never said, you're the Lord of my life. I'm second. I'm going to do what you want. You've never said that. And so to you, I wouldn't say that you even need to give. And I definitely wouldn't say it's because God told you to. You haven't signed up for this yet and said, I'm going to submit myself to God's word. But if you are a Christian, then you have. So first we adopt a posture of obedience. And what we understand in that posture of obedience is that God wants what's best for us. This is what we talked about last week. What we believe is the verse I preached last week, that God actually leads us to paths of life, that in his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand there are pleasures forevermore. We actually believe that our God in heaven wants what's best for us and takes us to the best possible places. And so if he tells us to do something, it must be what's best for us. So we trust that about giving too. So the question really becomes this morning, not why does God want me to give, but why is giving best for me? That's really the question that we are asking this morning. Once we adopt this posture of obedience and say, yes, Father, I am a Christian, and because I am, I am submitted to you, and I will be a person who is a giving, generous person. But I also understand that as I do that, it's what's best for me, and I'd love to understand why it's what's best for me. So I've got a few reasons for you that we're just going to kind of go through. The first thing I would say to you when you ask why is giving what's best for me, I would say it's because God is generous to the generous. God is generous to generous people. Now, I have to be careful with this because this is how you get to health and wealth, right? This is how you get to me preaching to you. If you give, God's going to give back to you a hundredfold. If you give to the church this much, God's going to give you this much. Meanwhile, I'm asking you to fund my private jet and you can't figure out how to pay for a civic, okay? So that's, I don't want to go there. I'm not preaching health and wealth. I'm not telling you that the more you give to God, the more money he's going to give to you. However, this principle that God is generous to the generous is unavoidable in scripture. Jesus talks about this in Luke chapter 6, verse 38, when he says this, give and it will be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Corinthians says, he who sows little reaps little and he who sows much reaps much. There is a principle in the Bible that is unavoidable, that God is generous to the generous. And I'm lying to you and dishonest as a pastor if I don't say that's one of the reasons it's what's best for you. Because when we're generous to others, God is generous to us. Now what it doesn't say anywhere is that God is generous to us monetarily. What it doesn't say anywhere is that the blessings that God is going to be generous with are ones that are going to fill up our bank account. It does not say that. It just says God will be generous to you. And God's generosity comes in forms that is so much better than money. You understand? When you are generous with your resources, God is generous with his. It's an unavoidable truth of scripture. So God's generosity looks like good, rich, and deep, spiritually nourishing, life-giving friendships. God's generosity looks like a marriage that's seen some seasons but is hanging in there and loving one another. God's generosity is good relationships with your children. God's generosity is a place to go every day that you don't hate. God's generosity is when you're walking through a hard season but you know that there is a good season coming because your God is good and you know that every day won't feel like this day. God's generosity doesn't always come in the form of money. I know a family, I know a couple who they have living with them right now, a family member, and this is a family member that should not be living with them, okay? They shouldn't be there. They should be able to live on their own, but they're not. And it is really, they are expressing a great deal of generosity to this family member. And one of their friends learned about this and happens to have a cabin, a nice one, and said, go, stay at our cabin for a weekend. You need that. That's God's generosity being expressed to someone who's being generous. Do you see that? It's not always a one-for-one reciprocal return of money, but God is generous towards the generous, and so it behooves us to be generous. The next thing I would tell you is that giving acknowledges stewardship. Why is giving what's best for me? Well, because when we give, we acknowledge this concept of stewardship. Stewardship, the whole sermon could be about stewardship. The whole sermon could be about all four of the points that I'm making. But stewardship in particular is this idea that once we are believers, we understand that the things that we have in our life are not our own. They're God's. And he's entrusted them to us. To use them for the purposes of advancing his kingdom in the most effective way possible. Back in May on Mother's Day, we did a child dedication. And we had 11 children that we dedicated that day. It was great, super exciting day for Grace. And part of the dedication of the children is for the parents to acknowledge, both literally and symbolically, that this child is not mine. He is yours. She is yours. We are raising them in our home, but they belong to you, God. They are your children, Jesus. And we are raising them the best we can in the way that they should go according to your standards. But these children are not my children. John and Lily do not belong to Nate and Jen. They belong to God. And he has entrusted them to us because he believes that we have a unique capacity to form them and shape them into who they need to be for Jesus so that they move through life advancing his kingdom. They're not our kids. They're God's kids. Your house is not your house. It's God's house. Your finances are not your finances. They're God's finances. And once we realize that, that we are stewards of the things that God has given to us, then it becomes incredibly important. The primary question we ask about all the things with which we have been entrusted is, Jesus, how do I use these to further your name? How do I use these things to bring attention to you? How would you have me organize this part of my life? And so when we give, when we write the check weekly or we click the button monthly or we set it up or whatever it is we do, when we are generous and we give, it reminds us. Every time we see that come out of our account or hit our credit card, whatever it is, that's a reminder. None of this is mine anyways. It's God's. It's God's to use as he sees fit. And if he wants more, he can have more. So giving reminds us that we are stewards, not just with our money, but in everything in our life. Another thing I would say to you is that giving allows us to participate in what God is doing by being a part of the body of Christ. Giving allows us to participate in what is happening in the church, in the kingdom, in the body of Christ by being a part of the body of Christ. I love 1 Corinthians 12. I've never preached on it here, and I need to do a whole series on it because I think it's just an amazing teaching. But in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul lays out this idea that the church is a body and that everyone who's a part of the church has a part to play. The body has arms and legs and feet and hands and it has all kinds of things that are incredibly important. It has lungs that nobody ever sees, but if we don't have lungs, then the rest of it doesn't work. And it all intricately works together to get things accomplished. And I love this teaching because it reminds me as a pastor, I'm just the mouth. That's it. But y'all are the hands that touch people who need it. Y'all are the arms that are wrapped around folks who are struggling. Y'all are the feet that take the good news of the gospel into work. Y'all are the lungs that make this thing go. None of us, none of us, not me, not an elder, not somebody who's been here 30 years, none of us are more important to what's happening at Grace than anybody else. We simply have our part to play. My part is to run my mouth. Sometimes I wish somebody else would take that part. Because maybe I'd like to be the ear sometimes. But everybody has a part. And I think our part of being in the body of Christ, a church in an affluent suburb is to use our resources to serve the greater body of Christ. And when we do that as a church, we get to participate in things going on just outside of grace as well. And so to me, it's a wonderful picture of why as a church we should want to have a generous heart. Right now, we give 10% of everything that we get to ministries going on outside the walls of grace. It is one of my big long-term goals for the church to see that percentage increase a lot so that we play our part in God's greater body and who we are. But not just as we think about reaching outside of the walls of grace, but as we think about what happens within grace and how when we give, we are part of the celebrations that God allows for us here. We are part of the victories that Jesus wins here. We participate in that by giving and doing our part and being a part of the body of Christ. I think back to October of 2017. That was the first time I got to go down to Reynosa to go see the folks at Faith Ministry. Colleen of Faith Ministry fame is with us this morning. Hello, Colleen. That's a ministry in Mexico that builds houses for people who otherwise would not be able to have them. And Grace has been partners with them since before Grace existed. So more than 20 years. And I got to go down there in October of 2017 to see it for the first time. And it was a really great experience. And I'll never forget, we're sitting there and I wanted to say it's the parking lot, but that's generous. It's the place where the cars go. And we're sitting in the van and we're waiting to pull out. And I hear a car crank up and and it was as if that poor thing was being tortured. Like, it did not, every noise it made was, please, please don't make me do this. Like, and I turn around, and the bumper is in shatters. It's being held with bungee cords, and to say that it was a beater is generous to beaters, and it was being driven by the pastor down there, a younger guy named Pastor Carlos. And Pastor Carlos, he works 10 times harder than me. I could not do what he does. I asked him one time what his weekly schedule was and just the Bible studies that he has and the different towns and stuff that he touches on and the different people in his orbit. He needs a good car. He's shuttling kids back and forth. He works so hard. This is not what he should be driving. And so I kind of leaned over to some folks that were on the trip and I said, hey, I think Grace could raise enough money to buy him a truck. Can we do that? And I talked to the folks at Faith Ministry. Would it be cool if we bought him a truck? He seems to need it. And everybody was good with it. And so I came back to Grace and I said, hey, this is, as we enter Christmas, this is the thing we want to do. We want to have enough money to buy a truck for Pastor Carlos. And we did. What kind of car did we buy him? Do you remember? Yeah, Ford Escape or Ranger or something like that. But it was nice and new and way better than what he had. And some of our folks from Grace got to go down and deliver it to him. And when I watched the video, I had tears in my eyes because he was so grateful. And so blown away by the generosity of the church. And it was a really sweet moment. And the next time I went down there, the first thing Carlos wanted me to do is come see his truck and say thank you again for it. Now listen, if you were here and you gave to that Christmas offering in 2017, that joy is your joy. That happiness is your happiness. That's not watching other people do a good thing like when we watch on the internet and our heart is warmed and then we scroll to the next thing. That's your joy. You did that. You participated in that. You made that possible. That was God using your gifts and your finances making you a part of the body of Christ so that you could participate in the good work that he was doing. That joy was your joy. If you give to grace, those 11 kids that were up here being dedicated, that's your joy. When we baptize somebody, that's your joy. When you see somebody come into the church, that's your joy. We have, I think, nine people coming to Discover Grace after church today coming out of a pandemic. That's your joy that those people are becoming a part of what we're doing here at Grace. Every win that Jesus claims here at this church, when we give, we are a part of that. Because those wins don't happen if we don't give. So we give because we are a part of the body of Christ. And that allows us to participate in the work that Jesus is doing, wherever he's doing work. The last point that I would make about why it's best for us to give is that giving invites us to mirror the generosity of God that's lavished upon us. It invites us to mirror the generosity that God has given us. Now, this too could be a whole sermon, and it was. The last time we talked about giving, Doug Bergeson, one of our elders, preached on it in February of 2020, and I don't do things like this, but it's the best sermon on giving I've ever heard. If you haven't heard it, and you'd like to explore this idea more, go back into the archives. It was Grace's Going Home series, February of 2020. Find the Doug Bergeson sermon. It's an excellent one on what I'm talking about right here, How we participate in God's generosity when we give. But what I would say to you this morning is simply this, that this is to me the most compelling reason to give. Because the longer you are a believer, the deeper you grow in gratitude to the Father. There's no two ways about it. You might think that if you've lived a life however you want it, in total selfishness, in total depravity, you've done all the bad things that anybody could do. You can check off all the boxes and and then at like 35, you come to know God, and you're amazed that he's wiped the slate clean, and he's accepted you into his kingdom, that that moment is maximum gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness. No, it's not. Because to walk with God is to understand that when you become a Christian, he doesn't just forgive you for all the stuff that you did up to that moment. He forgives you for all the crap that you're going to do too. He knows every terrible thought that you're going to have. When you get saved, whatever your lowest point is after that, whatever rock bottom looks like after you become a Christian, God was already in that moment whispering to you that he loves you and he forgives you and he wants you to come back to him. He's already in that moment. Whether that moment's behind you or ahead of you, God was in it telling you already, I've covered this too. So to walk with God and to fall short again and again and again, to arrive at that place that Paul arrives at in Romans 7 that is to me the most redemptive verse in scripture, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. To arrive there and be refreshed anew with God's overwhelming forgiveness and generosity to us. For it to hit us like a wave again that Jesus condescended, took on human flesh, lived with us in the muck and the mire, died on the cross for us, knowing that we would crud on that very death over and over and over again in our life only to require his forgiveness yet again and then he offers and then he goes about, once he dies for us, ascending to the right hand of the Father to advocate for us and to whisper in God's ear that, yes, I've covered that too. When we sit daily in the realization of the gospel and we let the waves of Jesus' forgiveness wash over us and God's generosity flood us, we cannot help but grow in our gratitude towards God. Whatever gratitude we experienced at salvation is the starting point for how it grows through our life. And so we give as an expression of that gratitude. We give because something so incredible is happening to us that we want to find a way to be conduits of that generosity that God has given us. God has given so much to me. God has given so much to us. God has enriched our lives so much that we can't help but want to desire to enrich the lives of others. We can't help but want to express the generosity that God has lavished upon us. And so giving in his best, most pure state is simply a reaction to the overflow of God's giving in our life. That's why Paul teaches in Corinthians that God loves a cheerful giver. Don't give out of compulsion, but give because you want to. And how can we grow our want to in giving? By focusing on the face of Jesus and remembering the generosity and the forgiveness that he offers us every day. And so giving is what's best for us because it reorients us to the gospel. It reorients us towards God's goodness in our life. God has been good to me and provided me this. I am going to give this portion of this, understanding that he can replace it or he can't, but God has been so generous to me that I want to be generous to others. That's why we give. I love this verse in 2 Corinthians 9-11 says, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. There's this part of the Sermon on the Mount that I find incredibly intimidating, where Jesus says, let others see your good deeds, see your good works, and shine for the Father so that your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your father who is in heaven. And I always think to myself, how do you act like that? A really easy way is to be generous. That's what Corinthians tells us. That God has enriched us. He's given us resources in every way. Why? So that we might enrich others. And then both you and them will turn that to thanksgiving to God. And it will point us back to the Father and our Savior Jesus. That's why giving is what's best for us. It's good for us. It develops a spirit of generosity that constantly, constantly orients us back to Jesus. So I would end this morning with a simple challenge for you. Trust God and give. Trust God and his word and give. How much should I give? Just a little bit more than you are. That's always the answer. 10%? No, that's an Old Testament thing. How much do we give in the New Testament? Just a little bit more than we are. Whatever that means for you. Who do I give to? I'll be the first to tell you. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that you have to give all of your giving to the local church. I've sat in churches, I've heard pastors say, your first 10% goes to this church and then on top of that, other places. That's not in the Bible. I'm not going to sit here and teach you that. I'm not preaching this as a self-serving thing for grace. If you believe in grace and what's happening here and you feel compelled to participate in the victories that Jesus is winning here, then give to grace. But you give wherever God is advancing his kingdom. Wherever God is working and Jesus is moving, you give there. Just give. Trust God and do it. I have never talked to a single person in my whole life who has said, you know what? I heard what the pastor said about giving and I decided to start being more generous. That was a huge mistake. I really regret it. Wish I could have that back. Never heard anybody say that. So this morning, it's simple. If you and I could have a conversation, I would simply end it by saying, just trust God. Obey Him. Be a person who's generous. Let's give together. Let me pray for us. Father, we do love you. We are so grateful for the goodness and the gifts that you've lavished upon us. God, I pray first and foremost that we would let those wash over us. I pray more than anything else that we would simply leave here increasingly overwhelmed with your goodness to us. Father, for those of us who need this, who need to think about this in our own lives, I pray that because you said so would be all the reason that we ever need. I pray that we would trust that and walk in that. Knowing that even when we don't understand obedience sometimes, that it is going to lead us to a path of life. God, give us the heart and the gratitude and the spirit to be people who are generous. I pray that each one of us would leave here determined to be just a little bit more generous than we were when we walked in today. And God, for those of us who are obedient and who respond and who give. Would we find you there, please? Would you show us yourself in that giving? Can we ask that through the generosity that you compel us to that we are brought closer to your son and so inspired and enlivened to continue to be generous. It's in his name, the one who died for us and who advocates for us, that we pray. Amen.
If you're like a lot of us, then this jar kind of looks like your life as we entered the pandemic. Lots of things in our life that are really important to us, big deals, things that we definitely want to prioritize, but maybe sometimes we have a hard time finding time for, and then other things in our life that are probably important, but maybe not essential, and we'd love to give our time to them, but we probably don't need to make big priorities out of them. But what happens in the end when we get so busy is that we don't have time for everything, right? But then with the pandemic, life, well it kind of hit the reset button. And we spent most of last year with nothing but time on our hands. And now, as we face moving back into what feels like normal, I think that we have this unique opportunity to reassemble our lives. And as we have this opportunity, I thought it would be appropriate for Grace to stop and really think critically about well, what are our big rocks? What are the things in our life that are the most important to us? What are the things that we want to prioritize above and beyond everything else and what would our life look like if we actually identified our big rocks and prioritized our time around those things? What if we put these rocks in first and made sure that there was space in our life for the things that were most important and then around those things we allowed all the other little things to kind of fill in the rest of our time and priorities? What would it look like if we were to hit the reset button on our life and reassemble it in such a way that we had time and space for what was important to us and we didn't have to worry at all about the other things that just at the end of the day, they're not nearly as big of a deal. What are our big rocks? And how do we make space for them as we enter into a new normal? Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I get to be the pastor here. A little confession, after we shot that video in the back corner, I was on my hands and knees for about 15 minutes picking up all those rocks. So I'm really glad we got it there on that first take, and I didn't have to do that again. Thank you for being here. Like I said, I'm the senior pastor here. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I would love to do that. We got a full crew here this morning. That is exciting and good. So thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us online, particularly if you're on vacation and you're still choosing to make this a part of your Sunday. We are grateful for that. I'm really looking forward to the rest of this series as we talk about exactly what I addressed in the video. This idea of coming kind of back to life, the world feeling normal again, or at least approaching it. If we can avoid this Delta variant, but that's a whole different conversation. But it feels like we're approaching that. And as we do it, we have this unique opportunity to kind of reconstruct our life around the things that are most important to us. And really, we have this opportunity to reconstruct our life around Jesus. So for the next four weeks, we're going to talk about what our big rocks are. What are the things that are the most important to us and how do we orchestrate those things around Jesus and around this pursuit of God the Father. And I said specifically that I'm looking forward to the rest of the weeks of the series because I'm not looking forward to this morning in this series. I did not wake up this morning excited for this sermon. Some Sundays I wake up and I'm really, really, I can't wait to share with you what God has laid on my heart. Last Sunday is a great example of that. This Sunday, I'm preaching about money. So when I got up this morning, it wasn't like, yes, the tithe, here we come. Nor did you get up hoping that this would be the Sunday that I talked about money. So listen, I'll just confess up front. I'm no more interested in preaching this than you are in hearing it. Okay, but we're here now. So this is what we're going to do. And really, the reason that we're talking about this is first of all, first and foremost, I don't talk about this very much at Grace. The last time we talked about this was in February of 2020, and I didn't even do it. It was Doug Bergeson, all right? So we don't do it a whole lot, but this topic is all throughout the Bible. Scripture is replete with instructions on giving about big rocks in life, if we're going to talk about the things that matter most to us and how to prioritize those around Jesus, then we have to talk about finances. We have to ask the question, what does God want us to do with our resources and with our money? And the Bible talks about it so much that it would be irresponsible as a church and I'd be irresponsible as a pastor if we didn't revisit it with some regularity. So we arrive at it this morning and as we arrive at it, I'm kind of approaching it like this. This is why I'm sitting down for this one at a table instead of standing and gesticulating and walking around wildly and trying to keep calm and not yell at you because I'm approaching this as if you and I could have a conversation about it. If you and I were able to meet for lunch or if you could come to the office or we meet somewhere and we could talk and your question was, what does the Bible have to say about giving anyways? Or maybe even, why does God want me to give? Then this is the conversation that I would want to have with you. So I'm staying seated to remind me that this is what I would like to say to each of you if we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about this together. And as we do that, I would even say to you this, that as I wrote and approached this sermon, I really had in mind the person who is new to church. Maybe you are someone who, for the first time in a long time, church is important to you again. For the first time in a long time, spiritual health is important to you again. And so maybe you're kind of trying to get reengaged spiritually. Maybe you haven't been in church a lot for the past five, 10 years, and so you're kind of starting to re-engage and maybe have never really thought critically about giving and what the Bible has to say about it. This is for the new and the non-believers, for those of us who hear that we should give in church, who probably understand that the Bible tells us to do it, but maybe we don't know all the whys around it and maybe we don't have a developed theology of why we should be generous. So this sermon in particular is for you. Now I know that at Grace, and I see the evidence of it over and over again, we have plenty of you who have a really good theology of giving, who understand tithing and being generous and why we do it. And so for you, I hope that we hit on some things that are encouraging, particularly the first point that I make. I think we should apply it to everything, not just giving. And so I hope that there's some encouraging ways to think about it. But this is really for folks who, if I sat you down and I said, what does the Bible say about giving or why should we give? This is for you if you feel like, gosh, I'm not sure how well I would answer that. So like I said, I'm approaching it as a conversation and I want to approach the conversation with what the Bible even has to say about it. And as I sought that out this week, you know, the Old Testament has a lot of very specific instructions that we are to give. The Old Testament introduces this idea of giving in generosity like a new idea. Leave the corners of your field for the sojourners, for the poor, for the widow, for the aliens, for the people who don't yet have a home. We're told to bring our tithe to the storehouse in the Old Testament. We're told there's a whole portion in Leviticus that tells us exactly, tells the children of Israel exactly how they are to give. So in the Old Testament, it's given as an instruction. It's introduced almost as a new idea. But what you find in the New Testament, if you want to read New Testament verses about giving, and the New Testament is simply the part of the Bible that comes during Jesus's life and after. And Jesus kind of changes everything. So what does the Bible have to say about giving once Jesus gets on the scene? Well, once Jesus arrives, the instructions about giving become a little bit presumptive, as if this is a thing that we already know. This is actually what Jesus says about it in the Sermon on the Mount. If you have a Bible, you can turn to Matthew chapter 6. I'm going to read you verses 1 through 4. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus' first recorded public address. It's the first time he talks. And he has performed miracles and those people began to follow them and then he begins to preach to them and he hits on myriad topics. But then he lands on giving for a different directions. But the interesting part to me about this verse, if you want to ask what does the New Testament teach about giving, is the two uses of the word when. When you give. When you give to the needy. Jesus is talking to the huddled masses. Talking to thousands of people in the middle of the day, presumably jobless folks for the most part. And he still assumes that they know, without ever introducing giving as a new idea, he assumes that they know that they should give. He assumes that they know that God expects them to be generous people. And so he says, when you do it, do it in such a way that you're not doing it in a showy way. Do it in secret. Be discreet about it. And there's a whole teaching there. But again, what's interesting to me is when you give, when you do it. And I bring that up because I think that that's how familiar a lot of us are with giving. We might not know why we're supposed to do it. We might not know what for. We might not know how we should be compelled to do it. We just know that we are supposed to. And so the interesting question is why? Why are we supposed to give? Why does God ask us in the Old Testament when he's setting everything up and then just assume of us that we know that we ought to in the New Testament? Why does God do that? And so we're going to spend the rest of the morning kind of answering that question, and this is the conversational piece of it. Why does God want me to give? The most important reason, the most important reason and most underrated reason we give is because God tells us to. The most important, and this is key, most underrated reason that we give is because God tells us to. Now, listen, here's why I say this. When my mom was growing up, she grew up in the 60s and 70s, and Linda, her mom, my mom, all wonderful woman, she ruled with an iron fist, man. This was back in the good old days, all right, when it was nice to be a parent. You rule with an iron fist. That was a funny slip. You ruled with an iron fist. Kids are to be seen and not heard. When the company comes over, you go upstairs. You do not interrupt. And when my mom would get out of line when she was told to do something, and she said, why? She had the audacity to say, why do I have to clean your room? Why? Because I told you to. Fire would burn in Linda's eyes, right? And mom would know. She better do whatever it was she was asked to do, even if it makes no sense at all to her, because there is going to be some serious repercussions if she doesn't. She saw the fire, and so she got right. And so when my mom grew up, because I told you to, was all the reason that a child needed. Well, when that's the only reason you get, that develops in you a little bit of resentment, right? This heart of resentment because my mom is kind and sweet and not rebellious like me and really was asking genuinely why I don't understand. Why do you want me to do that right now? It seems like I should be doing something else. Why do you want me to do that? But she wasn't allowed to ask that. And so that left her frustrated and resentful. So when she had children, she decided that because I said so is never a reason. I will always take the time to explain to my children why I'm asking them to do something. And to her credit, she did that. But when you're raising Nate, that becomes a real hassle. And I was always allowed to ask why. And I love that quote. There's some quote I picked up years ago that a reason is an invitation for an argument. And that's very true. And so I was always invited into that argument. Why? Go clean your room. Why do I have to do that right now? Go mow the grass. Why? And listen, if the why wasn't good enough, well, I didn't have to do it. In my head, if the why is not good enough, if it can't justify the request, well, then your request is dumb. And so what I learned in that environment is asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It manifests this idea of, okay, I understand what you want me to do, but I'm not going to do that until your reason justifies your request. And if it doesn't, if it falls short of King Nate's gauntlet of reasons, then you can forget it, buddy. So in our house, our response with Lily and then with John, which John can't talk yet. And I remember when Lily couldn't talk and people were like, just be grateful for these times. And I thought, you're jerks. You're not jerks. That makes sense to me now. John can't talk yet, but Lily can, and she likes to ask why. Lily's my daughter, for those of you who don't know me, not just some girl I talk about. But she likes to ask why. But the policy that we've adopted in our house is, first you obey, then you ask why. And this is gonna be what solves it forever. She'll have no issues when she's a parent. She'll replicate this exactly, right? But first you obey and then you ask why. First show that you're gonna be obedient. First show that you're going to submit. First show that the question is genuine and not an attempt to get out of it. And then come and we'll talk to you forever when you have a good attitude about the whys of why we should do something. And I bring this up because I think it's really important as we think about how we respond to the instructions of God. I know that very often when we are met with a teaching from Scripture that we should give, that we should read the Bible, that we should be selfless, that we should forgive as we are forgiven, that we should be generous to others, that we should turn the other cheek, that whenever it is possible for us, as far as it concerns us, that we should seek peace in others when peace is just not the thing that we want right now. Often in my life, and maybe yours too, we want to know the why before we offer our obedience. We want it to make sense to us before King Nate deigns to obey the instructions that I find here. And I will confess to you this, as I thought about this this week. This is not so much an indictment on your attitude, that's up to you, as it is sometimes an indictment on my preaching. Because when I preach and I give us instructions from the word, I always start with a why. Because I don't want to paint God as this ruthless dictator who sits in heaven giving you rules. I always want you to understand why it's what's best for you. But when we jump straight to the why before obedience, I think that begats in us this sense of entitlement. That if God's whys don't stack up for me, then I'm not going to engage in that behavior until they do. And I think it's important for us as believers to accept that the most important and underrated reason why we give is because our Father in heaven told us to. And I think this applies to everything. I think this applies to our quiet times. This applies to our grace with other people. This applies to any challenge that we would face. Anytime God's word tells us to do something, the first and most important reason we do it is because God told us to. Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I think that sometimes for me, I walk through life entitled as if I am owed a why, and God does not owe us that. So an important reason to apply to everything in our life is because our Father in Heaven told us to. Now once we accept that, and we adopt that posture of obedience, and I also want to be very clear, when I say that, I'm talking only to the Christians in the room. If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, you've never signed up for this. You've never said, I submit my life to God. You've never said, you're the Lord of my life. I'm second. I'm going to do what you want. You've never said that. And so to you, I wouldn't say that you even need to give. And I definitely wouldn't say it's because God told you to. You haven't signed up for this yet and said, I'm going to submit myself to God's word. But if you are a Christian, then you have. So first we adopt a posture of obedience. And what we understand in that posture of obedience is that God wants what's best for us. This is what we talked about last week. What we believe is the verse I preached last week, that God actually leads us to paths of life, that in his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand there are pleasures forevermore. We actually believe that our God in heaven wants what's best for us and takes us to the best possible places. And so if he tells us to do something, it must be what's best for us. So we trust that about giving too. So the question really becomes this morning, not why does God want me to give, but why is giving best for me? That's really the question that we are asking this morning. Once we adopt this posture of obedience and say, yes, Father, I am a Christian, and because I am, I am submitted to you, and I will be a person who is a giving, generous person. But I also understand that as I do that, it's what's best for me, and I'd love to understand why it's what's best for me. So I've got a few reasons for you that we're just going to kind of go through. The first thing I would say to you when you ask why is giving what's best for me, I would say it's because God is generous to the generous. God is generous to generous people. Now, I have to be careful with this because this is how you get to health and wealth, right? This is how you get to me preaching to you. If you give, God's going to give back to you a hundredfold. If you give to the church this much, God's going to give you this much. Meanwhile, I'm asking you to fund my private jet and you can't figure out how to pay for a civic, okay? So that's, I don't want to go there. I'm not preaching health and wealth. I'm not telling you that the more you give to God, the more money he's going to give to you. However, this principle that God is generous to the generous is unavoidable in scripture. Jesus talks about this in Luke chapter 6, verse 38, when he says this, give and it will be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Corinthians says, he who sows little reaps little and he who sows much reaps much. There is a principle in the Bible that is unavoidable, that God is generous to the generous. And I'm lying to you and dishonest as a pastor if I don't say that's one of the reasons it's what's best for you. Because when we're generous to others, God is generous to us. Now what it doesn't say anywhere is that God is generous to us monetarily. What it doesn't say anywhere is that the blessings that God is going to be generous with are ones that are going to fill up our bank account. It does not say that. It just says God will be generous to you. And God's generosity comes in forms that is so much better than money. You understand? When you are generous with your resources, God is generous with his. It's an unavoidable truth of scripture. So God's generosity looks like good, rich, and deep, spiritually nourishing, life-giving friendships. God's generosity looks like a marriage that's seen some seasons but is hanging in there and loving one another. God's generosity is good relationships with your children. God's generosity is a place to go every day that you don't hate. God's generosity is when you're walking through a hard season but you know that there is a good season coming because your God is good and you know that every day won't feel like this day. God's generosity doesn't always come in the form of money. I know a family, I know a couple who they have living with them right now, a family member, and this is a family member that should not be living with them, okay? They shouldn't be there. They should be able to live on their own, but they're not. And it is really, they are expressing a great deal of generosity to this family member. And one of their friends learned about this and happens to have a cabin, a nice one, and said, go, stay at our cabin for a weekend. You need that. That's God's generosity being expressed to someone who's being generous. Do you see that? It's not always a one-for-one reciprocal return of money, but God is generous towards the generous, and so it behooves us to be generous. The next thing I would tell you is that giving acknowledges stewardship. Why is giving what's best for me? Well, because when we give, we acknowledge this concept of stewardship. Stewardship, the whole sermon could be about stewardship. The whole sermon could be about all four of the points that I'm making. But stewardship in particular is this idea that once we are believers, we understand that the things that we have in our life are not our own. They're God's. And he's entrusted them to us. To use them for the purposes of advancing his kingdom in the most effective way possible. Back in May on Mother's Day, we did a child dedication. And we had 11 children that we dedicated that day. It was great, super exciting day for Grace. And part of the dedication of the children is for the parents to acknowledge, both literally and symbolically, that this child is not mine. He is yours. She is yours. We are raising them in our home, but they belong to you, God. They are your children, Jesus. And we are raising them the best we can in the way that they should go according to your standards. But these children are not my children. John and Lily do not belong to Nate and Jen. They belong to God. And he has entrusted them to us because he believes that we have a unique capacity to form them and shape them into who they need to be for Jesus so that they move through life advancing his kingdom. They're not our kids. They're God's kids. Your house is not your house. It's God's house. Your finances are not your finances. They're God's finances. And once we realize that, that we are stewards of the things that God has given to us, then it becomes incredibly important. The primary question we ask about all the things with which we have been entrusted is, Jesus, how do I use these to further your name? How do I use these things to bring attention to you? How would you have me organize this part of my life? And so when we give, when we write the check weekly or we click the button monthly or we set it up or whatever it is we do, when we are generous and we give, it reminds us. Every time we see that come out of our account or hit our credit card, whatever it is, that's a reminder. None of this is mine anyways. It's God's. It's God's to use as he sees fit. And if he wants more, he can have more. So giving reminds us that we are stewards, not just with our money, but in everything in our life. Another thing I would say to you is that giving allows us to participate in what God is doing by being a part of the body of Christ. Giving allows us to participate in what is happening in the church, in the kingdom, in the body of Christ by being a part of the body of Christ. I love 1 Corinthians 12. I've never preached on it here, and I need to do a whole series on it because I think it's just an amazing teaching. But in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul lays out this idea that the church is a body and that everyone who's a part of the church has a part to play. The body has arms and legs and feet and hands and it has all kinds of things that are incredibly important. It has lungs that nobody ever sees, but if we don't have lungs, then the rest of it doesn't work. And it all intricately works together to get things accomplished. And I love this teaching because it reminds me as a pastor, I'm just the mouth. That's it. But y'all are the hands that touch people who need it. Y'all are the arms that are wrapped around folks who are struggling. Y'all are the feet that take the good news of the gospel into work. Y'all are the lungs that make this thing go. None of us, none of us, not me, not an elder, not somebody who's been here 30 years, none of us are more important to what's happening at Grace than anybody else. We simply have our part to play. My part is to run my mouth. Sometimes I wish somebody else would take that part. Because maybe I'd like to be the ear sometimes. But everybody has a part. And I think our part of being in the body of Christ, a church in an affluent suburb is to use our resources to serve the greater body of Christ. And when we do that as a church, we get to participate in things going on just outside of grace as well. And so to me, it's a wonderful picture of why as a church we should want to have a generous heart. Right now, we give 10% of everything that we get to ministries going on outside the walls of grace. It is one of my big long-term goals for the church to see that percentage increase a lot so that we play our part in God's greater body and who we are. But not just as we think about reaching outside of the walls of grace, but as we think about what happens within grace and how when we give, we are part of the celebrations that God allows for us here. We are part of the victories that Jesus wins here. We participate in that by giving and doing our part and being a part of the body of Christ. I think back to October of 2017. That was the first time I got to go down to Reynosa to go see the folks at Faith Ministry. Colleen of Faith Ministry fame is with us this morning. Hello, Colleen. That's a ministry in Mexico that builds houses for people who otherwise would not be able to have them. And Grace has been partners with them since before Grace existed. So more than 20 years. And I got to go down there in October of 2017 to see it for the first time. And it was a really great experience. And I'll never forget, we're sitting there and I wanted to say it's the parking lot, but that's generous. It's the place where the cars go. And we're sitting in the van and we're waiting to pull out. And I hear a car crank up and and it was as if that poor thing was being tortured. Like, it did not, every noise it made was, please, please don't make me do this. Like, and I turn around, and the bumper is in shatters. It's being held with bungee cords, and to say that it was a beater is generous to beaters, and it was being driven by the pastor down there, a younger guy named Pastor Carlos. And Pastor Carlos, he works 10 times harder than me. I could not do what he does. I asked him one time what his weekly schedule was and just the Bible studies that he has and the different towns and stuff that he touches on and the different people in his orbit. He needs a good car. He's shuttling kids back and forth. He works so hard. This is not what he should be driving. And so I kind of leaned over to some folks that were on the trip and I said, hey, I think Grace could raise enough money to buy him a truck. Can we do that? And I talked to the folks at Faith Ministry. Would it be cool if we bought him a truck? He seems to need it. And everybody was good with it. And so I came back to Grace and I said, hey, this is, as we enter Christmas, this is the thing we want to do. We want to have enough money to buy a truck for Pastor Carlos. And we did. What kind of car did we buy him? Do you remember? Yeah, Ford Escape or Ranger or something like that. But it was nice and new and way better than what he had. And some of our folks from Grace got to go down and deliver it to him. And when I watched the video, I had tears in my eyes because he was so grateful. And so blown away by the generosity of the church. And it was a really sweet moment. And the next time I went down there, the first thing Carlos wanted me to do is come see his truck and say thank you again for it. Now listen, if you were here and you gave to that Christmas offering in 2017, that joy is your joy. That happiness is your happiness. That's not watching other people do a good thing like when we watch on the internet and our heart is warmed and then we scroll to the next thing. That's your joy. You did that. You participated in that. You made that possible. That was God using your gifts and your finances making you a part of the body of Christ so that you could participate in the good work that he was doing. That joy was your joy. If you give to grace, those 11 kids that were up here being dedicated, that's your joy. When we baptize somebody, that's your joy. When you see somebody come into the church, that's your joy. We have, I think, nine people coming to Discover Grace after church today coming out of a pandemic. That's your joy that those people are becoming a part of what we're doing here at Grace. Every win that Jesus claims here at this church, when we give, we are a part of that. Because those wins don't happen if we don't give. So we give because we are a part of the body of Christ. And that allows us to participate in the work that Jesus is doing, wherever he's doing work. The last point that I would make about why it's best for us to give is that giving invites us to mirror the generosity of God that's lavished upon us. It invites us to mirror the generosity that God has given us. Now, this too could be a whole sermon, and it was. The last time we talked about giving, Doug Bergeson, one of our elders, preached on it in February of 2020, and I don't do things like this, but it's the best sermon on giving I've ever heard. If you haven't heard it, and you'd like to explore this idea more, go back into the archives. It was Grace's Going Home series, February of 2020. Find the Doug Bergeson sermon. It's an excellent one on what I'm talking about right here, How we participate in God's generosity when we give. But what I would say to you this morning is simply this, that this is to me the most compelling reason to give. Because the longer you are a believer, the deeper you grow in gratitude to the Father. There's no two ways about it. You might think that if you've lived a life however you want it, in total selfishness, in total depravity, you've done all the bad things that anybody could do. You can check off all the boxes and and then at like 35, you come to know God, and you're amazed that he's wiped the slate clean, and he's accepted you into his kingdom, that that moment is maximum gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness. No, it's not. Because to walk with God is to understand that when you become a Christian, he doesn't just forgive you for all the stuff that you did up to that moment. He forgives you for all the crap that you're going to do too. He knows every terrible thought that you're going to have. When you get saved, whatever your lowest point is after that, whatever rock bottom looks like after you become a Christian, God was already in that moment whispering to you that he loves you and he forgives you and he wants you to come back to him. He's already in that moment. Whether that moment's behind you or ahead of you, God was in it telling you already, I've covered this too. So to walk with God and to fall short again and again and again, to arrive at that place that Paul arrives at in Romans 7 that is to me the most redemptive verse in scripture, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. To arrive there and be refreshed anew with God's overwhelming forgiveness and generosity to us. For it to hit us like a wave again that Jesus condescended, took on human flesh, lived with us in the muck and the mire, died on the cross for us, knowing that we would crud on that very death over and over and over again in our life only to require his forgiveness yet again and then he offers and then he goes about, once he dies for us, ascending to the right hand of the Father to advocate for us and to whisper in God's ear that, yes, I've covered that too. When we sit daily in the realization of the gospel and we let the waves of Jesus' forgiveness wash over us and God's generosity flood us, we cannot help but grow in our gratitude towards God. Whatever gratitude we experienced at salvation is the starting point for how it grows through our life. And so we give as an expression of that gratitude. We give because something so incredible is happening to us that we want to find a way to be conduits of that generosity that God has given us. God has given so much to me. God has given so much to us. God has enriched our lives so much that we can't help but want to desire to enrich the lives of others. We can't help but want to express the generosity that God has lavished upon us. And so giving in his best, most pure state is simply a reaction to the overflow of God's giving in our life. That's why Paul teaches in Corinthians that God loves a cheerful giver. Don't give out of compulsion, but give because you want to. And how can we grow our want to in giving? By focusing on the face of Jesus and remembering the generosity and the forgiveness that he offers us every day. And so giving is what's best for us because it reorients us to the gospel. It reorients us towards God's goodness in our life. God has been good to me and provided me this. I am going to give this portion of this, understanding that he can replace it or he can't, but God has been so generous to me that I want to be generous to others. That's why we give. I love this verse in 2 Corinthians 9-11 says, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. There's this part of the Sermon on the Mount that I find incredibly intimidating, where Jesus says, let others see your good deeds, see your good works, and shine for the Father so that your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your father who is in heaven. And I always think to myself, how do you act like that? A really easy way is to be generous. That's what Corinthians tells us. That God has enriched us. He's given us resources in every way. Why? So that we might enrich others. And then both you and them will turn that to thanksgiving to God. And it will point us back to the Father and our Savior Jesus. That's why giving is what's best for us. It's good for us. It develops a spirit of generosity that constantly, constantly orients us back to Jesus. So I would end this morning with a simple challenge for you. Trust God and give. Trust God and his word and give. How much should I give? Just a little bit more than you are. That's always the answer. 10%? No, that's an Old Testament thing. How much do we give in the New Testament? Just a little bit more than we are. Whatever that means for you. Who do I give to? I'll be the first to tell you. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that you have to give all of your giving to the local church. I've sat in churches, I've heard pastors say, your first 10% goes to this church and then on top of that, other places. That's not in the Bible. I'm not going to sit here and teach you that. I'm not preaching this as a self-serving thing for grace. If you believe in grace and what's happening here and you feel compelled to participate in the victories that Jesus is winning here, then give to grace. But you give wherever God is advancing his kingdom. Wherever God is working and Jesus is moving, you give there. Just give. Trust God and do it. I have never talked to a single person in my whole life who has said, you know what? I heard what the pastor said about giving and I decided to start being more generous. That was a huge mistake. I really regret it. Wish I could have that back. Never heard anybody say that. So this morning, it's simple. If you and I could have a conversation, I would simply end it by saying, just trust God. Obey Him. Be a person who's generous. Let's give together. Let me pray for us. Father, we do love you. We are so grateful for the goodness and the gifts that you've lavished upon us. God, I pray first and foremost that we would let those wash over us. I pray more than anything else that we would simply leave here increasingly overwhelmed with your goodness to us. Father, for those of us who need this, who need to think about this in our own lives, I pray that because you said so would be all the reason that we ever need. I pray that we would trust that and walk in that. Knowing that even when we don't understand obedience sometimes, that it is going to lead us to a path of life. God, give us the heart and the gratitude and the spirit to be people who are generous. I pray that each one of us would leave here determined to be just a little bit more generous than we were when we walked in today. And God, for those of us who are obedient and who respond and who give. Would we find you there, please? Would you show us yourself in that giving? Can we ask that through the generosity that you compel us to that we are brought closer to your son and so inspired and enlivened to continue to be generous. It's in his name, the one who died for us and who advocates for us, that we pray. Amen.
If you're like a lot of us, then this jar kind of looks like your life as we entered the pandemic. Lots of things in our life that are really important to us, big deals, things that we definitely want to prioritize, but maybe sometimes we have a hard time finding time for, and then other things in our life that are probably important, but maybe not essential, and we'd love to give our time to them, but we probably don't need to make big priorities out of them. But what happens in the end when we get so busy is that we don't have time for everything, right? But then with the pandemic, life, well it kind of hit the reset button. And we spent most of last year with nothing but time on our hands. And now, as we face moving back into what feels like normal, I think that we have this unique opportunity to reassemble our lives. And as we have this opportunity, I thought it would be appropriate for Grace to stop and really think critically about well, what are our big rocks? What are the things in our life that are the most important to us? What are the things that we want to prioritize above and beyond everything else and what would our life look like if we actually identified our big rocks and prioritized our time around those things? What if we put these rocks in first and made sure that there was space in our life for the things that were most important and then around those things we allowed all the other little things to kind of fill in the rest of our time and priorities? What would it look like if we were to hit the reset button on our life and reassemble it in such a way that we had time and space for what was important to us and we didn't have to worry at all about the other things that just at the end of the day, they're not nearly as big of a deal. What are our big rocks? And how do we make space for them as we enter into a new normal? Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I get to be the pastor here. A little confession, after we shot that video in the back corner, I was on my hands and knees for about 15 minutes picking up all those rocks. So I'm really glad we got it there on that first take, and I didn't have to do that again. Thank you for being here. Like I said, I'm the senior pastor here. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I would love to do that. We got a full crew here this morning. That is exciting and good. So thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us online, particularly if you're on vacation and you're still choosing to make this a part of your Sunday. We are grateful for that. I'm really looking forward to the rest of this series as we talk about exactly what I addressed in the video. This idea of coming kind of back to life, the world feeling normal again, or at least approaching it. If we can avoid this Delta variant, but that's a whole different conversation. But it feels like we're approaching that. And as we do it, we have this unique opportunity to kind of reconstruct our life around the things that are most important to us. And really, we have this opportunity to reconstruct our life around Jesus. So for the next four weeks, we're going to talk about what our big rocks are. What are the things that are the most important to us and how do we orchestrate those things around Jesus and around this pursuit of God the Father. And I said specifically that I'm looking forward to the rest of the weeks of the series because I'm not looking forward to this morning in this series. I did not wake up this morning excited for this sermon. Some Sundays I wake up and I'm really, really, I can't wait to share with you what God has laid on my heart. Last Sunday is a great example of that. This Sunday, I'm preaching about money. So when I got up this morning, it wasn't like, yes, the tithe, here we come. Nor did you get up hoping that this would be the Sunday that I talked about money. So listen, I'll just confess up front. I'm no more interested in preaching this than you are in hearing it. Okay, but we're here now. So this is what we're going to do. And really, the reason that we're talking about this is first of all, first and foremost, I don't talk about this very much at Grace. The last time we talked about this was in February of 2020, and I didn't even do it. It was Doug Bergeson, all right? So we don't do it a whole lot, but this topic is all throughout the Bible. Scripture is replete with instructions on giving about big rocks in life, if we're going to talk about the things that matter most to us and how to prioritize those around Jesus, then we have to talk about finances. We have to ask the question, what does God want us to do with our resources and with our money? And the Bible talks about it so much that it would be irresponsible as a church and I'd be irresponsible as a pastor if we didn't revisit it with some regularity. So we arrive at it this morning and as we arrive at it, I'm kind of approaching it like this. This is why I'm sitting down for this one at a table instead of standing and gesticulating and walking around wildly and trying to keep calm and not yell at you because I'm approaching this as if you and I could have a conversation about it. If you and I were able to meet for lunch or if you could come to the office or we meet somewhere and we could talk and your question was, what does the Bible have to say about giving anyways? Or maybe even, why does God want me to give? Then this is the conversation that I would want to have with you. So I'm staying seated to remind me that this is what I would like to say to each of you if we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about this together. And as we do that, I would even say to you this, that as I wrote and approached this sermon, I really had in mind the person who is new to church. Maybe you are someone who, for the first time in a long time, church is important to you again. For the first time in a long time, spiritual health is important to you again. And so maybe you're kind of trying to get reengaged spiritually. Maybe you haven't been in church a lot for the past five, 10 years, and so you're kind of starting to re-engage and maybe have never really thought critically about giving and what the Bible has to say about it. This is for the new and the non-believers, for those of us who hear that we should give in church, who probably understand that the Bible tells us to do it, but maybe we don't know all the whys around it and maybe we don't have a developed theology of why we should be generous. So this sermon in particular is for you. Now I know that at Grace, and I see the evidence of it over and over again, we have plenty of you who have a really good theology of giving, who understand tithing and being generous and why we do it. And so for you, I hope that we hit on some things that are encouraging, particularly the first point that I make. I think we should apply it to everything, not just giving. And so I hope that there's some encouraging ways to think about it. But this is really for folks who, if I sat you down and I said, what does the Bible say about giving or why should we give? This is for you if you feel like, gosh, I'm not sure how well I would answer that. So like I said, I'm approaching it as a conversation and I want to approach the conversation with what the Bible even has to say about it. And as I sought that out this week, you know, the Old Testament has a lot of very specific instructions that we are to give. The Old Testament introduces this idea of giving in generosity like a new idea. Leave the corners of your field for the sojourners, for the poor, for the widow, for the aliens, for the people who don't yet have a home. We're told to bring our tithe to the storehouse in the Old Testament. We're told there's a whole portion in Leviticus that tells us exactly, tells the children of Israel exactly how they are to give. So in the Old Testament, it's given as an instruction. It's introduced almost as a new idea. But what you find in the New Testament, if you want to read New Testament verses about giving, and the New Testament is simply the part of the Bible that comes during Jesus's life and after. And Jesus kind of changes everything. So what does the Bible have to say about giving once Jesus gets on the scene? Well, once Jesus arrives, the instructions about giving become a little bit presumptive, as if this is a thing that we already know. This is actually what Jesus says about it in the Sermon on the Mount. If you have a Bible, you can turn to Matthew chapter 6. I'm going to read you verses 1 through 4. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus' first recorded public address. It's the first time he talks. And he has performed miracles and those people began to follow them and then he begins to preach to them and he hits on myriad topics. But then he lands on giving for a different directions. But the interesting part to me about this verse, if you want to ask what does the New Testament teach about giving, is the two uses of the word when. When you give. When you give to the needy. Jesus is talking to the huddled masses. Talking to thousands of people in the middle of the day, presumably jobless folks for the most part. And he still assumes that they know, without ever introducing giving as a new idea, he assumes that they know that they should give. He assumes that they know that God expects them to be generous people. And so he says, when you do it, do it in such a way that you're not doing it in a showy way. Do it in secret. Be discreet about it. And there's a whole teaching there. But again, what's interesting to me is when you give, when you do it. And I bring that up because I think that that's how familiar a lot of us are with giving. We might not know why we're supposed to do it. We might not know what for. We might not know how we should be compelled to do it. We just know that we are supposed to. And so the interesting question is why? Why are we supposed to give? Why does God ask us in the Old Testament when he's setting everything up and then just assume of us that we know that we ought to in the New Testament? Why does God do that? And so we're going to spend the rest of the morning kind of answering that question, and this is the conversational piece of it. Why does God want me to give? The most important reason, the most important reason and most underrated reason we give is because God tells us to. The most important, and this is key, most underrated reason that we give is because God tells us to. Now, listen, here's why I say this. When my mom was growing up, she grew up in the 60s and 70s, and Linda, her mom, my mom, all wonderful woman, she ruled with an iron fist, man. This was back in the good old days, all right, when it was nice to be a parent. You rule with an iron fist. That was a funny slip. You ruled with an iron fist. Kids are to be seen and not heard. When the company comes over, you go upstairs. You do not interrupt. And when my mom would get out of line when she was told to do something, and she said, why? She had the audacity to say, why do I have to clean your room? Why? Because I told you to. Fire would burn in Linda's eyes, right? And mom would know. She better do whatever it was she was asked to do, even if it makes no sense at all to her, because there is going to be some serious repercussions if she doesn't. She saw the fire, and so she got right. And so when my mom grew up, because I told you to, was all the reason that a child needed. Well, when that's the only reason you get, that develops in you a little bit of resentment, right? This heart of resentment because my mom is kind and sweet and not rebellious like me and really was asking genuinely why I don't understand. Why do you want me to do that right now? It seems like I should be doing something else. Why do you want me to do that? But she wasn't allowed to ask that. And so that left her frustrated and resentful. So when she had children, she decided that because I said so is never a reason. I will always take the time to explain to my children why I'm asking them to do something. And to her credit, she did that. But when you're raising Nate, that becomes a real hassle. And I was always allowed to ask why. And I love that quote. There's some quote I picked up years ago that a reason is an invitation for an argument. And that's very true. And so I was always invited into that argument. Why? Go clean your room. Why do I have to do that right now? Go mow the grass. Why? And listen, if the why wasn't good enough, well, I didn't have to do it. In my head, if the why is not good enough, if it can't justify the request, well, then your request is dumb. And so what I learned in that environment is asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It manifests this idea of, okay, I understand what you want me to do, but I'm not going to do that until your reason justifies your request. And if it doesn't, if it falls short of King Nate's gauntlet of reasons, then you can forget it, buddy. So in our house, our response with Lily and then with John, which John can't talk yet. And I remember when Lily couldn't talk and people were like, just be grateful for these times. And I thought, you're jerks. You're not jerks. That makes sense to me now. John can't talk yet, but Lily can, and she likes to ask why. Lily's my daughter, for those of you who don't know me, not just some girl I talk about. But she likes to ask why. But the policy that we've adopted in our house is, first you obey, then you ask why. And this is gonna be what solves it forever. She'll have no issues when she's a parent. She'll replicate this exactly, right? But first you obey and then you ask why. First show that you're gonna be obedient. First show that you're going to submit. First show that the question is genuine and not an attempt to get out of it. And then come and we'll talk to you forever when you have a good attitude about the whys of why we should do something. And I bring this up because I think it's really important as we think about how we respond to the instructions of God. I know that very often when we are met with a teaching from Scripture that we should give, that we should read the Bible, that we should be selfless, that we should forgive as we are forgiven, that we should be generous to others, that we should turn the other cheek, that whenever it is possible for us, as far as it concerns us, that we should seek peace in others when peace is just not the thing that we want right now. Often in my life, and maybe yours too, we want to know the why before we offer our obedience. We want it to make sense to us before King Nate deigns to obey the instructions that I find here. And I will confess to you this, as I thought about this this week. This is not so much an indictment on your attitude, that's up to you, as it is sometimes an indictment on my preaching. Because when I preach and I give us instructions from the word, I always start with a why. Because I don't want to paint God as this ruthless dictator who sits in heaven giving you rules. I always want you to understand why it's what's best for you. But when we jump straight to the why before obedience, I think that begats in us this sense of entitlement. That if God's whys don't stack up for me, then I'm not going to engage in that behavior until they do. And I think it's important for us as believers to accept that the most important and underrated reason why we give is because our Father in heaven told us to. And I think this applies to everything. I think this applies to our quiet times. This applies to our grace with other people. This applies to any challenge that we would face. Anytime God's word tells us to do something, the first and most important reason we do it is because God told us to. Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I think that sometimes for me, I walk through life entitled as if I am owed a why, and God does not owe us that. So an important reason to apply to everything in our life is because our Father in Heaven told us to. Now once we accept that, and we adopt that posture of obedience, and I also want to be very clear, when I say that, I'm talking only to the Christians in the room. If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, you've never signed up for this. You've never said, I submit my life to God. You've never said, you're the Lord of my life. I'm second. I'm going to do what you want. You've never said that. And so to you, I wouldn't say that you even need to give. And I definitely wouldn't say it's because God told you to. You haven't signed up for this yet and said, I'm going to submit myself to God's word. But if you are a Christian, then you have. So first we adopt a posture of obedience. And what we understand in that posture of obedience is that God wants what's best for us. This is what we talked about last week. What we believe is the verse I preached last week, that God actually leads us to paths of life, that in his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand there are pleasures forevermore. We actually believe that our God in heaven wants what's best for us and takes us to the best possible places. And so if he tells us to do something, it must be what's best for us. So we trust that about giving too. So the question really becomes this morning, not why does God want me to give, but why is giving best for me? That's really the question that we are asking this morning. Once we adopt this posture of obedience and say, yes, Father, I am a Christian, and because I am, I am submitted to you, and I will be a person who is a giving, generous person. But I also understand that as I do that, it's what's best for me, and I'd love to understand why it's what's best for me. So I've got a few reasons for you that we're just going to kind of go through. The first thing I would say to you when you ask why is giving what's best for me, I would say it's because God is generous to the generous. God is generous to generous people. Now, I have to be careful with this because this is how you get to health and wealth, right? This is how you get to me preaching to you. If you give, God's going to give back to you a hundredfold. If you give to the church this much, God's going to give you this much. Meanwhile, I'm asking you to fund my private jet and you can't figure out how to pay for a civic, okay? So that's, I don't want to go there. I'm not preaching health and wealth. I'm not telling you that the more you give to God, the more money he's going to give to you. However, this principle that God is generous to the generous is unavoidable in scripture. Jesus talks about this in Luke chapter 6, verse 38, when he says this, give and it will be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Corinthians says, he who sows little reaps little and he who sows much reaps much. There is a principle in the Bible that is unavoidable, that God is generous to the generous. And I'm lying to you and dishonest as a pastor if I don't say that's one of the reasons it's what's best for you. Because when we're generous to others, God is generous to us. Now what it doesn't say anywhere is that God is generous to us monetarily. What it doesn't say anywhere is that the blessings that God is going to be generous with are ones that are going to fill up our bank account. It does not say that. It just says God will be generous to you. And God's generosity comes in forms that is so much better than money. You understand? When you are generous with your resources, God is generous with his. It's an unavoidable truth of scripture. So God's generosity looks like good, rich, and deep, spiritually nourishing, life-giving friendships. God's generosity looks like a marriage that's seen some seasons but is hanging in there and loving one another. God's generosity is good relationships with your children. God's generosity is a place to go every day that you don't hate. God's generosity is when you're walking through a hard season but you know that there is a good season coming because your God is good and you know that every day won't feel like this day. God's generosity doesn't always come in the form of money. I know a family, I know a couple who they have living with them right now, a family member, and this is a family member that should not be living with them, okay? They shouldn't be there. They should be able to live on their own, but they're not. And it is really, they are expressing a great deal of generosity to this family member. And one of their friends learned about this and happens to have a cabin, a nice one, and said, go, stay at our cabin for a weekend. You need that. That's God's generosity being expressed to someone who's being generous. Do you see that? It's not always a one-for-one reciprocal return of money, but God is generous towards the generous, and so it behooves us to be generous. The next thing I would tell you is that giving acknowledges stewardship. Why is giving what's best for me? Well, because when we give, we acknowledge this concept of stewardship. Stewardship, the whole sermon could be about stewardship. The whole sermon could be about all four of the points that I'm making. But stewardship in particular is this idea that once we are believers, we understand that the things that we have in our life are not our own. They're God's. And he's entrusted them to us. To use them for the purposes of advancing his kingdom in the most effective way possible. Back in May on Mother's Day, we did a child dedication. And we had 11 children that we dedicated that day. It was great, super exciting day for Grace. And part of the dedication of the children is for the parents to acknowledge, both literally and symbolically, that this child is not mine. He is yours. She is yours. We are raising them in our home, but they belong to you, God. They are your children, Jesus. And we are raising them the best we can in the way that they should go according to your standards. But these children are not my children. John and Lily do not belong to Nate and Jen. They belong to God. And he has entrusted them to us because he believes that we have a unique capacity to form them and shape them into who they need to be for Jesus so that they move through life advancing his kingdom. They're not our kids. They're God's kids. Your house is not your house. It's God's house. Your finances are not your finances. They're God's finances. And once we realize that, that we are stewards of the things that God has given to us, then it becomes incredibly important. The primary question we ask about all the things with which we have been entrusted is, Jesus, how do I use these to further your name? How do I use these things to bring attention to you? How would you have me organize this part of my life? And so when we give, when we write the check weekly or we click the button monthly or we set it up or whatever it is we do, when we are generous and we give, it reminds us. Every time we see that come out of our account or hit our credit card, whatever it is, that's a reminder. None of this is mine anyways. It's God's. It's God's to use as he sees fit. And if he wants more, he can have more. So giving reminds us that we are stewards, not just with our money, but in everything in our life. Another thing I would say to you is that giving allows us to participate in what God is doing by being a part of the body of Christ. Giving allows us to participate in what is happening in the church, in the kingdom, in the body of Christ by being a part of the body of Christ. I love 1 Corinthians 12. I've never preached on it here, and I need to do a whole series on it because I think it's just an amazing teaching. But in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul lays out this idea that the church is a body and that everyone who's a part of the church has a part to play. The body has arms and legs and feet and hands and it has all kinds of things that are incredibly important. It has lungs that nobody ever sees, but if we don't have lungs, then the rest of it doesn't work. And it all intricately works together to get things accomplished. And I love this teaching because it reminds me as a pastor, I'm just the mouth. That's it. But y'all are the hands that touch people who need it. Y'all are the arms that are wrapped around folks who are struggling. Y'all are the feet that take the good news of the gospel into work. Y'all are the lungs that make this thing go. None of us, none of us, not me, not an elder, not somebody who's been here 30 years, none of us are more important to what's happening at Grace than anybody else. We simply have our part to play. My part is to run my mouth. Sometimes I wish somebody else would take that part. Because maybe I'd like to be the ear sometimes. But everybody has a part. And I think our part of being in the body of Christ, a church in an affluent suburb is to use our resources to serve the greater body of Christ. And when we do that as a church, we get to participate in things going on just outside of grace as well. And so to me, it's a wonderful picture of why as a church we should want to have a generous heart. Right now, we give 10% of everything that we get to ministries going on outside the walls of grace. It is one of my big long-term goals for the church to see that percentage increase a lot so that we play our part in God's greater body and who we are. But not just as we think about reaching outside of the walls of grace, but as we think about what happens within grace and how when we give, we are part of the celebrations that God allows for us here. We are part of the victories that Jesus wins here. We participate in that by giving and doing our part and being a part of the body of Christ. I think back to October of 2017. That was the first time I got to go down to Reynosa to go see the folks at Faith Ministry. Colleen of Faith Ministry fame is with us this morning. Hello, Colleen. That's a ministry in Mexico that builds houses for people who otherwise would not be able to have them. And Grace has been partners with them since before Grace existed. So more than 20 years. And I got to go down there in October of 2017 to see it for the first time. And it was a really great experience. And I'll never forget, we're sitting there and I wanted to say it's the parking lot, but that's generous. It's the place where the cars go. And we're sitting in the van and we're waiting to pull out. And I hear a car crank up and and it was as if that poor thing was being tortured. Like, it did not, every noise it made was, please, please don't make me do this. Like, and I turn around, and the bumper is in shatters. It's being held with bungee cords, and to say that it was a beater is generous to beaters, and it was being driven by the pastor down there, a younger guy named Pastor Carlos. And Pastor Carlos, he works 10 times harder than me. I could not do what he does. I asked him one time what his weekly schedule was and just the Bible studies that he has and the different towns and stuff that he touches on and the different people in his orbit. He needs a good car. He's shuttling kids back and forth. He works so hard. This is not what he should be driving. And so I kind of leaned over to some folks that were on the trip and I said, hey, I think Grace could raise enough money to buy him a truck. Can we do that? And I talked to the folks at Faith Ministry. Would it be cool if we bought him a truck? He seems to need it. And everybody was good with it. And so I came back to Grace and I said, hey, this is, as we enter Christmas, this is the thing we want to do. We want to have enough money to buy a truck for Pastor Carlos. And we did. What kind of car did we buy him? Do you remember? Yeah, Ford Escape or Ranger or something like that. But it was nice and new and way better than what he had. And some of our folks from Grace got to go down and deliver it to him. And when I watched the video, I had tears in my eyes because he was so grateful. And so blown away by the generosity of the church. And it was a really sweet moment. And the next time I went down there, the first thing Carlos wanted me to do is come see his truck and say thank you again for it. Now listen, if you were here and you gave to that Christmas offering in 2017, that joy is your joy. That happiness is your happiness. That's not watching other people do a good thing like when we watch on the internet and our heart is warmed and then we scroll to the next thing. That's your joy. You did that. You participated in that. You made that possible. That was God using your gifts and your finances making you a part of the body of Christ so that you could participate in the good work that he was doing. That joy was your joy. If you give to grace, those 11 kids that were up here being dedicated, that's your joy. When we baptize somebody, that's your joy. When you see somebody come into the church, that's your joy. We have, I think, nine people coming to Discover Grace after church today coming out of a pandemic. That's your joy that those people are becoming a part of what we're doing here at Grace. Every win that Jesus claims here at this church, when we give, we are a part of that. Because those wins don't happen if we don't give. So we give because we are a part of the body of Christ. And that allows us to participate in the work that Jesus is doing, wherever he's doing work. The last point that I would make about why it's best for us to give is that giving invites us to mirror the generosity of God that's lavished upon us. It invites us to mirror the generosity that God has given us. Now, this too could be a whole sermon, and it was. The last time we talked about giving, Doug Bergeson, one of our elders, preached on it in February of 2020, and I don't do things like this, but it's the best sermon on giving I've ever heard. If you haven't heard it, and you'd like to explore this idea more, go back into the archives. It was Grace's Going Home series, February of 2020. Find the Doug Bergeson sermon. It's an excellent one on what I'm talking about right here, How we participate in God's generosity when we give. But what I would say to you this morning is simply this, that this is to me the most compelling reason to give. Because the longer you are a believer, the deeper you grow in gratitude to the Father. There's no two ways about it. You might think that if you've lived a life however you want it, in total selfishness, in total depravity, you've done all the bad things that anybody could do. You can check off all the boxes and and then at like 35, you come to know God, and you're amazed that he's wiped the slate clean, and he's accepted you into his kingdom, that that moment is maximum gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness. No, it's not. Because to walk with God is to understand that when you become a Christian, he doesn't just forgive you for all the stuff that you did up to that moment. He forgives you for all the crap that you're going to do too. He knows every terrible thought that you're going to have. When you get saved, whatever your lowest point is after that, whatever rock bottom looks like after you become a Christian, God was already in that moment whispering to you that he loves you and he forgives you and he wants you to come back to him. He's already in that moment. Whether that moment's behind you or ahead of you, God was in it telling you already, I've covered this too. So to walk with God and to fall short again and again and again, to arrive at that place that Paul arrives at in Romans 7 that is to me the most redemptive verse in scripture, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. To arrive there and be refreshed anew with God's overwhelming forgiveness and generosity to us. For it to hit us like a wave again that Jesus condescended, took on human flesh, lived with us in the muck and the mire, died on the cross for us, knowing that we would crud on that very death over and over and over again in our life only to require his forgiveness yet again and then he offers and then he goes about, once he dies for us, ascending to the right hand of the Father to advocate for us and to whisper in God's ear that, yes, I've covered that too. When we sit daily in the realization of the gospel and we let the waves of Jesus' forgiveness wash over us and God's generosity flood us, we cannot help but grow in our gratitude towards God. Whatever gratitude we experienced at salvation is the starting point for how it grows through our life. And so we give as an expression of that gratitude. We give because something so incredible is happening to us that we want to find a way to be conduits of that generosity that God has given us. God has given so much to me. God has given so much to us. God has enriched our lives so much that we can't help but want to desire to enrich the lives of others. We can't help but want to express the generosity that God has lavished upon us. And so giving in his best, most pure state is simply a reaction to the overflow of God's giving in our life. That's why Paul teaches in Corinthians that God loves a cheerful giver. Don't give out of compulsion, but give because you want to. And how can we grow our want to in giving? By focusing on the face of Jesus and remembering the generosity and the forgiveness that he offers us every day. And so giving is what's best for us because it reorients us to the gospel. It reorients us towards God's goodness in our life. God has been good to me and provided me this. I am going to give this portion of this, understanding that he can replace it or he can't, but God has been so generous to me that I want to be generous to others. That's why we give. I love this verse in 2 Corinthians 9-11 says, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. There's this part of the Sermon on the Mount that I find incredibly intimidating, where Jesus says, let others see your good deeds, see your good works, and shine for the Father so that your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your father who is in heaven. And I always think to myself, how do you act like that? A really easy way is to be generous. That's what Corinthians tells us. That God has enriched us. He's given us resources in every way. Why? So that we might enrich others. And then both you and them will turn that to thanksgiving to God. And it will point us back to the Father and our Savior Jesus. That's why giving is what's best for us. It's good for us. It develops a spirit of generosity that constantly, constantly orients us back to Jesus. So I would end this morning with a simple challenge for you. Trust God and give. Trust God and his word and give. How much should I give? Just a little bit more than you are. That's always the answer. 10%? No, that's an Old Testament thing. How much do we give in the New Testament? Just a little bit more than we are. Whatever that means for you. Who do I give to? I'll be the first to tell you. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that you have to give all of your giving to the local church. I've sat in churches, I've heard pastors say, your first 10% goes to this church and then on top of that, other places. That's not in the Bible. I'm not going to sit here and teach you that. I'm not preaching this as a self-serving thing for grace. If you believe in grace and what's happening here and you feel compelled to participate in the victories that Jesus is winning here, then give to grace. But you give wherever God is advancing his kingdom. Wherever God is working and Jesus is moving, you give there. Just give. Trust God and do it. I have never talked to a single person in my whole life who has said, you know what? I heard what the pastor said about giving and I decided to start being more generous. That was a huge mistake. I really regret it. Wish I could have that back. Never heard anybody say that. So this morning, it's simple. If you and I could have a conversation, I would simply end it by saying, just trust God. Obey Him. Be a person who's generous. Let's give together. Let me pray for us. Father, we do love you. We are so grateful for the goodness and the gifts that you've lavished upon us. God, I pray first and foremost that we would let those wash over us. I pray more than anything else that we would simply leave here increasingly overwhelmed with your goodness to us. Father, for those of us who need this, who need to think about this in our own lives, I pray that because you said so would be all the reason that we ever need. I pray that we would trust that and walk in that. Knowing that even when we don't understand obedience sometimes, that it is going to lead us to a path of life. God, give us the heart and the gratitude and the spirit to be people who are generous. I pray that each one of us would leave here determined to be just a little bit more generous than we were when we walked in today. And God, for those of us who are obedient and who respond and who give. Would we find you there, please? Would you show us yourself in that giving? Can we ask that through the generosity that you compel us to that we are brought closer to your son and so inspired and enlivened to continue to be generous. It's in his name, the one who died for us and who advocates for us, that we pray. Amen.
If you're like a lot of us, then this jar kind of looks like your life as we entered the pandemic. Lots of things in our life that are really important to us, big deals, things that we definitely want to prioritize, but maybe sometimes we have a hard time finding time for, and then other things in our life that are probably important, but maybe not essential, and we'd love to give our time to them, but we probably don't need to make big priorities out of them. But what happens in the end when we get so busy is that we don't have time for everything, right? But then with the pandemic, life, well it kind of hit the reset button. And we spent most of last year with nothing but time on our hands. And now, as we face moving back into what feels like normal, I think that we have this unique opportunity to reassemble our lives. And as we have this opportunity, I thought it would be appropriate for Grace to stop and really think critically about well, what are our big rocks? What are the things in our life that are the most important to us? What are the things that we want to prioritize above and beyond everything else and what would our life look like if we actually identified our big rocks and prioritized our time around those things? What if we put these rocks in first and made sure that there was space in our life for the things that were most important and then around those things we allowed all the other little things to kind of fill in the rest of our time and priorities? What would it look like if we were to hit the reset button on our life and reassemble it in such a way that we had time and space for what was important to us and we didn't have to worry at all about the other things that just at the end of the day, they're not nearly as big of a deal. What are our big rocks? And how do we make space for them as we enter into a new normal? Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I get to be the pastor here. A little confession, after we shot that video in the back corner, I was on my hands and knees for about 15 minutes picking up all those rocks. So I'm really glad we got it there on that first take, and I didn't have to do that again. Thank you for being here. Like I said, I'm the senior pastor here. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I would love to do that. We got a full crew here this morning. That is exciting and good. So thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us online, particularly if you're on vacation and you're still choosing to make this a part of your Sunday. We are grateful for that. I'm really looking forward to the rest of this series as we talk about exactly what I addressed in the video. This idea of coming kind of back to life, the world feeling normal again, or at least approaching it. If we can avoid this Delta variant, but that's a whole different conversation. But it feels like we're approaching that. And as we do it, we have this unique opportunity to kind of reconstruct our life around the things that are most important to us. And really, we have this opportunity to reconstruct our life around Jesus. So for the next four weeks, we're going to talk about what our big rocks are. What are the things that are the most important to us and how do we orchestrate those things around Jesus and around this pursuit of God the Father. And I said specifically that I'm looking forward to the rest of the weeks of the series because I'm not looking forward to this morning in this series. I did not wake up this morning excited for this sermon. Some Sundays I wake up and I'm really, really, I can't wait to share with you what God has laid on my heart. Last Sunday is a great example of that. This Sunday, I'm preaching about money. So when I got up this morning, it wasn't like, yes, the tithe, here we come. Nor did you get up hoping that this would be the Sunday that I talked about money. So listen, I'll just confess up front. I'm no more interested in preaching this than you are in hearing it. Okay, but we're here now. So this is what we're going to do. And really, the reason that we're talking about this is first of all, first and foremost, I don't talk about this very much at Grace. The last time we talked about this was in February of 2020, and I didn't even do it. It was Doug Bergeson, all right? So we don't do it a whole lot, but this topic is all throughout the Bible. Scripture is replete with instructions on giving about big rocks in life, if we're going to talk about the things that matter most to us and how to prioritize those around Jesus, then we have to talk about finances. We have to ask the question, what does God want us to do with our resources and with our money? And the Bible talks about it so much that it would be irresponsible as a church and I'd be irresponsible as a pastor if we didn't revisit it with some regularity. So we arrive at it this morning and as we arrive at it, I'm kind of approaching it like this. This is why I'm sitting down for this one at a table instead of standing and gesticulating and walking around wildly and trying to keep calm and not yell at you because I'm approaching this as if you and I could have a conversation about it. If you and I were able to meet for lunch or if you could come to the office or we meet somewhere and we could talk and your question was, what does the Bible have to say about giving anyways? Or maybe even, why does God want me to give? Then this is the conversation that I would want to have with you. So I'm staying seated to remind me that this is what I would like to say to each of you if we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about this together. And as we do that, I would even say to you this, that as I wrote and approached this sermon, I really had in mind the person who is new to church. Maybe you are someone who, for the first time in a long time, church is important to you again. For the first time in a long time, spiritual health is important to you again. And so maybe you're kind of trying to get reengaged spiritually. Maybe you haven't been in church a lot for the past five, 10 years, and so you're kind of starting to re-engage and maybe have never really thought critically about giving and what the Bible has to say about it. This is for the new and the non-believers, for those of us who hear that we should give in church, who probably understand that the Bible tells us to do it, but maybe we don't know all the whys around it and maybe we don't have a developed theology of why we should be generous. So this sermon in particular is for you. Now I know that at Grace, and I see the evidence of it over and over again, we have plenty of you who have a really good theology of giving, who understand tithing and being generous and why we do it. And so for you, I hope that we hit on some things that are encouraging, particularly the first point that I make. I think we should apply it to everything, not just giving. And so I hope that there's some encouraging ways to think about it. But this is really for folks who, if I sat you down and I said, what does the Bible say about giving or why should we give? This is for you if you feel like, gosh, I'm not sure how well I would answer that. So like I said, I'm approaching it as a conversation and I want to approach the conversation with what the Bible even has to say about it. And as I sought that out this week, you know, the Old Testament has a lot of very specific instructions that we are to give. The Old Testament introduces this idea of giving in generosity like a new idea. Leave the corners of your field for the sojourners, for the poor, for the widow, for the aliens, for the people who don't yet have a home. We're told to bring our tithe to the storehouse in the Old Testament. We're told there's a whole portion in Leviticus that tells us exactly, tells the children of Israel exactly how they are to give. So in the Old Testament, it's given as an instruction. It's introduced almost as a new idea. But what you find in the New Testament, if you want to read New Testament verses about giving, and the New Testament is simply the part of the Bible that comes during Jesus's life and after. And Jesus kind of changes everything. So what does the Bible have to say about giving once Jesus gets on the scene? Well, once Jesus arrives, the instructions about giving become a little bit presumptive, as if this is a thing that we already know. This is actually what Jesus says about it in the Sermon on the Mount. If you have a Bible, you can turn to Matthew chapter 6. I'm going to read you verses 1 through 4. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus' first recorded public address. It's the first time he talks. And he has performed miracles and those people began to follow them and then he begins to preach to them and he hits on myriad topics. But then he lands on giving for a different directions. But the interesting part to me about this verse, if you want to ask what does the New Testament teach about giving, is the two uses of the word when. When you give. When you give to the needy. Jesus is talking to the huddled masses. Talking to thousands of people in the middle of the day, presumably jobless folks for the most part. And he still assumes that they know, without ever introducing giving as a new idea, he assumes that they know that they should give. He assumes that they know that God expects them to be generous people. And so he says, when you do it, do it in such a way that you're not doing it in a showy way. Do it in secret. Be discreet about it. And there's a whole teaching there. But again, what's interesting to me is when you give, when you do it. And I bring that up because I think that that's how familiar a lot of us are with giving. We might not know why we're supposed to do it. We might not know what for. We might not know how we should be compelled to do it. We just know that we are supposed to. And so the interesting question is why? Why are we supposed to give? Why does God ask us in the Old Testament when he's setting everything up and then just assume of us that we know that we ought to in the New Testament? Why does God do that? And so we're going to spend the rest of the morning kind of answering that question, and this is the conversational piece of it. Why does God want me to give? The most important reason, the most important reason and most underrated reason we give is because God tells us to. The most important, and this is key, most underrated reason that we give is because God tells us to. Now, listen, here's why I say this. When my mom was growing up, she grew up in the 60s and 70s, and Linda, her mom, my mom, all wonderful woman, she ruled with an iron fist, man. This was back in the good old days, all right, when it was nice to be a parent. You rule with an iron fist. That was a funny slip. You ruled with an iron fist. Kids are to be seen and not heard. When the company comes over, you go upstairs. You do not interrupt. And when my mom would get out of line when she was told to do something, and she said, why? She had the audacity to say, why do I have to clean your room? Why? Because I told you to. Fire would burn in Linda's eyes, right? And mom would know. She better do whatever it was she was asked to do, even if it makes no sense at all to her, because there is going to be some serious repercussions if she doesn't. She saw the fire, and so she got right. And so when my mom grew up, because I told you to, was all the reason that a child needed. Well, when that's the only reason you get, that develops in you a little bit of resentment, right? This heart of resentment because my mom is kind and sweet and not rebellious like me and really was asking genuinely why I don't understand. Why do you want me to do that right now? It seems like I should be doing something else. Why do you want me to do that? But she wasn't allowed to ask that. And so that left her frustrated and resentful. So when she had children, she decided that because I said so is never a reason. I will always take the time to explain to my children why I'm asking them to do something. And to her credit, she did that. But when you're raising Nate, that becomes a real hassle. And I was always allowed to ask why. And I love that quote. There's some quote I picked up years ago that a reason is an invitation for an argument. And that's very true. And so I was always invited into that argument. Why? Go clean your room. Why do I have to do that right now? Go mow the grass. Why? And listen, if the why wasn't good enough, well, I didn't have to do it. In my head, if the why is not good enough, if it can't justify the request, well, then your request is dumb. And so what I learned in that environment is asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It does. Asking why before we obey manifests a sense of entitlement. It manifests this idea of, okay, I understand what you want me to do, but I'm not going to do that until your reason justifies your request. And if it doesn't, if it falls short of King Nate's gauntlet of reasons, then you can forget it, buddy. So in our house, our response with Lily and then with John, which John can't talk yet. And I remember when Lily couldn't talk and people were like, just be grateful for these times. And I thought, you're jerks. You're not jerks. That makes sense to me now. John can't talk yet, but Lily can, and she likes to ask why. Lily's my daughter, for those of you who don't know me, not just some girl I talk about. But she likes to ask why. But the policy that we've adopted in our house is, first you obey, then you ask why. And this is gonna be what solves it forever. She'll have no issues when she's a parent. She'll replicate this exactly, right? But first you obey and then you ask why. First show that you're gonna be obedient. First show that you're going to submit. First show that the question is genuine and not an attempt to get out of it. And then come and we'll talk to you forever when you have a good attitude about the whys of why we should do something. And I bring this up because I think it's really important as we think about how we respond to the instructions of God. I know that very often when we are met with a teaching from Scripture that we should give, that we should read the Bible, that we should be selfless, that we should forgive as we are forgiven, that we should be generous to others, that we should turn the other cheek, that whenever it is possible for us, as far as it concerns us, that we should seek peace in others when peace is just not the thing that we want right now. Often in my life, and maybe yours too, we want to know the why before we offer our obedience. We want it to make sense to us before King Nate deigns to obey the instructions that I find here. And I will confess to you this, as I thought about this this week. This is not so much an indictment on your attitude, that's up to you, as it is sometimes an indictment on my preaching. Because when I preach and I give us instructions from the word, I always start with a why. Because I don't want to paint God as this ruthless dictator who sits in heaven giving you rules. I always want you to understand why it's what's best for you. But when we jump straight to the why before obedience, I think that begats in us this sense of entitlement. That if God's whys don't stack up for me, then I'm not going to engage in that behavior until they do. And I think it's important for us as believers to accept that the most important and underrated reason why we give is because our Father in heaven told us to. And I think this applies to everything. I think this applies to our quiet times. This applies to our grace with other people. This applies to any challenge that we would face. Anytime God's word tells us to do something, the first and most important reason we do it is because God told us to. Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I think that sometimes for me, I walk through life entitled as if I am owed a why, and God does not owe us that. So an important reason to apply to everything in our life is because our Father in Heaven told us to. Now once we accept that, and we adopt that posture of obedience, and I also want to be very clear, when I say that, I'm talking only to the Christians in the room. If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, you've never signed up for this. You've never said, I submit my life to God. You've never said, you're the Lord of my life. I'm second. I'm going to do what you want. You've never said that. And so to you, I wouldn't say that you even need to give. And I definitely wouldn't say it's because God told you to. You haven't signed up for this yet and said, I'm going to submit myself to God's word. But if you are a Christian, then you have. So first we adopt a posture of obedience. And what we understand in that posture of obedience is that God wants what's best for us. This is what we talked about last week. What we believe is the verse I preached last week, that God actually leads us to paths of life, that in his presence there is fullness of joy. At his right hand there are pleasures forevermore. We actually believe that our God in heaven wants what's best for us and takes us to the best possible places. And so if he tells us to do something, it must be what's best for us. So we trust that about giving too. So the question really becomes this morning, not why does God want me to give, but why is giving best for me? That's really the question that we are asking this morning. Once we adopt this posture of obedience and say, yes, Father, I am a Christian, and because I am, I am submitted to you, and I will be a person who is a giving, generous person. But I also understand that as I do that, it's what's best for me, and I'd love to understand why it's what's best for me. So I've got a few reasons for you that we're just going to kind of go through. The first thing I would say to you when you ask why is giving what's best for me, I would say it's because God is generous to the generous. God is generous to generous people. Now, I have to be careful with this because this is how you get to health and wealth, right? This is how you get to me preaching to you. If you give, God's going to give back to you a hundredfold. If you give to the church this much, God's going to give you this much. Meanwhile, I'm asking you to fund my private jet and you can't figure out how to pay for a civic, okay? So that's, I don't want to go there. I'm not preaching health and wealth. I'm not telling you that the more you give to God, the more money he's going to give to you. However, this principle that God is generous to the generous is unavoidable in scripture. Jesus talks about this in Luke chapter 6, verse 38, when he says this, give and it will be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. Corinthians says, he who sows little reaps little and he who sows much reaps much. There is a principle in the Bible that is unavoidable, that God is generous to the generous. And I'm lying to you and dishonest as a pastor if I don't say that's one of the reasons it's what's best for you. Because when we're generous to others, God is generous to us. Now what it doesn't say anywhere is that God is generous to us monetarily. What it doesn't say anywhere is that the blessings that God is going to be generous with are ones that are going to fill up our bank account. It does not say that. It just says God will be generous to you. And God's generosity comes in forms that is so much better than money. You understand? When you are generous with your resources, God is generous with his. It's an unavoidable truth of scripture. So God's generosity looks like good, rich, and deep, spiritually nourishing, life-giving friendships. God's generosity looks like a marriage that's seen some seasons but is hanging in there and loving one another. God's generosity is good relationships with your children. God's generosity is a place to go every day that you don't hate. God's generosity is when you're walking through a hard season but you know that there is a good season coming because your God is good and you know that every day won't feel like this day. God's generosity doesn't always come in the form of money. I know a family, I know a couple who they have living with them right now, a family member, and this is a family member that should not be living with them, okay? They shouldn't be there. They should be able to live on their own, but they're not. And it is really, they are expressing a great deal of generosity to this family member. And one of their friends learned about this and happens to have a cabin, a nice one, and said, go, stay at our cabin for a weekend. You need that. That's God's generosity being expressed to someone who's being generous. Do you see that? It's not always a one-for-one reciprocal return of money, but God is generous towards the generous, and so it behooves us to be generous. The next thing I would tell you is that giving acknowledges stewardship. Why is giving what's best for me? Well, because when we give, we acknowledge this concept of stewardship. Stewardship, the whole sermon could be about stewardship. The whole sermon could be about all four of the points that I'm making. But stewardship in particular is this idea that once we are believers, we understand that the things that we have in our life are not our own. They're God's. And he's entrusted them to us. To use them for the purposes of advancing his kingdom in the most effective way possible. Back in May on Mother's Day, we did a child dedication. And we had 11 children that we dedicated that day. It was great, super exciting day for Grace. And part of the dedication of the children is for the parents to acknowledge, both literally and symbolically, that this child is not mine. He is yours. She is yours. We are raising them in our home, but they belong to you, God. They are your children, Jesus. And we are raising them the best we can in the way that they should go according to your standards. But these children are not my children. John and Lily do not belong to Nate and Jen. They belong to God. And he has entrusted them to us because he believes that we have a unique capacity to form them and shape them into who they need to be for Jesus so that they move through life advancing his kingdom. They're not our kids. They're God's kids. Your house is not your house. It's God's house. Your finances are not your finances. They're God's finances. And once we realize that, that we are stewards of the things that God has given to us, then it becomes incredibly important. The primary question we ask about all the things with which we have been entrusted is, Jesus, how do I use these to further your name? How do I use these things to bring attention to you? How would you have me organize this part of my life? And so when we give, when we write the check weekly or we click the button monthly or we set it up or whatever it is we do, when we are generous and we give, it reminds us. Every time we see that come out of our account or hit our credit card, whatever it is, that's a reminder. None of this is mine anyways. It's God's. It's God's to use as he sees fit. And if he wants more, he can have more. So giving reminds us that we are stewards, not just with our money, but in everything in our life. Another thing I would say to you is that giving allows us to participate in what God is doing by being a part of the body of Christ. Giving allows us to participate in what is happening in the church, in the kingdom, in the body of Christ by being a part of the body of Christ. I love 1 Corinthians 12. I've never preached on it here, and I need to do a whole series on it because I think it's just an amazing teaching. But in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul lays out this idea that the church is a body and that everyone who's a part of the church has a part to play. The body has arms and legs and feet and hands and it has all kinds of things that are incredibly important. It has lungs that nobody ever sees, but if we don't have lungs, then the rest of it doesn't work. And it all intricately works together to get things accomplished. And I love this teaching because it reminds me as a pastor, I'm just the mouth. That's it. But y'all are the hands that touch people who need it. Y'all are the arms that are wrapped around folks who are struggling. Y'all are the feet that take the good news of the gospel into work. Y'all are the lungs that make this thing go. None of us, none of us, not me, not an elder, not somebody who's been here 30 years, none of us are more important to what's happening at Grace than anybody else. We simply have our part to play. My part is to run my mouth. Sometimes I wish somebody else would take that part. Because maybe I'd like to be the ear sometimes. But everybody has a part. And I think our part of being in the body of Christ, a church in an affluent suburb is to use our resources to serve the greater body of Christ. And when we do that as a church, we get to participate in things going on just outside of grace as well. And so to me, it's a wonderful picture of why as a church we should want to have a generous heart. Right now, we give 10% of everything that we get to ministries going on outside the walls of grace. It is one of my big long-term goals for the church to see that percentage increase a lot so that we play our part in God's greater body and who we are. But not just as we think about reaching outside of the walls of grace, but as we think about what happens within grace and how when we give, we are part of the celebrations that God allows for us here. We are part of the victories that Jesus wins here. We participate in that by giving and doing our part and being a part of the body of Christ. I think back to October of 2017. That was the first time I got to go down to Reynosa to go see the folks at Faith Ministry. Colleen of Faith Ministry fame is with us this morning. Hello, Colleen. That's a ministry in Mexico that builds houses for people who otherwise would not be able to have them. And Grace has been partners with them since before Grace existed. So more than 20 years. And I got to go down there in October of 2017 to see it for the first time. And it was a really great experience. And I'll never forget, we're sitting there and I wanted to say it's the parking lot, but that's generous. It's the place where the cars go. And we're sitting in the van and we're waiting to pull out. And I hear a car crank up and and it was as if that poor thing was being tortured. Like, it did not, every noise it made was, please, please don't make me do this. Like, and I turn around, and the bumper is in shatters. It's being held with bungee cords, and to say that it was a beater is generous to beaters, and it was being driven by the pastor down there, a younger guy named Pastor Carlos. And Pastor Carlos, he works 10 times harder than me. I could not do what he does. I asked him one time what his weekly schedule was and just the Bible studies that he has and the different towns and stuff that he touches on and the different people in his orbit. He needs a good car. He's shuttling kids back and forth. He works so hard. This is not what he should be driving. And so I kind of leaned over to some folks that were on the trip and I said, hey, I think Grace could raise enough money to buy him a truck. Can we do that? And I talked to the folks at Faith Ministry. Would it be cool if we bought him a truck? He seems to need it. And everybody was good with it. And so I came back to Grace and I said, hey, this is, as we enter Christmas, this is the thing we want to do. We want to have enough money to buy a truck for Pastor Carlos. And we did. What kind of car did we buy him? Do you remember? Yeah, Ford Escape or Ranger or something like that. But it was nice and new and way better than what he had. And some of our folks from Grace got to go down and deliver it to him. And when I watched the video, I had tears in my eyes because he was so grateful. And so blown away by the generosity of the church. And it was a really sweet moment. And the next time I went down there, the first thing Carlos wanted me to do is come see his truck and say thank you again for it. Now listen, if you were here and you gave to that Christmas offering in 2017, that joy is your joy. That happiness is your happiness. That's not watching other people do a good thing like when we watch on the internet and our heart is warmed and then we scroll to the next thing. That's your joy. You did that. You participated in that. You made that possible. That was God using your gifts and your finances making you a part of the body of Christ so that you could participate in the good work that he was doing. That joy was your joy. If you give to grace, those 11 kids that were up here being dedicated, that's your joy. When we baptize somebody, that's your joy. When you see somebody come into the church, that's your joy. We have, I think, nine people coming to Discover Grace after church today coming out of a pandemic. That's your joy that those people are becoming a part of what we're doing here at Grace. Every win that Jesus claims here at this church, when we give, we are a part of that. Because those wins don't happen if we don't give. So we give because we are a part of the body of Christ. And that allows us to participate in the work that Jesus is doing, wherever he's doing work. The last point that I would make about why it's best for us to give is that giving invites us to mirror the generosity of God that's lavished upon us. It invites us to mirror the generosity that God has given us. Now, this too could be a whole sermon, and it was. The last time we talked about giving, Doug Bergeson, one of our elders, preached on it in February of 2020, and I don't do things like this, but it's the best sermon on giving I've ever heard. If you haven't heard it, and you'd like to explore this idea more, go back into the archives. It was Grace's Going Home series, February of 2020. Find the Doug Bergeson sermon. It's an excellent one on what I'm talking about right here, How we participate in God's generosity when we give. But what I would say to you this morning is simply this, that this is to me the most compelling reason to give. Because the longer you are a believer, the deeper you grow in gratitude to the Father. There's no two ways about it. You might think that if you've lived a life however you want it, in total selfishness, in total depravity, you've done all the bad things that anybody could do. You can check off all the boxes and and then at like 35, you come to know God, and you're amazed that he's wiped the slate clean, and he's accepted you into his kingdom, that that moment is maximum gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness. No, it's not. Because to walk with God is to understand that when you become a Christian, he doesn't just forgive you for all the stuff that you did up to that moment. He forgives you for all the crap that you're going to do too. He knows every terrible thought that you're going to have. When you get saved, whatever your lowest point is after that, whatever rock bottom looks like after you become a Christian, God was already in that moment whispering to you that he loves you and he forgives you and he wants you to come back to him. He's already in that moment. Whether that moment's behind you or ahead of you, God was in it telling you already, I've covered this too. So to walk with God and to fall short again and again and again, to arrive at that place that Paul arrives at in Romans 7 that is to me the most redemptive verse in scripture, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death. To arrive there and be refreshed anew with God's overwhelming forgiveness and generosity to us. For it to hit us like a wave again that Jesus condescended, took on human flesh, lived with us in the muck and the mire, died on the cross for us, knowing that we would crud on that very death over and over and over again in our life only to require his forgiveness yet again and then he offers and then he goes about, once he dies for us, ascending to the right hand of the Father to advocate for us and to whisper in God's ear that, yes, I've covered that too. When we sit daily in the realization of the gospel and we let the waves of Jesus' forgiveness wash over us and God's generosity flood us, we cannot help but grow in our gratitude towards God. Whatever gratitude we experienced at salvation is the starting point for how it grows through our life. And so we give as an expression of that gratitude. We give because something so incredible is happening to us that we want to find a way to be conduits of that generosity that God has given us. God has given so much to me. God has given so much to us. God has enriched our lives so much that we can't help but want to desire to enrich the lives of others. We can't help but want to express the generosity that God has lavished upon us. And so giving in his best, most pure state is simply a reaction to the overflow of God's giving in our life. That's why Paul teaches in Corinthians that God loves a cheerful giver. Don't give out of compulsion, but give because you want to. And how can we grow our want to in giving? By focusing on the face of Jesus and remembering the generosity and the forgiveness that he offers us every day. And so giving is what's best for us because it reorients us to the gospel. It reorients us towards God's goodness in our life. God has been good to me and provided me this. I am going to give this portion of this, understanding that he can replace it or he can't, but God has been so generous to me that I want to be generous to others. That's why we give. I love this verse in 2 Corinthians 9-11 says, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. There's this part of the Sermon on the Mount that I find incredibly intimidating, where Jesus says, let others see your good deeds, see your good works, and shine for the Father so that your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your Father who is in heaven. It's this idea that when people come into and out of your orbit in your life, they should simply see the way that you act and want more of your father who is in heaven. And I always think to myself, how do you act like that? A really easy way is to be generous. That's what Corinthians tells us. That God has enriched us. He's given us resources in every way. Why? So that we might enrich others. And then both you and them will turn that to thanksgiving to God. And it will point us back to the Father and our Savior Jesus. That's why giving is what's best for us. It's good for us. It develops a spirit of generosity that constantly, constantly orients us back to Jesus. So I would end this morning with a simple challenge for you. Trust God and give. Trust God and his word and give. How much should I give? Just a little bit more than you are. That's always the answer. 10%? No, that's an Old Testament thing. How much do we give in the New Testament? Just a little bit more than we are. Whatever that means for you. Who do I give to? I'll be the first to tell you. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that you have to give all of your giving to the local church. I've sat in churches, I've heard pastors say, your first 10% goes to this church and then on top of that, other places. That's not in the Bible. I'm not going to sit here and teach you that. I'm not preaching this as a self-serving thing for grace. If you believe in grace and what's happening here and you feel compelled to participate in the victories that Jesus is winning here, then give to grace. But you give wherever God is advancing his kingdom. Wherever God is working and Jesus is moving, you give there. Just give. Trust God and do it. I have never talked to a single person in my whole life who has said, you know what? I heard what the pastor said about giving and I decided to start being more generous. That was a huge mistake. I really regret it. Wish I could have that back. Never heard anybody say that. So this morning, it's simple. If you and I could have a conversation, I would simply end it by saying, just trust God. Obey Him. Be a person who's generous. Let's give together. Let me pray for us. Father, we do love you. We are so grateful for the goodness and the gifts that you've lavished upon us. God, I pray first and foremost that we would let those wash over us. I pray more than anything else that we would simply leave here increasingly overwhelmed with your goodness to us. Father, for those of us who need this, who need to think about this in our own lives, I pray that because you said so would be all the reason that we ever need. I pray that we would trust that and walk in that. Knowing that even when we don't understand obedience sometimes, that it is going to lead us to a path of life. God, give us the heart and the gratitude and the spirit to be people who are generous. I pray that each one of us would leave here determined to be just a little bit more generous than we were when we walked in today. And God, for those of us who are obedient and who respond and who give. Would we find you there, please? Would you show us yourself in that giving? Can we ask that through the generosity that you compel us to that we are brought closer to your son and so inspired and enlivened to continue to be generous. It's in his name, the one who died for us and who advocates for us, that we pray. Amen.
