Generosity

INTRODUCTION

[Communicator Note: Share a story of a time that you used, spent, ate (etc.) something that was someone else’s as if it were yours. The goal of this story is to give a self-deprecating example of our life that demonstrates the mindset “everything given to me is for me.”]

That Wasn’t For You. I grew up with three brothers, anybody else have a lot of siblings? The house gets a little chaotic.

One of the things that happened a lot in my home growing up were arguments over stolen items. For my brothers this involved clothes, but for me, this mostly involved food. I had a philosophy that anything that existed in my fridge or my pantry was there for me to eat. Anybody else? Like unless you put your name on it, or mark it as yours in some way, if I see it and I want it I’m eating it. It’s still a problem, y’all pray for my wife Cassidy. One time as a kid there were cinnamon raisin bagels in our pantry, and I had never seen those before, so I tried one out. It’s in the pantry, which means it’s for me. I liked bagels, but I discovered that I LOVED cinnamon raisin bagels. It was like dessert and breakfast altogether. I like them so much, I ate two of them, because I’m big.

My mom found two of the bagels missing from the bag and was furious, she gave that mom look to all of us and was like, “who ate the bagels?” I tried to play if off for a second but I have a bad poker face so I fessed up. I still remember the disappointment in her eyes when she looked at me and said, “those weren’t for you.”

TENSION

I operated with a mindset that I think is the default mindset for just about everybody: Everything life gives to me is for me. If it’s in my pantry or in my fridge, it’s for me. And if it’s mine, then I’m the one who decides how it’s used, and nobody else’s opinion matters.

This whole month we’ve been talking about how to build an Unshakeable life, and tonight we’re going to look at the difference between an Unshakeable and Shaky life based on how we view our possessions.

To do that, we’re going to look at a story that Jesus told in Luke 12:15–21. In the stories that Jesus tells, the story always has a point, and it usually is making one point in particular. In this one, he tells the purpose for the story before he even gets into the story, here it is:

“Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.”

Having a bunch of stuff is not what life is about, and you know the end of the story for this guy, what Jesus is saying is that a life built on an abundance of possessions, a life that says everything that’s given to me is for me, is shakeable.

I have to have more than the next person, I have to depend on my things to bring me security, I’ve got to fend for myself, and other people have to fend for themselves. When we live life that way, our life shakes under the storms of circumstances.

TRUTH

So let’s look back at Jesus’ story to see how this plays out in our life. Here’s how the story starts:

And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest.

A few of things I want you to notice. First, it wasn’t this guy’s great work that resulted in a great harvest. The story is clear that, even though he did what he normally does, the ground provided more grain than it normally does. Students, it’s important to understand that EVERYTHING in life that we receive comes from God. The greedy person thinks that they deserve everything that they have, and everything that they don’t have. The generous person recognizes that everything comes from God.

Second, the guy in this story is already rich, before anything else happens. This guy was set, and sometimes we can hear stories like this, and we say things like, “well if I just had a little bit more, then I’d be able to be generous.” This guy was rich, and he wasn’t generous. Wealth doesn’t create generosity. If you’re not generous when you’re poor, you won’t be generous when you’re rich.

So back to our story, this rich guy has an abundant harvest, gets a stimulus check, gets his Christmas money, finds $20 on the floor and then:

He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’

So this guy, who is already rich, has a massive harvest from his crops this year, and he ends up having more grain than he can even store!

[Communicator Note: This will work best with a real-life piggy bank (maybe clear so students can see the money in it), and some fake dollar bills. The tangible picture of, “I have more than I need” will help illustrate the point of the application, that God supplies our needs, but often gives us margin to be generous.]

Piggy Bank Illustration. It’s like if you had a piggy bank. This bank is used to store your savings, and once it’s full, you know you’ve got all you need to take care of yourself for the entire year. That’s what grain barns were for, to store grain in harvest that would last until the next harvest. What happened was that this guy had his piggy bank, and he got so much money, that he filled his bank and still had a ton leftover. He then is left with a question: what do I do with the stuff that I can’t store in my piggy bank? And here’s where I want you to see how the mindset we mentioned earlier plays itself out: Everything life gives to me is for me. This is what that looks like:

“Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.” ’

In other words, BECAUSE he had the mindset that everything that was given to him was for him, the only logical next step to having more than he needed was storing it all and spending it on what he wanted. He let his spending and desires outgrow his needs, and everything that came his way he saved or spent on himself. To him, that’s what life was all about, having enough so he could be comfortable and enjoy his life finally. After all, hadn’t he worked hard? Hadn’t he earned all that grain? Wasn’t it his to do what he wanted with it?

Let me ask you a question, do you think this guy was being evil in any way? Was he trying to hurt people? Was he being unfair? Was he even being unwise? I mean, if he had visited a financial planner, the planner might have given him this very same advice! So what was the problem? There’s a scholar named James Edwards who puts it this way:

His folly is his oblivion to God. There are many forms of pride, but the worst of them is to think that one has no need of God. He does not acknowledge the source of his blessings. Rather, he gathers to himself and serves himself, and as such is a practical atheist. He has succumbed to the wilderness temptation of Jesus to live from bread alone. -James R. Edwards, PNTC, 371.

The man’s words were, let me eat, drink, and be merry. But there was a common saying during those days that many Roman philosophers quoted, that Paul quotes in 1 Cor 15, and the rich man only gets the first half. It’s from Isaiah 22:13, “Let us eat and drink… for tomorrow we die!” The saying is basically meant to say, we only have this one life, let’s enjoy it! When I was in school people would say YOLO, you only live once, before doing something risky or dumb. Let me store enough up, eat, drink, and be merry. The rich man didn’t finish the saying, but God does for him:

“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”

And this is where we find our main point, the mindset shift that Jesus is getting at that will take us from greedy to generous. If you can learn to think this way, to treat your possessions this way, to treat your time this way, to treat your energy this way, it will revolutionize your life and you will become a blessing and make an impact that far surpasses anything you could do when living for yourself. You ready, here’s the mindset shift, from the lie of greed to the truth of generosity:

Lie: Everything life gives me is for me.

Truth: Everything God gives me is for Him.

[Communicator Note: Ideally you would circle back to your opening story to reveal how a life that views everything for my own benefit ultimately hurts people and falls short.]

What I didn’t say about my bagel story in the beginning is that during that season of my life as a kid, my family had taken in another family to live with us who had lost their home and had no place to stay. The reason those bagels were in the pantry, and the reason I’d never had them before, is because they were the family’s who were staying with us. While my parents were opening up their home, understanding that even our house was given to us from God to serve others, I had a greedy mindset that everything in this house is mine.

It was my parents’ house, but I was mad that I had less space. I was upset that I couldn’t hang out in the basement because they were living there. I complained that I couldn’t bring my friends over to play video games anymore. I wasn’t even content just eating our regular food, I felt justified that since it’s in our house, their food was mine to eat.

When you have the mindset that everything in the world is meant for your pleasures, you’ll overlook those in need, you’ll live for this life, and you’ll have a very shaky existence. But if you are generous, if you are rich towards God, understanding that it’s all His, you will build an unshakeable life.

APPLICATION

So if a greedy mindset sees everything as being dedicated towards my own wants and needs, what does a generous mindset actually look like? How do you live out the mindset that Everything God gives me is for Him? I want you to notice something from our story. God doesn’t rebuke the foolishness of the rich man until he decides to build bigger barns. God isn’t against wealth, he’s not against you or me having things. He’s against us thinking life is about our stuff, and that it’s our things that meets our needs and keeps us secure instead of him. God is not against a full piggy bank. He’s against the mindset that the resources He entrusts us with are all for us.

Here's another way to think about it:

All that God gives me is for Him to spend. When you think that way, you start to filter your money, your time, your energy through the question, what does God want to do with this? God’s goal is to get to your heart, but here’s a good way to break that down:

Some that God gives me is for His worship. (Tithe 10%)

4 hours a week I gather for worship, and one hour a day I spend with God or God’s people. (11 hours out of 112 waking hours)

Any money that I get, I tithe the first 10% to the church as an act of worship.

Some that God gives me is for my needs. (Live and Save 60%)

I pay for my food, my activities, my school expenses, and save the rest.

For many of you, all of your needs are met for you, and so it’s hard to imagine your extra money going to anything other than what you want for yourself. Discipline yourself to be generous, or you’ll grow up greedy, no matter how rich you are.

Some that God gives me is for my wants. (Enjoy 10%)

Learn to set a limit around the piggy bank of personal spending. Being generous doesn’t mean that you don’t spend any money on yourself, it means that you learn to limit that bucket so you can give to others.

Some that God gives me is for others’ needs. (Give 20%)

Our goal for this series has been to make it as easy as possible for you to buy into what our church is doing and be generous towards the next generation. Tonight we’ve got these really cool Unshakeable sweatpants, and you can get something for yourself that you also understand is going 100% to the needs of the next generation. Kids will get to go to camp and hear the gospel because you set some money aside to be generous today.

That formula will work for some of you and be a blessing, but some of you aren’t there yet. That’s okay! The most important thing is to shift your mindset and the rest will follow you. But tonight, take the first step.

Maybe in groups you need to:

Talk about how you tend to spend extra money you get and identify a next step to grow in generosity.

Make a commitment to start tithing and live generously.

Simply buy a pair of sweatpants as an act of worship and surrender (or just because they’re cool).

Whatever it is, our hope is that you will be freed from a greedy mindset, and build a life that is unshakeable, generous towards God, trusting in the God who does not change. Let’s pray.