Money Matters

Introduction

The Lord cares about our relationship with money.

In fact, in Jesus’ teaching ministry, it was one of His most repeated subjects.

About 30% of his teaching ministry was taken up with talk of the Kingdom

But coming in second, at 16% is His talk about money.

More than the Law

More than prayer

More than sin

Knowing that, we should pay attention when the Bible speaks about money.

God has something to say.

Context

This is what we will see in Proverbs this morning.

Today marks the final day of our thematic journey through Proverbs 10-29.

We have examined 8 topics so far, with alcohol being last week.

And now we finish up this morning by talking about money, wealth and generosity.

Big Idea

How you deal with money matters to God from start to finish.

Outline

1. How You Get Wealth Matters to God

2. How You Use Wealth Matters to God

3. Where Your Trust Rests Matters to God

1. How You Get Wealth Matters to God

Our Big Idea today is that How you deal with money matter to God from START to FINISH.

That means that God cares about how money comes into our possession.

Acquiring Wealth Through Godly Means

According to Proverbs, the way we should seek to acquire money is through the godly means of patient, diligent work.

Consider these handful of Scriptures from God’s Wisdom Book:

Proverbs 10:4 ESV

A slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.

You can see what Solomon says—the hand of the diligent worker is what brings wealth.

Chipping away and plying your trade with eagerness, day after day

This is how someone ends up in a position where they have abundance—by working for it.

We see the same idea in Proverbs 28:19

Proverbs 28:19 ESV

Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits will have plenty of poverty.

The one whose table is filled with bread is the one who works the land.

They rise early.

They toil.

They sew.

They cultivate.

They harvest.

Their steady, patient work ethic is what God has used to provide for them.

This serves as a reminder to us that WORK is a good thing.

Work is not a result of the Fall, for Adam was to work and keep the Garden before sin entered into the world.

Work and vocation is part of what it means to be an image-bearer of God.

It is not a curse to be run from, but a means that God uses to bring blessings into our lives.

But there are things that can get in the way of this necessary act of working.

Proverbs 10:4 and 28:19 shows us two different threats to God’s good gift of work and the blessings that come along with patient, steady labor.

Threat 1: Laziness

The first threat to godly, wealth-producing work is laziness.

After all, Proverbs 10:4 told us about how diligence will make riches, but poverty comes by a “slack hand.”

The NLT says it even more plainly, “Lazy people are soon poor...”

Laziness does not produce anything but leisure and rest.

And to be sure, we need both of those things at times.

But they should serve as a reward and a relief to us after we have worked.

They should not be viewed as a way of life.

If they are, there will be trouble.

We see this in Proverbs 26:

We are warned there of the sluggard:

He is so lazy that he sticks his hand in a dish of food and he can’t even muster the energy to take it out and put the food in his mouth.

Proverbs 26:15 ESV

The sluggard buries his hand in the dish; it wears him out to bring it back to his mouth.

In Proverbs the sluggard is depicted as someone who will come up with crazy excuses for not working (22:13).

They will argue with you that they are right about their laziness (26:16).

And they will let a whole vineyard, their means for making money, become overgrown because they want to nap and play (24:30-34)

Laziness poses a great threat to godly work and acquiring money through godly means.

We must refuse it and avoid it.

Threat 2: Worthless Pursuits

Chapter 28, verse 19 told us that working the land leads to having plenty of bread.

But the verse also reminds us that if you follow worthless pursuits, you will not have abundance, but you will go without.

...he who follows worthless pursuits will have plenty of poverty.

Worthless ventures would speak to attempts to acquire wealth outside of God’s wisdom.

This speaks to attempts to shortcut God’s way of building an estate—through patient, hard work.

Instead of working hard, the person who pursues worthless ventures is the person who tries to find a quick way to riches.

In fact, there are a number of verses in Proverbs 28 that speaks to what these worthless pursuits might be:

Sinful/Criminal Activity (v. 21): Doing wrong to get a piece of bread

Greediness (v. 22): We will talk more about this in Point #2.

Robbing Parents of Inheritance (v. 23): Proverbs says this person is no better than a murderer

But there are other ways that people will chase quick riches in attempt to circumvent God’s wise means for acquiring wealth:

Gambling

Multi-Level Marketing Schemes

The Lottery

Speculative stock trading that is really just poor stewardship

Even if someone were to make money doing this for a time, they will have to answer for God.

The means doesn’t justify the ends in His eyes.

He judges the means in the End.

Proverbs 28:20 ESV

A faithful man will abound with blessings, but whoever hastens to be rich will not go unpunished.

And more than that, we have to say that those who do get rich quick through some scheme they cooked up, tend to not stay rich for long.

They didn’t have the wisdom to get wealth in the right way and they don’t have the wisdom to keep it.

Proverbs 13:11 ESV

Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it.

Work Hard as Unto the Lord

Understanding these things, Christians should be the first to commit to steady, patient, diligent work and labor.

And understanding these things, we should be the first ones to see the threats of laziness and worthless pursuits and we should guard ourselves against them.

Both laziness and impatient shortcuts are driven by the same desire to have pleasure and plenty without working hard.

The wise must reject both desires.

See… (TRANSITION INTO ILLUSTRATION)

We should recognize that in this life, we will rarely be Broccoli Farmers.

Broccoli pops up in about 7-10 days.

You have about a week to harvest it

So in season, you can plant and eat broccoli in just a matter of weeks.

We may have some financial moments that look and feel like this in our lives, but by and large, this is not how wealth is acquired.

Instead, we should be prepared to be more like Bamboo Farmers.

The Bamboo Farmer will plant and water for four years without signs of life.

But they just keep working, day after day.

And then, after waiting, in a matter of about 6 weeks, the bamboo will grow up to 80 feet.

The point of the illustration is that needs and abundance come through planting and watering, day after day.

No Laziness.

No Shortcuts.

Patient, diligent work for the glory of God.

Application

Where are you tempted to be lazy right now?

Where does your flesh say, “Just fold the hands...a little rest?”

Is it in the morning when the alarm goes off?

Is it during the day when the boss isn’t looking?

Does it happen through procrastination?

Does it come through in an absolute refusal to work hard?

Where are you tempted to take shortcuts?

Is there something you want?

Are you concerned for the future?

Are you obsessed with the idea of being rich?

Do you fantasize often about a life with more money and scheme in your mind about ways to get it?

The answer to your laziness is to put it off and put on diligent work that brings God glory.

Colossians 3:23 ESV

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,

The answer to your desire for shortcuts is to put off sinful, impatient desires for wealth and put on patient work and wait on the Lord.

2. How You Use Wealth Matters to God

The Greedy and the Generous

God cares about how you deal with money from start to finish.

If Point 1 was about the start—how we get money, our second point is about the ongoing story of wealth in our lives:

How we use our money.

The Book of Proverbs essentially shows us two types of people when it comes to how wealth and possessions are used:

There are generous people.

There are greedy people.

Proverbs 11:24–25 ESV

One gives freely, yet grows all the richer; another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want. Whoever brings blessing will be enriched, and one who waters will himself be watered.

There is one who gives freely and brings blessing and waters—This is the generous person.

There is another who withholds—This is the greedy person.

There are some who use wealth for the sake of helping others. These are the wise who fear God.

There are some who use wealth only for their sake and their own glory. This is the fool who has no fear of God.

They feel they are accountable to no one but themselves, therefore they spend their wealth on no one but themselves.

Jesus’ Two Parables

The Good Samaritan

First of all, we have Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan.

He tells this story after being questioned by a lawyer about eternal life.

In the parable, a man travels down from Jerusalem to Jericho and falls into the hands of robbers

They strip him, beat him, and leave him half dead

A priest happens to be going down the same road, sees the man, and passes by on the other side

A Levite comes to the place, sees him, and also passes by on the other side

The priest and the Levite are professional holy men and you might expect them to be the ones to help, but they don’t.

The help comes from a Samaritan who treats the beaten man mercifully, as his neighbor.

And he uses what he has in order to be able to help the man:

He pours costly oil and wine on his wounds.

He took two days’ wages and paid for the man to have a place to stay

Luke 10:35 ESV

And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’

You can see how he compassionately showers blessings on the man in need.

He holds his own stuff loosely in order to bless someone else.

This is the generosity that Proverbs calls for.

The Rich Fool

But then you have a second parable from Jesus in Luke.

There is a rich man with bountiful land.

In fact, his land is so bountiful that he has nowhere to store all the extra.

Luke 12:17–19 ESV

and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” ’

There is no thought of his neighbor.

There is no thought of the poor or the needy.

There is no thought of the alien and the sojourner.

All he can think of is how to make his own life great and comfortable.

In the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus calls the man who showed mercy a NEIGHBOR.

In this Parable, the Greedy Man is called a FOOL.

Luke 12:20 ESV

But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’

What Proverbs Says

Proverbs lines right up with principles we are hearing of in Jesus’ parables.

Good Samaritan and Proverbs 14:31

In the parable of the Good Samaritan, the one who shows compassion honors God by loving his neighbor as himself.

Something that the Levite and the Priest failed to do.

Proverbs tells us that the One who uses their wealth to help the needy are not just showing mercy to man, but bringing honor to God:

Proverbs 14:31 ESV

Whoever oppresses a poor man insults his Maker, but he who is generous to the needy honors him.

The Rich Fool and Proverbs 28:17

Proverbs 28:27 ESV

Whoever gives to the poor will not want, but he who hides his eyes will get many a curse.

The greedy man who is only concerned with what money can do for himself and refuses to bless others will end up cursed in the end.

The stingy person hides their eyes from the poor, so the Lord hides His eyes of favor from the stingy person.

This is like what we saw in Luke 12, where the greedy man is called a Fool and brought to the grave, only to turn his things over to someone else.

The Spiritual Math

So then, we can do the spiritual math, can’t we?

Use your wealth just for yourself and ignore your neighbor —> You mock and dishonor God and you will end up cursed, without His favor upon your soul

But if you use your wealth to honor God by loving your neighbor —> You are blessed as one who blessed others.

In fact, if we return to Proverbs 11:24-25, we are reminded that:

The One who gives freely, grows richer.

The One who brings blessing will be enriched

But the One who withholds what he should give, only suffers want

According to Proverbs, this is generally how we can expect to see things work in the world.

There are exceptions to the rule—but in general, the stingy will lose everything, while the generous grow more prosperous.

And if God’s justice does not see to that in life, the Parable of the Rich Fool reminds us that He will see to it when the greedy person dies.

So Why Be Greedy? Because It’s Natural

You might wonder, if this is the way it is, how come the whole world is not more generous?

Why is there so much selfishness in our society?

Why aren’t we just surrounded by generous people all the time?

Well—that is because of the spiritual nature of humanity.

Human beings are fallen, just like their father Adam, who transgressed God’s Law in the Garden.

We are born depraved and separated from God’s saving grace.

We are sinners from the start.

And this means that the virtue of generosity does not come naturally to us.

When we think of money, we tend to think first of ourselves: what do I need, what do I want, what dream can this money finance, what would I like to do that I have never done before, etc. I am not suggesting that we are never generous but that, for most of us, when it comes to money, generosity is a snapshot in a long video of self-interest.

Paul David Tripp, Redeeming Money

The Supernatural Gospel

If generosity doesn't come natural to us, we are going to need something supernatural to change that.

And that is what we have in the grace of God in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Truly, the whole Bible is drenched with the generosity of the Lord.

He was generous in Creation.

Generous in His covenant with Abraham.

Generous in giving His Law to His people.

Generous in promising a New Covenant, where the stone heart of sin would be removed and a new heart, empowered by His Spirit, would be given in its place.

But how would that happen?

How would the people of God actually come to have new hearts?

2 Corinthians 8:9 ESV

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.

The Lord Jesus Christ — God's perfect Son, who never sinned — deserved nothing but blessing and favor.

But on the cross, He became poor.

He was cursed and crushed, taking our sin upon Himself so that we might be forgiven and made rich in Him.

And He rose again, proving that His offering for sin was accepted by the Father.

So then, The message of His kingdom is simple: repent and believe.

And when we do, we are not only forgiven — we are empowered by God's Spirit to actually obey Him and put sin to death.

It is through this Gospel, and only this Gospel, that we are freed from greed and stinginess...

...and freed for generosity and love toward our neighbor.

And then, with new hearts and God’s power at work in our lives, we obey the call of the Scriptures for generosity.

We are able to love our neighbor as ourselves like the Good Samaritan. We are able to please God with our generosity:

Hebrews 13:16 ESV

Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.

And inside the church, we are freed to be generous with one another, in the spirit of Jesus’ Cross:

1 John 3:16–17 ESV

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?

Application

So let me ask you friend:

Have you been closing your fist to others in stinginess and your heart to God in greed?

Have you closed your eyes to your neighbor and your brother or sister?

When you consider money, does a desire to please yourself eclipse a desire to please the Lord?

Today is a day to come to God and ask Him to relieve you of your greedy heart.

Ask Him to take away your desires that are more in line with the Rich Fool.

Ask Him to give you the heart of the Samaritan who laid down two days worth of work to help a stranger.

After all, Proverbs calls our generosity a “lending to the Lord.”

Proverbs 19:17 NLT

New Living Translation Chapter 19

If you help the poor, you are lending to the LORD—

and he will repay you!

There are plenty of people that it might be unwise to lend your money to, but not God.

He brings return on investment!

Your generosity puts money in God’s hands that He returns to you in spiritual joy—and sometimes in physical blessings as well.

Can’t we be generous and trust God with what He has given to us in the first place?

Can’t we trust His Word when it says:

2 Corinthians 9:6 ESV

The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.

The Power of the Tithe

This is one reasons that we commit ourselves to tithing in the local church.

In the Old Testament, God’s people would give their tithe (tenth) to the Lord from their money:

They would pay in grain, oil and livestock

Part of it was for providing for the priests

Part of it was for the poor

Part of it was to provide provisions for celebration in honor of the Lord

But in being generous with God in the tithe, they were being generous the Lord’s work and those in need.

But if they were not faithful in this, then they were robbing God:

Malachi 3:8 ESV

Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In your tithes and contributions.

Now, in the New Testament church, we don’t get a number.

There is no Bible verse in Matthew-Revelation that says, “Give 10%.”

But we do get clear instruction:

2 Corinthians 9:7 ESV

Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

As New Testament believers, we should cheerfully give to God what He has led us to give in our hearts.

And as we do this in the local church, our generosity accomplished so much:

Provides for the weekly ministry of the church

Provides for Gospel work local and around the world, including humanitarian work with the poor in places like Central America

Provides for the upkeep of the church building we use to reach people

Provides for our church staff, including our pastors

None of this can happen apart from the generosity of members of this Kingdom Outpost—Seaford Baptist Church

The most basic and simple way we can honor God with our generosity is to give to our local church.

This is God’s design.

And the one who does it will find it to be a discipline that brings blessing and joy.

Transition Into Point 3

So God cares about how we deal with money from the start to the finish:

How we get it wealth

How we use wealth

Now we talk about the heart.

3. Where Your Trust Rests Matters to God

God’s Concern With the Heart

God is concerned with your bank account.

He is interested.

He demands a SAY as your Master.

But He is far more concerned with your heart.

Proverbs 11:28 ESV

Whoever trusts in his riches will fall, but the righteous will flourish like a green leaf.

Whoever looks at money as a Savior...

Whoever looks at it as a Refuge...

Whoever bows down to money as the Thing that can protect them...

They will fall.

They will come to ruin.

On the other hand, there are the righteous.

What is implied is that they do not trust in riches.

Therefore, they will not fall.

They will flourish.

So again—Proverbs gives us a really clear picture:

Trust in riches = FALL

Display righteousness by not trusting in riches = FLOURISHING

Money and the Heart

See—here is the thing—if God cares about how we deal with money from beginning to end, then He cares about our hearts and money.

He cares about how you relate to money in your inner-man or your inner-woman.

He cares about whether you look to Him and say, “I love and trust Him” or whether you look at money and say, “I love and trust THAT.”

1 Timothy 6:9–10 ESV

But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

The one who trusts in riches is the one who loves riches.

Instead of loving God with all of their heart, mind and strength, they love money.

Because they believe money can do something for them that God cannot.

Money becomes their functional god they adore and find peace in.

And because of that—they will wander into all types of horrible sins as they are constantly consumed with the subject of money.

They become mastered by it.

They serve it.

And in turn, they do not serve God.

Matthew 6:24 ESV

“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.

In the end, the love of money and trust in money will fail.

Because death will come and someone else will have your wealth.

And you will stand before God the same way you came into this world— naked, holding nothing in our hands.

Nowhere to hide.

Helpless to His inspection.

Woe to us if we die and He finds a heart that chose money over Him.

The Wise Man Who Fears God

The wise man who fears the Lord will not give his heart over to money like this.

He may have a little or a lot—but he knows that it is fleeting.

He reveres God and loves God.

He believes the Lord is His reward.

Therefore the wise man submits everything TO God, including his wallet.

He knows that money is not his reward—it is just a tool to be used for worship and the honoring of God.

His reward will come from God—riches, honor and life.

Proverbs 22:4 ESV

The reward for humility and fear of the Lord is riches and honor and life.

These things may be tasted in part in this age—but all believers will receive them in full—IN CHRIST—in the age to come.

He is not like the Rich Fool in Luke 12 who ponders, “How can I spend all this extra on myself?”

Instead, the wise man who trusts in the Lord says:

“How can I use this for God’s purposes? How can I display love for Him and others with this and bring Him glory?”

Rather than letting an abundance make him proud and setting his hopes on riches, he hopes in God.

1 Timothy 6:17 ESV

As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.

Trapeze Illustration

How do we know if we are the wise man or the fool?

How do we know where we have set our hopes?

Consider this illustration:

Think of a trapeze artist flying through the air during their act.

They go from rung to rung to rung, putting full trust in the bar they are grabbing onto.

This can be used as a metaphor for life.

We go flying through life and we reach out for things we trust in.

Well—when you think of your life, if you are honest, what are you grabbing onto each day with full trust?

Are you flying through life grabbing onto the Lord to swing from each day to the next?

Are you setting your hope on Him?

OR—are you flying through life and the rungs you are grabbing onto are the rungs of money and finances?

Are you setting your hope on riches that you have or hope to attain?

Application

The person who is setting their hopes on riches will be prone to the sins that we have talked about:

They won’t want to work hard because that seems to slow and arduous—they need their functional god of money now

They will be prone to all sorts of immoral shortcuts because—they need the god they love—money—as soon as possible

They will be greedy and close-fisted because they can’t stand the thought of giving away security—and that is what they believe money to be

But the man or woman who is flying through life—trusting in the Lord and setting their hopes on Him:

They are able to be patiently diligent, knowing that riches won’t save them anyhow—their hope is in the Lord who will reward their labor in due time

They are able to be generous, knowing that there is no security in bigger barns and more crops.

Security and salvation comes from God alone—the One who loves the world and gave us His Son.

Conclusion

So then, let us heed this as individuals and as a church.

As an individual:

Has money been causing you massive amounts of worry?

Has it been a stress in your marriage?

Have you been feverishly scheming and plotting ways to get more of it?

Check your heart, friend.

Money is not evil.

Loving money is evil.

And a lot of bad sins can be born from that corrupt love.

God is your Savior—not wealth.

Trust Him.

Set your hope on Him.

This is the first step toward a life of integrity and generosity in the area of money and wealth.

As a church:

As a church body, we also have to listen to what God’s wisdom book has said to us today.

If we are doing our job right here, there will always be need:

If the church is growing, there will be a need for more space

If the church is going to be used, there will be a need for maintenance

If the church is going to reach the community, there will be a need for ministry money

If the church is going to reach the nations, there will be a need for missions money

In many ways, health and growth creates needs.

But the solutions of those needs is not to trust in the money that is needed to do it all

We have to trust in the Lord

We must set our hope on Him—the One who provides that which is sufficient for the calling

Let us not forget that our God will supply every need of ours, according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

To Him be the glory forever and ever Amen.