Wants/Needs #Stuff Week 2

Like a dog burying its bone

My little dog has an eccentric habit. It’s more of a compulsion really. Whenever we give him a rawhide bone, he spends the rest of the day and sometimes the next in a flurry of activity. Whether he is motivated by instinct or his own peculiar quirkiness or some combination of the two is hard to say.

Given a bone, he commences a search through the house for a suitable place to bury it. Once he settles on a spot, he proceeds to “dig” a hole in the linoleum. Undaunted by the fact that all his furious digging scarcely leaves a scuff on the floor, he carefully places his bone in his imaginary hole. Next he painstakingly noses imaginary dirt over it and then turns himself around to kick some more for good measure. This whole exercise in futility can take a quarter of an hour.

It is at this point, when he inspects his work, that he appears to realize something is amiss. His prize is not sufficiently buried and, in fact, is in plain sight. So he picks it back up and hunts for a better spot. And thus the cycle repeats over and over again until it’s time for a nap.

Sometimes as I watch him and shake my head, I wonder if there is some of this craziness in me, too. Are there things that I do over and over out of a compulsion I do not understand — things that are equally unproductive? Maybe you know what I mean. Things like wearing ourselves out trying to impress other people. Or how about chasing after things that never satisfy. Or maybe it’s just a cycle of busyness that doesn’t really get us anywhere. Sometimes I wonder, but then it’s time for a nap.

—Kari Myers, HomeTouch, October 17, 2010.

What if I told you that money and work are bigger than just your current situation? The Bible has some important things to say about money and work that play into our ministry of stuff that we are looking at these weeks.

The old saying is “either you will serve people and use money; or you will serve money and use people.” Until we gain proper perspective on stuff, we will be like the dog- working to find contentment and always coming up short of our expectations.

First, we work because God made us to be productive

Work was God’s idea, Adam was not ever able to just sit and be idol. God made man and gave him a task

I think this is one of the reasons people who do not work are more apt to depression- because they are not fulfilling one of their purposed in life. God is not a lazy God, but an active God, and we are designed in his image.

The first thing we read that God does is WORK- He created

We must also remember that one of the effects of sin is sickness- when our bodies get too old to work and be productive this is a side effect of sin, not the grace of God.

Second, we work to support ourselves

2 Thessalonians 3:10

God wants us to be self sufficient people- this is part of being free. The Bible tells us to “owe no one anything, except for love” (). We are only to be slaves to Christ, and when we constantly depend on someone else to take care of us, we become slaves to them.

There are situations when we need the help of the church or other people, but this should not be a continued lifestyle if at all possible.

Third, we work to support our families

As people of faith, taking care of our families is first charged to us. While others may feel the call to help, we are to be the first ones to support a family member

Fourth, we work to serve others

In our context this does not mean commune living, as it did in Acts. However, this is a call to break our covetous attitudes towards money and possessions.

You see, work, and the results of your work are not only about you. This is a piece of what Jesus is saying in the passage we heard from a little earlier. You see, we live our lives in a money based economy; but the Kingdom of God is not based on money.

The ministry of stuff can be built on a framework of three parts

Trust God

Work Hard

Serve others

teaches us that we can trust God, and that when we trust God we are free to serve people. This passage is not, as some people in the ancient past interpreted it, a call for Christians to not work, but to not be chiefly concerned with the things of this world. Work- not just for you, but for God and others...

This kind of thinking though, this framework asks us to work hard at defining wants and needs.

Now, please hear me, church. I am not trying to spark a debate on drug testing and government aid; or tax reform, or any of those things- because many of you know my opinion on some of these issues- what I am trying to do is relay a teaching of the Bible, and that is this:

You see, this promised Scripture of Jesus is about NEEDS, Praise God for this promise, when we seek the things of Jesus we are promised that He will meet our needs.

So let’s work at some basic distinguishing between wants and needs- shall we?

We say how valuable people are by the money they make- but God said how valuable people are by putting Jesus on the cross...

Food, water, clothing, shelter- NEEDS, cannot live without them.

Cable- WANT, Vacation- WANT, and teenagers, no matter what you hear cell phone- WANT

But what if we allowed God to re-prioritize the way that we view, make, and spend money? What if we lined the 4 reasons why we work up against realistic wants and needs and allowed that to dictate the way we use our stuff?

I like to think of the formula of needs, serve, save, spend....

I wholeheartedly think that this is the pattern set out for us in God’s Economy of money.

First- make sure your NEEDS are met through your stuff

- for you and your family. Financially this may mean paying all the bills. In our homes it means making sure that your families needs are met. For example, if your roof leaks, that should be taken care of before putting in the pool you’ve been eyeing…no matter how nice that pool sounds!!

Second- use your stuff to SERVE someone.

This includes tithes and offerings at church first, then other moments of serving others like special donations, etc. With possessions it means using them to help another person. For example, Jess and I have property to raise animals, and one of our visions is to raise livestock and give one animal to the Shenandoah Disaster Auction.

It is so easy to make this our last priority. For example, hearing someone say they cannot afford to give to the church, but seeing them a few days or weeks later buying a big screen tv....yes that has happened to many pastors I know.

Third- SAVE some stuff

One of the things that I love about Crown financial ministries is they reinforce the idea that you need to deposit something in your savings account every time you are paid- no matter how small- even if it is only $5, it will build over time. With our possessions it means taking care of what we have. Don’t put off repairs or maintenance- take care of what God has given you and invest in it for the long haul.

Fourth- Spend and use your stuff on WANTS

I’m not saying your shouldn’t buy that four wheeler you’ve been wanting, or go on that shopping trip with your girlfriends and buy some new clothes and shoes- I am saying this is the last lens in Kingdom Economy. I’m not saying you shouldn’t buy a new car, and if that car has all the options that is amazing- as long as it doesn’t hinder the other three layers of the ministry of stuff.

Dig a little Deeper

Which of the four lenses of Kingdom money principals do I/we struggle with the most?

Do I/We have a household budget, and do we stick to it? Would this help us meet some new goals?

What is one new way we can use our money and possessions to serve someone?