Sermon Tone Analysis

Invited to Contribute

2cor

Today as you may have guessed I want to teach on giving… In fact I almost called this sermon “Cheerfully contributing to the family” with a generic subtitle of “Gospel centered giving”, but that seemed a little overplayed… AS if we can just add the words “Gospel Centered” in front of anything, and people will all the sudden care more...

But none the less I do want to talk frankly about giving.

I feel compelled to teach us about what the New Testament standard is for believers to give.

I big idea in all this will be us seeing through the scriptures that our giving is not so much about us, and it is something we are invited to do, yet be quick to point out that we are not under an Old Testament command as some of my contemporaries might suggest.

Translation....

I want to answer the question, “do Christians HAVE TO Tithe?”

If you are new to the church you may not have any understanding of why anyone would care about such a topic, but suffice it to say, I am teaching about what the Bible says about our Money, specifically freely giving our money away, and not just to anyone, but specifically the church.

I want to answer questions like - When giving, is there a specific amount i should give?

and Does it matter where I give my money?

Before we get to these questions I wanted us to look at a biblical text to show the heart of what we see in the New testament in people being instructed in giving.

in we have a context to understand before we breakdown what is being said… This chapter starts with a positive assurance.

He is confident of the zeal that the Corinthians have shown from the collection that is meant to be sent to poor people in jerusalem.

He has even boasted to others about how eager the Corinthians are to give.

He tells them he is sending brothers ahead of him to prepare the gift they are giving, and so that they have time to get it all in to be sent.

SO please understand they were already giving and excited about contributing to the help that was needed in caring for the poor and preaching the Gospel.

That brings us to what we read starting in the 6th verse.

Couple things to keep in mind here as we hear Paul instruct the Corinthian church.

First - Paul is speaking in agricultural terms here.

Realizing farmers will really understand what he is saying here, yet for those who are not familiar with this kind of language, we get all the wrong ideas.

A farmer goes out to throw seed or sow seed in order to get as large of a harvest as possible because he knows that every seed that he tosses out will not grown and bring fruit.

The more seed he gets out the better the odds of it growing and producing fruit.

The farmer doesn’t expect every seed to be part of the harvest.

In fact he is somewhat caviler with his seed.

He reaches into a bag of seed, takes a handful and tosses the seed.

This is a quantity over quality way of farming.

It is simple, you cant get a harvest if you don’t get your seed out and the more the better since it will not all grow.

That is why when Jesus told the parable of the sower it was obvious that he was casting his seed over the good ground and also the rocky soil, beaten down path, and ground full of thorns… The more the better.

get it?

Secondly - it is thought by some that Paul was making a reference to a proverb that people would’ve known.

pro.11

There is a prevalent thought that says, “ it takes money to make money”… which is derived from these kinds of proverbs.

There is no return on your investment if there isn’t first an investment.

It seems as though what Paul has said echos this thought.

But what this verse is definitely not saying is, “Well you don’t have more because you don’t give more”… And the reason why it isn’t saying that, is because it is agricultural term meaning to admonish people to freely give trusting that a return will come, but it is never meant to be a legalistic view of giving in which people feel condemnation over if they are not giving “enough”.

In fact the greek translation of is more like, “he who sows sparingly will reap sparingly, but he who sows on the basis of blessings, on the basis of blessings shall reap”...

What does it mean to, “ on the basis of blessings” give?

Do we really think this is saying that Blessings = Money or wealth?

Because when we treat this verse as if it is saying, “ if we give a lot we will get a lot”… then we empty it of its power to point us to Christ!

I would submit to you that the blessings are treasuring Christ… Salvation freely given and recieved by unworthy recipients… The basis of Blessings is JESUS!!!

The Beautiful Gospel of Jesus Christ is the basis of all our blessings

So, if on the basis of blessings we give… Then on the basis of blessings we reap!!!!

Meaning we give because we are blessed by Jesus to be included in the family of God, and because we are in the family of God because of the work of Jesus, we reap!

And what are these Blessings????

The blessings we have are so much more than just some material blessings… and if we understand that, then we can actually talk about how we are giving money which is a material blessing.

What a better understanding we can have when we give our money as an act of worship because we are already blessed in Christ, and we then continually receive blessings from Christ who has already blessed us with so much.

Do we really think that us giving a percentage, or a tithe is what blesses us and keeps us blessed?

Do we really think that part of an old LAW based system for worshipping God is how we are going to keep him giving favor to us?

So Are NT believers commanded to Tithe??? NO

Why???

Because the Tithe was a part of the Mosiac Law.

That law has been done away with.

Some may say there is a difference between civil, ceremonial and moral law found in the OT, but the Tithe was not part of the moral Law.

Jesus modifies the moral law, or 10 commandments, we call this the law of Christ, which mostly keep the moral law in tact, yet we know from scripture that we are no longer under the Law.

The tithe was part of that law in which we are released from.

I would also point out that the tithe was for the Levites and priests and we no longer have them in the NT either.

When we did Moses give to Melchizedek it was a one time gift not the normative ongoing tithe gift.

Some would say that Jesus affirmed the tithe...

Luke

If you notice that Jesus is talking to Pharisees who were religious leaders of Jews who were under the Law, because he had not died to redeem them from the Law yet… So his affirmation of the tithe here is keeping with righteousness, which they couldn’t do… But the point of that verse was to show that religious activity like giving a tithe is not good if your heart is rotten toward God and his people.

And if you really can’t get past this because Jesus said it, then I expect you to put a tithe of mint, cumin, and dill in the offering boxes, because that is specifically what Jesus told them to not neglect.

Finally nowhere is tithing mentioned in the NT, rather they are encouraged to give generously, to give to the poor, to give to the work of the ministry, and to give more than just money...

This is why we are in the text we are today.

Paul was collecting a financial gift from those he loved to bring to the poor in jerusalem and they were excited to give generously and help contribute to God being praised by others as the relief came!

Now I realize that I may be ruffling some feathers for those who have always held to tithing as a principle to keep their heart in check, and it can have that value, but if your giving is about a percentage then you have a gospel issue in your heart.

If you think that your giving is what makes you blessed and keeps you blessed, you have a Gospel issue in your heart.

So what Should we give then?

if there is not a percentage, how will we know what we should give?

I am glad you asked...

2cor9.

Does it sound like Paul is telling them they HAVE TO GIVE a certain amount?

Nope!

You should give what you have decided in your heart..

I would challenge you that the more you grow in your faith of the knowledge of the Son of God, the more you understand the Beautiful Gospel of Jesus Christ, the more your heart will change into someone who loves to give and cherishes giving as an exercise in which they tell themselves how much more they love Jesus than their own money.

The reason we do not pass plates here at living water is because we do not want people to be under compulsion.

The polite stick up is something that is most seen when people feel bad because they can’t give or they cant give as much as someone else is.

But I would say that is a low view of giving, because we are not to look at what others give, rather we give as we have decided in our heart according tot the Grace of God in our life… and that is a wonderful blessing to partake in.

When it says God loves a cheerful giver, could it be that he wants his children free from sin, death, hell and the grave… he wants us free from his own judgement which is coming on this world, he wants us eternally united to him… and so when it comes time to give money so others can be served and helped, we are so happy and cheerful about our fortunate position in Christ that we gladly give, and God loves that.

God Loves a cheerful giver because it shows his children understand what they have recieved from him already… Cheerful giving shows true Faith and true heart change… God loves that.

So if you cannot give cheerfully keep your money we do not need it, God blesses and ensures that his children participate in contributing to his work continuing on the earth to this day.

You can accept the invite to be part of that Grace, the ministry that preaches the Gospel and saves souls from hell, or not.

Yet there is for those who gladly give on the basis of the blessings they have recieved, and reward to be reaped...

and this is where it gets interesting.... Notice the language...

God is able to make ALL grace abound to you, so that having ALL sufficiency in ALL things at ALL times, you may abound in EVERY good work.

God does not hold back from his children

it is not us and how much we give that makes all grace abound to us… it is GOD who does this… and when he does it is ENOUGH for our life.

yet not just to live our life any way we want, but for us to abound in every good work...

There seems to be a concept here that our lives are for good works that we now do because we are truly saved by God.

We have these good works we are supposed to walk in and live in...

and as it relates to giving, God makes his grace abound to us when we give cheerfully, and he does this so that we can abound in every good work… and this is found all over the NT when it comes to giving and living for God...

1tim

Here we see that we are to be generous and ready to share, and this is part of being rich in good works.. we are to do good… good works, they are very connected to being generous.

How can we not see how we handle our money and giving as part of the good works that we are all called to do in Christ!

The great thing about these good works is that they are actually the opposite of the motivation many in our day have for giving… Good works are for someone else, not us.

We do not need our good works… and Martin Luther said God doesn’t need your good works, your neighbor does.

Well how do we grow to understand our good works?

are my good works the same as your good works?

do we have different things to offer that are considered good works?

Last week Pastor Chad talked about how we have gifts and God has given gifts to the church for our mutual growing together in love and equipping for the work of the ministry.