Spiritual Growth-Giving and War
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17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
105 Your word is a lamp to my feet
and a light to my path.
12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.
6 The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
Laws of the Harvest-
Laws of the Harvest-
1. Your Harvest depends on whether you sow
1. Your Harvest depends on whether you sow
2. Your Harvest depends on what you sow
2. Your Harvest depends on what you sow
3. Your Harvest will always be more than what you sow.
3. Your Harvest will always be more than what you sow.
6 The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
38 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.”
8 And 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. 9 As it is written,
“He has distributed freely, he has given to the poor;
his righteousness endures forever.”
10 He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. 11 You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.
11 I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the Lord of hosts.
3 For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. 4 For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 5 We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,
Ps 103:10God does not does not deal with us according to our sins nor does he repay us according to our iniquities
Spiritual Growth- Generosity and Warfare
I want to start out by saying this, I want to highlight one of the groups in our church, not that we are divided or that it is them and us, its just us. But I want to highlight the youth and college ministry that meets on Wednesday nights. I tell you week after week, I am surprised at the spiritual maturity of this group, and let me tell you they are hungry for the Word of God. They are growing by leaps and bounds, and let me put this challenge up to the adults. I was like that when I came to the faith, in a short time I passed up many who had been in the church their whole life. Do you know what the difference in between those that plateau in their relationship with God and those that seem to skyrocket? It is the Word of God, and the word of God going from hear (head) to hear (heart).
By the way don’t get this confused they are not growing like that because they are young, they are growing like that because they are in the Word. I planted a seed and Brother Vic harvested a few years ago in a man named Ron McGee. And Mr. Magee with in his late seventies and thought that he was saved, but I confronted him the gospel and he ended up getting saved, and at like 76 years of age began to grow like crazy… do you know why? He got into this book and it began to transform him from the inside. He began to have great spiritual insight into things that most Christians never attain
Romans 10:17 ESV
17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
Psalm 119:105 ESV
105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
This year I want this church to start growing, not only growing numerically, but I want it to start growing in Maturity, spiritual maturity.
· Many people get their purpose tied up with performance.
· with activity, with just doing something. They begin to do things only to ignore the issues going on in their heart and they get knocked on their butts
· Your purpose is not activity, it is not doing anything, it is tied up with being, being conformed to the Image of Christ.
Ephesians 4:12–14 ESV
12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.
PICTURE OF A SAILBOAT- Waves and the Wind
· It would seem to me that it is a picture of someone on a sail boat, and if you get out into a boat and you don’t know how to operate the thing the waves can toss you to and fro, if you don’t know how to operate the sails you may want to go this way but the wind is blowing you opposite direction.
Life is like that, many of us when we came to Christ, we were quite dysfunctional,
· unstable in all our ways, and then we get saved, well guess what
· we are saved and unstable, and now you have the powers if darkness trying to sink you.
· And people get active, they just start doing something because they think that gives them some stability, a clear focus, some purpose in their life
· the problem is they are trying to do something for the Lord, but they are doing it without knowing who they really are.
ITS like getting thrown onto a football team one day and they show up on gameday in your running shoes while the other team has cleats,
· you show up in in your nike shorts and shirt, but the other team is where full pads,
· you got a headband and the other team has a helmet.
· Then the coach throws you onto the field and
· you don’t know your position in fact you don’t know anything about football.
· You thought to were coming to play a game of touch football, but its full contact and the team hits like Tampa Bays Defense
Listen the devil doesn’t care how new you are to all of this, you are dealing with the great psychopath that has ever lived, a ravenous murderer who doesn’t care about playing fair
He only comes to kill, steal, and destroy
SPIRITUAL GROWTH: Generosity and Warefare
Today and I am going to hone in on two aspects of Spiritual Growth and the first one most people never make the connection of giving with their spiritual maturity
· When I get back we are going to war as a church
· For the first time I am going completely full time
· I have two men of God that will be coming to preach the next two Sundays, and don’t use the cop out that because I am not here there is no point of coming. First you need the fellowship, two these men are filled with God’s Spirit and will have a word for you
This
1. Make the connection between giving and spiritual growth
Intro into giving:
A son was used to giving his father exotic presents over Christmas. He was well to do, so he could pretty much buy anything for his Dad that he wanted, and he liked getting things out of the ordinary. One year he brought in an antique car, another year hand-gliding equipment, he loved to get him out of the ordinary kind of gifts. On this particular Christmas he found something that was very unique. It was a talking bird that could speak five languages, and could sing the ‘Yellow Rose of Texas’, standing on one foot. So it was most definitely a unique bird. So unique was it that it cost ten thousand dollars to buy this bird for his father. But knowing his father was worth every bit of it he purchased this bird, and then gave it to his Dad for Christmas, had it sent to him.
About a week went by; he wanted to know, of course, whether his father enjoyed this unique gift this particular Christmas. So he went over to his father’s house, knocked on the door, and said, “Dad, did you get my present?” He said, “I sure did.” “How’d you like it?” His father said, “It was delicious!” Daddy missed the point. Daddy didn’t fully understand what he had in his hands. Daddy was treating as ordinary something that was special.
You see the Bible says that giving is a catalyst to your Spiritual growth and most people never understand “the why?”
· In the Bible this subject, the subject of giving, money in general, giving in particular, is portrayed as the single biggest indicator of your spiritual temperature. Like none, like no other area, in fact,
· when Jesus during the Gospels wanted to talk about your spiritual life, He would always go to money to bring up your spiritual life.
· The question is what’s the correlation, because it’s obvious many of us haven’t made it,
LAWS OF THE HARVEST
2 Corinthians 9:6–7 ESV
6 The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
Universal Law of Sowing and Reaping
So Verse 6 Paul says that there is a universal law at work: It is the law of sowing and reaping. We see it throughout all of creation.
· All of life comes from a seed.
· Rather it is a little baby- they came from a seed, or a forest full of trees and even weeds and thorns or a beautiful orchard, they all came from seeds and they all had to be planted. We see the law of sowing and reaping
· What Paul is saying the same law applies when it comes to giving, but the most is not about giving but about Growing. Here in a second, we will see how the giving is connected to our growth, our Spiritual growth- He wants his people to be generous people.
Laws of the Harvest-
1. Your Harvest depends on whether you sow
2. Your Harvest depends on what you sow
3. Your Harvest will always be more than what you sow. You plant a pear tree you get back more than you sow, and you get back more seeds to sow Luke 6:38 says the thing you give will be given back to you, “Pressed down and shaken together”
Law 1. Your Harvest depends on whether you sow and how much you sow
2 Corinthians 9:6 ESV
6 The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
No farmer ever has expected a crop and not planted seed! No sane one anyways.
· Now listen it doesn’t matter how many bible studies the farmer goes too, it doesn’t matter how many prayers he prays. Doesn’t matter how much witnessing he does if he doesn’t plant the seed, he is not going to get a harvest.
· And if he only plants one acre on a ten acre farm he shouldn’t expect it to spread onto the other nine.
· Unless he plants weeds, they will spread.
· If you sow sparingly you will reap sparingly, but if you sow bountifully you will reap bountifully
· Now when a farmer plants seed He is excercising faith. Because without sunlight and water even what he plants wont yield a crop.
· Now He is practicing faith in nature, if nature doesn’t cooperate, planting is a waste of time.
· Only we don’t trust nature we trust God. How you give tells me what you think about God, whether you trust him
· That’s why we tell you when we take up our tithes and offerings that this is an act of worship.
· You see when you give you are saying to God: God I know that I can get more done with 90% with you then I can do with 100% by myself
2. Your Harvest depends on what you sow
You get back what you sow. You are not going to plant apple seeds and get back a pear tree.
· IF you plant bad seeds, you plant weeds your not going to get back a fruit tree, you are going to get weeds that will choke out every thing else in your life
· Some people inside the church think that it’s a good idea to sow discord in a church. Let me tell you that person will get back what they plant. God will bring a curse upon their home and given them over to their ways
· Listen some people need friends in their life. They act like they are all cool with being a loner and acting all distanced, but deep down they want true companionship true friendship.
· Are you showing yourself a friend
· People need love, are you loving on people
· Are you dog broke and without a job, you get back what you plant
3. Your Harvest will always be more than what you sow
· When a farmer plants an apple seed, he gets back a tree that will be full of apples.
· If you sow a watermelon seed, you will get back a watermore watermelons full of watermelon seeds
Luke 6:38 ESV
· 38 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.”
Now don’t misunderstand the message today. I am not trying to squezze a few more bucks out of you. No I want you to be blessed!!
Why give? Because God is a Giver
The end of verse 7 says that God loves a cheerful giver
2 Corinthians 9:8–9 ESV
8 And 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. 9 As it is written, “He has distributed freely, he has given to the poor; his righteousness endures forever.”
God is a giver.
· John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave His son
· God gave is the gift of giving to work selfishness out. Don’t think that God needs anything from us. He gave us the gift of giving, of sowing to work selfishness and laziness out of us
· Giving is part of the nature of God.
· And we are partakers of his divine nature, that is that the orginal plan of what Adam and Eve was suppose to be, Jesus through the Cross has reversed the curse upon on and is re creating the image of God
Giving is directly correlated with our spiritual Growth
2 Corinthians 9:10–11 ESV
10 He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. 11 You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.
A lot of us are living under a curse, and that’s why we can’t enjoy it.
· Making more, if your financial life is going up, and your spiritual life is going down, you’re under a curse.
· God says this is a matter of honoring me, and this is a spiritual matter. Now, let me tell you the ultimate blessing.
· Here I love verse 11, he says, “ ‘I will rebuke the devourer, so that it may not destroy the fruits of the ground, nor will your vine in the field cast its grapes,’ saith the Lord of hosts.” This is, I could go somewhere with this, He says let me tell you the blessing, the blessing is I am a tell you, tell the devourer to leave you alone.
· And God says in verse 10 The he will supply seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest… Here it is… “of your righteousness…. You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way
· God is say that the power of evil and greed will broke in your life and what will replace it is a harvest of righteousness.
· God says that when you as a child of God begin to practice this thing of generousity, you will not only show yourself to be a child of God to others, but your heart will begin to flourish as well. All of a sudden the fountain of life will begin to bubble up inside of you leading to eternal life
· He says that you will be enriched in every way… Meaning that God who is the reward here, will begin to show great and precious things
Everybody say this with me: Giving is connected to my spiritual growth.. it will lead to a heart of thanksgiving
Oh Paul is just wanting our money, that’s what greedy people will usually say. But He says that their giving is a catalyst to their ministry….. Pulling down of strongholds
2 Corinthians 10:3–5 ESV
3 For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. 4 For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 5 We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,
· Chapter 10 is connected to the end of Chapter 9… those chapters were put there by man
· Listen we are going to war, and I am tired of acting like we can do it without the proper resources
· We are not walking in the flesh here, we are waging war against the powers of darkness. We are wanting to ecpand the ministry in ever highway and by way in the city and rescue those that are being held captive by Satan.
· We have the power to pull down every spiritual stronghold in peoples lives.
· We have the power to restore marriages