No Hint of "Ouch"
Deuteronomy 14:22-15:11
NO HINT OF “OUCH”
You’ll not likely find many who happily lay out funds in payment of taxes. We drop our payments into the mail with a great sense of resignation and pain. “Ouch!” is the most likely word we use.
On the other hand, how would we respond to making a payment on something that we really enjoy? Let’s say it’s a meal out with your spouse or a special friend. The price tag may be a little high but you pay the price rather happily. It’s your anniversary! There’s no sense of “Ouch” when you pay the tab.
So what’s the difference besides the size of the payments? It’s all in the attitude of the payer. The perspective of the mind and heart makes all of the difference with the actual cost in terms of dollars paid only being a small part of the experience.
The Scriptures’ view of stewardship is seen in the same way. It’s in the attitude of the heart that we are or are not good stewards of God’s world and of the blessings that he gives us. It’s finally about the spirit and not about the amount. It comes down to a sense of “Ouch!” or an expression of joyful “Thank You!
While the book of Deuteronomy is not often the first choice for reading devotionally, I suggest to you that the passage we have today serves to bring to a close our series on the teachings of God about Christian stewardship. In the end Paul’s words summarize it well: … God loves a cheerful giver.
It’s about worship
Let me set the stage. Deuteronomy is known best, I suppose, for the Ten Commandments, given in chapter 5. After that much of the book registers as a blank with us. But it’s actually the message of Moses to the people God loved as they were about to enter the Promised Land. Deuteronomy was the final sermon, if you will, of Moses who was not permitted to enter the land.
Deuteronomy speaks to us about God, the God of the covenant. That means that the Creator of all had announced and lived out the covenant of grace. And “grace” is the second key theme of the book as Moses reminds the people that God has chosen them though there was no special quality about that small nation among the many others.
In chapters 1-11 Moses gives us a recap of God’s covenant and his desire to love the people and to have his people love him and each other at the same time.
From chapters 12-26, the heart of the book or sermon God speaks to Moses about the social and ethical dimensions of that covenant. And as we narrow our focus a bit more, we see chapters 12-14 and a strong call for honoring and worship our faithful and wonderfully gracious Lord.
The message of Moses to the people was about the incredible generosity of God. God had chosen them and had rescued them from the chains of slavery in Egypt. God had been very patient with them in their times of rebellion though he punished them for their rebellion. In light of that generosity, God’s people are called to obedience. Put another way, the way to acknowledge God’s generosity was and is to be obedient. That obedience, though not a heavy-handed demand from God, was God’s way of providing a means and a way to respond to his generosity and his grace.
Chapters 12 and 13 speak a great deal about our worship of our generous and gracious God. Chapter 14 opens with ways to honor God in our daily conduct and the passage most in our focus today is all about our giving, our generous giving. You see, stewardship has been and is and always will be about our relationship above to our generous God.
The layout of these three chapters makes our relationship to God of first importance. The laws concerning food in the early verses of this chapter speak to the proper care of the people, both physically and spiritually. Then the verses move into our relationship with others. That’s where we come to God’s message that giving is a part of worship. To say it better, giving is and must be an act of worship.
In verse 22 we find the term “tithe”. The reference is clearly the tenth, but the tenth of what? Be sure to set aside a tenth of all that your fields produce each year. Eat the tithe of your grain, new wine and oil, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks in the presence of the Lord your God at the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name.
The people were going to be keepers of the land, farmers. We’re not farmers, so how must we understand what God says to us today. The answer lies in the recognition of God’s hand in the blessings that we receive. With no thought to the amount in our bank accounts we worship the faithful God who has given us every penny in those accounts.
When we see that God owns every minute and every penny and every person, the implications are enormous. The Lord over all time wants us his people at worship with God’s people. Be very careful how you look at the time you spend in worship or how you make decisions about missing worship. This is no matter of thinking God won’t miss the hour I skip today.
Since we belong to the Lord, be very careful how you use the gifts he has given you. Be guided by him into the areas of service that most use those talents and most bring to the Lord glory due him. Be careful about any laziness or disobedience.
Make your gifts and offerings to God show your devotion to the Giver. Be careful on decisions on saving and spending. Start with the 10-10-80 guide: 10% to offerings, 10% to savings, and 80% to living expenses. Be guided by God’s Spirit in your decisions every step of the way.
It’s all about worship. The passage, however, gives us two more helpful lessons.
It’s about celebration
Notice that the people are called to set aside the tenth or the tithe. While there are some provisions for the conversion of the foodstuff and produce into cash to give, the call is to use that tithe in the context of a celebration together of a meal together.
The point above all is the celebration. Yes, a meal is featured but that’s how the food grown and set aside as a tithe was to be used. The food grown and given was given to those who led in the worship of the synagogues, the Levites and priests.
The celebration is a celebration of what the Lord has given. Look at verse 24. …you have been blessed by the Lord your God… This was an opportunity to acknowledge before others that God had helped them with their work, as you see mentioned in verse 29.
Verse 26 reads, … then you and your household shall eat there in the presence of the Lord your God and rejoice. Together the people could recall the Lord’s abundant blessing.
The principle involved here is that the blessings from the hand of God are meant to be shared and shared generously. The chapter opens with a call for God’s people to be holy because the Lord their God was holy. Now the chapter ends with the fact that the Lord is generous, therefore his people must also be generous.
We celebrate and the thought of cost comes second because our focus in on celebration. We make extra efforts to make the celebration special and of course we can’t celebrate alone; we need people. Birthday parties alone, just by yourself, can be real “downers” but when shared with others, then we experience joy.
At the end of chapter 14 and as we move into chapter 15, it’s very clear that the celebration meal is to include not just the family but a much broader group of people, especially the foreigners, the orphans, widows, those who society normally didn’t think too much about.
We love our carry-in meals and as a matter of fact they are a needed part of the life in this church. It’s much, much more than about calories. It’s about fellowship and celebration of God’s goodness to us. To miss out on that is to miss out on precisely what the Bible is pointing to as a joyful part of our worship before God and with each other. Think about it and plan to be present. When you miss the meal, the celebration by others is diminished and you too miss the chance to joyfully be a part of others.
This translates into a generous giving of many kinds. As we’ve seen, the Bible speaks little about the 10%. That remains as a good starting point. God’s desire for our celebration of his blessings to us is that our giving of blessings be extended to others even as we enjoy them too. This is all to be done without a feeling of “ouch!” It can be and must be a visible way to say, “Thank you, Lord.
Isn’t it remarkable that one of means of grace God gives to us is a meal, the Lord’s Supper? God desires to be with us even as he feeds us. His gift to us is his own Son who came to this world to be our Savior and Lord.
It’s about love and obedience
We’ve see how these teachings and commandments are not just some ancient code to follow but God’s way of teaching us. We are reminded along with every other follower of Jesus Christ of the Lord’s providential care and faithfulness. No matter our particular circumstances, we are dependent on him.
God’s call is to love him and to love our neighbor and he expects our obedience in that. He’s not some grumpy accountant checking up on our percentages. Yes, he’s not pleased when we hang on to his blessings for ourselves. He is our God who sees our hearts and is honored when we, with hearts brimming with thanksgiving, say to him, “Take my silver and my gold… Take my heart; it is your own…” That is what the principles of Christian stewardship are all about. We are to give generously and together you with the Lord and with the encouragement of the people of the Lord decide what you will bring.
The offering plate becomes a table of sorts. The gifts go to ministry to others. The tithes are for our blessing and for all the blessing of all others who come under the ministry of the word here in this church and in this community.
God promises the well-being of his people even while he anticipates the needs of the poor and the oppressed. The Bible is frankly realistic; it doesn’t give you in return for faithful stewardship a bonus or a guarantee of financial success. Within the covenant God graciously includes many, many people: male and female, rich and poor, all races and languages. When his call is heard and obeyed, then in love and obedience the gifts flow generously, the service to others given willingly, and the celebration experienced as God’s blessings are enjoyed and shared. That pleases and honors our Lord. That is our worship, as Paul says in Romans 12:1.
In this we hear what we also hear at the Lord’s table. “The gifts of God for the people of God.”