October 31, 2021: "Stewardship: Give All You Can"

Proverbs 11:25

Generous persons will prosper;

those who refresh others will

themselves be refreshed.

Luke 19:1-10

He entered Jericho and was passing through it.2A man was there named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax-collector and was rich.3He was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd he could not, because he was short in stature. 4So he ran ahead and climbed a sycomore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. 5When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, ‘Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.’ 6So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him. 7All who saw it began to grumble and said, ‘He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.’ 8Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, ‘Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.’ 9Then Jesus said to him, ‘Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham.10For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.’

Today we are prepared to hear Wesley's final instruction in relation to managing our money. Having first gained all we can, and secondly having saved all we can, then we come to the place where we are ready to “give all we can.”

A BIG CHANGE FOR A LITTLE MAN

This brings us to our first witness. It's a story that every child in Sunday school can tell or sing.

Zacchaeus (described in Luke 19:1-10) was a little man with a big bank account. He was very wealthy. As chief tax collector, he profited from a corrupt economic system in which he collected more taxes to feed the voracious economic appetite of the Roman Empire from which he could extract a generous percentage for himself. As a result, he was despised, rejected by his own people, and unwelcome in the synagogue.

Have you ever wondered why Zacchaeus climbed up into that sycamore tree to get a look at Jesus? How had he even heard of Jesus? Luke may have given us a clue earlier in his Gospel, when, in the fifth chapter, another tax collector named Levi, a.k.a. Matthew, threw a dinner party to introduce Jesus to “a large number of tax collectors” (Luke 5:29). I like to imagine that Zacchaeus was in that disreputable crowd.

If Zacchaeus was indeed at the dinner table with Jesus, he may have experienced something he never had known before. He would have felt accepted by Jesus and loved by God. He could have glimpsed a life that was about more than grabbing all the money he could get. He may have realized that all his wealth could never buy the life he most deeply desired. Perhaps he became convinced there was a higher calling for the way he used his money.

When Zacchaeus heard that Jesus was coming through Jericho on his way to Jerusalem, he may also have heard the prediction that when Jesus entered the city he would be rejected and put to death (Luke 18:31-33). If that were true, then this might be Zacchaeus' only chance to see Jesus again.

So there he was, willing to sacrifice his pride and dignity by hanging on for dear life in the branches of that sycamore tree. He must have looked downright foolish! I suspect he nearly fell off the limb when Jesus called him by name: “Zacchaeus, get down here! I'm going to your house today!” (Luke 19:5).

It's probably an understatement when Luke says that Zacchaeus was “happy to welcome Jesus.” But it would be no understatement for Luke to record that everyone else “grumbled” at the idea of Jesus hanging out with an obvious sinner like Zacchaeus (19:6-7).

In response to the unexpected, undeserved, unearned grace of God in Jesus Christ, Zacchaeus blurted out, “Wow! The only way I know to say “Thanks” is to give half my wealth to the poor and pay back the folks I've cheated four times over!” Jesus said, “Now, that's what salvation looks like! Let's party!” (Luke 19:8-10). The principle of giving away half of your wealth has become mainstream in recent years. Many major philanthropists including the Gates and Warren Buffet have pledged to give away half of their wealth. For them it’s just numbers in a bank account. For many others, it may be the difference between life and death. I have pondered what it might be like to have wealth of that sort, simply because I would want to form a foundation of my own whose sole purpose would be to win souls to Jesus. Wealth for the sake of wealth might lead to misery. But, wealth for the sake of Jesus, given away to fuel causes that bring souls to Christ would seem to be a worthwhile endeavor indeed!

Erin once said in regards to the need to bless others, “There’s no luggage rack on top of the hearse!” Maybe Zacchaeus came to this conclusion as well. We can’t take them with us, so how we respond in the here and now is so very important.

Little Zacchaeus discovered that there is more to life than earning and saving. Zacchaeus came to experience salvation in Jesus Christ called him to give all he could. “Giving all you can” wisely can mean that you may be blessed with more to give!

Zacchaeus' witness underscores the deep reality that salvation is not merely a spiritual experience that prepares us for life after death. Salvation is the way God transforms every area of life so that we become a part of God's saving work in this world. Salvation changes our hearts by changing the fundamental orientation of our living, including the way we use our money. It sets us free from bondage to narrow self-interest and opens our lives to the way the Spirit of God can be at work through us in the lives of others.

Salvation is, of course, about a lot more than money, but it is never about anything less than money, particularly in a culture that is compulsively driven by the power of money, a culture in which money has such awesome power as a blessing or curse, as a gracious gift we manage for God's sake, or as a demonic tyrant that manages us for its own sake.

Martin Luther, the sixteenth-century reformer, said that three conversions are necessary in the Christian life: conversion of the heart, of the mind, and of the purse. The fact that Luther put the purse last on the list may suggest that he realized just how slow we are to allow that particular type of conversion to happen, or, like Wesley, he may have seen the movement toward generosity as a later development in our journey to salvation, just as it was for Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus did not earn salvation by giving. His newfound generosity was his response to the extravagant generosity of God. But salvation never would have become a reality for Zacchaeus without his movement from a life that was consumed with earning and saving into a life that was energized by giving.

THE WIDOW'S MITE

Our second witness has almost nothing in common with Zacchaeus. We’ve spoken of her in a previous sermon. She is a woman, she is a widow, she is poor, and she is nameless. Both Mark and Luke tell her story (Mark 12:41-44; Luke 21:1-4), but neither mentions her name.

It seems that Jesus was doing some serious people-watching in the Temple. Mark says that Jesus, as he watched, observed the way people gave their offerings. (On a side note, this raises the disturbing question of how much we would put in the offering plate if we knew Jesus was watching us . . . which, of course, he is!) Thirteen large, metal, trumpet-shaped containers lined the wall of the Temple courtyard. Because there was no paper money, we can imagine that when the rich dropped a large gift into the container, you could hear it clanging all the way to the bottom.

Jesus watched “and heard” the way the wealthy gave their gifts, “throwing in lots of money” (Mark 12:41). Then he noticed an anonymous widow who dropped two tiny coins into the offering. The original text says the coins were lepta, the smallest Greek coins of the day, which were so small that you couldn't hear a sound when they hit the bottom of the container. The translators of the King James Version figured the equivalent in seventeenth-century English currency and wrote that she gave “two mites” (Luke 21:2 KJV), thereby carving into church history the story of “the widow's mite.”

Jesus told his disciples, “I assure you that this poor widow has put in more than everyone who's been putting money in the treasury. All of them are giving out of their spare change. But she from her hopeless poverty has given everything she had, even what she needed to live on” (Mark 12:43-44).

Clearly, Jesus had a different way of counting the offering that day. He counted it

based not on its size but on its impact on the giver;

based not on the difference it made in the Temple treasury but on the difference it made in the giver's life;

based not on how much people gave but on how much they had left over afterward

based not on other offerings but on the capacity of the giver.

A FARTHER END

“Give All You Can” is not just about money. While it involves money and being faithful to Knowing Jesus and Sharing Jesus, it involves much, much more. Like Zaccheus, we come down out of the tree and we make a commitment to follow Jesus. Like the Widow, we may realize today that we don’t feel like we have much, but we are willing to give all that we have.

Jesus challenged Zaccheus to give 50% of his wealth to furthering the Kingdom. Do you remember the rich, young ruler? Jesus told him to give it all away. You and I have it easy by comparison.

I still remember the day when Erin said to me that giving to God’s Kingdom was not optional. I said to her that it was a lot of money, to which she said, “Okay preacher!” This upcoming year, I will tithe $750 a month to White Bluff, tithing on my salary. I tell you this not to boast, but to say to you that I will not ask you to do something that I am not first willing to do myself. Malachi 3:10 says, “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.” We did put God to the test, and time and again He has been faithful to provide for us. It may not have been in our time or way, but He continues to bless our entire family far beyond what we deserve. God is good.

Maybe you are saying today, “I cannot give the tithe.” If that is your response, we invite you to step up to the plate as you are able. In most churches, 20 percent of the givers give 80% of the budget. Imagine exponentially how much more we could accomplish for God’s Kingdom if 80% of the givers stepped up their giving another $100 a month! We invite you step up towards tithing. If you are a tither, consider giving beyond the tithe, which by definition is an offering.

Today I encourage you to take one step up and I say thank you to all who give to the Kingdom.

I have filled out my giving card. I am placing it in the plate. During the closing hymn, I invite you to do the same. This is a first chance to put it in. If you need more time to prayerfully consider your gift, please do so. We hope to pledges over the next couple of weeks to help determine the 2022 balanced budget. And, if you do not turn it in until later, we are always open to receiving your pledge and gifts.

Remember, your gift is given to God for the furthering of His Kingdom here on this earth. I commit as your Pastor to making sure that your gift is used for making disciples. Join me in that cause as we seek to continually increase the Kingdom of God here on this earth in 2022 and beyond!

SALVATION POEM