Dr. Ron Sumners
February 1, 2009
Today, I am going to talk about God’s economic plan. I am not going to talk about the world’s economic plan; you hear about that every day. Maybe I should say the world’s “lack of a plan.” You hear about the stock market and its ups and downs. My friend Crawford Taylor, a financial advisor with Merrell Lynch, told me years ago, “There is no security in securities.” We have seen the failure of major banks and Savings and Loan institutions in the past year. I don’t want to talk about your economic plan either.
I would like to talk about God’s economic plan. Listen to what the Word of God says in 1Timothy 6: 17-19. “Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put hope in their wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.”
One of the great mistakes that we make when we talk about money in the church is that we often do it in the context of a special appeal or in a crisis situation. If I stand up and tell you that there are thousands of starving people in the world and we are going to take a special offering for that purpose; you will give sacrificially to help. You have responded in a great way to my challenge of two years ago to give extra to pay off our mortgage early.
The result of this is that people have been conditioned to think that the only time they need to give is for a special appeal. Some appeals are more heart-moving than others. What would happen if I presented an appeal that we should give so we can pay the power bill. That’s not very exciting and it would be met with apathy.
A few years ago, many Christians were challenged to give for hotels, motels and a Christian amusement park. So, they gave sacrificially, only to find out that most of the money was put into the pockets of the ones who appealed for the gifts. We have heard of this over and again; people using the name of Jesus to defraud and get money for false or non-existent purposes.
We become angry with these abuses. The problem actually begins with us, with people who don’t recognize that the teaching of Scripture is not to give to special need but to give to God! And when that is done properly and scripturally, the problems that we have will be avoided. If we all gave as God commands, there would be little appeal for special giving! That system is housed in the local congregation, the church. It is a system of checks and balances within the body of the church to make sure that the funds are not misused. My salary is set by the church. I do not get a percentage of the offering! We have a committee that works very well to make sure that this church is a good steward of all you invest in God’s ministry. I want to share with you six points about how God wants us to look at His system and how that affects us.
1. GOD OWNS ALL THE WEALTH IN THE WORLD.
Psalm 24:1-2 says, “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell therein.”
If you go to the Shelby County Court House and look through the deeds of property, you will find that at 709 Meadow Ridge Court, there is a deed to a piece of property that has my name on it as well as my father-in-law. It states that we are the owners of that property. But don’t believe it. Hopefully one day I will own it, but I don’t yet. I will own it when I am seventy-nine years old; if the Lord allows me to live that long and I can keep making the payments to the mortgage company.
Will the house really be mine when I am 79? It is God’s house that He has provided for me as I do ministry for Him. He lets me breathe His air – for free! He lets me drink His water. His water is free but the Birmingham Water Works board takes a substantial amount for delivering His free water.
God doesn’t send you a bill that says, “You breathed 25 cubic yards of air this month so you owe X dollars.” God never sends an overdue notice.
The point is that none of us could live for a second if God did not share His wealth with us. In actuality, all that we finally have on this earth is a 3’ by 6’ hole in the ground. And we will not have it; it will have us! God owns everything!
2. GOD INTENDS FOR HIS WEALTH TO BE CIRCULATED.
This is a teaching in scripture that seems very hard for us to understand. But the teaching is clear! Even though God is all-powerful, and even though God owns everything, God cannot spend silver and gold unless we give it back to Him. He gives it to us to use in ministry. If we hoard it; He cannot use it. God wants us to give it back so He can bless it and multiply it and use it over and over again. He says, “Trust me; I’ll take care of you. Don’t worry about the food that you are going to eat. Just trust me to provide your needs.”
3. WE ARE ALL STEWARDS OF GOD’S WEALTH.
God provides it to us and says, “Here you are, you are my steward.” We are all stewards of what God has given to us. By “steward” I simply mean that I am a caretaker. I take care of the things that God gives me to use while I make my journey through the world.
Here is where I do have a choice. I can either be a good steward or a bad steward! Jesus said, “You shall be my witnesses,” As with our stewardship, you can be a good witness or a bad witness.
If I am a bad steward, I will hoard what God has given me. I keep it to myself and become selfish. I begin to think of the things I have as “mine.” We worked for it, we saved for it therefore we can do anything with it that we desire!
There are a couple of pertinent warnings in scripture. Ecclesiastes 5:13 says, “I have seen a grievous evil under the sun: wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner….”
Romans 14: 11-12 says, ‘“As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.’” So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God. We are like the people in the parable of the talents. God gives them something to use for a while, and then he comes back like the master in the parable and says, “What have you done with what I gave you to use during your time on earth.”
The Day of Judgment will be a day of accounting.
4. I CAN APPROPRIATE GOD’S WEALTH BY GIVING.
Luke 6:38 tells us, “Give and it will be given unto you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
There are three parts to that verse. 1) God says “Give.” God has the right to issue that command because it is all His anyway. 2) There is a promise. God says that when we give He will give back to us. That is the whole idea of circulation. 3) There is this principle: With the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Jesus is saying that with the same scoop you use, God will use that same scoop to give back to you.
Paul said it this way, “What you sow is exactly what you reap. If you sow bountifully, you will reap bountifully.”
If I am not receiving from God, what is the problem? Either God is not keeping His promise, which is never true, or I have a giving problem, and that may be very true!
5) I MUST ACT MORE FROM FAITH THAN REASON.
The amount of my gift to God will be determined more by faith than reason. If you already spend as much as you make, the idea of giving 10% to the church is not reasonable. In worldly terms, the thought of giving away something that you see as essential for yourself, is foolishness.
When you read through scripture, you will find that most of the people who are singled put for giving to God would have never have given the gifts if they had made their decision based on reason!
The little boy would have never given his lunch to Jesus if he had been acting on reason. He would have said, “If I give this lunch away, there won’t be anything for me to eat.” But since he acted on faith he gave it and the lunch fed not only him but everybody else too. The multitude was fed because a little boy acted on faith.
If the Christians in Macedonia who are mentioned in 2 Corinthians 8, had acted only from reason they would never have given to help the poor Christians in Jerusalem. Paul says that they gave out of their poverty. If they had sat down and carefully calculated how much they could afford to give, they wouldn’t have given anything. But because they acted on faith, they were able to give generously.
You see, if you work strictly from reason, you add up your income and subtract your expenses. And whatever is left over after you have given to yourself, you give to God. Usually this is very little or nothing at all!
If you act from faith, it changes your whole perspective. If you act by faith, you manage and control yourself so you give first to God. You will probably have to change your priorities to do that. When you act by faith, you will find joy in doing that.
God knows what you need. I don’t know the need. In fact, I am leery of people telling me that they have received a revelation from God and we must give to their cause or something drastic will happen in our lives. I had a man in my church in Montgomery who had an interesting philosophy about tithing. He said, “God will get it from you one way or another!” He meant that if you don’t tithe; God will orchestrate your car to break down or your air conditioner to go out. The money will go out from you one way or the other. I can’t completely agree. That philosophy makes God a God of retaliation. God, sounds a lot more like me than He does God in that scenario.
Secondly, God knows how much of the need He wants to meet through me. So, in faith, I determine that I am going to give to the overall ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ and I pray that God will direct me as to the amount. Remember 10% is the starting place.
6. GOD LOVES A CHEERFUL GIVER.
In 2 Corinthians 8, Paul is talking about giving. He says, “Don’t give begrudgingly. Don’t give with a scowl on your face. Don’t give to God saying, ‘I didn’t really want to, but I have an obligation!’” Paul says that we give with joy in our hearts. We should feel blessed that God has given us the resources to give to the advancement of the Kingdom.
A story appeared a few years ago in the Dallas Morning News. It was the story of a 14-year-old girl named Donna Ashlock. Donna lived in Patterson, California. She was a bright girl, very popular in school, athletic in nature, with a charming personality. But there was one thing wrong with Donna Ashlock. She had a very diseased heart. And the doctors decided that a heart transplant was the only thing that could save her life. And if there was no transplant she would surely die.
The story gets more involved. There was a 15-year-old boy named Felipe Garza who fell head over heels in love with Donna. He loved the way she looked. He loved the way she talked. For a long time, he just mooned and swooned every time she walked by. But eventually he caught her eye and they became friends. Then one day he heard that she might die, and he told his parents that if he could, he would take his heart out and give it to Donna
The story goes on. One day Felipe Garza, the picture of health, had a blood vessel rupture in his brain, leaving the brain dead, but all his organs healthy. In their grief, the parents decided to donate Felipe’s organs.
Among the organs that were donated was his heart and now it beats inside the body of Donna Ashlock. His parents said, “I know he wanted to do this. The way we look at it, he gave his heart to her twice and both times he really meant it.”
The Bible says that there is no greater love than to lay down your life for another. That is what Jesus has done for us. Our God is a giving God. He has given more than we can ever repay. But once you know Him…you will try!
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