Transcription
Before we begin this session, don't forget to take advantage of the free resources available at practicingtheway.org.
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Welcome back to the generosity practice. You've officially crossed the halfway mark. Now, I personally find Jesus's teachings on money and generosity both compelling and challenging. I've been unpacking my family story and life experiences around money with my therapist, and it's been revealing. See, although I know that God is generous and I know that God provides, I've still been formed into a person who isn't always quick to be generous. But what's begun to reform me in my journey hasn't been just new thoughts about myself or God or money or generosity, but little new practices. It's been having a generosity fund in our budget and the little moments of quickly sending money or buying that meal or seeing others' needs as my opportunity to become like Jesus. So if you want this practice to transform you into a more generous person, someone who is increasingly free of the love of money or fears around money, then you need to do more than just hear teachings about generosity. You need to practice generosity. That's why we've designed this practice around a four-step process where we learn and then we practice, reflect and then process it all in community. To that end, circle up in your Triads, same-gender groups of three or four people, and process last week's practice of identifying something you own but don't need and giving it away. Here are a few questions: First, what did your practice of generosity look like this week? Second, what does it look like to invite God into your current framework of generosity? How has he led you or invited you to be generous in a new way? Third, where have you noticed the influence of greed in your own life this week? What might you need to confess to God or others in light of that? Fourth, when it comes to simplicity and generosity, what internal or external obstacles are you facing? Turn to your Triad and discuss.
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For many years, I've been a part of a small group of pastors that get together every spring. This annual retreat has become a key part of my formation. And early on, a wealthy Jesus business person found out about our little group. His family owned a beautiful vacation home on the California coast near Big Sur, right on the water, whales out the back door. The owner let our group use it for years until he passed away and his family sold the house. All those years, there was a woman who was the caretaker of the property. She was a lovely, godly woman. Her job was to keep this valuable resource in impeccable condition, to make sure it was ready for when the owner would come to visit and that it was put to good use while he was away. And she had the best life. She lived in a cottage at the top of the property, the Pacific Ocean spread out in front of her. She got to enjoy this home that I could only dream of living in. She lived there, but she wasn't the owner. She was the caretaker. The problem is, when most of us think about our relationship to our home or our stuff or our money, we don't think of ourselves as the caretaker. We believe it's all ours. But that is actually not the view of Jesus. We are working through four themes from Jesus' teachings on money and generosity, which we summarize as: One, there's more joy in giving than receiving. Two, watch out for greed. Three, all we have belongs to God. And four, be generous to the poor. Next up on the docket for session three is, "All we have belongs to God." As I said before, scholars argue upwards of 25% of Jesus' teachings have to do with money and generosity, and almost half of Jesus' parables have to do with how his disciples are to steward their resources. Let's look at just one. Turn in your Bibles to Luke 12. In context, we are about to read from one of Jesus' longest teachings on money and generosity. In the middle is his famous line, "Sell your possessions and give to the poor." But he bookends this teaching with two parables. The first one we'll look at in the next session. It's called the parable of the rich fool, and it's about a man who builds bigger barns. The last one is called the parable of the faithful servant. The two parables are a compare and contrast. The first is a negative story about a rich man who was evil and hoarding all his wealth. The second is a positive story about the servant of a rich man who is good. Let's read it.
"Verse 35: Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning like servants waiting for their Master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks, they can immediately open the door for him. It will be good for those servants whose Master finds them watching when he comes."
Here, disciples of Jesus are to be like the servant of a wealthy aristocrat, but there's a twist.
"Verse 37: Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table, and will come and wait on them."
This is the upside-down kingdom of Jesus. The master takes the role of the servant. And this is Jesus' vision of God. God is like a rich, generous master who takes the place of a servant to his servants. Jesus goes on.
"Verse 42: The Lord answered, 'Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns.'"
Truly, I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. Meaning, if he does a good job stewarding the Master's house, the master will give him even more resources to steward.
"Verse 45: Suppose the servant says to himself, 'My Master's taking a long time in coming,' and he then begins to beat the other servants, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk. He begins to waste the Master's resources and treat terribly the people under his care. The Master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him in pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers.'"
Then here is the summary line.
"Verse 48: From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded. And from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked."
The radical idea Jesus is laying out here in Luke 12 has come to be called stewardship. You can define it as the active and responsible management of God's creation for God's purposes. And this idea was just as radical in Jesus' day as it is in ours. There are three basic components to the biblical theology of stewardship. The first is that God owns it all. In Jesus' day, there were two basic views of wealth. The first was non-ownership. You see this in Greek philosophy, for example. If you read Plato's Republic in school, in his mythical utopian society, the rulers own nothing. All resources belong to the society as a whole. The other basic view is ownership. This was the Roman view. You had absolute authority over your property. If you had a barn, you could burn it down with impunity. It's your barn. This is the majority view of the modern West. But the Judeo-Christian view that comes to us through Jesus and the library of scripture is a radical third way: not of ownership or non-ownership, but of stewardship, or we're caretaking. God is the owner, we are the caretaker. In the first story of the Bible, God creates the heavens and the Earth. That's a Hebrew way of saying everything. The universe is his creation. Then he creates a garden, and he literally breathes air into Adam's lungs. Life itself is a gift. And then he puts Adam and Eve in the garden to quote, "work it and take care of it." There's that language, caretaking. And this theme of caring for God's creation runs all the way through the Bible. Leviticus 25: "The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you reside in my land as foreigners and strangers." Deuteronomy 10: "To the Lord your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the Earth and everything in it." Psalm 50: "For every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. The world is mine and all that is in it." The idea all the way through the library of scripture, up to Jesus here in Luke 12, is that God owns it all. We buy and sell and farm and build and invest, sure, but we are the caretaker, not the owner of the house.
The second component to this is we are entrusted by God with his resources to do good. God owns it all, but he entrusts it to you and me to steward. Many of us live under the false assumption that whatever money we receive from our work or an inheritance or the lottery is ours to consume and spend however we want. Many of us live at or above the line of our income level, maxed out with no margin to share, or even worse, in debt, rather than under the line with breathing room to practice generosity and live at peace. We don't realize that not all our money is for us. Some of it is for us to live, to provide for our families, to put a roof over our head and food on the table, and more, to enjoy our life before God. There's that great line in Timothy about how God richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. God isn't a stingy investor, but a generous father who wants to bless you. But it's not all to spend on yourself. Some of our money is to give away to the poor and the needy, to the church and the gospel. And some of it is to build for the future, for whatever it is that God has put in our heart for our family or business or kingdom dream. And we are entrusted by God with his resources to channel every dollar to the right place. We are stewards.
Which leads us to the final component of a biblical theology of stewardship: God blesses us not just to have more, but to give more. You see this idea in all of Jesus' parables on stewardship, that those who steward the Master's resources well are given more resources to steward. No one does a better job of working this principle out than Paul in his second letter to the church in Corinth, chapters 8 and 9. It's one of the hallmark passages on generosity in all of the New Testament. In it, he's raising money from the church in Macedonia for the church in Jerusalem, which is living through a severe famine. In chapter 9, he writes this:
"Verse 8: And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written: 'They have freely scattered their gifts to the poor; their righteousness endures forever.' Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us, your generosity will result in Thanksgiving to God."
This almost sounds like the Prosperity Gospel, which is a uniquely American heresy that continues to spread through the church like a cancer. Put crisply, it says, "You give to get." That if you give to God, he will give even more back to you. Which means, ultimately, the motivation for generosity is greed, not love. Two words separate Paul's theology from the Prosperity Gospel heresy: "so that." "So that you will be enriched in every way so that you can be what? Generous." You see, the Prosperity Gospel is not a lie, it's a half-truth. When we give, when we are good stewards of what has been entrusted to us, God often does give us even more. Our harvest in Paul's metaphor may come back to us in the form of more money, or it may come back to us as more opportunity, or relationship, or health and happiness. But if you give, God will give back a net increase to you in some way. As the saying goes, you can't outgive God. But the purpose is not to make us rich, but to make us even more generous. Not to build bigger barns like the man in the parable, but to steward more of God's resources to the right place. As Randy Alcorn put it, "God blesses us to raise our standard of giving, not our standard of living."
So, God owns it all. We are entrusted with his resources to do good. And God blesses us not just to have more, but to give more. If this is true, radical as it is, then it means the question is less, "How much should I give away?" and more, "How much should I keep for myself?" I grew up in a church tradition where tithing was a central practice. From a very young age, my parents would sit me down on Saturday nights, give me my allowance for the week, and we would calculate 10% and put it in an envelope to bring to church the following day. And I still practice this, minus the envelope. But somehow, I imbibed that 10% was God's, but the other 90% was mine, baby, to do whatever I want with. But the truth is, everything we have belongs to God, and we are entrusted to use 100% of it well.
There is the famous dichotomy between Savers and Spenders. Savers are a bit more motivated by fear, a need for safety and security. Spenders are a bit more motivated by greed, the lust for more. I never really know what I am. I have both fear and greed in my heart. But there's a third option: not a saver or a spender, but a steward, one who, as an act of apprenticeship to Jesus, is working to channel God's resources for good.
But this raises all sorts of questions. What do I keep and what do I give? And how much? And where? And to whom? And what's an appropriate standard of living? And where's the line between enjoying our life before God and wasting his resources on luxury? What kind of car should I drive? How many pairs of shoes should I own? A million questions. And I get how complex this is. I live in Los Angeles, one of the most expensive cities in the world, and I'm raising three teenagers. It takes so much for our family to just get by here. How do I weigh generosity to the poor next to my responsibility to my kids? I get that this is not simple, but these are the right kinds of questions. And I hate to break it to you, the New Testament does not spell it out for us in detail. Instead, it calls us to discernment, to listen deeply to God with a singular desire to know and do his will. That said, there are six basic guidelines from Paul in his letters to the Corinthians. Our giving should be: Number one, regular, not sporadic. "On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money." Two, proportional. "Each of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income." Meaning, the more money you make, the greater percentage you and I should give. If you are barely able to fund your basic life necessities, you're still called to generosity as a follower of Jesus, but it's going to look very different than if you start a company that goes wild and you sell it for way more than you need to live on. The basic principle is, the more you make, the more you give. Three, sacrificial. "They gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability." It should hurt a bit. There should regularly be things we want to buy, but we don't, in order to give. Four, voluntary. "Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give—not reluctantly or under compulsion." No guilt trip from a religious leader, none of that. But of course, this means we need to make space to pray and discern what is in our heart. Next is joyful. "For God loves a cheerful giver." God doesn't want grumpy money, but a free offering of love. And finally, motivated by apprenticeship to Jesus, not religious duty or even philanthropy. "For you know the grace and that can be translated the generosity of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that through his poverty you might become rich." Meaning, we must come to see growing in generosity is a key aspect of our training under Jesus in kingdom living.
So, we're not flying blind. There are guidelines to follow, but the lack of a clear rule to follow means we have to listen to the Spirit of God in our heart, to regularly come to quiet before God and ask him, "Father, thank you for the gift of these resources. What do you want me to do with them?" Do you do this? Do you listen to God? If you were to answer a survey question with three options, which would best describe you today? One, I do not listen to God. I I don't know anything yet about hearing God's voice. Two, I listen to God, but not about money and generosity. I don't ask him about that. Or three, I listen to God about money and generosity. Is this for me or for me to give away? Many of us don't listen to God, at least not about money, because we're scared of what he may say. We still believe the myth that more money equals more happiness, and we're scared God may ask us to give our money away. And we don't yet believe in God as our father, provider. Which is why Jesus says in the same passage we read in Luke, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom." God is not a stingy investor out to maximize his profit margins. He's a loving father who wants to bless you and to form you into a daughter or son who is like him: generous and full of joy. And it is our honor as his children to steward whatever resources we have.
So, the invitation this coming week is to radically rethink your relationship to money and resources, not as owner or non-owner, but as caretaker, and to begin a lifelong journey of learning to listen to the voice of your loving, generous, joyful Father, Provider. What beautiful encounter. Cultural truths that all we have belongs to God and that we are caretakers of his creation. Many of us believe this in theory, but don't actually live it in practice, because it's really hard to trust that depriving ourselves of good can be for our good. So, let's take a few minutes to process this idea together. Here are a few questions: First, what emotions surface in you as you consider Jesus's parable of the faithful and wise manager? How does it encourage you, and how does it challenge you? Second, in your family of origin, what were the views and emotional dispositions towards money, and in what ways have those shaped your relationship to money today? Third, share about a time when you asked God about a financial decision in your life and listened for his direction. And fourth, how could the truth that everything belongs to God free you to live more generously? Hold space for your group to share honestly, with no no fear of judgment, and we'll be back in a few minutes.
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Hi, my name is Sunny Grover, and my family and I have been deeply impacted by this practice of generosity. The most salient conviction came from the pastor of the church that I came to faith at. Thinking about tithing, the senior pastor always used to say, "People need to stop thinking they're giving 10% to their church. They need to start thinking, God's allowing you to keep 90% of His money." But he always used to say, "Your pocketbook is a good reflection of your faith." Because in our day and age, in our society, money is the most tangible asset that someone has. So what they do with their money is a good reflection of what they value. I developed this conviction that I want to give more than I keep. Every year, as a family, we try to give one more percent of our gross income. Our entire framing is around, God is blessing us, and our job is to be a conduit. And finances are the most tangible way that that becomes real. We've gone beyond giving to our local church. By God's grace, we've found these other avenues. Some of them have to do with, you know, things that are very overtly associated with the Christian faith, so nonprofits like Practicing the Way. And other things have to do with places where the kingdom of God needs to break in, whether that's, you know, we give to a scholarship fund at a local university, and we give to a food pantry in Portland, and things of that nature. So I think that's how our practice has grown over the years. When I give generously, I feel the pleasure of God. It doesn't feel like a duty, an obligation. And if it's really hard for you to part with your money right now, do the smallest thing you can in a way that feels like an invitation to come one step closer to Jesus from where you are today.
Our exercise for this coming week is to begin listening to God about money and generosity. We've crafted a discernment exercise for you in the guide. It takes you through a series of questions designed to get you to reflect on your stewardship and listen to God for direction. This practice will force us to identify and confront the barriers that keep us from generosity. What you may find is, as you attempt to listen to God in prayer, things will come up in your heart. You may feel resistance or angst in your body. That resistance may be psychological or spiritual or practical. But this exercise will invite you to lovingly face the barriers that keep you from obedience to Jesus's commands.
Our reach exercise this week is twofold. It's to enjoy something good in your life and share it with another. You could spend that extra money you have on taking someone out to dinner who's going through a rough time, or open that bottle of wine you've been saving with a good friend, or take a kid from your community who doesn't have a healthy family situation out for ice cream. We're trying to learn to both deeply enjoy our life as a gift from God and to share our blessings with others.
Finally, this week, we're reading chapters 9 to 12 of "Giving is the Good Life" and listen to part three of the Rule of Life podcast on generosity. To close, may God bless you abundantly so that in all things at all times you may have all that you need. May you freely scatter your gifts to the poor. May God, who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food, also supply and increase your store of seed and enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. May you be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion. May your generosity result in Thanksgiving to God.
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