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FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, 1-29-12 AM
“KINGDOM CHALLENGE 2012: PLANK THREE”
2 CORINTHIANS 9:6-8
#4 in Series, “Kingdom Challenge 2012”
Plank Three: Focus on developing faithful stewards in the First Baptist family
I believe that it is possible to categorize all churches under one of three categories. First, there are risk
taker churches. These churches are ready to launch out into areas where they face the risk of failure,
embarrassment, and ridicule. They seek God, and to the best of their ability try to discern where He is
leading them and then “go for it”. They refuse to listen to the “naysayers”, the fearful, and the lazy. They
launch out into the unknown in waters over their head because they believe God is able to do in and
through them what they could never do for themselves. Sometimes they fail, but they learn from their
failures and know that failure need not be final and get back up and risk it all again for what they believe
God is leading them to do. Risk taking churches adopt the motto of the man who is called “the father of
modern missions” – William Carey. Carey’s motto was “Attempt great things for God; expect great things
from God”. A second category is caretaker churches. These churches usually have adequate buildings and
income to survive. They make decisions based on what they are comfortable with and what they are
confident that they have the expertise, the finances, and the people resources to accomplish. Caretaker
churches are satisfied with being average [Paul Harvey said that average means that you are the best of
the lousy and the lousiest of the best]. The caretaker church avoids risk at all cost. They want to keep the
peace and keep everyone satisfied. Their motto is “Things are going fairly well; don’t rock the boat”. The
third category is the undertaker church. They are dead. All caretaker churches eventually end up in this
third category if they don’t experience a revival. The undertaker churches carry out programs, have
regular services and marry and bury (though there are many more burials than marriages). One man in an
undertaker church wrote to his friend, “Pray for our church; the blower is still blowing but the fire is out.”
Launching out in faith into water over their head is not even on their radar screen; it is not even
considered. The motto of the undertaker church is “As it has always been evermore it shall be”. The
tendency for every church is to move from risk taker to caretaker to undertaker. That is the default
direction if something isn’t done to stop it. If a risk taker church does not slide into the caretaker category,
it will be because they purposefully and prayerfully seek God and continue to allow Him to stretch them.
Kingdom Challenge is our safeguard against becoming a caretaker church. Each year we seek the Lord
about where He wants us to go and what He wants us to do and then we present those ambitious plans to
you praying you will “buy in” to them and we just keep taking risks, learning from failures and seeking to
honor God and make His name famous among the nations.
We can’t talk about risk taking apart from talking about money. A risk taking church will always (I
mean always, without exception) be in need of funds and always looking to God to provide through His
people for the needs to accomplish what God has given them to do. Plank three of Kingdom Challenge
2012 has to do with money. I will not apologize nor will I ever apologize for talking about money and
how we relate to material things. The reason I will not apologize is because the Bible says so much about
it – especially in the gospels and especially in what Christ Himself taught. If you get angry when Pastors
talk about money it reveals something scary about your heart and your relationship with God and what
your god really is.
As we talk about plank three, we will be talking about grace giving from 2 Corinthians 9:6-8. This is
one of the greatest passages in the Bible on giving.
I.
The Principle of Giving (V6)
This verse is comparing giving to farming. The laws of the harvest operate not only in the natural realm
of agriculture, but also in the spiritual realm. Let me be clear right up front that I believe that the
“prosperity gospel” is heresy. If you don’t understand what that means, I’ll but it another way. The false
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teaching that permeates the airwaves of “Christian Television” that says that God wants you to be rich and
to prosper in the material realm and live in an expensive home, drive a luxury car, and wear expensive
clothes is garbage – rotten, stinking garbage. According to this false gospel, the way to get all these
goodies that feed the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life is to give money to selected
ministries. Having said clearly what this principle doesn’t mean, let me state what it does mean. If we are
faithful to sacrificially give as God directs, God gives us unspecified blessings here on earth – blessings
of His choosing. I believe that many of those blessings (not all) will be in the realm of finances. However
it will not be so that you can move up in housing and car and clothes. Verse 8 says that it will be so that
you will have “an abundance for every good work”. He will give to you so that you can give more and
experience the joy, the absolute joy of giving. It may be that He will give you the faith building
experience of seeing Him provide as you downsize and get rid of idols in your life. It may be the blessing
of being forced to set up a budget and get your spending under control. I don’t even have a problem with
saying that He will prosper you if you get the right definition of “prosperity”. My favorite definition of
prosperity is this: “Having enough for every need and the capacity to enjoy it.” Some have millions, but
not the capacity to enjoy it. They are slaves of their “stuff”. I know some widows in our church, who have
very little by American standards, but they have every need met and they enjoy life and are grateful to
God for His provision. Here is what tends to happen. As we make more and more money, we give
(percentage wise) less and less. Study after study shows that. Some of the most miserable people I know
are materially wealthy. They don’t possess their money; their money possesses them and they are not joy
filled people. When we give little, we will reap little true prosperity. When we give generously, we will
reap generously. The greatest reaping will be the joy of knowing we have been obedient to the Lord and
that we have pleased Him and partnered with Him in His work through the church here on earth and in so
doing have laid up treasures in Heaven. If you are using what God has given you to build bigger and
bigger, accumulate more and more, store up more and more, then every birthday is a reminder to you that
you are one year closer to leaving behind everything that is of value to you. If you are laying it up in
heaven, every birthday is a reminder that you are one year closer to your treasure!
Let me share some startling statistics. As you have seen in the articles on the front of the Encounters for
the last three weeks, the average percentage that American church members give to their church or charity
is 2.56%. Here is something even more alarming. 4 out of 10 church members don’t give anything and 2
or 3 more give next to nothing. My point is that there is not very much sowing going on. Because of a
lack of sowing, there is a lack of bountiful reaping.
That is the principle of giving
II.
The Pleasure of God (V7)
God loves grouchy givers and even non-givers, but those who give according to the guidelines of this
verse give Him pleasure. He gives us three characteristics of giving that gives God pleasure.
A. Giving Without Casualness (“So let each one give as he purposes in his heart”)
That phrase “give as he purposes in his heart” means that our giving is not to be impulsive, casual, or
based on seeing how much spare money we have at the end of a pay period. Our giving is to be prayed
through and planned out. The word “purposes” means to choose one thing over another. Every family
should have a prayed through plan for giving. Let me tell you one reason that I know that a lot of people
don’t have that plan. Usually our worst weather months are January and February. When we have several
Sunday’s of bad weather, and people can’t make it to church, that ought not to affect our giving for the
month. You should have it laid aside and give it the next Sunday when the weather breaks. That isn’t what
happens. We never even come close to making it up. That tells me a lot of people are not giving from a
purposed heart. We should always be open to give more when an unexpected need comes up in the church
or in a brother or sister’s life or a special challenge comes to the church through its leadership or when we
come unexpectantly into money, but the default giving should be prayerfully planned
The starting place for our planned giving should be the tithe (that word means tenth part). This subject
divides many of God’s people. The objection is that tithing was a part of the law and to say that every
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Christian should tithe is legalistic, that is, it puts us back under the law. Let me agree that tithing was a
part of the Mosaic Law (the Jews were required to give several tithes under a Theocracy where the tithe
was a part of what we would consider taxes). Let me also agree that tithing can become legalistic. So why
do I believe that every Christian should start their giving with the tithe? First, while tithing was a part of
the law, it was practiced by God’s people before the law. The first example is Abraham who gave a tithe
to the priest Melchizedek in Genesis 14:18-20. We also see Jacob committing to give a tithe to God in
Genesis 28:22. These recorded instances of tithing were hundred’s of years before the Mosaic Law. The
tithe was then incorporated into the law even though it did not originate with the law. While Jesus
commended the tithe in the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 23:23), tithing is not specifically commanded in
the New Testament. However, the New Testament does not say anything about the tithe being suspended
so it was likely assumed. Many of the early church fathers in the first few centuries after the church was
birthed encouraged and taught tithing.
Let’s look at the objection that tithing can be legalistic. What is meant by the term legalistic? It is doing
some act in order to obligate God’s acceptance and prove ourselves spiritual. Yes, tithing can be
legalistic. Someone may see it as a way to pay God off and gain favor and acceptance through their own
efforts. But church attendance can become legalistic; a daily quiet time of reading Scripture and praying
can become legalistic. To see the tithe as the starting point for giving is not legalistic.
A second reason that the tithe is a good starting place is that we are told in the New Testament that
giving is to be proportionate to our income (1 Corinthians 16:2a (NIV) “On the first day of every week,
each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with his income…”). Since the tithe is a
principle before and during the law, it seems reasonable that the tithe would be the starting point for
proportionate giving after the law.
Let me re-emphasize that the tithe is not an obligation to pay God off so we can proceed to spend the
remaining 90% of our income the way we want to. That is a perversion of tithing. One hundred percent of
our money belongs to God and the tithe is a reminder of that and our testimony to our family that it is all
His. Tithing is not the final goal of giving; it is the starting point. Tithing is not the ceiling to stop at; it is
the floor to start from. Tithing is not a bribe for God’s blessings; it is an act of worship and a testimony
that all we have is from God and we are the managers of His property. Adrian Rogers summarized tithing
this way: “Abraham commenced it; Jacob continued it; Malachi commanded it; Jesus commended it; who
are you to cancel it?”
Even if you don’t buy in to anything I’ve said and still believe that tithing is only for those under the
Mosaic Law and not for Christians under grace, I want to make sure you don’t have a misunderstanding
of grace. Grace is not a pass to do less than the law required; grace is God giving us the desire and power
to go beyond the law. One example would be that the law commands us to not murder our enemies; grace
enables us to love our enemies. The law commands us to not bear false witness against our neighbor;
grace enables us to speak the truth in love to our neighbor. The law commands us to not commit adultery,
but grace enables us to love our wife like Christ loves the church. If the law required a tenth, how much
more should grace willingly give? Again to quote my favorite Pastor, Adrian Rogers, “Any Christian
under grace that would do less that a Jew under the law is a disgrace to grace”.
God is pleased when we give without casualness.
B. Giving Without Complaint (“not grudgingly”)
The word translated “grudgingly” means with grief, sorrow, or sadness. It is to give with a note of regret
and reluctance. This word is translated “reluctantly” in the ESV and “regret” in the HCSB. If you see
giving to God’s work through the church like you see paying a bill from the utility company or insurance
for your car (something you have to do as bad as you dislike it), then God receives no pleasure from your
giving. Our giving ought to be from a heart of love for Him and gratitude for the health and job or
retirement He has given us.
C. Giving Without Compulsion (“or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver.”)
The word translated “necessity” means to constrain, to pressure, to impose, or to force. I don’t know
about you, but I pay my taxes out of compulsion, of necessity. I don’t like what most of it goes for, but I
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am commanded in Romans 13 to do it. Some people give the tithe with the same attitude they pay their
taxes and God takes no pleasure in that. One man said, “There are three kinds of giving: grudge giving,
duty giving, and thanksgiving. Grudge giving says, ‘I have to’; duty giving says, ‘I ought to’;
thanksgiving says, ‘I want to’” [Robert Rodenmeyer, Quoted in Donald Whitney, Spiritual Disciplines for
the Christian Life, Page 141]. Thanksgiving is cheerful giving and cheerful giving brings pleasure to God.
III. The Provision of Grace (V8)
This verse tells us how real giving – giving over and above the tithe becomes a reality.
A. The Source (“And God is Able”)
The reason we can give sacrificially – way beyond the tithe – is because we recognize that God is the
source of all we have or all that we will have. You are not the source; your employer is not the source; the
retirement plan you have is not the source, your investments are not thee source – God is the source. That
explains why God many times leads His people to step out in faith and give beyond what they are able.
This teaches them that the source is God.
B. The Supply (“to make all grace abound toward you”)
The supply for what we need to give is from God’s grace. His grace may take the form of things not
wearing out when they normally do, an inheritance, a gift, a promotion or bonus at work, money made
available from downsizing, or any number of other means. The supply of all of our income is a function
of God’s grace.
C. The Sufficiency (“that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for
every good work.”)
Where God guides, He provides. For some of you it is going to be a step of faith looking to Him for His
supply just to get to the minimum – the tithe. For some, God is going to impress your heart this year as a
part of Kingdom Challenge 2012 to give what seems like a ridiculously large amount and then show you
His sufficiency by providing it. This will be one of the most joyous things you have ever experienced.
You will really be cheerful as a giver of what you have trusted God to supply.
The Elders are trying to give you an example of that with thee 2012 budget. In tough economic times
we have decreased the budget compared to the 2011 budget by 1.2%, but we have increased the missions
part of the budget by 13.2%!
IV.
Action Plans
Here are a few of the things we are going to do to accomplish this third plank of Kingdom Challenge
2012.
A. Increase the Number of Tithers by 20% [140 families]
B. Become Debt Free as a Church in 2012
C. Encourage and Equip First Baptist Members to Move Toward Being Debt Free on Depreciating Items
CONCLUSION
Someone said, “If God’s people would bring God’s tithe to God’s house on God’s day, then God’s work
could be done God’s way” [Adrian Rogers]. May we become a church full of cheerful givers. (3066)