Time, Talent, Treasure Pt. 3 :: Lay Up Your Treasures

Visit our website
Follow us on Facebook
Follow us on Instagram

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:01

Thanks for joining us today as you listen to a portion of the message recorded at Find Life Church in Boulder, Colorado. If you'd like to connect with us further, you can visit us online at www.findlife.com.

SPEAKER_01 0:14

This one engage boulder, and there were some prayer initiatives that led up to this and a lot of activity. And uh how many of you guys were able to make it down to the tent this last weekend? Quite a few of us. It was awesome. I'm gonna have Jeanette share just some quick uh recaps and highlights so we can celebrate uh together as a body, and then we're gonna actually share a couple testimonies together. You guys welcome Jeanette.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

I first want to say thank you to all of you who embraced this whole mission and took it on. There was so much prayer that went into it. So those of you that were praying at home, that came to different gatherings we here had here at the church, thank you, thank you, thank you. I know it made a difference. And for those of you that were hands-on with um putting the tent up, breaking it down, helping inside the tent, around the tent, thank you. There's no way we could have done it without you. So good job, church. So over the weekend we saw um 219 people. Yeah, it was really awesome. And the Lord's hand was really on the whole flow of it. If somebody needed more time and needed a longer session, there was time for that. And so it was really beautiful. And um we had people from all over the place coming in. But what was really fun was all the other booths. This area that we're in is called the spiritual garden. So there was there was a lot of spiritual things happening, and it was beautiful that we had the atheists and from the atheist tent come into our tent and get words, get prayer. Yeah. We had folks from the unity church come in. Um, what was fun is that when they would come in, they'd go back and get their friends and say, You gotta go in. There are so many stories. We were here Friday night sharing them. I could take the whole time, um, but I'm not gonna do that because Luke's got a really good word. Um, but I did want to share one story with you, and so I'm gonna ask Piper to come up. I don't see Stacy. Are you coming? Okay, she wasn't sure if she'd be too nervous. But they're gonna share this amazing encounter that happened with a lady, and it fits into everything we were singing about. Like Jesus really is Lord overall, and he is drawing his people into his heart.

SPEAKER_04 2:53

So you can start. Yeah, it truly is just such an honor to be in the tent and to experience what's going on. And Jeanette set the whole thing up perfectly in that um we are in the spiritual garden there, and you can feel so many different entities within um within that tent. And so it's really easy to partner with the lies that others are carrying or to recognize unholy spirits. And so it takes a lot of discernment and calming yourself down to identify with the heart of God. And um, the particular woman that we're gonna share about, we could really feel a lot of stuff going on. And God was showing us some crazy pictures, and we're like, well, that we know that's not your heart, Lord. So what do you really want to share with this individual? And so I'm getting garbage, not knowing that Piper is silencing the enemy and silencing all of the deceptive spirits and lies that she's bound in. And in the meantime, um God tends to use my imagination a lot, which I have learned over the years uh not to dismiss it because it's pretty accurate. So this time he did the same thing, and um what I saw was a really tiny little sheep without any fleece. And then this little sheep kept growing and growing, its fleece was multiplying and it was coming up towards me, and it pierced me in the eye. So I thought, okay, well, what do you want to do with this Lord? And I recognized a couple things in that moment, and when the sheep pierced me in the eye, um what God was saying is that she had actually given him permission to open up her ancient gates. So open up you ancient gates, open up you ancient doors, that the king of glory would come in, right? Who's the king of glory? The the Lord, strong and mighty. And so she had already welcomed him in. I'm shaking, I'm nervous. I don't do microphones. Um thank you. So that's number one. She had already given him permission, and because of that, we could partner with the Lord and what he was doing. The other thing is that he had come to liberate the captive, that she was a spiritual captive, and that he was gonna release her of certain lies. So, and the other thing that he was saying is that she represents Israel, she identifies with Israel, and so that was the message of the sheep. She is my flock, you need to tell her that. I'm like, well, that's not gonna make any sense to her because she doesn't know all that, she doesn't identify with Jesus. But what so he gave me the word tell her she belongs. So that's the word that I had to initiate conversation, and Piper also had a really incredible word. What we were able to realize later is that she did identify with a lot of unholy spirits. Um she practiced in a lot of a new age spirituality, but the big thing is that she had Jewish roots, and so she had a lot of inheritance there, and she had identified very specifically with Jesus in the past, and so that's what Piper's gonna share with you is all the times Jesus revealed himself to her.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

Yeah, this woman was beautiful. Um, as she came in, she would just look lean real close to your face and say, There's just something so beautiful about you, you know. And you're kind of like, Oh, okay. I'm glad you see that. That's really great. Um, you can just sit back and receive, you know. And it was really sweet because she came in, and as Stacy said, you do feel lots of things that come in with people, whether it's pain they're walking in or different spiritual um things that they've engaged in. You feel a lot of things as they come in. And we were sitting just praying, and Stacy got this word about you're you're his flock. He wants you to know you're his flock and that you belong. Well, she just immediately starts weeping. Says, All I've ever wanted, all I've ever wanted is to belong somewhere. And she's just weeping, and then I s and then we let her just weep for a while, and we just sat with her, and then uh the word I just kept hearing the word vitality. And I was like, I said, you know, the word I keep hearing over you is vitality. And she starts weeping again, and I'm like, okay. And she said, What you don't know is that I have almost lost my life many times. I've not had a life of vitality. That's not a word that would describe me in my actual life, but it is exactly who I've always wanted to be. And so we got to actually speak truth over her, where her experience had only been with the enemy's attempt to steal who she was. Um, and as we spoke that word over her, she she then told us about a car accident she had been in when she was 16. And in that accident, there was actually a um a post or something that was on the back of a truck that came through her window and pierced through her brain. And she had had brain trauma. And she had had such severe brain trauma for so many years that she couldn't balance very well. She had extreme vertigo and she couldn't walk or stand for a long period of time without having extreme vertigo and needing to sit or lie down and rest. And she also could not think clearly because the vertigo would cause her to feel uh confused. And she began to tell us about how she had been a part of um a place called Enkencar or Enken. I don't know. It's a place in Boulder, I can't pronounce the name. But they are shamans, and they believe that they are the true paths to spirituality, and they invite all spiritual expression of any kind to be present in all of their working. And she had been in a chant session with um where they actually all surrounded her in a circle and they were all chanting, and she was seated in the middle, and her spiritual guide leader was sitting at her feet and just opened up. Any spiritual being that would like to come and heal this woman, you're invited to come and heal her. We just embrace you and we invite you. So there's all this chanting happening, and this invitation goes out. And she said, and you know who arrived? Jesus Christ, the man in white. And she said, He walked in and he took me by my right hand. And she said, the funny thing is, the right hand means to be drawn forward or drawn into. And I was like, You're right. And she said, So he took my hand and he's and as he took my hand, I stood up and I began spinning, and I spun in one direction for an hour, then I spun in the other direction for an hour, and I was healed of all the brain trauma that I had experienced to that date. Now, this had been 12 years later that she had had this healing experience where Jesus had met her in the midst of her ritual that none of us would have identified as something Jesus would maybe want to step into, but he knew her and he knew she was seeking. And he said, If anybody's invited, I'll be the first to show up. So he did. He steps in. Then, then she says, You know, in fact, Jesus has shown up to me several times. And I was like, Really? And she said, Yeah. Um, he showed up to me when I was on a walkabout, which is also another um, it's a spiritual journey. They do that a lot in the the um African or sorry, the Australian cultures. And she said, Um, I had been just I had just been baptized by a shaman and I went on a walkabout, and as I was walking on this walkabout, I looked into the clouds and I had what I would describe as an out-of-body experience. And while I was standing in the clouds, Jesus Christ in white came and stepped up to me and told me who he was and reminded me that I knew him. And that was the end of her experience with him there. And then she explained a couple of different times where she would see him in dreams or she would see him in different um in different spiritual quests that she was on. And as she was describing all these things, she said, you know, the funny thing is the healing or the accident that I got into happened on Easter Sunday. And the healing that Jesus brought me also happened about 20 12 years later on Easter Sunday. What do you think that means? You know, and so we got to share with her the resurrection life of Christ because she understood Easter Sunday to be the death of Jesus. And we were actually, Easter Sunday is the life of Jesus, it's the resurrection life of Christ. So we shared with her about the resurrection life of Christ. And she said, I really oh, and so I said, you know, it seems to me that maybe Jesus all along the way has been inviting you repeatedly into a relationship with him. And she said, Absolutely, and I really want that. And so then she actually led herself to the Lord, is the easiest prayer of salvation ever. Because we just sat there with her and she I said, I'll pray for you, and well, I'm gonna thank Jesus for the way that he has revealed himself to you in all of these times, and then I'll let you just pray however you'd like. So I prayed, Jesus, thank you. Thank you for your kindness to meet her every time she's been seeking. And then she said, Yes, and Jesus, I want a relationship with you, and I want to be yours, and from this day forward, I'm gonna serve you. And from the and she just, I mean, she was praying things that I was like, I don't know that I had the courage to pray that for a long time in my journey. So it was really powerful, just the way that Jesus had been meeting her, and here we were just available to to watch God show off on how much he loves us and how he met her in all of those places.

SPEAKER_04 12:31

Um, and then yeah, so she hadn't spoken that she had never really read a Bible, and so Piper's like, I can take care of that for you, let me go grab one. So she prays over this little Bible and she goes, I need you to read this verse for me. And so it she dropped us into John chapter 8, and she just opened it up. And the backdrop on that is that um the Pharisees and the scribes are trying to find accusation and charge against Jesus. They so they bring this idolatrous woman. Um, you you all know the story. And so the verse that they drop us into is right before Jesus is saying, Okay, you all are sons of this of slavery, which don't remain in the house forever. But a son remains in the house forever, and only the son can liberate who you really are, liberate you into freedom. And the verse right underneath that um is where she pointed, and it says, We are not illegitimate children. You are not an illegitimate children, but you are a child of God. And if you know God, if you know who the Father is, then you also receive me, Jesus is saying. So you receive me in the name of God. And so she's like, Yes, I can do this, okay. And she literally grabs her Bible, she showers us with hugs, and then she goes out into the spirit garden and she embraces the unity tent, the Echen car, how do you say it?

unknown 13:53

Echenar.

SPEAKER_04 13:54

Echenar. So she goes there and she's talking to them about spinning the wheel and past lives and all of these idolatrous, religious spirits, and she's testifying to who Jesus is and what Jesus just did for her. So it was truly a beautiful salvation. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:15

So awesome, isn't it? So good. Could we just pray for her, Piper? Will you can we pray for her? I don't know if she'll ever come to our community. We invited her, but she's out there somewhere, so we want to pray that she gets tucked into a community that can disciple her.

SPEAKER_00 14:32

So yeah. So, Jesus, we just pray um over Tovah today, whose name in Hebrew actually means beautiful, good child. So we just speak over you, Tova, that you are beautiful, you are good, and you are a child of God. And we just uh thank you, Jesus, for the way that you have never failed to show up to her in her in her journey, in her seeking. Jesus, you always draw us to yourself, Lord, but you also always meet us where we are. So I thank you, Jesus, for how um perfectly you have loved her, even when she didn't see it before, and the opportunity for us to be able to pray with her and see all that you've done in her life, and we just bless her spirit to know you, to be fully knit into the family of God as well. And we just bless every person that came to the tent. I know there are many other salvations and many other people that encountered your heart. So, Lord, we just speak over all of those who came to the tent, all of those who have experienced you, who are on spiritual journeys pursuing the true spiritual path, which is you, Jesus. Lord, we just pray right now, God, that you would just continue to reveal yourself, Jesus Christ in white, to all of these people around, Lord, that you would continue to draw them into yourself, Lord, that you would continue to show that you are the one true God. You are, Lord, the holy one. You are the one that sticks closer than a brother, Lord. You are the friend that comes alongside of us in all of our seasons, Lord. And I just pray that as every person walks away from the tent, having received something, a deposit of your heart for them, or have walked into relationship with you, Jesus, I pray that you would breathe on all of those experiences, Lord, on all of those encounters with your heart, and that it would just go out and it would bear fruit, Lord, that they would be knit into the body, that they would be knit into you, Jesus. We just ask that no seeds that were planted would fail to bear fruit, Lord. In Jesus' name.

SPEAKER_01 16:47

Yes, yes, yes, yes. That's good stuff right there. Hey, I'm gonna ask the ushers to come forward and we're gonna receive the the offering this morning. And uh, as we'll talk about here in a little bit, this is uh this is an important part of the way we worship together. It's a chance to give, but it's also a chance to experience freedom. And so uh I'm gonna pray. Some of you give online, some of you give over text, some of you uh prepare to give this morning, and maybe you're not, and that's okay too. That's an invitation. Um but can we agree together as we continue our worship through giving? God, we thank you today that you are the giver of all good things. And we thank you today that you have our best interest in mind. And it's our joy to be able to bring our gifts back to you. You've entrusted us with so much. We are recipients of great generosity, God, and it's our joy to be able to give. And would you take what we give and multiply it with the things on your heart, God. We love you today, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Yes. Um, before we hop into the message quickly, last week we talked about for we're taking three or four weeks and we're making you aware of some needs within the family. You guys know that we are a family. By the way, if you're a guest or a visitor here today, thank you for coming to join us. You're officially part of the family, all right? Um so we see ourselves as a body, as a family, and every now and then we have some very specific needs within the family that show up. And so uh last week, if you were here, um we talked about some opportunities to join the teams in Divine Life Kids and even Kinos, our student ministry. And uh just so you guys know, the way that we kind of see this as a leadership, you know, we we do see this as a body. And so we uh you know, we want to make every effort to make you aware of the needs within the body, and then we trust that God, this is Jesus Christ's body, that he stirs in individuals, he stirs desire to take care of the body. How many of you guys know that God has given us everything we need to care for each other within this fellowship? He's supplied all of our needs. And so when we talk about some of the needs within our children's ministry and youth, we don't talk from a place of anxiety or a place of pressure, and it's not our job as leaders to convince you to do anything. It's the Holy Spirit's job to move us and to call us and to stir in our hearts to come be apart. And thankfully, it's a joy that God has given us our children as an inheritance. The heritage of the Lord is put in them, right? And so it's our joy to be able to serve. So we are trying to amp up the teams to the tune of a dozen to 15 people or so over the summer and coming into the fall. We have some volunteers right now that are consistently serving and they're doing a great job. We want that to continue. Now, the challenge with announcements like this is everybody in the room nods their heads, but we always think that the person down the row from us is the one that's gonna go raise their hand and do it. Right? It's easy just to say, oh, I've done that or I'm doing something else. Now, again, my job is not to convince you of anything, but I want you, I do want you to realize don't count yourself out, okay? If we could all do this, if you could take wherever you're sitting across the room and just say, God, is this something that you would like me to respond to? We trust that if that's you, that you'll be obedient to that, right? And and it may be no, but we are praying that over the next few weeks that God raises up those who will say, you know what, this is something I'm going to do to disciple and deposit into the young people for a season. And so the volunteer commitment, it's maybe once a month to once every six weeks, not too bad. Give you everything you need to serve to set you up to win. And I'm just so thankful for our team, Catherine and Stacy and Valerie, and all the others who are serving consistently, pouring their hearts out in belief for our sons and daughters in this house, those who will who we will be passing the baton to. Amen. Can we thank our children's team? And uh, so, anyways, that's the thing. So if you want to respond to that, if the Lord stirs something, if you feel something stirring, and maybe you're older, maybe you feel like, gosh, I'm not even sure if I know how to relate to kids anymore, that's okay. See it as a mission. You get to create an opportunity for young families that are in that stage of life to come and have their whole family encounter God in age specific way, which is really important, right? That's okay. You can be awkward and still do it, right? You don't have to be called and gifted. It's okay. It's a need in the family. I've never, I've never met a single person who is called to take out the trash. I never met a certain person who was called to vacuum the carpet. There's sometimes there's needs. That we rise up to serve because God has called us to be his family. Amen? Come on, I'm gonna start preaching on that this morning. So if you want to respond out in the foyer, there's a bunch of cards. Just pick one out, pray about it, bring it back over the next couple weeks, and we're gonna continue to update you as that goes. Alright? Are you guys ready to dig in? We have a lot of work to do in 20 minutes. If you guys are familiar with how things we do things at Vine Life, there comes a certain point in the service where you see a thing on the screen that says Prairants, please pick up your kids. This will most likely be one of those Sundays. Alright? So we're gonna take this all the way to the uh to the clock. Sound good? Um open your Bibles this morning to Matthew chapter 6, and we're gonna start with the reading of the word. And as an intro before we read, that we have been in this conversation the last couple weeks called Time, Talent, and Treasure. I love the story that was just shared with us about the man dressed in white who came to bring freedom and liberation, and this precious woman named Tova, that he would come and get into the details of her life to set her free. And that's what he is after. We are so deeply loved by God that there is no place in our life that he won't talk to us about. Including our time, our talent, and our treasure. Most of us, our worlds are run by these metrics and these things. All of us in the room at this some point this week talked about your calendar and your bank account and the things that you're doing or not doing, and priorities in life, all these things. And God, because he loves us and wants our deepest joy and freedom, wants to bring his kingdom into our life. The trouble is we're in a cultural moment that we want the benefits of the kingdom, but without needing to have a king. And we've got to confess that. Because the only way to enter into joy and freedom is to welcome the Lordship of Jesus into our life and say, My life is only best lived and surrender to you. Woo! Come on, guys! Alright, Matthew chapter 6, starting at verse 19. Do not, okay, this is Jesus talking. This is he's like, He is, he is, this is like serious Jesus preach right here. Alright? This is middle sermon on the mount, and he's just ramping up. And he goes on a riff of three movements as it relates to treasure. Verse 19, do not lay up for yourself treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. The eye is the lamp of the body, so if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness. No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God in money. This is the word of the Lord today. Amen. So last week we talked a little bit about time. If you weren't here at the service, um you should go. If you were too busy to be here last week, you should go listen to the sermon about time and busyness. Now I'm joking. We talked a little bit about how one of the ways of the world that that distracts us, distract us and actually takes us out of God's best will for our life is this prone, this, this, this, uh this thing that we are prone to busyness and distraction, and we end up saying yes to things without actually submitting some of our calendar and our commitments back to the Lord. And so, and I want to be clear here. The call of that sermon is not to just to eliminate everything and just do less of everything. That might be part of it, but the the greater call is to know what Jesus wants you to say yes to and give your full life to that. You want everything you do to be full of purpose and meaning and done to the glory of God, right? And so as He is stirring in your heart what to say yes to, our job is to be faithful and obedient to that and not to just be given to pulled in every direction. And as we live that way, he begins to unfold a new kind of time that gives him glory and bears more fruit in our lives. You can go back and listen to that. We are gonna talk about treasure today. Yeah? So if you're a guest here today, it's like this is the lotto ticket, right? Because every time you visit a church, you know, you you're hoping you show up either in Vision Sunday or tithing Sunday, right? And uh so we're gonna get into it. And fortunately, Jesus, he was never afraid. It just never was an awkward subject to him. Because money very rarely had to do with just about investment tips and how to stay out of debt and how to, you know, how to plan your finances. It always had to do with the heart. Because Jesus was ruthlessly after the heart. And he, and this is why he would always circle back to topics like this about treasure and money. Because there was there's very few things that will get that will cut into the heart of who we are and what matters to us and where our priorities are and what we're trusting in, than to talk about time and talent and treasure. Very few things. And so Jesus, as he would, as he was starting to ramp up and talking about treasures, this is really what he was after. And he was inviting us into a new way of life. And I mentioned this last week. One of our friends, Chris Cruz, up in Reading, he said this we must be intentionally discipled by Jesus, or we'll be unintentionally discipled by the world. And this is why this is so important. We have to talk about money because the world has something to say about money. And if you don't know what that is, you will be discipled into the ways of the world. Which is why we must surrender to the words and the teaching and the truth of what Jesus came to model and show us the freedom he came to liberate us into. And this is where he gets into that, right? And so this passage does come in three movements. And he's not just giving financial tips, he's after our heart. He wants to identify what matters to us. And here's why this matters for me. I've seen too many marriages dismantled because of financial conflict. I've seen friends walk away from their calling because of the fear of not having enough. I've seen people crippled by a poverty mindset, convinced they are not in a financial position ever to be generous. On the flip side, I've also seen people wisely steward their finances, avoiding consumer debt, living within their means. I've seen I've known wealthy people who love God with everything and see their ability to produce wealth as a calling to be stewarded for the kingdom. I've seen people who felt like they have nothing to give, be moved by the Spirit of God, and take major risks because they were convinced that the inheritance given them in Christ was more than enough for anything they would ever need. And so I understand this topic hits us in a lot of different ways, especially talking about it in church. Um, and some of this stuff it starts to trigger some shame. You might be in a place in life that you didn't want to be. You didn't ask to be here, and you're not sure why you got here as it relates to treasure or money, and maybe you feel like you've been buried a little bit, buried under the weight of some either past decisions or maybe some medical bills. Some of us have have unfortunately experienced the consequences of unseen forces in our life, be it job changes or stock market things or whatever. There's things that happen to us and we're in a position that we don't want to be in. And so some of sometimes this thing can start stirring up. It just feels a little guilty or maybe shame. Let me just tell you the shame and the pressure is off. You are a son and daughter of God. You were created in the image of God. You were dearly loved by the God of the universe this morning. Okay? Can we just make sure that that's on the table here? And as we talk about money, to be clear, in Paul's letter to Timothy, he said that the love of money is the root of all evil. Money is not the root of all evil. The love of money is the root of all evil. We'll get to that here in a second. I don't believe it's more virtuous to be poor than to be rich. I've met plenty of poor people who are greedy, covetous, fearful, stingy. And I've met plenty of wealthy people who are generous, wise, free, and full of the Spirit of God. I've also met a lot of wealthy people who are greedy, covetous, fearful, and stingy. And I've met a lot of poor people who are generous, wise, free, and full of the Spirit of God. So let's not box this in. It's not about how much money we have or don't have. This is about what God is exposing in our life and the way that we see the world, and the way we see what we've been given, and the way we see ourselves as called to steward the things of God in our lives. Amen? So it's not just about being rich or poor, but money magnifies. This is the point. Money magnifies what is actually in our hearts in the way we see. So this is why Jesus transitions, he starts with laying up treasures in heaven. Instead of giving ourselves to the things that can be taken from us, he then says, to lay up treasures in heaven. And then the second movement, which is kind of a surprising movement, he starts talking about the way that we see, which is kind of a weird thing. There's three movements of this passage. And he says, the eye is the lamp of the body. Right? And a lot of times when this verse is preached, it's preached totally in a different context. It's saying, listen, don't set your eyes on things you shouldn't be looking at. We use this passage to talk about lust or judgment. The passage is still a reference to the Hebrew scripture to talk about a good eye and a bad eye, have to talk about with a way of seeing the world. When your eye is full of light, it's a way of seeing your neighbor and your circumstances through abundance and provision that I'm called to sow light into my neighbor, into my world. A bad eye, an eye full of darkness, is an eye that's squinted, an eye that's tight, an eye that's stingy and pulled back, saying that there's not enough to go around. And so as Jesus is talking about laying up treasures in heaven, he's talking about a way of relating to God and relating to man through an abundance mindset, not just a scarcity mindset. He's talking about generosity. Generosity is the only way to lay up treasures in heaven that cannot be taken from you. Every other type of accumulation can be taken from you. Moth and rust can destroy it. A thief can break in and steal it. Anything that you give can never be stolen from you. Do you understand that? I I've made some bad financial decisions in my life. Fortunately, not any like severe financial decisions. But I've made I've made decisions that I'm not proud of. I've lost money. I've spent money frivolously. I've regretted things I've done with money, but I've never lost a penny that I've given. I've never lost the if you want to make sure you never lose money, you will never lose what you give away. That's a great life principle, actually. And I have never once regretted anything that I've given, and I've never met somebody who regretted giving too much. Never once. Because anything that we give becomes an eternal treasure. It becomes something that God can use, especially out of abundance. It's about the way we see. So the measure of light in our eye has to do with the level of our generosity. You can measure the light of your eye by your level of generosity. It's how we participate in God's economy. It's how we believe and confess and believe that God is generous towards us. It's difficult sometimes, but this is so true. Generosity is part of our freedom. It's not just about making things happen and getting things done, it's about part of our freedom. Mother Teresa, in an interview, once said this. She gave an interview to Hello Magazine, and she was asked the question, is it only the affluent who give? And she replied, No, even the poorest of the poor give. The other day a poor beggar came up to me and said, Everyone gives to you, and I also want to give you 20 pesos, which is about two pence. And I thought to myself, what do I do? If I take, he won't have anything to eat. But if I don't take, I would hurt him so much. So I took. And he was so happy because he had given to Mother Teresa of Calcutta to help the poor. And she said this giving cleans the heart and helps you to get closer to God. You get so much back in return. Don't you love that? Even Mother Teresa talking about giving, it's not just about the recipient of the gift. The act of giving cleans the heart. It reveals things about us. It's the fastest way to reveal things about us. This is why Jesus continues to come back and back to this. And so this third movement that he gets into, he then goes for the jugular, so to speak. And he says, No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. Now some of you are familiar with this passage and the words used. This word money is this word mammon in Greek. And it had to do with more than just money. Mammon had to do with unrighteous wealth. It had to do with money accumulated through the ways of the world and by the ways of the world, for the ways of the world. He's not trying to draw a line between having money and not having money. He's trying to expose an idol of the age called Mammon. Here's what another pastor had to say. This is a painting drawn back in the early 1900s, painted in the early 1900s, that represents the giving of a life to this idol, mammon. Here's what a pastor had to say. He said, Jesus did not throw around words. So it is significant that he used the word mammon at least four times in the New Testament. When he used it, he did not simply mean money. He deliberately used the word mammon to show us what happens when we become attached to money. But mammon's influence does not just stop with wealth. If we are not vigilant, the spirit will expand to every, extend to every area of our lives and convince us to trust it instead of God. It tries to motivate us to do more things for it than for God, with the goal of replacing God as the source of what we need. In the book of Exodus, the Spirit convinced the people they did not need God. And its strategy has not changed. This evil spirit will deliberately lead us astray and abandon us. But God will always extend his mercy and grace when we need him. So Mammon, as Jesus would teach on this, as Jesus was discipling his people, Mammon was this idea, it was a spirit that Jesus was exposing. And any idol, and it was saying it was true in Jesus' day, and it's true in our day, any idol in our life that contends for our hearts, they all make the same promise. If you will serve me, hey, if you will, if you will give your life to me, if if you will worship me, if you will love me with all your mind and your heart and your soul and your strength, I will take care of you. I'm gonna take care of you. I'm gonna make sure you have what you need. I'm gonna make sure you have the right friends and relationships in your life. We're gonna make sure that you're remembered. An idol makes promises to us that if we trust in it, it will serve us. The problem is, no idol ever falls through on those promises. Jesus is the only king who will actually bring us the security and the belonging and the significance that our hearts desire that we were made for. But mammon is one that promises if we pursue, if you pursue me, if you pursue the riches of the world, you're gonna have what you need. But the problem with mammon is that as soon as you get to that next level, the carrot moves. You guys know what I'm saying? As soon as you get that promotion that your heart is set on, it feels good for about two and a half weeks. And then Mammon says, you know what, that's great, but you have to work a little harder. That's not enough for you. That's not gonna be enough for you. That's not gonna satisfy you. You gotta keep giving yourself. As soon as you get that bonus or that raise, as soon as you get that new car, as soon as you get that house that you've been eyeing for the last three and a half months. That's the one that I need. This is the life that I need. As soon as you get what you feel like you deserve or what you're owed, the thing is you get there and mammon has a way of promising something to you, then as soon as you get there, the carrot moves, and it just needs you to work a little harder all the time. You're never quite there. You know how exhausting that is? Which is why Jesus, he was so serious. Mammon will never satisfy you, mammon will never take care of you, mammon, there is no security when you give your life to mammon. There is only security when you serve God as your master. Why? Because everything you need has already been given to you. You don't have to work for it. That's the message of the cross. That's the finished work of the cross. Everything in Christ has already been extended to you. And our ability to see that and enter into it and then live from the place of spiritual inheritance is our ability to walk in the glorious freedom of the sons of God. Come on. And so Jesus would expose Mammon. And so I'm just gonna keep going here. If you get if you've got to get kids here in a second, you can go do that. I'm sorry. I just this is a good message. I know my I always put my wife in a hard position because she she she carries a lot while I'm up here preaching. So thank you, honey. Um Warren Buffett, a billionaire that many of you know, um, he was, I think formerly one of the richest men in the world. He at one point he was reflecting in one of his biographies about his when he when he first caught the vision for pursuing a life of greatness, pursuing a life of money, is when he was about 10 years old. And uh he was at a dinner with his with his father and his and his father's friends. And he was at this dinner, and a man, a waiter, a server came alongside the table with a tray with a bunch of leaves on the tray. And he saw these men one by one look at the tray and point to which leaf, which tobacco leaf that they wanted. Then as they would select their preference of leaf, the man would go then to roll a cigar on the spot for each of them to smoke. And at a young age, Warren Buffett, when he's about 10, he saw this and he says, This. He says, Whatever kind of life gets me this, I will give everything I have for this. If this, you know, whatever is going to earn me this kind of life, so I'm gonna give myself to this. And he caught a vision from a young age, as many of us do. We catch a vision for the kind of life that we want to live, the life that's promised us, the life that we feel like is going to satisfy us. But this life, as Jesus would say, causes us to hate the things of God, causes us to despise the things of God, to despise anything else. And it's not just about lusting for money. Mammon is more than just wealth, it's a spirit of the age. It also has to do with the envy of our neighbor, a colleague who's doing slightly better than you, who's taking one more vacation than you a year. Right? They're driving the next model up. It can also be manifested as anxiety over unmet needs. So, and I think that that probably touches all of us here. And so, if we reverse engineer all these passages as Jesus is getting at the stuff, he's exposing these idols out of his mercy and his goodness in our life to show us where life is actually best lived in freedom. As you reverse this whole thing, and he ends with you cannot serve God in money, it goes back. So that's why you live with your eye full of light, and this is how you lay up treasures in heaven to overflow with generosity. This is why generosity is at the heart of the gospel. It's the heart, it's the fountainhead of the gospel is the generosity of God, the God who overflows in abundance towards everything. And it's the life that we're called to live. And so this is why this is where it's fun to just for a moment talk about tithing here for a second. Everybody's favorite word. Tithing. And I do want to briefly touch on this. It's a Hebrew practice, as we know, about bringing the first fruits of what God has given us. And we came to know the tithe means a tenth, the first fruits to the Lord. In the Old Testament, it was given to the temple. In the New Testament, we can see it in the life of the early church. And they would take everything they had and begin to lay that at each other's feet, sharing freely with one another as each had need. But I'll just acknowledge for a moment, sometimes this tithing conversation, it gets derailed really fast. And I don't know how many of you guys have experienced this, but it doesn't take long for a tithing conversation to devolve into an argument about law and grace. And what is it? Is it law or is it grace? Does God still expect this? Or can we just do whatever we want? Right? And I have to feel those conversations quite a bit. And it's it's always a funny one. Um because quite honestly, it's just no longer an interesting conversation to me. It's just it's just a boring conversation to me. Law or grace, who cares? Like for me personally, I don't care if it's law or it's grace. When I see what Jesus modeled of his love for his bride and his church, the fact that he gave everything without reserve for the flourishing of the church, why am I arguing about 10%? And when I feel these conversations, a lot of times, I'll just make a note on this, and this might sting a bit. But usually the people that are most uptight about the conversation about tithing, um the people that are most uptight, when when I when I look at the quality of their life, they rarely strike me. I rarely experience people that have a problem with tithing as outrageously generous people. I've never had somebody come to me and say, Man, I got a problem with tithing. This is severely limiting to me. I want to give way more than 10%. And I just feel like we're just way underdoing it. Right? Now, listen, do I believe that we're in a season of grace? Absolutely. Do we get hard? Do we talk about this often as far as like what we expect? No, because just like I mentioned before, we expect, we, we, we are convinced that the Spirit of God moves in each of our hearts to be generous towards one another and towards the church because God cares for the church. The church is central to God's plan for the world, to extend his blessing to the world. And so we we very rarely get into this, but I just want to encourage you this morning that tithing is not just about right or wrong. It's not just about what God expects or not, doesn't expect. Tithing is a practice that actually liberates our hearts to be reminded of everything that's available in God in the first place. So to me, it has nothing to do with duty. It's been a joy in my heart, even since I've been at Vine Life since 2002. And this is a commitment my wife and I made way before we even before we were married, and as we've grown a family and just thick and thin in times of little and in times of little more, right? Of we are going to give ourselves, right? Just so you know, pastors ties to. It's not we're just taking all your money and then blowing it, right? That's not how this works. It's add it's a practice, it's a it's a it's a it's an attitude and posture of the heart that even what I have been given I didn't originate with me. It didn't not, it didn't come from me, it came from God. And so who am I to tell God how he gets to use his money? So tithing I've come to find is this practice, and you can you can send me letters, whatever, you can argue with me, that's fine, I don't care. Alright? Because I'm telling you, this is about freedom. Okay? No, we're not gonna nobody's gonna hunt you down and tell you you're not giving it. That doesn't that doesn't happen here, alright? There is freedom to be moved by the Spirit of God. I'm just telling you, I've never met a person who regretted outrageous generosity. Okay? So here's why tithing as a practice matters. In the spiritual, in our spiritual life, there's practices we give ourselves that form us in certain ways. So you being here in this room is a it's a practice of gathering with the saints. And what it is, it's retraining your mind and your life to say that that participation of the family of God is actually better than individualistic preference that the world says is the trump card. So this is actually a really important gathering. This is a practice that you gather with believers, and it's training you to say your individual preference isn't all that matters. When we gather around the Lord's table in communion and we receive the body and the blood of Jesus, it's a practice that reminds us that it's not by my own work that I'm saved. It's by faith. It's through grace and by faith that I am saved. And any spiritual fruit that comes of my life is because of the work of the finished work of the cross. Right? The Sabbath is a rhythm that we practice, that God says you must labor six days a week, and one day a week you are to reserve as a Sabbath into my name. It's a day that we remind ourselves that by doing nothing we are still loved, which is the core of the Christian faith. If you don't believe that, you're not a Christian. That by doing nothing I am still loved. That this is the core, this is the heart, this is why we practice that, that I can remind myself that even without having to do anything, the extravagant love of God is still available on my behalf. That now I can enter into that and live everything and work and give myself and labor on toward towards God out of that heart. So that's a practice. Tithing is the same way tithing, I believe, for me, it's not it's not about law or duty or any of that. It's about a practice that as I tithe, it's reminding me that give a life surrendered to Jesus is way better than a life surrender surrendered to mammon. And every time we give as part of our liturgy and our spiritual practice here, we are confessing and proclaiming that we serve a God who is almighty. He is the God of Israel, he's the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He's a God who is on the throne forever, and he has my best interest in mind because I'm a son and daughter, a recipient of the kingdom of God. Ah! So here's what happens when we give, even tithing. When we give, this when you're giving online, when you're giving on your baskets, or whatever. And I'm not getting into does all the tithe go to the church? You know what? Just focus on giving. Just focus on giving, alright? Make that like your prime participation in the economy of God. Here's what happens when we tithe it teaches us that all of our money belongs to God, not just 10%. You guys realize that? So it just happened, all of it actually belongs to God. He just lets us use about 90% of it. That's a fair deal. Tithing as we as we give, it helps us trust and depend on Jesus instead of trusting and depending on ourselves. It reveals the motives of our heart. Surprisingly, here's one that we don't think of often. Tithing actually helps create a solidarity even with the poor. Because as we give out of sacrifice and not just abundance, when we give out of need, we are reminding ourselves of the poor of the world who live every day like this. So we're actually participating in the global human condition and those who are depending on their bread, their fresh bread every day. Tithing reminds us just how much Jesus loves the church. Just read Ephesians chapter 5. Tithing reminds us of who we are in Christ. That God loves us. We're taken care of. Okay. Now, when we start talking tithing, there's always that question in the back of your head, are they talking about this because the church is hurting or needs some cash? Listen, as long as I've ever been a part of the church, ever, the church has always needed more money. In any church I've ever been to. I've never met a church like, alright, we're good. Just chill out. No. Yes, of course. We're always needing, and we're always wanting to grow, we're always wanting to invest, we're always wanting to steward our finance as well. But this is so much more than that. This is about discipleship, this is about experiencing freedom, this is about participating in the life of the church and what God wants to demonstrate into the world, right? That we are a generous people with our eyes full of light. Okay? Okay, this is my last thought, and then we're gonna we're gonna wrap this, which is not bad. We're only 11 minutes over. Alright. When Jesus was asked one time about taxes, somebody tried to corner him, they tried to, you know, you guys remember this this passage? They tried to ask Jesus about do we pay taxes or not? And this is brilliant. And again, Jesus subverts the entire conversation as he always does. They think they're talking about taxes, and he doesn't he's not even interested in that. And he said, here's what he says to them. You know, they said, should we pay our taxes to Caesar or not? And he said, look at the coin. Whose face, whose image is on the coin? They said, Caesar. And he said, Okay, we'll render to Caesar what's Caesar's, render to God what's God's. No, sometimes we read that and say, all right, well, some money belongs to Caesar, some money belongs to God. But that's not what Jesus is saying. He's saying, listen, the coin that you hold in your hand was minted with an image. If that image is on this coin, then that coin belongs to Caesar. But God's image is minted on something else. Which is what? Us. God's image, you are minted with the image of God. So when he says, give to Caesar what is Caesar's and give to God's what is God's, he's not just saying give God's money and give Caesar to Caesar's money. He's saying, no, give to Caesar the taxes, but your entire life, because you were made in the image of God. Render to God what's God's, that's all of you. Who cares what Caesar gets? God gets all of you. Come on, that's awesome. And so we still limit this conversation. Who cares about the money? God gets all of it. God, you take all of it. This is my son Ash, right here. He's got a sword in his hand right now. He's gonna be a preacher. And so this morning, as we end, can you feel the life? Can you just feel it? Um This is not about convincing, we're not gonna pass around offering buckets and do that thing. We're not doing that, okay? This is about being reminded of the riches inheritance of God. And if if we could end anyway, it's to remind ourselves that we are in the image of God. We've already been recipients of the inheritance. All we have to do is read Ephesians chapter one and so many more. Can I just read a couple over us this morning? If you're just wondered what's already been given to us in God that should satisfy our hearts, it's so much better than the spirit of mammon. It's that we have we are adopted as children, we have both access to one spirit. We have been made into a heavenly man, inheritors of the kingdom of God. We are servants, we are joint heirs with Christ, we are new creations, we are a kingdom of priests, we are sanctified, we're accepted, we are forgiven, we have been made into one body, we have been put into Christ, we have been clothed in righteousness, we've been called friends, we have our names written in the Lamb's Book of Life. We have been given a blessed hope. We've made together to sit with Jesus in heavenly places, we have been given fellowship with the Father, Son, and Spirit. I could keep going, but I think you get the point. Just read the word and then just freak out because that's what we should all be doing. It's freaking out of what's already been given. You cannot, we cannot undo all the riches that have already been given to us in Christ. And may God break us out of our small thinking and our boxes that always make it about this and that and the other and raise us up into a new kind of thinking that sees the world with light in our eyes and gives radically and generously and risky and gives everything and not just our cash, but our time and our talent and our treasure and everything even more than that, and lays it at the feet of Jesus for our joy and for the world's good. Amen. Hey, let's stand together across the room. Yeah, come on. Alright, so um, we're gonna have our ministry team up here in a second. As we end our time together, we're gonna have a ministry team up front. You can come forward and get prayer. If you have things in your body that you need prayer for, if you have anything else you want to talk about, if you want to talk about what a relationship with Jesus looks like, man, this is the time. Do not disregard this moment. So I want to pray for us as we leave, that we're leaving as image bearers, that we're leaving as full inheritors. Come on, just that when we leave, we can read the will one more time. Come on, you just gotta read the will every now and then. And so, God, I bless this body of believers. This is your body, this is your church. And we thank you, Lord God, that you have allowed us, you've invited us to participate in everything that you're doing. And that's just shocking. So, God, as we go, let us go with expanded thinking, let us go in the peace and the strength of the kingdom of God, that we would go with light in our eyes, laying up treasures in heaven, worshiping you, surrender to you, Lord God, for our freedom and for the world's good. We love you, Jesus, and it's in your name. We pray. Amen. Come on.