Here is the manuscript for the fifth and final sermon in the series “Taking the Stew out of Stewardship”. Many people think of stewardship only in terms of offerings for some worthy cause. The principle of stewardship applies to every area of life. Over the past few weeks we have talked about our stewardship of, time, our talents our gifts, thanksgiving, and our bodies. Today I want to talk about stewardship of money. What is your attitude toward money? How do you get money? How do you use it? The answer to these questions makes all the difference in the world.
For an audio recording of the sermon click the YouTube link at the end of this manuscript.
You can see the entire service from December 6, 2020 on the Christ Church YouTube Channel. https://youtu.be/SH0RwALUYuA
Scripture
1 Timothy 6:3-19 ESV If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that accords with godliness, he is puffed up with conceit and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain. But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. But as for you, O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will display at the proper time—he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of Lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen. As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.
Text:
1 Timothy 6:10 ESV For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Introduction
The Advent season started last Sunday and will continue through December 24th. The word 'Advent' comes from Latin and means "coming;" its purpose is to look forward to the coming of Christ to Earth; it was a season that focused on waiting.
Advent season is a time of expectant waiting and preparation for both the celebration of the Nativity of Christ at Christmas and the return of Christ at the Second Coming.
Today I want to finish my series on stewardship by talking about the stewardship of, wait for it……money.
No this is not a sermon about tithes and offerings. I'm going read a scripture that you often hear before offering time, just to get it out of the way, but this is the last time that you will hear it from me today because this sermon is not about that but about our duty to be good stewards or managers of money which really belongs to God anyway. So here's the scripture and then I'll move on.
Malachi 3:8-12 ESV Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In your tithes and contributions. You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the Lord of hosts. Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts.
Now that that's out of the way let's really get into what I want to talk about today.
What is money? One person said, “Money is life transmuted into currency.” Another said “Money speaks all languages, and can always be at work” Still another says that money is “dirty stuff.”, like one Scripture that describes money as “filthy lucre”
1 Timothy 3:8 ASV Deacons in like manner must be grave, not double-tongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre;
Money comes close to ruling the world. This, is perhaps the reason Jesus said;
Matthew 6:24 ESV “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 and money.
There are still others who call money “the sign and symbol of our material possessions.” A well-known psychiatrist contended that “to be normal is nothing to brag about.” and he continued by saying, “Money, pure and simple, is the god of the average normal. Lesser gods are bluff, show, and fake.
We have all heard the slogan, Get the money! or "make that money" I jokingly said that to somebody a couple of days ago.
When we think about it, what in life is more intimate than the money we handle? It represents our labor, our investment of time, talent, and skill, our choice of life’s purposes. The way we spend money represents the real desires of our hearts, the secret motives by which our lives are guided.
The stewardship of money, just like stewardship of our, time, talent, thanksgiving, or body, all things we have talked about in the last month, stewardship of money is a Christian concern.
In 1 Timothy 6, Paul dealt with this matter of money. In verses 6–10, he showed the danger for us in the desire to be rich and he said that “godliness with contentment is great gain”, that was verse 6.
In verses 11–16 he warned Timothy against this danger and pointed him to faith in God as the way out of danger.
In verses 17–19 he gave Timothy a charge to pass on to those who were already rich.
Let us look at the truths about money that are implied by our text.
1 Timothy 6:10 ESV For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Money in itself is amoral, it is neither good or bad.
Our text does not say that money is “a root of all kinds of evil,” but that “the love of money” is. It is our attitude toward, and use of money that cause it to lean one way or the other, toward good or evil. Money is one of God’s gifts to us, but it is hard to possess it without considering it as our own when we should instead realize that we are only stewards. Remember the sermon on stewardship of talents. In that parable that Jesus used the talent was actually money.
Here's a very important point. The very best work is never done for the love of money, but rather for the joy of achievement and the love of God and others.
Someone may write any kind of music for money, but when Handel in tears and prayer wrote the “Hallelujah Chorus,” money was forgotten.
Caiaphas, the high priest for Jesus’ trial might well have been high priest for pay, but Jesus our high priest had no such motive. How much money do we think would buy George Washington to endure the winter at Valley Forge, or a soldier to charge the enemy, or a mother to protect her child from a hail of bullets? For the sake of money men have sometimes done good work, many times devilish work, but for the sake of money no man ever did his best work.
William Carey, who was a missionary in the late 1700s and early 1800s, was reproached by friends for giving so much time to studying and preaching, because they felt that he was neglecting his business as a shoe cobbler. His response to them was; “The gospel is my business. I only cobble shoes to pay expenses.”
In a poem titled “I Am Money,” an unknown poet stated this point exactly.
Dug from the mountainside, washed in the glen, Servant am I, or the Master of men,
Steal me, I curse you, Earn me, I bless you,
Grasp me and hoard me, a fiend shall possess you.
Lie for me, die for me, Covet me, take me,
Angel or devil, I am what you make me.
Money is amoral, but the wrong attitude toward money is immoral.
The “love of money” is self-destructive, self-condemning, and harmful. To covet it, to be greedy and ruthless in pursuit of it, to let our lust for money become the overpowering passion of our lives is morally wrong and self- destructive. In our text and its context, Paul showed us four things.
If the passion for money is the main thing it will lead us astray.
If the passion for money is the main thing it will bring grief and sorrow
If the passion for money is the main thing it may lead to worldly pride.
Faith in the power of the money we possess will prove to be a false faith.
For one thing, to let the passion for money come first in our lives will lead us astray from the faith.
1 Timothy 6:10 ESV For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Nothing can be more depressing or heartbreaking than to see some person or some family who were once faithful to Christ and his church become affluent and prosperous and lose all interest. We’ve all seen this, and it's tragic. I'm good I don't need to pray anymore. I have plenty money I don't need God, I don’t need all that church stuff.
To let the passion for money come first in our lives will be the means of bringing grief and sorrow on ourselves and on others.
1 Timothy 6:10 ESV For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Years ago there was a news story of a seventy-seven-year-old man being found dead, a suicide, in a bedroom of the eighteen-room mansion that had been his family’s home for eighty-seven years. This would not be so remarkable were it not for the fact that his father, a sister, and a brother had preceded him in death in exactly the same way—four members of the same family in the same house. What was the matter with this family? This was an old and famous brewery family in a midwestern city whose “love for money” had led them to traffic in the health and misery of their fellow humans. They had indeed pierced “themselves through with many sorrows.”
Emerson once said, “The worst thing about money is that its costs so much.”
People have paid for their fortunes with every good thing in their lives. They ended up with money, but they had nothing good left. No loving family, no real friends, no peace, nothing but money, and we have heard that "money won’t buy happiness " and it won't or at least real lasting happiness.
The possession of money may lead to worldly pride.
In 1 Timothy 6:17 Paul gave Timothy a warning to pass on to those who are rich;
1 Timothy 6:17 ESV As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.
Paul was not condemning the possession of wealth as such. The great moral questions are how one makes money, how one uses it, and to whom that person considers himself or herself accountable.
Paul warned against being “high-minded”, or haughty. This is false pride. We somehow have the idea that money has the power to buy anything, that everything has its price. But this is not true. Money will buy a bed but not sleep, food but not appetite, finery but not beauty, a house but not a home, medicine but not health, luxuries but not culture, amusements but not a Savior, a church building but not heaven.
Faith in the power of the money we possess will prove to be a false faith.
Paul’s warning was not only against worldly pride but that the believers also not “have their hope set on the uncertainty of riches, but on God.
1 Timothy 6:17 ESV As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.
The pleasure of material things is only temporary at best, and at worst it can be taken from us at anytime.
There is a story of a pastor who went to the home of a successful farmer one Sunday after service. The farmer took him on a tour showing him the beautiful barns; the filled silos; the cattle, horses, and sheep. He challenged the minister about the morning sermon on God’s ownership of all things. “Look at all these buildings and land, these cattle and livestock,” the farmer said; “they are mine, not God’s. I planned and worked for them. Do you still think God owns them?” After a long pause, the preacher asked quietly: “Whose will they be one hundred years from now?”
Yes, whose?
This brings to mind one of Jesus' parables;
Luke 12:16-21 ESV And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”
To grow old, controlled only by money and the desire to increase it, is not success, but a sad and terrible failure. It is better to die poor in finances than impoverished in soul, because Jesus said;
Matthew 5:3 ESV “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
The right attitude toward and use of money is moral.
Because this will please God and bless the world and everybody in it.
The right attitude toward money is not to love it, nor covet it, nor push and shove and cheat and kill in the effort to accumulate large sums of it. Money is an instrument to be used. We should use it as a servant of God, who is the owner anyway, and as a servant of our fellow man or woman.
The right attitude toward and use of money will bless us here and now.
In his farewell address to the Ephesian elders, Paul preserved a beatitude of our Lord’s
Acts 20:35 ESV In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”
Jesus said this when he sent the twelve apostles out into the surrounding communities to minister;
Matthew 10:5-8 ESV These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And proclaim as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay.
Giving, if rightly motivated, becomes an investment in eternal things. Not getting but giving enlarges life. When we give that others may be blessed, we actually recover life.
The right attitude toward and use of money will bless us at the judgement seat of Christ.
We’ve talked about the judgment seat of Christ as the place where believers are rewarded based on how faithfully they served Christ after salvation.
2 Corinthians 5:10 ESV For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.
The New Testament is very clear on this. Jesus said,
Matthew 6:19-21 ESV “Do not lay up for yourselves 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.
In Florence, Italy, an epitaph on a tombstone reads, “Here lies Estrella, who has gone to heaven to enjoy a fortune of fifty thousand florins , which she sent on ahead.”
The Florentine florin was a gold coin that was used from 1252 to 1533. It is difficult to know it's exact purchasing power today but some estimate it between from approximately 140 to 1000 US dollars. So 50,000 florins could have been as little as $7,000,000 or as much as $50,000,000 in other words lots of money. Her tombstone says that she had already stored that up in heaven by what she had done here on earth while alive.
Let’s read Jesus’ words again.
Matthew 6:19-21 ESV “Do not lay up for yourselves 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 right attitude toward and use of money will bless the work of the kingdom of God.
John Wesley had a famous sermon on stewardship that had three points: (1) get all you can, (2) save all you can, and (3) give all you can.
The reality is that everything the church does requires financial backing. If there is going to be a building, there have to be people giving to the building fund. If there is going to be missionaries, there must be people willing to invest money in missions. If there is going to be preaching and ministry there must be money. If there is going to be a distribution of food to needy families, someone must donate time, money, and food for it to happen.
Considering all the things that the church does we can clearly see that without money, it would not be able to function very well. Granted, there are cases in the Bible where God provided manna or sent ravens to feed the prophet, but as a general rule, the principle stands that God’s people contribute financially to the work of God.
Deuteronomy 8:18 ESV You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day.
Conclusion
What is your attitude toward money? How do you get money? How do you use it? The answer to these questions makes all the difference in the world.
This is the second week of Advent and this week the focus is Love. John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life is one of the most well- known and often referenced verses in the New Testament because it clearly explains the message of the gospel.
By believing in Jesus, God's Son,, we receive eternal life instead of the death we as sinners deserve. But it’s important to remember that it is a gift; it can also be refused. Those who do not believe in Jesus will be condemned and receive the just punishment for their sin.
You could receive no better gift this Christmas than the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ. If you haven’t done so already, choose today to put your faith in Jesus. Accept Him as your Savior; confess your sins, and accept His sacrifice on your behalf.
“The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.”
Sermon Audio
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