God's Money and My Faith
Transcript
We are starting our first week in our money series, and we're really excited to be able to spend some time talking together about money. We know that when we talk about money, we can get a little uncomfortable. It's kind of one of those issues you're not really supposed to talk about in our culture. You don't ask somebody how much they make. You don't ask about people's finances. And so we just know that in general, spending some time, we're going to take four weeks out to talk about money and finances and address some of these things that it can make us a little uncomfortable.
So we decided to start, thought it would be helpful today, to start by talking about a concept that the Bible says has a lot to do with how we view finances and how we think about money, but that isn't money directly to kind of ease in this morning. So we're going to kind of start off in one area, and then we'll move into money. You are all going to die. Isn't it nice to talk about something a little bit easier than money kind of transition in? We're all going to die. Like every single one of us, it's very clear.
This is the way the world works. At some point, we will take our last breath. We will buy the farm, kick the bucket, take a dirt nap. Like we're going to die. And the Bible says that our mortality, the fact that we won't be here forever, should have a lot to do with how we view finances. Our mortality should have a lot to do with how we think about possessions and how we think about money.
And so I just wanted to kind of ease in talking about money. We thought we'd address death first. Let's pray. We'll be in Matthew chapter 6 this morning. We'll pray together, and then we'll flip over there. God, we thank you for this time we get to get together and address really important issues.
Nobody in this room is going to live a life not affected by money. No one in this room is going to live a life where money doesn't play a major role in how their life plays out. And so, God, we just want to humbly come to you, come to your scripture, and learn how we ought to see money, view money, understand money. And we pray, Lord, that your Holy Spirit would teach us today as we do that. We love you, and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.
So we'll be in Matthew chapter 6. The page number is on the screen behind me. I believe it's 526, I think. Yep, 526 is where we'll be today. And so here's what we're doing. Today we're mostly going to talk about big picture principles, foundational things for how we approach money.
The next three weeks we'll talk very practically about money. So today we're going to talk about principles. Next week we're going to specifically talk about generosity when it comes to giving money away to other people, to causes and that sort of thing. The following week we're going to talk about tithing and giving to the local church. Like is tithing still something we're supposed to do? Is that an Old Testament concept?
What does giving to the local church mean? How does all that play out? So that's what we'll spend our time on two weeks from now. And then the final week we'll talk about kind of working, spending, and saving. So the Bible's pretty clear that some of your money is meant to terminate on you and should be used for your enjoyment and your pleasure and for looking out for the future.
And so we're going to spend a little time talking about that. So we're really trying to address where is money? How are we supposed to handle money? Where is it supposed to go? And so we're going to talk about giving it away to people in the local church towards mission and then spending it, saving it, buying a steak, seeing a concert, that kind of thing. So, but today we're going to talk specifically about some big picture principles.
And then because we want this to be as helpful as possible, one of the reasons we wanted to do this is we, as a church family, have a lot of new Christians and a lot of people just hanging out and checking out Christianity. And that's a beautiful thing for us. And we just have a lot of questions when it comes to money, when it comes to how do we handle this? What do we do with that? What does this look like? What's the rule is kind of the question a lot we get.
And so we just wanted to address that. We also, over the next three weeks, are going to do some Q&A. So send in your questions to Twitter, Facebook, whatever. We're going to spend some time after each sermon just kind of answering some of those questions as best we can. Also, the Bible has a lot to say about money. Jesus talks about money a lot.
And so we have to talk about it some. To really address it. It's a big deal in your life. And the Bible Acts like it's a big deal. So we want to talk about that.
The one thing I do feel like we need to address, every time a church talks about money or takes time to do a series on money, it feels a little bit like, oh, so y'all need some money? Like it just feels like, oh, y'all hurting? Like, you know, what's going on? And so I just wanted to clearly say, we don't need money. Like we don't need your money right now. We're not in hurting or anything like that.
We're church plants, so we're not rich by any means. We try to do things very cheaply. We try to handle money really well. But we're not hurting for money. The Lord has graciously provided for us. And so this isn't a, hey, light's about to be cut off.
We've got to get kicked out of here. We've got to talk about some money or things are going to turn bad on us real quick. That's not what this is. It really is that we just have a lot of questions. It's an important issue. It's a big issue.
Now, that having been said, I want to be clear. Every time I've hung out and been in a church and they started talking about money and then the pastor said, we don't need your money. We don't want your money. I've always been like, come on. Tell the truth. Like, be real with me.
So I want to be real. I want to be honest. We don't need your money. We're not hurting for it. We want your money. Like, we agree with what we're doing here.
We pay for stuff. We rent things. We pay pastors. Matt and I are able to be full time because people generously give here. We are able to support church plants. We're able to do a lot of things.
And so we like money. It's not evil. We want more of it so we can use more of it for more stuff. For Kid City, for all the stuff we do now, we're starting to get student groups started. So don't hear me say, like, fakely, we don't want money.
No, we want it. It's good. We're going to use it. The more money we get, the more we're going to give away, the more we're going to spend. But that's not what this is about.
And we're not even going to talk about us, like, the church money stuff today. We're going to talk about some big picture principles. So Matthew 6, we're going to start in verse 19. And this is Jesus teaching, and he's going to take in this really short section. He's going to lay out some big picture principles, some foundations for how we ought to view money. 19.
Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy. Where thieves break in and steal. So treasure specifically means possessions, because he's talking about rust and moth and thieves. Like, you know, you can't be like, well, I treasure my children. No, he's talking about possessions. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys and where the 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 and money. Okay, so that's where we're going to spend our time today. And so Jesus says some really clear, really concrete things there. And it's also, though, if you look at the section, it's kind of confusing. Because here's what he does.
He says, don't lay up treasures in heaven. Or don't, don't lay up, do lay up treasures in heaven. Don't lay up treasures on earth. Lay up treasures in heaven. So he's talking about money and possessions.
Then he says something about your eyes and lamps. And if your eye is a lamp and your lamp doesn't work, then you're in the dark. And how dark your darkness is if the lamp is broken. Like, if the light in you is darkness, how dark would that be? Is kind of how he ends it. Then he goes right back into, you can't serve God and money.
So he goes, money, lamp, eye thing, money. And he says this really like, you can't serve God and money. Feels a little bit like this intense, like really drove the point home. And it's like, what were you doing in the middle here with the light stuff? Like, it confuses me. It's a little bit like if you, if you did this on a paper in elementary school, you would make a C.
Like, my mom and I went to the store. I love puppies. Puppies are soft and great. At the store, we bought milk and cereal. Your teacher would circle the middle sentence and be like, what was all that about puppies? What were you doing?
Like, were there puppies at the store? This is not how you write stuff. And so he says money, eyes, money. And so what we have to understand is that the eye section has something to do with money. He hasn't changed the subject. He didn't randomly like, oh, he doesn't have ADD.
It wasn't like, oh, I forgot to tell you this earlier. Now let's talk about money again. Like, it has to do with money. And so here's really simply what I believe he is saying there in that section on eyes. When he says that, the eye is the lamp of the body, and if you don't see well, basically what he's telling us is when it comes to money, it's a vision problem more than anything else. It has to do with how we view money, with how we understand money, with how we see it.
And that the truth is a lot of us are just blind to how big of an effect money has, how actually weighty it is, how much control it has. And we're blind to how we ought to view it. And so that's why he's going to unpack some big principle things here. And really, that's what we're doing today. We're looking at principles, foundational things, so that we can actually know how to do practical things. And that's how life works.
That's how your life works. You have principles that guide how you practice, how you live, what you do. You have a foundational belief set that affects how you live. It affects how you handle money. It affects how you think about relationships, love, and marriage. It affects really everything you do, how you work, what the goal of life is.
You have some big picture principles that affect the practical things. A real easy way to think about this or to explain it is before I ever started dating, I had an understanding of what the principles behind dating, like what the goal was. And so I went in. I had some good principles and some bad principles. One of the good ones I had, one of the things I understood about dating was the point of dating was to get married. Like it was supposed to be fun, but it wasn't just about fun.
Just for the record, if you're dating someone and that's not fun, since dating is about marriage, stop dating that person because marrying someone you don't have fun with would be terrible. Just doing basic math there. But I knew that when I started dating that the goal of dating was marriage, was to find someone to marry. So I went into dating, always asking the question, is this person marriable? And for all the couples in here dating, this just got way more intense, you were like, dude, go back to talking about money. Like, stop this.
But I went into dating relationships knowing that I was looking for someone marriable. And then once I had like a framework for dating, once I had some principles, then I had practical questions. Like, how do I actually get a girl to go on a date with me? Once on that date, how might I get her to kiss my mouth? Like, I had practical questions. Does the wiping away the hair thing work or is that just in movies?
Like, what do we got going here? Like, you have practical questions. And so the next three weeks, we're going to have practical questions we're going to address. But today we're going to handle some big picture principles, foundations for how do we look at money? How do we think about it? And that's what Jesus is talking about.
And the first thing is we don't see money clearly. Money for us, I'm going to just try to quickly say a few ways that we just don't see how big of an effect money has. Money has a lot to do with how you view yourself, what your identity is. So you'll meet people who grew up with not a lot of money and have a lot of weight in, we were poor and we fought through. Like, we didn't have all this stuff. We didn't have, you know, and we fought and we made it work and we, you know, we had family and that's what mattered.
We had our neighborhood and that's what mattered. You'll meet people that had money and that completely changes their worldview. When we use labels like rich and poor, it's an identity label, not an adjective as much as it is like the type of person. And depending on how you land finance wise, it really has a lot to do with who you believe you are. Boils down to money, level of money. And we don't realize that.
For some of us, money just makes decisions for us and we don't even have to, like, we don't think about it. We don't think about the fact that the overarching decision-making process in our life is money. So if a job offers you more money, accept it. Why would you not accept it? It offered you more money. So people will just pick up and move somewhere.
They don't question anything about their family or church family or relate, like, just, oh, it's going to pay more money. And then we'll, like, and this will happen in, like, community groups. Hey, I'm moving here. This place is going to pay me more money. And the whole group just says, sweet, congratulations. And we don't ask the question of, do you realize your only way you decided was money?
College majors. I love history. But you can't make money studying history. So I'm going to do this major. I'm going to go be an orthodontist. Why?
Because of money. Do you like teeth and mouths? Nope. But I like dollar bills. Like, and that's how people make decisions. Job decisions.
Big, life-changing decisions. Not joy. Not giftedness. It's not just money. Where are you going to go? Where are you going to land?
Where are you going to be? How are you going to live? Just money. You're just following the money. We make big life decisions off of it. It affects who we think we are.
It affects how, like, and we just don't even realize it. We don't think about how much money is behind the scenes having control over things. In some ways, money is the Illuminati of our souls. Like, Jesus here says money has a lot more secret control than you think. And we're like, yeah, okay. Like, every time anybody talks to me about the Illuminati, I'm like, sure, okay.
But that's what Jesus is saying. There's a little bit of, like, we don't see it. We don't see how much power it wields. And then at the end, he's going to try to help us see it. So as he goes through this, he's helping us see money clearly.
How we ought to view it. And so that's what we're looking at. We're going to start back up at the top. And we're going to look really at three big principles that Jesus is going to kind of lay out for us. We did get some of our illustrations and some of our thought processes from a book called Treasure Principle by Randy Alcorn. It's a very good book.
It's really short. We suggest it. So once we realize we don't see money correctly, we need to then approach and say, okay, Jesus, how ought we to see money? How ought we view this? And so 19, do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. All right, that's simple enough.
Jesus says the goal on earth is not lay up treasures for yourself. Another way that we're blinded, some of us, our goal on earth is arrive, be comfortable. Just get to the place where I can just have the things I want and rest and not worry. And your whole life goal is a financial goal. It's a money goal. And what he's saying is, no, that's not the goal.
Don't lay up treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But what he's saying is, everything you have will rust, will rot, will eventually end up in a dump. Every Apple watch is going to be garbage at some point. Some of you are like, they already are garbage. Sure. But so is your Samsung Galaxy.
It's going to end up being garbage. Everything, everything you have is going to be garbage. Some of you right now drive a really beater car. At some point, it was really nice. I mean, as nice as a geostorm can be. But it was nice.
It was new, came off the line, you know. And now you drive a beater car and that's where all cars are headed. All of them. Will be junk. Will be a clunker. That's how that works.
And so what Jesus is saying is, don't pile up garbage. That's not a smart thing. And then he says something that's weird. So we understand that. We understand you can't take it with us. The Bible says that clearly in a couple of places.
That's really what he's saying is, all the stuff you have when you die is no longer yours. Like you cannot take it with you. Ecclesiastes 5.15 says, As he came from his mother's womb, he shall go again, naked as he came, and shall take nothing for his toil that he may carry away in his hand. 1 Timothy 6.7 says, For we brought nothing into this world and we cannot take anything out of it. I heard somebody ask John D. Rockefeller's money manager at one point, said, How much money did he leave when he died?
And the money manager said, All of it. And that's how that works. Everything you have, you can't take with you. But then Jesus says something interesting that I think is something we don't really realize. He says the back end. So don't lay up treasures on earth.
We're like, Okay, yeah, I kind of understand that concept. Can't take it with me, although it's probably enjoyable to have it here. You know, I just know that eventually it ends. But he says, But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys, where thieves do not break in and steal. So what he just said was not material things are bad.
Treasure is bad. That's not a Christian belief at all, that material world is bad. Christian belief is that God made the material world and it's very good. There's a reason that bacon is delicious, that riding a roller coaster is fun. Or terrifying for some people. It's still fun.
There's a reason. Like material world, that's why we like soft things and like holding something very well crafted. And when you see a really nice car, you just want to stare at it. Like material world is good. But what he says is, don't put all the weight here.
Seek real treasure. Because the Bible tells us that we were all designed for eternity. And that when we die, we will continue on into eternity. And it's not a ghosty, floaty, feetless, specter eternity. It's real. We have real bodies.
We'll have real things to do. We'll live in real places. We're going to spend eternity on a new earth for Christians. We'll be on a new earth with, he just renews creation. So what he's saying is send it to a place where sin doesn't exist.
Where it's not broken. Where it doesn't rust. Send it to a place where you can actually have it forever. That's why in another place, when he's talking about the same concept, Jesus says, Why would you be, if you can't be trusted with that which is not yours, why would someone give you that which will be yours? Give you real possessions. Give you something to actually own.
What he's saying is, everything you have now is on loan and eventually will no longer be yours. But everything then, you'll keep forever. Because you won't die and it won't rust and moths won't eat it. So what he's saying is, seek the treasure. Just send it on to eternity. You know how, you know how every time you get something new, or you get a box that has something new in it, but it's got wrapping paper around it so you don't know what the new thing is, and your little heart is like, yee.
Like, you know how you get excited about stuff? Like, every time your birthday was rolling around as a kid, or Christmas was coming up, or someone's like, I have a surprise for you. Like, you're just like, ooh, things, treasure, candy. Like, we just get excited. Every time you buy something new, hold a new gadget, like, there's just something in you. There's like an emotional, spiritual reaction to stuff.
Am I the only one who feels this? I feel like everybody has someone inside of them going, yee. Like, that's not true. We have this, and what Jesus is saying is, that is not in and of itself wrong. You're just too easily pleased. You're pointing it at the wrong stuff.
Seek real, eternal treasure. So the first thing we need to know, and if you're taking notes, write this down. I cannot take it with me, but I can send it on ahead. That's the first big principle. I cannot take it with me, but I can send it on ahead. What he is saying is that, and he ultimately says it's through generosity, through giving things away, that we actually get eternal stuff.
Jim Elliott was a missionary, and he's the guy from the movie End of the Spear. If you've seen that, he showed up in a place to help people meet Jesus and immediately was murdered. And he said at one point, wrote in his diary or his journal or whatever. I guess he's a man, so it was a journal. If you were like, nice diary, he'd be like, it's a journal, bro. I don't know him.
Maybe he thought it was a diary. Jim Elliott says this, He is no fool who gives up that which he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose. He is no fool who gives up that which he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose. That's what Jesus is saying. It's not foolish of you to give things away, because you're actually gaining something that will never be taken from you. It's not foolish.
In a lot of ways, money, how we handle money, how we view money is like playing the game Uno. The goal of Uno is to be, you win when you run out of cards. And if the game ends and you're stuck with cards, there's a penalty for that. And the truth is, when we die, all of the stuff we've amassed around us immediately becomes useless. And all of the stuff we got rid of has eternal value. It's forever.
And that's what Jesus is saying. He's just trying to help us understand that we get to have true riches through generosity. So next thing he's going to point out to us. Well. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Verse 21.
Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. We spent some time talking in the Give series about one of the implications of this is that you can actually know what you care about by looking at your checkbook. You can know what you care about by checking out your bank statement. But here's the other thing that I think we miss on this. Our heart goes with our treasure, and so there's a lot of joy offered to us in this statement. There's a lot of joy offered to us in the statement, where your treasure is, there your heart is also.
Because what he's saying is you can take your heart and you can put it in eternity. You can take your heart and you can, by moving your treasure, by giving things away, knowing that you receive rewards in eternity, you can take your heart and move it to eternity where it's safe and secure. So we think that getting nice things is nice. But the truth is, whenever we get nice things, we get more worried about our stuff. Like our heart goes with it. So if you ever had a house and like, really, if someone broke in and stole everything, you were out 50 bucks, you might not even lock your door.
Like you wouldn't even care. I had a friend of mine said, his brother used to say, man, I wish somebody would steal my identity. And then the bill collectors could call them. Like he just didn't have anything, so he wasn't worried about it. And that's the way it works. But when you get a nice house, suddenly it's like, well, I kind of need an alarm system and I need some good insurance and maybe a moat with some crocodiles.
Like I'm really worried about this stuff now. Like if you, if you're, some of you, your car, somebody runs into you today. You're going to lunch with your community group or whatever. Somebody runs into you at a stoplight. You get out and just go. You good?
Ain't worried about it. Like you walk around, look at your bumper. It'll ride. You get back in your car. You don't care. If they totaled your car, you out 600 bucks.
You figure it out. Some of you though, like when you get, you get a nice car. My brother saved up and was able to get in high school. We were able to, he was able to get, my actual parents were able to give it to him. He got a used Camaro and then he spent a lot of time working on it and getting it real nice. And we were riding one day to the beach and he came around a corner because he ran into people all the time.
He came around a corner. His name's Logan. He's part of our church. You can ask him about it later. He came around a corner and ran into a Mustang of another guy who was probably in high school, college or whatever. It was the prettiest car accident I've ever seen.
A Camaro just, I mean, front of the Camaro crush, back of the Mustang crush. Both of them were just like, like little hearts were hurting. They almost got in a fight because the guy in the Mustang, like Logan didn't just run into his Mustang. He ran into his heart. Like something he treasured and valued and cared about. He just ran into it.
Some of you, if your car, like you've got names for your car. If your car got ran into, you'd jump out and be like, Tina. They'd be like, is there a child or something in the car? No, it's my car. Because wherever we move our treasure, our heart goes with it. And there's so much joy offered in sending your heart to eternity.
So much joy offered to you when he says, give it away. You won't worry about it. You won't care about it. And your treasure is secure. Nobody looks at eternity and says, I lost 3% this quarter. You don't have to worry about it.
So he's offering us joy. And that's the second kind of major point that I think is helpful. It's heaven, not earth. And this is for Christians. Heaven, not earth, is my home. And that's where my treasure and heart, I'm saying this wrong.
My treasure and my heart should be there. Heaven, not earth, is my home. And my treasure and my heart should be there. That we actually get to push our hearts towards eternity where we get to rest. You don't have to worry about it through giving things away. We're going to skip the eyes, the lamp part because we kind of talked about that.
Him just explaining that we just don't see this clearly. 24. Kind of the last major principle he's going to cover is, 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. You cannot serve God and money.
And even there he's hinting at how much control money has that we just don't think about. Really what he's saying here is that either you will serve God, And by extension, money that is in your possession will serve God. Or you can serve money. But you can't do both. So if money is the main goal, you're serving it, And you're not serving God.
Don't kid yourself. Or you can serve God, And the money that has been entrusted to you can serve him as well. So, kind of the principle here is this. God owns everything. I am his money manager. Because everything we have is on loan.
So, God owns everything. Let me quickly just show you some verses where the Bible says that. Psalm 24.1 says this, So he actually claimed you too, just so you know. He's like, I own you. You'd be like, no, I'm free. No, you ain't.
Haggai 2.8, The silver is mine and the gold is mine, declares the Lord of hosts. Deuteronomy 8.18, You shall remember the Lord your God, For it is he who gives you the power to get wealth. In Exodus 19.5, it's a longer verse, But in it, God says this, All the earth is mine. So, here's the deal. Everything that passes through our hands, Every bit of money that is in your bank account, In your wallet, Under your mattress, Is God's. It's not yours.
It has been entrusted to you. And as a money manager, You will eventually sit down and settle the account with God. So, a money manager looks like this. So, you're a money manager. You work for a really, really rich lady. Super rich.
And you manage her money, Because you're good with money. So, you watch all of her accounts. She does her thing, Making money or whatever, And then you help handle it. So, you help invest it. You're paying attention to what's growing, What's not growing. You're watching it.
You're investing some. You know, you're diversifying her funds. And you're investing in different areas. And you're, Now, because you're her money manager, You pay yourself a salary. You make sure that you're taken care of. You're going to discuss that with her.
But you're going to pay yourself a salary. You have the ability to handle money. But it's not your money. And every once in a while, You're going to sit down with her and say, Let me show you what I'm doing with it. Let me show you where it is. Let me talk to you about your money.
When excess money comes in, It doesn't go to your account. When you die, You don't leave all her money to your children. That would be frowned upon by her, I think. And what we've got to realize is that everything we have is on loan. And the Bible is clear. Jesus tells a lot of parables to this effect, That at some point, We're going to sit down and give an account.
What's beautiful is that through the cross, It's not going to make or break us. Jesus has already paid for our sin. We get into heaven scot-free because Jesus paid our debt. We are perfectly loved, perfectly taken care of. But we are going to give an account for how we handled the time and the money that we had, The talents that we were given.
Yeah, the Bible is clear on that. So at some point, We're going to sit down with him and give an account. So Jesus very clearly says, And we tried to make it into some principles, And took some of how Randy Alcone words it to help us remember it. But I cannot take it with me, But I can send it on ahead. Heaven, not earth, is my home. My treasure and my heart should be there.
Everything belongs to God or everything is God's. I'm his money manager. That is how we ought to begin to view money. And then we can start answering the other questions. Where can it go? How can I use it?
What's it supposed to look like? The real practical questions, But those are some of the principles. Now, one of the things that Jesus says, And he says it really clearly, Is, Go for the treasure. Go for the reward. Serve and give and be generous, Because you will receive back in eternity. So immediately we say, Alright, time out.
Isn't that selfish? Like if I'm only being nice, And only giving because God's going to pay me back, Aren't I just being selfish? And the answer to that question is no. And the first reason is, It's Jesus' idea. We didn't make it up. So if you made it up, Maybe.
Like if you make something up, It's probably pretty busted. Just for the record, Like question it a little bit. You might have just come up with a pyramid scheme, You know, And involved Jesus. Like I don't know. But Jesus came up with this idea.
And here's, He says it a lot. I'm going to run through quickly. Just places where Jesus mentions this. Earlier in this chapter, In chapter 6, He teaches on giving. He says to do it secretly, So you'll receive a reward from God. He says the same thing about prayer and fasting.
Do it secretly. You'll receive a reward. Luke 12, He says, Sell your possessions, Give to the poor, Buy money bags in eternity, Where treasure does not fail. Luke 6, He says that persecution gains us reward, And that we should celebrate when we're persecuted. That we should actually be excited When someone attacks us because of Christianity. That it gains us, He says you'll have great reward in heaven.
Your reward is great in heaven. It'd be like if I told you I'd give you a million dollars If you let me punch you in the face. When I punch you in the face, You're going to start laughing. That's going to be the most fun. You've ever had being punched in the face. Because you just got a million dollars.
Like you excited. That's what he says. Somebody starts punishing you because you're a Christian. You should be like, This is great. I'm just racking up treasures in heaven. This is amazing.
That's what he says. He says you'll be excited. Luke 6, Love and lend, And your reward will be great in heaven. Matthew 19, Luke 18, He tells a rich man to sell everything And to give it to the poor And that he'll have treasure in heaven. Several of Jesus' parables Have to do with settling accounts And being rewarded With how you handled what he had, How the people handled what the king gave them. Matthew 9 and 10 Says this in both of them.
He says, Even a cup of cold water Given to someone because they're my follower Will not lose its reward. He's keeping track Of cups of cold water. So we all need to set up a free lemonade stand. And just be like, Ka-ching! Like that's what he's saying. Like you will receive reward for this.
And here's why This isn't bad. Here's why it's not selfish. In order to live And to do this radically To the point that the New Testament Is going to call us to, We have to trust Jesus. He comes from eternity And tells us This is how you ought to see it. But in order for us to do it, We actually have to have our faith in him.
We have to trust him. Y'all know Wayne Brady And y'all love him. So, Everybody thinks Wayne Brady's the best, I'm sure. He has a new show, Or had a show. It probably got canceled. I hope it did.
It was kind of terrible. But, Let's Make a Deal. Anybody seen this show? It's weird. But in the show, What they do is, They will give you something So you can have this now, Or, And they constantly are trading.
So they'll be like, You can have a thousand dollars, Or we'll give you What's in this mystery box. And then you're like, Oh, Oh no, What's in the box? Like, But I also want a thousand dollars. And so the whole point is like, Trading, And then they have things called zonks, Which is where you open the box, And the word zonk comes out, And you don't get nothing, Go sit down. That's how the game works. So, What Jesus is saying is, You're playing, Like, Life is us playing, Let's make a deal.
And there's a moped in front of us. And they're like, You can have the moped, Or, You can have what's behind curtain number one. And we're like, That moped looks pretty sweet. How many cc's is that thing? Like, That's what we're doing. And what Jesus is saying is that he's walking out from behind the curtain, And saying, Don't take the moped.
I know what's behind the curtain. Don't take the moped. And in order for us to actually begin to leverage things, Leverage our money, Leverage our finances, View this the way, We have to trust Jesus. We have to have faith to do it. And so it's not wrong, And it's not selfish. It's actually us, Continually pushing more faith, More of our trust into him.
Hebrews 11, Talks about this, Talks about, Some people call it the faith chapter, But it kind of runs through a bunch of Old Testament saints, And it basically says this, This is the point of Hebrews 11. Abraham was told to move, Leave his family, And he's going to go to a land that's not his own, But God's going to give it to him. But God didn't give it to him, He gave it to his descendants. So Abraham, When he dies, Owned none of the land, Except for a cave that he buried his wife in, And he got to be buried in next to her. Isaac, Same thing. He goes through, He says that Moses, Left the palace of Egypt, Where he was treated like a king, Because he believed that the persecution of Christ, Was of more value, Than the pleasures of Egypt, Because he was looking ahead to his reward.
It says that all of these saints, All of these Old Testament followers of God, Trusted that they were invited into a better country. Trusted that they had been given a greater reward. Trusted that, Although their life was terrible now, Although they had given up everything to follow, Although they were consistently not gaining a whole bunch of stuff for themselves. That they had a better reward coming, And that they had faith. Now here's the thing.
We're not going to do this. We're not going to apply any of these principles. Like if we stop here, We're just going to be like, Yep, That's true about money, And I should think about it that way. But we don't really have the ability to do anything with it. Until, Until, Eternity, Is as real to us, As it was to Jesus. Until we see, It as clearly as he saw it.
Then we'll actually begin to be able to leverage some of what we have. Flip over to Hebrews chapter 12. We're going to look at this really quickly. We're going to begin to try to help ourselves see, And know what Jesus is talking about when he says this. You see, Hebrews chapter 11 keeps going. It says that there were prophets who wore sheepskins and goatskins, Who lived in caves and holes in the grounds, Who were persecuted and mistreated.
That the world wasn't worthy of them. That they were stoned. That they were sawn in two. They were put to death by the sword. And that they did this so that they might gain a better resurrection. That they believed through sacrifice, That life would be better in eternity.
Because they trusted God. They trusted him, Took him at his word. And then it goes into chapter 12 and it says this. Therefore, Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses. Talking about all of the people that followed God, Trusting him through sacrifice and pain, Even when it didn't pay off in this life. Let us also lay aside every weight and sin, Which clings so closely.
And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, Looking to Jesus, The founder and perfecter of our faith, Who, For the joy that was set before him, Endured the cross, Despising the shame, And is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him, Who endured from sinners, Such hostility against himself, So that you may not grow weary, Or faint hearted. That we are to fix our eyes on Jesus, And that for the joy that was set before him, He endured the cross. That Jesus could look and see so clearly what was to come. See so clearly the eternity that was to come. See so clearly the new heaven and the new earth, That were going to be created by God.
See so clearly that with joy he went to the cross. That he knew the joy that was set before him, And so he was able to sacrifice, Until we see eternity that clearly. We may be generous, But we won't be generous to the extent that the Bible says. We may view our money sometimes correctly, But we won't be able to approach it the way that the Bible says, The way that Jesus talks about, Until we know and feel and believe, That we have a greater hope. That we have a greater home. That eternity is real and really offered to us through Christ.
Until we look at the cross and see so drastically, Starkly and clearly, That Jesus knew, That an eternal hope and an eternal joy, Was offered through sacrifice. Sacrifice. When we see Jesus that clearly, When we consider him, When we fix our eyes on him, Then we are able to begin, To trust and to believe, And to taste and see, The joy that is set before us. To see what is to come. I love that it says, That they knew they had a better country. That we actually are going somewhere, That is not non-material.
It's better. It's this world, But nothing is broken. Nothing rust. Nothing stolen. Nothing is destroyed. That's why you actually have real possession, Because it lasts forever.
In the Chronicles of Narnia, Written by C.S. Lewis, It's a children's fictional story, But they're great. At the end of the last book, They all go to Aslan's country, Which is God's country, Which is heaven. The new earth. And there's a talking horse, Who says this. He says, I have come home at last.
This is my real country. I belong here. This is the land, I have been looking for all my life, Though I never knew it till now. The reason why we loved the old Narnia, Is that it sometimes, Looked a little like this. And for every believer, Every person who's placed their faith in Jesus, To pay for their sin and their debt, When we enter into the new heaven, When we enter into God's presence, This is what's going to explode in our hearts. I'm home.
This is my real country. This is what I was looking for, Although I never knew it. This is what I was consistently searching for, Every time I chased after something, Although it never clicked. And the reason we liked the old stuff, Was that sometimes, It's a little bit like this. See, God made everything perfect, It was destroyed by sin, And through the cross, And through our resurrection with Jesus, As he rose from the dead, We get to rise from the dead, And we get to enter into, His perfect peace, His perfect creation once again. But there's glimpses of it.
Every time you've been captivated by a night sky, Every time you've seen a sunset, And you just couldn't stare away, You almost wrecked your car, Because it was over to the left. Every, Every time you've had a really good popsicle, On a really hot day, That you had to eat super fast, Because it was about to melt everywhere. Your first taste of coffee, In the morning on a cold day, When it's crisp. When you were wearing your Uggs, And drinking your pumpkin spice latte. That moment, In the morning, When you don't want to get out of bed, Because it's so warm, And you're just like, I could just be here forever.
Like you're laying really thinking, I might just quit my job, And stay here. Every time you've been captivated, By like an infant laughing, I watched a video the other day, Of an infant, Every time the parent took a bite of a potato chip, Just died laughing. And you just watch that over and over again, Just a little kid laughing. Like every time you've been caught off guard, By how beautiful scenery is, Or seen a deer standing in a field, And you just couldn't not stare at it. All of these moments, When you've bit into a really well cooked steak, All of these moments are just hints, Of what's to come.
That God in his good grace, Still lets us enjoy what is here, But it doesn't compare. There's a better country, And a better home, On the other side of a resurrection, For those who follow Jesus. With real, The way the Bible talks about heaven, Is it's a city, It's a banquet, It's a wedding party, It's a celebration, It's real. And until it becomes more real to us than this, We'll forever take the moped. Until we can trust Jesus, And see him so clearly on the cross, We'll take the moped every time. And for most of us, We're chasing after mopeds.
And Jesus is saying, Trust me. I have bought for you a better resurrection. I have given you and granted you a greater home. You will live for eternity. And realize that your money, How you use it here, Will matter then. And when you die, Everything you have, Will no longer be useful.
But what you've pushed towards eternity, Will be yours. Because in my presence, There is no sin, There is no brokenness, There is no rust, And no moths. Markets don't crash. And we get to stare at Jesus, And begin to see, That our eternity is made secure through him, And that that really is our home, Where we'll finally find our real country, Our real home. And the reason why we enjoyed all the stuff here, And what we were forever chasing after here. The band's going to come back up, We're going to sing, And make much of Jesus, And here's what I want us to do, We didn't talk about, What to do with money this week, We talked about how we ought to see money, And really we won't see money that way, Won't be able to view it that way, Won't be able to hold it that way, Until eternity becomes so real to us, Until we realize, That that is actually, Where we will go as Christians, If those who have been bought by Jesus, Rescued and redeemed by Jesus, Through the cross, Where he paid our debt, It says consider him, So that you don't grow weary, Or lose heart, And I would just encourage all of us, As believers this week, If you've trusted Jesus, If you've followed Jesus, If you're a Christian, To sit down at some point, And consider Jesus, To sit down at some point, And know that for joy, That was set before him, He endured the cross, And that he's invited us, Into that joy, And that an eternity is to come, And sit for a while, Carve out some time, And sit, And only try to hold in your head, The sacrifice of Jesus, And the eternity that follows, I find that when I've thought about, Sat and meditated on the cross, And on eternity, It helps change, And put everything into perspective, And that's what we're told to do, Is to consider him, To fix our eyes on him, And so as we go into the next three weeks, We're going to talk about really practical things, Take some time this week, To consider Jesus, To sit and weigh it out, And to think about eternity, Y'all stand, Let's sing, And so as we go into the beginning, мои juices, And so as we go inside, And so as we go into the bow, And so as we go into the down, And so as we go into the spectrum, And so we move into the distance, And gentle thought of actually, And so as we move into the middle of it, And so as we go into the next three days, And so as we go into the direction of theת loc Intelli, And then we show the topic of beautiful, And so as we go into the image, And so as we watch it, And so as we go into the next three days to a sûrinté clip on it,