Stewardship II: Discipleship in Action – the heart of the matter
September 25, 2011
BMC- Matthew 6:19-24 & Luke 12:13-21, 29-34
Introduction: Recap
Those of you who were here last week, will recall that we began this two part stewardship series by reflecting on the tithe. I suggested that it should not be seen so much as a tax, a mandatory amount to be paid because of all that God does for us, nor as a tribute, an expected contribution that we give in order to do our part. Rather, we should approach the tithe as a testimony. It should be a declaration of God’s faithfulness in our lives and of our joy in serving God.
As such, the tithe serves as training wheels for faith in which we learn to give of ourselves. In the process, we train ourselves to give our hearts to God as well. That is where we ended last week, with an invitation to chew on this and prayerfully consider who really has your heart, God or money. And it’s where we are picking up today. Where is your heart?
Last week, I echoed Andy Stanley in suggesting that ultimately God doesn’t want your money. Ultimately God wants your heart, but that our use of money is a part of this process. I believe that we get a sense of this within our Matthew 6 passage for this morning.
Matthew 6
This passage comes in the midst of the Sermon on the Mount. Here Jesus is telling us to store up our treasure in heaven where it is lasting rather than on earth where it will be destroyed or stolen. Now typically, we tend to interpret this in purely spiritual terms, right? We tend to think of this passage as saying, “Don’t focus on stuff in this world because you can’t take it with you.” Instead, focus on God with your time, talents and actions.
Now this is certainly true at one level. Ultimately everything is God’s and you can’t take it with you, and yet Jesus makes a profound and perhaps disturbing shift in verse 21 as I noted last week. “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Perhaps, we could say, “For where your stuff is, there your heart will be also.” In other words, it’s not so much about shifting our attention away from our possessions and instead toward God as it is about shifting our possessions away from ourselves and instead toward God. To do so is good stewardship but it is also a way of training our hearts.
Now ultimately, all of our stuff is God’s and yet God has chosen to entrust it to our care as managers or stewards of God’s stuff. Ultimately then, the way that we use our stuff reflects the state of our heart and our connection to God; or as Jesus put it, where our heart is.
This means that if you don’t know where your stuff is going or if your stuff is mostly focused on you, then your heart is also mostly with you rather than with God. Let’s look at it from God’s vantage point. As Andy Stanley suggests if you entrust your money to an investor, to someone who manages your money, you expect him or her to be concerned with your interests about how that money is used. After all, it’s your money, right; and a steward manages things with the goals of the owner in mind. So if we don’t use the resources that God has entrusted to us in God’s ways, then we are like an investor who does not take the wishes of the owner seriously.
Moreover, if you go to that investor some day and ask where your money is or how it has been allocated, you expect them to know. If they answer, “Well, I’m not really sure. You see, I haven’t really kept track of that.” You’re going to be taking your money and investing it elsewhere, right? Since we are investing God’s money, shouldn’t we have a good accounting of how it is being used as well?
After all, as Andy Stanley suggests, “If you want to know where my heart is, you look at my check register, my American Express bill, my Visa statement. You look at Quicken if you want to see where my heart is.”[1] Because these documents serve as indicators of what our priorities are in life and ultimately where our heart is.
And as scary as that is at one level, it also seems to me to be profoundly true. As much as that challenges me to think more intentionally about how I spend that money, it seems to me that Andy is on to something in suggesting that this is a significant way to monitor where our heart is. It can also be a way for others to speak into our lives, if we will let them.
This matters because Jesus says in verse 24, “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” This puts things into pretty stark terms. It seems to me that Jesus is saying that ultimately when we focus too much on money being our own, it becomes our master. It is where our heart is, but when we strive to turn our money, our stuff, over to God and place it where it rightly belongs then we declare God as our true master.
That’s why, while I think that Dave Ramsey has some deeply practical and helpful suggestions about Christian financial practices, I also take issue with one of his primary premises. Dave Ramsey repeatedly says, “Live like no one else so that you can LIVE like no one else.” Now in and of itself, this not such a bad thing and interpreted correctly, we might even be able to embrace it ourselves. But when I listen to what Dave Ramsey really means by this, I bristle a little bit.
When Dave Ramsey says, “Live like no one else so that we can LIVE like no one else,” I hear him to mean that we should make intentional faith based choices about how we use our money now. We should live like no one else in our culture of consumerism. And I’m with him up to that point.
But then I hear him to be saying that the point of doing this is so that we can “LIVE like no one else” as in better than everyone else, at a higher standard of living. If we live like no one else, we won’t have the financial burdens that others do and will then be able to use more of our resources for ourselves. I believe that the purpose should be to use those freed up resources for God, but that’s not what I hear Dave Ramsey saying. He is saying that it’s so that we can live freely enough to be able to do whatever we want with the money that we have because we are not saddled with debt.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I agree that debt is running rampant and that many of us have gotten caught up in that at one time or another for one reason or another. And I agree that we should do all that we can to get out of harmful debt and to avoid being in debt. And to be fair, Dave Ramsey would suggest that we should give a portion of our resources back to God.
But then, in the materials that I have seen from him, he seems to suggest that once we are debt free and we have given a portion of what we have back to God, that we are free to do whatever we like with what is left. I don’t buy that. That’s not to say that we should be legalistic or judgmental about how we use the remaining resources. And it is not to say that I have this down or that I am the perfect model in this. I’m not, but I believe that what we do with our remaining resources does still matter.
What we do with our remaining resources is a statement of where our heart is and ultimately is part of our discipleship in action. Where as Dave Ramsey seems to make what we do with what is left after giving some away and saving a little to be mostly about us, I believe that it should still ultimately be about God. That is the sense that I get in looking at our Luke 12 passage for this morning, anyway.
Luke 12
In Luke 12, we have the parable of the rich fool. Someone asked Jesus to tell his brother to divide the inheritance with him. Now first of all in the way of an aside, note what Jesus does here. For those who know family systems theory, Jesus resists being triangled into this disagreement. He self differentiates and puts it back to the brother. In Matthew 18 terms, he tells the brother to work it out with his brother himself first.
But from there, Jesus names an inherent danger in this request. It shouldn’t be about money. It should be about relationship. Jesus tells us to watch out for greed. “Life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” That’s certainly not what our culture tells us, right? And often times though we logically know it to be true, the way that we live our lives in regard to stuff implies that we really don’t get it. Often times, all of the stuff that we have and our attempts to gain more stuff suggests that in reality we do think that life consists of an abundance of possessions.
That’s what George Carlin seems to suggest when he talks about stuff. “George Carlin was a comedian known for his irreverent comedy and also his distaste for religion… Carlin had composed a comic routine to poke fun at American’s propensity to collect more and more stuff.” It seems to me that there is a lot of truth in this about how we approach stuff. He says,
“[We all need a little place for our stuff], ya know? That's all, a little place for my stuff. That's all I want, that's all you need in life, is a little place for your stuff, ya know? I can see it on your table; everybody’s got a little place for their stuff. This is my stuff, that's your stuff, that'll be his stuff over there. That's all you need in life, a little place for your stuff. That's all your house is: a place to keep your stuff. If you didn't have so much stuff, you wouldn't need a house. You could just walk around all the time.
“A house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it. You can see that when you're taking off in an airplane. You look down, you see everybody's got a little pile of stuff. All the little piles of stuff. And when you leave your house, you gotta lock it up. Wouldn't want somebody to come by and take some of your stuff. They always take the good stuff. They never bother with that [junk] you're saving. All they want is the shiny stuff. That's what your house is, a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get...more stuff!
“Sometimes you gotta move, gotta get a bigger house. Why? No room for your stuff anymore. And maybe put some of your stuff in storage. Imagine that. There is a whole industry based on keeping an eye on your stuff! [Or sometimes we have yard sales and garage sales to get rid of our stuff so we can buy more stuff]
“Did you ever notice when you go to somebody else's house, you never quite feel a hundred percent at home? You know why? No room for your stuff. Somebody else's stuff is all over the place! And if you stay overnight, unexpectedly, they give you a little bedroom to sleep in. Bedroom they haven't used in about eleven years. Someone died in it, eleven years ago. And they haven't moved any of his stuff! Right next to the bed there's usually a dresser or a bureau of some kind, and there's NO ROOM for your stuff on it. Somebody else's stuff is on the dresser.
“Sometimes you leave your house to go on vacation. And you gotta take some of your stuff with you. Gotta take about two big suitcases full of stuff, when you go on vacation. Plus your carryon stuff, plus the stuff in your pockets. You gotta take a smaller version of your house. It's the second version of your stuff. And you're gonna fly all the way to Honolulu. Gonna go across the continent, across half an ocean to Honolulu. You get down to the hotel room in Honolulu and you open up your suitcase and you put away all your stuff. "Here's a place here, put a little bit of stuff there, put some stuff here, put some stuff--you put your stuff there, I'll put some stuff--here's another place for stuff, look at this, I'll put some stuff here..." And even though you're far away from home, you start to get used to it, you start to feel okay, because after all, you do have some of your stuff with you. That's when your friend calls up from Maui, and says, "Hey, why don'tchya come over to Maui for the weekend and spend a couple of nights over here."
“Oh, no! Now what do I pack? Right, you've gotta pack an even SMALLER version of your stuff. The third version of your house. Just enough stuff to take to Maui for a coupla days. You get over to Maui--I mean you're really getting extended now, when you think about it. You got stuff ALL the over the world. Stuff at home, stuff in storage, stuff on Honalulu, you got stuff on another island, you got stuff in your pockets. I mean, supply lines are getting longer and harder to maintain. You get over to your friend's house on Maui and he gives you a little place to sleep, a little bed right next to his windowsill or something. You put some of your stuff up there. You got your Visine, you got your nail clippers, and you put everything up. It takes about an hour and a half, but after a while you finally feel okay, say, "All right, I got my nail clippers, I must be okay." That's when your friend says, "Aaaaay, I think tonight we'll go over the other side of the island, visit a pal of mine and maybe stay over."
“Aww, no. NOW what do you pack?”[2] Having stuff affects us and can become our focus.
But Jesus says, “Life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” Jesus then tells of a rich farmer that yielded an abundant crop and instead of asking what God might have for him to do with that additional crop, he decided to build additional barn space to store the crop for himself. And he admits that the reason for him to do this is out of a selfish desire to “take life easy, drink and be merry.” He thought that all that he had was really about him and his enjoyment.
God’s response was to say, “You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?” Now at this point in the story, Jesus’ original audience was likely very confused. They lived in a culture in which having a lot of stuff suggested being blessed by God and yet Jesus said that God called him a fool.
Why is he a fool? He is a fool because he does not understand why he has the extra. It’s not because he is rich. It’s because he doesn’t understand why he has so much extra. He thought it was all for his current consumption or his future consumption. It’s not. It’s for the blessing of others which is made obvious by the fact that he has so little time left to live.
Then Jesus does some interpretation to say, “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.” And we may hear an echo of where your treasure is, there your heart will be as well. When we store up things for ourselves, Jesus says that we are not rich toward God. He says that our heart is not with God when we treat our stuff like it is really for us.
Then later in the verse we hear echoes of the Matthew passage for this morning. In verses 29-34 we read, “And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
We should not set our hearts on things of this world like the pagans, like those who do not know God; but rather on God’s kingdom. We do so knowing that God will provide everything else that we need. Our treasure should be in heaven where it is safe and then our heart will be there as well.
By selling some of our possessions and giving some of our extra to the poor, as Jesus suggests, we move our hearts toward heaven. As Andy Stanley suggests, somehow in God’s economy, using our extra, giving of the resources of what God has entrusted for us becomes treasure in heaven. When we have more than we need and give to those that are in need, we turn our hearts over to God. When I am rich toward people that are important to God, I am rich toward God.[3]
Getting There
I’m guessing this morning, that the majority of us when asked would say that we desire to give our hearts entirely to God. If you also accept this scriptural precept that doing so is connected directly to how we view and use our money, you may be wondering at this point, “But how do I get there?”
Certainly a part of this is as simple as taking baby steps related to your finances in how you view them and what you do with them. From there, I think we tend to assume that the rest comes down primarily to education. We often think, “if we can just better understand what God wants us to do, we will be able to do it.” I’m sure that there is something to that; and on Saturday, November 19th, First Mennonite in Bluffton will host an Everence Stewardship University in which we can learn more.
Beth and I attended one of these while in Harrisonburg and found it to be very helpful. This one will include workshops on “Living with ‘enough,’” “Investing Can Glorify God” and “Do Your Future a Favor,” to name a few. There is more information about this on the bulletin board in the foyer.
Stewardship Education is good and yet while I was at the Annual Conference Assembly for Ohio Conference in March, I attended a workshop that Everence presented and was struck by what the presenter shared. He suggested that when it comes to “Stewardship Challenges: We tend to think that the solution to stewardship is education. We lose focus because we tend to think the goal is having a congregation full of committed donors.” Instead, they used a study to suggest that in reality, growth in stewardship was a direct outpouring of discipleship practices more broadly.
They found that people who were more involved in congregational discipleship also gave more of their financial resources. They offered six categories of discipleship as a base line for their study. They included
- attended worship at least Sunday 3x’s per month,
- prayed privately at least every day,
- participated in congregational fellowship by attending church events 3 hrs/month,
- were involved in service by volunteering at church 3 hrs/month,
- studied with personal devotions daily and
- gave 10% before taxes or more.
The results showed that church goers 30-49 who took 2 steps of the six, gave $1,368/year. Those church goers who took 5 steps of the six, gave $3,604/year. And those church goers who took all 6 steps, gave $4,650/year. This means that if we want people to grow in their stewardship, we need to encourage them to take more of these steps of discipleship. This makes sense to me when I remember that that this is all really about transformation.
Head knowledge is good and yet it only goes so far. We can only do so much by our own power. If we seek true transformation and if we truly desire to give our hearts fully to God, it requires seeking God’s presence in our lives. This happens in part through many spiritual disciplines and the cumulative affect of these disciplines inherently develops other areas of our faith as well.
Conclusion: For God so loved…
In the end, this should not be perceived as me coming with all of the answers, because I have a lot to learn about this myself. It is also not a judgment upon money and those who have it because we all have it and on a global scale, we are all relatively rich. Rather it is an invitation to seriously consider the money that God has blessed you with and how you are called to use it primarily for God’s purposes rather than our own.
The scriptures are clear that where our treasure is, there our heart is also. God wants our hearts and the choices that we make in regard to how we use God’s finances are an indicator of where our hearts really are. Are they really with God or are they really with us. Stewardship is a matter of the heart and the practice of stewardship is discipleship in action.
God calls us to faithful stewardship out of God’s love for us. “God doesn’t want something from you. He wants something for you. We know this from God sending Jesus. [The Gospel of] John doesn’t tell us, “For God so wanted something from you that he sent his only son.”[4] No, it’s “for God so loved the world that he sent his only son.”
“When you come to a place of saying that I want to honor God with everything and all of it. There is a freedom and a peace that comes that is overwhelming.”[5] There is a release from the bondage of our stuff and a freedom to live more fully into God’s kingdom. May we turn our hearts toward God and grow in our understanding and practice of stewardship.
Amen.
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