SPEAKER_01: Thanks for checking out this podcast from Carterville Christian Church.
SPEAKER_01: We're so glad you're here.
SPEAKER_01: Our hope is that through these messages you'll grow deeper in your faith and experience the life-changing hope of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Now let's jump into this week's teaching.
SPEAKER_00: What an awesome opportunity we have.
SPEAKER_00: And just to spend some time in prayer for the Lord, to the Lord asking him to invade this year.
SPEAKER_00: He's already ahead of us.
SPEAKER_00: He's already moving and working.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know where you are, where you are coming into this coming into this school year.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's mixed emotions as you send a kid off for the first time to school, or as you, as you send a kid off to a different school building, or as you get get ready for another year, buckling up as a school employee, whatever the case may be, wherever you are, and whatever changes might be ahead.
SPEAKER_00: We know the Lord is going with us and that he's faithful to provide no matter what situation we find ourselves in.
SPEAKER_00: What an awesome opportunity we have as a church, too, in the next couple weeks as hundreds of students and volunteers start flooding this room and this building on Wednesday nights.
SPEAKER_00: What an awesome opportunity we have to extend the love of the Father to people who desperately need it.
SPEAKER_00: And what an awesome opportunity we have as a church.
SPEAKER_00: I hope praying that we as a church will see those opportunities and seize those opportunities as they come this year.
SPEAKER_00: Continuing this as we kind of look at uh different teachings of Jesus as he addresses the issues of our money and our finances, and we're kind of picking up where we left off last week.
SPEAKER_00: Last week we talked about how uh we are stewards of what God has entrusted us with.
SPEAKER_00: That ultimately God is the owner of everything and that we are his stewards.
SPEAKER_00: We are the ones that are his money managers, so to speak.
SPEAKER_00: We're the ones that are given his stuff to then manage on his behalf.
SPEAKER_00: And we are expected, as those of us who are in Christ, are expected to be faithful with what with what has been entrusted to us.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we talked about this last week.
SPEAKER_00: And so today, what I want to do is kind of get really more specific and kind of practical and talk about, because one of the ways that we faithfully steward what has been given to us is through our giving.
SPEAKER_00: It's straight up, just through our giving.
SPEAKER_00: And we've said it here before that we really believe that this practice of giving is actually a gift from God.
SPEAKER_00: It's something that God has established for us, a rhythm that God has established for his people, that is actually meant to help his people, that is meant to be good for his people.
SPEAKER_00: Because he knows ultimately what we know, right, is that giving, it focuses in on what is of ultimate value.
SPEAKER_00: And giving like helps loosen our grip from the things of this world that maybe we're holding too tight on, and instead cling to Christ and find true joy and contentment in him.
SPEAKER_00: Giving makes us flex the muscle of trust and invites the Spirit to bring peace into our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And giving sets our hearts right on the issue of ownership.
SPEAKER_00: Through through the practice of giving, we are reminded that everything we have is God's.
SPEAKER_00: Kind of was you know opposed to this whole church thing, whole Jesus thing, but his son and their and his family had started coming to church, so he started engaging in church or at least showing up to church, you know, and um, but wasn't really interested in the whole Jesus thing, but he loved old cars, and Luke was like, Well, I love old cars.
SPEAKER_00: So Luke just started going over to his house and sitting on his back porch once a month or a couple times a month and just talking about the cars that he's you know refurbishing, that he's putting back together, all this, all this kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And they talked and he did this, went on for months, and then eventually the conversations went from old cars to his relationship with Jesus and who he could find his trust in.
SPEAKER_00: Eventually, this man surrendered his life to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: It was actually pretty incredible.
SPEAKER_00: Luke got to baptize him and his oldest son in their bathtub at their house.
SPEAKER_00: Um, Luke said that uh directly, well, not directly, just a few months after that, this old man ended up passing away.
SPEAKER_00: He passed away.
SPEAKER_00: And so Luke's following up with his oldest son, the one that he had baptized in the in the bathtub as well, and and just asking him how he's doing, you know, catching up with him.
SPEAKER_00: And in the midst of this conversation, his his son just looks at him and says, Hey, so did dad tell you about the money?
SPEAKER_00: And Luke's like, I don't, I have no idea what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_00: What are you talking about?
SPEAKER_00: And this this son began to explain that his dad had had us had a procedure done at a major hospital in the city they need they live nearby, and and it had actually gone terribly wrong.
SPEAKER_00: And this man is a hard businessman, so he took that hospital to court and he won a settlement.
SPEAKER_00: And as a result, he he won a settlement, got this huge amount of money, I don't know what it was, but got this huge amount of money in the late 80s, and and he uh then turned and didn't need any of this money.
SPEAKER_00: He was a successful businessman, didn't need any of it, and he turned and invested all of that into a little startup company called Apple in the 1980s, and didn't believe in capital gains tax, didn't think Uncle Sam should have any part of what I'm what I'm taking in.
SPEAKER_00: So he left it and all came to his son, his son, who now was a believer for about four months at this time, and his son looks at Luke, my my buddy, and just says, What does God want me to do with all this money?
SPEAKER_00: And you know, I think that's a that's a good question for believers to regularly ask.
SPEAKER_00: And what does God want me to do with this?
SPEAKER_00: What does God expect me to do with this?
SPEAKER_00: You know, a study show that if you make$34,000, if your household makes$34,000 a year, then you are in the top 1% of earners worldwide.
SPEAKER_00: What does God want you to do with all your money?
SPEAKER_00: What does God expect you to do with what you have received?
SPEAKER_00: I think like we've heard this, heard this question before.
SPEAKER_00: Like, a good question to ask is, God, how do you want me to use my money?
SPEAKER_00: But a better question to ask is, God, how do you want me to use all your money?
SPEAKER_00: Because that's what we talked about this last week.
SPEAKER_00: It's it's all his.
SPEAKER_00: And I wonder what kind of difference, what kind of impact the church would have in the world if every single person who claims Christ would live with this attitude, with this question in mind.
SPEAKER_00: God, how do you want me to use all your money?
SPEAKER_00: We're able to ask that question when we remember ultimately that it is God who is the owner of all.
SPEAKER_00: It's we are his stewards.
SPEAKER_00: And so if the expectation for us is, for those of us who belong to Christ, is to steward well what we have received, then the good question for us to ask this morning that I want us to kind of dive into this morning is well, how what does he expect me to give then?
SPEAKER_00: Like what is Jesus really expecting of me to give?
SPEAKER_00: And so that's what we want to explore today, is what Jesus has to say specifically about what we give back to the Lord out of what he has freely given us.
SPEAKER_00: And what we're gonna do, we're actually gonna start in Matthew 23.
SPEAKER_00: If you got your Bibles, open up to Matthew 23, it's where we're gonna start.
SPEAKER_00: But in my study this week, what's what's interesting is that it seems to be that Jesus has a lot more to say about, hey, what not to do when it comes to your giving than he does sometimes about what to do, about our giving back to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: So I want to look at several different texts in Matthew and Mark to look at what he's what he's gonna say.
SPEAKER_00: But I want to start with this kind of this question: like, what kind of giving does Jesus condemn?
SPEAKER_00: What kind of giving does Jesus say, yeah, don't do that?
SPEAKER_00: And that's the first one is just simply this it's giving with your eyes closed.
SPEAKER_00: That's the that's the first kind of giving that Jesus condemns.
SPEAKER_00: Look at with me in Matthew 23, starting in verse 23.
SPEAKER_00: Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites, for you tithe, mint, and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: These you ought to have done without neglecting the others, you blind guides, straining out a nap and swallowing a camel.
SPEAKER_00: So happy back to school Sunday, everybody.
SPEAKER_00: Glad you're here, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Like this is a pretty, like just gonna step right on your throat, kind of a passage here, you know.
SPEAKER_00: This is the first kind of giving that Jesus condemns.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, warning, don't just do all of the religious things and miss the point completely.
SPEAKER_00: I think that's what Jesus is getting at here.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing we do a lot of religious kinds of things here at Cardiffville Christian Church.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if this is the first time you've been with us.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've been coming for 40 years, but the whole point is we do a lot of religious things here.
SPEAKER_00: We've already done several of them this morning.
SPEAKER_00: You know, several of them this morning.
SPEAKER_00: We we stood together and we sang worship songs to our God who's worthy of our worship.
SPEAKER_00: That's a good thing to do.
SPEAKER_00: And we we spent an extended amount of time in prayer just a second ago.
SPEAKER_00: That's a good thing to do.
SPEAKER_00: It's a religious thing to do.
SPEAKER_00: We we spent time remembering the Lord's sacrifice and went to the tables and took the items of communion.
SPEAKER_00: Man, that's that's a good thing for us to do, but we miss the point when all these things become a checklist of what determines how good of a Christian we are or not.
SPEAKER_00: I think that's kind of where the where the Pharisees are here.
SPEAKER_00: Like, so sometimes we can just get into this mindset, like that our our walk with the Lord is just a checklist of things that we have to do.
SPEAKER_00: Let me let me check this off and be on his good side.
SPEAKER_00: So I went to church, I served in my monthly rotation, I read my Bible, I went to my life group, I gave my tithe.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes our checklists can just make us blind to the person next to us.
SPEAKER_00: I think that's what Jesus is getting at in Matthew 23.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he keeps harping on the Pharisees and these seven woes to the Pharisees in Matthew 23.
SPEAKER_00: Like you can see this language throughout.
SPEAKER_00: He says, these Pharisees, they preach at you, but they don't practice what they preach.
SPEAKER_00: They put burdens on the shoulders of the people, but they don't lift a finger to help carry them.
SPEAKER_00: They shut the door to heaven in people's faces.
SPEAKER_00: They wash the outside of the cups, but the inside are filthy.
SPEAKER_00: They're like whitewashed tombs, outwardly beautiful and inwardly rotting away with death and decay.
SPEAKER_00: They're blind to those around them.
SPEAKER_00: And as a result, they're missing the heart of God completely.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus says, Hey, your giving is pointless if you're missing the bigger issues that I care about.
SPEAKER_00: Like your giving is worthless if you're still missing out what my heart is actually beating for.
SPEAKER_00: And in specifically in our text, in mercy and justice and faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see the lengths that the Pharisees are going to here?
SPEAKER_00: He says, Woe to you, Pharisees, for you tithe mint and dill and cumen.
SPEAKER_00: Like literally, they're they're measuring out herbs in their gardens to tithe back to the Lord on them.
SPEAKER_00: And they're doing this in a self-righteous kind of way.
SPEAKER_00: Like I'm being gonna be so nitpicky with these little things right here.
SPEAKER_00: It's almost like outrageous the kind of kind of links they're going to to show their religious superiority, that they had all things in order, they, but they were missing the bigger issue.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing the little things in the eyes of God are often the most visible things in the world.
SPEAKER_00: Like the little things that we that we do are often the are often the things that like gain the most attention, and it's some of the weightier issues that the Lord really cares about that are often done where nobody else is gonna see it.
SPEAKER_00: Where like where it's really just you and God and your heart is completely revealed to him of what your real motives are.
SPEAKER_00: And this is a warning to the Pharisees, but it's a warning for us, right here, the kind of giving that Jesus condemns.
SPEAKER_00: As we give to the Lord, are we so focused on the deed of giving itself that we are actually blind to the heart of God altogether?
SPEAKER_00: Are we just so focused on our religious deeds that we miss our neighbor?
SPEAKER_00: Are we giving to God, but have you closed your eyes to those around you at the same time?
SPEAKER_00: So this is what Jesus condemns right here.
SPEAKER_00: Is don't just give for the sake of giving.
SPEAKER_00: Give and make sure your eyes are open to the people around you, to the needs around you.
SPEAKER_00: Make sure your eyes are open to the bigger, weightier issues of what I'm what I'm really here for.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus also condemns another type of giving.
SPEAKER_00: Turn with me to Matthew 6, if you got your Bibles.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew 6, starting in verse 1, this is what he says Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others.
SPEAKER_00: Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.
SPEAKER_00: But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you.
SPEAKER_00: This is the warning Jesus gives.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, don't don't pr don't be like those who practice righteousness to get attention.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe, maybe the issue that that we come to here is not like an issue of being blind to our neighbor, but maybe the issue instead is a temptation to do all this all this good to be seen by others, to get the recognition of others.
SPEAKER_00: And for so many of us in this room, this can be a natural temptation.
SPEAKER_00: Like this is this is a natural for some of us to seek recognition for what we have done.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's natural for my kids to try to seek recognition for what they have done.
SPEAKER_00: Like they they want me to have, like they want to get my attention for different things.
SPEAKER_00: But specifically, there's an example, my our youngest daughter, Ivy, has been doing this a lot recently, you know, and it's more of like as we start getting on to our other kids, Ivu, Ivy will gently remind us of how good of a girl she is, you know?
SPEAKER_00: That's what she'll do.
SPEAKER_00: So as we're getting on to one of her siblings about being unkind or about, hey, not listening and obeying the very first time whenever we've told them, or not like just sitting down in your chair at the dinner table and eating the food that's in front of you.
SPEAKER_00: She'll like let us let us finish our discipline with that child, and then she'll just look at look at me and say, Daddy, I I sit, I sit and listen, don't I?
SPEAKER_00: You know, like I listen and obey, don't I, Daddy?
SPEAKER_00: You know, I eat my food whenever you tell me to eat my food.
SPEAKER_00: It's like, well, actually, you don't, you know, that's not that's not the case.
SPEAKER_00: But she's like, or I would have obeyed you when you asked me to do that, Daddy.
SPEAKER_00: I I would listen to you.
SPEAKER_00: And like you can see what Jesus is saying here, right?
SPEAKER_00: In this passage, the hypocrites, they they sound the trumpet in the synagogues in the streets.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, this is a pretty regular thing in Jesus' day.
SPEAKER_00: It's that when alms giving was was brought so that the poor could could be taken care of, like a trumpet was sounded whenever somebody would bring a big gift so that it could be then distributed to those that were in need.
SPEAKER_00: But what Jesus is condemning is, hey, you're throwing in this alms giving, and then you're standing there saying, Hey, I'm the one who's providing for all of you that are coming to collect it.
SPEAKER_00: And he's saying, This is this is all backward here.
SPEAKER_00: Like the hypocrites sound the trumpet in the synagogues in the streets so they may receive recognition for what they are giving.
SPEAKER_00: They're saying, Look at me, I'm obeying you, I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, I have my priorities in order.
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting, actually, this is in the middle, I don't know if you caught this, this is in Matthew 6, this is right in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount.
SPEAKER_00: And it's interesting, one commentator pointed out, I thought this was this was something I've never noticed before, how Matthew ends chapter 5.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 5 comes through this long exhortation.
SPEAKER_00: You know, you've heard that it was said to the people long ago, but I tell you.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus, throughout the whole time, is just taking it a step deeper, taking it to our heart.
SPEAKER_00: He ends that whole that whole section in Matthew chapter five with this, with this phrase, be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.
SPEAKER_00: And then it's just a really bad chapter break right there.
SPEAKER_00: Like it's a really bad chapter break because he says, Hey, be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.
SPEAKER_00: And then chapter six begins with, Hey, be careful not to practice your righteousness so that others may see you.
SPEAKER_00: Like for the for the recognition of others.
SPEAKER_00: Be perfect and be careful.
SPEAKER_00: So this is maybe this is an instruction that some of us in this room need.
SPEAKER_00: By all means, like strive for Christ's likeness.
SPEAKER_00: By all means, continue to grow.
SPEAKER_00: We all need to grow, continue to be shaped into the image of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We all need to continue growing in this way, but let it not be motivated by the praise of men, by the fickle praise of men.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus' instruction instead is hey, let your giving be done in secret, as an act of worship to the only one who's worthy of it.
SPEAKER_00: Like that's who you're giving back to.
SPEAKER_00: It's an act of worship to the God who sees it and who sees you, and he will reward you.
SPEAKER_00: Has your giving becomes something that is done with a puffed up chest?
SPEAKER_00: With a chest that's puffed, looking for the recognition of your good deeds.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus condemns this kind of giving.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus also condemns one other kind of kind of giving in Mark 12.
SPEAKER_00: If you got your Bibles, turn over to Mark 12.
SPEAKER_00: It's an interesting little interaction here.
SPEAKER_00: Mark 12, starting in verse 13.
SPEAKER_00: And they sent to him some of the Pharisees and some of the Herodians to trap him in his talk, to snare him in his talk.
SPEAKER_00: They came and said to him, Teacher, we know that you are true, and you do not care about anyone's opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances, but truly teach the way of God.
SPEAKER_00: Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?
SPEAKER_00: Should we pay them or should we not?
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus, knowing their hypocrisy, he said to them, Why put me to the test?
SPEAKER_00: Bring me a denarius, and let me look at it.
SPEAKER_00: And they brought one, and he said to them, Whose likeness and inscription is this?
SPEAKER_00: And they said to him, Caesar's.
SPEAKER_00: And Caesar said, or Jesus said to them, Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.
SPEAKER_00: And they marveled at him.
SPEAKER_00: This is an interesting interaction right here.
SPEAKER_00: This is the final week of Jesus' life that we're that we're zooming in on right here.
SPEAKER_00: And what's interesting is that it says that the Pharisees and the Herodians both came to Jesus at the same time.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is an interesting pairing because these two wouldn't, these two groups wouldn't normally intermingle.
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees are, you know, the Jewest of the Jews, you know, like they're like the true blue Jews, you know, trying, and they're and they're so opposed to Roman oppression that they would have actually resented paying taxes to their oppressors, the Romans, and actually probably would have resisted it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe not in a zealous way, maybe not outright in a in a physical or violent way, but they would have definitely been opposed to paying taxes to Caesar.
SPEAKER_00: The Herodians, on the other side, were all for it.
SPEAKER_00: They were like, well, yeah, we should fall in line.
SPEAKER_00: This makes sense.
SPEAKER_00: Like, Rome is doing a good job of being our superiors here, and specifically Herod's family seems to be the ones that have got it together.
SPEAKER_00: So they're in line with this.
SPEAKER_00: So there's a lose-lose situation that Jesus is experiencing here, because in the midst of the Pharisees and the Herodians is the crowd of all the people listening to him.
SPEAKER_00: And so if he just simply says yes, it would make him a traitor to the people.
SPEAKER_00: They'd be like, yeah, he's not the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: Like, what kind of Messiah would condone us paying taxes back to Caesar?
SPEAKER_00: Like, who would who would say that we need to give money back to our oppressors?
SPEAKER_00: He's supposed to free us from this oppression.
SPEAKER_00: And if he was to say no, then it would make him a revolutionary that then needs to be dealt with and tried for treason.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus sees it right through their hypocrisy, right through this whole idea, they they come up and try to snare him, try to trap him in his words.
SPEAKER_00: It's never a good idea.
SPEAKER_00: And he sees through their hypocrisy and their evil intent, and he calls them on it, and he says, Hey, why don't you just go ahead and give me, give me a denarius?
SPEAKER_00: And there's something to be said that Jesus isn't dependent on this.
SPEAKER_00: Like he doesn't have one in his pocket.
SPEAKER_00: None of his disciples like have one right there.
SPEAKER_00: It says the Pharisees and the Herodians are the ones that bring him this denarius.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, Bring it to me.
SPEAKER_00: And he then he just makes an interesting comparison in this text.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Whose image is on this inscription?
SPEAKER_00: And they simply say, Caesar's.
SPEAKER_00: What's interesting though is that we don't really have the full picture of what that entails.
SPEAKER_00: Because actually, what we know, and what we know is that as Jesus is looking at this coin, as he's looking at this denarius, was a pretty well-known coin in the Roman Empire.
SPEAKER_00: On one side it would have said, Tiberius Caesar, son of the divine Augustus.
SPEAKER_00: Literally, it's saying, the ruler is the son of God.
SPEAKER_00: He is divine.
SPEAKER_00: As you flip the other side, it would have said something that said, pontificate, no, pontifex maximus, which means the great high priest.
SPEAKER_00: This coin used in the Roman Empire was actually a declaration of who they believed their king to be, who they believed their emperor to be, no less than God himself.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus, as he's looking at this crowd, as he's looking at this crowd, he says, Whose image is on this?
SPEAKER_00: And as he looks at the crowd, he sees Pharisees and he sees Herodians, he sees, you know, the downtrodden and the outcast, and he sees the upper class, and he sees all this mixture, this hodgepodge of people.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what he sees in every single one of them?
SPEAKER_00: He sees a different image than what's on the coin.
SPEAKER_00: A different image.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus playing on this word here.
SPEAKER_00: Whose likeness is on here?
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember what Jesus or what the Lord says in Genesis chapter 1?
SPEAKER_00: Let us make man in our image and after our likeness.
SPEAKER_00: And so God created man in his own image.
SPEAKER_00: In the image of God, he created them, male and female.
SPEAKER_00: He created them.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, Hey, render to Caesar what is Caesar's, but give to God what is God's.
SPEAKER_00: What Jesus is saying, hey, give these, give these little metal, worthless pieces of metal shavings back to Caesar.
SPEAKER_00: If he's claimed them, go ahead and give them back to him.
SPEAKER_00: But also, hey, give back everything that belongs to God.
SPEAKER_00: Which is you, by the way.
SPEAKER_00: It is your entire being.
SPEAKER_00: It is everything that encapsulates you.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: It's everything.
SPEAKER_00: Don't get your priorities out of whack here.
SPEAKER_00: Like, don't be giving with uh with messed up priorities.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to God, and so does everything else.
SPEAKER_00: Give back Him what truly belongs to him.
SPEAKER_00: Like Jesus condemns giving with our priorities mixed and giving with our chest puffed and giving with our with our eyes closed.
SPEAKER_00: But in all the gospels, there's a particular instance of giving that Jesus explicitly celebrates.
SPEAKER_00: Explicitly He celebrates giving all that you have.
SPEAKER_00: There's an instance in Matthew or Mark chapter 12, later in that same chapter.
SPEAKER_00: This is what it says.
SPEAKER_00: As Jesus sat down opposite of the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box.
SPEAKER_00: Many rich people put in large sums, and a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins which make a penny.
SPEAKER_00: And he called his disciples to him and said to them, Truly I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box.
SPEAKER_00: For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.
SPEAKER_00: You know, this is again the final week of Jesus' life.
SPEAKER_00: He's on his way out of the temple for the last time.
SPEAKER_00: This is the last time he's visiting the temple.
SPEAKER_00: He's on his way out.
SPEAKER_00: He sits down in the outer court, in the court of women, and he's watching this happen, watching the spectacle happen of giving of offerings and tithes back to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And what he would have been seeing, actually, as he as he looks across the court, what he would have seen is 13 different uh receptacles, like offering receptacles that were shaped, that were like were bronze receptacles shaped like trumpets.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he would have seen on one side.
SPEAKER_00: So as the wealthy would come in and they would throw in big amounts of offering, they would always bring in coins and they would make a lot of clanging noises as they gave in their offering.
SPEAKER_00: This is what they were doing.
SPEAKER_00: This is what Jesus has already condemned in Matthew 6.
SPEAKER_00: They don't do this in a way to gain recognition from somebody else but but give in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was um in 2018, uh myself and Damien and Mark Hand, one of our elders, went to went to uh visit mustard seed in Japan.
SPEAKER_00: And we went to several of the church plants, the church plants there in um in Japan, and we we saw a lot of different things and went to it went to several different cities.
SPEAKER_00: It was pretty incredible to see the work that the Lord is doing over there.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the cities we went to is a city called Kyoto.
SPEAKER_00: Kyoto used to be the capital of Japan.
SPEAKER_00: It's definitely like the um the historical capital of Japan, like a lot of rich history there.
SPEAKER_00: A lot of a lot of people will like make journeys there to honor uh the history of their nation there.
SPEAKER_00: And and we went, as we were in Kyoto, one of the things we did was we actually went to a temple, a pagan temple while we were there.
SPEAKER_00: And it was, you know, open.
SPEAKER_00: You kind of walk through it, walk through these grand things.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that was most interesting to me is whenever we saw people bringing offerings to their gods.
SPEAKER_00: And what was interesting, what was interesting to me is that we were hearing these bells ring as we walked into this temple, and as you get closer, you can realize what the people are doing.
SPEAKER_00: And Jay Greer was there and he's explaining to us what's happening.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Yeah, the people ring the bell, they ring the bell to get the attention of their God.
SPEAKER_00: And then they would take their money, they would never bring bills, they would only bring coins, and they would come and they would throw their coins in there, into these like like wooden boxes that would hopefully clang around and make some noise, so they so their God would see the offering that they have brought before them.
SPEAKER_00: And then they would offer up a prayer to God, hoping that because of their gift, now the Lord would answer their prayer.
SPEAKER_00: And it seems to be a pretty good idea representation of what Jesus is seeing happening right here.
SPEAKER_00: You notice Jesus, Jesus isn't necessarily like condemning any of the giving that's being brought by anybody else, but he is exalting one specific gift.
SPEAKER_00: You see this in this text?
SPEAKER_00: He's he's he's exalting, he's elevating one kind in the midst of the spectacle that's happening of people bringing in their alms giving and their and their first fruits and their and their tithes and their offerings.
SPEAKER_00: What Jesus is doing is he actually is pointing out to this unassuming widow.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, this widow might have might have, and maybe she wanted to go unnoticed because she was kind of embarrassed by the size of her gift that she was able to bring.
SPEAKER_00: And she comes in and just has these two little small copper coins.
SPEAKER_00: They're actually called a lepta, and they're worth like 164th of a denarius.
SPEAKER_00: That's what they were worth.
SPEAKER_00: Like a penny, right?
SPEAKER_00: I actually read studying for this sermon that in these days most people would live on daily wages.
SPEAKER_00: They would live day to day off their daily wages, which means that she had to at least fast for the day because of her sacrifice to God.
SPEAKER_00: At least she had to go without food for that day.
SPEAKER_00: And what may be actually more accurate is that this widow, because she was a widow, didn't have regular daily income.
SPEAKER_00: And what she was giving was actually the last of her savings.
SPEAKER_00: She was giving everything, all that she had to live on.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus does something here.
SPEAKER_00: He calls his disciples to him.
SPEAKER_00: Anytime Jesus calls his disciples to him right here and says, Hey, look right here.
SPEAKER_00: You see this?
SPEAKER_00: This is what the kingdom is about, is what he says.
SPEAKER_00: Like she gets it.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, she has given more than everybody else combined.
SPEAKER_00: She's given more than all everybody else combined.
SPEAKER_00: And the disciples, I would imagine, because like they typically do, they're kind of scratching their heads, what in the world do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Like she had two leptas, like this pennies.
SPEAKER_00: And we can't even go, like we can maybe go buy a loaf of bread with that.
SPEAKER_00: Like that's all we can get from that.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is like, no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: You don't understand.
SPEAKER_00: She she gets it.
SPEAKER_00: And the question is, she gets what?
SPEAKER_00: I think she gets what?
SPEAKER_00: What how Craig Blomberg puts it, it's not about how much one gives, rather, it's how much one sacrifices.
SPEAKER_00: So, how does Jesus expect me to give?
SPEAKER_00: And I think as in point blank, in a sacrificial way.
SPEAKER_00: Like for those of us who are who are who belong to Christ and who are his stewards of what he has given us, we're expected to faithfully steward what he has given us.
SPEAKER_00: That means giving in a sacrificial way.
SPEAKER_00: You know, a lot of times when we're and we talk about come to a time of giving as a church, we talk about we talk about bringing your tithes and offerings.
SPEAKER_00: Tithe is a weird word that we don't use anywhere other than church.
SPEAKER_00: And tithe is really something, it's it's like something the Lord established with his people as a way for them to show their devotion and trust to God.
SPEAKER_00: They would give their first 10% of their crops and their livestock and their income back to God as an act of trust, as an act of worship.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, in fact, it wasn't just one tithe.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, there were there were a few different times that tithes and offerings were commanded to the people of God.
SPEAKER_00: One one author actually totaled up and he said it was actually more about like 23% of your total when you add in all the different special offerings and free will offerings and different tithing requirements in the Old Testament.
SPEAKER_00: It was actually about 23 to 26% of what you earned was given back to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing like these tithes and and offerings were commanded to all of the people.
SPEAKER_00: They were commanded to all of the people, not just the affluent.
SPEAKER_00: Like they were there were those who the Lord prospered more than others, and they weren't put into a different bracket of giving.
SPEAKER_00: They were all expected to give the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: And the interesting thing about Jesus is that in the gospels and in his teaching, Jesus never, never commands, never commands his followers specifically to tithe.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus never lowers the bar.
SPEAKER_00: Like it's not about the amount, it's about your heart.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he's getting at.
SPEAKER_00: And because that's the case, like tithing to the Lord is not the end goal, it's not the finish line for believers.
SPEAKER_00: It's the starting point.
SPEAKER_00: Like it's it's where we should begin.
SPEAKER_00: It's the least we can do in light of what we have received, in light of the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Because we know that in the gospel, we know the truth that in love, God gave his one and only son for us.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus didn't tithe his life on the cross, he gave it completely for you and for me.
SPEAKER_00: He gave it willingly and sacrificially for our sin.
SPEAKER_00: And so here at C3, we realize that we need to give because we have freely received.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it really comes down to.
SPEAKER_00: And our generosity can only start when we have received well what we have in the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Only when our when our hearts and our lives have been changed by the grace of Jesus that we will live our lives with this sacrificial generosity.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, I don't know where you are this morning.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, like if you're sitting here and you're just like, you're sitting on something that's been gaining interest for 40 plus years, you know, and you're like, you know, that that flip that financially fortunate, you know.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you you walk in this room and you're like, I barely got two pennies to rub together right now.
SPEAKER_00: What I know, what I'm sure of, is that each of us has received far more than we deserve through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And as a result, our question that we should ask is, God, what do you want what do you want me to do with this money?
SPEAKER_00: What do you want me to do with what you've entrusted me with?
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we love you.
SPEAKER_00: We're uh thankful for what you have uh freely given to us.
SPEAKER_00: Not just in the things that we can see around us, not just in our bank accounts, not just in our our stuff.
SPEAKER_00: We're thankful for way more than that, for what you have given us that we could not earn on our own, that you've given us life and hope.
SPEAKER_00: Or you've given us peace and joy, you've given us salvation.
SPEAKER_00: And so I pray that we would, as a church, just come to a deeper understanding more and more of the love that we have received from you, of the grace that we have received from you, of the mercy that we receive from you every day.
SPEAKER_00: And as a result, we would be we'd be led to give.
SPEAKER_00: Not in a way just to just to give, to to check it off a list, not in not in a way just to gain recognition from other people, not in a way that our priorities are all mixed up, but in a way that is just, Lord, a giving as a natural response of everything that we have because of everything that we have been freely given in you.
SPEAKER_00: Or we give it all back to you because you alone deserve it.
SPEAKER_00: Be glorified as we lift your name right now.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks again for listening to the Carterville Christian Church podcast.
SPEAKER_01: Our prayer is that today's message has encouraged you and drawn you closer to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: To learn more or get connected with our church family, visit CartervilleChristian.com.
SPEAKER_01: We'd love to walk alongside you in your journey of faith.