LIVE GENEROUSLY | Acts 4:32–35 | Pastor Ryan Gerlach | 7.05.26

to live a generous life!

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hello, this is Pastor Ryan Girl and Pastor John Anderson. Welcome to the Resurrection Church Play List. Each week we bring you Sunday's message from Resurrection Church right here in Racing Wisconsin. So whether you're listening on the woman or living the war, just holding some laundry or avoiding folding laundry, we hope this encourages your faith, challenges your perspective, and reminds you that resurrection isn't just something that happened, it's something God is still doing. Enjoy this week's message.

SPEAKER_01 0:27

Like to invite up a reader at this time? Miss Danielle, you guys are in for a treat. If you're a visitor, Danielle reads all of the New Testament scriptures in the original Greek. So this is gonna be a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

Good morning. Before I get started on the reading, and I brought tissue. My three children were baptized here, and parenting still isn't all that easy. And by the grace of God and the wonderful people in this community, I have been blessed to get through some really hard times. And while I hope that you and Sylvie and your family don't have to go through anything like that, know that you will be carried by the people in this community with their love, prayers, and support. And in English, a reading from Acts. Chapter 4, verses 32 through 35. What an amazing message. When I read through this, I'm just really spoke to me. Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. With great power, the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them. For as many as owned lands or houses, sold them, and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. This is the word of the Lord.

SPEAKER_03 2:48

Amen, Danielle. It's almost like I don't even have to be up here now. So but as they say, that that'll preach, Danielle. Thank you so much. And true words, absolutely true words. Um, we've been going through a sermon series called Back to Basics, where we just go back to like the fundamentals of what it means to follow Christ. Um, and and it's just been an incredible blessing just looking back to what some people would say, oh, I know that story, but maybe perhaps we're getting a new lens on it and what it looks like. Uh first week we talked about following Jesus. Jesus' first words to his disciples were come follow me. And the first step of following Jesus is guess what? Following Jesus. And then we love God. And what does it look like to love God and then love neighbor? Practice forgiveness. A huge part of following Christ is being forgiven and then doing in turn. And today we're talking about living generously. So, what does that look like? And before you're your brain shut down, you're like, oh, it's one of those asking for money sermons. It's not, all right. I promise. Um, so before we jump in, let us pray. Good and gracious God, I echo the words of Danielle. Just what a beautiful uh community you have constructed here, that you have formed together here. People that um are filled with equal amounts of lament and joy and everything in between, people that lean on each other. Uh, and because we lean on you, God, um, a community of believers that hopefully will just seek you in all they do. Help us live a generous life so that the world can know what your heart looks like. We pray this in your holy name, is all God's people say. Amen. Amen. There's a story about a boy who just graduated high school, very exciting time. And this and this boy had a very wealthy grandmother, and he said, Grandma, I don't need anything for my graduation. Just give me some cash. That's all I need going forward. And so she gives him a present, and he's like, Wow, it's a brick of cash, maybe, or a brick of gold. I don't know what it is. And he opens it and it's a Bible. He gets so mad, he's like, I didn't need a Bible. Grandma needed money. And she said, Grandson, in between those pages is wealth. A lot of wealth beyond comprehension. And he got mad, he left his party, barely said goodbye to grandma. And then as as he was going through his college years, he thought about grandma and he'd call her from time to time. But as he was graduating college, he called grandma again and said, Grandma, I'm graduating. I don't I don't need anything, just I just need cash to start my life. If you just give me cash, and she goes, Well, did you read your Bible at all these last years? There's wealth between the pages. And he said, Grandma, I don't need to read the Bible, I need cash. And so he got mad again. And a couple years went by and he finds out his grandma passed away. And remembering the words of his grandmother, there's wealth between the pages. He opens the book, and wouldn't you know it, there is a note that says, get a job, love grandma. Right? I think I think this is a good way to open up the conversation of what does it look like to live a generous life? Uh, is it giving wisdom? Is it giving money? What does it look like to truly live generously? Uh, and as a pastor uh once once said, uh, generosity actually starts long before you even open your purse or wallet. It's a heart condition. Now we we are looking at this early church, and Daniel echoed it so well. It was this church that just gave freely. They were so struck by not only the people that were in the presence of Jesus, how transformed they were, but these stories of Jesus, the Son of God who looked like God's heart for the world, who did things that just no normal person would do, that loved people that probably was hard to love. And they heard the story of how he died and came back because he loved us too much to stay dead. And their stories they shared. I could imagine them breaking bread together. And that's why we have a tiny table over here because it's the basics of why we do communion the way we do it is if we could, we'd all go to each other's homes and we break bread and we'd share the good news of Jesus with each other. And and some of us do that with our small groups, and that's holy. But in the early church, it's what we're looking at, and they had all things in common. Not meaning they all, you know, look the same, dressed the same, voted the same, smelled the same, but they shared everything in common. You need my lawnmower, take my lawnmower. You want to drive my donkey, just visit your the in-laws, take it. Because there was nothing that they held on to that was more powerful than the resurrected Christ and this the gospel news thereof. They were transformed people living transformed lives, and everything else, as Martin Luther would say, is a diaphragm. It didn't matter as much as the gospel message. I can imagine them, and this is probably just for two people. There's an old SNL skit where these guys just got together and they shared stories about a gentleman named Bill Brasky, and every story they would share got bigger and bigger. Well, Bill Brasky once did this and this. I imagine stories about Jesus. Anyone know this by the way? So it's okay, good, just making sure. Uh, every story was greater and grander. I could see the disciples. Well, one time Jesus walked in water, and and one time Peter was sinking and he foolishly went in the water, and Jesus came and he lifted him up and all these stories. And and I ran from Jesus and I betrayed or I denied him, and and yet he still welcomed me back into his arms. And I don't think I've been the same since. I haven't been the same since. So the gospel doesn't just change individual individuals, it changes communities, it changes lives. And I've seen that, I've seen that before. I've seen communities be changed. The first hearkening of the Holy Spirit on the early church, this this Pentecost Sunday, a whole uh smathering of people with different tongues and different languages from different cultures all encountered Christ, the Holy Spirit, his presence in a radical way that changed the trajectory of the church forever. And everyone from Paul and beyond, all that have encountered Jesus, have been changed after that. So, what does it look like then? We have been blessed, we have been transformed, we have been changed just to say exactly how we are, or is it calling us into something different? So God really just blesses us and have it stop there to hold on to our blessings and just stack them up and store them and hoard them so that we can be on the that famous hoarding show or whatever. There's a story about, well, not a story, this is a sea, it's called the Dead Sea. Anyone ever been to the Dead Sea? I've seen people float in it and it's like so buoyant because it's like 10 times saltier than uh than like I think the ocean. And it's it's because uh the the Jordan River flows into it and there's no outlet, it just goes there and it stays there, and because of that, there is just um you know, uh fish can't survive it. There's like literally no life except for microorganisms, but the river flows and it dies there because there's no outlet. Um, and but you put that against the same exact river flowing into the Sea of Galilee, and in scripture we see all these miracles and wonderful things that have happened at the Sea of Galilee, and there's life. Why? Because this, the, the, the river, the Jordan River that flows into there, there's an outlet, there is an overrun. There is miracles that have happened on their life. There's fish, there's all these fishing stories. So, what's the difference? The same river, Sea of Galilee. It has an inlet, Dead Sea has an inlet, but there is no outlet for the Dead Sea. They receive the same water. The difference is what they do with it. What they do with it. So the question for us isn't, hey, has God blessed me? Because indeed he has sometimes our eyes to close are close to it, sometimes we see them uh in holy ways. Not how much he blessed me, but the real question is, will the blessings actually stop with me or will they flow through me? Will they be used like a conduit? A blessing is meant to become a river, not a dam just to hold it, not a reservoir. We had a fun little uh balloon bash and neighborhood camp kids came and we had a cookout. Awesome volunteers came, but there was like an overflowing of water balloons, and we they were going faster than we could fill them up. But I just remember this image of this one one kid just trying to stick all these water balloons in their shirt so they could carry them around, and every time they put it in their shirt, it would pop and pop and pop. So all these balloons were like disappearing, and they were trying to hold on to it. And it I thought, well, that's a great example of how we can sometimes just try to grasp onto things, the things we call treasures, but they are just finite. They they're dust, they don't last forever. It's best when shared, when given out instead of hoarding, and one cute little girl comes up to me and says, This must be the greed they're talking about in the Bible. And I'm like, That's the this is the one. This is the one. But it was it was it was just really fun. I'm still I still can't hear out of this year. I got so many water balloons in that one. But when asked, uh, the first billionaire ever, first billionaire ever, Rockefeller, uh, he was a big oil tycoon. How much money is enough? A billion dollars was astronomical back then. It was insane. And he said this beautiful response. He said, just a little bit more. I think sometimes our without our our our compass set on Jesus, without our outlook on Christ, without our focus on what really matters, we have this scarcity mentality where if I just had a little bit more, then I can have a generous life, then I can live a holy way, then then that's when I will be set. But when you realize what you have is enough and what God gives us is holy, when we have this outpouring of something transformative and we can't contain it, there's nothing that we have that truly, truly matters in comparison. This the thought of just a little bit more is how much can I share? Just a little bit more. I always have something else to give. And this is true. I know it's it's a fun little back and forth, but you can give without loving, but you truly cannot love without giving. There has to be a give in it, not a constant take, take, take. It's almost like it's it's the same as like if you breathe in, I'm just gonna keep breathing in, but I'm never going to exhale. There's no life in that, only death. And I think faith, generosity, a spiritual walk with Christ has an inhale and an exhale. This Greek word for breath and spirit, pneuma, is almost like the Hebrew word for God. It's this, yeah, way, this breathing in and out. It's a holy rhythm of life and the holy rhythm of um just flowing with the spirit. So pneuma, the receiving of love is also this giving of love. This receiving of forgiveness is also you makes you forgive, and this receiving of great generosity leads us to place of a place of living generously. How could we not? How could we not with a God who whose arms never close, whose grace is sufficient, and there is no end to his love for us. We see Jesus say it in John. It's it's a out of the believer's heart. If those that follow me trust in me, their hearts shall flow with rivers of living water, living water. You should be an outpouring. Jesus didn't just picture believers as ponds, but as flowing rivers. So, dear church, what are you rich in? What are you overflowing in? Uh Pastor John said this last week or two weeks ago, even. He said some of the richest, wealthiest people I know don't don't have a lot of money. Some of the most generous people I know are those that just probably don't have two pennies to rub together. Generosity starts way before the wallet even opens. Are you rich in wisdom and encouragement and patience and listening and laughter and mentoring and cooking and and and fixing things and hospitality and kindness? What are you what are you overflowing in and what does the world need? I feel like this early church, a story of acts, it's holy because it's a beautiful magnifying glass on the heart of God. It's what we're called to be as a church. These people that that don't live in a life of scarcity and in a place of mine, but a place of what can I do to give more. Like when we even we lost power for hours here at the church, and there was wonderful people, Chris, Todd, Pastor John showed up to keep generators running, the whole Mahali family did, and keep it going. That was just the immediate thing that came to my head. Uh, gave away their holiday weekend to keep uh the neighborhood food camp, like refrigerators and freezers going while we didn't have power. I mean, that's just one example. There's so many examples of how this church has benevolently given back in holy ways that brings uh brings us to tears. Uh, John and I talk about man, this is such an amazing church that continuously lives a life of generosity. Amen. So, my homework for you, dear church, is really really ask yourself, what what are you overflowing in that you can you can share with the world? God has blessed you in so many ways, and maybe we haven't even identified it yet. What are you rich in that you can be generous and generously living? So much so that your neighbor, that person at the grocery store or the coffee shop, will look at you and look at Neil, look at this you and say, Why are you glowing? Why are you so full of of this? I want to be a part of that. And you can live out and even use words, this resurrected life, this generous life of living for Christ. Amen. Amen. Dear church, let's pray. God, I pray that we can just posture our heart hearts towards you so that we can be a people that have nothing but a generous outlook. Those times, even when we are scammed or burned, or where we give ourselves and we get taken advantage of in ways, help us not be numb or have compassion fatigue. Help us know that those all those things are in your hands and we give not to receive, but give because you've so freely gived. Help us be excited, help us look at the early church and just be a reflection of that as we proclaim the resurrected gospel message and all we do. We pray this in your holy name, is all God's people say. Amen.