Where Money Finds It's Meaning | Pastor Jake Sweetman

In this insightful sermon, we explore the profound themes of Revelation 21 and uncover the true meaning of wealth within the framework of God's kingdom. Listen in as we discuss how the faithful witness of the church can transform adversaries into allies and how the material benefits of this world are meant to glorify God and expand His temple.

Journey with us through biblical history, from the Israelites' Exodus and return from exile to the early church's mission, and learn how God continually redeems and repurposes earthly wealth for worship and mission. This message challenges us to reflect on our relationship with money and urges us to give joyfully and sacrificially in line with God's divine purposes.

Join us as we delve deeper into aligning our resources with our faith, transforming assets into tools of redemption, and preparing for the growth and multiplication God desires for His church. Embrace the call to partner with God and let your heart and wealth serve the advancement of His eternal kingdom.

Follow us for more messages that inspire faithful living, and don't forget to share this transformative sermon with others.

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Transcript

 Welcome to our house offering weekend.

We've been taking up an end of year offering like this for seven years.

In fact, the first ever Friday night gathering or gala that we ever did was actually here in this building in 2017.

Before we owned it, we purchased this property at the

 But this used to be an event space.

Before that, it was a church.

This building's from 1895.

But it was an event space for a while.

We hosted our giving gala in this space in 2017.

The name of that event was Future Now.

Future Now.

And little did we know that we were actually standing in our future on that night.

God has been so, so faithful.

And this is our seventh year of coming together as...

 one church and bringing an offering that blesses the Lord.

And that's what we're doing today.

We're giving an offering to partner with Jesus in seeing his kingdom expand through our church.

We are also in a series going through the book of Revelation.

So I have Revelation house offering edition today.

Does that sound good?

 Jump with me to the very end of Revelation is where we're going to be today.

Revelation chapter 21.

I'm going to pick it up in verse 9.

Revelation 21 and verse 9.

While you're turning there, I just want to take a moment to honor my beautiful wife who has stood so faithfully, so beautifully, so devotedly by me.

 Not just these 10 years, but so many more.

16 years of marriage.

And honey, I love you with my whole, whole heart.

Thank you for everything you pour into this church to make her what she is.

She shines because of your touch and because of your creativity and your devotion.

We love you.

Would you honor my beautiful bride today?

 Revelation chapter 21, picking up in verse 9, says this.

One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, come, I will show you the bride.

Everybody say bride.

That's us.

I'll show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.

 And this angel carried me away in the spirit to a mountain great and high and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of the heaven from God.

So the bride is this city coming down out of heaven from God.

The city shone with the glory of God and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel, like a jasper clear as crystal.

Jumping to verse 16, the city was laid out like a square and

 As long as it was wide, he measured the city with the rod and found it to be 12,000 stadia in length.

That's about 1,500 miles, so about half the size of the United States.

 and as wide and high as it is long.

So this city is a cube and that's intentional.

This is symbolic because what it's saying is that the whole city is a temple.

In the temple of Solomon, the holy of holies, the innermost room where the presence of God dwelled was a cube.

And so John is seeing a literal city temple bride come out of heaven and

 here in this vision the angel measured the wall using human measurement it was 144 cubits thick the wall was made of jasper and the city of pure gold as pure as glass the foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone the first foundation here we go was jasper the second sapphire the third agate the fourth emerald the fifth onyx the sixth ruby the seventh chrysolite the eighth barrel the ninth topaz the 10th turquoise the 11th jason and the 12th amethyst

 The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate made of a single pearl.

The great street of the city was of gold, as pure as transparent glass.

I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.

The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives its light, and the Lamb is its lamp.

Listen to these next few verses.

These are important for us today.

The nations will walk by its light.

 and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it.

On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there.

The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it.

Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life.

Today on this House Offering Sunday, as I prepare...

 us to give generously to the Lord.

What I want to show us today is where money finds its meaning, where money finds its meaning.

Why don't you write that down in your notes?

 as we travel along together.

In the centuries after John wrote these words at the end of Revelation, Christians began building churches throughout the Roman Empire, and what they used to construct those churches were the stones of fallen pagan temples.

They called it spolia, which is a Latin word that means spoils or plunder.

 It's significant that what once adorned the worship of false gods was taken and repurposed to build churches for the worship of the true gods.

Same stones, new purpose.

Same materials, redeemed meaning.

 In Revelation 21, what we just read is that picture made perfect, that as we cross over into the crescendo of human history and we enter the new creation, we see that the materials don't change so much, but the meaning does.

Now, when we reach the end of our series in 17 years, we'll have the opportunity...

 We'll have the opportunity to unpack this passage in full, but today, as we prepare to sow into house offering, I just want to draw out this single profound point, and it has to do with the people that John calls the nations and the kings of the earth, and what these two groups of people are said to bring into the new creation.

Throughout Revelation, both these groups, the nations and the earthly kings, are described frequently as the enemies of God.

 The nations regularly are portrayed as opposed to God and opposed to his people.

They are under the authority of the beast.

They are intoxicated by Babylon's immorality.

They are deceived by her sorcery and they are ultimately judged by God and the Lamb.

And yet here at the very end, or should we say at the new beginning, we see something stunning that at least some out of those nations are walking into the new creation, living forever in the unfiltered light of God's presence.

 And the same goes for the kings of the earth.

Apart from one reference to them at the very start of Revelation where Jesus is called the ruler of the kings of the earth, every other reference to these kings is always portraying them as the enemies of God.

And yet here in the end, some of these kings are entering the new creation to walk in the Lamb's light.

 And that's the first thing that I want you to see, that because of the church's faithful witness, this is the point that Revelation is making, because of the faithful witness of the church all throughout Revelation, many who were once God's enemies are converted into his friends.

I want you to dwell on that a moment.

Think of those whom you consider to be the archetypal enemy of God.

 And now imagine that you followed Jesus with such passion, such sacrificial love, and such boldness that you actually played a role in those enemies becoming God's friends.

I believe that as we give in today's offering, that is one expression of our faithful witness that God will use to see to it to convert enemies into friends.

 The second thing that I want you to see has to do with what these nations and these kings bring.

John says the kings bring their splendor and the nations bring their glory and their honor.

In other words, they bring their cultural and material wealth, the very things they once pursued for themselves.

Now, all of that is redeemed.

 The glory that they once claimed for themselves now belongs to God.

The wealth that they once worshipped now becomes the means of worship.

One Revelation scholar, John Christopher Thomas, says it like this, that they now worship God with the very things they had formerly sought for themselves.

 Richard Bauckham, another scholar, says this, if you guys could bring up the next slide.

According to the end of Revelation, heaven contains the very best of what the nations have built, but all of it finds its true place in worship to Jesus.

I want you to notice that the materials that are used to describe the heavenly city, the gold, the pearls, and the precious stones, are the same materials that Revelation says Babylon spent so much time idolizing.

 In Revelation 17, 4, the woman, this woman represents Babylon, was dressed in purple and scarlet and was glittering with gold, precious stones, and pearls.

She held a golden cup in her hand filled with the abominable things and the filth of her adulteries.

So the same materials that made Babylon corrupt now make the new Jerusalem beautiful.

 the same pearls that built babylon now adorn the heavenly city the same gold that adorned the crowns of the kings now crowns the gates of new creation why because their purpose has changed what once was impure stained by greed and stained by vain glory now is pure as glass shining only to reflect the glory of almighty god you see the new heavens and the new earth it turns out

 are not entirely abstract and immaterial.

In fact, the same way that you and I will be resurrected with physical bodies, so also will new creation consist of redeemed and repurposed materials which serve their purpose of declaring the glory of God instead of being the end goal of man's desire.

History does not end with the destruction of wealth, but the redemption of it.

 What changes as we turn the page from Babylon to New Jerusalem is not the materials, but the meaning.

And this is exactly how we should expect God to think about wealth.

He is, after all, the creator of the material world.

And he made it good.

And he made it for his glory.

 And he intended that you and I would cultivate the material world, including wealth, for the sake of his glory.

What went wrong there was not the existence of wealth itself, but the meaning that we ended up giving it.

You see, this is the key to your relationship with money.

The key to our relationship with money is the meaning that we ascribe to it.

 And here's what Revelation is showing you, that in the end, all the wealth of the world will find its proper purpose in the new creation construction of one giant temple where God and the Lamb are worshipped.

And so the invitation then is simple for you and I to make the temple of God the meaning of our money.

And the question is a searching one.

Is this how you think about money?

 Because the whole Bible is actually asking you to think about money in this way.

You see, this moment at the end of Revelation is not random.

It is the crescendo of a theme that runs all throughout Scripture, that the wealth of the world belongs to God, and he intends for it to be used to demonstrate his goodness, to expand his temple, and to enlarge his kingdom.

Let's go all the way back to the beginning of the book in Genesis chapter 2.

 In verse 10, this is pre-fall into sin.

So this is the good creation of God.

A river watering the garden flowed from Eden.

From there it was separated into four headwaters or four rivers.

The name of the first is the Pishon.

It winds through the entire land of Havilah where there is gold.

Verse 12, the gold of that land is, say this word with me, it is good.

Yes, aromatic resin and onyx are also there.

This is the first time that gold is mentioned in the Bible.

 And I want you to notice where it shows up.

Right smack dab in the middle of the creation story.

And the gold itself is described using the same Hebrew word as the rest of creation in Genesis chapter 1 as good.

So there's continuity there that gold is part of God's good creation that God made.

Good not for hoarding, but good for using to hallow the name of God.

It is good when it serves the glory of God.

Remember, all you biblical scholars, Eden in the scriptures is portrayed as

 the original temple the place where God's presence dwelt with humanity and Adam and Eve have the task of extending that temple to cultivate the garden so that it fills the rest of the earth and evidently some of the raw materials that they were meant to use for that expansion was right there in the ground gold aromatic resin and onyx

 And so is it any surprise then that when we get to the book of Exodus, the second book in the Bible, we find that those very same materials are used in the construction of the tabernacle.

 The house of God in the midst of the Israelites.

The lampstand, the ark, the altar, the priestly garments, all those materials used.

No coincidence at all because in the building of this mini Edenic temple, God instructs Israel to repurpose the very materials associated with the original temple that humanity had since turned into idols and God wants them to use them again for the dwelling place of his glory.

And so that raises the question for us.

Where does Israel get that gold?

 Where did they get those materials?

Because they'd just gotten out of slavery.

Where did the wealth come from?

Well, look at what God says to Moses at the beginning of Exodus.

As God is about to send Moses into Egypt to lead the Israelites out of captivity, here's what God says in Exodus 3.21.

"'I will make the Egyptians favorably disposed toward this people, so that when you leave Egypt, you will not go out empty-handed.'"

 Every woman is to ask her neighbor and any woman living in her house for articles of silver and gold and for clothing which you will put on your sons and daughters and so you will plunder the Egyptians.

And as the narrative progresses, that's exactly what happens.

One day the Israelites were dirt poor, oppressed slaves.

The very next day they were walking out of Egypt scot-free, bags overflowing with the wealth of the greatest superpower the world had seen up until that point in history.

 And God intended to bless them with that supernatural act of provision.

Just like God intends to bless you as He provides for you.

But here's the deal, literally.

God's desire to bless you cannot be pulled apart from God's ultimate purpose of the wealth that He entrusts to you.

Because when Israel made it to Mount Sinai and God gives them the instructions for the building of their tabernacle, His house, guess what materials God commanded them to use?

 The gold that they just got leaving Egypt.

They're thinking, wow, goody, look at me.

God gave me all this gold.

Aren't I blessed?

And God's like, yes, you are so blessed.

Now about that gold.

Now about that bonus.

Now about that raise.

Yes, I gave it to you for you to enjoy, but I also want you to enjoy giving part of it back to me.

 Just like the scripture says, the wealth of the wicked is stored up for the righteous, but the righteous must understand they are not the end goal of that wealth.

They are simply the ones that God can entrust to steward it rightly, to build his dwelling and extend his kingdom.

The new car is not the only reason God got you the bonus.

The nicer apartment is not the only reason God gave you that raise.

 The key to our relationship with money is the meaning we ascribe to it.

God provides it to you, Christian, with the expectation that you will use it for his purpose.

He expects you to recognize him as the provider and to joyfully prioritize your wealth towards the building of his temple, the advancement of his missions.

 When we fast forward several centuries, you guys are gonna see a pattern here in the Bible.

The Bible's full of patterns.

I'm not just making this up.

This is a story that the Bible is telling.

When you fast forward several centuries in Israel's history, we see the same pattern.

That after generations of disobedience, including the lack of proper stewardship of their materials, by the way, Israel's temple ends up being destroyed and the people are carried into Babylonian exile.

 But even then, God is not finished with his people.

He's not finished with his plan to dwell with them.

And so he moves the heart of a pagan king named Cyrus to send his people home.

Look at Ezra chapter one, beginning in verse one.

In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, that's the prophet, he's got a book in your Bible, the Lord moved the heart of Cyrus, king of Persia, to make a proclamation throughout his realm and also to put it in writing.

 This is what Cyrus king of Persia says.

The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah, because the previous one got destroyed.

Any of his people among you may go up to Jerusalem in Judah and build the temple of the Lord, the God of Israel, the God who is in Jerusalem, and may their God be with them.

 and in any locality where survivors may now be living, the people, that is their Babylonian Persian neighbors, are to provide them with silver and gold, with goods and livestock, with freewill offerings for the temple of God in Jerusalem.

So here, Israel's return from exile is depicted to us as like a redo of the Exodus.

This is Exodus part two.

And once again, God provides for his people through the wealth of the nations.

 that their Persian neighbors give them silver, gold, livestock, and offerings, everything needed to rebuild the temple.

Once again, God's intention is clear.

He redeems wealth for worship.

 He takes what was once used merely for personal gain and he repurposes it into building a dwelling place for his presence.

That's what God always does.

He doesn't just bless his people with provision as though you were the ultimate point.

He blesses them with provision so that they will engage in the beautiful purpose of building his house.

 Let's look at one last example in the New Testament this time, where the theme of God's temple is developed and broadened into the mission of the church to go into the world to preach the kingdom of God and to make disciples.

We'll look at the two-part singular story of Luke and Acts, written by the same guy, two parts of the same story.

Luke writes this history, and he records this history

 for a purpose of showing you how the gospel of Jesus traveled from the very insignificant town of Bethlehem all the way to the heart of the Roman Empire in the capital of Rome itself.

And the way, listen, the way God ironically uses the wealth of Rome to make his gospel travel is right at the heart of that story.

 Luke begins his historical account with a narrative about Caesar imposing a census on the people for the sake of taxation.

And so as a result of this census, Joseph and a very pregnant Mary are forced to travel to Bethlehem to be counted in the census.

 And there in Bethlehem, Jesus is born into the world in the narrative against the backdrop of Roman economic oppression and persecution.

It is meant to be seen as a tragic set of circumstances.

But then Luke wants you to see in connection with how the story ends at the conclusion of Acts.

 Because the apostle Paul is arrested and he's tried for his bold, unashamed proclamation of the gospel.

And in the midst of his trial, he appeals his case all the way to Caesar.

And because Paul is a Roman citizen, the local governor in Judea had no choice but to send Paul all the way to Rome to appear before Caesar.

And that meant Paul

 on the empire's dime was taken aboard a Roman ship under the protection of Roman soldiers and brought all the way to Rome, which is where he wanted to go to preach the gospel anyway.

 And look at the very last verse in Acts, Acts 28, 31.

There in Rome, Paul proclaimed the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance.

So what starts as a story of oppressive taxation at the start of Luke ends with the story of God using those very same taxes to pay for Paul's voyage to Rome where he's able to boldly proclaim the gospel of the kingdom right under the nose of Caesar.

It's amazing.

 And of course, this spelled the beginning of the end of paganism in the Roman Empire, which eventually became filled with Christians.

And that's not just about the growth of Christianity.

That's about the impact of Christianity.

Because what followed was one of the most profound moral revolutions in human history.

The gospel slowly dismantled a culture that treated the poor, the sick, and the unwanted as expendable.

 It ended the exposure of infants and began the first movements for the protection of life.

It birthed hospitals, orphanages, and cared for the weak.

It elevated the status of women and called men to purity and monogamy.

It transformed charity from a display of status into an act of worship.

Even Roman slavery began to lose its moral footing.

The empire of conquest was

 quietly transformed by a people who walked in the way of the cross of Jesus Christ and the world as they knew it was transformed.

God's intention for money prevailed.

 that it would find its meaning in the expansion of his temple and the extension of his kingdom.

From Egypt to Persia to Rome, from gold and silver to modern day money, God keeps using earthly resources for his eternal glory.

He redeems what's been misused.

He repurposes what's been corrupted.

He takes the wealth of the world to build his house.

He gives money its proper meaning.

 The only question is, have you?

Today, his house is not a physical tent or temple.

His house is us.

It is the church.

 It is local congregations of people who shine as lights in their cities and who multiply throughout the world.

A people built together by the Spirit for the glory of God.

And just as God will repurpose the wealth of the world in new creation, he calls us to do the same now for his church because we are the living preview of that temple.

 And when we give, we are joining that same redemptive story.

We're saying, God, take what's in my hands and use it for what's in your heart.

We're letting our resources find their purpose because make no mistake, your money has a mission.

It's just a question of who you have determined your money is going to serve.

In Babylon, money builds monuments to the self.

In Jerusalem, money builds a house of worship for God.

Citizens of Babylon,

 worship what they build.

Citizens of the heavenly city build for the sake of worship.

And every time we give, we are proclaiming which kingdom we belong to.

And we are recognizing the worth of the one to whom we give it.

You see, he's not just worthy of our wealth in eternity.

He is worthy of our wealth now.

Look at Revelation chapter 5 verse 12.

I'll prove it to you.

 This is the scene of heavenly worship.

This is what we are emulating every time we gather, Revelation 4 and 5.

We'll get there soon in our series.

I cannot wait.

Favorite two chapters in the whole Bible.

Look what happens at the revelation of the Lamb of God.

In a loud voice, they were saying, worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and, say it with me, power and?

God.

 Power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise.

You see, in this scene of heavenly worship, what reveals the activity of heaven that you and I are currently reflecting, what we see is that today we are not only meant to ascribe to the Lamb honor and glory and praise and things of that sort, but also our wealth.

He is worthy of our wealth now.

And it's not just giving for giving's sake.

 It's giving for the sake of the mission of the Lamb being extended throughout the world.

Because here's the deal.

The faithful witness of the church, including the money that we steward, is part of what turns God's enemies into God's friends.

Which brings us back to where we began.

 that in the redemption of the nations and the redemption of the kings of the earth, entering the temple of new creation, look at verse 27 of Revelation 21, the last verse that we started with, nothing impure will enter the new creation.

Nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those, say only those.

Only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life.

So if only those written in the Lamb's book of life enter the new creation,

 That means that those redeemed nations and redeemed kings have their names written in that land's book of life.

And if God redeems them through the faithful witness of the church, including the way his church steward their wealth, that means that our money becomes one of the means through which God fulfills his saving purposes.

In his sovereignty, even our resources become a tool of redemption.

That's the invitation that God has for every single one of us today.

 take our resources, and say, God, use us as a tool of redemption.

And that's why the whole biblical story, again and again and again, points you to the true meaning of money.

That you would use it for the expansion of his kingdom and his temple.

And right now, that means being all in on his local church.

The ever-expanding temple of God in the earth.

That's what the New Testament calls us, the temple of God.

 And that is exactly what house offering is about.

Just like in Exodus, we are bringing our gold to build churches for his presence, the glory of Christ.

Just like in Ezra, we are investing in churches that rebuild ruins, the beauty of the bride.

Just like in Acts, we are funding the movement of the gospel to go further in its impact, the good of every single city that God calls us to.

 Over the last six months, God has begun to clarify to us what he wants us to prepare for in terms of growth and multiplication.

And he's brought that clarity through several prophetic words for, in fact, in exactly the last six months.

 The first of those prophetic words came back in May.

Nicole and I, along with several of our team, were in Atlanta, Georgia for a conference, a gathering.

We belong to a network of churches called C3.

And so we were gathering with our C3 family across America in Atlanta.

And during one of the nights of worship, a seasoned pastor, which is a kind way of saying he's older...

 who we know deeply and love so much.

He came up to Nicole in the midst of worship, and he said this to her, God has given you an apostolic cry in your prayers, and you will prophesy the expansion of the boundaries of your church through your prayers.

 And that resonated so deeply with what God has been stirring in our hearts for the future of Cathedral.

And then, of course, one month later in June, there was the word that hundreds of us heard Father David give on the last night of Holy Spirit Conference.

Here's what he said.

You don't currently have enough campuses to contain what God is doing at Cathedral.

And then he proceeded to name wild places like Bangkok in the south of France.

It was crazy if you were there.

But nobody was more shocked by the goodness of God in that word.

 in that moment over that word than me because all week long in private I was wrestling with this unction to stand before you guys on Friday night of Holy Spirit conference and cast vision for planting cathedrals in cities wherever God would lead us but I wasn't sure how bold to be with you in that and then right before I got up to preach father David gives this word about planting more campuses and I was absolutely electrified and I got up there

 And I just declared multiplication over our church because it was so clear to me that God is affirming that and that God is with us.

And then two days later on Sunday, we had Pastor Jude Fuquay, a beloved friend of our church, preach in our Sunday morning services.

Many of you weren't there because you all had COVID-19, but it was an amazing day.

Like it was really, really humbling for me, honestly, to have a guest and none of you here, but it was really, really beautiful.

 And he preaches lights out as he always does.

And then right smack dab in the middle of his sermon, Friday is like fresh in my mind.

And then right in the middle of the sermon, Pastor Jude turns to Nicole and I were sitting right there.

And he goes, God is bringing worldwide influence upon Cathedral.

I'm like, wow, God, you're really just pouring it on thick this weekend, aren't you?

 And then finally, just a few weeks ago, Nicole and I were in London for C3 Europe's gathering of pastors and leaders, which was such an inspiring gathering to see what God is doing all across Europe.

And during one of the prayer sessions of that conference, the guy who was leading it, in a room full of hundreds of people, just points to me and says, you are going to plant churches all up and down the West Coast.

And I thought, okay, God, I get it.

 All of these words were in the last six months.

Every single one of them was given independently of the others with no knowledge of what the other people had said.

And that is unique.

We've never had that.

We're 10 years into building this church.

Not one time have we ever had a consecutive set of words like that.

 And I would just like to point out that if this is what we've been able to see happen just through average, everyday, ordinary faithfulness and obedience, imagine what God is signaling the next decade is going to look like for you.

 There are so many people in Los Angeles alone, and now God is inviting us to think larger, to think the West Coast and beyond.

It seems that the Lord is revealing something of what we need to be preparing for, but it's not just about planting campuses.

It's also about the enlargement of Highland Park and South Bay and Nashville.

 When Joel and Katie Millgate, who were here with us about a month or so ago, preaching in our Sunday morning services, we went out to lunch after, and he shared with me that he felt the Lord say to him during worship that we are going to need a significantly larger vessel to contain what God is doing in our church.

And we do sense that, particularly with the growth that we've seen here in Highland Park in just the last 12 months.

We do sense that there is an enlargement coming to our church.

 Since this time last year, we've seen our average attendance churchwide grow by 39%.

Highland Park alone in the last 12 months has grown by 61%.

It's pretty amazing.

We've seen 64 brand new people go through all four weeks of essentials and say, I want to be a covenant committed member of this community and give their lives to build a church.

Thank you.

 Cathedral Kids has exploded across the board.

It's up by 39%.

In Highland Park alone, Cathedral Kids in the last 12 months has grown by 85%.

There are so many kids coming to our church.

It's amazing.

God bless all of the kids' team.

And we're so grateful that you love Cathedral.

 and that your friends and your family whom you bring love Cathedral, and that they would love it so much that they want to be a part of what God is doing here.

And really, our focus is so simple.

We're gonna continue to be a church for the glory of Christ, the beauty of the bride, and the good of the city.

That means that we're gonna keep unapologetically focusing on worship, discipleship, and mission.

And as we do that, we're trusting God to bring growth and to bring multiplication.

Now these words from the Lord that we've received, they are not promises.

 They are invitations to potential.

They are what can happen when God's providence meets our preparation.

House offering is about that preparation.

That's what we aim to do today.

So as we get ready to give, I believe our financial surrender should be marked by two important qualities.

First is that our giving today should be joyful.

 We should be giving in response to the love of God that produces such joy in us.

And as we give joyfully, what that does is it positions us to be transformed in our act of giving.

I've been studying recently how it is that people, specifically Christians, actually transform and actually change.

And according to both scripture and the science of the brain, one of the absolutely essential ingredients to produce change in your life is joy.

 No joy, no change.

And of course, we know that joy is not circumstantial.

We know that joy comes from meditating upon the love that God has for us and the delight that he takes in us.

The Bible actually says that we have joy in God's presence, literally in the Hebrew, at the turning of God's face to us in love.

And so today, before we give, let's just consider the cross.

 But God loves you and delights in you that much.

And so despite your circumstances, you can have amazing joy today.

And to give out of that place of joy.

No wonder the Bible says God loves a cheerful giver.

It's not just about the attitude we have as we give.

It's actually about how that attitude creates the very conditions that we enter into so that giving produces something in us.

The second thing is that our offerings today should be sacrificial.

 The measure of generosity is not in how much we give, but it is in what it costs us to give it.

Every sacrificial offering mirrors the heart of the cross when we give what's precious for the sake of the kingdom.

People will often say that generosity is not about the amount, but that's not really biblical if we use that as an excuse to not be sacrificial in our giving.

 The reason Jesus commended the widow who gave the two coins in the book of Mark and says, wow, like she gave more than anybody else was because she gave everything.

When the religious leaders who were wealthy, they were just bringing their leftovers.

Now they gave more than her, but she definitely gave more than them.

She felt the weight of what she was giving leave her hands.

So the point is not that we give everything here today.

The point is that we feel the sacrifice.

 that we feel the weight, that we give an offering that is commensurate with the gift that we have received in Christ.

Nicole and I have made it a habit to give sacrificially in offerings just like this today since we've been married for 16 years.

And so many times I've been around the world at conferences texting her saying, I feel like we're supposed to give like five grand in this offering.

Are you good if I do that?

She's like going to bed at home in LA.

She's like, no, what?

I'm like, cool, great, yes.

Connection's really bad.

I'm giving it.

 And truthfully, what we hold in our hands today, the saying is true, you cannot out-give God.

And we have been blessed miraculously by the Lord.

The transformation that's happened in our hearts as we've given towards God's house that we've been able to plant ourselves in is even more miraculous, and that's a miracle that's still in motion today.

And so today, let's bring our offerings joyfully, and let's bring our offerings sacrificially,

 As Revelation invites us, let's bring the glory, the honor, and splendor of our households, our businesses, our finances, as faithful sacrifice to the Lamb.

Because when our money finds its meaning, our hearts end up aligning with His.

Amen?