Damien Schitter: Hello everyone.
Damien Schitter: This is Pastor Damian.
Damien Schitter: You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, orlando.
Damien Schitter: At New City, we believe all of us need all of Jesus for all of life.
Damien Schitter: For more resources, visit our website at newcityorlandocom.
Damien Schitter: Thanks for listening.
Nadia Chong: Church.
Nadia Chong: Please join me.
Nadia Chong: Give us understanding that we may keep your law and observe it with our whole hearts.
Nadia Chong: Lead us in the path of your commandments, for we delight in it.
Nadia Chong: Turn our eyes from looking at worthless things and give us life in your ways, through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen.
Nadia Chong: Scripture today is from Psalm 37.
Nadia Chong: Trust in the Lord and do good.
Nadia Chong: Dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.
Nadia Chong: Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Nadia Chong: Better is the little that the righteous has than the abundance of many wicked.
Nadia Chong: The Lord knows the days of the blameless and their heritage will remain forever.
Nadia Chong: They are not put to shame in evil times.
Nadia Chong: In the days of famine they have abundance.
Nadia Chong: The wicked borrows but does not pay back.
Nadia Chong: But the righteous is generous and gives, for those blessed by the law by the Lord shall inherit the land, but those cursed by him shall be cut off.
Nadia Chong: I have been young and now I'm old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.
Nadia Chong: He is ever lending generously and his children become a blessing.
Nadia Chong: This is God's word.
Benjamin Kandt: I had a mentor who bought a brand new pickup truck and it was nice.
Benjamin Kandt: It was like the high trim level, four by four leather seats, a little lift on it, not a Florida man lift, but like a classy lift.
Benjamin Kandt: And because this dude was a follower of Jesus, he was generous in his stewardship of that truck.
Benjamin Kandt: He would let people borrow it all the time to move.
Benjamin Kandt: If you have a pickup truck, you know that's part of the blessing and the burden of owning a truck.
Benjamin Kandt: And so one time somebody borrowed his truck, moved, something brought it back with a gigantic dent in the back bumper.
Benjamin Kandt: They felt terrible and they said I'm so sorry.
Benjamin Kandt: He said, hey, listen, it's okay.
Benjamin Kandt: But it was not okay.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, it was not okay.
Benjamin Kandt: He was so upset and frustrated and angry, but he didn't want to take it out on them, they didn't really do it on purpose.
Benjamin Kandt: And so what did he do?
Benjamin Kandt: He kind of took it out on the Lord.
Benjamin Kandt: He went and he prayed, and this was a version of his prayer, something like this Lord, why did you let them dent your truck?
Benjamin Kandt: You see, because in that moment he was trying to live his theology, he was trying to practice what he preaches In that Psalm 24 says the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof all of the people that dwell therein.
Benjamin Kandt: In other words, everything belongs to God.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what he was living in light of when my children went through that phase, or when they go through the phase where they learn the word mine and everybody knows this phase, my wife and I would catechize them Whenever they would say it.
Benjamin Kandt: We would say nothing is yours, everything belongs to God.
Benjamin Kandt: And it worked until they worked it on us.
Benjamin Kandt: And so we would be eating ice cream as a family.
Benjamin Kandt: They would devour it and I'd still have a little bit left, and one of my kids would say daddy, can I have some of your ice cream?
Benjamin Kandt: And I'd say no, dude, this is mine, you already ate yours.
Benjamin Kandt: And they'd say but, dad, nothing is yours, everything belongs to God.
Benjamin Kandt: Right, and that's true.
Benjamin Kandt: It is true, and in fact, what happens is is that the sin in our hearts takes our time and our stuff and our money and claims it and clings to it as if it's ours.
Benjamin Kandt: But the scriptures actually describe us as simply stewards, because everything belongs to God.
Benjamin Kandt: And so we're going to look at that together.
Benjamin Kandt: We're going to look at what does it mean that we are simply stewards, and I want to point out this is actually really important, because everything that you have, it's not yours that's an individualistic approach but it's also not the state's that's the socialistic approach.
Benjamin Kandt: But it's also not the states that's the socialistic approach.
Benjamin Kandt: But it's not even your families.
Benjamin Kandt: That's the traditional approach.
Benjamin Kandt: It's God's.
Benjamin Kandt: It's God's and that's the biblical approach, that if everything belongs to God, then he has entrusted the things that we have to us as stewards.
Benjamin Kandt: And so what I want to do is I want to ask and answer the question how do we steward our life?
Benjamin Kandt: What does it look like to be stewards?
Benjamin Kandt: I want to look at Psalm 37 together and I want to point out kind of a theology of stewardship under three words simplicity, industry, generosity, simplicity, industry and generosity.
Benjamin Kandt: Let's look at the text together.
Benjamin Kandt: If you have a Bible or a device or your worship guide, go ahead and get Psalm 37 out in front of you, because we're gonna look at some of these scriptures together.
Benjamin Kandt: I want you to see that simplicity is learning to steward your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: It's stewarding your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse 16 with me.
Benjamin Kandt: Psalm 37, verse 16 says this better is the little that the righteous has than the abundance of many wicked.
Benjamin Kandt: How can a little be better than a lot?
Benjamin Kandt: How is that possible?
Benjamin Kandt: That's what that verse is saying Only if you're free from wanting more.
Benjamin Kandt: That's how Socrates, the ancient philosopher, believed that a wise man, a wise woman, would live a simple life.
Benjamin Kandt: But he was also known for doing something.
Benjamin Kandt: He would go down to the marketplace and he'd spend hours just looking around, wandering around what we would call window shopping today.
Benjamin Kandt: And so one of his friends actually approached him and said hey, why is it that you go and look at all the things and you seem so intrigued by all the stuff?
Benjamin Kandt: To which Socrates replied I love to go there to discover how many things I am perfectly happy without.
Benjamin Kandt: That's simplicity.
Benjamin Kandt: That's stewarding your heart properly.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, simplicity is about stewarding your heart toward freedom.
Benjamin Kandt: It's not necessarily about having less, it's about wanting less.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what simplicity of heart is.
Benjamin Kandt: Richard Foster defines it like this.
Benjamin Kandt: He says simplicity is the quote joyful unconcern about possessions in order to seek his kingdom first.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, in Matthew 6, jesus taught us that where your treasure is there, your heart will be.
Benjamin Kandt: Also.
Benjamin Kandt: Another way to say that is is your heart follows your treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: Our culture likes to say follow your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: The Bible likes to say, yeah, but what's your heart following?
Benjamin Kandt: That's your treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what your heart follows after, and so it's important to understand that your treasure is whatever you will sacrifice for.
Benjamin Kandt: If you want a little indicator of that, look at both your calendar and your bank account.
Benjamin Kandt: That's how you find out where your treasure is.
Benjamin Kandt: Where do you sacrifice your time, where do you sacrifice your money?
Benjamin Kandt: That's your treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: And so 10 days ago, I sat down and I journaled, I dated it that's how I know when it was and I just simply put at the top of the paper I said why do we love money?
Benjamin Kandt: And I just started journaling.
Benjamin Kandt: I have like 20 things.
Benjamin Kandt: I'm gonna summarize them.
Benjamin Kandt: These are the things that came up.
Benjamin Kandt: We love money because it's a metric of success.
Benjamin Kandt: It's a way of keeping score.
Benjamin Kandt: You can tell if you're winning based on how much money you have, because it's an agreed upon status symbol in our culture.
Benjamin Kandt: Again, I'm not saying these are good things, I'm just saying these are things.
Benjamin Kandt: Also, money can't buy happiness kind of, because it can buy a measure of pleasure, that's for sure.
Benjamin Kandt: Money can buy experiences and comfort.
Benjamin Kandt: It can buy physical attractiveness so that you get more attention from people.
Benjamin Kandt: It can buy a modicum of protection so you get a sense of security.
Benjamin Kandt: It can buy some favor with other people.
Benjamin Kandt: We call that ingratiation.
Benjamin Kandt: Money can buy leverage over other people too.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, let me just kind of summarize.
Benjamin Kandt: Here's the thing.
Benjamin Kandt: Money has this ability to actualize many different desires.
Benjamin Kandt: If you want it, if you've got enough money, a lot of things you can actually get it.
Benjamin Kandt: You can have it.
Benjamin Kandt: This is why we love money.
Benjamin Kandt: You're not crazy for loving money, but you are vulnerable.
Benjamin Kandt: You're profoundly vulnerable.
Benjamin Kandt: The reason why is because, if money is your treasure, you will never be free.
Benjamin Kandt: You will always live in fear.
Benjamin Kandt: Rainier Marie Rilke, the famous poet, said it like this our fears are like dragons guarding our deepest treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: Where are you afraid?
Benjamin Kandt: Where do you feel fear?
Benjamin Kandt: Those are dragons guarding your deepest treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: You want to know what you treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: You want to know what really has captivated your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: Right, if simplicity is stewarding your heart, where does your heart treasure?
Benjamin Kandt: Pay attention to your fears.
Benjamin Kandt: What are you afraid of?
Benjamin Kandt: You see, simplicity is about freedom, setting you free from fear.
Benjamin Kandt: How do we gain this?
Benjamin Kandt: How do we get this simplicity?
Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse four.
Benjamin Kandt: Verse four says delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: The way you get set free, the way you steward your heart, the way you learn simplicity of heart, is by learning to treasure the one who treasures you.
Benjamin Kandt: It's by learning to tell him all of your desires.
Benjamin Kandt: If it's true that money actually is potent in our lives because it can pay for what we want, if that's true, one of the ways to deal with that is to just simply tell the Lord what your desires are.
Benjamin Kandt: Lord, I want security, significance and satisfaction.
Benjamin Kandt: I want those things.
Benjamin Kandt: Let me just let you in on a secret.
Benjamin Kandt: You are made to want those things.
Benjamin Kandt: You have creational desires that evil comes in and perverts and distorts and warps.
Benjamin Kandt: But the desire to be secure and satisfied and significant is something God put in you and evil comes along and distorts it, misdirects it, and so we go to the Lord.
Benjamin Kandt: We say Lord, I want security.
Benjamin Kandt: Teach me what that looks like.
Benjamin Kandt: To find security in you.
Benjamin Kandt: What are you doing in that moment?
Benjamin Kandt: You're delighting yourself in the Lord.
Benjamin Kandt: Delight yourself.
Benjamin Kandt: That's a reflexive action.
Benjamin Kandt: It's something you do to you.
Benjamin Kandt: That's the command there.
Benjamin Kandt: Do this to yourself, delight yourself.
Benjamin Kandt: So if you're right here now going, I don't really delight in the Lord.
Benjamin Kandt: I'm saying yeah, and the Bible's commanding you to do this action, to learn the practice of reflexively delighting, cultivating a certain amount of delight in the Lord, and that's actually what will set you free the freedom of simplicity.
Benjamin Kandt: Aw Tozer, in a phenomenal book called the Pursuit of God it's worth reading says it like this the man who has God for his treasure has all things in one.
Benjamin Kandt: Many ordinary treasures may be denied him, or, if he is allowed to have them, the enjoyment of them will be so tempered that they will never be necessary to his happiness.
Benjamin Kandt: What if you could be set free such that having certain things were not necessary to your happiness?
Benjamin Kandt: He, if you could be set free such that having certain things were not necessary to your happiness.
Benjamin Kandt: He goes on, he says this or if he must see them go one after one, he will scarcely feel a sense of loss for having the source of all things he has in one all satisfaction, all pleasure, all delight.
Benjamin Kandt: Whatever he may lose, he has actually lost nothing, for he now has it all in one, and he has it purely legitimately and forever.
Benjamin Kandt: That's the freedom of simplicity.
Benjamin Kandt: Have you touched that Like?
Benjamin Kandt: Have you touched that in your lived experience as a disciple of Jesus.
Benjamin Kandt: I have, but then it fades away pretty quickly.
Benjamin Kandt: I return back to finding my security, significance and satisfaction other places.
Benjamin Kandt: But here's the thing the times when I've touched it, the times when I can truly honestly, sincerely, say to the Lord take what you want, just leave me yourself and I'll have enough.
Benjamin Kandt: When I can say that prayer, it's usually in times of peak experiences, high points of joy or low points of pain.
Benjamin Kandt: Why both of those?
Benjamin Kandt: Well, because when you have peak experiences, high points of joy or low points of pain, why both of those?
Benjamin Kandt: Well, because when you have peak experiences, you recognize that it's still not enough to satisfy your soul.
Benjamin Kandt: Like if you could just have everything you ever wanted, you'd realize it's still not enough.
Benjamin Kandt: So in those peak experiences, I recognize that those are simply beams coming down from the sun.
Benjamin Kandt: Capital S, the one who is worthy of all of my desire.
Benjamin Kandt: But in those moments of pain you realize, when everything's stripped away, what do I have?
Benjamin Kandt: What do I have if I don't have the Lord?
Benjamin Kandt: And so the Lord invites us, will walk with us through peaks and valleys in order to invite us into recognizing better is the little that the righteous has than the abundance of many wicked.
Benjamin Kandt: So not only do we steward our hearts through simplicity, we steward our hands through industry.
Benjamin Kandt: Point two look at verse three with me.
Benjamin Kandt: It says this trust in the Lord and do good, dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.
Benjamin Kandt: Look down a little further at verse 27.
Benjamin Kandt: It says this turn away from evil and do good, so shall you dwell forever.
Benjamin Kandt: Two times in this psal Psalm it just simply says do good.
Benjamin Kandt: Simple, clear Christians are doers.
Benjamin Kandt: We are people who are active in the world.
Benjamin Kandt: We are actually working things out.
Benjamin Kandt: We believe we can contribute to the betterment of our society.
Benjamin Kandt: And so we've been known for doing good throughout the history of humanity.
Benjamin Kandt: And a lot of that is because in Ephesians 2.10, it says that we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
Benjamin Kandt: Now I just want to be.
Benjamin Kandt: We define a disciple as someone.
Benjamin Kandt: A disciple is united to Jesus, in communion with God, community with one another, co-mission for the world.
Benjamin Kandt: And we double click on co-mission.
Benjamin Kandt: We say your mission with God and others in this world is your work and your witness.
Benjamin Kandt: When we say work, we mean good works, like Ephesians 2.10, but we also mean your work, your occupation, your vocation.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, the reason why is because I believe most of the good works God ordained for you are actually worked out through your daily work.
Benjamin Kandt: That's where you most of the good works God ordained for you are actually worked out, through your daily work.
Benjamin Kandt: That's where you're doing the good works that God intends for you to do in the world.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, this has actually marked Protestantism in particular.
Benjamin Kandt: This has been a truth that's been core to who we are, as children of the Reformation, if you will.
Benjamin Kandt: Max Weber is the one who kind of popularized this phrase, the Protestant work ethic, and what he pointed out was that, essentially, we have a value attached to our work, that work really matters and it's a part of your calling.
Benjamin Kandt: And the thing I'm just going to go real nerdy, real quick.
Benjamin Kandt: Historically, what happened is in the Reformation.
Benjamin Kandt: The Reformation recovered a lost doctrine called the priesthood of all believers.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, the Catholic church had made it seem as if the highest order vocations are priests, monks, missionaries, the type people like me Some of you still believe that that's okay.
Benjamin Kandt: Lord's still at work in your life.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, the Protestant Reformation said actually no, the priesthood of all believers means that it doesn't matter what your particular work is.
Benjamin Kandt: It's a calling from God to do the works that he prepared beforehand, that you should walk in them and by so doing, sanctified, made holy every type of work, every type of work that's according to his will, and so in doing that, actually it inspired and invigorated an industry that Protestants changed the face of the world through.
Benjamin Kandt: By industry, I just mean a commitment to hard work.
Benjamin Kandt: Now, here's the thing.
Benjamin Kandt: There's other historians and scholars, social scientists, who will point out that we've actually lived in the last 300 years in the United States of America.
Benjamin Kandt: We've lived in a secularized version of the Protestant work ethic, and really what's being pointed out there is that no longer do we work because we believe it's a calling from god.
Benjamin Kandt: Now we work in order to find our worth, and so work still has religious significance, but now it's a salvation scheme.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, in in this world there's there's a problem because, um, ephesians 2.10 follows right after Ephesians 2.8 and 9, because that's how numbers work Eight, then nine, then 10.
Benjamin Kandt: And so this is what Ephesians 2.8 says.
Benjamin Kandt: It says this for, by grace, you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing.
Benjamin Kandt: It is the gift of God, not a result of work, so that no one may boast.
Benjamin Kandt: So the hard, full court press against thinking your works contribute anything to your salvation or your standing before God Ephesians 2, 8, 9, and then seamlessly shift to and yet God's prepared good works for you to walk in, be industrious, and so only when we hold that tension we realize that Protestants didn't just recover the priesthood of all believers, but also justification by faith alone.
Benjamin Kandt: In other words, you work from acceptance with God, not for acceptance with God.
Benjamin Kandt: You work from status, worth, dignity, identity, not for those things.
Benjamin Kandt: When you secularize the Protestant work ethic, you find, actually, our work is where we find all of our worth, and when that's the case, what ends up happening is that you, you find yourself living in such a way where busyness is a status symbol.
Benjamin Kandt: Um, I heard a man recently say it like this.
Benjamin Kandt: He said hey, there's, there's two things that I really like but need to repent of.
Benjamin Kandt: First, I really like being exhausted because of how busy I am.
Benjamin Kandt: Second, I really like telling you about it.
Benjamin Kandt: What is that?
Benjamin Kandt: That's a cultural status symbol, isn't it?
Benjamin Kandt: How are you?
Benjamin Kandt: You know, I'm just really busy and exhausted.
Benjamin Kandt: That should be like oh wow, you're failing at life.
Benjamin Kandt: You don't know how to manage your time well.
Benjamin Kandt: You don't know how to actually give your best time, energy and attention to the things that matter most.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what that should sound like, but we all know it doesn't.
Benjamin Kandt: That's why you're laughing right now.
Benjamin Kandt: And so here's the thing Simultaneously, the Christian gospel removes the need to prove yourself from work by your work, through your work, and also makes your work profoundly meaningful.
Benjamin Kandt: It does both of those together, but only when the Christian gospel sets you free from having to earn favor, earn status, earn worth, justify your existence through your work, because if you live like that, time management becomes time enslavement.
Benjamin Kandt: But actually God is inviting you out of the idolatry of industry to work and to rest with him.
Benjamin Kandt: So here's something that maybe a tool, maybe a metric how well do you keep the Sabbath day?
Benjamin Kandt: How many times, how many 24-hour blocks in seven days?
Benjamin Kandt: Do you do nothing that you know to be work?
Benjamin Kandt: It's an indicator.
Benjamin Kandt: It's an indicator of how well you really believe that your status and value and worth is received, not achieved.
Benjamin Kandt: But listen, some of you in the room today, you need to hear that when God created the world, he created it in six days and rested on the seventh, and then he commanded humanity to do the same.
Benjamin Kandt: He said this work six, rest one.
Benjamin Kandt: Some of you in here actually need to hear work six, like stop being lazy, get after it.
Benjamin Kandt: Have some holy ambition to bring goodness, beauty and truth into the world.
Benjamin Kandt: Some of you need to hear that, but I think a lot of you need to hear rest one, rest.
Benjamin Kandt: Let yourself be refreshed as a human being, not a human doing.
Benjamin Kandt: For once.
Benjamin Kandt: Don't live under Pharaoh's regime anymore.
Benjamin Kandt: You think Pharaoh died in ancient Egypt.
Benjamin Kandt: Pharaoh's alive and well, ruling over you, saying more bricks, less straw.
Benjamin Kandt: It just happens through your email inbox now, and so one of the ways we can be set free from industry idolatry is by resting, keeping the Sabbath day holy.
Benjamin Kandt: But here's another way we can recognize that, in the end, all that we will receive will be simply an inheritance.
Benjamin Kandt: Look with me back at the text.
Benjamin Kandt: Six times Psalm 37 talks about land, the land, and five of those times it uses the word inherit.
Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse nine.
Benjamin Kandt: It says this those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land.
Benjamin Kandt: Verse 11,.
Benjamin Kandt: The meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace.
Benjamin Kandt: Verse 22,.
Benjamin Kandt: Those blessed by the Lord shall inherit the land.
Benjamin Kandt: Verse 29,.
Benjamin Kandt: The righteous shall inherit the land and dwell upon it forever.
Benjamin Kandt: Verse 34, wait for the Lord and keep his way, and he will exalt you to inherit the land.
Benjamin Kandt: What's the big deal?
Benjamin Kandt: Why keep talking about this over and over and over again?
Benjamin Kandt: Why the land?
Benjamin Kandt: Deuteronomy 8, which we just read recently in the McShane Bible reading plan, says this this is the most beautiful description of the land I know in the scriptures.
Benjamin Kandt: It says this the Lord, your God, is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs flowing out in the valleys and hills.
Benjamin Kandt: A land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates.
Benjamin Kandt: A land of olive trees and honey.
Benjamin Kandt: A land in which you will eat bread without scarcity what a beautiful word without scarcity.
Benjamin Kandt: Eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing.
Benjamin Kandt: A land whose stones are iron and out of whose hills you can dig copper and you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord, your God, for the good land he has given you.
Benjamin Kandt: That's why the land is such a big deal.
Benjamin Kandt: That's why I can say unequivocally that security, significance and satisfaction were God's idea because he provides for it for his people in the land.
Benjamin Kandt: But here's the thing the land was a gift from God but simultaneously always belonged to God.
Benjamin Kandt: His people were simply stewards.
Benjamin Kandt: That's why they got kicked out of the land.
Benjamin Kandt: They refused to steward the land that God intended.
Benjamin Kandt: Now let me just do a little excursus here on what's called hermeneutics, the study of how you read scripture.
Benjamin Kandt: Okay, in reading the Bible, any promise or prophecy always has an immediate, intermediate and ultimate fulfillment.
Benjamin Kandt: Promises and prophecies, like the land promises here, have immediate, intermediate and ultimate fulfillment.
Benjamin Kandt: Okay, so the land in scripture, the immediate fulfillment is the geography in the Middle East.
Benjamin Kandt: That's the immediate fulfillment.
Benjamin Kandt: God's giving them actual land, real boundaries.
Benjamin Kandt: Okay, that's the immediate fulfillment in Psalm 37.
Benjamin Kandt: That's important.
Benjamin Kandt: But here's the thing even in the Hebrew Bible, where those promises are made five times, the dimensions of the land are given and they're different every time.
Benjamin Kandt: So what's the boundaries of this land?
Benjamin Kandt: You see, what I think is happening is the Lord is sowing, even into the Hebrew Bible.
Benjamin Kandt: He's sowing some idea that there's something bigger happening here than simply a chunk of land the size of New Jersey, and that's the intermediate fulfillment.
Benjamin Kandt: The intermediate fulfillment of the land is the Lord Jesus himself.
Benjamin Kandt: It's Jesus himself, and this is what I mean by this.
Benjamin Kandt: All of the promises of God find their yes in Jesus Christ.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what 2 Corinthians 1.20 says.
Benjamin Kandt: And so when the New Testament says that we who believe in Jesus are, that's what 2 Corinthians 1.20 says.
Benjamin Kandt: And so when the New Testament says that we who believe in Jesus are in Christ, that is a locative meaning of that word.
Benjamin Kandt: This is what that means.
Benjamin Kandt: It means that you, if you belong to Jesus, simultaneously are a you're a resident of Orlando and a resident of Jesus.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what that means.
Benjamin Kandt: Some of you are like I live in Oviedo, it still counts, oviedo, okay.
Benjamin Kandt: It means that you are both simultaneously right here, right now, a Floridian and a Christian, because you live in Jesus Christ.
Benjamin Kandt: He is the location, he is the land, he is the ultimate or he is this intermediate fulfillment of what it means to inherit the land from God.
Benjamin Kandt: The Lord has given him to you and so, listen, the geographical locus of God's blessing is no longer a place in the Middle East, but a person in heaven, the man, christ Jesus.
Benjamin Kandt: This is essential to know.
Benjamin Kandt: Ephesians 1.11 says this in him, that is Jesus.
Benjamin Kandt: In him, we have obtained an inheritance.
Benjamin Kandt: Do you see that All of the promises in Psalm 37, five times, you will inherit the land, inherit the land, inherit the land.
Benjamin Kandt: It's found in Jesus, but that's not the ultimate fulfillment of this promise.
Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse 11, it says this but the meek shall inherit the land.
Benjamin Kandt: Does that sound familiar?
Benjamin Kandt: Jesus quotes this in Matthew 5 in his great sermon on the Mount, and awkwardly, jesus gets it wrong because he says blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Benjamin Kandt: It's like oops, jesus, you should have read your Bible, or maybe not?
Benjamin Kandt: Maybe Jesus knew that the immediate and intermediate and ultimate fulfillment of the promise of the land was that the meek shall inherit the earth.
Benjamin Kandt: We preached on meekness last year and simply put the meek.
Benjamin Kandt: Meekness is love-constrained power.
Benjamin Kandt: It's people who have power, but it's constrained by love, the love of God and the love of neighbor.
Benjamin Kandt: So why is it that the meek inherit the earth?
Benjamin Kandt: They're the only ones God can entrust it to.
Benjamin Kandt: They're the only ones who would be trustworthy stewards of the entire earth.
Benjamin Kandt: That's why the meek inherit the earth, and so the whole, entire cosmos is the fulfillment of this promise for the land.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, the land promises from Genesis to Revelation, the land promises are always multi-layered and in their prophetic fulfillment, what does this all mean for you and me?
Benjamin Kandt: So what is another way to ask that question?
Benjamin Kandt: Well, there's a place called Mount Morgan in Queensland, australia, and the people who lived on this mountain owned this mountain.
Benjamin Kandt: They toiled arduously for years on its barren slopes, just trying to eke out some sort of an existence.
Benjamin Kandt: What they didn't know until the late 1800s was that under their feet was one of the richest sources of gold the world has ever known.
Benjamin Kandt: They produced over 225 tons of gold, along with copper and silver.
Benjamin Kandt: It was now, mind you, it was technically theirs, and yet not experienced, not accessed and not enjoyed.
Benjamin Kandt: Brothers and sisters, those of you who belong to Jesus, you toil anxiously, day and night.
Benjamin Kandt: You work so hard, not realizing that you already have an inheritance in Jesus Christ, a greater treasure than you could ever earn or work for on your own, and it's been given to you.
Benjamin Kandt: And so we cling to scraps of security and we think that we can kind of have this man-made existence.
Benjamin Kandt: But if you belong to Jesus, then what Paul calls the unsearchable riches of Christ are already yours.
Benjamin Kandt: You just get to inherit it by faith and patience.
Benjamin Kandt: And so, if you believe this, you can begin to steward your heart through simplicity.
Benjamin Kandt: You can steward your hands through industry and then, finally, you can steward the results through generosity.
Benjamin Kandt: Look with me at verse 21.
Benjamin Kandt: Verse 21 says this the wicked borrows but does not pay back.
Benjamin Kandt: But the righteous is generous and gives, for those blessed by the Lord shall inherit the land, but those cursed by him shall be cut off.
Benjamin Kandt: It just says really simply here the righteous is generous and gives.
Benjamin Kandt: Why?
Benjamin Kandt: One of my favorite Old Testament scholars is a guy named Bruce Walkie, and Walkie says this famous quote.
Benjamin Kandt: He says the unrighteous disadvantage others to advantage themselves.
Benjamin Kandt: The righteous disadvantage themselves to advantage others.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what it means when it says the righteous is generous and gives.
Benjamin Kandt: It's been said that obedience to God in this area, in this area of your life, obedience to God requires you to use your money, to quote, procure, preserve and further the wealth of others as well as your own.
Benjamin Kandt: So obedience to God, your own wealth and other people.
Benjamin Kandt: Wait, what?
Benjamin Kandt: Like?
Benjamin Kandt: Which social justice warrior said that the Westminster Assembly in 1643, when they wrote our catechism, the larger catechism?
Benjamin Kandt: They were talking about what it means not to steal Positively.
Benjamin Kandt: What it means is to pursue the wealth of the other people around you as you do your own.
Benjamin Kandt: That's our own denomination.
Benjamin Kandt: I actually believe a lot of our social justice issues that I talked about last week would be solved if we would just take our confessional documents and live into them properly.
Benjamin Kandt: The larger catechism teaches us what justice looks like when it comes to our money, and some of you are like, okay, fine, fine, fine, I'll give some money, but only to kind-hearted, upright people whose poverty came upon them through no foolishness or contribution of their own and who will respond to my aid with gratitude and joy.
Benjamin Kandt: Well, that's something right.
Benjamin Kandt: I've moved you a little bit to start, but problem is is that almost no one exists?
Benjamin Kandt: Who qualifies, then?
Benjamin Kandt: And in fact, what if that was Jesus's stance toward you, where would you be?
Benjamin Kandt: Your generosity in the scriptures, especially to the poor and the undeserving, is a good test of your grasp of the gospel.
Benjamin Kandt: Why is that?
Benjamin Kandt: Well, in 2 Corinthians 8, 9, it says this for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ Pause.
Benjamin Kandt: Do you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ?
Benjamin Kandt: That's the question, because if you know it, you would know this.
Benjamin Kandt: He goes on to say this that though he was rich, yet for our sake he became poor so that by his poverty you may become rich.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, paul makes your generosity with your money a test case of your grasp of grace.
Benjamin Kandt: If you're materialistic and ungenerous, if the affections of your heart are clinging to material things, you may have a superficial intellectual grasp of your own undeservedness before Jesus, but in the end you're really just middle class in spirit.
Benjamin Kandt: But Jesus says that for those who are poor in spirit, those who are willing to have open and empty hands to receive the wealth that only he can give, those are the people who then responsively give generously.
Benjamin Kandt: So what's the answer?
Benjamin Kandt: How do you become a more generous person?
Benjamin Kandt: Is this where I crank the screws down a little bit more and like burden you with a little bit more guilt so that you'll pinch out a penny or two?
Benjamin Kandt: No, because 2 Corinthians 9, 7 says this each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
Benjamin Kandt: That's what it says and what's going on here.
Benjamin Kandt: You see, I think what it really means is that God loves a cheerful giver, because God himself is a cheerful giver.
Benjamin Kandt: Like I wish I had way more time to just go into the intraterritorial life of God, how God doesn't give, because that's something he does.
Benjamin Kandt: God gives because God is self-giving love, father, son, holy Spirit.
Benjamin Kandt: I mean it's amazing, but suffice it for this.
Benjamin Kandt: The most famous verse in all the Bible, john 3, 16, says for God so loved the world that he gave Core to the heart of who God is is he's a cheerful giver.
Benjamin Kandt: Core to the heart of who God is is he's a cheerful giver.
Benjamin Kandt: He just enjoys.
Benjamin Kandt: But we don't believe that.
Benjamin Kandt: We don't believe that in the very heart of God there is an irresistible urge to bestow blessing on his people.
Benjamin Kandt: We don't trust that, we don't have confidence in that kind of a God, the kind of God whose very goodness brings him pleasure.
Benjamin Kandt: When he gets to bring pleasure to his people, that he actually enjoys it.
Benjamin Kandt: Like if let me just quote Jesus here If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly father give good things to those who ask him If we can do that?
Benjamin Kandt: How much more the father, who is himself a cheerful giver?
Benjamin Kandt: And so we struggle to believe Psalm 37, 19, where it says that we are not put to shame in evil times, in the days of famine, we will have abundance, and Paul knows this.
Benjamin Kandt: That's why, in Romans 8, he says he who did not spare his own son but gave him up hear the word gave him up for us all.
Benjamin Kandt: Will he not also, with him, graciously give us all things?
Benjamin Kandt: Will he not provide for us?
Benjamin Kandt: You see, god knows that the gospel has gotten into your heart when it comes through your wallet, because that's when he realizes that you've been wooed and won over to a God who is a cheerful giver.
Benjamin Kandt: And so, listen, how do we learn this, not just intellectually but experientially, when we begin to give as an act of worship?
Benjamin Kandt: Now, you may or may not know this, but we have this big, fat blue book that nobody likes.
Benjamin Kandt: Some people like it, I'm suspect, called the Book of church order, and it defines a lot of things about who we are and how we function, all those things.
Benjamin Kandt: In the book of church order there's a section about how we're supposed to worship, and in that section on how we're supposed to worship, it explicitly says that giving an offering is a core part of what it means to worship the triune God.
Benjamin Kandt: And so we're bringing it back.
Benjamin Kandt: We're bringing it back into our liturgy?
Benjamin Kandt: Why Because we're short on cash?
Benjamin Kandt: No, that's not why.
Benjamin Kandt: Because what you do with your money is it's a thermometer to your heart and a thermostat to your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: What do I mean?
Benjamin Kandt: A thermometer tells you what the temperature is right.
Benjamin Kandt: Similarly, where your money goes.
Benjamin Kandt: It tells the temperature of your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: It tells what you love, what you treasure.
Benjamin Kandt: Like when you get a raise, do you raise your standard of living or your standard of giving?
Benjamin Kandt: That's a helpful way to diagnose the condition of your heart.
Benjamin Kandt: It's a thermometer in that sense.
Benjamin Kandt: But it's also a thermostat Because remember I told you earlier what you treasure is what you sacrifice for.
Benjamin Kandt: And so when you give, because you believe that God, in his cheerful generosity, gave Jesus Christ to you and that moves you from the inside out to be a cheerful giver, when that's you, that's a thermostat.
Benjamin Kandt: It begins to trend your heart in the direction, stirs the affections of your heart for Jesus, makes your hands cling a little bit less to your possessions and your time and your money and your stuff and actually open them in open-handed worship and devotion to the Lord and generosity towards your neighbor.
Benjamin Kandt: And so my hope is that the outcome of this sermon is not that anybody would feel a hint of guilt, not a hint or pressure, because, remember, reluctance and compulsion mean nothing before the Lord, Only a cheerfulness of heart that responds in adoration to all that God is for you, all that he's done for you.
Benjamin Kandt: And so my hope for the outcome of this sermon is that we will hear stories, testimonies of people just they'd had some cash hanging out that they were waiting to do something with.
Benjamin Kandt: They're like.
Benjamin Kandt: Oh well, in that sermon I realized I want to give it to somebody lavishly as a gift and I want to hear dozens of those stories.
Benjamin Kandt: That's my hope.
Benjamin Kandt: My hope is that verse 25 will come true here in our midst.
Benjamin Kandt: Look at it with me.
Benjamin Kandt: It says I have been young and now I'm old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.
Benjamin Kandt: He is ever lending generously and his children become a blessing.
Benjamin Kandt: What a testimony, what a story.
Benjamin Kandt: Let me close with a quick story.
Benjamin Kandt: In 1684, there was a guy named Robert Bailey who was sentenced to death in Scotland for his convictions, his strong faith, in other words, he lived in a time when it was not cool to be a Presbyterian.
Benjamin Kandt: Some of you are like it's still not cool dude, I know I understand.
Benjamin Kandt: Bear with me, I'm trying here, okay.
Benjamin Kandt: The night before he was executed he told his young boy, george.
Benjamin Kandt: He looked to him and he spoke Psalm 37, 25 to him.
Benjamin Kandt: He said, son, listen, I have been young and now I'm old, and yet I've not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.
Benjamin Kandt: And before he was hanged he began a speech and he says my love for the Christian religion has brought me to this, but the officials ordered that drums be beat so loud that he could not be heard.
Benjamin Kandt: Before his death he had some time with his wife and kids and he spoke these words.
Benjamin Kandt: He said that I am entrusting you quote to the compassionate and merciful heart of my God.
Benjamin Kandt: Think about that.
Benjamin Kandt: You're about to die and you're entrusting your children and your wife to your God.
Benjamin Kandt: His son grew up to be a significant leader after the revolution and the Bailey family became known as having being one of the most respected families in the nation.
Benjamin Kandt: In other words, bailey died with nothing and yet God came through as a living testimony that the righteous will not be forsaken because they trust their God.
Benjamin Kandt: Let's pray, father, we do.
Benjamin Kandt: We look to you now, the God who so loved that he gave Jesus.
Benjamin Kandt: We look to you.
Benjamin Kandt: You were the one who gave your very life poured out for us.
Benjamin Kandt: Holy Spirit, you are the one who's been given poured out into our very hearts that we might be stirred up to become cheerful givers like our God, the cheerful giver.
Benjamin Kandt: Jesus, would you move?
Benjamin Kandt: Would you move us?
Benjamin Kandt: Would we, as you said, not serve mammon but serve you?
Benjamin Kandt: It's a work of your grace.
Benjamin Kandt: We pray for it now in Jesus' name.
Benjamin Kandt: Amen.