SPEAKER_00: Well, good morning.
SPEAKER_00: Today is Sunday, the twenty-seventh of September, two thousand and fifteen, and God is still on the throne.
SPEAKER_00: He was all week long, all week long, he was good and gracious and loving for you.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what your experience was, I don't know how you've processed this past week, but I can say with assurance that God is on the throne and God is involved with us.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what the week ahead will be, none of us do, but I can say with assurance that God is faithful and loving and just and gracious and in control, and that's the way I want to start my week out, filled with a sense of who God is.
SPEAKER_00: Part of his goodness and part of his grace is that it may go well with us.
SPEAKER_00: He is beneficent.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've used that word in this last week.
SPEAKER_00: You ought to try it.
SPEAKER_00: Walk around every once in a while and say, hey, God is beneficent.
SPEAKER_00: Beneficent, that makes you think of the Pope or something, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: All it really means is God is predisposed to our good.
SPEAKER_00: Predisposed to our good.
SPEAKER_00: God is good.
SPEAKER_00: And he is part of his goodness is that he tells us the ways of life, the way to go, the paths to follow.
SPEAKER_00: Proverbs 14, 12 tells us very clearly that there's a way which seems right to us, but the end of that way which often seems right to us is nothing but death and discouragement and destruction.
SPEAKER_00: And God loves us enough to tell us, don't go this way, go that way.
SPEAKER_00: Jeremiah 29.11, one of my favorite verses.
SPEAKER_00: How many of you have that memorized?
SPEAKER_00: You really ought to.
SPEAKER_00: Jeremiah 29.11, if you don't write it down and say, this week I'm going to focus on it.
SPEAKER_00: It says, For I know the plans that I have for you, plans for good and not for evil, plans to give you a future and a hope.
SPEAKER_00: Now, how many of you know it now that you've heard it?
SPEAKER_00: All right, that's better.
SPEAKER_00: Well, every command that God gives us is either to protect us from some harm or to provide us for some good.
SPEAKER_00: We've seen so far, we're at number eight this morning out of ten, and we have seen have no other gods before me.
SPEAKER_00: Put God first in your life.
SPEAKER_00: God needs to have first place in our life, and everything else has to be somewhere else.
SPEAKER_00: Put God first in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: No idols.
SPEAKER_00: We need to worship God as He is, not create a God of our own liking.
SPEAKER_00: The great danger is that we have a picture of God that is not who God is.
SPEAKER_00: We have a desire for God to be someone other than He is, and God says, have no idols.
SPEAKER_00: Worship the God who is, not just the God who you want.
SPEAKER_00: Make sure that God really makes a difference in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
SPEAKER_00: And that has more to do than just an oh God this or an oh Christ that.
SPEAKER_00: It has to do with speaking rightly about God.
SPEAKER_00: But it also has to do with living in such a way that we don't empty our faith of all meaning.
SPEAKER_00: If we could take all of our Christian activities and all of our Christian talk out, just be excised from the DVD of our life, and it would make no difference whatsoever.
SPEAKER_00: You would still be recognized, then you have been taking God's name in vain.
SPEAKER_00: If it's just Christian things that you're doing and Christian words that you're talking, it has no meaning.
SPEAKER_00: It's empty and it's using God's name in vain.
SPEAKER_00: He says to remember the Sabbath, he says, stop, stop, refocus, regenerate.
SPEAKER_00: Have one day of the week at least in which you are regenerating and renewing and recreating your soul and personally and physically and emotionally.
SPEAKER_00: Stop and refocus on who God is.
SPEAKER_00: Honor your father and mother begins then with all of the horizontal relationships.
SPEAKER_00: He'd been talking about the vertical, and then he moves to the horizontal, and he begins with that most basic human relationship of our parents, and we look carefully at that.
SPEAKER_00: Then he says, no murder with hand or heart.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not just a matter of taking a gun and shooting someone.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus makes it very clear that when we have hatred and anger in our heart, it's the equivalent of murdering.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, keep your bodies and your minds sexually pure.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not just a matter of what we do physically, although that matters, but it goes far deeper.
SPEAKER_00: It has to do with the thoughts and intentions of our heart.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus made it very clear that when we lust, when we have impure thoughts, it's it's in some ways the same as actually carrying them out.
SPEAKER_00: Although please don't.
SPEAKER_00: Far worse to actually carry them out.
SPEAKER_00: But from a spiritual standpoint, he wants our bodies and our minds to be sexually pure.
SPEAKER_00: And we then move today to no stealing.
SPEAKER_00: Let God be your provider.
SPEAKER_00: It's a very simple command in one level, and yet there is a great deal at stake with this command.
SPEAKER_00: So let's take a look at it.
SPEAKER_00: Exodus chapter 20, verse 15, you shall not steal.
SPEAKER_00: So here for the third time in a row, commandments six, seven, and eight, they consist of two simple words in the original.
SPEAKER_00: No murder, no adultery, no stealing.
SPEAKER_00: That's the sum total of each of those tender commandments.
SPEAKER_00: Simple, straightforward, and when you think about it, no stealing, it almost goes without saying.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you've successfully passed kindergarten, uh, you will have probably learned, whether you've mastered or not, that you don't take the truck from your little playmate's hands.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, just keep your hands off of things that aren't your own.
SPEAKER_00: And in essence, it's that simple.
SPEAKER_00: Now there's far more to it than that.
SPEAKER_00: Um if you haven't perceived that you shouldn't take that which is not yours, you have made an incredibly poor start in life.
SPEAKER_00: And most kindergartners have begun to get that down pat.
SPEAKER_00: Um it's interesting, however, when it comes to this eighth command, when you look into the the at the theologians and the commentaries who have written volumes and received PhD degrees and THD degrees for studying and uh reflecting on God's Word, when it comes to the eighth command, it's amazing how silent they are.
SPEAKER_00: As though it is just so simple, what more is there to say about it?
SPEAKER_00: No less a Bible teacher than G.
SPEAKER_00: Campbell Morgan, and that may name may be familiar with some of you who are uh older, G.
SPEAKER_00: Campbell Morgan, an incredibly good um Bible scholar and pastor and writer of commentaries, even such a one as G.
SPEAKER_00: Campbell Morgan, and I'll read most anything that G.
SPEAKER_00: Campbell Morgan writes, except the following.
SPEAKER_00: He says, at this point in the Decalogue, in the Ten Commandments, the Decalogue passes from a discussion of essential facts of human life to matters of lesser importance.
SPEAKER_00: G.
SPEAKER_00: Campbell Morgan, gee, where in the world was your mind when you were saying that?
SPEAKER_00: Some of the commentators who wax eloquent page after page after page only deal in about three paragraphs with the eighth commandment.
SPEAKER_00: As though it is so simple, and it is simple, and yet there is something upon which this is based that is of great importance.
SPEAKER_00: And that is, as we will see, that God is and wants to be seen as your provider.
SPEAKER_00: And when you take into your hands that which He has not given you, you are rejecting God as your provider.
SPEAKER_00: So it's very simple, and yet it's tied completely to the character of God.
SPEAKER_00: All of the horizontal commands are tied to the vertical commands.
SPEAKER_00: You cannot be rightly related to God without being rightly related to one another.
SPEAKER_00: You cannot be rightly related to other people without being rightly related to God.
SPEAKER_00: They go together, and this one goes to the very core of who God is.
SPEAKER_00: So let's begin with the simple part of it.
SPEAKER_00: Stealing.
SPEAKER_00: How would you define stealing?
SPEAKER_00: Well, taking Tommy's truck with your chubby little hands in preschool or something.
SPEAKER_00: Well, stealing is to wrongfully acquire something that is not yours.
SPEAKER_00: And it's usually done by seizing it, uh, trickery, daring, or force.
SPEAKER_00: Um, there's only a limited number of ways in life that you can acquire something.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, first and foremost, we can work productively for it.
SPEAKER_00: That's actually God's intent.
SPEAKER_00: Man was left in the garden to work and oversee the garden and benefit from his labors.
SPEAKER_00: And that hasn't changed.
SPEAKER_00: The normal and most appropriate way, typically, for us to acquire something is through hard work.
SPEAKER_00: And that's been understood right almost until the present day, but I'm not going to get into politics here.
SPEAKER_00: Or something can be freely given.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you get a Christmas present.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that wonderful?
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that a wonderful way of getting something?
SPEAKER_00: It could be uh a wedding ring, it could be uh uh whatever, uh a new phone.
SPEAKER_00: Your wife, can you imagine your wife loving you enough just to give you a brand new phone?
SPEAKER_00: I see a number of men smiling, I don't see the women smiling.
SPEAKER_00: That's a different man.
SPEAKER_00: Or you can take something.
SPEAKER_00: There's really only you you can freely receive salvation through Christ because Christ alone, all our sins are placed upon Him.
SPEAKER_00: There's no working that you can do to receive Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's a free gift, that's a valid way as well.
SPEAKER_00: But what God is talking about here is seizing something by trickery, uh, force, or daring.
SPEAKER_00: We used to have a thief in our family.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, we've had a number of them.
SPEAKER_00: We called them dogs.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever had a dog that was a thief?
SPEAKER_00: Boy, I don't know, maybe it's us and the way we raise our dogs.
SPEAKER_00: Thankfully we don't have any right now, but uh I remember one dog, that rascal.
SPEAKER_00: If if we had somebody around and we put some cookies out on the table and looked the other way, boom, that mongrel took our cookies.
SPEAKER_00: We had a dog, uh it was a fox terrier, very um, very stubborn dogs.
SPEAKER_00: They often say that people get dogs like themselves.
SPEAKER_00: This was a wonderful dog.
SPEAKER_00: That dog had a vertical jump, vertical leap that was amazing.
SPEAKER_00: We'd be sitting at the dining room table, and I'd look over here, and I saw something out of the corner of my eye.
SPEAKER_00: That dog could jump vertically, turn its head around, go back down, and the next time he knew exactly what he was gonna get.
SPEAKER_00: That mongrel! Um, perhaps you've been robbed.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been robbed?
SPEAKER_00: We had an interesting experience one time.
SPEAKER_00: Uh we were driving from Brussels, Belgium to Barcelona.
SPEAKER_00: Wonderful drive, uh, beautiful uh highways.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Jane was sitting in the uh on the right-hand side, I was behind the wheel.
SPEAKER_00: We had just entered Spain, and um it was a busy uh interstate or uh autobahn type road.
SPEAKER_00: And um I noticed that there was a car that came along beside us, and I looked over, and there were, I don't know, three or four guys, or there was a gal in there too, I think, and they were looking over and they were pointing down at our wheels, and I thought, and and they were trying to get us to stop, and so I'm oh maybe I've got a flat tire and I don't know it or something.
SPEAKER_00: So I pulled over on the side of the road and they pulled over behind me, and a guy came and he motioned for me to come and look under there.
SPEAKER_00: So I get out of the car and and I go down behind, and uh I get down like this.
SPEAKER_00: I was my head was about this close to the to the ground, and and as I was looking to see what was wrong, I heard this bellow.
SPEAKER_00: This bellow coming from the right hand side of the front seat.
SPEAKER_00: Jane, do not cross Jane.
SPEAKER_00: What had happened is while they had me down there, uh, my head basically to the ground, uh, some other people got out of the car and went around to the right hand side.
SPEAKER_00: This was summer, the window was open, and before she knew it, someone had reached in, grabbed her purse, which was on the floor of the front seat under her legs, ripped it out, and took off, and this wounded cow bellowed.
SPEAKER_00: Um Jane's not here this morning, so uh please don't tell her.
SPEAKER_00: Uh there was a sense of violation.
SPEAKER_00: If you've been robbed, there's a sense of violation.
SPEAKER_00: There's all kinds of other violations, but many of the same emotions, actually.
SPEAKER_00: Something was taken from her.
SPEAKER_00: And that's just the nature of thievery.
SPEAKER_00: Something taken that is not ours, or we have the audacity by trickery or force to seize something that is not ours.
SPEAKER_00: We violate and seize something that is not ours.
SPEAKER_00: Well, the Bible makes it incredibly clear that uh this is to be condemned.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, the eighth commandment, you shall not steal.
SPEAKER_00: No stealing, no stealing.
SPEAKER_00: It's repeated uh as well as in uh in Deuteronomy 5.
SPEAKER_00: No stealing, don't do it.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Leviticus 19, 11 says, Don't steal, don't defraud your neighbor, don't rob him.
SPEAKER_00: It's a little bit hard to miss the point that's being made.
SPEAKER_00: The prophets, ever the conscience of God's people, Israel.
SPEAKER_00: The prophets were very clear about this.
SPEAKER_00: Ezekiel 18, 7 reminds us that the righteous man does not commit robbery.
SPEAKER_00: Ezekiel 35, 15.
SPEAKER_00: The wicked man will die unless he follows God's way and restores, repays that which he has stolen.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Zechariah 5 pronounces a lasting curse on the house of the thief.
SPEAKER_00: You just can't get away from it.
SPEAKER_00: In the New Testament, the same theme is picked up time and time again: the eighth commandment.
SPEAKER_00: Three times in the story of the rich young ruler in the Gospels, in Matthew 19, Luke 18, Mark 10, uh, is pointed back to this basic principle.
SPEAKER_00: Um, Titus chapter 2, when it's talking about church leaders.
SPEAKER_00: Uh church leaders are to be exemplary, not perfect.
SPEAKER_00: There is no perfect church leader.
SPEAKER_00: Elders, deacons, pastors, whatever, there's no perfect church leaders, but they are to be someone who, among other things, uh, is not uh out for um for personal gain.
SPEAKER_00: Titus says that slaves should not steal from their masters.
SPEAKER_00: Um Ephesians chapter 4, verse 28.
SPEAKER_00: Let's let's turn to that one for a moment.
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians 4, 28 Galatians.
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians 4, 28.
SPEAKER_00: I never have find problems finding anything in my Bible until I'm standing up here and I'm trying to turn to it.
SPEAKER_00: Do you have any anybody can relate to that?
SPEAKER_00: Talking about new life in Christ from 17 on.
SPEAKER_00: Uh verse 25, put away falsehood.
SPEAKER_00: Um speak the truth to one another.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 26, in your anger, do not sin.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 28, let the thief steal no longer, but let him labor doing honest work with his hands.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of taking with your hands, we're to be doing honest work with our hands that we might have something to share with anyone in need.
SPEAKER_00: And this is talking about Christians.
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about Christians.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, Stop stealing and work hard so that you will have something to give to another.
SPEAKER_00: Uh and you look a page or two further in Exodus from uh where we are, uh, if you look at Exodus chapter 22, there is a uh a whole, almost the entire first half of chapter 22, talks about stealing and what you're supposed to do if you steal.
SPEAKER_00: And the principle in Exodus 22 is that you not only return and repay what you have stolen, but that you you you do restitution, you restore, in some cases twofold, in some cases fourfold, in some cases fivefold, and in some cases sevenfold.
SPEAKER_00: It's not enough just to not steal.
SPEAKER_00: When you do steal, you're supposed to repay, and typically you're supposed to repay far more than you have stolen.
SPEAKER_00: As much as seven times more.
SPEAKER_00: So it's pretty clear that stealing is condemned.
SPEAKER_00: It's very interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Most of us, if we were asked, are we thieves, we would almost certainly say no.
SPEAKER_00: Um, according to the pollsters, and the the pollsters do things other than just follow the politicians.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, I'm getting so tired of the polls that I wish they would start talking, polling people about are they thieves or not.
SPEAKER_00: And actually, the pollsters have uh found that 86% of the adults in this country say that they have not stolen.
SPEAKER_00: Evangelical Christians, um, 91% of evangelical Christians report that they are not guilty of transgressing the eighth commandment.
SPEAKER_00: Um I suppose there are people here who have never stolen something.
SPEAKER_00: I suppose that's possible.
SPEAKER_00: I just think it's highly unlikely.
SPEAKER_00: Um is there someone who has never stolen anything?
SPEAKER_00: I they say confession is good for the soul.
SPEAKER_00: I remember distinctly, about eight years old, living in suburbs of Chicago, Glen Allen, Illinois, I walked into a Woolworth's five and dime store.
SPEAKER_00: Now, many of you don't even remember what nickels and dimes are because they're so worthless these days.
SPEAKER_00: How many people remember a Woolworth five and dime?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there we go.
SPEAKER_00: Uh there's even a few young hands who uh have heard about it.
SPEAKER_00: So I, eight years old, I walk in, and for some reason I thought I was in desperate need of one of these kind of reddish-pink erasers, you know?
SPEAKER_00: And so I stood there and I remember it like yesterday.
SPEAKER_00: I stood there and I kind of looked around, and I grabbed it and I put it in my pocket, and I just kind of do do walked out the door.
SPEAKER_00: I get about 15 feet out the door, and there was a hand on my shoulder.
SPEAKER_00: It was this big, huge guy.
SPEAKER_00: He was probably 16 years old and you know, five foot ten or something, but I thought this, you know, busted.
SPEAKER_00: And he took me to talk to the manager, and the manager gave me a Talking to, and worst of all, he threatened to call my father.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I told you a couple weeks ago about what happened when I called my mother a dirty name in her presence, and I was not interested in him calling my father whatsoever.
SPEAKER_00: He gave me a stern talking to, and he didn't call my father.
SPEAKER_00: Main Street, Glen Allen, Illinois.
SPEAKER_00: To this day, to this day, when I walk or drive past the store that used to be the Woolworths, I have this trauma inside me.
SPEAKER_00: Please don't tell me that you have never ever once stolen something in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Or if you haven't, if you haven't, just don't tell me, please.
SPEAKER_00: Who do we think we're kidding?
SPEAKER_00: We smile good-naturedly about the little boy who's caught with his his chubby fingers in the cookie jar.
SPEAKER_00: We chuckle about that.
SPEAKER_00: As though there's something cute about learning as a child to take things that you're not supposed to take.
SPEAKER_00: Why do we think that's cute?
SPEAKER_00: Why do we make Robin Hood into a hero, robbing from the rich and giving to the poor, as though the end justifies the means?
SPEAKER_00: As though robbing from the rich to give to the poor is essentially a good thing because it's a good end.
SPEAKER_00: It's a good result that poor people aren't as poor anymore.
SPEAKER_00: And that is a good thing.
SPEAKER_00: And it shouldn't just be the Pope who cares about poverty and social issues, by the way, but again, that's not our theme for this morning.
SPEAKER_00: What about pens and paper clips and computer cartridges and supplies at the office?
SPEAKER_00: What about using the phone for personal use when that's not what it's intended for?
SPEAKER_00: And the policy is you don't use that for personal things on the job.
SPEAKER_00: Is that or is that not stealing?
SPEAKER_00: If you know it's not allowed and you do it just because it's a relatively small thing, is that or is that not stealing?
SPEAKER_00: Theft in the workplace is huge.
SPEAKER_00: Retailers report that theft from their own employees is greater than theft from shoplifting.
SPEAKER_00: I guess there aren't enough eight-year-old little boys around anymore.
SPEAKER_00: In retail sales or retail companies, the reports that I get are that theft from employees is greater than theft from shoplifters.
SPEAKER_00: We've gotten comfortable helping ourselves to things that are not ours.
SPEAKER_00: Look at your home.
SPEAKER_00: Look around your home.
SPEAKER_00: Do a mental inventory.
SPEAKER_00: Is there anything in your home that you borrowed and have just forgotten to return?
SPEAKER_00: We've just moved twice in the last uh few months.
SPEAKER_00: We bought a home in Indiana, we moved to there, then we left that home empty, and we've come here.
SPEAKER_00: And when we moved to Indiana from South Texas, I'd have to tell you, I found a couple of things that I had borrowed.
SPEAKER_00: I hadn't intended to keep them, but somehow or another I neglected to return them.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I know you probably say, We're overcharged many times, and perhaps you are.
SPEAKER_00: So you go into Target and they're ringing up or whatever, and you know that you were undercharged for this item.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Jane, this amazing woman, she stands there at the register and she knows exactly what the price was of everything that she has bought.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know how she does it.
SPEAKER_00: I hardly know what I've bought, much less what the price is.
SPEAKER_00: But but she will watch the uh thing pop up on the register, and she can tell you if she's been overcharged or undercharged.
SPEAKER_00: What happens if we're undercharged?
SPEAKER_00: Do we just chalk it up and say, well, I probably got overcharged a bunch of times?
SPEAKER_00: Well, you probably did.
SPEAKER_00: Is that or is that not stealing to just allow yourself to be undercharged?
SPEAKER_00: What about uh um overstating your expenses on the expense report?
SPEAKER_00: Even just a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: Uh many people uh have expense accounts.
SPEAKER_00: Uh many people here have expense accounts.
SPEAKER_00: I have an expense account.
SPEAKER_00: It's very easy and very, very subtle to, in small ways, small Christian ways, of course, to inflate or expense off things that really aren't expenses, reimbursable expenses.
SPEAKER_00: What about cutting corners at work?
SPEAKER_00: And I don't mean the corner, if you work in a shop, you cut the corner off of the table you're making.
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about what if what if you cut corners in work?
SPEAKER_00: You don't you don't put in a full day's work, you you extend inappropriately your lunch hour, you play fast and free.
SPEAKER_00: Few of us probably punch clocks, but it's awful easy to play fast and free.
SPEAKER_00: And is that not stealing from our employer?
SPEAKER_00: What about as as we fill out our tax returns?
SPEAKER_00: And the tax codes are incredibly obtuse.
SPEAKER_00: And it's sometimes very hard to tell what is appropriate and what's not, but it's also very tempting to assume the gray matters are okay and we push the tax codes just a little bit, or we report things that are in our favor and not in the government's favor.
SPEAKER_00: And you know it's rigged against you, you know the government's trying to.
SPEAKER_00: Now, there's a big difference between avoiding, legitimately avoiding taxes, or evading taxes.
SPEAKER_00: I get that, believe me.
SPEAKER_00: But it's still real easy.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, along about the 14th of April.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and probably if we wait that long, we're in trouble anyway.
SPEAKER_00: But uh what about you as an employer?
SPEAKER_00: There are some employers in our midst.
SPEAKER_00: What about employers not paying an employee a fair wage?
SPEAKER_00: Just because you can.
SPEAKER_00: Migrants, migrant workers get paid peanuts because we can get away with it.
SPEAKER_00: Is that or is that not stealing?
SPEAKER_00: You say, well, we made an agreement.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, of course they made an agreement.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't have really any other choice.
SPEAKER_00: Why do you think they work for peanuts for lowest possible wages?
SPEAKER_00: Would you like to go out there and do that job day in and day out and get peanuts?
SPEAKER_00: An employer who doesn't pay a fair wage just because we live in a capitalistic society where the market determines things, but you know you're not giving someone a fair day's wage for a fair day's work, and I have no idea which of you are employers, and I'm not talking about any one of you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just saying, is that or is that not stealing?
SPEAKER_00: What about pirated software?
SPEAKER_00: I was walking down the streets of a town at the foothills of the Himalayas about uh about a year and a half ago in India, and what was the the software that was for sale on the street was absolutely incredible.
SPEAKER_00: And it was.
SPEAKER_00: It was too good to be true.
SPEAKER_00: Most things that are too good to be true are too good to be true.
SPEAKER_00: Those prices were not real.
SPEAKER_00: That was pirated or uh copies or something, but it wasn't true.
SPEAKER_00: Um, more to the point, Monday night football.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I don't know how many of you have cut the cable.
SPEAKER_00: Our family cut the cable a number of years ago.
SPEAKER_00: We stream over the air.
SPEAKER_00: Works wonderfully, except for Monday night, because Monday night football is not available over the air.
SPEAKER_00: However, if you know someone who has a cable, has a cable subscription, you can use their credentials to stream it online.
SPEAKER_00: And that's stealing.
SPEAKER_00: It's just plain stealing.
SPEAKER_00: Tomorrow's Monday night football.
SPEAKER_00: What about plagiarism?
SPEAKER_00: Taking others' words, others' thoughts, others' productive work.
SPEAKER_00: I know a friend of mine who was a pastor of a large church who was dismissed because of plagiarism.
SPEAKER_00: And he should have been.
SPEAKER_00: But we get comfortable taking things that are not ours.
SPEAKER_00: Well, um, what's at stake here is something extremely important, and I really want you to get this.
SPEAKER_00: God is our provider.
SPEAKER_00: And when we when we take something into our own hands that He has not provided for us, including through the ability to work hard, that's a gift of God.
SPEAKER_00: We'll see that.
SPEAKER_00: But the issue with stealing is that we don't trust God to give us what we need.
SPEAKER_00: So we take it into our own hands and take it.
SPEAKER_00: Now, it may be subtle, it may be that you've never thought about it that way.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure that as an eight-year-old, when I was reaching out for that little eraser, and I have one just like it in my desk over there right now.
SPEAKER_00: It's so frustrating.
SPEAKER_00: I wasn't thinking that I'm rejecting God as my provider.
SPEAKER_00: I wasn't conscious.
SPEAKER_00: But think about it.
SPEAKER_00: God is and wants to be our provider.
SPEAKER_00: He wants to be seen as our provider.
SPEAKER_00: He wants to be worshipped as our provider.
SPEAKER_00: All that we have comes from him.
SPEAKER_00: And when we receive from him what we receive, we receive all that we need.
SPEAKER_00: It's just we think we need a whole bunch of other things.
SPEAKER_00: And we are, in essence, rejecting him as our provider.
SPEAKER_00: A couple of simple thoughts and a couple of words of application.
SPEAKER_00: How we handle things, material things, is a spiritual barometer.
SPEAKER_00: That's very clear when we look in all the scripture says about material possessions.
SPEAKER_00: Things are not evil.
SPEAKER_00: They're not evil.
SPEAKER_00: There are evil things, but material goods are not in essence evil.
SPEAKER_00: However, the way we handle our material possessions reflects something about our spiritual lives.
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures, when they talk about material things, are just filled with this.
SPEAKER_00: Luke 16, the parable of the steward or the manager.
SPEAKER_00: I hope sometime we'll have a chance to look at this in some detail, but I want to just take a moment and look at a couple of verses in Luke chapter 16, verses 10 through 13, where it says, one who is faithful in very little is also faithful in much.
SPEAKER_00: And one who is dishonest in very little is also dishonest in much.
SPEAKER_00: If then you've not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust you for true riches?
SPEAKER_00: And true riches are spiritual, go well beyond gold and silver.
SPEAKER_00: And if you have not been faithful in that which is another's, who will give you that which is your own?
SPEAKER_00: You see, Jesus makes a clear link between how we approach material things, which are relatively unimportant themselves, but how we deal with them.
SPEAKER_00: There's great things at stake here.
SPEAKER_00: And it has to do with what's going on in our spiritual lives.
SPEAKER_00: A barometer is a thing that gets you in touch with things you normally aren't aware of, changes in atmospheric temperature.
SPEAKER_00: Now, unless you've got limbago and you can feel the change in the weather, or unless you're addicted to the weather channel, uh, you probably aren't aware of when highs and lows come through.
SPEAKER_00: You're not, it's not normally accessible to us.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, uh a barometer lets us see that.
SPEAKER_00: How we handle material things, uh 1 Timothy 3 is very clear.
SPEAKER_00: Considering an elder, he must not be a lover of money, a deacon must not be addicted to dishonest gain.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because it says something about his spiritual life.
SPEAKER_00: There's a link here.
SPEAKER_00: All that we have comes from God.
SPEAKER_00: Full stop, without exception.
SPEAKER_00: Paul says pointedly in 1 Corinthians 4, 7, what do you have that you did not receive?
SPEAKER_00: Now, if we're not careful, we'll think, well, I earned that.
SPEAKER_00: Well, it makes it very clear in these other passages.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, wealth and honor comes from you, O Lord, the ability to work hard, the fact that you were raised in a place where you got a good education, you were raised with a good work ethic, you've been given privileges, you work hard.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not denying that you work hard whatsoever, but is that ability to work hard and earn well not a gift from God?
SPEAKER_00: Did that come from you because you're so great and so smart?
SPEAKER_00: What about somebody who is raised in absolute poverty and has no chances?
SPEAKER_00: Are they inherently less than you are?
SPEAKER_00: Or have you been greatly blessed?
SPEAKER_00: Has that been given to you?
SPEAKER_00: There is nothing that we have, including the ability to work hard and earn money, that isn't from God.
SPEAKER_00: Everything that we have comes from God.
SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy 8, 11 and 12.
SPEAKER_00: Have to look at that one.
SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy 8.
SPEAKER_00: God speaking to his people Israel, when they come into the land, take care lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandment and his rules and his statutes with I commanded, lest when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, and then your heart becomes lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, and who did all of these wonderful things and filled, fed you in the wilderness, verse 17.
SPEAKER_00: Beware lest you say in your heart, My power, the strength of my hand, has gotten me this wealth.
SPEAKER_00: What do we have that we have not received?
SPEAKER_00: Nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Your sparkling personality, your good looks, your abilities?
SPEAKER_00: What is there that we have not received?
SPEAKER_00: Nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Now, that's because God is our provider.
SPEAKER_00: And he makes it very clear that how we handle the things that he has provided for us are of great importance.
SPEAKER_00: And God is and wants to be seen as our provider.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew 6, he cares for the birds of the air and he clothes the lilies of the field.
SPEAKER_00: Who does that?
SPEAKER_00: God does that.
SPEAKER_00: And God gets the glory for all of that.
SPEAKER_00: When we take that into our own hands, then we're taking the credit for something that has been given to us by another.
SPEAKER_00: Keep your way of life free from the love of money, being content with what you have, for He Himself has said, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you, therefore I may confidently say the Lord is my helper.
SPEAKER_00: What can man do to me?
SPEAKER_00: God has given me everything.
SPEAKER_00: Everything that I have is from God.
SPEAKER_00: Everything that I need, I receive from God.
SPEAKER_00: What I do not receive from God, I do not need.
SPEAKER_00: I want it, I have desires.
SPEAKER_00: But if God has not given it to us, either directly or through the ability to earn it or the privileges that we have, and we feel compelled to grab it even though he's not given it, we are rejecting, rejecting Jehovah Jirah, our provider.
SPEAKER_00: His grace is sufficient for me, for me.
SPEAKER_00: His grace is sufficient for me.
SPEAKER_00: What God gives me is sufficient.
SPEAKER_00: A couple of very simple thoughts by way of application.
SPEAKER_00: If you have taken anything into your own hands, which you have not gotten correctly, give it back and repay.
SPEAKER_00: I have a couple of books sitting on my bookshelves in Westfield, Indiana, waiting for our return, which as I was going through this, I realized I'm a book guy.
SPEAKER_00: I'd borrowed books and I hadn't returned them, and I need to return them.
SPEAKER_00: And I probably ought to buy a couple of extra and give it back to my friend Greg that I've I've stolen from.
SPEAKER_00: What is there in your house?
SPEAKER_00: What is there in your life that you have wrongfully acquired, you've taken into your own hands instead of allowing God to provide it for you?
SPEAKER_00: And the answer is you're to repay it and probably even more.
SPEAKER_00: Restitution was not just the value of what you've taken, but twofold, fourfold, fivefold, sevenfold.
SPEAKER_00: And what I'm suggesting is that we learn to pay attention to the barometer.
SPEAKER_00: Real practical thing before we finish here.
SPEAKER_00: Have you made any financial commitments to the Lord that you haven't fulfilled?
SPEAKER_00: Whether it's to this church or to the mission downtown or to a missionary or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: Are there any commitments that you in good faith have made and you have not fulfilled?
SPEAKER_00: I got thinking about this this week.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's really a pain to preach.
SPEAKER_00: Because God keeps pointing the spotlight on me.
SPEAKER_00: We've been in transition for a long time, a number of months.
SPEAKER_00: And we have some missionary commitments, and we're we've been 30 years fully supported by the gifts of other people as missionaries, all right?
SPEAKER_00: And there are some of my dear friends that the monthly contribution just has kind of slipped to the side.
SPEAKER_00: And so this week, uh I wrote a whole bunch of checks because I had made a commitment, and to not do it is saying something about my life.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't intentional.
SPEAKER_00: I wasn't trying to play fast and free with money or with my promises.
SPEAKER_00: But are there any financial commitments that you have made that you've not fulfilled?
SPEAKER_00: And I would just say, do it.
SPEAKER_00: Trust Jehovah Jireh.
SPEAKER_00: Jehovah Jireh, my provider, his grace is sufficient for me.
SPEAKER_00: My God shall supply all my needs according to his riches in glory.
SPEAKER_00: He will give his angels charge over me.
SPEAKER_00: Jehovah Jireh cares for me, for me, for me.
SPEAKER_00: Jehovah Jireh cares for us.
SPEAKER_00: Will you trust him?
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Heavenly Father, you are the great provider.
SPEAKER_00: That's your name, Jehovah Jireh.
SPEAKER_00: He will provide.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, Father, may we not still be in kindergarten, still learning the basic ways of life in your universe.
SPEAKER_00: I pray we wouldn't look to the sins of others, but even the little ones of our own.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, help us by your grace, not out of a sense of guilt, but out of a sense of being overwhelmed by your love and your goodness and all that you have done.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, may you be our Jehovah Jirah.
SPEAKER_00: And may we trust you to give us what we need and not take things into our own hands.
SPEAKER_00: I pray in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.