2 Corinthians 9 6 thru 15

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1 “A Cheerful Giver,” 2 Corinthians 9:6-15 (June 15, 2014) 6

The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. 8 And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. 9 As it is written, “He has distributed freely, he has given to the poor; his righteousness endures forever.” 10

He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. 11 You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. 12 For the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God. 13 By their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ, and the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others, 14 while they long for you and pray for you, because of the surpassing grace of God upon you. 15 Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift! PRAY We’re working our way this summer through a series of sermons we’re calling “Grace Core Values,” where each week we take some topic that’s important to the life of the church and see what we can learn about it from a certain passage of Scripture. This is not to say that if you looked up all the sermons at the end of this series you would find the only topics that matter to our church – not at all. There are others. But these are the ones God laid on our hearts this summer. And today we will look at the subject of generosity – giving. Giving is not just a Grace Bible Church core value, but it’s a core Christian value. Christian people must be giving people and that’s what we’ll look at this morning under three headings: first, why do we give? Second, how much should we give? Third, how can we give? First, why must we give? Many of you, like me, to the extent you’ve heard this passage taught by preachers, you’ve heard it taught in the context of tithing (if you don’t know what tithing is we’ll get to it in a minute). This is a classic tithing sermon text. And because I’m a preacher I can tell you how this works – there comes a season in the church’s life when giving, when receipts are down, the money isn’t coming in to the church’s coffers like it used to or like it needs to, and someone comes to the preacher and says, “You know, giving’s not been great the last couple of months. Preacher, maybe you need to preach some sermons on tithing.” And so preachers go to this passage and work up a sermon on tithing to encourage the people to give more money to the church. Now, in my experience that doesn’t work – I’ve never preached a sermon on giving and then in the following weeks noticed any kind of big increase in church receipts. But more than that – it’s a bad use of the Bible. That’s not what this text is about. This © 2014 J.D. Shaw

2 passage in 2 Corinthians 8-9 (it’s actually part of a two-chapter long discussion Paul has on generosity) is not about giving money to support your local church at all. Now, is it wrong to support your local church? Not at all – I think the Bible tells Christians there are three main ways we should focus on giving our money away. First, Christians are called to support their pastors. Paul says this in 1 Timothy 5:17-18: 17 Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. 18 For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain,” and, “The laborer deserves his wages.” According to Paul, Christians should give money to their local church to make sure their pastors are cared for. Pastors, elders who make their living shepherding the church, who have devoted themselves to prayer and ministry of the Word, should be paid by the church, and paid well – that’s what “double honor” means. As the church is able, the church should provide that kind of living to those men. That’s true; it’s just not what Paul is concerned about in 2 Corinthians 9. Second, Christians are called to support missionaries. In 1 Corinthians 9, we read how when Paul ministered in Corinth – he was there eighteen months – he would not take a salary from them. He refused to let the Corinthians pay him. Instead, other churches supported him, sent him money, so that he could devote himself to prayer and teaching the Word of God. Now, what do you call someone who is in full-time Christian ministry far from where he grew up, and is not supported by the people he actually serves but instead is financially supported by Christians who live some other place? You call that person a missionary. And based on the model of Paul and other places where this sort of thing is mentioned in the Bible and just on plain common sense, Christians should give so that missionaries can be supported and the gospel can be taken to places where it is currently not known. But, again, that’s not the focus of our passage today. Ye there is another reason for Christian generosity that is far more prominent in the Scriptures than these two – it’s not even close. The Bible talks about a third reason for Christian giving a hundred times, two hundred times, more often than it does the others. Third, Christians are called to help the poor. In chapters eight and nine Paul is not talking about giving to support Christian workers. Rather, he writes about a big offering, a large monetary gift, he is collecting from all the churches in what we’d call Greece today – then it was the Roman provinces of Macedonia and Achaia – for the Christians back in Jerusalem. We read about it in Romans 15:25-26, where Paul says to the Roman church: “25 At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints. 26 For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem.” Apparently the believers in the Jerusalem church were impoverished, and their relief is a concern we read about all through the New Testament – we read about it in the book of Acts, in Galatians, and 1 Corinthians. Paul and all the pillars of the early church were very concerned that Christians use their money to relieve these poor. © 2014 J.D. Shaw

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Now, why are we to be generous to the poor? Here are three reasons why Christians must give not just in general, but to the poor in particular. First, we are commanded. The duty of God’s people to help the poor can be seen all through the Bible, not just the New Testament. In fact, if you gave me twenty-four hours to read all the passages in the Bible on the duty of Christian charity to the poor, I still may not have enough time to do it. There are that many of them. Verses about how God loves the poor, and how if you lend to the poor you lend to God. I asked Jim to read earlier from Deuteronomy 15, I’ll read again verses 10-11 – this is Moses speaking to the people of Israel about how they should treat one another, and he says this: “10 You shall give to him [who? The poor] freely, and your heart shall not be grudging when you give to him, because for this the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake. 11 For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land.’” In fact, earlier in chapter 15 Moses says that if Israel would simply be obedient to the commands of God “there should be no poor among you.” God says that the promised land he was to give to Israel was so rich and verdant, there would be an abundance of food there, that no Israelite should ever be poor. Second, we have the example of the early church. This is Acts 4:32-35, talking about the early church: 32 Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common. 33 And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. 34 There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold 35 and laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. So, it was practiced in the early church – modeled for us. But Paul in 2 Corinthians 9 gives us a third reason why we must give to the poor (verses 12-14 – NIV 1984 – Paul’s point is much clearer than in ESV): 12 This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. 13 Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. 14 And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Christians, when we give to the poor we don’t just help them – that would be sufficient reason to do it, but it’s not the only effect. When we give generously to the poor we cause people around us, even those, especially those, who don’t believe in God, to praise God, to thank God, that He would put people on this planet who would do such a thing. Friends, everyone knows what it’s like to be selfish, and how hard it is to overcome that. Few people really know what it’s like to be generous. But once you’ve met a truly generous person, you’re changed. You never forget the generous people in your life. © 2014 J.D. Shaw

4 And when it dawns on someone that you are generous because of the work of the gospel of Jesus Christ in your life, it has a powerful impact. It serves to authenticate the gospel to people; it makes it real to them. It helps make our God real to them. A few weeks ago, Jim mentioned the quote that’s attributed to St. Francis of Assisi: “Preach the gospel continually; use words if necessary.” From what I’ve gathered over the years, St. Francis probably didn’t say that. It is impossible to really preach the gospel without words – sooner or later you’re going to have to open your mouth and talk about Jesus if you’re going to share the gospel with someone. Certainly Francis believed in the necessity of preaching – by all accounts he was an outstanding preacher. He sparked a revival with his preaching. But, boy, I think everyone can understand why that quote means so much to so many people. Because we all know that at the end of the day, while words are necessary, they aren’t sufficient. Words are good, but they’re also cheap. According to the Bible, you can’t just say you’re a Christian; you must have a life that proves you are a Christian. And few things speak to the reality of the work of the Holy Spirit in someone’s life than radical generosity to the poor. James 2:14-17: “What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? 17 So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” So, that’s why we are to give generously to the poor: it’s commanded, we have examples in Israel and the Bible, and it will make the gospel real to the lost. Second, how much should we give? Christians are to give generously, but we have not yet defined what “generous” is. And notice, Paul doesn’t say how much the Corinthians should give to the poor in Jerusalem, just that he wants them to be generous. But, how much is generous? And here at last is where we will talk about the tithe. What is the tithe? The word “tithe” actually means “one tenth,” so to tithe would be to give away one tenth of your income. The tithe was first set up in the Old Testament. In Israel twelve of the tribes of Israel tithed, gave away ten percent of their income, to support a thirteenth tribe of Israel (we usually don’t call them that but that’s what they were) – the tribe of Levi. The Levites were not included in the original allotment of land that took place when Israel under Joshua’s leadership conquered the Promised Land from the Canaanites, so they didn’t have land of their own to farm but instead were to serve different functions for Israel as a whole: they served as workers in the temple in Jerusalem, as priests in towns all around Israel, and even as what we’d call public health officials and social workers in Israel. So God set up the tithe to so that the Levites would have financial support to do their work.

© 2014 J.D. Shaw

5 And based on that, many pastors today say that Christians take the Old Testament teaching on the tithe and apply it to the church today. These men teach that Christians must give ten percent of their income (some get real specific – ten percent of your gross income!) to their local church to support the pastors and ministries contained within. And I disagree with that, and there are actually several reasons why – first of all, the Levites in the Old Testament served a much more public, governmental, role than gospel preachers do today in the New Covenant age. Preachers today don’t have that kind of role – we aren’t social workers or public health officials. Plus, the tithe was to be given at the temple in Jerusalem. But there is no modern day, Christian equivalent to the temple. We have churches today on every corner in Mississippi, but those aren’t temples. The temple was the institutional seat of state religion in ancient Israel, and through it all the poor throughout the country were to be served – there is no church equivalent to that. Plus, if you say, “The practice of the tithe in the Old Testament is directly analogous to what Christians should do today,” you have another problem. Because you must then answer the question: “which tithe should Christians practice today?” You say, “’Which tithe’? What do you mean?” There wasn’t just one tithe under the Old Covenant – there were three! Every year you gave a tenth of your crops to the temple, but then we read in Deuteronomy 14 that every third year you were to give another tithe, a second tithe – so twenty percent total – which was to go to the relief of the poor. And we know that by the time of Jesus the Jews practiced yet another, a third, tithe. So, for those who claim that Christians must tithe just like in the Old Testament, I say, “Ok – so you’re saying that some years your church members must give twenty or thirty percent of their income away to the church?” And of course no one claims that. Yet, in the New Testament, when Jesus has the opportunity to repudiate the practice of giving the tithe, he doesn’t do it. He never says, “Oh, the tithe, that’s law, and we’re under grace now. It doesn’t apply.” When it comes up, in Matthew 23, he actually affirms it. So, here’s what I think the Bible teaches with regard to Christians and tithing today: we are, Christians, to give away ten percent of our income, but it doesn’t all have to go to their local church. Some must, but you can in good conscience spread the rest of it around to other organizations that preach the gospel. But some of it, some significant part of it, must go toward the relief of the poor, because all throughout Scripture caring for the poor is a priority for God and His people. Some people get really nervous when they hear tithing taught this way, because they think the church will suffer. They say, “If you give people the freedom to give some of their tithe to the poor or other organizations, then there won’t be enough money to run the church!” Nonsense! According to all the research out there, fewer than ten percent of Christians tithe. The problem isn’t some faulty understanding of the tithe; the problem is that Christians aren’t trying to tithe at all. Friends, if all Christians gave away ten percent of their income, even if only half of it, or a third, went to the churches, we’d still have © 2014 J.D. Shaw

6 enough giving at Grace Bible Church that, frankly, we wouldn’t know what to do with all of it. We’d figure it out, quickly, but initially, we’d have more money than we know what to do with. And the tithe is the floor of Christian giving, not the ceiling. I once heard a Christian say, “I don’t believe in tithing; I just give what the Holy Spirit prompts me to give.” To which I replied: “That’s great, but I don’t think the Holy Spirit will ever prompt you to give away less than ten percent.” If you sense a voice that says, “Just give away five dollars this week,” I don’t know who it is but it’s not the Holy Spirit – unless you only made fifty bucks that week. Plus, if in the Old Covenant, the people of Israel were committed to the practice of the tithe, then it only makes sense that we, in the New Covenant, with all the greater blessings that accompany it, should be more generous with our money than they were in Israel. The tithe must be the floor for Christians. The tithe has historically been seen as the amount of money which everyone, even those at the very low end of the economic ladder, can reasonably be expected give away. Will it hurt? Will it involve sacrifice? Absolutely – but it’s supposed to. By the way, that’s how you can know you’re being generous: when it hurts. Generosity is supposed to be sacrificial in nature; being generous means you’re giving away so much of your money that you can’t do certain things because of it. When you can’t buy certain clothes, can’t go on certain trips, can’t eat certain foods or eat out as often as you’d like, then you can know you’re generous. Now, for most of us, it’s tough to tithe – for most people in most times, it’s sacrificial, it hurts, to give away ten percent. For others of us, we’ve been so blessed financially that we can tithe without really feeling it, it doesn’t hurt us to tithe, tithing doesn’t prevent us from doing anything at all, so we need to give more than the tithe or we aren’t really being generous. But the tithe is at least the floor of Christian giving – for most of us, we can know we’re at least approaching generosity when we tithe. Third, how can we give generously? I’ve already said the vast majority of Christians don’t tithe, and it’s also probably true that the vast majority of Christians who could comfortably give away more than the tithe don’t do that. So, how can we get to the point to where we are giving like that, and gladly, not just to the church, not just to missionaries, but also to the poor? Three things: first, we must see that God will give us what we need to be generous. Verses 8-11: 8 And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. 9 As it is written, “He has distributed freely, he has given to the poor; his righteousness endures forever.” 10 He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.”

© 2014 J.D. Shaw

7 Now if you turn on any of the so-called “Christian” channels on your cable system or satellite provider, you’ll hear these verses, and especially verse 10, talked about a lot by the preachers on those channels. And what you’ll hear them say is this: if you give money to the ministry of those preachers, if you “sow your seed” with them, then God will give you a harvest, a harvest of money, that you can’t even imagine right now. God wants you to be rich, and he’ll make you rich, if you’ll just have enough faith to give the little you have to the TV preacher first. That’s their message. But that’s not what Paul’s saying here – not at all. What’s he saying? Christians have “all sufficiency in all things at all times” in verse 8, and are “enriched in every way” in verse 11 – so that they may “abound in every good work” – again, verse 8 – and “be generous in every way” – again, verse 11. God gives us resources, Paul says, so that we can be a pipeline of generosity from God to the poor. John Piper, in a sermon on generosity, said this: “If we act as conduits for God's grace (instead of cul-de-sacs), then there will be an unending supply” from which we can give. The promise is God will supply and he will multiply your seed for sowing. Now the main reason we aren’t more generous with our money is that we don’t believe those verses. We don’t think God will enrich. And instead we fear that we will impoverish ourselves if we are generous, so we don’t give. We fear we won’t be able to meet our financial responsibilities, so we don’t give. We fear our kids or our spouses will resent us for not having as much money and nice things as other people do, so we don’t give. And what we think must happen is that God must give us the abundance first, and then we’ll give. God, give me enough money to pay all my debts and have two years’ salary in the bank, and then I promise I’ll be generous. Sometimes God does that – sometimes people are born into wealth, so before they ever face the decision to be generous they have their abundance. But that’s not God’s regular way. Instead, God wants us to trust Him first with what we have, and then he’ll provide the abundance. That’s verse 6: “6 The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.” We must sow in faith first, then we’ll reap. Remember what the master said to the servant in Jesus’ parable of the talents. The servant invests his five talents, earns five more, and the master says, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much.” Matthew 25:23 (emphasis added). God wants us to trust that he will enrich us. But how can we do that? How can we trust God like that? Trust God with our money like that? Money’s hard to come by – money’s really important. How can we trust God enough to give sacrificially – until it hurts? Second, we must know that God has already given us an indescribable gift. I love how Paul ends his two-chapter long exhortation on giving generously to the poor. Verse 15: “Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!” What’s God’s inexpressible gift? You know – it’s the way I end every sermon. Jesus is God’s inexpressible gift. “For God so loved the world that he gave [he gave Jesus for © 2014 J.D. Shaw

8 us!] his one and only Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.” Friends, where would you and I be if God did not give us His Son? You’d be in your sins, with the just and holy wrath of God hanging over your heads, without hope and instead having only the fearful expectation of the judgment to come. God gave you His Son, and in his death Jesus paid for your sins and reconciled you to God, so that you weren’t just pardoned but adopted into God’s family. In Christ, you went from being God’s enemies to being his children. What a gift! And, not to put too fine a point on it – when Jesus was on the cross, did he only tithe his blood? No – he gave it all, to cleanse you and make you holy. “There is a fountain filled with blood [not ten percent full – one hundred percent full], drawn from Immanuel’s veins; and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.” God gave you his Son – and Jesus didn’t die for us reluctantly or under compulsion. The Father didn’t have to order Jesus to earth to redeem us. The book of Hebrews tells us that Jesus went to the cross with joy. He cheerfully gave himself for us. And friends, to the degree you see that Jesus was the ultimate cheerful giver – he gave his blood with joy – you can cheerfully give even the tithe. That’s verse 7: “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” Perhaps the most important verse in the Bible when it comes to giving is Acts 20:35, where Paul says: 35 In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’” God believes that, Jesus does. Do you believe that – it’s more blessed, it’s more joyful, it’s more pleasurable, to give than to receive? I think you do, because think about it. When you were a child, and Christmas came around, all you could think about was the presents you were going to get, right? That’s all your focus. But as you get older, you’re not nearly as worried about what you’ll get as what you give. And you know, parents, few things are better than finding the perfect gift for your child, and seeing how happy it makes them. Way better than what you get is what you can give that will bring joy. Or, perhaps even more than giving a gift to your child, giving a gift to your best friend or your spouse that you know they’ll like. When you find the perfect gift and you get to see how delighted they are in it, is not seeing their joy truly more pleasurable than anything you could get? Friends, that’s how God is all the time – he’s completely happy because he is no man’s debtor. He is a giver! And to the extent we see how cheerful God is as a giver, we’ll want to be generous givers to the poor. One last thing: third, we must seek God’s wisdom in how we give to the poor. I’ve said over and over again for the past thirty minutes that Christians have a duty to charity for the poor. But I haven’t told you practically how to do it – in other words, I haven’t said, “Get your checkbooks out, take a significant chunk of your tithe, and make out your gift to this poverty-fighting organization.”

© 2014 J.D. Shaw

9 Why? I read this book recently, When Helping Hurts. It’s the best book I’ve ever read on a Christian philosophy for helping the poor. I commend it to you; hopefully we can get some copies in the bookstall soon. And basically, this is what the authors say: to truly help the poor, it’s not just enough to cut a check. If you only throw money at the poor, it will create or perpetuate a cycle of dependence among the poor, and that’s destructive. The Bible is very clear: human beings have dignity, and part of human dignity is, whenever possible, to be to work and provide for yourself and your family. I’m not talking about emergency situations where there’s been some kind of natural disaster, but in the normal course of things only giving money to the poor is destructive. There are all these studies out that have proven conclusively that anti-poverty programs that are focused only on relieving the material poverty of the poor without addressing their real spiritual need to work and be productive will, over the long haul, wind up hurting the poor more than helping them. Plus, if you just cut a check, and never actually get emotionally involved with the poor, it’s really a form of arrogance. You’re basically saying to the poor, “OK, I’ll give you some money, but I don’t really want to spend time with you. I don’t really want you in my life; there’s no way you can teach me anything.” One of the great things about When Helping Hurts is that the authors take great pains to point out that alleviating poverty is a two-way street. Yes, the poor need our money, but we need them, too. They can teach us things too we’d never learn any other way. We must be willing as Christians to give generously of our time, in our relationships, and of our money to help the poor. And of course, in light of the gospel, it makes perfect sense. God doesn’t just beam food down to us from heaven, but not have a relationship with us. Nor does he just “save our souls” and ignore our physical needs. God does both with us, so it makes sense that we must do both with the poor. And I was convicted all last week about how I’m personally not doing that. And I’m really not sure if there is an organization in Oxford that’s doing that. I’ve had conversations with some of you who do care deeply about the poor how so many wellmeaning organizations fall short. So, here’s my hope. Here’s my application. I pray everyone at Grace Bible Church begins to at least practice the tithe – with a large portion of it devoted in some way to the poor. And then I pray that at least a few people in the church will get this book (and if you want a copy and can’t afford it, I’ll get you one), and begin to pray for wisdom that we might know at Grace Bible Church how we can be generous with our money, with our relationships, and with our time to the poor. The authors make it clear: it’s actually really hard to help the poor without making their situation worse – we need wisdom. My hope is that God would raise people up in our church to take the lead in this so that we could all, with true, godly wisdom, learn how to be generous toward the poor. God has been so generous with us – he’s given us life, he’s given us health, he’s given us his Son. The only proper response to God’s inexpressible generosity is to be generous to © 2014 J.D. Shaw

10 the church, missionaries, and the poor. So let’s pray together that God would give us the wisdom to do it. PRAY

© 2014 J.D. Shaw