"Stewardship"

Scripture: Matthew 6:1-4; 19-24

As we continue in our examination of Jesus’ Sermon, we come to the passage that I have chosen to call “Stewardship”. Now I know what you’re thinking – “Oh no – he’s going to give us the “money pitch”! But actually, I’m not – today we will be looking far beyond just money and into what the Church should be about.

Homiletics reports, regarding Leonard Sweet’s book “Soul Tsunamu”:
“God is the giver. The believer is the receiver.” Sweet writes that most stewardship programs have a theology of “giving.” He believes that Christians must return to Scripture for a theological understanding of God as “giver.” This, he says, will redefine one’s relationship with God.
The philosophy goes back to the basic truth that God is the giver and the believer is the receiver. Christians love God because God first loved them. The good things of life are available to enjoy because of God’s gracious giving. Sweet writes, “In a theology of receiving, the first question is not ‘How much do I give to God [out] of what is mine’ but ‘How much of God’s do I keep for myself?’”

Sweet further develops this idea by contrasting a traditional emphasis on stewardship, which he says is poorly understood, with an emphasis upon trusteeship. “The fundamental question of anyone who is a trustee of an estate is not ‘How much do I give away of what is mine’ but ‘How much of this estate do I receive for myself so that the estate might grow and prosper and do good?’”
The language of trusteeship is the language of receiving first, and only after the receiving question is settled does it become the language of giving.

In Psalm 50:7-15, we read that the animals of the forest, the birds of the air, the cattle of a thousand hills, and everything that moves in the fields are all God’s. And yet, we have been given responsibility for them all. In Genesis 2:19-20, we read that God has created all life, including animals and birds, but he gives the Man authority to “name” each one. The word “name”, in this context, implies authority over, but not just the right to do whatever we wish, but that we have been appointed as “trustees” to care for and administer the Lord’s creation.

So stewardship for us, in combining Sweet’s theological ideals with the scriptures, is that we have been appointed as managers of the Lord’s creation, with the right to keep some of these resources for our own use.

With that, let’s turn to our text for the day.

Read Matthew 6:1-4

In Jesus’ teaching for today, his emphasis seems to be on money, but try to remember that money is simply an analogy for the things of earth. The Lord’s lesson is about our “trusteeship”, our “managerial responsibilities”, our stewardship over all that he has given us.
And in our text, Jesus doesn’t say anything about how much we should give to those in need – he is talking strictly about our attitude in giving. This takes us back to Leonard Sweet’s thoughts – namely do we think “How much am I willing to give to God?”, or do we think “How much of God’s do I keep for myself?” In Jesus’ teaching, he is telling us that those “hypocrites” are thinking along the line of the first question, when they should have been considering the second.
When we think of our offering as “our giving to God out of what we have”, and want others to know just how much that may be, Jesus says that the honor given to us by others will be our reward, and that on the Judgment Day, we may very well miss out on his eternal reward!
And one more thought on the issue of secrecy – it isn’t so much that no one else can ever know what you have returned to the Lord, it’s actually more about our attitude in the offering. Do we brag about our gift, or are we humble in the giving?

Read Matthew 6:19-21

This is about our priorities in managing the resources that the Lord has entrusted to our care. It all comes back to Sweet’s questions on who actually owns the resources? If we see our resources as ours to do with as we see fit, we are, in essence, “storing up treasures on earth”. And if we readily acknowledge that they are all God’s to begin with, and return a portion of that glory to his honor, these very same resources become “the treasure of heaven.”
So the question for us now is “Are we returning true honor and glory to the Lord, or are we a bit sparing in showing him our gratitude”?

Read Matthew 6:22-24

In the understanding of today, the eye allows light and vision to come into our lives, but in the context of Jesus’ day, the eye was seen as that which reveals all that is at work within our lives. If our life is about bringing honor to Almighty God, then the eye projects a “light” to the world – we become an example of Christian living to others, if you will. But if our life is all about ourselves, then we are told that there is no “light”, that there is only darkness within us. And, of course, “darkness” of the soul refers to our sinfulness.
Once again, it’s our attitude toward God and his great gifts to each of us – are they ours, have we produced them, or have they simply been on loan to us from the Lord?

And then the Lord concluded this section with his thoughts on serving two Masters, and he says that we can’t! We can’t serve, or bring glory and honor, to both God AND the things of earth, for if we do, we will never be able to love them both. And from personal experience, we will nearly always wind up loving the secular, and will turn away from the divine.

Now a few other thoughts that may have come from Jesus’ teaching – first, how much is a tithe? A tithe is that which we return to God to help the kingdom grow and thrive. For many, we believe that this amounts to 10% of all we have. But I have found only one reference in scripture that equates a tithe to 10% (Leviticus 27:30-33). And 10% isn’t a bad place to start, but can we truly place a set amount on the gratitude we show to the Lord for all that he has given us? How much is enough? How much time do we give for the growth in the Kingdom? How often will we use our God given abilities to help those who are in need? How much or our finances is the right amount to dedicate to the growth and strength of the church?
How much is enough to give sufficient glory to God for all he has given for us?


Second, stewardship of the Lord’s resources is not just about how much money we put in the plate each Sunday morning. It is about our generous gift to God for all that we have received – our time, our abilities, our family, our passion and compassion, our health (even when our life hasn’t been exactly perfect!), and yes, our finances, too.
There’s an old saying that “You can’t out give God.” But have any of us really tried?

Yesterday at the regional Church Conference, our District Superintendent Dave Kofahl presented an excellent message, with the theme being “Refresh: Reclaiming Our Wesleyan Heritage”. Now his message wasn’t specifically about stewardship, but it was about the attitude we have in faith. (Remember Sweet's thoughts?) He told us that our Christian faith must have both an inlet and an outlet, and he offered a comparison between the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea.

The Sea of Galilee is a living and vibrant body of water. It has provided food for countless millions of people, as well as employment for many, for thousands of years. It has a fresh water inlet from the Northern Jordan River, and it has an outlet for water to flow south through the Jordan itself. On the other hand, the Dead Sea, being 1,500 feet below sea level, has no outlet, and even though water continues to flow in, evaporation continues to make it more and more salty with each passing year. While the ocean has a salinity of 2-3 %, the Dead Sea is in the 25-30 % range, and as such, is dead - nothing can live in it. As a matter of fact, there are signs at the beach warning everyone about the hazards of ingesting the liquid, or even of getting the water in your eyes! It has become worse than stagnant simply because it has no outlet.

Jesus is the source of our faith, and showing him honor by giving back to his glory, is the outlet. And that honor is given every time we “refresh” the church. In 2 Corinthians 5:17, we read “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”
How “fresh” and “new” are each of us? Are we prepared to honestly say YES to bringing honor and growth to the Kingdom by faith and following in Christ? Do we truly want to be refreshed and return to our Wesleyan heritage, or do we just expect others to do that, while we sit and watch?