Becoming a Disciple - Week 1, Day 3

Money, Money, Money (Being Generous)

There will come a day that you will stand before God and give an account for how you used the money that He entrusted to your care. On that day, when you stand before God, I promise you will not regret a single dime you gave to the things of God and the Kingdom of God.  

Jesus said, “No one can be a slave to two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you’ll be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot be a slave to both God and money.” Luke 16:13

I think you want to be a generous person. I don’t think anybody would honestly say, “I want to be a slave to stuff. I want to be a hoarder. I want to be rich toward myself and poor toward God. I want to spend every dime I have on myself.”  I don’t think you want to be like that. 

But there’s a danger in thinking that you are a generous and compassionate person because you have felt sometimes that you are generous and compassionate. Let me try to illustrate this for you: 

• You see a starving child on TV, and you feel sad. You think to yourself, “I’m not calloused like some people are. I have deep feelings about human suffering. I must be a compassionate guy.” 
• You see someone on TV who is filthy rich, maybe a show like MTV’s cribs or the old Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, and it just sickens you. You think, “If I were rich, I’d be really generous. I’d give tons of money away to help others.”

But you aren’t rich, and you need everything you have for yourself. But, if you were rich, you would be generous. 

In Malachi 3:10, God says, 

Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse…Test Me in this and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of Heaven and pour out so much blessing you will not have room enough for it.  

As a Christian, it is important that you understand that a tithe means it is our duty to give the first 10% of what we make to the church to further the message of Jesus. God says, “test Me in this.”  This is the only place in the Bible where God uses this kind of language. “Test Me and see if I don’t throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you don’t have room enough for it.”  

When we offer up our tithes and offerings, we are saying, “God, I trust you to provide for my needs. God promises that if we are faithful to Him in this area of our life, He will take care of our needs.

God wants us to be generous people because He is a generous God. Will you trust God and start giving 10% of the money that you make to advance the Kingdom of God?

We know how hard it is to trust God with the money that He provided for you with, so at Sagebrush Community Church, we have a 90-day money-back guarantee. If, after 90 days of tithing, God has not been faithful to you and provided for your needs, we will refund all of your money, no questions asked. Now, what is your excuse?

Time Out:

1. Why do you think God wants us to give money to the church?

2. What are some reasons that people give for not funding the mission of the church?

3. Are you giving anything to the church to fund the message of Jesus?

4. What are you going to do about that?