St. Luke’s Evangelical Lutheran Church -- Watertown, WI
Pastor Mark Gartner
6So we urged Titus, since he had earlier made a beginning, to bring also to completion this act of grace on your part. 7But just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.
8I am not commanding you, but I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others. 9For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.
10And here is my advice about what is best for you in this matter: Last year you were the first not only to give but also to have the desire to do so. 11Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means. 12For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what he does not have.
Dear children of God whose hearts are filled with God’s grace,
The phone rings just as you are sitting down to eat supper. It doesn’t take long and the person on the other end of the phone introduces themselves. The introduction goes something like this, “Hi, I’m calling today for the police department. How are you doing today?” We usually answer in a polite voice that we are doing fine, and it is about now that most of us have a pretty good idea what is coming next. The person was not calling from the police department to let me know some of the new things that the police are doing to make me and my neighborhood safe. They are not calling to get my input on what I think it would take to make the police better. They are not calling to update me on some new equipment or police cars that have been added to the police department. They were not calling to assure me that the police department is doing everything in their power to train their officers to protect me and the citizens in the most effective way possible. This person was calling because the police department was fundraising. Usually through some outside agency that is hired to raise funds they were calling and asking for money. I don’t hold anything against police departments having a fund drive. They need the money to do the work which is before them just like the many other groups that are out there. But my point is that I knew right away what the person on the other end of the phone was calling for. It was about money. After I politely told the person on the phone that I wasn’t able to assist them with their fundraising, the call ended rather quickly.
The point to all of this is that there are times when we have to admit that it is all about money. Maybe you have felt this way when people have come to your door trying to sell you a certain thing that will make your life so much easier. Maybe you have felt this way with other phone calls that you get which are looking for funds for their good cause. But on this Debt Reduction Sunday, I want all of us to think about what part money plays in a Christian’s life and in the life of our Church or our Synod. Is the perception out there that all the Church cares about is money? Is all that we as Church are and do concerned with money? Today’s reading from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians addresses this same issue. And as we sit here this morning and talk about this very thought (which can be rather sensitive to some people), I want us to see how Paul puts this all in perspective for us. With these words in our minds, our theme for this special Sunday will be:
Sermon Theme: It’s Not All About The Money
1. It’s about a wonderful Savior for us
2. It’s about an undeserved privilege we have
3. It’s about a common commitment we share
1. It’s about a wonderful Savior for us
I have to admit that on special Sunday’s like today, it seems easy to lose track of what we are really here for. Are we really here today for the giving of a special envelope that is being used to further God’s ministry here at St. Luke’s by paying down our short term debt? I would pray that this is not the only reason that you are here today. While it is good and proper for us to gather thank-offerings to do God’s work here at St. Luke’s and throughout the world, money cannot be the only reason that we are here. Vice versa, I would hope and pray that people are not offended by our discussion of money and how we can better use God’s gift to thank and praise our God.
If it is not all about the money then what is it about? The apostle Paul in our text reminds us first and foremost that we are here today to hear again about our Savior who came into this world to save lost and condemned people like you and me. To point this out, he uses the picture of rich and poor. This past week I heard a discussion on the radio about how much money a person needed to earn in order to be considered part of the working middle class. The first caller in said that he thought a person needs to make at least $120,000 in order to make it into the middle class. Most of the other callers disagreed and the majority of the people said that making between $70,000 - $100,000 puts you in the middle class. The discussion ended by stating the fact that about 70% of the United States makes less than $70,000. So you tell me what makes you part of the middle class and does that make you rich or poor. To bring this point home, when you got up this morning did you consider yourself rich or poor? As you were paying the bills this past week, did you consider yourself rich or poor? As you went to work this past week, did you consider yourself rich or poor? We might all answer this in different ways, but Paul tells us something that is very clear.
Paul states the picture of riches and poverty this way, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.” This verse tells all of us here today that we at one time were living in extreme poverty. This word for poverty is a word which means that you are begging for a living. This word wants to remind us that spiritually speaking all of us needed to rely on someone else to provide for us. We had absolutely nothing. And when did this poverty start? It started all the way back in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve lost their spiritual riches and gave them up when they chose to disobey God and eat from the tree that God had commanded them not to eat from. At that very moment, they and all people who would come after them which includes us were in extreme spiritual poverty. Death and the consequences of sin came into God’s perfect world. This poverty became ours from the time that we were conceived in sin.
That is why we want to remember the second part of this verse. Jesus came into this world to bring us his riches. Jesus became a beggar for us. He had the riches of a throne in heaven. He had a perfect home in heaven as God, but he chose to become poverty for us. He became a human being like us and lived a perfect life in this sinful world for us so that we might receive the riches of eternal salvation. Jesus lowered himself to the point of suffering our punishment on the cross and being laid in the tomb. As these verse clearly tell us, he did all of this for us and our sin. He did this to pay for our sins and win for us eternal life in heaven.
So I now ask the question again, Is the Church all about money? If this is what you think Church is all about, it is kind of sad. I would pray that it is very obvious week in and week out that it is all about a wonderful Savior. I would pray that you are here in God’s house today and every week to hear the Good News that every one us needs to hear. I was poor in my sins and God made me rich through the work of his one and only Son. The Church is not here to receive. The Church is here to dispense to you the spiritual medicine that our sick hearts need to hear. I would pray that we want to come often to this place of worship to find comfort and then increase our faith by hearing God’s Word and coming often to the Lord’s Supper. It’s not all about money. It is about souls and may we never lose sight of this.
2. It’s about an undeserved privilege we have
Our reading for today also tells us the Church is about something else, “Just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.” Giving! – what is the world’s view of giving? When it comes to supporting causes or supporting various groups what is our view? All to often we have to admit that we support many of these causes only because we feel that it is necessary. It is almost like paying dues and I need to do my part to make sure that things get done. It isn’t always done with joy. It is almost like we feel like we are forced to do it. But the words that we just heard from Paul have a completely different ring to them. Paul calls it grace. It is by grace that God allows us to take part in supporting God’s work here on earth. Isn’t this a different way of looking at things?
The background of this text is that a number of different Churches were collecting a special offering to help the Christians back in the city of Jerusalem who were suffering. Paul was reminding them how God’s grace had filled their hearts as they gave their money to support God’s work in Jerusalem. What led them wasn’t compulsion or the feeling of I better give or things are going to go down the tubes in Jerusalem. They didn’t give because Paul twisted their arms so much that they thought they better give or God isn’t going to be happy. Paul describes it this way in verse two of this chapter as he describes the gifts that were given by the churches in Macedonia., “Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity.” What did they have in their hearts that led them to give so generously. It was God’s grace and joy to thank God with their financial gifts of money.
As we look at our congregation we always need to recognize the undeserved privilege that we have to do God’s work on this earth. God has given us the privilege to let people know that Jesus has saved them from their sins. The many ministries that we have at St. Luke’s are means to help us build up the faith of those who belong to our spiritual family which is accomplished through our weekly worship serves that are led by two called pastors and supported by faithful musicians. We build up the faith our families as we support Christian Education through our Day School and its called teachers as well as support for our Luther Preparatory School and our Lakeside Lutheran High School where our young people continue to grow in their faith. What a joy and privilege it is that God uses us to support the work of the synod through our Synod Mission Offerings which helps to fund the training of our future Pastors and Teachers as well as our Home Missions and World Missions which go to places and people we could never reach. It is not about the money. It is about an undeserved privilege and opportunity that God give to us to be a part of his team and his work.
3. It’s about a common commitment we share
We have seen two things that it is all about. It is about our wonderful Savior and an undeserved privilege. We will now see the last thing that Paul tells us it is about, “So we urged Titus, since he had earlier made a beginning, to bring also to completion this act of grace on your part… And here is my advice about what is best for you in this matter: Last year you were the first not only to give but also to have the desire to do so. 11Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means.” As I said before this text is talking about a special offering that was being collected to support the Christians in Jerusalem. From the words of our text, it seems that the offering had begun to fall behind a little bit. Paul was encouraging them to remember their common commitment that they had made to make their offerings and finish this project.
Paul gives us some wonderful advice that is fitting not only for the people at his time but for Christians of all ages. When we talk about giving, God is not looking at the amount. Part of what he is looking at is to see if the gift is given in proportion to what God has blessed us with. He says they should give, “according to their means.” In other words, Paul is stating that if their willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has and not according to what someone does not have. It would not be God-pleasing to divide up the offering in equal parts among all the members, but they were to give as God had blessed them. They would give a percentage that they had decided in their hearts to give. In this way all people can support God’s work through the common commitment we share. Whether we are a teenager, or a wealthy business person we would all be able to share in this common goal.
We at St. Luke’s can benefit from this can’t we? Eight years ago in 1999, we as a congregation decided that to best serve the spiritual needs of our people and the community in which we work, we needed to add to our facilities and expand our existing facilities. This meant the building of a new school and adding an entrance way to the Church, while enlarging our present day worship facilities by the addition of the side pews in our Church. About this same time, in May of 1998 St. Luke’s decided that the ministry here at St. Luke’s could be expanded by the calling of a second full time Pastor which was myself. In a way we are much in the same boat as the Christians that Paul was writing to. We have started to pay off this ministry and support this ministry with our offerings. The project is begun. Today is wonderful opportunity for us to show the support of our common commitment with this special one time offering to help lower our short term debt. I firmly believe that God has given to the people here at St. Luke’s the grace and joy and resources to do this work together. He has blessed us with so much! And at the same time, may we always realize that God’s work which we are sharing in will not all of sudden by done when this special offering is done. May God open our hearts to see what it is all about.
Is it all about money? Is that what our Church is about? Sometimes it can seem that way and sometimes we have to admit that money can dominate our meetings and things we are discussing. But Paul gives us a good perspective today of what the Church is all about and our part in God’s Church. May God keep us in the proper perspective. May he keep us thankful for all that he’s given to us individually and as a Church. And may he lead us to support his work in the world with our treasures and abilities. Amen.