What Do You Know About Money?

I know only a very few Christians who are abounding in money.

There are those believers who, like Abraham (Genesis 23:16) or Lydia (Acts 16:14, 40), have more than enough resources to live and still have disposable income to give away. Churches, Bible colleges, seminaries, and Bible camps benefit from wealthy contributors.

But those who abound in money are not the ones who fund ministry. Paul wrote, “Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren to go to you ahead of time, and prepare your generous gift beforehand, which you had previously promised, that it may be ready as a matter of generosity and not as a grudging obligation. But this I say: He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work (2 Corinthians 9:5-8).

• Paul did not appeal to the wealthy in the Corinthian church. He appealed to the saved in the church.
• Paul taught that giving is not merely a matter of how much income or expenses one has; rather, giving is a matter of how much grace one has received.
• We give out of gratitude for the grace we have received.

For example, in our church four times each calendar year we take Abounding In Thanksgiving offerings. It is important to note these are not named Abounding In Money offerings.

Our AIT offerings are giving that is above and beyond our systematic support of the local church of which we are members. Our AIT offerings are GIFTS TO GOD in grateful response for His gift to us. Our AIT offerings are sacrificial.

To give in an AIT offering likely means a giver chooses not to use that money for something else. It may mean no eating out for the next two months. It may mean putting off the purchase of new phone, a new dress, a laptop, a television, or new carpet.

For most of us, participating in an AIT offering will not be because we have an abundance of money. For most of us, participating in an AIT offering will be because we have an abundance of gratitude.

This is why we encourage everyone to participate. We all have been the recipients of God’s grace, and we are thankful to Him for His gift to us.

But we not only display our thanksgiving to God in our financial giving; we display our thanksgiving to God in the abundant offering of every resource we have. For example, none of us abounds in time, but to serve the Lord requires we relinquish our limited time to do the work of a disciple. To connect, care, converse, or chase requires time, a limited, not an abundant resource. When we give of that precious commodity to the work of the Lord and His gospel, we can abound in thanksgiving to Him.

Jesus talked a lot about money. Jesus talked about money more than he did heaven and hell combined. Jesus talked about money more than anything else except the Kingdom of God. We know our Lord regularly taught in parables. Of the 39 parables recorded in the New Testament, 11 address money.

Admittedly, many pastors find preaching on money as difficult as preaching on divorce. We are self-conscious that our hearers will conclude our preaching on money is self-serving. Still, Jesus taught with authority on the subject and so should those who echo his words to his followers.

Coins and bills have no moral value. They are metal and paper, nothing more and nothing less. Having or not having money neither makes a person unrighteous nor righteous. The place we give to money is a moral matter and requires the teaching of Jesus to give ethics to how we earn money and how we spend money. Acquiring, giving, using and spending money is a moral issue. We need Jesus’s teachings to direct our thinking about money.

What do you know about money from the teachings of Jesus? The point of this Musing is not to tell you everything Jesus says about money but to prompt in your mind the question, “How does the teaching of Jesus impact my comprehensive approach toward money?”

Some suggestions:

• Type “Jesus and money” in your search and broaden your understanding of what Jesus said about money.
• Ask a Christian friend, mentor, or fellow church member, “What do you know about money from the teachings of Jesus?” Listen to the answer and talk about Jesus’s teaching.
• Pray for your pastor as he endeavors to preach the teachings of Jesus, including his teachings on money.

As always I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.

Can You Dream It Too?

Her: What did they ask you?

Me: They wanted to know my vision for the church. What did they ask you?

Her: They wanted me to tell them what your vision was for the church.

The same question came from so many different people and in so many different settings I concluded the question had to be coordinated, not intentionally probably, but coordinated in some way by a strong voice or group of people.

Brenda and I were visiting the small group of Baptists in South St. Paul, Minnesota, who were looking for their next pastor. Among the wide array of queries that came my way, the repeated question was, “What’s your vision for the church?”

Prior to meeting the search committee and the people of the church, I had been to Minnesota exactly once in the whole of my life. I spent an afternoon at the Como Zoo before leaving the land of hot dishes and “You betcha’s.” Neither Brenda nor I knew a soul in Minnesota nor much about the state beyond its claim to 10,000 lakes and its then current governor, who turned out to be a better pro wrestler than leader of the state’s executive branch.

I had no substantive answer to their recurrent question. How could I? I knew nothing of the community, little of the church’s history, and virtually nothing about the church’s resources and gifts. But that was more than seventeen year ago. Fast forward to today.

None of you needs me to tell you how broken our world is. From...

• The shocking revelations of sexual abuse by priests of the Church of Rome to
• The heartbreak of a murdered college coed to
• The strangulations of a mother and her children at the hands of a parent to
• The senseless death by her own hand of a fourteen-year-old girl to
• The bullying middle school boys and girls will receive over the next two weeks to
• The growing epidemic of opioid addiction to
• The quest for identity and acceptance in gender fluidity to
• Women who kill their babies in their wombs to
• Fathers who abandon their women and children to
• Tensions between ethnicities rising to levels that must soon burst from pressure to
• The astonishing and horrifying sexualization of our culture and our economy, and
• So much more,

We conclude our world is broken.

Is there any place a broken person can turn for help?

Is there anyone who cares enough to love another broken human?

Can someone provide hope why any of us should seek to live one more minute in this mess?

Is there a real, genuine safe place where a woman or man looking to offload their burden can find relief?

As I read the New Testament, I conclude Jesus intended for a church, a local group of Christians who covenant together to follow the teachings, ordinances, and commands of Jesus, to be the place where other broken human beings find the help they need.

We have in our possession the gospel of Jesus Christ, the good news that mends broken people. We can love broken people because we were loved when we were broken. We can offer hope to broken people because Jesus offered hope to us when we were broken. We can show how to find relief from the burden of sin because the burden of sin we once carried no longer rests on our shoulders.

We once were broken too, but not any longer.

Yes, we still battle against all the stuff that comes from living in a broken world, but we are not broken. Jesus changed who we are and what we are when he saved us by his work on his cross.

In the days, months, and years he gives us as we anticipate being with him - where no brokenness of any kind exists - we search for other broken human beings to help and we welcome every broken human being looking for healing.

Would you join me in helping broken people?

Would you sacrifice time, comfort, money, ease, and the American Dream to help other broken people? Would you be a local church that stands with outstretched arms receiving any and all expressions of brokenness? Would you be a local church that goes out and finds broken people wherever they might be and deliver to them healing in Jesus’s name?

Me: Want to hear my vision for our church?

Her: Sure, what do you have?

Me: Your brokenness welcome here.

As always I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.

More Than Anything Your Church Needs This

The blips about the problems in the American church appear on my newsfeed nearly continuously. Makes sense, I am a pastor after all.

Today, I learned…

• 3,700 churches permanently close their doors annually. Coincidently, somewhere near 3,700 who sensed the call to ministry are questioning their call to the ministry of the Word.
• A megachurch that was the model for church growth in the 90s and 00s is spiraling out of control in the wake of a #metoo scandal involving internationally known church leadership
• Churches are to blame, according to a Clemson University study, because families with developmental disabilities across the spectrum do not feel welcome in a local church. And in a hopeless comment about what can be done in the church, the author opines, “There is no one way of preparing for children with chronic health conditions such as autism or learning disabilities that affect social interaction.”
• Baptisms resulting from conversions are embarrassingly low for an institution whose Founder commissioned it to make that activity its singular focus.
• Children raised in the church are abandoning the tradition of their parents at alarming rates, a decline that is not new and shows no signs of slowing down.
• A significant number of church members feel disconnected from the whole of the church.

We cannot program our way out of any the problems listed above, any of the unnamed problems in any of our churches, or any of the problems in our families or personal lives. We cannot organize, staff, and vision plan solutions effecting eternal change. We cannot strategize to address every unique felt need of each individual who passes through our doors.

Left to ourselves we - the church - are powerless, ineffective, foolish, and self-destructive.

I see one solution and one solution only, the effectual, fervent prayer of God’s people for the church.

This is the strong injunction of the New Testament and the example of all in the early church. Read the Gospels and you will see Jesus praying for the disciples and the coming church. Read the book of Acts and you will witness the church praying for the apostles and for each other. Read the Epistles of the New Testament where the apostles record their prayers on behalf of the churches, its leaders, and all its members.

Nothing in the New Testament occurs outside of the prayer of God’s people. Draw a line backward from the salvation of men and women, the restoration of broken families, the healing of damaged lives, the revitalization of weakened churches, and so much more, and the line begins with prayer.

If you long for solutions to problems you cannot solve, pray. When you want to run away and hide, when you wish this all would just go away, when you grow disillusioned with your church, when you contemplate thoughts and express words that shock you, pray. When your church doesn’t seem interested in the Great Commission, pray. When your efforts to change people and culture in your church fail, pray.

When you hear the elders / pastors in your church call the church together for prayer, change your plans and pray. Close the book, put down your phone, turn off the screen in front of you, bow your face before God and pray. Pull out your church directory and pray. Bring to mind the people in your small group and pray. Drive near the home of other church members and plead with God for the people in that house. Walk within one block of your residence and ask God to grant escape from hell for the people who live near to you.

Friends, there is no change apart from the working of God – no change in your own life, your family, or the church. If we do not pray, nothing changes.

Pray for the church.

Pray for your church.

As always I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.

Two Words You Must Say A Lot!

Timing is everything they say, and with some words the wrong time can ruin the best of words. Deliver those three little words, “I love you,” when she was just about to DTR (Define The Relationship), ushering you to the Friend Zone, may leave you and her shell shocked, causing you to pause even when writing in a card to mom on Mother’s Day, fearful mom may be thinking of having a DTR conversation with you.

“I’m sorry,” while great words needing utterance with regularity, can also be out of place. The same goes for “please” and a few others. But there are two words that always fit the occasion and never leave the hearer wounded.

The old evangelist said, When gratitude dies on the altar of a man’s heart, that man is well-nigh hopeless.

Say thank you more than you think you do, to more people than you think deserve it, in more situations than seem necessary, in more mediums than you normally use, and to God in everything.

• Say thank you to the custodian mopping the restroom at the place where you work.
• Say thank you to the cashier who swipes your credit card or gives you change.
• Say thank you to your mom or whoever the person is in your home who does the laundry.
• Say thank you to your dad for loving your mom.
• Say thank you to the musicians who aid our worship.
• Say thank you to your Bible teachers and pastors for delivering the Word of God to you week after week.
• Say thank you to your children’s Sunday School teachers or those who care for your little ones in the church nursery.
• Say thank you to the tech guys who make it possible to hear and see when the church gathers.
• Say thank you to your children for bringing youth, happiness, young love, and life into your home.
• Say thank you to your siblings for answering the phone, playing video games, talking late into the night, and giving been there – don’t that advice.
• Say thank you to parents for your education, the furniture you plop down in or on in their home, their cars you drive, and their food you eat.
• Say thank you to your spouse for faithfulness to you today, yesterday, last week, last month, last year, and since your wedding day.
• And on and on the list goes.

In the next hour can you say thank you to someone for something you observe? Before the end of the day can you write a thank you note, address the envelope, put a stamp on it, and drop it in the mail? When you say goodnight to your spouse, can you say thank you for something in your relationship your spouse contributes that makes your life better, easier, happier?

Lest we overlook the obvious as Christians, can you tell your Lord thank you again and again for his boundless mercy, his abundant grace, his unconditional love, and his certain promises? Would you thank our Lord right now? Would you thank him again one hour from now? Would you thank him on the drive home? Would you thank him around the dinner table? Would you thank him as you tuck the kiddos into bed? Would you thank him with the last thoughts before sleep overtakes you?

Say thank you and do not let a day go by without doing so. This is an expression of your Christian character.

In everything, give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

As always I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.

Serving Those Who Serve

Chris Pitts is a Second Lieutenant in the United States Air Force Reserve serving as a chaplain. His family and our church say goodbye to him each summer for many weeks and eagerly await his return. He writes about what it means to be a military chaplain and the impact of the local church. Part two follows.

Last week we considered three questions What is a military chaplain? Should we be involved in military chaplaincy? and Who can be a military chaplain? Today, we think about one final and important question -

What is the role of the local churchin military chaplaincy?

One role the church serves with a missionary and military chaplain is to send the individual and his family (Acts 13:1-3). Military chaplains should not pursue this ministry in a vacuum. The support of the local church in sending is not a “nice to have” but an absolute requirement. It is the local church that observes and recognizes the giftedness, preparedness and qualifications of a minister. Once the church has fulfilled this role, they then identify with the work the chaplain has been called to by commissioning or sending. The local church is not simply sending and saying, “We are happy for them!” Rather, the church is also getting behind the work and saying, ‘We are happy to participate in the work!”

A second role of the local church in military chaplaincy is to be the main source of accountability and support for the chaplain. He and his family will participate locally with a body of believers, but membership will continue to reside with the sending church. The pastor, members and chaplain family should engage with each other as possible to encourage accountability and support. This also serves to encourage the local body in their participation in the work, the Great Commission (Acts 14:24-28).

Hopefully this piece has succeeded in helping your understanding of military chaplaincy and encouraged your support of missions. We have an incredible privilege in being an integral part of the mission through our missionaries. It may have provided you the information needed to defend the chaplaincy should someone dispute it. I hope it will create advocates for the chaplaincy.

If, Lord willing, I am reappointed as a chaplain, we may have the opportunity in the near future to send me and my family into the mission field. We are incredibly grateful for the support we have already received in this pursuit. We love our church family and would not be able to do what we do without your prayers and support. Thank you for participating in this work with us.

As always I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.