DATE: October 20, 2013
By Bruce Borner
Let us pray. May the words i speak inadequate and untrained as they might be… somehow be made adequate. Amen
I am on the stewardship committee … and of course our pastor is also on the committee. I asked Alison is it true that a stewardship sermon is thought to be the hardest sermon for a preacher to preach.
Alison responded quickly… I don’t agree. I don’t agree because stewardship is what it’s all about… it is where the rubber meets the road.
And you know it really is.
I recommend everyone take the opportunity to do this lay person’s sermon. I didn’t realize how much the preparation for it would affect me. If any of you have ever run a marathon or have done serious long distance running or any sport that taxes your system beyond a point, you know the high you get. It’s an endorphin high. That’s how I’ve been feeling. Like I’ve run a marathon. To understand the power of giving we need to know the power of the holy spirit. We must recognize that the holy spirit is as real as the practical reality we live every day. Its power is there for the tapping. I have been so aloft from the preparation, I’ve been engaging in conversations about it over the past weeks with people I’d never have these conversations with normally, including a friend in my office who shared her own spiritual experience of giving.
I will avoid the use of quote religious words or phrases that we’ve all heard throughout our lives… words that have lost their significance in a way because of their too frequent use. I’m not being critical of the use of the words, but critical of us as listeners. We hear them but not the message. For example, the good news of the bible. We kind of get the concept of good news but I just don’t think we think about or fully understand just what and how good that news really is. Or what we have to do to benefit from it.
I recognize that many and maybe the majority of you here today are fully aware of the points I will be making.
My objectives today are one, to make the case for giving as a way to tap into the spiritual world and why that is so important. The second objective is to make a sales pitch for Saugatuck Congregational Church.
I don’t mean to preach to you but instead to preach with you. But to avoid confusion I ask that you keep your preaching to an inaudible whisper.
Scripture, as I see it is tricameral — working toward 3 goals.
- It provides instruction for living and working in the practical world.
- It provides instruction for tapping in to the spiritual world described in scripture.
- and It provides examples and anecdotes to reveal how the one world, the practical world can be merged with the other world, the spiritual world.
We know Jesus existed in this merged world and his words more than any other prophet outlined a recipe for all man/womankind to pursue that goal.
I like to cook and tend to like to follow recipes. I’ve learned from experience that deviations from recipe can go horribly wrong. Besides many classic recipes are already the result of decades, if not centuries, even millenia of experimentation. It’s not always easy to follow recipes. There is always the strong temptation to go off recipe, to try something new, to rebel.
Throughout our lives we learn the practical side of what it takes to be successful, what it takes to be whole, to be a well oiled functional being. These concerns are with us every day. It’s an in app in our brain. Many of us know the recipe but we know we don’t always follow it. We’re always tempted to go off it.
Jesus gives us instructions for tapping in to the spiritual world. He teaches us that to commune with the holy spirit we must act or behave in ways contrary to how we might otherwise choose to act or behave.
But what is the spiritual world? Personally I see it as something amorphous, bathed in love, soaked in understanding and dripping with wisdom. It is something that eclipses our practical reality. The same rules don’t apply when the spirit moves in our lives. Mountains can be moved. Miracles are born here.
You’ve heard of divine intervention or more recently divine shift which are just examples of the manifestation of the holy spirit.
We learn through scripture, through preaching that we have access to this world. And better, we might even be able to get on board. Merging our practical world with the spiritual world.
I served two terms as an Elder in the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City. One of those terms was under Dr. Bryant Kirkland, a rockstar of a preacher in a flagship church of the denomination. He was a good friend of Norman Vincent Peale. It was he who made the case for me for giving, which is in some ways why I wanted to give this sermon. Dr. Kirkland made the connection between the act of giving and the consequences of giving by saying "It works, I don’t know why it works, but it works". I loved the simplicity, the directness and the innocence of the statement and then soon after, discovered the very truth of it. Dr. Kirkland said to ‘test’ God in this. That this was one of the few times scripture allows that us to test God.
As sure as you know that a ball thrown up into the air will fall back to the ground, you can be sure that there are miraculous consequences to giving. Always.
Giving is not easy. Logically it flies in the face of reality. It’s in our nature, human nature, to preserve, conserve our money, keep it, not give it away, and it’s in our nature to want to be paid for our skills, not to volunteer them. So to achieve the benefits promised by scripture we need to go against our very nature. You might catch the parallel to this with much of what Jesus taught. Love our enemies? Turn the other cheek?
To earn access to this all powerful spiritual entity we must in the right moments subvert our instinct…
There are practical life examples where this is true.
When golfing for example, logic says that the harder you swing the club the farther the ball will go. But the opposite is true for most golfers. A very conscious effort must be made to convince the brain not to swing with abandon.
So why should we go against our nature and give of our time and money?
The promises related to giving are rampant in scripture. And these promises are quite clear.
Proverbs 11 He/she that giveth away finds increase, he/she that withholds is drawn down.
Malachi 3 Bring all your tithes to the storehouse and test me if i will not open for you the windows of heaven and give you a blessing so much so that you will not have enough room to store it.
My favorite scripture related to giving says this
Psalm 41 1-2 Oh, the joys of those who are kind to the poor. The Lord rescues the givers when they are in trouble. The Lord protects them and keeps them alive. He gives them prosperity and rescues them from their enemies.
Practically speaking from my experience and in the experience of others written through the ages, the consequence of giving is that it brings surprising gifts.
The organizations or individuals to which you give, whether it’s money, time or attention, you are making a difference. And if it is your intention that it be so, the value of your gift will be multiplied greatly. A miracle achievable only by calling on the holy spirit to intervene.
To you as the giver expect returns that are surprising, rarely delivered as expected but always delivered. These gifts are custom designed for you. The friend at my office with whom I ardently discussed my sermon preparation shared with me that she believes giving in addition to other gifts causes the lighting up of the pleasure centers in the brain… like what chocolate does.
Today and the weeks ahead we’ll be hearing testimonials from church members related to giving.
These are real world examples of God’s grace emanating from the spiritual world.
So if you need to be convinced, test God in this. Between now and gratitude Sunday November 10th give something to someone or some organization and be attentive to the grace of God that results.
We are blessed as a congregation to have a very deeply spiritual pastor. Someone who struggles constructively with the difficult theological concepts and freely shares her pursuit. Alison offered a refinement to the process of giving by introducing or reinforcing to our Sunday Nooma group the concept of ‘intentionality’… That when you decide to give, give with the intention that it will do good. Give with the intention that your gift will be multiplied. Give with the intention that blessings will not only fall on you but blessings / miracles will fall on those to whom you give.
If you are new to giving … start small, give $1 here and $1 there. Intend that it multiply in the hands of the receiver. So your $1 becomes $10, your $5 becomes $50, your $1000 becomes $10,000.
And now the sales pitch.
For those who already know the power of giving and what it brings to life, give cheerfully, give more, fully aware of the gifts it will bring to your life and to the lives of others.
For those who have yet to learn of the power of giving… test God and give. You will find that for each level of giving you achieve you will be made capable of giving more.
Without our own worship space, we as a congregation are you might say out in the wilderness. These times though have brought us closer together as a church family. You have to know that our future is bright. We have a great pastor, a great, growing youth program with vibrant new leadership and in a little over a year we will be proudly ensconced in a new Temple to God.
At Saugatuck Congregational Church families young and old are impacted by that which is taught here. Those who leave our doors and go out into the world do so aware of the impact they can and do have on others.
So when you think about where to give and who to give to, think about this church. When you support the church you become a steward and stewardship, when you really think about it, is what life is all about … it’s where the rubber meets the road.
Tap in to the holy spirit by giving to this great church and reap your Surprising Gifts.