Do Something
Jim Clements · Tidal Church Moncton · May 26, 2024 · If Money Talked series
Jim Clements closes the series by urging us to give God our money, our time, and our story. Drawing on Psalm 50, Luke 19 and Numbers 14, he shows that everything is God's, His timing matters, and obedience means acting now.
More from Jim Clements · The If Money Talked series
Topics: Money & Generosity, Mission & Outreach, Discipleship
Transcript
[0:01] So today concludes our series on If Money Talked. And over the last three weeks we've talked about making sure that you are the master over your money and your money's not the master over you, to make sure that you are experiencing proper budgeting and finances so that you can do when God calls you to do something for the kingdom. And then last week Denn shared with us biblically the expectation of us living in obedience when it comes to our giving to the kingdom. So today I get to conclude it, and I want to, everyone's like, yeah, you get to conclude it so we can get onto another series. No, I want to give you direction, the set direction, because you hear a lot of this stuff, and I always think of a GPS, right?
[0:50] And there's one thing that's good about a GPS is that it gets you from where you want to go to where you're going. But sometimes when you get off track on that GPS, it says, turn back where possible. That's the only time I think the GPS has about as much idea of where you're going as you do at that point in time. Or it would say, turn back at this spot or turn back, maybe I just travel too many country roads and I get lost. So our GPS today, as we look forward and think about our giving and our finances, I'm also gonna talk about our time and our story. So three things today in the GPS is always, what are we doing with these three things in our lives that impact what God wants us to do, that impact people but are also impacting self?
[1:40] And when I think about when I'm on my kayak, and yes, I do own a kayak, I know it's hard to believe, but I can get in one. And when I own a kayak and I think about when I paddle, and a lot of times in our life when it comes to our lives and we're trying to figure things out, we're like, we're using one paddle and we're by ourselves. Well, the only way we're gonna find success in these three areas of our life as I'll lay out this morning for us is if we paddle in unison with God, if we've got the one paddle in. And my wife goes, you're only gonna take one paddle. And I said, no, I'm gonna take the other half. And she goes, well, one paddle, you're just gonna go around in circles. Well, I hope the message won't be like that, but together when we experience the love and we live in obedience of God, we put one oar in and push.
[2:36] And God puts one oar in and He pushes. And we do this in unison. See, we think that the last three weeks, like I think as you've sat there the last three weeks, there's been tension building in some of you. And tension is good because tension means that God is gonna break through with wherever you are right now. And I want to tell you that the last three weeks and today you will hear my voice, but you'll hear the words that I share is what God's laid on my heart. And at the end of the day, it's not what I say. It's not what me saying, if you gotta put an oar in the water, it's time. You gotta God put an oar into water too. It's what God says to you. The only thing and only time I'll ever ask you is I want you to be prayerful and I want you to seek God in these three areas that we'll talk about today.
[3:26] And if you've got a problem with it, then you take it up with Him. Don't take it up with me. Take it up with Him, because I had an experience while I was away on vacation. And I give and I give the kingdom work and I believe in reaching other people. But then God presented me with a situation that I wasn't prepared for, because in the tension of life, we feel the need of our finances arise many times. And one of those times for me that had happened involved a homeless person. I was visiting my son in Southern California.
[4:14] As we approached the store, we were gonna go in and we were gonna get some groceries, and a man standing by the carts, the grocery carts that people have returned from their cars, was quiet and just standing there. He didn't have a sign to tell you his whole story. He didn't say anything to us. He just stood there. His sign had one word on it and it said, hungry. And in that moment God said, you have lived in obedience of your giving to Me and the kingdom, but how have you lived in obedience and to direct opportunities that I've placed before you for others, for people? And in that moment I walked inside of the store with my son and I said to him, I said, let's do something.
[5:10] Let's do something. And we went through that store and I put more thought in the grocery buying than I've ever in my entire life thinking about if I'm in that situation, what are the foods that I would want? And we gather those together, about three bags. And I'm not telling you this for me. I'm telling this for you on your GPS. Not only have we talked about you giving to the kingdom work and obedience that God has given to you, you have to give the people that God puts in front of you. We walked out of that store with these bags and I couldn't find them. He was gone. And that would've been easy to say, oh, I'll just throw it in the car and we'll just take it with us.
[5:57] But God just said, I told you to do something, now do something. And I must have looked like a crazy man with groceries. I couldn't find my car, wandering up and down the parking lot aisles where the cars were, looking for this gentleman. And he had moved to another buggy corral and was crouched down doing something in his backpack as we approached. And we just walked over and we just said, we just want to know you're loved. And gave the groceries to him. It wasn't a big deal until after. Because when we did that and we turned the walk away, I just glanced back and the people with their grocery cart coming down towards their cars saw what we did and they stopped, and they gave him something out of his grocery bag, out of their grocery bags, and the people behind them stopped and gave him some money to help.
[6:58] See, the thing is when you help other people, you don't know what other people are also doing as part of the story that gets told. And they all of a sudden could see somebody that nobody saw probably for hours. So when it comes to our resources, we have to make sure that we understand who supplies it. It is God who supplies it. And when we give and give back to Him and His kingdom work and we have and we give to other people and we have for ourselves enough that we use for ourselves and that our is in a line. But He owns it all, and He creates space then for us to rely upon Him to continue to give.
[7:47] In Psalm 50:7-11, it says, oh my people, listen as I speak, here are my charges against you. Oh Israel, I am God, your God. I have no complaint about your sacrifices or burnt offerings you constantly offer. But I do not need the bulls from your barns or the goats from your pens. All of the animals of the forest are Mine. And I own the cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird on the mountains and all the animals in the field. It's all His. It might be in your bank account, it might be sitting in your garage, it might be in your living room. It's all His, always was, is now. And what always will be, it's all His.
[8:33] Malachi 3:10 says, Bring all the tithe into the storehouse so there will be enough food in My temple. If you do, says the Lord of heavenly armies, I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great, you won't have enough room to take it in. Put Me to the test. God promises us that He will open the window, not we will open the window. He will open the window. Scripture holds 7,487 promises that God gives us. And this is one of 'em, Him saying, I will flow in through that window more than you could ever handle.
[9:18] But He also gives us a warning when it comes to resources. And Ecclesiastes 5:10, whoever loves money never has money enough. Whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income. It's too meaningless. As goods increase, so do those who consume them. And what benefit are they to the owner except to feast his eyes on them? The sleep of a laborer is sweet, whether he eats little or much. But the abundance of a rich man permits him no sleep. I have seen a grievous evil under the sun. Wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner, or wealth lost through some misfortune, so that he has a son, that there's nothing left. Naked a man comes from his mother's womb, and he comes.
[10:05] So he departs. He takes nothing from his labor that he can carry in his hand. This too is a grievous evil: as man comes, so he departs. And what does he gain? Since he toils in the wind, all the day he eats in darkness with great frustration, affliction, and anger. Then I realize that it is good and proper for a man to eat and drink and to find satisfaction in toilsome labor under the sun during a few days of life. God has given him, for this is his lot. Moreover, when God gives any man wealth and possessions and enables him to enjoy them, to accept his lot and to be happy in his work, this is the gift of God. It's all His. How our GPS lines up: God, other people, and self will determine how we go through.
[10:59] But before I go any further, I do owe you an apology. I do owe you an apology because we've used the word generosity quite often. And I'm here to tell you that generosity is not something we do as followers of God for God. Generosity is what God does for us because He loves us. Generosity is God's do for us. It's obedience. When we think about our time and we think about the things we're always asked to be part of, small group, to serve, to attend church, it amounts to about four and a half hours every week.
[11:51] In the average week, everybody has 168 hours. We're asking for you to start with four and a half. See, timing is everything, and timing is precious. And you can't create more. Time is the one commodity that everybody wants more of, but you can't make more of it. And so you wanna make sure that we're just not going through it without any purpose. God's time moves with purpose. Every hour moves forward for the kingdom with purpose. Every minute moves forward for the kingdom with purpose. Every second has purpose. When it comes to God's time, many of us think that we can live by any schedule we choose, that it's in our own time.
[12:48] And then when the time is right, maybe if it's perfect, then I'll turn to God because I always hear God is there waiting. God will always be there. But the purposes that you're losing out on, the opportunities that you're losing out on in order to use your time in a proper way, is more effective to do it now than to wait. So it's not lost. How does that matter for people? When we think of GPS, God, people and self, that's being in your community, that's finding service opportunities within your community, with your neighbors, in your workplace, whatever those opportunities to share your time with is, you do that.
[13:46] I try to create time with my neighbors. I try to figure out what's something that we can do together that helps me spend time with them. And when I came back from vacation, my neighbor next door to me, I said to him, I said, I got a surprise for you. He goes, great. And he didn't. He said, what is this? I'm not telling you until I get back. And so when I came back, I went over to his house and I said, you got a metal grinder? He goes, I sure do. And I said, we're gonna make a project. I said, we're gonna make some big old pots to roast, to cook lobster in, so we go and get lobster or whatever. We're gonna have a corn boil. None of these small pots anymore. We're gonna make these big ones and do. And he goes, we are? And I said, yeah. And I said, the best thing is we're gonna do it together. Our time is so valuable.
[14:34] Jesus wept over Jerusalem because of poor timing, 'cause it didn't recognize the time. See, timing counts. God's timing counts and our timing has to be in obedience with Him. Luke 19:41-44 says this, but as He came closer to Jerusalem and saw the city ahead, He began to weep. How I wish today that you, of all people, would understand the way to peace, but now it's too late and the peace is hidden from your eyes. Before long your enemies will build ramparts against your walls and encircle you and close in from every side. They will crush you into the ground and your children with you.
[15:20] They will not leave a single stone in place because you did not recognize when God visited. You see, the Israelites were told that they should move into Canaan on a specific day that God told 'em to do and what the timing was. But they didn't, and they waited and they were routed. They were beaten by the Canaanites. In Numbers 14:39 it says, when Moses reported what the Lord said to the Israelites, the people were filled with grief. Wouldn't you be if God said you missed your window, you missed your opportunity? If you saw it, you'd be filled with grief.
[16:06] Then they all got up early the next morning, went to the top of a range of hills. Let's go, they said. We realize that we have sinned, but now we're ready to enter the land the Lord has promised us. Now we're ready to do it. We'll do it in our time, not God's time. Even after being told not to, what was gonna happen. But Moses said, Why are you now disobeying the Lord's orders to return? Why to return to the wilderness? It won't work. Do not go up into the land now. You will only be crushed by your enemies because the Lord is not with you. When God tells you to do something, it's because in that moment He is right with you.
[16:52] When you delay or miss that opportunity, now you're going to do it and you're saying, oh God, can You come bless what I'm gonna do? He's like, I was ready to bless it yesterday. But now you do it in your own timing and not the perfect timing that I have. When you face the Amalekites and the Canaanites in battle, you'll be slaughtered. The Lord will abandon you because you have abandoned the Lord. But the people defiantly pushed ahead towards the hill country, even though neither Moses nor the ark of the Lord or the covenant left the camp. Then the Amalekites and the Canaanites who lived in those hills came down and attacked them and chased them back. As far as Hormah, it's gotta be God's timing.
[17:44] If you profess to be a follower of Jesus Christ, it is not only your finances or your resources that He has gifted and gave to you generously that you give to Him to say, You are number one. It is your time. Is it gonna be inconvenient at times when the opportunity pops up? You better believe it. Is it gonna be awkward? Absolutely. But if He's number one in your life, it's gonna happen. And He, not you, will make it happen the way that He wants to in His time. Ecclesiastes 3:1 gives us clarity. As clear as it can be, there's an appointed time for everything and there is a time for every event under heaven, God's time, not your time.
[18:39] We need to understand that timing and the seasons that God ordains in our lives for the city's communities and people we come in contact with, that it's Him. See, too often you can't go out and plant strawberry plants and then after two weeks ago, I'm gonna go harvest them. Well, good luck with that. That's what sometimes we live like, or sometimes we're running so hard that we think we're doing God's work and He's telling us to rest. But yet we keep driving and driving and then we go, man, I'm so burned out. Like, I don't wanna do anything. Oh, it's 'cause three days ago He told you to rest the day.
[19:25] Rest is for a purpose because He designed us. He knows exactly how we're to work. Doing the right thing at the wrong time, even though it's well-intentioned, is gonna miss the mark every time. Understanding God's timing and us aligning with that or obedience, we'll make sure that the proper things happen. God wants us to understand and recognize in our lives the shifts that He happens in a spiritual divine moment that He moves us towards. There's a great disaster in history of Christianity from 1271 when Niccolò and Maffeo Polo, the father and uncle of Marco Polo, we'll skip doing that, was visiting Kublai Khan, and Kublai Khan was the ruler over China and Asia, and he was like one of the biggest conquerors and rulers of the world.
[20:27] And as they share the gospel of Christianity and Jesus Christ, as they share the gospel and who God is, he was intrigued. And he said, go back to your priests and send a hundred of people like you. And when the hundred people come, I'll be baptized. I'll make sure all my barons follow it and be baptized. I'll make sure that there will be more people in my kingdom following Christianity than there is in yours. However, nothing was done and 30 years passed. Two or three missionaries at that point in time in history were not enough.
[21:17] And if we stop and think, what would the world have been like in God's time, if they would've done what the opportunity created? How China and those areas may look now when it comes to Christianity. Could it be that God is trying to create an incredible shift for me when it comes to our campuses where the Shediac, Miramichi, here, the whole east coast of New Brunswick? God has laid it on my heart and He said, the time is now. People need hope. People need love. People need to understand who I am in their life. And the people that you have at 9:45 have stories that need to be told. And you need to move, and move now. It's not when it feels okay.
[22:04] It's not when it's like, okay, we could do it now. It's not when it fits. It's now. And that's why we're moving. Do we have all the answers? You better believe we don't. But the one answer I've got is that God said, move, and we're moving because that's what He wants. In a generation that is so frustrated and so without hope, the time is now for us to move as a church because God is calling us about the possibilities. You can't live in New Brunswick or experience the Acadian culture or live on the East Coast and not know about lobster.
[22:54] Right? And our stories are similar to a lobster in a way. Let me get there. A lobster sheds its shell and then it grows a new shell in order for it to continue to grow and experience its growth. If it stays in its shell, the shell eventually becomes a prison. But there's that vulnerable time in a lobster's life when they shed the shell and the new one hasn't hardened yet. They're susceptible to be tossed about by the currents of the ocean and maybe get damaged or tore apart on the rocks.
[23:39] Or other fish can come by and eat 'em 'cause they don't have to crack the shell anymore. They've lost their protection. But the difference for us is that in your story, your GPS with God, you are penning your narrative together. The story of your life. It is being done in unison between you and Him with people. It's the sharing of your story that God has given in the campuses that we'll have before yourself. It's the next chapter. Are you willing to let the page turn, like a lobster who has to shed their shell? You have to shed things in your life. You have to be willing to give up where you're at right now in comfort to be a little vulnerable for God to begin the next stage of your life story that He is laying out.
[24:36] It is as much for you as it is for the people that you are gonna come in contact with. God will create shell moments for you and you get to decide, is it gonna be my prison and the kingdom moves on without me? Or am I gonna step in and accept the new stage of my life? How important is your story? Your resources matter, your time matters, and your story matters. 2 Corinthians 3:1-6 that says, are we beginning to praise ourselves again?
[25:26] Are we like others who need to bring you letters of recommendation or who ask you to write such letters on our behalf? Surely not. The only letter of recommendation we need is yourself. Your lives are a letter written in our hearts. Everyone can read it and recognize our good work among you. Clearly you are a letter from Christ, showing the result of our ministry among you. This letter is written not with pen and ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not carved on tablets of stone, but in human hearts. But we're confident of all this because our great trust in God through Christ. It is not that we think we are qualified to do anything on our own. Our qualifications come from God.
[26:12] He's enabled us to be ministers of the new covenant. Your story matters. Your story has significance. Your life is a tale. It's a tale that has been penned alongside of the divine hand of God as He intertwines His narrative for kingdom work. As you do your narrative along the same way, with each retelling of your story, lives are impacted, hearts are touched, perspectives are shaped, and people are inspired.
[27:01] Your story becomes a cornerstone for generations to come. A legacy that you are building based on your personal growth and your personal experiences and self-discovery. As we expand our horizons here at Moncton Wesleyan for what God is calling us to do, we will establish new faith communities in communities around our region. We will tell the story of our church and of each of you. You will tell your story. Your story holds immense value. It's not just wanted. It's essential to the growth of the kingdom.
[27:47] Through sharing your experiences, you will pave the way for other people to experience their faith journey. And experiencing a one-on-one relationship with Christ each and every day when it comes to our resources, our time, and our story, the GPS is making sure we're aligned with God, making sure we're involved with people, and making sure we're taking care of ourselves. Because in the church today, we think there's a problem. But the bottom line is there's not a money problem in the church.
[28:35] There's not an economic problem in the church. There's not a government problem, there's not a social problem, there's not a resource problem. There's not a time problem. The only problem that we have in the church today is an obedience problem. And when we live in obedience with Christ each and every day, and we live there so that other people, that family, that friends, that coworkers, that neighbors, that yourself, that you can believe, I have put Christ number one in my life, as we move forward with the call that He has placed in our life as a church and as individuals, we will move. Because when God matters, you believe that kingdom of God has a purpose and a priority that ranks over you. You know that you count and you have an eternal purpose.
[29:23] You trust God with your life and with all your needs. You know that it's not yours. You know that it's God, and you know that He's supplying it. You are breaking the spirit of self-reliance and materialism for kingdom's sake. You understand that others matter. And then, and only then, will the living God use an example of someone like us as a church that has placed God over all things. Will we see the movement of the kingdom through Atlantic Canada, through New Brunswick, through the places that He calls and places us to make a difference in the lives of people? Only then will it happen. So we don't have a problem like the world's got a problem.
[30:13] Ours is an obedience problem over our lives to give full and total control to God so that Jesus is number one. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your love. We thank You for all that You give us, the generosity that You pour out to us and the calling that You then place on our lives. So Father, as we wrestle to do something, that You're calling us to do something with our finances, to do something with our time, to do something with our story so that the name of Jesus Christ gets lifted above everything else in our life and everybody knows that.
[31:05] May we sense and feel Your Spirit moving with us. Help us not to be like the Israelites and delay and just gets slaughtered, but help us to be victorious over it all. In the name of Jesus, we pray this, amen. As you, we're gonna play a song. And this is what I want you to do down front. I have little wooden disc tokens and I'm gonna get you the song, this an ESA song plays and the worship team sings and plays it as you sit and contemplate. Are you ready to let your life be an empty token like one of these?
[31:56] Or are you willing to take it, come down and get one and put what He's telling you on it. And to remember and put it in a place to say, my resources, my time, and my story will no longer be token. It will meet with a purpose that God has. Some of us need a little pruning. You know that, a lot of us have looked at the beauty of a piece of driftwood, and I was gonna cut it, but I won't cut it, afraid.
[32:41] I might get injured. I don't have all the safety gear on. Who knows where the video goes. But you know, the driftwood is a beautiful piece. But it tells a story much like us if we don't take the direction of the GPS of God, people Himself seriously in our lives and put Jesus number one, we just go whichever direction life takes us. We get bumped along the way. We get scarred. We get changed from what we originally were and what God intended. And then we wake up one day and we realize God's timing's passed and that we missed the timing that He had for us on our life.
[33:26] But I'll tell you this, that when you take a piece of driftwood and you cut it open, it looks exactly like it was meant to. Look on the inside. The core is still there. The God who created you in miraculous creation of the day that you were born had a purpose and a calling on your life. And no matter the scars that have been placed or the pieces that have been broken off, or however you look today, you, on the core, are still what God meant for His purpose. You just have to prune it all the way and get back to the core of what He wants for you and your life.
[34:12] We're gonna sing one more song before we end our service. Thank you for listening today. May the driftwood that you find in your life be returned to the core of the purpose that God had for it.