Don't Let Money Master Your Life

Talk It Over

Guardrails keep vehicles from straying into dangerous or off-limit areas. We need personal guardrails so we don’t stray into areas of life that can harm us or the people we love. When it comes to our finances, it’s easy to cross the line into the danger zone. That’s why it’s essential to establish guardrails against greed.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

• Are you a saver or a spender? In what ways have you benefited from that tendency? In what ways has it created challenges for you?

• How much do you value generosity toward those in need? Based on your current finances, to what extent are you able to prioritize generosity toward others? In what ways, if any, would you like your current level of generosity to change?

• "You can be completely out of debt with money in the bank and have driven off the edge financially.” Do you agree that you can be financially responsible but still have an unhealthy relationship with money? Why or why not?

• Read Matthew 6:24. In what ways do you currently “serve money”? How do you think that affects your relationship with God?

• On a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 being, “I’d have to make few changes” and 10 being, “It feels impossible,” how difficult would it be to reprioritize your finances from “live, save, give” to “give, save, live”?

• What is your best next step toward establishing a guardrail against greed by prioritizing giving? What is one thing you can do this week to begin to take that step? How can this group support you?

MOVING FORWARD

Establish guardrails around greed. The best way to avoid greed and irresponsibility is to give, save, and live . . . in that order. To begin, pick a percentage and give it first to a church you trust and that is making a difference in your life and community. That’s how you guard against greed. That’s how to ensure you have money, but money doesn’t have you.

MESSAGE

Sorry to say there's no guardrails on the chair so during my message if you feel the inclination lean against somebody else. We need guard rails. You know, I was thinking the other day, I was going down the highway and I wasn't aware of the guard rails. They were there. The thing is, when you've guard, guard rails, just stop thinking about 'em. They're just automatically gonna be there, and if you haven't got them, then you, you need to watch carefully.

If you've ever been going down a windy pathway on the road and there's no guard rails, Never seen some of those videos in Asia and places where they're on the side of a mountain and there's no room to walk, but they're driving a bus and they come to a corner and they have to do a 15 point turn to get around that corner.

No guard rails. Anyways. Hi, I'm Pastor Lynn, otherwise known as DOT's Husband. Uh, it's an inside joke I guess, but it's true. And now I wanted to, you know, I was thinking the other day, maybe you think this way sometimes, and I wonder how much I would have if I owned, if I didn't know how much you owned. I wonder how much I would, uh, still accumulated if I hadn't noticed what was on offer, you know, all the advertising.

What if I didn't know about those things? How much would I have saved if I didn't know how much you had spent? You know, and, and I'm thinking about all the things we might have if we didn't know so much. And, and I think my trouble is that I know too much. I know too much about what you have and what I think I want.

We went to the Cooley Rocks Cars love cars, but you go along, there's some, someone said, oh, I'll see those five cars there. There's over a million dollars worth right there. And I'm thinking, really? I could have bought one when I was younger for about 7,000, but not today. You know, we just want to see and accumulate and I know too much about what you have and that I don't have, and I know too much about what, you know, the things that I don't really need.

I think I've got a problem. My problem is I need counseling about all these things. I think I want, and it's not just the area of money, but it's other things too. I think I want it, and I don't, I don't need it. But that's what gets in our system. So we're talking today about guardrails and particularly financial ones.

And we're not just talking here about, um, you know, avoiding bankruptcy. You know, that'd be a good topic. I'll get Dave Ramsey to help out there. But whatever you think about money, today's guardrail is about not straying into the area where money means something. It shouldn't. All right. That's what we're talking about.

It's not how much you have or don't have. I've been in both places. I was a pastor once. You know what? I actually am just about retired from a job doing taxes and accounting. And that doesn't mean I'm qualified. Uh, just, it just means I got into it because I was a pastor who was starving. My family needed food, so I went around the corner and said to the guy who was doing tax returns, do you need someone to help out?

Okay. I kind of learned on the job over 35 years later. I'm still getting paid, so that's all right. Haven't kicked me out. But the point is that whatever you think you know about money, it's time that we look at again. It's one of those things that's so in our lifestyle, guardrails, what's a system designed to keep vehicles and people from straying into dangerous and off limit areas?

So there it is. It's a system. It's designed to help us and to protect us and keep us safe. God rather not placed in the danger zone. I'm glad of that. They give you a lot of space after the guardrail to pick yourself up and dust yourself off. Otherwise, we'd be over that edge before we knew it. They're in the safety zone.

Guardrails are designed to minimize the damage that we can and will do to ourselves and to others. And guardrails are a standard, a standard of behavior that can become a matter of conscience. Isn't it great when you get to a place I'll get there one day when the guardrails are so firm. I don't even have to think of my conscience pulling me up.

I'll just automatically do the right thing. Ah, that'd be nice for then. I'll let you know when it happens, but without guardrails, I'll never get there. That's the point. It's guardrails that help me decide how far I'm going to drift. And before I hurt myself and others, these are personal things. The point of a guardrail is to light, light up our conscience before we hurt or get hurt.

Now, if you're not a follower of Jesus, you can switch off now and you don't have to listen to anything I say might be wise, maybe not for this, but if you are a follower of Jesus, it's too late. You've already signed on for this. You can't just say, I don't want guardrails cuz Jesus is saying you gotta have them.

And if you are a follower of Jesus, and even if you're not, it's probably a smart idea to think about what guardrails we have. And now we're looking at financial guardrails. You know, what we talked last week about the challenge of sex and, and all that. I just wanted to say the word, but if you really, if you wanted to know more about that message, it's very raw and nasty and.

Uh, there's a lot of good stuff that came out of Pastor Kevs talk last week, and I applaud him and Anne for being so out there and so, so willing to share. But if you were to talk to couples and as a pastor, I've heard people come to me with troubles. The two main areas they have troubles with are the sex and money.

You know, it's such a, a nitty gritty part of who we are in our existence. So as a pastor, we, um, have times where we need to address the issue of what's going on. So you picked a great time to be here to hear a message about money. Okay? So get your notebooks out. Now. There's the word on the street about the church.

You know what it says? Our culture says this about the church. The church is against sex. And it wants your money. All right? So we're gonna have a big offering at the end of this one. That's the way they used to do it. We do it differently around here. We kind of followed that new covenant model that God owns you, so you can feel free to give whatever he allows you to give.

Give with a generous heart. That's all. I'll talk about offerings. Okay? Maybe a little bit more, but um, The church just wants money, you know, not so the church actually has the inside story about money. You know, we talk about sex. Well, why not? God made sex? We talk about money because why not? God gave us everything we have and even the bits we trade, you know, and the bits we want, and the bits we don't have.

He knows all about that. So I'm not talking about avoiding bankruptcy or credit card debt. Actually, we do have that course coming up. All right. There's got a cap course starting next Saturday and the follow up is the next week because you have to do homework. Oh, but it's worth it. And the cab course is an example of how to budget, how to that B word, you know how to make sure you've got the things in place that you need.

For the future. And when you hear that ad on tv, you know that little phone call and then it's somebody saying, oh, it's somebody budget. Well, that's a reason for that. People, their testimonies on that show, on that ad are about how their lives changed completely. We're not talking about that. Okay? Jesus wants something for you, not something from you.

This is more than just a t-shirt slogan by the way. Yeah, all we live this ethos of who God is and what he wants for his people. And the other people outside of the church are getting touched every day by that same generous spirit. So why would we want to preach a message about you giving us stuff? We already work for the person who owns everything.

You were in the business of distributing wealth, reassigning it, reprioritizing it. And that's a great thing to be a part of. So financial guardrails, we're not talking about avoiding bankruptcy. May you may be completely out of debt, good on you. You may have lots of money in the bank. Fantastic. Or you may be on the other end of the scale and just making ends meet.

And this message is the same for all of us, no matter where you see Jesus had this to stay, say about it. And I'll tell you, this is a fun fact about this passage we're gonna look at right now. He says, no one can serve two masters. And you think, what are you talking about? I don't even have one. You know, you must have me confused with somebody else.

Jesus is so shrewd. He bates us here. No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you'll be devoted to one. And despise the other. What is he talking about? Hate, despise love. What's that got to do with money? Right. Well, he has an issue with this whole premise. No one can serve to masters.

Masters. He uses a word, which is from the Greek word. The Greek word is curio. The Greek word just means ownership, possession. You see, if you owned somebody like a slave owner, you could control when they lived, if they lived, when they died, where they go, who they marry, whatever they do, that's ownership.

And that's the word he chooses and says, you know what? It's that serious. You can't serve two lords, two masters, two people. You can only serve one, or you'll hate that one if you try and serve another. Nobody owns me. We say we live in that culture that thinks that nobody owns me. How's that working for you?

Hmm. You know what? The whole concept that I'm my own boss is not a godly one. It's not even an ancient wisdom. It's a modern idea. It's one that forgets about family and community and about all the good that God wants to do through you and in you. And so Jesus didn't say that his truth, his truth is here.

Here's what he says. No one can serve two masters. You cannot serve both God and money for Jesus followers. The primary issue is regarding mastery and control or ownership. It's not how much you have or how little you have, but who owns it? Do you own it? Do we have money? Or does money have us?

You know, you think of all these people with great possessions as an accountant. You see it a big balance sheet, beautiful cars and houses and all that stuff. And the people have no time because they're always looking after their car. And that house and the, you know, those things possess them. They're so busy trying to maintain what they've got and how many rooms can you sleep in anyway.

The reason Jesus followers need guardrails financially is that money and what it promises money, and what it promises are the chief, uh, what's the word I'm looking for? The chief competitors for mastery of your life. That's the problem. It's not about the good shiny tingly stuff, the beautifully shined cars.

It's about what's in charge. Who's in charge of you. And what's taking over a fun fact about Matthew who wrote this down, he heard Jesus, he used to be a tax collector. He was the money man. He wanted to take the money off other people plus a little bit more. And so he knew all about what money meant. And so he's listening to Jesus.

And when Jesus said, follow me, he left everything literally, he realized he had a new master to follow. Without guardrails, we're tempted. I'm tempted to actually do veer off the cliff of consumption on one side or to hoard things up on the other side. So this is what the image would look like if we were to not have guardrails, would be falling off the cliff of consuming everything we got.

Eat, eat, eat, consume, or I'm afraid. I'm gonna lose out, so I'm gonna hoard everything. I'm not gonna share with anybody. If people come asking for handouts and gifts and offerings and you know, all that sort of charity stuff, no way. I can't afford that. What if I get poor tomorrow? It's just gonna happen overnight.

Maybe it could, but the point is, who do you trust? Unbridled desire. Or unbridled fear of both coming from the same root in our life and that root is a word we can't see in the mirror. A word that we always use to describe somebody else, and the word is greed. You know, it's an ugly word. I don't wanna be thought of as the greedy one, but let me tell you, every time I choose me over everything else and everyone else, what am I doing?

Being greedy. I'm forgetting where I came from and what I've got now. All came through the hands of God. Every good and beautiful gift comes from the father of Lion. Now everything you have, you've rejoiced in it. Thank you. Praise God. Right? We've got it and some of us are still getting it, but we've getting it because of the one who gives, and that's the main point here.

And here it is. Greed is the assumption that it's all for my consumption. All right. That's the, the little phrase there. I'm sure the people at home got that. Okay. Greed isn't mysterious. Greed isn't some wisely guy counting his gold, never getting married because he doesn't wanna share it with his, with his kids, or anything in the future.

No, greed is not somebody else. It's something we know about ourselves. And someone, we don't want to be a greedy one. So we sort of relegate greed to someone we don't know and someone will never be. But in fact, it could just be how we live our lives. So greed is simply an assumption that goes like this.

If it's placed in my hands, it's for me. If it's in my pay packet, it's for me. If it's in my super fund, it's mine. If it's a bonus, it's mine. Ah. Ah. That's how Greek works. Everything's for me. I'm happy with that, aren't you? The world could be a different place if we get past that assumption. And here's the tragedy, really, this is the point without any jokes.

If we fall into the habits of overspending or hoarding, what we're saying is, God, you don't exist. Oh, you know, the bottom line of that greed, that fear, that hoarding or that consuming is that we live as though God does not exist. And let me tell you, you may come from that position today and stay right with that thought.

But when we really get down to it, God is saying, I'm here and because I'm here, it makes all the difference about what you do with what you have. If we fall into the habits of O'S spending and think there is no God, we may as well join with King Solomon. We had that in our soap devotions recently.

Ecclesiastes, he says this and some of you will relate to it. Eat, drink, and be married for tomorrow. We die and there's a, a new T-shirt for the church here. You know what if we live that way? Oh, hang on. I think I know some people that do. You know what I'm saying is I'm not being too flippant about it. We can live that way without saying it out loud.

We're just gonna eat and drink and be married because you know what? Tomorrow there's nothing. We're just gonna be little bits of dirt in the ground anyway. Or Ash. Ashley. So what does it matter? But that's living as though God does not exist, as though he doesn't have an eternal plan. That the stuff we have today is a little tiny shred on eternal lifespan, and that that matters more than all of that, that matters more than glory that belongs to the one who gave it.

Man, that changes things doesn't, it sort of turns it around. But if there is something in you, if there's something small in you, then even a non-Christian version of it that says, if there's something in you that you have the suspicion, there has to be more to life and there has no has to be something beyond this life, then you dare not allow your life to be driven by consumption or hoarding because you are living as if there is no God.

You're living as though it's about me now and about me later. Okay. People say they think that that's right until there's trouble. You can live that way until something goes wrong. Something interesting happens when we get into a place where maybe somebody else took it away from you. Maybe you gambled it away.

Maybe you've made bad choices about it. Maybe you know, you just think it's gonna be okay and it didn't turn out that way. And then those who think eat Adrian, could be married tomorrow, would die. They do something strange, they pray. Maybe that quiet trip to the bank and you're praying, oh God, it's Lynn.

Remember me. I haven't been around a lot much lately, but I need your help right now. There something changes in our spirit when we're desperate. We definitely know that we've reached the end of our consuming habits, and then we pray, and then we say, God, I need your help. So my question is, if it's worth praying about when you get to that point, why isn't it worth praying about now?

You know, if you're gonna think of God, then why not think of him now. Let's get started on right side of the guardrail and start with guard rails. Somebody laid you off, somebody lied to you, somebody moved out and took everything with them. The partner that took your money and ran had nothing to do with you.

But either way, do you know what we do? Even if we're not very religious, we pray. Wouldn't think that God's gonna somehow change his position. But then he reminds us of a little awkward truth and he says, you chose the wrong master. That's the problem here. You chose the wrong master. He is not being facetious or vicious or angry at you.

He is just saying, did you see what happened there? You focused on the wrong master. You thought stuff was in control when in fact you were in control of by stuff. So we need some help here. Let's get onto the guardrails. The guardrails against greed looks something like this. What we've gotta do is begin to reprioritize.

Priority means I put that ahead in my mind before I need, it's a prior commitment that's deciding before I need it. This is what I need priority. That's what budgets are really. Prioritizing. So this is what Jesus teaches, and I'm gonna show you wh where he says it in just a minute. If you are living like most people, your finances look something like this little screen here.

First of all, I will live with what I have. Then if I've got something left, I will save it. There won't be much of that, but there'll be something. And finally, I've, yeah, I've, I've got a giver, something, you know. And we think when we put that $2 coin in the offering, in of the Salvation Army or something, they come knocking at the door.

Oh, I feel so good about that. Look what I've done. Oh God, were you watching when I did that? You know how it goes. That's the normal life, isn't it? That's how the priority works. And then Jesus comes along and he says, let's just flip that over. We'll take the last one first. Give. And then save and what you have left, you'll be surprised how much you have left.

That's what you live on. What a difference that is. Uh, we talked about guardrails for a reason. This is a way to protect ourselves from greed. And we've got a little graphic here. Um, Andy Stanley tells the story. Of how he raised his kids, and as soon as they were able to understand it, he started to give them jars in their room.

One had give, one had saved, one had lived. He said, now the first one you are going to . Give into that. All right. This is you honoring God and saying, God, you own everything. Thank you so much. I'm gonna give at least 10% of my pocket money into that jar. So he taught them to put coins in there. And then the second one, you're gonna need something for the future and you're gonna trust God, but you're also gonna be wise.

And so you're gonna put something in that second jar, save at least 10% again, and then look, that gives you a whole 80%. To do what you need to do when you go to the tuck shop or you go down the shops and you see something you like, you feel free because you've already got the others covered. And Jesus kind of turned it around this way and he, Andy Stanley tells the story.

He says, well, why would the preacher tell the kids to put money in that give jar? It's not like I'm gonna sneak in at night and steal it. I could do that if I wanted to even blame the tooth theory. But it's really about, you know, why do we think the church wants to take our money? It's because we don't realize that they already have a different priority system that, that everything the church gets is meant to be in God's hands to give out to others.

And it does around here. That's what you'll notice happens. The beyond far and above and beyond what's given. God multiplies that. So in the world, the bad news is that people think the church has a different motive, and I can't say that all Christians don't, but I know the majority who follow Jesus will never want to take that position.

So why in the world would the preacher tell his children then? Here's one. Very horrible, really fact. 90% of you are going to run out of life before you run out of stuff. I almost put a picture up here from yesterday. There was a, a beautiful old car and right next to his two skeletons sitting in, in recliner chairs, and I think that illustrated perfectly.

Most of us are gonna run out of life before we run out of stuff. God has us covered. And especially if you live in a country like this one man, I wake up and I praise God. There are times I walk down the street and see the parks that are kept for me by council and others, and I think, man, I just like living in a palace.

It really is, you know, there's so much protected space, so much beautiful trees and things to enjoy, and there it is right in front of me and I didn't have to pay for that. God made it happen. So I'm just saying our percentage of life has more to do with how we live than what we have. And as soon as we get ahold of that, we become independent.

Yes. You know, if you, you can go to lots of talks about independence and income, but we're talking about it this way. Independence from a life independent of God. Get head around that. We're talking about a life that's independent of a life independent of God. We depend on God and we have fully paid up members of that club.

Yeah, I'm a dependen on God. People say religion is a crutch. Well, no, it's my life. It's more than that. It's more serious than that. I actually can't walk away from God. If I try to think thoughts away from God, he pulls me back. Mm-hmm. He loves me so much. He doesn't leave me the way he found me. And then, so we're not independent.

We don't want to be independent of God. We want to be reliant upon him for the rest of our lives. Money will compete. Listen, money will compete for the first place in our life. We need to do some serious thinking about that, don't we? Fun fact, Jesus never, don't get any ideas, be never took up an offering.

Okay? Sorry about that, pastor. Skip. We don't, we don't want anyone of us to be slaves to consume a debt. We the church. We want you to own your stuff, but not be owned by it. This is how you do it. Very quick example from my family. You probably know people in your life like this. I have, um, a few c several brothers, too many to count, but two that stand out right now have this problem called gas.

Sorry, it's not what you think. It's a guitar acquisition syndrome. Bit less smelly. At times, but you know what? They love guitars. Over the years I've known them, which is a long time. My brother turned 70, soon he's acquired so many guitars. But here's the thing, even when he was young as a Christian, he did something with those guitars that kind of surprised me and I learned from it too.

And here's one example of these two boys here. We recently reconnected with them about two years ago on Facebook because they posted this picture and one of them is um, Peter over here and John Armstrong, and this is what they wrote on their post. He's talking to his brother, Pete's talking to John. You are playing the Roy Schick guitar given to me by Eric Bradley one night at Youth for Christ in Liverpool.

We'd been playing rhythm guitar and he'd been playing rhythm guitar and singing with the group called Sinners Tea Party. Yeah, it was a good name for a Christian group. Aren't. Eric, his brother Lenny, that's me and steel guitar player Jim, were real encouragements to me. Look how old they are. And this is the guitar my brother donated to him today.

Peter is often seen a Tamworth. He's a full-time professional musician. His brother John is a pastor of a church up in Bathurst. And I'm not saying we made that happen. We, we were just part of the generosity of God to let that happen. And so, you know how, what the guys look like when we did that. This is me, this is Eric.

That's Jimmy. Oh yeah. Bring it on. So young, young Eric over there who's now about 70, but look at him there. He's barely nudging 20. And he decided, you know what? I've got a guitar, one of my gas guitars that would just be really perfect for Pete, and he gave it to that young boy. He's done that several times in his lifetime.

Very quickly, my other brother, Tom, who's not in the picture, he came to visit us recently. He owns this guitar. Tamini, apparently is really good. I don't know, I dunno.

You can't hear it online, but it's really nice. He came to visit, he said, look, I've just had this redone, isn't it nice? I said, yeah, can I play it? He said, sure, sure. And I'm playing it. And he says, oh, that's yours. Pardon? Well, you go to school and you teach the kids at school re and you must sing for them sometimes.

And yeah, I do. My guitar's about 35 years old. Still scratchy, still plays all right, but he said, use this one. And that is an example of gas when God gets a hold of you.

So I just hope you got gas sometimes. Isn't we grilling? No one can serve two masters. Either you hate the one and love the other, or you will devoted be devoted to one, despise the other. You cannot serve both God and stuff. It wasn't just money. What does a life saved this way look like? Jesus says, you can live unafraid.

Pardon? You mean I can actually stop worrying? I can actually live in a place where money is not an issue for me. Whether I have it or not, can I really get to that place in my life where, you know, I'm so settled in this area of guardrails in my life that I'm not gonna be worried about money. Whatever comes,

he says it this way in Matthew's 6 31. So don't worry saying, what shall we eat? What shall we drink? What shall we wear? What shall we play? Don't worry. You know, all these things are important to us, aren't they? What we eat, especially in the generation Jesus spoke to, they didn't have refrigerators. So what you ate was what you could store for the next 24 to 48 hours.

You know, it was a real life issue. But don't worry about that. Don't worry about the things you think you need, the things that you see. Others having the advertising that just invades us. The, the gambling, you know, everything about that. Don't worry about it. And he says, this goes on. He says, for the pagans, run after all these things.

Now in our generation, pagans is a distorted word. It just meant if you follow the God other than the God of Israel, all right? If you've got any other gods in your life, then you're a Pagan, but that's okay. As far as he's saying. Even the pagans run after the. Worrying about life, but we don't do that. He says, for pagans, run after all these things.

And your heavenly Father knows what you need. He knows that you need them. Isn't it great if you say to me, I, you know, I tried following God, but I don't think it works for me. I say, which God did you follow? Cuz my God is generous. My God is caring and patient. My God is so loving and so giving towards me.

If you've followed that one, I don't think you'd be saying what you're saying. I probably wouldn't follow your God either. If your heavenly Father knows what you need, do you need to worry? And Jesus says No. And I'm telling you, the moment you wrap your heart around that, Your belief system around that.

The fact is you can live instead of with hands closed because I'm afraid you live with hands open because you're so free. You know, what do I have to hold on for? Because God knows what I need. Yeah, but there's always a, but Matthew 6 33, instead of worrying and hoarding and consuming, here's the plan. Get out.

Get out your notepads. Here we go. This is how we work it out, but seek first. All right? What's first on the list? What should I seek? What should I seek? He says, seek first his kingdom, his rule, his authority, and his righteousness. How do I get right with God and stay in that place? You know what? This is what we should see.

He says That works every time. If you heaven, any father knows what you need, you don't have to worry. It's an other's first and me second. Kingdom and me second is right down the list. So it's others first. Some others. Some others. And then I'll be okay more than, okay, I'm blessed. What is right for others is what is right.

Finish with one last scene. Here we go. So quickly, the disciples are heading with Jesus to Jerusalem. And they're on their way to Jerusalem and they're thinking, you know what? When we get to Jerusalem, he's probably gonna get arrested. We're probably gonna get arrested. He's gonna die. We're gonna die.

Pretty bad day for everybody. But they're on the way. They're thinking, you know, when he comes in his kingdom, there's gonna be a throne. One of us could sit next to him, one on the right, one on the left, and they start this conversation with each other. Uh, wouldn't you like to be the one next? No. I'm gonna be, yeah, I've been, Jesus made me walk on water.

I'm gonna be next to him. Don't you worry about that? And John says, no way. He's the one that he loves. You know, the disciple that Jesus loves, that's me. So they're having this little de conversation and they get so far down road and Jesus says, hang on a minute over under the S tree, we gotta talk. I just added that Bitman.

He said, let's get serious about this. He says them to them. This Mark records it. You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles, the non-Jews lauded it over them and their high officials exercise authority over them. And they said, yeah, that's why we're talking about Thrones. We wanna be on 'em.

He says, no, not so with you. Look, some straighten the eye and says it's not going to be that way in my kingdom. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. So you know what? We're getting to a place where we're understanding that the priorities shifted so much in our life because of Jesus, and that's what he want for you.

If you're not a follower of Jesus, you can still take . Whatever drops of wisdom you've heard, but you know what? What would life be like if I just let Jesus lead? What would it be like if I just let Jesus have control? And he went on to qualify it. He said, I'm not just telling you stuff. I'm about to give all that.

I have to make this real. He says, for even the son of man did not come to be served, but to serve, to give his life. As a ransom for many I'm about to do for the whole world, and what I'm going to do will turn around and ask the whole world to do for one another. That's what the kingdom's like. That changed the world, didn't it?

We wouldn't be sitting here if hadn't have done what he said he would do. How can it still change our world today? If we adopt that same principle, seek first the kingdom, his kingdom, his righteousness, and all these things which he knows we need will be given to us as well. Put others first in your finances as evidence of your devotion to God's others first kingdom, and he will take care of you more, more than you can imagine.

That's why I asked you to consider giving off the top. Give first, save second, and live with the bounty that is left. After all of that, this is how we guard against greed. Let's pray. Father God, we're talking about something that affects our everyday life. We're getting the place so easy in our culture of

Consumer thought and, and all the advertising goes with that and the gambling. What would it mean? Wouldn't it be nice we think, to win the lottery? But you are saying, wouldn't it be nice if you just trusted me? Wouldn't it be nice if you just understood how much I care about you and not just you, but the others that'll be blessed through you.

Wouldn't it be nice if we just bowed our need to you and said, I surrender. Wouldn't that be nice? That's where we want to be. Lord Jesus, hear our prayer. Amen.