Christ life & ministry is out from His grace & sufficiency -...
2 Cor: 9:11-15 · Randy Peterman · Sep 24, 2017
2 Corinthians (2017), No. 36
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/410261635332610

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

How many of you are pretty solid on your theology for giving now, after all these lessons? Everybody feel like they got a good start? Because we're going to keep going. We're not done yet. But at the end of chapter 9, this should be the last closing part on Paul's writing to the Corinthians about giving. And this part here is actually very interesting. because he's going to tie in our spiritual life with giving and thankfulness in a repeated pattern. He's going to establish a repeating pattern as we go through these last verses. And so as we look at these verses and we take a look at the pattern that's here, you're going to notice repetition and you're going to notice he's really belaboring the point he's been making for two chapters. Hopefully it will be still edifying to you nonetheless.

The biggest thing that I find when I teach through personal finance is that the Holy Spirit does some teaching to me as well. Even though I understand the principles and I grew up with my dad actually doing personal finance counseling for various people back so long ago now.

I grew up hearing the principles and then as soon as I became an adult and got married I moved to Texas and pretty much abandoned a lot of the personal finance principles because of what was surrounding me and not really considering what the word taught and what was there. So I got myself into a bunch of personal finance issues. I got into a tremendous amount of debt and things like that. Fortunately, that got dealt with. But it's still one of those things where I look at these things and I imagine myself in different stages of my life that I've been in.

Maybe you guys recognize from your past different places where you were financially. So as we go through this, as we're closing the arc of personal finance not personal finance, of giving, but knowing that it relates to personal finance. Put yourself in the mindset of thinking about some of these people who are in Corinth are broke, they're poor, and some of them are rich. And so no matter where we are in our personal finances, there's probably somebody in Corinth who probably was sitting in a chair similar to yours listening and thinking about the giving in a personal financial state just like yours. So just kind of keep that in the back of your mind as we dig into the passage and take a look at what's here. Let's go ahead and read along with me in chapter 9 verses 11 through 15.

Paul writes, you will be enriched in everything for all liberation thanksgiving to God. For the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints, but is also overflowing through many thanksgivings to God. Because of the proof given by this ministry, they will glorify God for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ and for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all. while they also by prayer on your behalf yearn for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift. give you a little spoiler, but our last verse in this section actually mirrors a very similar sentiment to the last verse in what we're going to go over in the Acts lesson upstairs. So there's some celebration and thankfulness that is going to be a repeating theme this morning for you.

So Paul starts out here in our breaking out of this section in verse 11, you will be enriched in everything for all liberality. How many of you hear that you will be enriched in everything and immediately find yourself slightly challenged by your circumstances? One of the things that I looked at when I was, and I really thought about this a bit while I was preparing for this lesson, is that when we have false teachers and televangelists in this health and wealth prosperity gospel kind of shenanigans that gets pitched into the world today on predominantly the television and radio, they'll go to a verse like this and say, you will be enriched in everything. And I don't know about you, but there's been times for me where I've thought, I'm not rich in anything. let alone just finances, right?

But Paul is speaking about something to the church in Corinth for a special circumstance. There are times when we read the letter from Paul where he's talking about a specific circumstance and I think this can be arguably one of those times when Paul is telling them they will be enriched in everything And we shouldn't take that to mean that all Christians all the time will have financial prosperity.

So we want to be careful. We don't want to whitewash things. We don't want to generalize. We want to be very careful when we approach these texts. We're going to take a lot more detailed look into what some of the contexts are for why this might be a legitimate thing. And there are some applications for us today.

But I just want to be careful that when we take a look at this, when he says you'll be enriched in everything, that as, particularly as Americans, we're the top 2% of wealth in the whole world, our nation. Even our poorest of poor in the United States are better off than some of the poorest of poor in other countries. So when we read these things, we think about wealth, we all put it in our first world American context, we have to remember that sometimes we're ahead on the bell curve, we're at the very end.

So Paul writes these things, and I wanted to cross-reference very intentionally 1 Timothy 6, 5-6 and 2 Timothy 4, 3-4. So if somebody will turn in their Bibles to 1 Timothy 6, 5-6 and then just read it, and then once they're done, somebody else turn to 2 Timothy 4 and read verses 3-4. 6, 5-6. and constant friction between men of depraved mind and deprived of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain, but godliness actually is a means of great gain, when accompanied by contentment. Okay, and if somebody will read 2nd Timothy, or chapter 4, verses 3 and 4. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears, and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables.

Sounds like America. Well, there's parts of that. Man, that's a rabbit trail I'd love to go down. I'll just say this. There's a lot of stuff that the Roman culture was dealing with that the American culture deals with because of the prosperity and the large governance that Rome had. and the liberalization of leadership. And I want to say that not to be too political, but there was a shifting direction in Rome where the leaders figured out if they can just placate the masses, they'll stop having uprisings. And placating means offering more and more and more things to tickle their ears, right? And I think we've experienced that in our lifetimes as well in the United States.

So that's a rabbit trail. I'm not going to go too far down. But the thing with these two verses, we see that there's those who are ear ticklers, right? And they're going to tell you things that you want. When somebody tells you something you agree with, what's your reaction? Well, it can be yay or it can be lay. I knew I was right. Someone thinks like I do. We feel validated in our thoughts and things like that.

But when it comes to God's Word, is the barometer how I feel or what I think? No. Because I could be all over the place. What's the measurement? What's our unit of measurement? Well, it's facts, and it's based on Christ and who he is and what God has revealed through the Word. So no matter how far we are off in either direction of the pendulum, we have truth that is the standard.

So ear-ticklers may tell us things about gain. So Paul is addressing two kinds of teachers, but we have in prominence today a blend of those two. those who will teach us about gain, and the health and wealth prosperity folks, and those who are tickling our ears. I've gotten in trouble with a few people that are friends on Facebook by naming Joel Osteen, but I think he's a prominent figure that represents taking those two ideas and blending them together. He doesn't ever present the gospel, but he sure does present you being a better person. And that tickles a lot of ears, which then loosens some of the purse strings.

So Paul, when he's coming into this, when we take a look at this, and he's saying to the church in Corinth, you will be enriched in everything for all liberality, he's not speaking with the false agenda of a false teacher. He is speaking about a condition that the church body, that even today, can look to apply. So let's ask this next question here. What are the conditions for this enriching? Because Paul is going to tell us, and the preachers never do. These false teachers don't tell us, but Paul does. The conditions are several fold here.

So let's take a look at the Greek word translated here as liberality is rooted in the sense of not being selfish. Actually the word that's translated liberality here could be translated as you being simple and you being selfish. Okay? So and me being simple and me being selfish just in case that sounds like there's a you and me and we're different. So all believers Living simply and being selfless. Now that's not some of the new agey stuff that I've seen promoted lately of living some kind of minimalistic lifestyle. Or maybe like the Catholic priests who take a vow of poverty or something like that.

That's not what he's talking about. But the idea here is that there is liberality rooted in not chasing the worldly things. It doesn't mean there's anything wrong with having a house that is maintained or a car that works. Those things aren't evil. It doesn't mean that if you have a 200 square foot little tiny studio apartment that barely has room for a bed and a toilet next to a kitchen sink kind of a thing that you've got enough and that's all you should have. But it's a simplicity that's there that allows you to contribute in this case. So the first thing is that there is a liberality rooted in simplicity.

And then there's a second thing and we need to take a look at that. The second thing that comes along with selflessness is a genuine need. That's really important here. There needs to be a need that the selflessness can be applied to. The liberality just doesn't go anywhere, it was going somewhere and God had a purpose for it.

So everybody I think understands the idea of generosity. But how many of you have ever been wrestling with giving somebody a gift and you're like, what do you give the person who has everything? Some of you said everything along with me because you know exactly what I'm talking about. When I was a kid I remember drawing pictures for my dad because I had no money and I couldn't give him anything that would have been a gift.

But as I got older I saw his sacrificial living where he didn't have as many toys as some of the neighbor's dads or whatever else because he was preparing for other things for his family, and he knew the needs might come up. And so he lived simply, and I'm using my dad as an example, you all know him, but I don't mean this to build him up in some weird way to make him seem greater than he is.

He's still a person, right? You can still call him Vern. But he lived simply so that he could then provide in a caring way. knew the need was there. But it was one of those things where sometimes people would come and they would have needs financially or otherwise and he was able to participate in helping them.

That's a very practical example. I hope I don't get in trouble when my dad doesn't come talk to me and say don't share that stuff. No, he shares that upstairs, you know that. That simplicity came paired with a need. When you watch the televangelists, what's the need? More money. But what do they need more money for? What's their strawman need? To build up their ministry. To build up their ministry.

And Paul's going to talk about ministry in this passage. We already read that, right? And so let's compare, as we go through this, let's compare the ministry of the charlatans, if you will, with the ministry of Paul and his cohorts and then Titus and the stewards that were carrying the purse to Jerusalem.

So what does giving liberally look like? Paul uses the word liberal here and of course we think of that and we associate that sometimes with political things, but that's not what he's talking about. His use of liberality or liberal here comes tied to the word stewardship.

And when we think about stewardship in our own lives, We probably have a certain number of anchors that we've grown up kind of holding on to, but what's funny is that, and funny in a ha-ha sort of a way, not in a weird sort of a way, is the Bible actually presents to us some goalpost ideas. The Bible talks about storing up in your storehouse for when things get tough. but it also talks about giving with liberality. Do those sound like opposite ideas? They can if you haven't spent time pondering and thinking through them. If you haven't saved up, you might not have very much to give liberally, right?

But there are times when the Holy Spirit will sometimes move in the life of a believer who's what we would consider impoverished, and they'll still give most or all of what they have. We've talked in past lessons about parables in the Gospels about giving all the widow's might. So those things come together, but who's in charge of letting us know how much we should give? It's the preacher in the pulpit, right? You've got to give more. We have a building project. the Holy Spirit, right? So if we're abiding and the Holy Spirit directs us, we may give more.

There have been times in my life when the Lord has indicated to me that I need to give more and there's been times when he's indicated to me I need to give less and those have not always been tied to income level things. What's been amazing is sometimes he will actually say You need to stop giving as much to something and then he'll present a new need like a month later that I didn't even know existed. And again, when I say that, that's an example.

I'm not trying to build myself up. Please, nobody misunderstand that. But liberality looks like stewardship directed by the Holy Spirit, just like being conservative sometimes. But Paul is talking to the church in Corinth. There is a real need. What's Jerusalem going through? They're being persecuted.

You remember when we started the book of Acts upstairs, how many people came to know the Lord in Jerusalem that first day? It says 3,000. Thank you, Tom. 3,000 people became believers. Several people said it. I heard you the loudest. 3,000 people came to know the Lord.

Well, guess what? In Jerusalem, where they're surrounded predominantly by either pagan Roman soldiers or very religiously rigorous but legalistic and not biblical or Old Testament law-based Jews, you're going to be shunned. In my lifetime the closest thing I can think of is like the Amish community here or even some of the Jehovah's Witnesses. If you leave the Jehovah's Witness organization, everybody that you knew inside the Jehovah's Witness organization has been instructed to not make eye contact, do not speak to you, do not talk to you in any way, not socially, not nothing, because you have abandoned the true faith.

And that's how the Jews would have responded in many of these people's cases. They might have lost their jobs. So when Paul is collecting this money, the context is that there's a real need. And that real need is going to be met with God's generosity through the church in Corinth but the stewardship was aligned with the need. It wasn't just given haphazardly. I wanted to highlight one other thing in the previous section that I failed to say out loud so I'm going to step back here.

Titus and his group are going to take the needs of the operation expenses and the presentation of ministry and they're going to take a look at Philippians 4.19. Let's see what Paul writes about that, because Paul's letter to the Philippians is also about financial things for a good chunk of it, so there's some overlap there.

In Philippians 4.19, Paul writes, and my God will supply all your needs according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus. How big is God's bank account? And I say that jokingly, right? God's bank account is infinite. But the needs will be supplied by God, and He will use us as agents. We get to be stewards of that.

Sometimes that means liberally, and sometimes the Lord has given us just a little bit, and sometimes He's given us nothing because He's going to use someone else. So, liberality in this case is directly related to the Holy Spirit directing the body in Corinth to give. Not every need is a need you have to meet, but the Holy Spirit will direct you. So what's the number one thing you should take away from this as a believer today, as a steward of your finances? If we had to summarize all this up. Liberality? Okay. How will you know that you need to be liberal? with your sharing or giving. God will reveal it to you. You need to be abiding so the Holy Spirit can say, here, do this.

And you can say, yep, I'm a ready vessel and he's provided enough things. I will say this, the Bible is full of examples over and over and over again. I've been listening through the Old Testament on my commute back and forth from work. And there's examples of, for example, Elijah with the woman making cakes with the oil, and the oil just keeps going and keeps going. If God is going to use you, he's going to use you, and he's going to provide through his means to make those things fulfilled. And we've seen that in our lives multiple times, but we may not have known it, because God doesn't always draw attention to those things. But I guarantee you that he's faithful. but the Holy Spirit will direct our steps. So let's keep going because Paul does and otherwise we'll run out of time, right? So that liberality, that giving has produced something. What does it produce? What does Paul say it's producing in his own life? Thankfulness. All right.

I often ask these kinds of questions about lots of words and the answer is very similar and overlapping and related, but what do we need, what is required for thankfulness to take place? Closeness to God. Okay, closeness to God. In showing thankfulness to Him, that's the case. Let's say generically thankfulness, but in this case it's applied towards God.

We need at least three things. We need a party who's thankful. We need a party to whom they're thankful to. So in this case it's Paul and God. And what is the act of thankfulness about? sacrifice somebody made to make things go better to the glory of God. Okay, so it's a sacrifice. I'm going to restate that slightly differently but close to that. It's a recognition of something that took place.

If we don't ever slow down, if we don't ever take our headphones off and turn off our televisions and stop having screens and entertainment and all the things that our culture tells us we should do after we get home, Some of you, you're retired, maybe you don't do that anymore, right? You don't have to worry about the coming home part. But we're told all the time, Facebook, do all the things. If we don't take time to reflect, we may not have that response of thankfulness.

So thankfulness requires two parties, at least. Sometimes there's more parties. And the time to reflect. And the fourth thing I should have added, I'm sorry, is an expression of thankfulness. If I'm thankful but I never tell you, It's like secret thankfulness, right? And it's something that we should do. It's an encouraging thing, right? So thankfulness. Paul is thankful.

Now I've got a question there at the top of that section. Paul does not know how much the church in Corinth will be providing for Jerusalem. He's writing this letter saying, hey, remember you guys promised. that you're going to be generous. He doesn't know how much, but what is he anyways?

He's thankful. Why is he thankful? Because he knows God's going to move in the church in Corinth. He knows who the Holy Spirit is. He knows the Holy Spirit will move in the hearts and the lives of those who are abiding. So he's thankful. They were anticipating God's work in the church across the Roman Empire as well as in Corinth. The next thing there, in verse 12, for the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints, but is also overflowing through many thankfulness to God.

For the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs. So what is the ministry of service? Who are the ministers and how are they serving? I think in this case, because of what Paul has set up in chapter 7 and 8, the ministry of services, and even earlier in 9.3, is Titus and his cohort, the two mystery men. They are they are the ones that have this ministry of service.

And we get to participate, or in this case, the Corinthian church gets to participate. So later on I'm going to ask, who's they? And that's the answer. That's a freebie. Everybody should be able to raise their hand and say they know who that is. But the stewardship that Titus and the other two mystery men have is the ministry of service. The ministry is the stewardship, and the service is actually rooted in the same word that we translate into deacon, as we have deacons in the church that serve. The role of deacon is not a leadership position, it is a serving position. So their ministry of service is like, you're going to go out there, lay your life on the line, because There are robbers who want to at least take your money but probably wouldn't really care if you died so you couldn't turn them in.

And there's other traveling risks. If you get on a boat you better hope that they did their due diligence to make sure the boat was properly prepared and the weather doesn't go crazy. Obviously Paul went through a shipwreck or two, right? As they're doing all of that, they're also being persecuted by the Jewish leadership that does not want Christianity to get spread. And they really wouldn't mind if the Jerusalem believers didn't get those resources.

So the ministry of service in this case is Titus and his at least two people that were traveling with him as cohort. And they're traveling along. And Paul wants to emphasize to the church that it's also going to be provisions that they can offer and safety that they can offer in care for Titus and his group.

Now let me ask you this, are you aware of any similar situations where the threat of death and robbery and so forth are happening today? I expect during the hurricanes and I mean afterwards there's always people that will take stuff that shouldn't be taken. Yeah, there's been looting and things like that. Unfortunately I have seen some news reports about resources that were sent down to Houston for example and then just thrown away. And I was like, dude. People are clamoring for those resources and then somebody just decided, well, I'm done here and they just threw away what they had left over and they didn't distribute it. Things like that.

But what I was thinking of is, how many of you remember when the church first got connected with Hassan? This was back some years ago now. I remember my dad went over to Uganda for the first time and Roy Smith had worked really hard to get all these little mp3 players that had the Bible on mp3 format on them. And my dad had to travel from here to Uganda with these MP3 players.

And there's a notorious problem of traveling to these third world countries is that some of your goods just go missing. It's treated as kind of like a tax for traveling is that some of your stuff is going to disappear and maybe most of your stuff is going to disappear. You just don't know. And so they were thinking it would be kind of funny if somebody stole all those mp3 players and then just handed them the Bible.

I was like, well, that might be convicting. But even today, these kinds of risks of things being stolen is very real in different parts of the country. Did he get there with all of them? My understanding is that he did. And then the problem was that there weren't enough, of course, because everybody wants to be able to listen to the Bible. Not everybody can read there, but they can listen.

Great opportunity. The batteries finally died on those, I think, and that was the biggest problem. Technology. In the heavenly places, I don't think we're going to have MP3 players and the batteries will never die. So from a modern context, some of these things can take place.

So continuing on, after considering the thankfulness, they glorify God for your obediences, or the next section at the top of page three. So Paul says, because of the proof given by this ministry, the Corinthians were contributing to a larger ministry of caring for the persecuted saints.

We already saw that the Macedonians had been giving generously. What was it that Paul wrote about the generous gift of the Macedonians? Does anybody remember? They were poor to begin with, but they still gave. Yeah, they gave even more than Paul had even thought they could give, they gave.

And so this ministry, this was a proof of God's work in the lives of the believers to actually establish the validity of what was going on. And so the proof of the ministry was there If you were in Titus' shoes, and you think about this, if Paul comes along and says, Titus, I think you need to go take some money to Jerusalem, and we just need to collect it, and you get through your traveling to the coast, you've hit Corinth, and you've got almost no money, you might still know the Lord wants you to go. But Titus had proof. God had, through the Holy Spirit, moved in the lives of the believers and said, my thumbprint is on this. My seal is on this.

So there was a confirmation, a proof of the ministry that the Lord had established there for them to use. And through that proof is more thanks. They will glorify God. So then here's the question, who's they? 2 Corinthians 9.3 indicates to us that it's the Titus and the two mystery men. The three stewards will be thanking God for the reasons mentioned earlier, but also for the obedience of the church in Corinth, leading to action in their giving as a response to the gospel.

And this is one of those things where the legalists and the guilt bringers would say, well, if you really believe, you're going to give. and then the oppression comes. Now you're oppressed. Now you've got to give. I'm going to come and I'm going to bring in the guilt and the legalism. But that's not what's happening here. Paul is saying they're going to glorify God because they're going to respond to the gospel and give. But it's not you better because, it's you're going to.

Do you hear the difference there? Does that make sense? It doesn't come with heavy handedness. And that's what we always worry about when somebody is talking about money in church, right? Here comes the heavy handedness. You must not really love the kids because you're not contributing to the kids building ministry fundraising event, right? Aww, too bad you hate babies. That's terrible! That's not the point here. Paul is saying they will glorify God on account of what's there. In the next section of the verse, for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ, for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all.

It was obedience. Now again, when we hear obedience, that's always a word that makes people's legalism radars go off, right? Everybody has a legalism radar? If you go to Holly Hills, you have to have one. If you don't, talk to me after church. I'm just kidding, really. But the thing is that we hear obedience and we go, oh no, legalism. That's not the point. Paul is calling out what already exists.

He's not coming in heavy handed. for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ. So what's the gospel of Christ? Because we're going to go over the gospel and grace this morning. What's the gospel? That you believe that Jesus Christ died and was buried and resurrected on the third day according to the scriptures, right? So we have belief here and that led to a liberality. Now I want to say something about God's glory that I think is important. Does God need us to glorify him so that he has enough glory? No. He doesn't have a glory bank that has a finite capacity and we've got to make sure we keep it up at capacity.

God will never need us to be glorified. He's infinitely glorious in his own nature, in his own being. He doesn't need us for that. But Paul's emphasis throughout this passage is that God still yet, even though his glory is infinite, gains glory on account of our obedience. But because of how grace is set up, it doesn't matter. God will be glorified anyways in our own lives. That's pretty cool.

So when it comes to these needs that God has to fulfill, does he need us? He could do it miraculously, just like with the oil. God knows how to miraculously generate needs. Or Israel, when they were out wandering in the wilderness, God gave them. He sent quail. He sent manna. He sent water. He didn't need really generous Egyptians to go sweeping out. And like, hey, God told us to bring you some manna. No, God just sent the manna. So those things happen, but in this case, this was obedience, nonetheless. And this was obedience that God used, and he established a doctrine of agency. And it was as a response to their salvation.

Now, I want to, this is a bit of a roundabout way to get there, but if we take a look at Romans 12, verse 8, Paul is talking about spiritual gifts in Romans 12. verses four through eight. So if you'll turn there with me I'll go ahead and read that out loud because I think it's it's worth calling that out. For just as we have many members in one body and all members do not have the same function so we who are many are one body in Christ and individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly, if prophecy according to the proportion of his faith, if service in his serving, or he who teaches in his teaching, or he who exhorts in his exhortation, and he who gives with liberality, he who leads with diligence, he who shows mercy with cheerfulness. So giving is a spiritual gift. You ever hear anybody pray for that in charismatic circles? They'll want tongues. They'll want healing. Nobody's like, God, make me a giver. They're like, no, I'm not sure that I want to share. And I joke a little bit, but the reality is that in my life experience, I've never heard that.

But giving is a spiritual gift in some cases, but that's not what Paul is talking about here in his liberality. The liberality was for all the believers who were responding in obedience to the gospel. Not just those who had the gift of giving, in this case. And I'm calling that out as a contrast, not to guilt anybody. That's again not the point of this passage. So why should we be giving?

It's because the Holy Spirit has moved in us. Now let's circle back around in Paul's argument as he goes through this. They've proved out, they've responded to the gospel, and that response has covered the gift to the church in Jerusalem and provisions for the three travelers, which is what Paul emphasizes at the very end of 13. And then in 14 he says, while they also by prayer on your behalf yearn for you, because of the surpassing grace of God in you.

And I'm going to do something that is slightly cheaty as a teacher, and I'm going to reorder some text for flow of thought. I'm calling that out before we go in there. I'm not trying to be a heretic, but I'm reordering some text for flow of thought, okay? Don't stun me after church.

So I've got here, it says, they, the ellipsis, pray on your behalf. And then up above that, while they, ellipsis, yearn for you. Because Paul links those things with the compound idea. So I'm going to reorder, but I'm just calling that out. So while they yearn for you. Titus and his cohorts, Paul had already established earlier in this letter, had a bond with the body in Corinth, and they were bragging on them. They were boasting about the church in Corinth to Paul. And so they yearned for them. They missed them.

And the question I've got there is, has the Lord established a bond between you and others in his body that came not through going to the same church or living in the same area, but through meeting? A meeting that the Lord brought about for your building up and for edification?

Because Titus was a builder-upper. That's a technical term. You'll find that in a lot of theology books. He was an encourager. He was a builder-upper. And so Titus came in, and as Caroline has started saying, and I think we should all start saying, it's a Titus thing. It's a builder-upper thing. We're encouraging one another. We're looking at what God is doing in the body.

And he yearned for the church in Corinth. You ever yearn for people like that? Every time I go to Carson City, I run into at least one or two old friends that I really miss. I don't miss Carson City. Carson City is not my favorite geographical location on the planet, but I miss the people that are there and I yearn for them. And I yearn for my friends in Texas. A few of them are coming up this week for my birthday and I'm kind of excited. So they yearn for them.

The Lord had established a bond between Titus and the church in Corinth and they're part of that. And then Paul says, and I'll prove it to you, and that's why I kind of did the little juggling of the text order, is they pray on your behalf. Okay? They're praying for the church there.

How many of you have people that you know that are in distress and you pray versus you hear about somebody that's in distress and you pray, and your sense of personal connection has an impact on how you pray? This is not because you're a terrible Christian or anything like that. It's just that when you know somebody and you find out they have a tough time or need and you pray, your heart is moved. I don't know a bunch of people in Mexico that were impacted by the earthquakes. In fact, I don't think I know anybody. I still pray for them. But I know somebody who's in Puerto Rico.

Well, that moves my heart differently. That's my brother-in-law's sister that's still there and other extended family. So our prayers may be impacted by that. But Paul, in the tone of Titus's prayer, calls out. He yearns for you, and I can tell you that he yearns for you because of how he's praying. All right, and we are running out of time. I recognize that. So he continues on. He continues on in their yearning for them because of the surpassing grace of God in you.

I told you we were going to talk about the gospel and grace. Here's the grace part. What's our working definition of grace? I'm going to ask this every time we run into grace because you've got to all have it memorized. This is important. It's life changing. What's grace? the unmerited and limited blessings of God based on the totally radical work of Christ on the cross. Okay, so grace is a gift giving benevolence from God.

It's not just a sin covering thing. Growing up that's what I heard grace was. Now let's just for the sake of beating a dead horse mis-define grace and see how useful this verse is. If grace is just the covering of sins, which I've heard many legalists present, and we read this because of the surpassing covering of sin of God in you, that's not very exciting. It just means you guys are a bunch of screw-ups. Does that sound like something you yearn for? Ah, yearn for the screw-ups. That's not what Paul's writing about.

And if your definition of grace is as small as mine was, this verse didn't mean very much. But if your definition of grace is that it's God's benevolent, unmerited gifting and love and care for you because of what Christ did on the cross, I yearn for those people. I get that.

I miss my friends and family across Texas and Nevada. Not because of Texas and Nevada, but because of God's graciousness in them. So we can all identify with the same principle. I really miss my friends and family in Indiana, but I really, if I never had to go back to Indiana again, it would be okay. Because I have to drive through Kansas, which is this whole other story.

So we have this idea of surpassing grace, and I would be falling short of my Greek study duties if I didn't remind you that surpassing is the hyperbolo which is the idea of throwing the ball not just inside the stadium from outfield to the catcher, but the idea of the catcher throwing the ball all the way out of the stadium over the big green monster in Boston, like that big giant wall, right? So, the idea there is, the Huper Balo is that the surpassing grace is this infinite large grace. Then Paul closes these chapters seven, eight, and nine, with thanks be to God for his indescribable gift. And theologians have gotten a little mixed up about his indescribable gift.

What are they talking about? Is it talking about money? Because Paul's been talking about money and giving, right? I would argue it is not that. I would argue that it is the gift of salvation. That's consistent with the theme of what Paul has done here, where he's tied salvation to the giving. If his gift was merely money, not only is that inconsistent with other writings from Paul, like Ephesians chapter 1, but it really changes the whole feel of the letter. So I would say the indescribable gift is the gift of salvation.

Paul is refocusing the readers in Corinth and us today to be focusing on God's gift of infinite, eternal, and outpouring of his riches. because that's consistent with God's character. So in conclusion, as we wrap up these chapters on giving and financial stewardship, we see that Paul closes it with a focus on God and his gift through Christ. It is a single gift with an infinite number of expressions throughout our lives and on into eternity. Do you know God is going to be pouring out his riches to us in the heavenly places? I don't know what we're going to do with God's infinite riches, but if they're rich and God said they're rich, that means they have value. I just don't understand if we'll go to God's riches ATM. I've got to withdraw? I don't think that's how that's going to go.

If finances are an earthly burden, then we're challenged to seek God's light yoke in them through the Holy Spirit. If generosity is not your gift, if Romans 12, 8, where he says, if you give, give liberally, if that sounds frightening, then you still should only give through the direction of the Holy Spirit so that you can be cheerful. If the gospel is not your motivation for giving, then dig deeper into the gospel and how that should be impacting your life. If Paul can say it, I think we can say that too.

I don't mean that, again, to bring guilt. It's just something to consider, something to meditate on. The world uses meditate in a gnarly way. I want us to reclaim that word in Holly Hills. Meditate on God's word. And we can say that the Holy Spirit leads to loving liberality and careful conversation through self-control, or conservation, not conversation, for the care of the body until Christ's return. Titus had a deep, compassionate love for the church in Corinth that Paul interweaves with this reminder about a generous gift. We should be reminded by this to consider the ministry of edification that the Holy Spirit has worked within us as a larger body.

So abide, and you'll know if you need to be liberal or conservative with your giving. Abide, and you'll know when you need to be an encourager. And abide, and you'll know when it's time to go out onto the road and watch out for those highway robbers and the crazy pirate ships, right? I'm just kidding.

I don't think God's called us in most cases to that circumstance. But there are missionaries that the Lord may call to that. Because it's a Titus thing and we're all part of it. Okay? Alright, let's close in prayer. Heavenly Father, we ask that you would reinforce these doctrines about stewardship and these doctrines about giving. And we ask that you would teach us these things in our day-to-day lives as we abide we would know about stewardship. And as we abide, we would know about our ministry to one another. We do pray for the missionaries that are out there that are dealing with some of these threats on a day-to-day basis. We want to lift up the leadership at our church as they are examples of these things to us, as well that they would be abiding in you and discipling and shepherding and carrying these things on. We thank you in Jesus name. Amen.