Giving of oneself & financially is out from Gods grace

Today we start chapter 8. We're actually going to do 8 and 9 through into September there. And it's all about giving. It's all about giving, which is pretty cool. Actually, I've been through this before, but it's just cool. You go back and you look at it and say, wow, look at this. This is really neat stuff. It's totally different. It's totally different than the world's giving. Absolutely not on the same page. So let's go ahead and look at that.

I borrowed something from J. Bernard McGee here, his kind of outline of chapters 8 and 9. So he has, you notice that the old teachers will use words, they'll have the same letter will start each of the sections, you know, so he's going to have examples of Christian giving 1 through 6 today, exhortation for Christian giving, explanation of Christian giving, and encouragement.

If you've studied a lot you'll see that I like to have the same, which is fine, there's nothing wrong with that. You just kind of think, oh that's kind of neat. I think you had an excellent set of choices. Excellent, right. Anyway, so we're going to focus on, actually I'm teaching next week too, so I have the exhortation. There's a little bit of exhortation today. Verse 6 is kind of along that line. Or maybe an example of exhortation in the past. Okay, so then Constable had a really cool thing. What we're going to find here, there's going to be some different groups of people.

And it's actually hard, I found it hard, to keep track of who's Paul talking about. Paul's going to talk about, before I show you this, he's going to talk about, obviously he's ministering to the Corinthians. So he's going to give an example to the Corinthians of a ministry that he was involved in in Macedonia, with some churches in Macedonia. But the example he's going to give is of their giving to Paul's ministry to the church back in Jerusalem, to the poor in Jerusalem. So it gets a little bit, you look at it and say, who's he talking about here?

So I tried to sort that out. So if I missed one or mislabeled it, help me out and we'll correct it. I think I got them right. So actually, I thought Constable did a good job here. He points out, and actually I had not realized how much scripture was involved in the New Testament about the poor among the saints in Jerusalem. There's actually quite a bit that talks about that.

And Paul basically, in his travels in Galatia, in Macedonia, in Achaia, in Asia Minor, he I hate to use the word solicit. Solicit is not the best word. But he encouraged the believers to give to the poor in Jerusalem. And so that was part of his ministry. And actually, here's another cool thing. There actually were delegates. Paul didn't want to handle the money. He didn't want to be, in fact he says that in various ways. So he had these men traveling with him. They would they would take care of the money and they would travel with him and they would be the ones that would take their money back to Jerusalem.

So it's kind of interesting. And let's just read, before we start getting into the main text, let's just read, can someone read Romans 15, those two verses, 25 and 26 in Romans 15? It kind of gives a little bit of flavor for this. But now I'm going to Jerusalem serving the saints, for Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make a contribution to the poor among the saints in Jerusalem. Great, thank you. So basically I just kind of, so there's a couple of cases, Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make a contribution to the poor among the saints in Jerusalem. And we're going to find out an astounding thing here, that the Macedonians were even poor, even worse off But they wanted to give.

They said, Paul, we've just got to give these. And Paul said, you really don't need to do this. We're going to get into that. It's interesting. Interesting set of dialogue there. So and we find out that giving. really it helps us to reinforce this is is out of God's grace and we shouldn't we know we shouldn't take on light I gotta give because everyone else is giving or we have some rule we make up we want to give in accordance and I have the last chart kind of speaks to that I kind of pulled out some things hopefully it'll be helpful alright so let's go on here so the that's from constable so could someone read verses 1 through 6 in chapter 8 Now brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God which has been given in the churches of Macedonia, that in a great ordeal of affliction their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality. For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord. begging us with much urging for the favor of participation in the support of the saints. And this, not as we had expected, but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God. So we urged Titus that he, as he had previously made a beginning, so he would also complete in you this gracious work as well. Great. Thank you, Randy.

And just so by the way, I kind of found out in the study that actually the three churches in Macedonia that most people believe were the church of Philippi, the church of Berea, and the church of Thessalonica. Those are at least three churches in Macedonia that Paul visited and that had funds that were carried back to Jerusalem. Now brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God. So brethren or brothers, make known is we make known the tense is present tense so he was continually making known the grace of God and you think that's a large part of Paul's ministry. He was constantly extolling God's grace and what God's grace was all about.

Actually that Ephesians 6.2 is Christ set out.

So let's look at so actually it's like I said it's basically we make known to you a narrative to tell to inform And in that Colossians passage, could someone just read that, Colossians 4.7? All my faith shall Tichicus declare unto you, who is a beloved brother, and a faithful minister, and a fellow human, in the Lord.

Okay, I think we're... I thought there was no word. There's an informed word in there some place? Well, he will bring you information. That's exactly. So that's the word right there. Right. So so anyway, the idea is to make known and this is ongoing. So basically it's the grace of God. So actually, you know. We don't have to necessarily read those two, but those talk about the gospel.

One of the main things of God's grace that Paul was putting forth was the marvelous gospel, the good news. And so that was part of the aspect of his grace. And he's going to present the aspect of Christian giving as part of God's grace and how it's sourced in God and not sourced in ourselves. And if we think it's sourced in ourselves, we're on the wrong track to start with.

So the focus in these verses and following is upon what God's grace has accomplished. Paul's not necessarily bragging on quote-unquote the Macedonians. They were a great bunch of folks. What he's bragging about is God's grace working in the Macedonians and how it's beyond what he expected.

In fact, it doesn't make sense that people that are poor would give they're poor, they're giving the people that are poor also, that's great, but they're worse off than the people that are giving to them. It seems all backwards. We say that can't be. You can't do that. People that are poor off shouldn't be giving, but you think of the widow's mite.

She gave the most. So it's pretty cool stuff. I get the funny feeling that they had been practicing generous giving among themselves to such an extent that they could basically make that offer to Paul and say, here we go. You got something extra because among each of them, some have greater amounts of this little thing or that little thing and among others less, but they learned how to share. Well, that was part, that was part of, they didn't, you know, I don't think it was a burden to them. Paul, from our perspective, we said that's an extra burden on those people who are already poor. From their perspective, it apparently was not. They thought these people need that goddess.

Well, you know, I think I always summarize giving as God doesn't want us to give grudgingly, but he loves a cheerful giver. Isn't that grace? We want to hold on to what we have. I know. I mean, don't we? So, you know, there's no mandate to give. It's God's grace. It allows us not only to give, but give cheerfully. Well, I'm going to mess this story totally up. Isn't the story about, you know, someone, say you receive a gift for a thousand dollars. You say, oh, thank you, Lord. I'll give half of it to the church. What if you receive $10,000? Maybe I'll give $2,000. How about $1,000,000? Maybe 10,000 might be good.

It's interesting how the lower amounts, oh yeah, Lord, I'll give, you know, but I don't know. That story is told in various ways in various forms, but it kind of shows that we, you know, the old man wants to hang on to that when it's not even ours to start with. So it's kind of interesting. So anyway, all right, so let's go on.

So basically now we make, now we wish to make known to you, brethren, the grace of God, which has been given in the churches of Macedonia. having been given, in this case it's in the perfect tense, so the grace of God having been given, the idea that it is sourced in God, is to give, to grant, to bestow. This idea here is that it was given in the past, God's grace continues to be given up into the present and on into the future. God's grace doesn't stop. God doesn't say, okay, enough grace now. You had enough, no more. It continues on.

So his grace in terms of giving for Macedonia started and actually Tom kind of hit on that point. It's something that was part, you know, the God's grace was such that they continued to give even in their poverty. Which is pretty cool stuff. Alright.

And it's in or among the churches of Macedonia. These churches are motivated and enabled by God's grace. Other verses on God's grace, one that I kind of liked here. Can someone read back in 1 Corinthians 1 verse 4? I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ.

Right. So the grace of God, if we know Christ is our Savior and Christ is enough, we have the grace of God. That's a fact. But do we actually live in light of that? Do we really believe that? I find, well, these problems down here on earth, they're pretty tough. Do I really believe I have God's grace? It doesn't seem like it. Or couldn't this trial have been a little bit different? Or couldn't this happen? We have all kinds of things.

I'm sure there have been numerous times during Paul's growing as well as working ministry where you just had to step aside and think. The grace of God has really shown above and beyond all expectation to me in getting me to believe. And it continues. And he just couldn't stop praising the Lord for it. Yes, yes, he does. Just like we're learning in Acts, in the main service, God's grace was evident in Paul's life from the very beginning. Here Paul is doing the absolute opposite. He's out going after Christians and killing them.

And God, in his grace, saved him and gave him this wonderful ministry. It's pretty cool stuff. And then actually, let's look at the Titus one. Titus 2.11. That's pretty cool. But the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. Yeah, that's pretty cool. It keeps going down there. It enlightens the body of Christ. The grace manifests itself. In Ephesians 4, 7, Paul wrote, but to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Great. And I love that. What was the measure of Christ's gift? It was all in. 100%.

So we can't say, God, you're kind of holding back here. Hey, I'm in the same boat as all you guys. I look at the trials and tribulations of life and I say, Lord, It would seem like it would be better if we didn't have that trial. We could do so much more. Actually, Paul said the exact same words. He said, Lord, I've got this thorn in the flesh, and I could do so much better without that thorn in the flesh. Eventually, he said, Lord, I think I agree with you.

Your grace is sufficient. For when I am weak, then I am strong. There are so many pretty cool things. God's grace is totally involved in giving. And if you separate that, if you separate God's grace from giving, you're off on the wrong track. With all of this about grace, I mean we have so many verses about grace, and yet the Christian world does not understand at all grace. Not that we have it all figured out, and so grace giving is part of that, which is why the church, most of the churches still, you know, are you tithing? Right, oh, absolutely. You know, whatever. Passing offerings. Right. Yeah, I mean, because they don't have a clue about grace. No, they don't. They do not. They do not.

We have all this teaching. It's really pretty amazing. You start looking at this and you think, wait a minute, things are upside down. They're all messed up. But just think about passing offering plates. Don't you feel guilty if you're not putting something on? What's the source of that? No, it's all flesh. Right. Let's see. I only have a 10, but I only want to give one here. I'm going to make the 10 make the 10 look like a one. There you go. There you go. Three pennies. Go ahead.

I do think it's worth noting, actually, in light of what Bob said, that there are certain traditions within Christianity, and when I say Christian, I always say Christendom, or even non-biblical Christianity, that attempt to use psychology and the passing the plate is one of those things.

Exactly. Or the hearse with the stick, that's one of my favorites. Yeah, that's right. Those kinds of things are psychological. Charles Finney was supposedly Right. I know. I know. There's a lot. I mean, you go back and look at a lot of ministries. A lot of ministries, they don't have giving right. They got giving messed up. They got psychology, you know, all kinds of things.

But I think, you know, at times if there's a need in the body, let's say at Holly Hills there's a need here, we need to make that known, let God's grace work through the body to meet that need. I don't think it's anything wrong about information being provided. Like if we need a new roof or a new furnace or whatever. Right. And also, we'll see in a little bit, there's nothing wrong with actually, Paul talks about planning.

He says, I don't want you to wait until I get there and then be I want you to say before I get there. He talks about it. It's very interesting. Every day, as you have prospered, put something aside, so when I get there, you'll have something to give to the poor saints in Jerusalem. He talks about that. That's perfectly fine. Planning, doing your planning, and looking at your finances is fine. There's nothing wrong with that. He doesn't want you swayed by arm-twisting. That's part of the message. Okay, good, cool. So now, basically we talk about the grace of God that has been given to the churches in Macedonia. So now he's going to talk about what was going on in the Macedonian churches.

And it wasn't pretty. It was pretty brutal. I think most of us, if we had this going on in our lives, we'd say, giving, that's the last thing in the world I'm thinking about. I've got all this other stuff going on. that in a great ordeal of affliction, their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality. So we'll kind of take it a piece at a time here. A great ordeal of affliction. So actually the idea of the ordeal is actually this word for test, which we're going to use here in a little bit. That by a great test of affliction.

And that's actually kind of cool. Let me just go ahead and put the other. So there's three words that I kind of dug into here. Great is the idea that it's in the intensity of something. It's an intense. It's an intense situation. And the word great is used.

The verse I have for that, we don't have to look at that one, the one in Corinthians was with much trembling and so it's an intensifier, if you will. But the probably most important word in all of this is this word for test, which is related to docima or docimazo. And it's a process of proving or being proven. So let's look at a couple of verses there. So that's the idea that by this great ordeal of affliction, God is is proving that you are who he's made you to be. You are a person in Christ. Someone read Romans 5 verse 4. We have two occurrences of the word in that verse. It kind of jumps into the middle. Actually, why don't you read, maybe go back and read How about Romans 5, 3, and 4?

And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope. So in verse 4, in my version, I have proven character. So proven character is this word for test or ordeal. So it's proven character is part of the process that God is using. And then he also is using this word philipsis, pressure. And that actually shows up in verse 3. Not only this, but we also exalt in our tribulation, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance and then proven character. So God is using both the testing process and this pressure to conform us to Christ.

And that's part of the process that was used in Macedonia. So Wyss has this in the midst of a severe testing, so he brings out the idea of testing here, severe testing which was in the form of affliction. So here's where I started making sure that in their abundance of joy and their deep poverty. So there is the Churches of Macedonia. The word is abundance or super abundance, exceeding measure, And actually that word is used in another part for the abundance of grace. And this was extreme poverty, extreme death. So there are a couple of verses that I have there. And they're the idea that, let's look at one of those at least.

How about the 2 Corinthians 1.8? I think you use the wrong word for extreme depth because it comes according to. I know. I'll address that in a second. Good.

You know, one of the neat things here is that if the three churches you mentioned, Philippi, Thessalonica and Berea, we know very little about Berea, although if when. Paul and Silas went there, Brea, was there were more men who were noble than those in Thessalonica. Thessalonica is a church that's lifted up because of its maturity, at least in the young believers. Philippi, the Epistle of Joy, these are churches that I think kind of potentially stood out as where that grace was really manifesting in a very special way. The word noble is used of them, it seems like, too. They were churches that really where they rightly divided God's word. They were concerned about God's word. Especially Berea was very concerned about God's word.

Can someone read 2 Corinthians 1.8? For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia. that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life.

Right. Excessively. So that word qatah can be used a couple of different ways. It depends on one, and I'm not real strong on this, but it depends on whether it's a preposition. It can be used It can mean down or upon or against and that's sort of the focus of direction or it can be used, we'll see later on in terms of relations, among, according to. So it's an intensifier in this case. But it does kind of strike you. At first I thought, Qatar? That's that's what they're they're they're translating as extreme. It seemed it seemed wrong at first. It seemed like I can't be.

But it's in that in this situation, it intensifies the word depth. It's probably a pepper. Well, it's sort of like a down like you punch down depth. I mean, it's intensifies depth. So that's how the preposition. It's a location where it's exactly right. Exactly. OK, good. I wonder if people ask about that question. That's good Tom. Their poverty went down. This is why I love Uist. There's down, there's the Qatar.

So he takes that word and he folds it into the translation. Go ahead, Tom. When you look at that word for depth, you think of Picard's bathysphere going down to the deepest point of the deepest ocean. And that adds a little bit of excess to it, you would almost have to say. Right.

So to the point here, they were in deep straits. I mean, this was not something... And this is what makes it more incredible. That's why Paul is just astounded. And we'll see here shortly. Their power went down to the depths. But then in the next phrase he says, this doesn't make sense to the human mind. So their depth of poverty overflowed in the wealth of the liberality. I kind of struggle with the phraseology here. I thought the Amplified did a pretty good job. Overflowed in the wealth of lavish generosity on their part. It doesn't make sense. You put this on you.

Here's what we're going to do. We're going to go to the poorest churches in Denver. that are led by the Lord, and we're going to ask for them to give. The other guys, we're not going to go to. It's just totally backwards. You think, wait a minute, you're going the wrong places. They don't have any money. No, you don't realize this is where the Lord wants the money to come from. I don't care how much they have, that will be sufficient. It's just totally backwards. You don't go to the churches that have the money.

You go to the churches that are walking with the Lord and His grace, and that money just like the widows might, will be more than all this lavish abundance. So it's just totally different than what man thinks. Again, I think it relates to the maturity of the body in those various churches in Macedonia.

So Paul is going to testify. He didn't say, I testify or I beseech. Let's just see here. Bear witness. For I testify according to their ability and beyond their ability they gave of their own accord. So they weren't forced to give. That's another part that we're going to see. So this is to bear witness. I testify, bear witness. To testify. And Paul used that and other places to see. And he would testify about a variety of different things.

I want to cover that. OK. The first point is that according to their ability. And here's our Kata again. But in this case, it's going to be according to it's going to be this is the preposition of this direction. According to their relation. I'm sorry. In relation to their ability. According to their ability.

And the idea, let's look at, it's pretty cool, the idea is kind of in 1 Corinthians 16, 1-4. Does someone read that? 1 Corinthians 16, 1-4. So this kind of gives the idea of putting aside Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so do you also.

On the first day of every week, each one of you is to put aside and save as he may prosper, so that no collections be made when I come. When I arrive, whomever you may approve, I will send them with letters to carry your gift to Jerusalem. And if it is fitting for me to go also, they won't go with me. So that's kind of the idea. You put it aside. He didn't want them to wait until he got there. Put it aside as you prosper. So that's the idea.

So the first principle here is that according to their ability. But then the next one, which is just and then beyond their ability. And this is a preposition para, opposed to or contrary to. So contrary to their ability, they're going to give, which is They gave of their own accord. So accord is, and this isn't of their own accord as directed by the Holy Spirit. I'll put a caveat with that.

Because you could argue, well, of their own accord, maybe they're walking in the flesh. But I think this is to show us that they're not being pressured. Their arm isn't being twisted. They aren't using psychology on them. So they gave of their own accord. And let's see. We're going to see that actually coming up. So basically it talks about, as we'll get here in the next week or so, we'll see that, of their own accord or voluntarily. Alright.

Begging us with much urging for the favor of participating in support of the saints. Begging is the idea to desire, to long for. Sometimes it's translated as beseech. I think I got a little ahead of myself there. I was thinking about that earlier. It's almost like they just can't hold back. They just want to say, we know how it feels. And we're going to see how that comes out here very shortly.

So in a couple of verses there it's used in terms of, Paul used it in several occasions, so I won't necessarily look at that. So then the next part is beseeching with much urging. So the idea to make an appeal, and that's actually kind of coming up in the same verse later on.

With much exhortation they begged us, is the way Weiss brings it across. and Roger don't you think that it would be because everyone knew they were the poorest churches so they would not be asked and so in their mind they were like well we're not going to be asked to help the saints in Jerusalem. We want to make sure that Paul knows we want to help. Even though we're the poorest church. Don't forget us.

That's good. That's really cool. But here's the part that's really cool. It doesn't actually come across as participation you don't actually think about. Actually the King James brings it across actually with the word fellowship which I like because the word here is Koinonia. This really blows your mind.

You're sharing with your brothers and sisters. That's the basis of giving. They wanted to share with the brothers and sisters in Jerusalem. They wanted to be in fellowship with them. We have a fellowship meal and we share our food. But they want to share Just like you'd share with anyone in this body, I want to share with you how God has prospered me. In this case, how God has not prospered me. I'm going to share with you what I have. My small amount of financial ability, I want to share with you. It gets down to fellowship. That's part of the whole process of thinking about giving. Giving is a fellowship. Under Grace is to be a fellowship with the recipient.

I don't think about that. I think about, well, let's see, we need cracks in the parking lot. I don't think about, well, that's sharing with my brother or sister who might need that for their need. Back on the last point. I think part of it too is you said they were giving out of mouth their prosperity, but to them they had more than they needed. So it was where their focus was on. We've got more than we need. They obviously had something to give. What they thought they needed was less than maybe other people. But it's kind of relative. But they still felt, God has given us more than we need. So we have extra.

They felt they had enough to give. At some point you say, I don't have enough. They apparently felt they had enough to give, even though they were in deep poverty. And how about the widow's mite? She gave her everything. It says she gave her everything she had, I think, right?

So, I don't know. That's kind of old testament, but interesting. Okay. All right. So, let's go on here. Okay. So, actually, let's see. Who are these saints? Okay. So, I wanted to make sure. Okay. These saints, who are those saints? You guys know probably now. Those saints are the ones in Jerusalem, right? I just want to make sure. You start reading through there and I'm thinking, what? Is it Corinthian saints? What saints are we talking about here?

I did that as much for myself as for you guys. Stay in contact. Stay in contact. This is ministering to the poor saints in Jerusalem. mind-boggling to me. I didn't realize the significant ministry that Paul had in terms of these saints. I mean, I kept thinking, well, he's going around and he's talking about, you know, the gospel, which it was. He's teaching them. But then, oh, by the way, he has this additional ministry that he's providing for these saints in Jerusalem. Randy? There's a huge amount of persecution for the Christians in Jerusalem. Maybe I'm getting ahead of your lesson. That's an excellent point. That's why he's sending money.

If you think about it, if somebody walks away from Holly Hills and they say, I'm not a Christian anymore, our thought usually is not like, you're excommunicated. But if you left Judaism and you said that Moses was wrong and Jesus was right, you were cut off. And so no one may do business with you. They may not communicate with you. You're not going to be invited to Christmas or Easter, right? That's of course a Jewish thing, right? But you're cut off. Exactly. And so they needed support. They did. And actually, I don't think we realize, your point is well taken, how significant that was to be excommunicated from the Jewish culture and just be.

And then Paul, right before Paul's saved, he just puts a pedal to the metal. I'm going to chase you guys down. If you're still in Jerusalem, I'm going to get you there. If you travel, I'm going to chase you down to wherever. And then the Lord says, well, wait a minute, Paul. Hold the boat here. You've gone far enough. I didn't get a chance to pursue that. Anyway, that's a good point. And this is where Paul kind of does an aha.

And this, not as we had expected, but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God. So a couple of the principles are going to come out here, which is pretty cool. And this, not as we expected, or actually it could be what we hoped, which seems a little strange. So the first principle is they gave themselves to the Lord. So I'm going to kind of summarize this at the end.

So the first part of giving, and it makes total sense, if you aren't walking in fellowship with the Lord, you shouldn't be giving. And that's why we want to take money from unbelievers. We don't want their money. So they first gave themselves to the Lord, gave is to give oneself, deliver, consecrate and then to us, and I put a little asterisk there, to us by the will of God.

So is Paul kind of hedging here a little bit? Go ahead. Wouldn't you hope that they'd walk with the Lord first and then they'd give? What do you hope for? Money? Well I think he's talking, I took that Yeah, I see what you're saying. I took that as going back to the previous verse. I mean, they had not as we expect. Well, hope, hope, you know, that's maybe a better. And that's why it's in there, Bob. But actually, it is literally hope. And so, you know, once again, the context, context, context. So in this context, I agree with you. He didn't expect these very poor people to have anything left. They were totally drained as far as I think that's better. And that's better.

And so, you know, what's the interlinear recap there? Is anybody have that? I don't have expected versus hoped. I can get it sometime. I'm looking it up. Well, like in the numerical standard, it has a little little footnote says hoped. I mean, you know. The word is literally hope, and that happens.

You'll see that will come across, not in this case, but in many cases. The little translation of many words is not what will be brought across in the translation sometimes. I think this is better expected. It still says not as we hoped. Right. Anyway, I think in the context, expected is the preferred.

That's why it's there, I think. Let me just go down here. So once again, Paul's minister to us, Paul's minister to support the saints in Jerusalem. I was just kind of thinking of myself here, putting myself here. So as I learn from this text of scripture, I want to be in fellowship with the Lord. And then it says, before I think about giving, I want to be involved in the ministry. I'll kind of make the transition here.

This is talking about being part of the ministry with the Saints in Jerusalem, but like here at Holly Hills, if there's an opportunity to be part of the ministry of what's going on, that seemed to me to be included. That could be anything involved in the ministry at Holly Hills. The whole spectrum. teaching, it can be in the nursery, it can be anything.

And then lastly we're going to see giving financially is the third part of that. So that comes as a third thing. So this is a cool thing. Giving. Are you giving yourselves sacrificially? There's a lot of verses like in Romans 12. Present your body as a living sacrifice. So there's plenty of verses talking about how we're to give ourselves and to walk with the Lord. So that's part of the first, giving ourselves. Secondly, to the ministry.

And so we're going to come back to that. So actually here's a verse that kind of is a little bit kind of transitioning into the rest of the as we go into next week. So we urge Titus that as he had previously made a beginning, so he would also complete in you this gracious work as well. I found this a little bit Kind of hard to track through this totally. We urged. So it's the idea that we urged or exhorted him to make an appeal.

In 1218, can someone read 2 Corinthians 12.18?

I desired Titus, and with him I sent a brother. Did Titus make a gain of you? Walked we not in the same spirit? Walked we not in the same steps? So, and then also there's another one in, it's coming down the pipe, talking about Titus. So Titus was involved in several different things with Paul. So he's talking to Titus about the Corinthians it seems like. that as he had previously made a beginning on a previous occasion, so he would also complete in you this gracious work as well. So the question is, what is this gracious work, this little act of grace? So what do you think? I didn't have a good answer. I think it's to do with giving, but go ahead.

Yeah, well I think coming back from chapter 7 where Titus had come back from Corinth and had represented it and encouraged Paul and said, hey, you guys, Titus is testifying that the Lord is working in you. That's his beginning. Right, good point. We get here and they're going to send Titus back with this letter. So imagine this letter, 2 Corinthians, shows up. Titus is carrying it with another brother, as 12 says. And the gracious work is to collect some money for the brethren in Jerusalem. That's how I would understand it. Excellent. Thank you. That's good.

The same principle, actually, if we read the letter to the Philippians, we see the beginning of Philippians. He says that the Lord would complete this work in you. And the idea is, again, this generosity of giving. Right. And that's a good point. That's kind of the where the rubber meets the road. If God has been working in your heart and leading you along, that's the final part of that. Part of his grace.

It's cool. I think it's worth calling out, Roger, that when we think about stewardship, it's easy to get focused on one narrow area. Like, oh, well, I've got to give 10%, or I'm going to give whatever percentage, and it's money. But we have this stewardship, and what's awesome is that we can see, even if we don't have resources, that there's still an opportunity.

One person got to go travel, at least, with Paul. That's cool. It wasn't money, but boy, you get to go out. Yeah, actually, there's a verse I found that says, and there was this guy from this church and this guy from that church, they all were with Paul. I'm saying, man, he's got a whole caravan of guys here, traipsing around with him. And they just got, you know, mouths open, so to speak. Look, this is the Apostle Paul. We get to hang out with him.

This is pretty cool. Pretty neat stuff. Okay, so here's my and so actually I tried to put some footnotes as I did before He is Titus and you as a church at Corinth. So, okay. So here's my attempt at principle and this is highly influenced by I went back and listened to what Hal had done So this is highly influenced by that and by others. So anyway, here we go.

So what does grace giving look like? First First, giving of oneself to the Lord. Second, giving to the ministry by the will of God. So that's what I talked about. So the first two you can do and never touch your pocketbook. I think most of us, as the Lord has allowed us, we give ourselves to the Lord and we want to be involved in the ministry. It doesn't have to be anything. It's whatever you can do. Whatever the Lord leads you to. And third is finances.

I like this part. I kind of folded this part in. It's to be a fellowship with recipients. And that really freed me from thinking, wow, this is really cool. I get to have fellowship with Randy, or with Bob, or whatever, and giving. It's pretty cool stuff.

Two parts of this you give according to your ability, so you're wise and careful about this, and even beyond your ability as the Lord directs. I put the little caveat where Paul didn't expect this, so I'm not putting the burden on anybody here. I'm just saying Paul thought it was astounding, and I think it's astounding too, giving beyond your ability.

But the churches in Macedonia, as pointed out, did not. I want to help the ones in Jerusalem. And they thought that was no big burden. To me it seems like it could be extra arm twisting. I'm not going to say that. It's a court, you know, it's a role in a court, no pressure. So this is my, my, my attempt at that. No offering place. No offering place, right.

You know, that's great, Roger. I think this is really very applicable to the way you've stated it. I'm going back to something we just discussed that I'm struggling with, but I, I think Paul, You know, Paul's fully recognizable of his pre-saved self, right? Exactly.

By the way, I hoped that you would just go ahead and give. By the way, I'm learning a lesson, because that lesson I'm learning is you first gave yourself to the Lord, and then unto the will of God. I mean, in other words, I think what he's saying is, you know, we kind of expected you to be giving, but look what you've done. I mean, it doesn't come across quite that way, but it puts his hope, really kind of his expectation was that they give. Oh, but by the way, We need to see God's grace work through God's will to have this happen and praise the Lord. I'm kind of paraphrasing this, but is that okay? I like that. Well, I see this is all giving. This is how giving looks like.

So don't put the cart before the horse, so to speak. The cart is the financial part. Don't put that up first. follow what the passage says. They gave themselves to the Lord first, then to his will. I struggle with how to phrase that a little bit. The ministry and the will of God. So you give yourself to God's will. How should I be involved in this ministry? Thirdly, the financial part.

I think that's key. Think of it as a fellowship. That's what makes it cool. You think, hey, this is cool. I get the fellowship. We can have coffee, and I can help you if you need it. So that's it for today. Great class. Thanks for all the input. So we're going to continue on next week. Next week kind of shifts, and we're going to get a little bit different labor here. And then actually we go on into chapter 10, being a hilarious giver.

We thank you Father, thank you so much Lord for the blessings we have. Lord thank you that you want to be involved totally in our giving of ourselves and our work in the ministry and in our financial parts Lord and we pray that we would see that you're involved and it's not that we're trying to figure out something that some kind of amount of whatever that would please you that you already are working in our hearts to show us what what the needs are and that we respond by faith father in Christ's name Amen