Portfolio - Week 3

Amen. We're gonna continue in our series today portfolio talking about talking about giving,

and we have we've established over the last two weeks. We talked about

tithe. In week one, we talked about offering. Last week Amen and

uh uh. And this week we're gonna we're gonna talk about another element because

we we talked about how the tithe is that planting and harvest rain it makes

the soul receptive able to be planted into. And then we talked about last

week that that that you're offering is the seed that we sow and that God

multiplies at the seed level and everything in giving God that God talks about it

as sowing and reaping. It's it's agricultural talk. It is uh. It

is the way that that that harvest happens. And you know, one thing

that that you have to know is that you have to know that you're planting

seed in good ground. Say amen, Amen. You know, most of

the time you plan a seed in sand, nothing happens. You plan a

seed in good ground, it causes it to germinate. And here's the only

difference is that when seed goes in sand, sand doesn't know what to do

with the seed. Just simply doesn't know what to do. But Good Soul

has the right I'm not going to go go into it's got the right conditions

to make germination happen. The microbes and all of the fertility that's there causes

germination to happen. So when you start thinking about where you give and what

you give and those kinds of things, make sure that you're giving in a

place that they know what to do with the seed when it's planted. One

thing I can guarantee you is that when you give here, your money goes

to ministry to help live. Uh. You know, we're not We do

not have the philosophy of building a huge bankroll. That is not our plan.

As a matter of fact, usually if you're if you're giving today,

by Wednesday, it's too late for you to ask for it back because we've

already done something with it. Come on, somebody. That is the way

that we believe that that lives need to be touched right now. Now.

We're fiscally responsible, But we don't just sit on your tithe and your offerings.

We uh, we we have a plan and a vision to reach our

community and people that are far from Jesus. The other The other element that

we need when we talk about giving and bringing seed to harvest is along the

lines. There has to be there has to be a catalyst, There has

to be a fertilizer that's added to that in order to create that harvest and

to bring things into perfect timing. And today I want to venture away from

money a little bit, and I want to talk about that other element that

brings fruit will harvest into our lives. I think it's one element that we

don't look at enough when we talk about giving, because we think it's just

about throwing some seed on the ground and kicking dirt over it and then expecting

God to do something with it. But if we don't operate in an attitude

of gratitude, then we're not fertilizing that seed. That's song. See,

graciousness and gratitude is everything in giving. Let's start in Second Corinthians chapter nine.

We're gonna read a passage we read last week. We're gonna spend a

little more time on this particular part of it than we did last week.

But Second Corinthians chapter nine, starting in verse seven, So let each one

give us he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity. God

loves a cheerful giver, and God is able to make all grace abound toward

you, that you, always, having all sufficiency in all things, may

have an abundance for every good work. Let's pray, Father, I thank

you for your mercy. I thank you for your grace. Lord, I

thank you for who you are and all that we are in you. I

pray that you illuminate your word today. I pray that you help us gain

kingdom perspective and that we begin to operate Lord in graciousness like we've never operated

before. Lord, we give you glory and honor and praise in Jesus' name.

Amen, Amen, and amen. You know, when I first started

lead pastoring, my sermon, the tempo, the energy, what was largely

impacted by the number of seats filled. Come on somebody. In other words,

if people didn't come to church, I didn't preach as good. And

the reason is because I had my eyes focused on what wasn't there rather than

what was there. And over the years I've learned that I can't control whether

you come to church or not. I can't control that. As a matter

of fact, it's quite surprising that I can preach my very worst sermons,

and there'll be more people here than when I think I preach my very best

sermons. There's nothing I can do to control that. But what I can

do is be grateful that God sent the right person to hear the right word

at the right time, so that they are positioned to receive something from Him

that they've never received before. And graciousness is all about perspective. It's all

about understanding that there are multiple ways to do everything. And here Scripture says

that God loves a cheerful giver, And when we really look at the foundation

of that word cheerful, it's one who has a gracious attitude, one who

is appreciative of the opportunity to give back. That is literally what it means

when it says God loves a cheerful giver, not grudgingly of necessity, although

there are times where I'm sure that we have given that way in our lives,

where you know, sometimes you don't give because it feels good, you

give because it feels bad. You just know that it has to be done,

and you do it. But God loves God's desire. God's heart is

attracted to the gracious attitude of giving. And when we begin to do that,

and we begin to operate in another perspective, and there's a level of

gratitude that is hard to come by. Do you realize I want you to

think about the relationships in your life for just a moment. I want you

to think about the people in your life, and how many people in your

life skew more negative than they do positive. Now, if you work in

the public sector and people are coming into your business, you know that that's

true. You probably see ninety percent of people that there's always something wrong.

Come on, now, listen. If I look for something wrong, I

will find something wrong. As a matter of fact, one hundred percent of

the time, you're going to find what you look for. If you're looking

at your wife and you want there to be problems, I'm su're gonna find

problems with your wife. But if you if you look for if you look

at your wife with appreciation, you look at your wife with with love and

admiration, you're going to find those things in return. Because we get what

we look for. And when it comes to giving, most of us operate

in one of two categories. It's either obligatory. In other words, we're

we're obligated to give. We know that we're supposed to give, and we

somehow give because we're in fear that God is gonna do something if we don't.

Now we have this idea of God and and and it's translated through many

other cultures and many other religions that God is angry and he sits on his

throne with a thunderbolt, and he's waiting for us to do the wrong thing

because he's a gotcha God, and he's just waiting so that you go sa

file. He wants to punish you, he wants to zap you, he

wants to get back at you. But our God is a gracious, loving,

good God. He is a gotch God, but he wants to catch

you doing something good so that he can release his blessings on you. And

then there is the hap hazard giver who just simply when the bucket comes around,

there's no forethought, and you reach in your pocket and you just throw

whatever's there in the bucket. And the hap hazard giver is not gracious or

grudge grudgey. He's just not anything. It's just, hey, God,

I'll just give you whatever I happen to have, and then I guarantee you

at some point, as a haphazard giver, you have done that and you've

gotten to the restaurant and you're thinking, oh, no, I gave too

much. I thought that I thought that fifty dollars bill was in my billfold,

but it wasn't. It was in my front pocket. How can I

get Should I just call the church and tell them I need that back.

No, I can't call the church and tell them I need that bag.

I'd be terrible if I call the church tell him I need that The reason

we knew buckets now instead of plates is so it's harder for you to make

change. That's why we used to use the bags. It was impossible to

see down in the bags. But then somebody visited our church one time and

went told people that we passed bags that had snakes and everybody was sticking their

hand and they're impetting the snake. And when somebody told me that, I

said, obviously they didn't give an offering. Obviously they they didn't give anything,

or they would have realized that there was money in there and not snakes.

But the reality is is God wants us to transition from obligatory givers or

haphazard givers to cheerful, grateful givers. He wants us to get involved.

That's what we talked about in the flow of God. He wants us to

get involved in the in the seed time harvest process by looking at our lives

and realizing that He's already done so much, that He's already done things for

me that I could never expect anybody to do based on my actions. In

One Thessalonians, chapter five, verse fourteen, it says, now we exhort

you, brethren, warn those who are unruly, comfort the faint heart,

and uphold the week. Be patient with awe. See that no one renders

evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good, both for

yourselves and for all. Rejoice, always pray without ceasing. In everything,

give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you,

he says, in everything that's happening, give thanks. Give thanks.

When things are not going the way we felt like they should go, give

thanks. Live with a thankful attitude because God desires his very best for you.

And God's very best for you is better than your best for you.

Because you don't have the foreknowledge of what's coming in the next season of your

life. And sometimes when we go through times that it just doesn't necessarily feel

good. As a matter of fact, I just want to show one hands

how many times you ever been through a season in your life where just it

didn't feel good. But then you get a little further down the road and

you realize that that was the training ground for whatever was to come. And

I got some skills through the difficult times to help me make it through the

next season. And the next season became a testimony because of what God did

in the past. Because God doesn't look at our lives the way we look

at our lives. We see time linear. We see God moving and working

on a timeline that stretches from left to right, and I'm somewhere on this

line. But when God looks at time, God takes our timeline and he

turns it on its end, and he looks from top to bottom. And

for God, everything happens at once because he sits above time, and he

says, if I can position them in this moment, tomorrow will be more

beneficial than a small blessing today. If I can just move them through the

seasons of training and building them an appreciation for who I am, and a

deeper trust in my character and my nature. Most of our troubles happen with

God when we seek the hands of God what God does for us, rather

than seeking the face of God who he is, his character, and his

nature. Because if we seek what He does for us, sometimes it looks

like God's not for us. Let me say that again, if we just

simply look for what he does. We threw a ten in the offering.

We quoted that scripture. God multiply some thirty, some sixty some one hundred

fold. I got one hundred fold faith. So let's turn that ten into

a grain. Come on, baby by bay, throw the dice. That's

our attitude with God. Right, And we think that that's that, that's

who he is. But three reality is God is building a legacy through us.

He is writing a beautiful story through our lives. And that story unfolds

word by word, paragraph by paragraph, page by page, and we learn

to live in the gratitude that God didn't give us what we deserve. In

James Chapter one, verse two, us as my brethren count it all.

Joy, Now listen me hold on, let me finish, my brethren,

count it all joy. And when you fall into various trials, knowing that

the testing of your faith produces patience, But let patience have its perfect work,

that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. Uh, that's

worth reading just one more time. As a matter of fact, if you

know that, that's probably worth tweeting. Just that that passage of scripture,

that's probably worth underlining. If you've got one of those old fashioned paper bibles,

come on, somebody, probably you can highlight it even in your digital

Bible and set a reminder to read it every day, because this one will

help you, it says my brethren, count it all joy when you fall

into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience, But

let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete,

lacking nothing. Understanding that now is not the appropriate time for everything. Now

this applies in multiple ways, not just gratitude. Right. There are times

to have conversations and times not to have conversations. Are there are time for

confrontations, and there's times for mercy. That there's times for everything. And

as a matter of fact, there's a whole book of the Bible based on

that Ecclesiastes. There is a time for everything, and when we understand that

that these happenings, these trials that we're going through, we count them joy.

Now I struggle with that, and I used to say, I want

to have a conversation with the writer because there's some things that I just don't

I'm just not able to count joy. But that was when I lived in

the reality of that this moment is the most important moment. But this moment,

right here, right now, it's just another moment. Come on,

somebody, This one has no more weight than the moments that have gone by

or the moments that are yet to come. It is a moment pregnant with

the possibility of God, the miraculous workings all around us, but so is

the next moment and the one that preceded it. And our ability to count

things joy when things get difficult allows us to experience God on a whole nother

level that I don't just need him now, but I just need him.

I need him for yesterday and I need him for tomorrow. I don't know

what tomorrow is gonna throw at me, but I'm gonna lean into him tomorrow

and I might as well be leaning into him. Now it's a state of

mind, and we count it all joy. You know, when my oldest

daughter, she was a brand new baby, and you don't know how to

do things when you're a first time parent. I mean, you know most

of the things we get wrong. As a matter of fact, we finally

decided to have LEXI came to the conclusion, listen, we didn't kill Madison,

so we can probably keep a second one alive. Right. Uh.

But there was this one moment she she wasn't very old, and she,

uh, she had a messy diaper, And I told Angel I was the

hero and the story, because I'm always the hero in the story. You're

always the hero in your story, right, how does listen, baby,

I got this, don't worry about I'm gonna change the diaper. So I

went over and on did the diaper, and it was bad. It was

like, whoa, when did you eat that? I mean, you know

that's just like so I just like I had seen, you know, I

had been taught or reached down, picked her up by her legs, wiped

her off cleaneder you know, folded the thing and put the new diaper under

there, and she she made she passed just a little bit of gas,

just just a little you know, and I smile. It was so cute,

you know, this this moment and I looked down and you know,

her butt was making this. I didn't know what was happening. And I

looked at the engine. I said, wasn't. And when I said,

was it that cute? Is what I was gonna say, wasn't. When

I said wasn't, straight into my mouth. And now I'm holding it's everywhere.

It is everywhere right, and and and and all that I can say

is not, thank you Lord, That's not That's not what was on my

mind. You know, I was saying, he's bird's Bird's bad. It's

bad. I couldn't get because I didn't want to move my tongue right because

it was just it was a moment of just total I don't know what.

I've never experienced anything like that since either. And here's the thing, that

moment, I didn't feel a whole lot of joy. But I get down

the road and that's one of the most joyful, exciting, fun moments that

we love to tell about because we're past that now and it's one of those

memorial stones. It's one of those life experiences that you get past and you

realize that had I had the same joyful attitude, then I would have allowed

that moment and that memory to be so much more fervent and so much more

rich in my memory and in my life. Cause I don't remember putting the

diaper owner, I don't remember how the rest of that story went. It

stopped with me say it's bad, but now it's say it's a sense of

joy. So let me ask you this, Why would joy be different a

few days later than it was in the moment. It's because my perspective was

different. It's because my my perspective wasn't the same in the heat of the

moment as it was down the road. There's a there's this this narrative that

Jesus, this teaching that Jesus gives in scripture, and we like to talk

about it because, you know, we point out that it's about hypocrisy,

where Jesus says, hey, you know, you're talking about the speck in

your brother's eye, but what about the beam in your own eye? What

about that big plank, that big board that's sticking out of your eye?

And you know, when it's preceded by by hey, don't judge, and

we just we we manipulate and just tear scripture all apart, and we say,

oh, you're not supposed to judge. Bible says don't judge. That's

naturally not in the Bible. It says, don't judge, lest you be

judged by the same measure of judgment you give, you will be judged.

He's like, listen, don't don't don't be a butt. That's the point

of that teaching is, don't be a butt to other people, show mercy

to people. But really, he tells this story and he uses the eye

because he could have used anything right. He uses the eye because the eye

is the object of perspective. And he says, here, you have a

perspective, but your spect your perspective is skewed because in your perspective, you're

always the most important person. You're the always the most important thing. And

he says, if you don't get perspective right, then you miss some great

beautiful discipline, some great beautiful opportunities in the kingdom, like repentance, like

forgiveness, like counting it all joy when it doesn't necessarily feel joyful. But

when I get down the road, I suddenly realize that it's blossomed into this

beautiful moment and looking back, if I had experienced it joyfully, then it

would have been so much richer. Now, you know, well what you

said this was you said you were gonna talk about giving. When we live

in this attitude of gratitude, When we live in this attitude where we count

things joy rather than always focusing on the things we don't have, we become

appreciative of the things that we do have. We become appreciative for what God

is doing in this moment right now. So when we go through those hard

and difficult times, and I look back in my life, you know,

of the one difficult time in my life was when my grandmother passed away.

My grandmother passed away, and I was right here in this church on a

Sunday night when I got the phone call to come to the hospital because my

grandmother was not gonna make it. I might not even make it to the

hospital. So I raced up to the hospital and she passed away just probably

twenty minutes after I got there. The whole family was there when she breathed

her last breath. We were in the room together, and that was a

traumatic, difficult moment. But I looked back at that moment and as far

as I can remember, that was the last time that our entire family was

in a room together. That was the last time that real togetherness happened.

And there was none of the usual Brazleton gathering stuff happening. Nobody was throwing

punches, come on, somebody, Nobody was talking about this and talking about

that and screaming and yelling. It was just we were there together, and

in that moment there was this beautiful sense of love and family togetherness. That

was a moment. If my perspective had been different, that would have been

so much more beautiful and joyful because I had the perspective of gratitude. Lord,

thank you for allowing us to experience this together. You know that,

Pastor, you're crazy man. You Yeah, those things that you're talking about,

those are not real. I want to assure you the things that I

share with you are real. I had some teenagers one time who were who

lived a very isolated, sally sheltered life that they were kept from any cultural

experience. And they graduated from high school and they went to college, and

like the second week of college, they came back to you one time and

they sat down in their eyes were like that big a rounds and they said

that and they said, those things that you told us, they're real.

And I said, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, they're real.

They're real. We just thought that you were just making stuff up. But

this real. People really act like that. And I said, yeah,

I know, I know people act like that. It's like we just had

we known, we would have listened better. Listen, listen better. These

things are real. Look for opportunities and everything that happens to be gracious and

show gratitude. When you get to the restaurant today and you get the worst

waitress in the world. All the food's wrong, and it's cold, and

it's slow, and she doesn't know how to run your credit card and all

of those things happen, look at it and say, hey, this is

an opportunity for me to show kindness to someone who is not going to get

kindness from anybody else in this building. What an opportunity. God, thank

you for allowing me to be the one to show where the love of Jesus.

Or when you go to get your corn beef today it was the Saint

Patrick's Dan and you got to cook corn beef right. So when you go

and there's not a corn beef left at the convenience store, don't get all

bunched up and mad. Just get a brisket. It's the same thing.

Find opportunities to be gracious and to show gratitude, and that comes alongside the

seeds that we sow, and suddenly, because we're not making demands for God

to speed along our harvest and eat a premature harvest, that it can become

ripe and fresh. Because we don't always see ourselves beaten down or in need.

We see ourselves living in plenty, so that our harvest can actually come

to ripeness and that we can get the maximized harvest from the seed we sow

because we live in an attitude of gratitude. Clinch, you guys can come

and get ready if you want to. In Psalm chapter one thirty nine,

starting in verse thirteen, it says, for you formed me, for you

formed my inward parts, you covered me in my mother's womb. I will

praise you. I will praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Marvelous are your works, and that my soul knows very well. Thank

you. Lord, I'm going to praise you because there's nobody else like me.

Lord, I'm going to praise you because you hand made me. What

you think about that you're not assembly line, your handmade, your hand made,

crafted and put together, not by some novice, not even by an

apprentice, handmade by the master craftsman of the universe. That he knitted you

together and he made you, and that you're so unique that no one else

has a fingerprint like yours. That you're so unique that no one else that

has ever lived or ever will live, has the same neural pathways and thought

processes that you have. That God made you exactly the way you are because

He sees value in you. When he made you, he threw away the

mold. Now, I know some of you have been told that before,

and it was not in a good context. I'm telling you, I'm saying

it's a good thing. Because there's nobody like you, and things may be

difficult, you may feel pressure, But God created and designed you for such

a time as this wonderfully and marvelously made. And if you can't think of

any other reason to be grateful, be grateful because you're one of a kind

that throughout all of creation, you are the only one. Wow. I

was pastoring a little church plant Man. I preached my heart out. I

thought it was the best sermon I'd ever preached. Care I made the altar

clouse, expecting everybody in the place just to weep and run and fall on

the floor, and just you know, I got to the end of it,

and I made the altar calling not a soul moved. I thought,

Hm, that's strange. I remember getting in the car that day and pulling

out of the little shopping center where the church was turning round, and I

was going through Brazleton. I told God, I said, God, I'm

never I'm never gonna be able to preach with the authority of Rod Parsley.

I'm never gonna be able to to put sentences together like TD Jakes. I'm

never gonna be funny like Jesse to Plants. I was going through all these

people that I watched on TV. It was like the Holy Spirit just kind

of sat down beside me and buckled in and he said good. He said,

cause you know, I've already got a Rod Parsley. I've already got

a T. D. Jakes. I've already got a Jesse to planets.

What I really need is a Steve Stewart. And I've been looking around.

You're the best one I got. You're you're him. And I said,

but Lord, why didn't anybody come to the altar? Why did I preach

my heart out? And nobody came to the altar? And I felt the

Lord say, because you've done a pretty good job the week's prior to this

too. Nobody came in with immense need today, and I thought, oh

my gosh, these things cumulative. People are starting to grow in the Lord.

People are starting to experience new things. And I learned to be gracious

for the people in the seats. I learned to be gracious for what came

in and the offering, and in those days it wasn't very much. And

then I saw God bless start changing lives, touching people and moving me to

places that I never thought were attainable, just because my perspective changed just a

little bit. Today, if your perspective will change just a little bit,

the harvests in your life will grow exponentially because you're not making a withdrawal from

the seed that you saw, because you realize God is sufficient and right now

enough is enough everybody staying with me all over the building. If you're here

today and you can examine your life and say, hey, there's some areas

I haven't been very grateful in, Well, let me not even start there.

Let me start here. As you've examined your heart through this message,

you would say to yourself, I'm a pretty negative, miserable person. I

complain about everything. I can't see the bright side because I feel like I'm

locked in the dark, and I want to change that today. I want

to stop seeing the world as a negative, broken, hateful place, and

I want to start seeing the world as a place filled with the opportunity that

God has placed me in to make a difference around me. If that's you,

this ultra cause for you, or maybe you're here and you'd say,

hey, I got some areas of my life and I'm probably not as grateful

as I should be, probably not as gracious. I'm not tried to see

the blessings of God. But I want to start doing that. Maybe you're

here today and you've never experienced Jesus. You feel like the world is a

hard, cold place because you don't know the Creator in a personal real way.

But today you want to come to know him today. You want to

trust him today. You want to say, wash away my sins, my

shortcomings, and make me a new creation. If you're in any of those

places today, this alter moment is for you. So if you're here and

you'd say, hey, I just I'm a negative person. I want that

to change. I got some areas I could be more gratefully, and I

want that to happen. Or you want to know Jesus as your savior.

On the count of three, I want you to step out, and I

want you to make your way to the front. Fertilize the seeds you've shown

you've suwn. It'll change your harvest. On the count of three, step

out and move one, two, three, step out and move right.

Now, come on, come on, the band's gonna play. These altars

are open our alter team as you're waiting on you operate in that attitude of

gratitude. It'll change everything.