God’s Surprising Path to Rest & Abundance

Welcome to the Illuminate Church podcast.

We hope today's message is encouraging to you.

We are in our final week of unrest.

The series ends today, and we have one final principle to

learn about what God wants to teach us to transform us from

the way that we rest to the way that He rests, because his rest

is actually restorative. Let's go.

And our rest is just kind of busyness that looks a little bit

like laziness, and we're not sure it's restful at all.

But His rest is restorative. One last principle to share

about the Sabbath, which is this 24 hour period of time that the

Lord has said to keep holy, to set it apart as holy to Him.

Here's what it really boils down to.

God loves you so much that He's commanded you to rest.

That's how much He loves you. He wants you to take time apart

with him, with people you love, doing things that you love, stop

your regular work and rest and what he calls the Sabbath.

And I keep saying that we have this one last week today to

really end up the this series called unrest.

But the truth is, if you will obey the word of the Lord and

begin to practice the Sabbath, you have a day a week to

continue to familiarize yourself with the Sabbath and to I don't

want to say perfected because that has so much legalism in it,

but I just mean that you will get better and better at

practicing the Sabbath and sabath theme as you go about

sabath theme, not sunbathing, which is what sabath theme gets

auto corrected to. We talked about that in Week 2.

All right, So if you're ready for the last, the message today,

say I'm ready. The message title is the last

principle that I want to share with you.

It's called more with less everyone say more with less.

Look at your neighbor, Say more with less you look at me.

Look at him more with less. Really what I want to convey to

you is do you want more or do you want less?

What if I said it's more anger? I'm just kidding.

No, not just if you do you want more life or less life.

Three of you want more. The rest of you want less less.

Do you want more provision or less provision?

Do you want more peace or less peace?

More purpose or less purpose? Do you want more discernment or

less discernment? Do you want more energy or less

energy? Drink a Red Bull.

Now here's the thing. It's a biblical principle.

If you want more than you're going to have to start with what

appears to be less. Another way to think of it is

these two words counter intuitive.

Living more with less, That's counter intuitive.

It would seem like you have more if you had more, but really in

the Kingdom of God you have more when you have less.

Paul says it this way in a letter that he wrote to the

church in Corinth. If you want to open your Bibles

to 1st Corinthians chapter 1, if you need a Bible, raise your

hand and the ushers will bring you Bible.

You can use the You Version app or if you're lazy, I'm going to

put it on the screen and enable you First Corinthians chapter 1.

1 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention

When you're ready, say ready. If you're not ready, say hold

up. OK, I'm going to wait.

I want you to have the Word of God.

If you're sitting there at home watching open a Bible, don't

just observe, participate in this.

Paul is writing to the church in Corinth of one of the first

churches he planted, and this is the first letter you wrote in

the 1st chapter. And look what he says.

Verse 26. All right, I got to go.

Now, if you're not ready, that's on you.

Verse 26, Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you

were called. Let's stop here.

The Lord got through. Paul is having us do a little

bit of reflection. A juxtaposition is being set up.

Remember who you were before you were called.

Remember who you were before Jesus.

Remember who you were before you were asked to serve in some way

in His Kingdom. Think for just a moment not to

be lowly about yourself, but to marvel on what God has done.

That's what we read next. Not many of you were wise by

human standards before you were called before Jesus.

You're just a nobody. Not many of you were

influential, didn't have many followers on YouTube.

Not many of you were of noble birth.

Verse 27. But God chose the foolish things

of the world to shame the wise. God chose the weak things of the

world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things, the

despised things and the things that are not to nullify the

things that are so that no one may boast before him.

It is because of him, God, that you are in Christ Jesus, who has

become for us wisdom from God. That is our righteousness,

holiness and redemption. That's what Jesus is for us, our

righteousness, our holiness and redemption.

Therefore, as it is written, let the one who boasts boast in the

Lord. I have done nothing.

He has done it all. God took a murdering stutterer

and made him the leader of the all the Israelite people.

This murdering stutterer didn't even want the job.

He tried to talk God out of it. Not me.

I stutter too much. Pick somebody better.

And yet God used them to lead probably the greatest escape in

human history, where 2,000,000 Israelites were freed from the

hand of Pharaoh overnight. And not only that, God used this

murderer, stuttering Doofus to lead one of the greatest

military battles victories. In one moment, as Pharaoh and

his army were caught up in the sea and vanquished, God used

Moses the fool to shame the wisdom of Pharaoh.

Not only that, but God took the weakest man in the weakest

family in the weakest clan, in the weakest tribe of all the

Israelites. That would be like me going and

saying, no, not the worst player in the NBA, not even the worst

player in the G League. No, not the worst player in

college. Not the worst player in high

school. OK, now I got the JV junior high

school. No, no, with elementary school

junior team. The last guy on the bench who

never sees the court, That's who we're talking about.

God chose that man. And then he said, hey, I want

you to take your 30,000 army and lower it down to 300 men and go

to fight Midian. And here is Gideon, the weakest

of all, shaming the strength of the Midianites.

It's counterintuitive, it doesn't make sense.

How could God do so much with so little?

God took a lowly slave girl and made her the queen of a nation

and she had such influence this non noble that she LED her

people from death to life. We know her as say her name

Esther. Esther what a great name, a

nobody who God used to save the nation.

God took a military brat, a religiously hypocritical

teenager, a clueless college kid to build a church the likes of

which the gates of hell cannot withstand.

His name is Tim Ingram. It's me, a nobody.

And God is using this nobody who doesn't have a lot of wisdom,

who doesn't have a lot of strength to confound the wisdom

of the world and the strength of the world.

And here we are today as evidence of God's hand.

God took a baby boy and raised him the age of 33 and allowed

him to be crucified on a cross. Now check this out as

counterintuitive. In death he brought us life.

In death, loss, He brought us victory.

The people wanted a warrior. God gave him a baby, and the

baby became the king of kings. His name is Satan.

Count of 3123. Counterintuitive living says

that there's no way that this can happen.

It's impossible, It doesn't make sense to take the weakest of the

weak and have them confound the strongest and the wisest.

And it's absolutely true that it doesn't make sense and it won't

work out if the limit of what you have is humanity.

But when you add in the exertion of the power and the authority

and the wisdom of the knowledge of the Lord God, then what's

impossible becomes possible. And This is why Paul tells us

you ain't got nothing to boast about because you alone is you

alone, but you with God unstoppable.

A lot of people talk about wanting good common sense.

I want uncommon sense a lot of people talk about.

I want power, I want supernatural power.

I want to boast and what God is and God can do and not be

limited by what Tim is and Tim can do.

Amen. Indeed.

So it sounds great to us. I believe when God does an

incredible work, a mighty thing through a weak vessel, we

rejoice in that. It makes all of us feel like

there's something that's possible.

We say yes to counterintuitive living, yes to God doing

something that only God can do, and we rejoice and we do boast

in the Lord. But what about when God says

this? You will have more time if you

give me one day a week. It's counterintuitive.

It doesn't make sense according to human standards.

Or what about when God says you will have more provision when

you give 10% of your provision away?

Well, that doesn't make sense either.

I would have more provision if I just kept my provision.

If I give away my provision, I have less provision.

So according to the world standards, it doesn't make

sense. It's counterintuitive to think

that with less, you'd actually have more.

I want you to know that Sabbath thing and giving, they're

essentially the same thing. They ask a question of us that

we must answer if we want more with less.

Here's the question, who is Lord of all?

Who is Lord of all? Many of us in here rejoice that

Jesus is our Savior. Can I get an Amen that we have

access to the Father eternally, both now and beyond this life?

We will be living with our heavenly Father in the glory of

heaven. We'll get new bodies.

This earth will go away. Get a new earth.

It's going to be incredible because He's our Savior and we

rejoice in that. We're happy He's our Savior, but

are you happy He's your Lord? He's Lord no matter what.

By the way, you don't choose that.

You can choose whether or not He's your Savior, but He's

always the Lord. The question is, are you

submitted to His Lordship, His authority, His Kingdom order?

Because that includes such things as giving and Sabbath

thing. I want to talk to you today

about giving, specifically my journey around giving so that I

can relate it to how Sabbath thing works.

So follow me here, OK? OK Psalm chapter 24 verse one

Psalms 24 · chapter mention

says the earth is the Lord's and everything in it, the world and

all who live in it. Don't y'all know it.

Sometimes a verse is hard to understand.

Luke chapter 14 verse 26. Jesus says unless you hate your

Luke 14:26

father and mother, your brothers and sisters, your children,

unless you hate yourself, you cannot be my disciple.

Now Luke chapter 14 verse 26 May take some theological study and

Luke 14:26

debate and conversation with other believers to understand.

It is a difficult passage to unpack, unravel and live out.

Psalm 24 verse one is not one such scripture.

It is so straightforward. It might be the easiest

scripture in all the Bible to understand.

Everything belongs to the world and everyone, all the people who

live in it, belongs to the Lord. If you can think of a thing,

it's part of the everything, and everything belongs to the left

speaker, belongs to the Lord your glasses belong to the Lord

your hair, if you have it, belongs to the Lord.

Your hair, if you don't have it, He already took it Mine.

You were generous to give it. That's so kind of you.

Let's just declare it. Bald people are the most

generous people on earth. Tweet that OK, this is easy to

understand. Everything belongs to the

Lord's. Now follow me here.

Leviticus chapter 27 verse 30 says a tithe of everything from

Leviticus 27:30

the land, whether grain from the soil or fruit from the trees

belongs to the Lord. We already know that because

everything belongs to the Lord. But then it says the tithe is

holy to the Lord. Tithe, don't let anyone confuse

you, just means 10 percent. 10% of everything on the earth is

holy to the Lord. It all belongs to them.

But 10% is set apart. That's what holy means, set

apart to the Lord. Now Malachi chapter 3 wraps this

Malachi 3 · chapter mention

whole thought up about the tithe.

There's going to be a long scripture here on the screen.

I'm not going to read the whole thing, but essentially what

Malachi chapter 3 verse 10 says, God says bring me the tithe of

Malachi 3:10

your income. Whatever comes into your

storehouse, bring whatever comes into your house, bring to the

storehouse and test me, try me and see if I won't prove myself

to be who I say I am. That's not exactly what it says,

but that's what it says. He says open the storehouse of

heaven, all the windows and everything that's poured on and

all this blessing and all these things come upon you.

But the point is God's saying, will you trust me?

And as you trust me, you will find that I am trustworthy.

I'll prove myself to you, but the first act is going to be a

step of faith and obedience on you.

My wife and I were married in September 12th of 1998.

And some of you have heard this story before and just let it hit

you again. Some of you hear this for the

first time, but it's my story. I can't tell anybody else's

story because this is the story. I lived.

But in September of 1988, we got married.

I've been working at a church for three years.

I started in ministry in August of 1995.

This August will be 30 years. It feels like it's been 2

minutes. Praise God.

I've been working at this church three years and I had never

tithed. I don't know that I ever really

understood the tithe. I thought it was optional.

I thought it was for generous people, not for poor people.

And I was poor because I was making $22,485 a year.

I remember I was flowing in it, baby.

So I get married and now I have another person I'm responsible

for. My wife graduated from the

University of Florida with a degree in physical therapy.

She had a great job at Tampa General Hospital working with

burn patients. It's amazing to make a lot of

money. She moves to Ocala.

Ocala at that time just didn't have a big market for physical

therapists. There were like 2 clinics in the

whole town. They ain't hiring.

So the two of us are living off $22,475 a year.

Yee Haw. We get to the end of one month

after a bunch of months being married and I'm looking at the

money. I'm like, I, we ain't making it.

I got it. Here I am serving the Lord and

we're suffering and we ain't making it.

And Christine says she hears from the Holy Spirit, comes to

me and says, I think we need to obey God in regards to finances

and begin to tithe. And I said, I don't think you're

hearing right. You see up to that point, even

working at the church, I wasn't a tither, I was a tipper.

And tippers say, hey God, you were good this week.

Here's 5 bucks. And back in the old day,

remember we used to pass the plates and when the plate

passed, you never let it pass without you doing something.

Otherwise you felt like a fool like so you would reach into

your pocket and pull out a penny or a quarter or a dollar or just

air. And when the plate came, you

were like. If you had coins, you set them

down gently so nobody knew you're putting coins in, right?

If you had a dollar or more and you're like, look, uh huh.

I can feel your judgment. So I was a tipper, not a tither.

I would just give what I had. I remember one time giving 20

bucks and feeling like I was the most generous guy, most

sacrificial guy in the world. 20 bucks.

Yeah, baby, look at me. God, he's like, oh, I'm

watching. So Christine says, I feel like

we should obey the Lord's command, the tithe.

I said let me pray God. You see, we can either tithe or

pay the rent. We can't do both.

Clearly you don't want us to be homeless, so isn't it wise to

pay the rent and not tithe? So I went back to my wife and

said you were right. The Lord said a tithe.

And so the very next Sunday, I wrote a check, the biggest check

I've ever written to any organization, charitable,

Obviously you've got rent and all these other things.

But and I take it to the church and I remember I was giving

reluctantly and my hands over the offering and like, Oh my

word, if we do this, we will not pay rent.

Sunday, Monday, the next day I'm at work.

Ring, ring corded phone. Remember, hello, it's Christine.

She's like hey, like hey, hey, I just got offered a full time

job. Are you not amazed?

Some of you know the story because that afternoon ring

ring. Hello.

Hey, I just got offered another full time job from another

company. 2 jobs. They were fighting for her.

She like bring it on her salary doubled my salary.

P TS make more than youth directors.

Apparently she became the breadwinner.

Had to check my ego. Like hey OK, my wife's making

more money than me, fine by me. Wednesday the landlady calls and

I'm in my mind thinking, OK, I'm going to tell her she's got a

new job, the money's going to come in.

We're going to make up for the rent, don't you worry.

It's going to be all fine, Patty.

That was her name. It's going to be fine, Patty.

And before I could get my excuses out, she said the Holy

Spirit told us to tell you not to pay your rent this month.

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, four days.

I think we're underestimating how great God did here.

If you believe in the provision, excuse me, the prosperity

gospel, what you just heard is we gave and therefore we got.

God gave U.S. financial resource.

If you believe in the provision gospel, which sees the Lord as

Jehovah Jireh, that's his name, then what you heard is what we

heard. We learned in those four days

that when God says He will do something, He'll do it.

And what we took into our spirit is the assurance of who He is.

And from that day to this, not just from our pocketbook, but

from all of our books, we've trusted the Lord and say God, we

want to do it your way, because when we do it your way, you do

what only you can do. Amen.

The principle is the same with time as it is to money.

When you bring your offering, your tithe, excuse me, to the

church and give it, you're not actually giving it.

You've heard me say this before, you're returning it.

If I borrow Pastor Kim's car, drove it around for three days,

came back and put a bow on top of him and said I'm giving you a

car, he'd be like, bro, it's my car.

Like whatever. We're not giving God our tithe.

It belongs to Him. It's holy to Him.

We're returning it to him. But when you return the tide to

God, you're also giving him something.

You're giving him faith, and faith moves the heart of God.

Hebrews Chapter 11, verse 6 says that without faith it is

Hebrews 11:6

impossible to please God. Take the end of verse of it.

When we have faith, it pleases God.

He says, man, my daughter, she believes me.

My son, He trusts me, and I'm going to show myself faithful,

trustworthy in her and his life. Is my mic acting funny?

You want me to switch mics? Kenny, Keep going.

I can't see that far. You're making hand gestures.

I love you, too. Faith is the currency of heaven.

It's the same with the Sabbath. It's the exact same.

Do we have the faith to trust God that I can do more in six

days by giving him one than I can do in seven days on my own?

I want to show you some counter intuitive living, not reactions,

outcomes. Excuse me to what happens when

you Sabbath? Here's what I mean.

When you practice the Sabbath, you'll find out that production,

the Sabbath's production is actually reduction.

There are things that when you practice the Sabbath are going

to be reduced in your life. The first one is this.

The Sabbath reduces pride. Everyone say pride.

Pride turns out to be the original sin.

When Adam and Eve were in the garden, God said don't eat from

this one tree of the knowledge of good and evil before.

But when you eat of it, you'll be like me.

And you don't want to be me because you don't want to be a

God of yourself. You want me to be God.

Let me do that job. Well, the devil comes along.

It's like the God really say, don't eat from that tree because

the only reason he doesn't want you to eat from that tree is

because you become like him. So Eve saw the fruit.

She saw it was pleasing to the eye, good for her body, and she

wanted to be like God. So she ate the fruit, gave it to

Adam. He ate it as well.

And it all happened because they decided, well, I would rather be

the God of me. It's the original sin of pride.

It's the same driver of all of the sin that we experience in

our life today when we have decided, you know God, I think I

know better. I know how better to fill this

void in my life, this temptation I'm feeling.

I know better how to deal with it then you know how to deal

with it. So in my pride, I'm going to do

what I think is best rather than what you think is best.

Sabbath theme does the opposite for when we Sabbath and when we

tithe, what we're saying to the Lord is I am not dependent upon

myself, but I am rather dependent on you.

My time is dependent on you. The finances that I have are

dependent not on me, but upon you.

I'm going to trust you, but it's going to cause me to swallow my

pride. Five years ago, when we first

taught this series, we were in the high school.

Any high school people here remember the high school days?

Hello. We have mic problems then too.

He was sitting right over here. He'd always sit right over here.

He still sits over here when he comes to church.

He was hello. He was brought to Florida to

lead a $200 million build of Gaylord Palms.

And it did the big Gaylord Hotel.

You know what I'm talking about. They did an expansion.

They did a big renovation of their meeting spaces and this

whole swimming area. He was in charge of building all

of this. And he's sitting over here

listening to me talking about the Sabbath.

And he's like, we got to do this as a family.

But our construction crew works seven days a week.

And I'm the one who tells them when they work and when they

don't work. So I'm having all these guys

break the Sabbath because of me, and I'm breaking it too, because

when they're working, I'm working.

And so he's sitting here thinking, I got to shut down the

job site one day a week, which means I'm going to have to walk

into the construction Hut with all these alpha male

construction guys, you know, and tell these guys, hey, we're not

working one day a week because the Lord God said no.

And it'd be like you Bible thumper, you idiot.

Listen, holy man, we got to be on time and on budget.

And if we skip one day a week, we ain't making it, you dummy.

And he knew this was going to happen.

And in his pride, he didn't want to do it.

Like, man, this is going to be embarrassing.

This is going to be challenging. But God has spoken.

He was convicted by the Holy Spirit.

He walked in the Hut. He said what he had to say.

They talked back. He's like, well, I'm locking it

up. I'm going to have a gate and I'm

going to lock it. And I'm going to be the only one

with the key. So when I say we're not working,

we're not working in the story, I want you to know, at the

completion of that job, they were six months ahead of

schedule and $12 million under budget.

That's a lot. Can anybody use $12 million?

There's some for you. Only two people raise their hand

for $12 million. You 2 get 6 each from the Lord.

Not for me because I don't got it.

He had to swallow his pride and say I'm not dependent on myself,

I'm dependent on the Lord. He had to make a stand in the

public sector and the Lord honored his faith.

Six months, $12 million. There's another girl who's in

our, as a woman in our life, Step 2, that we just finished up

at our house. And she said growing up, I never

slept well. My poor mom, she said never

slept well. I was a bad sleeper, bad

sleeper. I started practicing the Sabbath

and for the first time in my life, I'm sleeping through the

night. Listen, they're both miracles of

great significance to the people involved, and they teach us the

same principle. When we offer our faith and

obeying the Lord, He responds and gives us things that we

cannot have on our own, but that He gives us out of His own hand.

Amen. The last to the Sabbath reduces

coveting. Everyone say coveting.

Could it be that the opposite of coveting is actually

contentedness? One of the commandments is do

not covet. When we practice the Sabbath,

this is what we learned. I have everything that I need.

Everything is OK not because of what I have or who I am, but

because of who has me and whose I am.

We often don't practice the Sabbath because we don't know

how to sit still, and we don't sit still because we're not

content. We always have an itch to do

something. We try to sit still for 15

minutes and all of a sudden you realize like 10 minutes in you

have your phone out. Like what happened to sitting

still for 15 minutes and doing nothing?

I just need to check the weather and now I'm scrolling.

Oh, I just got a text and now I'm scrolling.

Death scroll, Is that what they call it?

Doom scroll? Same difference.

Both ain't good. I don't know if you've ever been

praying and like 30 minutes later, you forgot you were

praying. Like, oh, wait, I was praying.

Oh, you're reading the scriptures and your eyes are

going down the page and like halfway down you're like, oh, I

haven't been paying attention. I've been reading the last two

minutes. Anyone else?

Yeah, this is a contentedness issue.

It's mine all over the place trying to answer questions that

only God can answer. Itches and scratches that only

God can soothe and and heal. When you practice the Sabbath

practice, it's not going to happen like this.

You're not going to be experts tomorrow and you sit for 5

minutes. Just sit can become 10 minutes,

20 minutes, 40 minutes, an hour. Just you and the Lord, just

content because of who He is and what He has.

And this one is very related to the last one.

The Sabbath reduces pride. The Sabbath reduces coveting.

And finally, the Sabbath reduces fear.

We often don't Sabbath because of fear.

We're afraid we won't get it all done.

We will afraid we won't succeed enough.

We won't have enough money, we won't have enough stuff if we

don't work more. And I'm not talking about just

earning work, but working around the house, making sure the car

looks right for the neighbors not to yell and look at my shiny

car. Isn't everyone impressed with my

great yard? Sorry.

What if you rested as if the work was already done?

What if you rested in this way? Do what you can by following the

Lord. Wake up and say, God, this day I

submit to you, I'm going to do whatever you say for me to do

today. And at the end of that time, end

of the six days, you said, God, I did everything you said, so

I'm content, even if stuff's unfinished.

But you did what He said for the day.

He sets your checklist, not you. And then you check the boxes,

and then you rest at the end of the day.

God gave us the Sabbath to help us with our fear.

God gave us the Sabbath to learn that we can trust him every

Sunday or excuse me, Friday night going into Saturday that

we Sabbath, it feels like we're doing a trust fall into the arms

of God. OK, Lord, the stuff undone, the

kitchen sinks a mess. The bathroom needs to be just

fall back into his arms. Since I got you and I got all

this, we'll take care of this. Don't worry.

When we're fearful, what we're really exposing is that we have

an impoverished spirit. The impoverished spirit always

says, I don't have enough fill in the blank.

You can meet the most wealthy people in the world and they

will feel the most impoverished of anybody, and you can find the

most impoverished financially people, but yet they are full of

the goodness of God. When we have the impoverished

spirit, we're hungry, unsatisfied, and when you're

hungry and unsatisfied, you are at great risk of eating anything

you can find, even in the trash can, any junk food.

You know what I'm talking about in real life, Like if you're

just hungry, sometime you're like, I don't want any of this

junk, but there's nothing else. Well, OK, marshmallows, I feel

your judgment. Again, write this down.

In the end, God has already done all the work.

If you can't rest, just meditate on this thought and you'll begin

to rest. He's already done all the work.

John chapter 19 verse 30. When he had received the drink,

John 19:30

Jesus says it is finished. With that he bowed his head and

gave up his spirit. What if we learned to rest from

a place of knowing that the work is actually done?

When Jesus went to the cross, the work that destroyed sin and

death was finished there on that cross.

The work that gives you and I identity as a son or a daughter

of the King was finished on the cross.

The work that now gives you purposeful plans for your life

was finished on the cross. The work praise God that ensures

us eternal peace was finished on the cross.

So if all the work is finished, then we can rest.

So I say to you as your pastor, rest.

God commanded you to rest. But see it a different way.

God invites you to rest. Come to me all you who are weary

and heavy laden, and I God, Jesus will give you rest.

Thanks for joining us today. We hope God is speaking to your

heart through this message. If you'd like to connect with

us, you can text connect to 407-588-0115 or visit Illuminate

dot church. Have a great week.