Generosity | Pastor Christian Lindbeck | Venture Church

Hi, and welcome to Venture Church Online. My name is

Kelsey and I'm our online campus pastor. We're so glad

that you're joining us. Drop a comment below of where

you're streaming from. We love to interact with you. We

hope that you enjoy today's service.

Church we're doing. We're good. Happy fall.

I know there's two weeks in summer left, but let's

be honest, it's fall. You guys saw outside right, school

buses and the weather.

Have informed us it's fall.

So like, get a new backpack and sharpen your pencils

and put on a sweater.

Right, it's time to go. We're glad to have you here.

If I haven't met you yet, my name's Christian Lindbeck,

another one of the grateful pastors on the team here

at Venture This morning, it's my privilege to wrap up

which was fairly a summer series and a little bit

of an insider look for us, a series that we

called Family Matters, and we just took three weeks to

talk about the core values that define Venture Church.

That's how we make decisions.

It's how we decide what it feels like and looks like,

what it is the experience of being a venture driven

by these core values.

So we took three weeks.

We talked about mission, how mission moves us community that

really informs who we are.

And today we're going to talk about generosity.

In fact, if you walk through our lobby you'll see, well,

they're a little tattered right now, but the columns of

the building are actually head up. What these held up

with these core values of who we are, so generosity.

I want to start this topic with what might seem

like an interesting question. Did you know that Venture Church

was an Assemblies of God church?

Did you know that a few of you get dow that.

Yeah, so most of us on the pastoral staff, myself

and Morgan, and Pastors Brandon and Die and many of

the other pastors on staff here, all of us are

ordained through the Assemblies of God.

This is an.

Assemblies of God Church. For those of you who are

familiar with the age, ask yourself a little question. If

you had to summarize what the Assemblies of God is

all about, how would you answer that? So just take

a moment kind of answer that in your own heart

and mind.

There for a second, you got something good.

Okay, Now let me give you what I think is

my answer to this question, and they'll put it up

here for you as well, because I think it's really important.

The Assemblies of God is about the active presence of

the Holy Spirit to shape believers.

Into a new, global, vast.

Kingdom family that are being formed into the likeness of

Jesus and participating in building his kingdom. I think it's

a clear, truthful and worthwhile thing for us to be about.

What is the assemblies that got about?

We are a community where a mission that is empowered

by the Holy Spirit. We are being shaped into family,

we are being transformed from the inside out, and we

are impacting the world around us as.

We participate with Jesus to build his kingdom.

And I think that this is a really hopeful vision

for what our mission is about and what it is

we are doing together. Scripture is clear that Jesus redeems

us and then fills us with the Holy Spirit, and

that spirit knows us intimately our thoughts, our deeds, our motives,

our problems, our hurts, habits and hang ups, says Celebrate

Recovery would say, and this Holy Spirit is working earnestly,

tirelessly with love and correction and encouragement to shape who

we are, like to bring us further out of a

life of self destruction, deception lies sins self protection, to

bring us into life of freedom and joy and purpose

and community and a worthwhile, well lived life. I think

this is like a really hopeful, true thing. And it

doesn't just shape us. This good news about the Gospel

doesn't just shape us individually, but it is what it's doing.

It shapes us. It shapes us who we.

Are, what this community looks like, and it directs us

into gladly, happily, joyfully intentionally participating with Jesus to build

his kingdom. And it is from that place about the

purpose of our life and the purpose of our community

is happy, good, joyful, worthwhile purpose.

That's where I want to talk about generosity. I do

not want to.

Talk about it out of guilt or shame or arm

twisting or play the right song to emotionally manipulate people

to somehow participate in generosity, but rather out of the

central assurance.

That God loves you. Jesus has redeemed us.

The Holy Spirit is eager, delighted to shape us into

people that look more and more like Jesus, more and

more living life shared life together more and more building

up as kingdom. It's our greatest privilege, it's our highest calling,

and it's what God is doing inside of us. So

this message on generosity is not trying to get into

your wallet.

It is trying to get into your heart by way

of your wallet.

And if that makes you uncomfortable, brace yourself because Jesus

is clear on.

This very idea.

The way we use our resources is shaping our heart.

Let me get more specific about it.

I and we believe adventure, that purposeful and glad and

generosity may be one of the clearest marks of a

God aligne life. There are ways that you show that.

You may test yourself. You may look around at others

and say, is this a God aligned life? Like Ask

yourself and the way you use your resources, the way

you are generous with your time, your attention, your home,

and your affection, this.

Will show you that's rubber meets the road. Faith. You

can have all kinds of ideas about Jesus, but when you.

Lay down your own security, in your own prosperity, or

when you show radical generosity of kindness to somebody else,

this is the rubber meets the road. This is the

thing that the Holy Spirit wants to do to shape

in us generosity venture. We believe that generosity begins by

honorably upholding the principle of the tithe, that is, giving

the first ten percent the first fruit.

We give God what we get first, and we hand

it over tim and we do this as an act

of worship.

We tithe to provide for this church that we love,

and we are on ministry together. We tithe to bless

the remainder of our resources.

Scripture is very clear about this.

And we tithe as a testimony to our own hearts

and others that our whole lives belong to God.

And I just want you to hear me say from

the get go about.

Tithes, that means our resources are not just a means

for our survival and our success, but they are a

way for us to worship God and to participate in God's.

Work locally, lobally, generationally. You already heard Morgan say this.

Furthermore, beyond the tithe, we support Kingdom builders.

It's just this, we're saying, like, together, we.

Want to support what's going on here, but we want

to reach past what's going on here. We talk about

this each week. You've seen the impact. You just saw

the video about bread booths. But each week we work

together to expand the global mission of Jesus that every tribe,

tongue in nation would.

Know the good news about who he is.

We bring the gospel to our local communities by building

thriving churches and by showing real love, compassion, practical help.

To our neighbors. Make a local impact, and.

We're raising future Christian leaders who we hope will make

an influence and every sphere around the world.

That's the baseline. This is like the fundamentals about generosity

for us.

But today I said, I want to touch our hearts

with it a little bit, as we're going to explore

how our hearts are shaped by generosity by touching two

parables in the Book of Luke.

And I chose Luke for a very specific reason.

Luke is piercing, he's candid, he's urgent, he's honest. And

the reason is Luke was a doctor who laid everything

down to follow Jesus and to follow go to travel

quite treacherously with Paul all across the known Mediterranean at

that time to make sure others heard the good news

about Jesus so a.

Doctor who laid it all down.

And writes emphatically that we would understand the same. In fact,

Luke starts his book by trying to establish something very clearly. Friends, readers,

I want you to know that what you have been

taught is true. You may count on it, and since

it is true, you may shape your life around it.

The goal of.

His book is that we would have confidence in what

we believe, and so he wants to be exceedingly since

he gave so much, he wants to see that the

way of Jesus changes everything.

Why are we alive? What are we doing? How do

we handle our resources?

So I've picked two parables that will help us look

into that morning. Both of them speak to this central

question I'm given.

What is true about life?

How are Christians liberated to be generous with their lives,

their wealth, like I said, their homes, their hearts, and

their attitudes. How does a reframed understanding of our self

and the purpose of our life show up in the

way that we.

Handle our money.

I just think it's such a brass tax observation. Like

I said, a rubber meets the road kind of place

there is we said, this. When I talk about what

is the assemblies of God, we know that there is this.

The Holy Spirit is working to align our lives. There

is a way that an aligned life looks like, and

we might ask that question, then, what does a life

aligned look like?

In generosity?

What is the result of the Holy spirits work in us?

There is an answer to that question, and the question

is what is it?

Or the answer is what is it?

Jesus once said this about how we spend our resources.

He says, where your treasure is there, your heart will

be also. You see, this is a little clue about

getting to the heart by way of the wallet. He

noticed a little switch. Maybe it's an unexpected switch for you.

But we might expect him to say where your heart is,

that's where you will put your treasure.

But that's not what he says.

He says, where you put your treasure there, your heart

will follow. Let me put a point on it. He's

saying money has the power to shape the direction of

our affection. What we love will be shaped by the

way we spend our resources. It can change the focus

of our attention. So how we use our resources not

only reveals something to us and to others. But it is,

and I want to hear this actually shaping what we

love when we spend it there, it shapes.

Our heart in that direction.

And so I would ask you, now, this is a

good question for you to wrestle with. What does your

money say about what you love? Where is your money

leading your heart? I don't know how that hits you,

but when I read it this morning, I wrote after

that sentence, oof, yeah, another time Jesus says like this,

master your money or it will master you. What wealth

offers and goods and power and allure and false security

is powerfully auctive.

And will corrupt our hearts and scriptures.

Trying to be clear, we will not drift into a

proper perspective. We will not accidentally find ourselves generous and

working against the direction of our heart.

Which is towards self protection.

She's trying to say, this is something you have to decide,

and when you decide it and you take action to

change it.

So will your heart be changed.

And as your heart is changed, so will your life

be changed. Jesus in these parables will urge us to

make a decision. So let's let's jump in. Let's start

with the first one, we're gonna be in Luke chapter sixteen.

I'll be in verses sixteen through nineteen. This is a

well known parable about a beggar named Lazarus Lazarus and

a rich man named nothing, and this is no worthy

in parables. Jesus never gives these characters a name, but

this one time he gives Lazarus a name and intentionally

gives the rich man no name. Lazarus's name means the

one God helps.

The rich Man's name is lost into the sands of time.

It's a striking story, and I want you to hear

it with this perspective. Beginning in verse nineteen, it says

there was a rich man who is dressed in purple

and fine linen.

Readers of that day know that purple meant he was loaded,

purple and fine, loaded, and lived in luxury. Every day.

At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered

with sores and long.

Just to eat what fell from the rich man's table.

But even the dogs came out and licked his sores,

it's implied, and made a meal out of him. The

time came when the beggar died, and the angel carried

him to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and

was buried in Hades, where he was in torment. He

looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by

his side. So he called to him, Father, Abraham, have

pity on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip

of his fingers in water and to cool my tongue,

because I am an agony in this fire. But Abraham said, son,

remember that in your lifetime you receive good things. Why

Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted and

you are an agony. Besides, all this between us and

you is a great chasm that has been set in place,

so that those who want to go from here to

you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.

He answered, I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family,

for I have five brothers. Let him warn them so

that they will not come to this place of torment.

Abraham replied, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them

listen to them. No, Father Abraham, he said, but if

someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.

And he said to them, if they do not listen

to Moses and the prophets. They will not be convinced

even if someone rises from the dead. You see, Lazarus

is destitute, he's hungry, he's sick, he's covered in sores.

He's lying outside of a man who lives an oblivious luxury.

And Lazarus would love to even eat the scraps that

the dogs have. He doesn't even have access to what

dogs have. Instead, the dogs come outside and make an

additional meal of him. And there's a little word play

happening that we can't see easily in Greek, but it

says at that time Lazarth died and he went up

to the side of Abraham, the place of honor, and.

It says the rich man went down.

But the images the rich man was swallowed by the

grave like a mouth swallows somebody up. And the one

who made the vulnerable starve is devoured by death. Did

you pick that up? Because this is a strong parable.

It's not a blueprint about the afterlife.

You're not learning here how heaven works and hell works.

That is not the point of this parable. In fact,

the point of this parable has a very strong piercing end.

Remember, the audience is alive and listening to the story.

He's talking to his living audience.

By telling a story about somebody who has proverbially died,

because he wants to wake his living audience up. You see,

Jesus is making this very clear point. I wrote it

down to you so you cannot miss it while you me,

while we are still alive and able to change.

Do not waste your life storing up treasures that will

not last. Be generous. Now, align your resources.

With God's kingdom now. And there's a point of Jesus parable.

He wants to say something.

Like heard, do you hear me? Do you ever get?

Says Jesus wants to walk up and kind of shake

people by the shoulders. This is a verbal shake on

the shoulders. Hey, you wake up. Life has a purpose.

You are redeemed for something. This matters. How you trust

me is displayed most prominently. And how you treat those

in need around you, how you participate in my kingdom,

how you are generous with time, love, attention, and your resources.

Let's go backwards. We're going to go back to Luke

chapter twelve. This is all connected in one big segment

of teaching, and as far as Luke is concerned, these

are theologically connected ideas In Luke chapter twelve, beginning in

verse thirteen, it's a real life situation.

A rich man approaches Jesus.

He's a teacher and a rabbi, and he wants Jesus

to solve.

A legal dispute for him.

He wants to make sure he's getting all the wealth

that's coming to him in his inheritance.

That's his question for Jesus. Wrong guy to ask.

Jesus does not reply with legal advice for him, but

instead with a warning. He says, watch out, be on

your guard against all kinds of greed, for life does

not consist in an abundance of possessions.

And then he.

Tells this parable with a crowd gathered around him, the

man still standing there. He tells this parable the ground

of a certain rich man. He might get that point

right away, yield in an abundant harvest. And he thought

to himself, what shall I do? I have no place

to store my crops. Then he said, this is what

I'll do. I'll tear down my barns and build bigger ones,

and there.

I will store my surplus grain.

And I'll say to myself, you have plenty of grain

laid up for many years.

Take life easy, eat, drink and be merry.

But God said to him, you fool, this very night,

your life will be demanded from you. Then who will

get what you have prepared for yourself? And listen to

verse twenty one. This is how it will be with

whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich

towards God. And he's not talking to the parable who

doesn't exist. He's talking to the audience standing around him,

and they're supposed to go like.

Gulp, like one step back right.

He's saying, examine your own heart, and he puts the

stern warning in there. This is how it will be

for anyone who is not rich towards God. You see,

this is a story of inevitable reversal.

Not because Lazarus was poor. There's no glory in being poor.

He did trust in God, and not because the rich

man was rich either.

It's not because he was rich.

It's because he hoarded his possessions because he had a

blindness towards need around him, because he did not see

the vulnerable. He did not have an eye towards eternity,

and he had nothing to do with it. And likewise

with this rich man who comes up and says what

will I do?

And Jesus saying, wake up, don't believe the lie. Believe

in me. Once you understand what's true.

And I don't know how many times like you have

to tell yourself this little thing.

Maybe you have little bright moments I do.

When you understand the truth clearly for a moment, everything

changes and what you looks like you needed to cling

to all of a sudden just looks so silly to

cling to what am I building in this life? Friends,

I have a small tirate in me because we talk

about stretch and give up. We live so much better

than in the history of humankind they have ever lived.

We live with so much wealth that what feels like

stretched poorness to us would feel like ridiculous wealth to

many others.

We know wealth.

We have figured out how to live, not seeing the

vulnerable or like this rich man who, by his self

righteousness I'm sure gave enough to have said he met

the mark?

Did it change his art? Did he see all these

things art mine?

Did he see his chance to be the hands and

feet and heart of Jesus to people around him?

That would be a changed heart.

That's the work that Jesus is trying to get at

This is what these parables are about. Look, I will

shape your heart by shaping your wallets.

I'd like to end today by exposing a lie of

the devil that he tried on Jesus.

He did when Jesus was in the desert being tempted,

he was tired, hungry, thirsty, worn out.

The devil came to him and Luke four to seven

and said, if you'll worship me, it will all be yours.

Just give up right now, or just turn towards me.

We can do whatever you want and all be yours

is all.

What do you want?

Money, power, influence, sexual power, like you know, you can

have whatever you want. Just turn towards me now. Spoiler alert,

Jesus' is not cave to this temptation. I think you

know that, But it's not even what I want to

point out today. Do you know what I want to

point out today? The devil had nothing to offer him.

He is a liar.

He owns nothing, He has no good thing that he

could give. He has no authority in the world, no

possessions to give in the world.

His promise is actually a lie.

It's a ruse it's a sham. That way of life

has nothing to give. Grasping self protection, building up your

own little empire and kingdom is a lie. And guess

what it does not bring joy, life purpose? It is

a lie. It's like a man standing in front of

his neighbor's garage offering to bless people on their way

by none of it belongs to him. If he's like, oh,

let me give you this thing, he has nothing to give.

All that Satan can offer us is.

Cunning, deceit to wisted truth, death.

It's his only thing.

His pitiful way of grasping greed, taking care of number one,

amassing temporary wealth and using others leads to nowhere. Jesus's

promise invites us into the way of freedom, a chance

to worship God with our whole life, and invest our

life with open handed generosity, generous with your heart and

your head in your hand, and your stuff and your time.

And your home.

And we are built, dear friends, with a built in

addiction to cling to the things that we have. And

we are offered liberation. We are offered to chance to

be liberated from a small life dedicated to the collection

of things. Friends, I want to say like, hey, fun

getting dressed, pecking out clothes.

These things came from stitch fix. Congratulations to me. Fun.

That's fine, But if you live to do those things,

check yourself. Where you put your heart is where you

put your love, and what you love shaping your life,

and your life is shaping your eternity. Jesus offering us

an opportunity shape what you love by the way you invest.

So I ask you this question today, three questions just

to think about this week.

Where is your heart? How do you know? What would

your resources say about what you love? That's another oof

for me.

By the way, what might it look like to align

your resources fully with your hope in Jesus? Where's your

money leading your heart? Where's your heart leading your life?

What are we about? What are we doing here?

Pray to God it is not some shallow collection of

stuff and make the food, buy the food, clean up

the house, pay your taxes, and die. May it be

that we are leading lives transformed by the Holy Spirit,

participating in his kingdom.

Looking forward to his return. We can't live in.

Such a way that our own death and the inevitable

return of Jesus will be a joyful reunion and not

an embarrassing accounting.

That's a decision we need to make. Now.

This is Jesus saying, I offer you because I love you.

Wake up. I want to close with a final observation

to go something like this. Generosity is a whole person posture.

Being generous and I hope you heard me say it

many times today is about much more than our resources.

Did you know that you can be very financially generous

and just an awful person.

Uh, don't do that. You might have missed the point.

Generosity is a whole person posture. May venture be marked

and we put it on that column? May we be

marked by generosity with our attitude? How about our attitude

towards the other, the stranger, the vulnerable, the immigrant, the

politically different?

How about a generous.

Heart, a generous attitude, a generous home, a generous hand,

and a generous wallet. You want to know what's going

to testify it, Jesus that kind of generosity. May venture

be marked by that sort of generosity? A mentor that

was just teaching us the staff. We had a staff

development the other day and I.

Loved he had a line that I loved. The said

money is the easiest.

Kind of generosity, but it is the kind of generosity

that trains your heart to be Jenus everywhere else side. Today,

I've given you very practical next steps because this message.

Was a little like twenty thousand foot theology.

If you've never gone to our What's Next page, can

I urge you to go check it out today?

There are very.

Practical next steps on there. The first one is this

is sort of a dare Go. Meditate on the Luke

twelve story. Read it as though you were in the audience. Two,

ask the Holy Spirit to talk to you about generosity.

Just say, Holy Spirit, if you got something to say

about this, I'm listening.

Prepare yourself.

Three, take a practical next step. Because this is practical.

I'm going to be very clear with you. Take a

practical next step.

This has to be learned.

If you are not if you go to church here

and you're not tithing here, try that out.

Try tithing. If you are here and you're tithing here

and you have not tried to stretch yourself to be

a kingdom.

Builder, to invest in the good news going around the world,

try that invest be kingdom builder.

You know Morgan mentioned right now we're trying.

To build this building, and it's a lot to do,

and I think it can get confusing because if you

think about building this building like we're building our own

little empire, that will be disappointing. If you're like, oh,

Venture is going to be so cool, so epic.

Wait, do you see how cool we are? That's not

gonna go very far. But if you say.

We will build the spaces that will transform.

Countless human lives for years to come, now.

We're talking like you can't count the number of kids.

Whose lives are gonna be changing those rooms. It's uncountable

what influence.

Will be made when they talk to their parents or

their friends or go to school. Thousands of human lives,

the trajectory of human lives will be changed because.

We had the faithfulness to make space to make it happen.

I've set and Venture University classes, taught them with people

who have no idea about Jesus. By the end of

the class, they've given their life to Jesus and have

become like model participants in his kingdom work. That's what

happens here. That's what we're doing. So I just look,

thank you, here's what I want you to hear. This

is a personal ask from me. We've got a long

way to go. Can I have that chart?

We're on our way, but you know, nine hundreds a

long way over there.

And look this, we've already decided we're doing this.

This is happening. And so I am just asking, here's

a practical way.

Would you make a decision to build not your own

little empire, my own little.

Empire, but you help us build God's kingdom.

And it's not going to take a heroic effort from anybody,

well maybe a couple of people. It's going to take

faithfulness from everybody. So I'm asking you scan a QR code,

buy a thing. You could buy a trash can. It's

like ten bucks. Like everybody, jump in, do your part.

Let's do this work together. And I just want to

say again, this is not a guilt message. I'm not

trying to pressure us. It's not meant to crush us.

It's intended to wake us up. Shame is a lie

and conviction is a gift.

Let us be a community marked by generous and.

My only hope I want to live and work and

pray and serve in a community marked by generosity.

That's up to us altogether.

The Father knows you and loves you, so he sent

the Son to redeem you totally, to recover your entire life,

to raise you from death into life, so that nothing

is our own.

The Holy Spirit has come along.

To apply that good news to our heart.

Let him do his work, find the way to live generously.

In Jesus' name, Lord God, we thank you. We thank

you for your word word, thank you for your patience.

We thank you that you've collected us into kingdom community.

To your name be all the glory and honor and truth,

the name of the Father and the Son and the

Holy Spirit.

Amen. Amen. Yeah. I hope you hear the heart of

that message this.

Morning, and I do want to invite you to go

to our next steps to continue to follow up on

how we can practically be a part of this and

take this heart message and transform our.

Lives with it.

I want to invite you to stand to your feet

with me this morning. Grandparents, We love you, guys. Make

sure to swing by in the lobby there grab a

little bouquet of flowers from us to you. We love you,

We're thankful for you, we bless you. Thank you so

much for being here with us at Venture Church. If

you're interested in one of those tours to catch the

vision of how we're going to use this space, meet

at the info table right after service.

We'd love to walk you through. God bless you. We

will see you next week and go seehawks.

Thank you again for joining us. If you enjoy today's service,

go ahead and subscribe to our channel so you can

see future messages. If you'd like to learn more about

Venture Church, you can flick the link that's in our bio.

We hope to see you again.