Sunday Mornings | Living Generously

Thank you for listening to the Kelowna Christian Center Podcast.

Our desire is that today's message will be fresh and encouraging to you.

For more information on KCC and how to connect, visit us at KCC.net.

Good good morning, everyone.

I how how many there were a number of you who just kind of came in after 10 o'clock.

We started a little fin and then I looked back after the lights came up.

I thought, hey, you guys are here.

You made it on a sunny morning.

Glad to have you at church today.

And uh I know it's beautiful outside.

How many of you are grateful for the weather?

Grateful for the change in season, change in times.

It's uh good to be, it's good to be in Kelowna.

Um we're going through a series right now called At Our Best.

At Our Best.

And this is where we talk about the church, KCCU, when you're operating at your best.

And what attributes and what values are you carrying that cause you to operate that way, that cause you to uh run at full potential, run at maximum octane.

So this is for us at KCC.

Uh KCC has been here for 35 plus years.

We've been uh moving from location to location in the last close to 18 years.

We've been settled in here in the lovely community of Rutland.

Yeah, and uh we are uh continually re-evaluating our values, revaluing, and we're continually uh attempting to build upon what has brought us to this place.

These values are important, and if they're important, then they're areas where we invest our energy, where we invest our income, where we invest our talents, our treasures, where we invest our time.

And there are areas where we are continually resourcing so that we don't get lax, we don't get loose in areas that are important.

So a few weeks ago we talked about Jesus being first.

Is that our first value?

Jesus is first.

And then Malachi shared last week, he did such a great job.

We should give him another hand.

Because God values people, we should value people.

So this community is a place where people belong before they believe, before they behave.

They belong here.

This place, they have the same father that we do, they have the same God that we have.

Some people just don't know it yet.

But it's true, and so we treat each other with respect, with dignity, with with acceptance.

We welcome people in, and this community is an invitational community.

Today I'd like to talk about the value of generosity.

Come on.

Generosity is awesome.

How many of you love being generous?

This is the season to be generous.

This is the time to be generous.

Do you know that uh someone who's going out uh planting right now is not going out with like one seed in the ground?

They're going, if they're putting one carrot seed in the ground, they're gonna expect a harvest of what?

One.

That good farmer, a good farmer is going out and this and he is scattering seed.

He's being not thrifty, he's being generous.

He's throwing it out there because he's trusting God, he's trusting, he's believing for an incredible harvest.

And this is not the time to be stingy.

Tell your neighbor, it's not the time to be stingy.

It's not the time to live live light.

You've got to be generous.

This is the time to give seed, throw seed out there.

We're gonna talk about living generously.

Living generously.

The scripture that I'd like to point our attention to today comes from Proverbs chapter 11, verse 24.

Proverbs 11:24

Verse 25.

Uh, let's read that together, if you would.

The world of the generous gets larger and larger.

The world of the stingy gets smaller and smaller.

The one who blesses others is abundantly blessed.

Those who help others are helped.

How many of you want to live large?

How many of you want to live large?

Then you've got to have a generous heart.

If you're living small, if you want to live small, hold things in.

Hold things close.

Throw out that one little seed.

But if you want to live large, be generous with what you have.

Be generous in your giving.

I'm excited to share about generosity because I believe it's the heart of God.

How many of you have been given something by God?

Yeah, you've been given it generously.

And that same heart resides in us.

This is where we live at our best at KCC.

The Bible encourages us to have generous spirits and to live generously in our lives.

It even promises us that the value or the quality of our lives will become enlarged.

And it will enlarge our impact, will enlarge our influence, will enlarge our opportunities if we are generous with one another, with what God has given us.

Generosity, a lot of people when they hear about it, they think, oh, okay, the church is just talking about money.

Generosity is far, far more than just money.

It's more than just finance.

Money is a part of it, but generosity is more than just your giving, it's about your living.

It's about your lifestyle.

Are you living a generous lifestyle?

A generous person will give generously sympathy, will give generously financially, will give generously in forgiveness.

The scripture says when one of the disciples went to Jesus, they said, Listen, Jesus, how much should we forgive another person?

How, like, what is the number?

These are people of the law, right?

This is what the people of the law are like.

Give me a number that I have to forgive Malachi.

Should I do it like eye for an eye?

You know, should I do you slap one cheek, you turn the other cheek, well, that's it, I'm done?

Is it twice?

And Jesus said, no, no, no.

You don't understand forgiveness.

If you really want to carry the heart of God to forgive, you've got to forgive, not just seven times, because they're like, well, seven's pretty generous.

He says, no, seven times is not it.

You've got to give 70 times seven.

You've got to forgive.

And that was just like blew the minds of the disciples.

They're like, are you kidding me?

I have to give, I have to give forgiveness 490 times to someone.

And Jesus is like, that's even more than that.

Because 70 times seven was emphasizing the maximum, infinite, perfect amount where you're always, always forgiving.

Because you know what God's heart is towards you?

To forgive?

Not seven times.

How many of you would be done with that this morning?

Seven times?

He it's more than just, how many of you have needed more than 490 times forgiveness?

How often do you forgive?

You forgive totally.

All the time.

You're forgiving, forgiving, forgiving.

We should be generous with our patience.

I'm not looking at anyone in particular, but the parents out there with their kids.

Be generous with your patience.

Be generous with our kindness.

Be generous listening.

I sometimes, you know, there are those people who talk and those who listen sometimes.

And sometimes it's just you've got to be generous and just listen.

Just listen.

And not be as much of a talker, but more of a listener.

You know, God gave us two ears and one mouth.

We listen twice as much as we talk.

We've got to like keep keep that in our heart because sometimes we can grow to a place where we think we know it all, and we just got to step back and go, it's time for me to listen.

Listening, generous in our in our giving, generous in our living.

Generosity oftentimes is given or demonstrated in our finances.

It's oftentimes the easiest way to actually test our own hearts.

Are you willing to give?

Are you willing to offer something that causes you to sacrifice a little bit?

Generosity.

I love the story of David.

King David.

They're raising an offering for the temple.

And King David is there, and King David's like, listen, I want to give something.

And his accountants and all his money managers are there and they're listening and they're going through all the specs, and they're like, David, you're giving like X amount of dollars.

And he comes back to them and he says, Listen, it's about something that costs me.

I have to give until it costs me.

Generosity will cost you.

Generosity will require something from you.

It's not just generous.

I love look, kids are such an amazing example of that.

Can I have a smartie?

They give you like a smart tee.

The crumb of a smartie at the bottom of the box.

And then they're so proud of this, right?

And they it doesn't come naturally for you to be generous where someone says, Dad, I love you so much.

You're so awesome.

We went the other day up to a little corner store, and we got gave, I gave them each a buck, and they came back with like those five cents sour keys, you know, those good little candies.

And I'm like, Can I have one?

And they give me like a berry.

Like one of those Swedish berries.

And I think, but I've got one son, the youngest of them all.

I'm not gonna name him, but he's the youngest.

He just says, Dad, open your hand, and I just open my hand.

He pours out candy back so much that I'm giving it back to him.

I'm like, I don't need that much.

Like, I'm on a diet.

Like, I just want a taste of something, right?

But he's like, this is the heart of the generous.

The generous gives and gives and gives and gives and isn't caught with a stingy idea of life.

This is how God works.

I want what you have, God says, I want what you have, but when you give it to me, I'm gonna give you something more.

Generous God.

So I'll give.

And Christians sometimes are the largest violators of generosity because they walk around and they sing songs like, God, I'll give you my life, and I'll give you my children, and I dedicate them to you, God, and I give you all these things, but then when it's like the church needs a spring cleaning, oh, I haven't got the time for it.

We haven't had a spring cleaning.

I'm just using it as an example.

Or something comes up and it grips our heart that we can say a lot with our mouths, but is it really in our heart?

And generosity tests where it sits in your heart.

Where uh the the the treasure of a man is where their heart is, and you can tell a lot by where their heart is, by where they place their treasure, where you place your generosity, where is it?

Like, just to make it clear, the Bible talks about very important words.

Words that we talk about at church, words like believe, belief, faith.

It's a really important word.

The Bible talks about that 272 times.

Uh prayer, the word to pray, like prayer, is pretty important.

And prayer gets talked about 371 times, and then love gets talked about 700 times.

Love is really important, but giving, generosity is talked about 2,152 times in the scripture.

God, now why is that so important to God?

Why is giving, generous giving, so important to God?

It's important to God because God is a giver.

And without God giving it to us at all, we would have nothing.

We wouldn't have the breath we breathe, we wouldn't have the uh the roof over our head, we wouldn't have the sun that shines, hallelujah! Praise the Lord.

We wouldn't have the flowers that come from the earth that God gives to us every day.

It's in his heart to give, it's in his heart to cause us to live through the things that he gives us.

So, generosity, a lifestyle of generosity, what does it look like?

How does it look for the believer to walk in a generous way?

Well, if you were to go to Scripture, you'd actually go to the book of Corinthians, 2 Corinthians chapter 8 and verse 9.

2 Corinthians 8 · chapter mention

Now, the way you would, it's it's the same place that you would go, like if you wanted to know about love, you would go to 1 Corinthians 13.

If you want to hear about the heroes of faith and about the faith and the great acts of faith, you would go to Hebrews chapter 11.

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

If you want to hear about giving, you go to 2 Corinthians chapter 8, chapter 9.

2 Corinthians 8 · chapter mention

And this is a place where Paul is talking to the church in Corinth, the church in Greece, and he's talking to them about generosity.

Now, what had happened is that the church in uh Jerusalem was being persecuted.

The church in Jerusalem was just like being affected by Roman rule.

There was severe pressure on the church.

They were in a real place, they were poor.

It was a poor church because this is the they were living in the time where if you denied, if you denied that Caesar was your Lord, you were either burnt at the stake, you were set sent into the Colosseum, you were dipped in tar, crucified, lit on fire, set on the street as a light post along the Roman way.

This was a serious time for the Jewish, uh the church in Jerusalem.

So Paul goes to the churches in Macedonia, in Greece, and he says to them, What do you think we can do to help the church in Jerusalem?

Can we raise an offering?

Can we help them in some way?

And all the churches gathered together and started giving of their resources and their money to help the Christians in Jerusalem.

Well, Paul goes and he approaches the church in Corinth.

He says, Hey guys, you want to join in?

You want to help?

Uh what do you want to do?

How do you want to be a part of this?

And he starts approaching them in 2 Corinthians chapter 8 and verse 9, uh chapter 8 and 9.

2 Corinthians 8 · chapter mention

And what he talks to them about in terms of generosity is that generosity is about their attitude more than it is about the amount of money that they were going to give.

It was about their attitude.

Now, why is it always about our attitude?

I you know, you can change the amount you give, that's easy.

But changing a person's attitude is difficult.

It's a little bit more challenging to change someone's amount that that we can flex on that.

But talking about going in and changing the attitude is a challenge.

The fact is, God doesn't need your money.

He doesn't need anything from you, really.

He needs nothing from us.

The fact is that God can take care of everything on his own.

And it's not about the amount that you give, it's about the heart of which you are giving and why you are giving that matters to God.

So he starts talking to the church uh in Corinth, and he starts in chapter uh eight, verse twelve.

He says this if you are really eager to give, then it isn't important how much you have to give.

God wants to give you to give what you have, not what you haven't.

In other words, you give what you're capable of giving.

I I I learned giving from the way I learn, and I think the way we all learn, is through like modeling.

And I was fortunate to grow up in a home where my parents were great models of givers.

My grandparents were both great models of people who gave.

They gave hospitality, they gave food, they gave finance, they gave uh whatever they could.

They gave of their energy, they gave of their time, they looked for ways to be able to give.

And I I love that so much as a kid when I was growing up, we always had someone living with us.

A room in like we had a room in our our basement, and someone was always staying there.

It wasn't like a suite where we were making money on the side, it was like this was to be a blessing for someone who needed something.

They gave away our car a few times.

I remember that.

They gave away all sorts of things that were opportunistic for us, and I just thought this was the way we live life.

But we need to look at those models and say, all right, how do you want to give?

How should we give for those of us who have never had an example of someone who's actually given before, lived a life of generosity.

So, looking at the church in Corinth, I'm gonna look at four four different attitudes that define a generous lifestyle.

And these are attitudes that you can imbibe on your own and you can take it as lessons for yourself to actually go into life and be like, I'm gonna give the way Paul approached the Corinthian church to be able to give.

Four attitudes.

Um, the first attitude that gave them uh incredible lifestyle of generosity was that radical generosity is enjoyable, it's enjoyable.

2 Corinthians 8, verse 1 and 2 says that the brothers and the sisters in the church of Corinth, they want you to know about the grace that God has given the church.

2 Corinthians 8:1

In the midst of a very severe trial, their overflowing joy, their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity.

In other words, they were themselves in a really difficult place.

The Church of Corinth.

They were in a place where they were under pressure, they were under trial, they were living in difficulty.

Difficulties in their own community, in their own state, and yet they decided to give joyfully to those in the church in Jerusalem.

Now, the first thing we have to realize about giving and joy to making a life of generosity is that it's never done under compulsion.

It's never done under a way where you're living your life in such a way that you're having to do something.

The church in Corinth was not giving under like pressure.

They were giving under a place of joy.

That I am able to help.

I am able to bless.

I am able to be a part of the solution to the church's pressure in Jerusalem.

There were certain things about this church that they didn't give under guilt.

They didn't give under this same pressure, but they gave under joy.

This last weekend I took my kids to their first soccer game of the season.

And uh and afterwards we decided, you know what, we saw a sign?

Hey, a yard sale.

This is great.

Hey, another garage sale.

And I had had some luck the week before where we had been driving around seeing these garage sales, and I thought, this is great, let's go to someone's garage sale.

Now I had always or I had always told the kids when they wanted to stop in at a garage sale and look around, I'd always told them, forget it, they're garbage sales.

Because it's people just getting rid of their junk for an extreme amount of money.

But it had been a long time since I'd actually been to a yard sale.

A garage sale.

And so I said, you know what?

Let's stop in.

Let's stop in at this garage sale.

And I stopped in, and the first one we actually just drove right by because I looked and I was like, keep going, keep going.

We don't need more pots and plants and all these other little items, knickknacks they had.

Antiques, apparently, they call them, which is virtually just stuff you should throw out.

It's like these antiques.

We have an old countertop.

That's an antique.

It's an old countertop.

Throw it away.

Um, but we went into this one place.

Oh, we went to two garage sales, and one of the garage sales we went to, they had like a kettle that was like being sold for like$30.

And it was like a used, old, used kettle, camp kettle.

$30.

I was like, okay.

The next place we went to, they had like a box of free stuff.

They had items on the shelf that were like a buck, not like 20 bucks, for like a puzzle.

And it's like these things that were in their in their opportunity to give.

Like we walked out with more than we had intended to walk out with for less than we had intended to spend.

It was just like a dollar here.

Give me an my grandpa used to call it uh he uh he would say uh it was like a pence or something like that, two pence.

It was like 25 cents.

And he would he would buy these items for cheap.

And I just realized that when I was going through this garage sale, there are two types of people.

Those who want to squeeze a dollar out of whatever they can, and those who just saw the kids coming and were like, yay, take this, take this.

And I was like, no, we're gonna have our own garage sale if you do.

Like, we're trying to live a little thin here.

But I was looking at this sense of you'd walk in and you could tell it from the people that were there, that one person would be there and they'd be serious.

I'm like, oh my goodness, this is gonna be a tough buy.

Like, I'm gonna buy this person's old dish.

It's gonna be a hagel.

Versus the other people that you walked into their place and they had a smile on their face, and it was a joy for them to give.

Now the scripture says this it is better to give than it is to receive.

When I was a kid, I thought that was a lie.

Because there's no way that giving is better than receiving.

When I was a kid, I was like, man, it was a lie just as much as this is gonna hurt you as much as it hurts me.

No, it doesn't.

Like, when you're gonna spank my bomb, it does not hurt you, it hurts me.

It was my parents lying to me, and I thought this was just another one of those lies.

It's like, giving is better than receiving.

I thought there's no way this even makes sense.

But as I grew up and matured, giving is better than receiving.

All the mature people, raise their hand if you believe that.

That's right.

We love, there is a there is a blessing in giving.

There is a blessing in being able to give, and it's the mark of maturity when we realize that we can actually give with joy in our hearts, giving to God.

The second part that we learn is that living a life of generosity is supernatural.

It's supernatural.

The scripture says that they gave as much as they were able, and then they gave above their even their ability.

In other words, they gave above what was natural for them to be able to give.

Giving, when you live a generous life, you live in a state of the supernatural.

If you want to experience the supernatural, start becoming generous.

Look for opportunities to be generous.

I experienced this young and uh younger.

I I had a scope on my gun.

I was going to uh upgrade my scope because my my gun couldn't hit anything I was shooting at.

And it was the scope's problem, right?

And so I thought the scope's broken.

And uh I thought, I'm getting rid of the scope, and I had it for sale, and and I finally I I was journaling with God one day, and I was writing my my thoughts down before with God, and God said to me, Give your scope away.

I was like, I yep, behind me, Satan.

Like that doesn't work.

He says, give it away.

So I I thought not too much of it, and then the next day, of course, someone walks in, you're in conversation, like, man, I could really could use a scope.

It's like, ah, I got a scope for you.

How much?

Free.

It's yours.

Not less, like this is my little testimony, but not less than an hour after I gave him a scope, someone came and gave me a brand new scope.

It's like the suit to me, in my mind, there was a lesson at that moment of the supernatural effect of generosity.

God does things that we can't expect when we become generous.

We don't expect.

One of the greatest lessons in scripture is about Jesus feeding the 5,000.

He did everything wrong when it came to church growth.

He took his whole group out to a remote area where no one was.

It's like, well, that's wrong.

Uh don't go to a remote place.

But he went to a remote area where no one was, and 5,000 men were there.

They say that it could have been up to 20,000 people, as the families would have been included.

And he begins preaching for a long time.

We try and keep our services to 90 minutes.

Jesus just like broke that church growth model.

He's like, this is what we're gonna do.

I'm gonna keep on preaching until the people started getting fatigued.

Now they're a long way off in a remote area, and one of the disciples comes to Jesus and he says, Jesus, people are getting hungry.

How many of you are getting at that place right now?

It's 1110.

People are getting hungry.

And Jesus says to them, Alright, go get them food.

And Jesus, and the disciples are like, Alright, thank you, Jesus, but where are we gonna go?

20,000 people is a lot of people.

So they look for food, and you know they find a little boy his lunch.

Five was it five fish, two loaves, or two?

Five loaves, two fish.

Five loaves, two fish.

Five loaves, two fish.

It doesn't really matter because what happens later it doesn't matter.

So I'm sure there's some biblical precedent to this, but literally he comes to with to Jesus, and Jesus says, Bring me the food that you've been able to collect.

And the disciples come to him with the boys' lunch.

20,000 people.

And Jesus says, Okay, give it to me.

He gave thanks for this food, and then what he does is he breaks it into little pieces, and he gives each of the disciples a fraction of what they had given him.

It doesn't seem like very much.

He says, and now get everyone to sit in seats of fifty, small groups.

He says, Everyone's in groups of fifty, now start giving out the food.

And as the Bible says, as they started giving out the fraction of the peace that they had, like a fraction, twelve disciples, five loaves, two fishes in their hand, they start giving it out, it multiplies in their hand.

And it starts multiplying, giving it out to the people until the people were all fed, and afterwards each of the disciples had a doggy bag.

Like they were they got to leave with a bucket of food.

Supernatural things happen when you give to God what you have.

When you give to God even the things that you now you may say, well, I don't have very much, but give to God what you have.

Give him that skill, give them that energy, give them that time, give them that resource that you have.

And as you give to God, God will supernaturally do something in that time.

That is the lesson of generosity.

The generous life is a supernatural life.

Number three, radical generosity.

Living a generous lifestyle is voluntary.

It's voluntary.

The scripture says they gave themselves first to the Lord.

Nothing came out of compulsion.

Just as we, when we lay out our salvation call, we say, if anyone has never received Jesus before, they're welcome to receive Jesus today.

It's not done under compulsion, it's just done for your sake to be able to respond to it.

The same thing goes with generosity.

Generosity has to become voluntary.

If it's if your arms twisted, forget about it.

It's not gonna work because you have to do it.

It's done because it's voluntary out of your own heart.

You're giving of yourself, you're giving of your resource, you're giving of your time.

Voluntary giving is a generous life.

It's not done because someone else has to do it.

We will never tell you what to do, how much to give.

We will never say how to do it.

We're just gonna say, bring it before the Lord, and whatever he says to do, obey it.

Obey.

That's what we have to do.

Lastly, number four, a generous lifestyle is enthusiastic.

When it comes to giving, you give cheerfully.

And with a smile.

Do you think the farmer's walking out there going, I'm gonna drop the seed, I wonder what it'll become?

Probably a weed.

He's walking around.

No, he's when he's putting his seeds in the ground, he's watching that seed every day.

Look, a sprout.

Look, like you remember as a kid, probably everyone did this.

Went to school with a styrofoam cup, some dirt, and a seed.

And you were so amazed when you saw coming out of the ground this one little sprout.

You're excited, mom, dad, check it out.

Mine's growing.

And then my sisters would always grow like twice as tall as mine, and they'd be like, ah, whatever.

Mine's gonna taste better.

But it's but you're excited when you see the start of something, when you give generously, you're when you're living a life that is generous, it's enjoyable, it's enthusiastic.

The word enthusiastic means to be in theos, in God.

That means that you're actually lined up with God.

And the scripture says here that they they pleaded, they pleaded for the privilege of sharing what they had with God's people.

In other words, they were praying, please give me opportunity to give.

Is there any way I can give?

Give me an opportunity so I can do it with everything, all that's in my heart.

They were looking at competing with one another.

I'm gonna, I want to give.

Just like that person's giving.

I want to do the same.

That same enthusiastic response has got to be there for a generous liver.

So today, today, my call out is to you as KCC, look what has been done.

In 35 years, look at what we've been able to do because of generous living.

And I say today that we are at our best when we are living generously.

We have 40 students down from the from our high school, 40 students great.

Uh, how many Paul?

Over 40.

4'2, right?

42, are actually down in Mexico at churches that you helped build and you helped resource.

And we're helping send them down there to be able to be a blessing in Mexico because of your generosity.

Because of your generosity, this property is paid off.

This building is paid off.

Because of your generosity, there are thousands of students being reached with online education.

There is generosity flowing through the veins of the person you're sitting beside.

And we just believe that we want to continue in that way, being at our best, looking for ways to even increase, not decrease, but increase our level of generosity.

Amen?

Father, we thank you this morning for your word.

We thank you, Lord, that you love us so much that you don't keep us in the same place, but your intention is to help us grow.

And Lord, you want us to grow larger and larger and larger and not shrink back at all.

And we thank you, Lord, that you're always there for us.

And when we call out to you and we call out your name, you're there and you hear us.

You've been so generous to us.

You've forgiven us our sin.

You've given us a new hope.

You've provided for us a new future.

We thank you, Lord, for our the new person you've made us into.

And we give you thanks today.

In Jesus' name, we send out a generous amen.

Amen.

God bless you.