Rick Warren - 9 Divine Promises for Those Who Give from the Heart - Part 2

Can you guess what subject in the Bible God makes

more promises about than anything else? It's not faith. It's

not prayer. It's not love. It's not patience. It may

surprise you that God makes more promises in the Bible

about generosity or giving than anything else. 2 Corinthians 9,

2 Corinthians 9:7

verses 7 and 8. You should give as you have

decided in your heart to give. In other words, nobody

can tell you what to give. What's generous for you

is your decision based on how much income you have.

But he says you should decide what you've decided in

your heart to give. Never give reluctantly or under pressure

because God loves the person who gives cheerfully. Don't give reluctantly,

don't give under pressure because God loves a cheerful giver.

Now that's the premise. Here's the promise. Then, here's the promise,

God will generously provide for you so that, here's the promise,

in all things, at all times, you'll have all that

you need and plenty left over to give more to

every good work. You're gonna have all you need at

all times, in all things, in all places, There's no

wiggle room there. God says, I am guaranteeing I will

meet your needs. Do you believe that verse? Let's go

to a couple more promises. Number seven, number eight. God

says that if I learn to give like he gives,

he will multiply what I give him. He'll take what

I give him and he will multiply it and make

it go even further. Now there's so many examples of

this in scripture. that I don't even know which one

to choose from. I could tell you about the story

of Jesus feeding the 5,000, where he took a few

loaves of bread and fish, one boy's lunch, and he

fed 5,000 people with it. He took it, he broke it,

he blessed it, and he multiplied it. And throughout the Bible,

God does this principle of multiplication, the miracle of multiplication. Many,

many times. He takes a little and whatever you give God,

he turns into a lot. So whatever you need more of,

give it to God. Let me say that again. Whatever

you need more of, give it to God. You need

more time, give your time to God. Put him first

in your time. You need more money, give your money

to God. Put him first in your money. You need

more energy, give your first energy to God. And he'll multiply.

You'll have more energy. You know, throughout the Bible, God

compares giving and generosity to planting seeds. Let me show

you a couple verses. This is a very common metaphor.

He says, every time you're generous, every time I give

to God or to other people in need, whatever he says,

it's like planting a seed. 2 Corinthians 9, verses 10

2 Corinthians 9:10

and 11 says this. Just as God gives seed to

farmers and bread for food, God gives you a supply

of seed, in other words, to plant. He gives you

a supply of seed to plant, and then he makes

it grow so there's a great harvest from your generosity. And,

here's the rest of the promise, God will make you

rich enough to be generous at all times. Now, you

might want to write this down. Giving is not a

debt I owe. It's a seed I sow. Giving is

not a debt I owe. It's a seed I sow.

And I sow it in faith. God doesn't need your money.

He doesn't need my money. Then why does God want

to teach me giving? To teach me to trust him.

And so I become more like him. And to become

more generous. Giving is not a debt I owe. It's

a seed I sow. Now when you plant a seed,

do you get one seed back? No. you get a

whole plant with a lot of fruit. And in those fruits,

there's a multiplication of seed. No one has ever planted

one seed and got back one seed. If I take

a kernel of corn and I plant that corn in

the ground, I don't get one kernel of corn back.

I get a stalk with three or four ears of

corn with literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of kernels

on that corn. This is the principle of multiplication. He

says that if you'll take, when you give to people,

if you'll take your money and use it to help others,

God says, I'll multiply it so that when it comes back,

it's multiplied. You don't get one seed back when you

plant it. You get a hundred or a thousand seeds

out of that one blessing. Now here's the important part

that I want you to get. God says, you can plant,

I'm giving you, just like I give a farmer seed

to plant, I'm giving money for you to use for good.

Money is a tool. Money is neither good nor bad,

it's just a tool. And you should use money for

good rather than bad. Any money I just spend on myself,

it's gone. Any money I use for good is actually

building an investment and it's multiplying in heaven. But when

you plant a seed, you reap a harvest. Now God

lets you decide the size of your harvest. It just

all depends on how much seed You plant. Here's what

the Bible says, 2 Corinthians 9, verse 6. Remember this. Okay,

2 Corinthians 9:6

now anytime the Bible says remember this, God wants you

to remember it. Remember this. Whoever sows sparingly will also

reap sparingly. And whoever sows generously will also reap generously.

That means God says, you get to decide, I get

to decide how much God blesses my life. And how

do I decide how much God blesses my life? By

my giving. If I sow just a few seeds, then

I'm going to reap. a small harvest. If I sow

a lot of seed, if I give a lot away,

then I'm gonna reap generously. The size of the harvest

is determined by the size of sowing. God leaves it

up to you. If you have little faith, then you

get a little result. If you have a lot of faith,

you get a lot of result. If you sow extravagantly,

you get an extravagant result back. Now, in planting seed

and waiting for the harvest, The harvest is never immediate.

I want you to get this because a lot of

people don't understand this. The harvest is never immediate. Seeds

take time to grow. So you plant in one season,

in the planting season, and you harvest in another season,

maybe six months later. It's not instant. This is true

in your generosity and your giving. It's not like I

give something to somebody else or give something to God

today and this afternoon God makes up for it. God

is not a slot machine where you put in the

coin and pull the one-armed bandit and all of a

sudden you hit the jackpot. God is not a gambling

man like a slot machine. No, he is like a farmer.

He says you plant in one season and you reap

and another. Look at this verse on the screen. Ecclesiastes

Ecclesiastes 11:1

11 verse 1 says this, be generous and instantly you'll

be rewarded. No, it doesn't say that, does it? Be

generous and what? One day, one day, one day you

will be rewarded. There's always a time delay between sowing

and reaping, between planting and harvest, between giving and and receiving.

Why is there always that delay? Because God wants you

to trust him. Are you going to do the right thing?

If you saw immediate results every time you gave, there'd

be no faith needed. You know, it's like a jackpot.

I put in this, I get this. I put in this,

I get this this week. You know, I remember one

time I was out on the patio after service and

a guy came up to me after a message that

I taught on tithing And he came up to me

and he said, Pastor Rick, tithing didn't work for me.

I saw no return on it. I said, well, when

did you start? He said, last Sunday. Last Sunday? That's

not like a season away. God says, have you developed

a habit of being generous? I want to see if

you've developed this habit before. I'm not interested in playing

games with you. I know many of you use the

Daily Hope Devotionals as part of your regular Bible study,

and so I want to share some exciting news. We've

put 365 of the best devotionals into a brand new

book that we're calling the Daily Hope Devotional, Purpose, Peace,

and Promise for Every Day. This devotional book is designed

with clear, practical, biblical teaching to help you make knowing

God your number one priority. I believe it will help

you stay focused on God throughout the day... as he

provides you with real purpose, lasting peace, and his unfailing promises.

Imagine starting every day like that.

This book is a great way to share the hope

you have in Jesus with your friends, co-workers, and relatives.

I hope you'll get a copy for everyone you know.

Be sure and request your copy when you partner with

Daily Hope to take the Word of God to a

hurting world.

I learned generosity at a very early age. As a child,

my parents gave me three little envelopes and later three

little piggy banks. And they would give, if my allowance

was three dimes or three nickels or three quarters, and

then later it was $ 3 as I got older, one

envelope was marked tithing, one envelope was marked saving, and

one envelope was marked spending. And if I got that money,

I was taught from an early age, you don't get

to go out and just spend it all on yourself.

You have to learn to save. You need to pay

God first, that's tithing, okay? Then you pay yourself second,

that's saving. And then you spend the rest. But if

you're not paying God first, and if you're not paying

yourself second, you're not saving anything. You're not getting God's

blessing in your life. You're going to be in constant

debt all your life. So I learned easy. Now, obviously,

when I was making.

$ 3 a.

And $ 1 went to tithing, one to saving, one spending.

I was actually tithing 33%, not 10%. But I've tithed

all my life. And God has blessed me. Then when

I got to college, I started learning how to give

in faith. And I remember a specific time when I

had a $ 500 college bill. And I also owed a

friend $ 10 for gas that he'd loaned me. And I

only had $ 50 in the bank. And I knew that

that $ 50 was not going to pay my $ 500 college bill.

or the $ 10 that I owed a friend. So I

remember reading the verse that talked about give and it

will be given to you. And I read the verse

about sow and reap, and I read all of these

promises you talked about. So I went and I withdrew

that $ 50 out of the bank. And I decided that

I was gonna give it to the American Bible Society.

Why I chose them, I don't know. But I just

thought they're creating Bibles to give away to people around

the world. So I sent the $ 50 donation to the

American Bible Society, and I sent a little handwritten note, said,

you know, I'm a starving college student, and I've got

a couple bills, but this money wasn't gonna pay off

that bill, so I thought I may as well give

it away, and I'm trusting God to keep his promises

of give, and it will be given unto you. And

if anybody happens to read this letter, would you pray

for this college student? You know, it was about a

month later that I got invited to speak at a

church up in downtown LA. And I spoke Friday night

and a Saturday night and a Sunday morning and a

Sunday night to their youth group. And when we finished

that night, the pastor of that church stood up and said, well,

we're gonna take a love offering for this young man,

Rick Warren. And I'm going, oh, terrific. Because I wasn't

planning on getting anything out of it. I was just

doing it because I wanted the experience and I cared

about the kids there. And so they took up an

offering and he put it in an envelope or actually

gave me a check. And when I got back to

my college dorm, I opened it up and it was $ 565,

which meant I had $ 500 to pay off the college bill,

$ 10 to pay back to my friend and $ 55 to

pay the tithe on the gift. You think that made

a believer of me, of giving in faith? You see,

you can give by reason or you can give by revelation.

When you give by reason, you look at your bank

account and go, what can I afford to give? Anybody

can give by reason. You don't even have to be

a believer. You don't have to be a Christian. It

takes no faith to give by reason. This is how

much I've got. This is what I can afford to give.

But to give by revelation is go, God, how much

do you want to give through me? How much do

you want to give through? This is a test of faith.

And many, many times, time after time, I've now done

this literally hundreds of times where we would pray, Kay

and I would pray, and God would give us a

number to give that was so astronomical, we thought, we

don't have that to give. I remember in one of

the early building programs of Saddleback Church, we committed to

give an amount that was equal to my entire salary

for three years. And I thought, how are we going

to live for three years without my salary? But that's

what we, God calls good. And in a miraculous way,

God took care of that need and met my needs.

And he's done it so many times. I do it

without thinking now. I know that God keeps his promises

about giving. And so when Kay and I got married,

we started tithing. This weekend was our 44th anniversary. And

so we've been married 44 years. When we got married

the first year, we started tithing. Tithe means 10%. We

start giving 10% to God. At the end of the

first year, we raised our giving to 11%. At the

end of our second year, we raised our giving to 12%.

At the end of our third year, we raised our

giving 3%. So we were now giving 15%. Now, why

did we do this? I mean, we didn't tell anybody

about it for nearly 30 years. So we clearly weren't

showing off. We weren't trying to impress God or to

impress anybody. We didn't tell anybody about it for years

and years and years. But every time I give, it

breaks the grip of materialism in my life. Every time

I give, my heart grows bigger. Every time I give,

I become more like Jesus. And I want to be

that way. So every year we would increase our giving

to the Lord. And there were times when the cupboard

was bare and the year was real tight and tough,

but we'd still raise our giving like a quarter of

a percent because we always wanted to give more the

last year. And on other years when we had like,

you know, I wrote a book or got a salary

raise or something like that, we would raise our giving

four or 5%. And till finally now for many years,

for the last at least 15 years, Kay and I

have given away 91% and live on 9%. And, you know,

people often ask me, why do you think God chose

you to write a book, Purpose Driven Life, that has

now sold in all of its editions over 50 million copies?

It's the best-selling hardback nonfiction in history. It's in Guinness

Book of Records as one of the best-selling books of

all time. It sold over 50 million copies just in

English in the different versions and it has sold in

137 languages. Well, that brought in an awful lot of money,

millions of dollars. And people say, why do you think

God chose you to write that book? And one of

the things I know is because he knew what I'd

do with the money. He knew we wouldn't spend it

on ourselves. And, uh, and people say, well, if I

had all those millions of dollars, uh, I I'd give

it all away too. No, you wouldn't because you're not

doing it now. I had a nearly 30 year track

record of giving when we didn't have the money. When

the cupboard was bare, when I was driving a truck,

a car that I bought for $ 500 over in leisure world,

instead of buying a new car so we could give more.

And the times that we said we didn't buy that

TV because we wanted to give more. And God knew

that I had a track record that he could trust

me with all that money. Now, let me give you

one more that promises that God has made. And it

is this. God promises that my giving is stored up

in heaven. This is a big, big thing. God promises

that when I give, I'm not actually giving it away

that God is actually storing it up in heaven. Let

me show you some verses about this. First Timothy chapter six,

verse 18 and 19 says this. Use your money to

do good. Use your money to do good and give generously.

Always being ready to share with others whatever God has

given you. Okay, can you do that? That's the premise

of the promise. Always be ready to give generously, always

be ready to share with others whatever God's given you.

Here's the promise. By doing this, you will be storing

up real treasure for yourselves, he's talking about in heaven,

it is the only safe investment for eternity. Now, I

want you to circle two words, for yourselves. It says

you'll be storing up real treasure for yourself. God says

that when you give to God or you give to

somebody in need, you're storing up treasure for yourself. And

there's nothing wrong with that. And where are you storing

up for yourself? In heaven. Circle that treasure for yourself.

Treasure for yourself. What is that? Well, we know that

God has set up a bank account for you in heaven.

And he says, you can store up treasure for yourself

in that bank account. How do you do that? By

giving it away. Now, how do we know that God

has a bank account for you in heaven? Because Jesus

mentioned it five times. Five times. Anytime God mentions something

five times, he's saying, I want you to get the message.

Jesus uses the phrase store up treasure in heaven five times.

I want to suggest to you that more important than

your retirement account on earth is you need to start

thinking about your eternal bank account in heaven because that

one's got to last trillions and trillions of years, whereas

your retirement account, it may be just a few years.

You say, well, Rick, how do I fund that eternal investment?

How do I store up treasure in heaven? Well, you

can't take it with you, but you can send it

on ahead through giving. And Jesus tells us this way,

Luke chapter 16, verse nine. Jesus says, use your worldly wealth,

Luke 16 · chapter mention

your worldly resources to benefit others and make friends. He's

talking about eternal friends, make friends in heaven. In this way,

your generosity stores up a reward for you in heaven.

So really, it just comes down to this. Do I

believe these promises? Yes. Really, it just comes down to,

do I really trust God to keep his promises? You see,

you only actually believe the part of the Bible you

actually do. And so if you say, well, I believe

the Bible, but God's given you all these promises and

you're not tithing or you're not being generous, you don't

really believe the promises of God. Now, why would you

believe God and trust him enough to save you, but

you wouldn't believe and trust him enough for all the

other things he's promised? That doesn't make sense. You say, okay, well,

if I really want to trust God, what's my starting point? Well,

my starting point is, as I said, tithing. God says

over and over again that if I make $ 10, right

off the top, the first dollar goes back to him.

It's called tithing. Tithing means a tenth. You know that

at least 10 times in scripture, God says the first

part of everything you make belongs to me. The tithe

is mine. It's holy to me. And God says, you're

not to use my part of the income I give

you on yourself. You can use the other 90%, but

he says, if you use my part on yourself, you're

cheating me. Deuteronomy 14, 23 on the screen says this,

the purpose of tithing is to teach you to always

put God first in your lives. If you're not tithing,

God is not first in your life. Show me your calendar,

show me your money, and I'll show you what's first

in your life. Let's bow our heads for prayer. God,

I know this is a scary time for some people

because they just have never trusted you and your promises.

So help them realize that the same God who died

for them and the same God who loves them and

saves them and is gonna keep his promise to take

them to heaven is the same God who says, I'll

do these nine things if you'll learn to be like me,

if you'll learn to be as generous as I am.

Now you pray. Say, God, I want these promises in

my life. Say, God, I want good things to happen

to me. I want my children to be blessed. I

want my work or business to be blessed. I want

to be happier. Lord, I want my Influence to increase

and I want to end up with more than I've

got And Lord, I want to trust you to meet

all my needs and I want to believe that you

will multiply what I give you and I want to

trust that whatever I give in tithes and offerings and

Charity that my giving is being stored up in heaven

so today I commit or recommit to giving the first

10% back to you. I'm going to trust your promises.

I'm going to believe your word. And I know that

is pleasing to you. Lord, I can't do this on

my own. So I need you to keep your promises.

I'm going to test you. I'm going to accept your

challenge to see if you won't bless me in return.

And then it'll be a blessing that I can't even handle. Lord,

I look forward to this in faith and in confidence

and in expectation. If you've never invited Jesus into your heart,

Jesus is the answer to all of our promises. Say,

Jesus Christ, come into my heart and life and fill

me with your love. I want to follow you the

rest of my life. We humbly pray this prayer together

in your name.

Amen.

I know many of you use the Daily Hope Devotionals

as part of your regular Bible study, and so I

want to share some exciting news. We've put 365 of

the best devotionals into a brand new book that we're

calling the Daily Hope Devotional. Purpose, peace, and promise for

every day. This devotional book is designed with clear, practical,

biblical teaching to help you make knowing God your number

one priority. I believe it will help you stay focused

on God throughout the day as he provides you with

real purpose, lasting peace, and his unfailing promises.

Imagine starting every day like that.

This book is a great way to share the hope

you have in Jesus with your friends, co-workers, and relatives.

I hope you'll get a copy for everyone you know.

Be sure and request your copy when you partner with

Daily Hope to take the Word of God to a

hurting world.

Thank you.