Well Supplied

How many of you have have been just out of curiosity?

Just you've been here roughly the m most of this year.

Like since January, you've been here a number of Sundays, cool.

We are wrapping up today, officially wrapping up.

We might do a little tie the bow on it next Sunday kind of message, but we're officially wrapping up our series that we've been in really since February, but with a short break in the summer called Unbreakable Joy.

We have spent uh really the majority of this year, since February, I think, going through the book of Philippians.

If you're new to his hands, that is the primary way that we typically teach as we go through scripture, either through uh one book of the Bible.

We've done Romans, we did Ephesians a few years ago, a couple years ago we went through the whole story of the Bible.

Last year we went through the whole book of Matthew.

Or we're gonna go through one section of scripture and just really go through it and dive in.

In fact, after this is all done, we're starting a series called What Jesus Wants, and it's a study of John chapter 17, which if you've ever read it, is this prayer that Jesus has right before he goes to the cross, and it's a prayer for us.

John 17 · chapter mention

We get to see in that prayer what Jesus actually prays that we would become.

And so we're gonna explore that and what it would look like for us to live lives that in a way answer that prayer of Jesus.

I'm really excited about that.

So we love to go through scripture, and if it's your first time, way not to, I mean, just honestly, way to be here for the very end, right?

Like there's something to say about that.

You're here at the very hopefully this is good enough that you'll be like, I'm gonna go listen to the rest and you want to know more about Ephesians.

Or rather, Philippians.

I don't even know what book we're in.

That's how good I am at doing this.

Okay.

Philippians.

That's the one.

So let me just set this up really quickly.

Here's the gist of Philippians.

It's all about joy.

Paul, the author of Philippians, one of the leaders of the early church, he's in prison when he writes it, but it is not a bummer, it's not a downer in any way.

It's not filled with Paul begging people to please support him and help him because he's struggling so much.

If you don't know the context of Philippians, you would think that the author is having the best time of his life.

That he's he's on cloud nine, he's experiencing all the best parts of life because it's just filled with statements of joy and gratitude.

And then when you realize where he is and what he's facing, which is execution, you recognize that wow, there is a kind of joy that you can have through faith in Jesus that does not make sense.

In fact, uh in Philippians chapter four, we've already read this, it says that God will give us a peace that surpasses understanding.

That's another way of saying peace that doesn't make sense.

If you follow Jesus and you commit to that and you surrender to him and just day by day say, Lord, make me more like you, and help me shed all the things that I need to get rid of and let me just be the person you created me to be, eventually you'll become a person who doesn't make sense.

I don't know if that's a good sales pitch or not.

But you will.

You'll be a person who makes no sense.

People will look at you and they will say, I don't understand how you have that much joy.

I don't understand how you're not freaking out.

I don't understand how you can love people that are really hard to love.

You'll become a person who doesn't make sense.

That's what we have in Philippians.

Joy that makes no sense.

It is not circumstantial.

It's so much more than that.

And I don't know about you, I I want to be a person who doesn't make sense.

And today we're gonna explore the very end of Philippians chapter four, and it covers a topic that honestly, in terms of our world and how our world works, makes zero sense.

And I'm just gonna give you the disclaimer up front.

It is about finances, and I'm kind of mad about that.

Let me explain.

Um, this is one of my least favorite subjects to talk about in church because a lot of churches get it wrong and it gets icky and dumb, and and it's like, in fact, if you search online, like on YouTube, um messages about this scripture we're gonna read today, it is almost completely filled with just with sort of like typical cliched pastors trying to get you to give money to their church messages.

Okay?

That is not the aim of today.

I just want to make that really clear.

The aim of today is really simple.

It is that we as people would learn to trust God so completely that we trust him with everything.

With our lives, with our kids, with our careers, with our relationships, and with our finances, that we would trust God so much that we would say, Lord, I surrender everything to you and I trust you.

Which is really hard.

But this is something that Paul speaks to, and as we go through scripture, we gotta deal with it.

So, with that said, I'm just gonna read Philippians chapter 4, verses 15 through 23, and then we'll we'll talk more.

Philippians 4:15–23

Um, as you know, you Philippians were the only ones who gave me financial help when I first brought you the good news and then traveled on from Macedonia.

No other church did this.

Even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent help more than once.

I don't say this because I want a gift from you, rather, I want you to receive a reward for your kindness.

At the moment, I have all I need and more.

I am generously supplied with all the gifts that you sent me with Epaphroditus.

They are a sweet smelling sacrifice that is acceptable and pleasing to God.

And this same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs from his glorious riches, which have been given to us in Christ Jesus.

Now, all glory to God our Father forever and ever.

Amen.

Give my greetings to each of God's holy people, all who belong to Christ Jesus.

The brothers who are with me send you their greetings, and all the rest of God's people send you greetings too, especially those in Caesar's household.

May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.

If there was one verse that I could pull from that to say this is sort of a focal point for us today, it would be verse 19, which says, This same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs from his glorious riches which have been given to us in Christ Jesus.

Suffice it to say that the way Scripture, Old Testament and New Testament, teaches about finances makes no sense.

You want to be a person who doesn't make sense, do your finances the way that God encourages us, challenges us, and even at times commands us to do in Scripture.

You read scriptures like Malachi chapter 3, verse 10, which says, Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, so there will be enough food in my temple.

Malachi 3:10

If you do, says the Lord of heaven's armies, I will open the windows of heaven for you, I will pour out a blessing so great you won't have enough room to take it in.

Try it, put me to the test.

You can see where certain churches and pastors and and whatnot will take scriptures like this and use it as a tool to try to inspire people to give and to give more and more and more.

And so sometimes this stuff gets taken and twisted.

And while that is true, you also cannot deny that God, over and over again in Scripture, is saying to people, trust me with your finances.

Trust me, surrender this to me, do it my way, and see what happens.

As believers, this is the crazy thing.

If you're new to the whole idea of being a Christian, again, maybe this is the worst Sunday, it's a bad sales pitch, but it's worked out in my life.

I'll say that.

Um we are called as believers, truly, to set aside a percentage of what we are given.

Because we recognize that everything we have comes from God.

And we're called to give that away.

Now that's between you and God.

What that is, how much that is, who you give it to, uh, that's between you and him.

But we're called to live that way.

And then on top of that, we're also called to live in constant obedience and this constant awareness that at any moment in time, God might call us to be generous.

He might call us to give.

And when he does, it's not always going to make sense.

Because you know what, that whole idea of take a percentage of what you have and set it aside in scripture, this is often called a tithe or first fruits, that doesn't make any sense.

In fact, when I was in college, my senior year, I was working at this marketing company, interning, as I was finishing up my degree, and I was underneath this guy named Craig, and uh Craig was probably my age now, I would say, or so, and so he seemed old at the time.

Um and I and now I'm like, I'm probably older than Craig was, whatever.

So Craig was taking me along to sales calls, and he was teaching me how to do sales calls.

I'd never done that before, and I'm just I'm an intern.

And we get to talking on this long drive in Kansas City, Missouri, and he starts asking me about my life, and I'm I mentioned, you know, my faith and church.

I was really involved at my church.

I was basically like the volunteer uh middle school youth pastor.

And so I'm talking about that, and he kind of starts going off about church.

I could tell he had had some negative experiences, or at the very least, negative ideas.

And so he ends up asking me about money.

And he asked me very point blank, like, do you give money to your church?

And I'm like, absolutely.

And he goes, honestly, really?

And I was like, Yeah.

He goes, You trust your church?

And I said, kinda.

Um I mean, truthfully, I actually, when I was uh in college at a different church than uh than I was at at the time, there's another church I'd gone to before.

They were doing this big giving campaign.

Some of you may have been in churches before that do those.

Um it's not really how we do things, but whatever.

And this giving campaign was to build a gym.

And it was amazing, it was an incredible experience because I love sports and so a gym.

Like we're gonna, we're gonna build a gym.

And and I gave to that.

I actually gave a lot to that.

That summer it was one of the first moments in my life where I really fully surrendered my finances to God.

I worked at Chili's.

Shout out to anyone who works in restaurants.

Any Chili's people, by the way?

Anyone ever working at Chili's?

Just me, okay.

All right, well, so I'm just, you know, I'm I'm shelling out baby back ribs left and right.

And, you know, back in those days, because I'm I'm older now, right?

This is 20 something years ago, uh, most of your tips would be in cash.

And so I had this really easy system.

I would take all the money that I'd made each night, and I I could calculate 10% pretty easily, right?

$80 in tips,$8 is 10%.

And I would fold$8 into my wallet.

And then when I would get to my room, I would know the folded money that would go to church.

And I did that all year long.

And I gave to this campaign, this build the gym campaign.

And it was all about reaching out to kids in the community, and it was all about like helping underprivileged kids have a safe place to play.

And I'm like, this is my jam, I love this.

So I ended up going back to school, because I lived about five hours away from my family where that church was, and I came back the next summer.

And I'd given, like, from my perspective, my name should have been on a brick or something somewhere.

Like I felt like I'd I felt like I was a pretty serious contributor, a plaque at least, you know, maybe a maybe a bench outside had my name on it.

I didn't know.

And so we come back, and my brother tells me the gym is built.

I'm like, oh dude, I want to go, I want to go see it.

Let's go play.

Let's go play some basketball and do it.

We go, and as we walk in, this lady stops us at the door and she says, Oh, I'm sorry, do you have a membership?

And I went, Yeah, we're we're members here.

I thought she was talking about to the church.

And she goes, No, do you have a gym membership?

And I was like, Well, that's very different than that wasn't mentioned on stage in the whole giving campaign.

And I actually said that to the lady, I said, Oh, I donated to this.

I thought that this was like a community center and it was open to the kids.

And she goes, Not joking.

She goes, Yes, one night a week we open it up to the public and anyone can come, but other than that, you have to have a membership.

And so we just paid a few extra bucks that day and went in.

I was so mad.

Like, you would you be mad?

Yeah, of course.

But you know what was interesting?

As Craig, my my boss, as an intern, was asking me about giving to my church, do I trust my church?

That story came to my mind.

And when I said kinda, I explained, you know, man, I kinda do.

I've had some experiences where I go, huh.

But at the same time, I said, really, it's between me and God.

And it's something that I do out of obedience to God.

Now, if the church I happen to give to decide to be jerks, then that's between them and God.

And I wouldn't want to be in that position.

But for me, I really don't regret it because it's between me and the Lord.

And he he looked at me and he said, Well, talk to me in 20 years and let's see if you're still doing that when you have kids and mouths to feed.

So, Craig, if you're watching, it's been 20 years checking in, still doing it.

All right, there you go.

Um, we're good.

So, but like I get it, I get it.

Craig's perspective, it's nuts.

It is nuts.

This world trains us to believe that you need more than what you have.

You don't need less.

You're supposed to take what you make and set money aside.

That doesn't make sense.

That is crazy talk.

Like our world operates in a whole different kind of economy.

And we all know that economy really well.

Right?

Our world, for example, our world operates in the economy of supply and demand.

Supply and demand.

We learned this at a very young age.

So we have marketing companies that work to drum up demand, to make us all go nuts and go crazy and spend more on something that we probably don't really need.

And then there's even times where things are made artificially scarce, and so the supply is crunched, so that demand rises and prices go up, and we live in this world where that's all being manipulated all the time, and then sometimes it's just the way the market works, and we're just constantly at the mercy of the law of supply and demand.

And because in our minds there's a limited supply, we often live in this fear.

Sometimes it's the fear of not having enough, the fear of missing out, whatever it might be, and we make these scarcity-based, fear-based decisions that oftentimes lead to us just doing really dumb things with our money.

I'll give you an example from my life.

Um, anybody here, and I I use this as an illustration a few weeks back or a month or so ago, uh, but in a different context, did anyone here grow up collecting cards of any kind?

Like, how many guys in the 80s and 90s grew up collecting baseball cards or basketball cards?

Just want to see my people, okay?

Or Pokemon cards, those of you who are a little younger, like I was kind of old when that happened, but yeah, so I spent a good portion of my childhood collecting uh pieces of cardboard.

Um, technically wax, but whatever.

Uh, pieces of cardboard with the faces of famous athletes on them.

I had a huge collection, it was a passion of mine.

And if you collected cards back in the 80s and 90s, let's say you've got some box at home with 10,000 cards.

Some some people in here, you're like, yeah, I do.

In my garage, I've got this box.

Do you know how much those cards are worth today?

Nothing.

Truly, I hate to break it to you.

It's worth not uh.

And here's why.

They printed so many cards back in the day.

And at the time, people felt like they were scarce.

I actually remember I had this one card of a big-time baseball player, and they had only made 2,000 of that card.

2,000.

And it was worth like$400, apparently.

But then this thing came out called eBay, and uh, if you've been to eBay, you know what I'm talking about, right?

There's nothing that's scarce with eBay.

Like that was all before the internet.

And so if you wanted to find that one of 2,000 cards, you had to go to some shop somewhere, you had to drive somewhere, and who knows you know where those were distributed.

But if if there's 2,000 of something, a thousand of them are for sale on eBay at any given time.

And so eBay comes out and boom, the whole supply-demand thing gets all out of whack, and those cards are worth zero.

So I just want you to know that.

But today, just know if you walk into like a sports card shop today, and I'm only speaking from personal experience and stupidity, um, and you're like, hey, I want to buy a box of cards.

Like a, you know, how much?

This is like 500 bucks.

Yeah, for real.

I know this because a few years back, my oldest son was like, Dad, I want to start collecting basketball cards.

And I was like, Let's do it.

This is awesome.

This is like my childhood on repeat.

Nostalgia is a powerful thing.

We walk in and I say, Hey, I want to buy my son a box of cards, how much for this one?

And the guy goes, Oh, that one's$700.

And I was like, You're gonna have to explain.

Right?

How?

So come to find out, because of the whole supply and demand thing, this does have a point, kind of.

Um so come to find out, I just love this stuff.

This is so I like to nerd out on this stuff.

Um basically the card companies were like, well, okay, we'll fix this, we'll fix this problem by we'll make cards that are like extremely rare.

Forget one of 2,000.

We're talking five, ten, one.

So let me show you guys a few examples of this.

This is nuts.

This just shows you how dumb our world is when it comes to money, okay?

And if, by the way, if this is something that you have participated in, you're not alone.

Maybe I have too, though not to this degree.

Okay, so uh here's a card of Caitlin Clark.

She's a big basketball phenomenon, all right?

This is a Caitlin Clark rookie card.

You can see in the bottom right corner, one of one.

It has her signature, that has a patch from her jersey.

Uh, that card sold last year for$650,000.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But alright, check this out.

This is where it gets crazy.

My son's favorite basketball player is Stephen Curry.

Okay?

This is Stephen Curry's 2009 Topps Chrome rookie card.

I'm gonna show it to you right here.

Um, if you were to pull that card, if you were to find, if you have this card and it's in decent shape, a thousand bucks.

Okay?

2009, a thousand bucks.

But this is right when the card companies were starting to adjust.

They made another version of this card that's the exact same card, but it just has some gold on the edges, so we'll we'll pull that up.

Just, you know, that's it.

The edges aren't white, they're gold.

They only made 50 of those.

Um, one of those sold last year for$250,000.

But check this out.

They made this card.

Same card, right?

It's like, whoa.

But it's shiny.

And there's little gold and little holographic designs on it.

There's only one of these, but it's never been found.

Okay, so they estimate that if someone were to were to find this card, it would sell for anywhere from five to six million dollars.

Okay?

But here's what's crazy there's all these conspiracy theories.

I've I went on a real deep dive on this.

Um, so keep that up, keep that up for a second.

How many of you would spend five million dollars on that?

I mean, I would, I guess it would depend on how much money I had.

Um, no, it's dumb, right?

So, because this has never been found, there are still unopened boxes of cards from that set.

They sell for about$25,000 a box.

A single pack, just one pack, a thousand dollars for a pack.

All because that card might be there.

Now, some kid may have opened it in 2009 and thrown it in the trash, it could be in some shoebox somewhere, or and this is the going conspiracy, this is what people actually believe.

That there is someone that's opened this card.

And they happen to be someone who's a big-time collector, and they happen to also own a lot of the unopened boxes of that card.

Because the day this card is found, those boxes that currently sell for$25,000 are worth zero.

They're worth nothing.

Because the only reason people are spending that is for that card.

And so there's this strong belief that someone has this, but it's in their best interest not to let people know because they're selling the boxes for$25,000 a piece, right?

That's the law of supply and demand.

That's the way our econom that's the way our economy works.

It's a stupid, silly version of it.

It's dumb, it's pointless, but that is the way the world's economy works.

There are things that people will do anything for and spend all kinds of money for that are dumb.

It's a piece of cardboard.

Right?

I mean, do I want it?

Kinda.

But like, you know, you guys can put that down.

But that's that's just an example of the kind of things that happen in our world financially.

And so it's funny, we we look at scripture and it says, hey, take take a percentage of what you make, set it aside, give it back to God.

That will break the hold that money has on you, and you will actually put it to work and you'll see God use it.

And and people in our world will say that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard of.

But I look at that and I go, guys, that's like the dumbest thing I've ever heard of.

Just know that when we read scripture and when the version of how to manage your finances in scripture doesn't make sense, pause for a second and ask yourself the question: Does our world's view of money make sense?

If we live by our world's understanding of the economy, here's what we'll do.

This is what we'll become.

Luke chapter 12, verses 15 through 21.

Luke 12:15–21

Jesus said, Beware, guard against every kind of greed.

Life is not measured by how much you own.

And then he told them a story.

A rich man had a fertile farm that produced fine crops.

And he said to himself, What should I do?

I don't have room for all my crops.

And then he said, I know.

I'll tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and then I'll have room enough to store all my wheat and other goods, and I'll sit back and say to myself, My friend, you have enough stored away for years to come.

Now take it easy, eat, drink, be merry.

But God said to him, You fool, you will die this very night.

And then who will get everything you work for?

Yes, a person is a fool to store up earthly wealth but not have a rich relationship with God.

Now that doesn't mean you can't do both.

Doesn't mean you can't both store earthly wealth and be wise and whatnot and invest.

That's fine.

But it says you'd be a fool to do that and not have a rich relationship with God.

And let's be honest, it is challenging sometimes to do both.

There are so many scriptures, and we talked about this several weeks ago, I won't go back into it.

You can go back and listen to a message that we had on money problems, and we talked about the fact that in scripture, the primary money problem is not you don't have enough money.

The primary money problem is that money has too strong a hold on your life.

And we obsess over it and we think about it.

And man, this is a story that for years I would read and it was a hypothetical, but in the last year of my life, this is now a very real story to me.

And I had an experience about a year ago that still plays in my head, and God has still challenged me through it.

I had an investment.

I'm not really a money guy at all, but a friend of mine had encouraged me to invest in something called Bitcoin.

I don't know if you've heard about it.

And so I did, and then it like blew up, and I had a goal in mind, and it was a big goal, and it got there, and I sold it.

Um, and then uh, you know, right after I sold it, it was like God said, Justin sold, shoot it to the moon.

And so, like I sold it and super grateful, accomplished what I wanted to accomplish, but then it just like exploded, and had I kept it until now, it just be a lot.

Um, you know.

And and I've I've talked with good friends of mine, I've talked on this stage, but I've you know, I have processed.

You guys have been good therapists for me over the last few years.

I've done that.

But you know what, you know what I really mourn?

Um Yeah.

You nailed it.

It's it's the two it's having two barns.

Like I have everything I need.

But this story, it speaks to us, right?

Because at least it speaks to me, because there's something about this man going, you know what?

I'll build a bigger barn, I'll have two barns, and then I can just relax.

I won't have to stress, I won't have to worry, I won't have to rely on God.

I'll have all that I need.

And God says, it's not gonna work out for you.

And so that's the reality of what I have mourned in my life is I could have had another barn.

I could have a bigger barn.

And again, this story used to be a hypothetical, now it's like it hits me kind of different because I realize, oh my goodness, Lord, I'm sorry.

I took my eyes off of you and I'm thankful for the blessing, but I took my eyes off of you and I totally put my trust in that.

Because I have literally wrestled in my mind, I mean, which it isn't literal, so I guess I've figuratively wrestled, with this concept of I could have had more.

That is not God's economy.

That is the world's economy because that idea, I could have had more, it is rooted in fear, it is rooted in scarcity, and it's rooted in the idea that there's a limited supply and that you've missed out.

Or maybe you're missing out.

This is the way God's economy works.

Matthew chapter 14.

Matthew 14 · chapter mention

It says that evening the disciples came to Jesus and said, This is a remote place and it's already late.

Send the crowds away so they can go to the villages and buy food for themselves.

But Jesus said, That's not necessary, you feed them.

But we only have five loaves of bread and two fish, they answered.

Bring those to me, he said.

And then he told the people to sit down on the grass, and Jesus took the five loaves and two fish.

He looked toward heaven, and he blessed them.

And then breaking the loaves into pieces, he gave the bread to the disciples who distributed it to the people.

They all ate as much as they wanted, and afterward the disciples picked up twelve baskets of leftovers.

About five thousand men were fed that day, in addition to all the women and the children.

What you see in this story is that God he doesn't live under the law of supply and demand.

He's not bound by that.

So there's no scarcity mindset with Jesus, right?

The disciples have that.

There's a ton of people.

There's 5,000 plus people.

And they're like, Jesus, these people are getting hungry and 5,000 plus hungry people.

Like, that's scary.

That's a terrifying thing to think about.

And Jesus says, feed them, and they're like, we only have this.

All we have is this.

What use is this?

And here's the cool thing about that story.

Jesus is like, well, if you give it to me, it's very useful.

And so they trust Jesus with what they have.

And if you know that story, it's actually a little boy who brought some tiny loaves of bread and a few fish.

It's like a lunch.

And that little boy had to trust Jesus with what he had, and then he got to watch as Jesus multiplied it, not just to feed him, but to feed a lot of other people.

And you recognize in this story that Jesus doesn't think the way that we think about finances, about resources.

He isn't like, ooh, that's not very much.

We're in a lot of trouble.

What are we gonna do?

Jesus says, Yeah, I operate in in a different way and with a whole different economy at my disposal, and he's able to take it and make it not just enough, but there's extras, there's leftovers.

And guys, I'm I'm I have seen this play out in the coolest ways.

In the coolest ways.

In fact, my buddy Thomas is here.

Hey Thomas.

Um I'm sure I told Thomas that I was gonna give him a shout-out because I I think he'll remember this.

Uh, Thomas, about seven-ish years ago, had a he was he was a great help to me in the early days of meeting.

No, it was longer than that, it was a decade ago.

Yeah, 10 years ago.

So I had just become the leader here at his hands, and our finances were in kind of an interesting place.

We'd been blessed tremendously with this building that our founding pastors had purchased.

We still owed about$10 million on the building, uh, but that was set up to be able to be paid off in a really cool way at no interest, and so that was that was that.

Um but our expenses and our giving and our the size of church we are like this guys, this whole building was built before the church existed.

The very first Sunday that we were ever here in the building, we had 200 people here in this building.

Okay?

There's there's more than like 200 high school and junior high students here right now, and that was how many people, like imagine being in this room with a which is cool, celebrate that for sure.

All right.

I'm just saying, from an economic perspective, this was not built on man's economy.

They were operating in a lot of faith because 200 people cannot sustain this.

And so we were at this place where something had happened, and we were asked to start paying a lot more on the building loan than we had been paying up to that point.

And it was the an exact amount, it's a very unique situation that we were given about a month's notice and told we were gonna start having to pay$20,000 every month on paying off the building.

Which is a crazy amount of money when you think about it, but then you think the size of this building compared to your house payment, like that kind of makes sense.

But we had like no notice.

Just a few weeks, like boom, this is gonna happen.

And I met with Thomas, because Thomas is a he's a financially wise person, and the meeting basically uh the if I could give it a theme, it was oh crap.

That would have been the theme of that meeting.

And I sat with Thomas with a bunch of spreadsheets printed out, and we sat at this Mexican restaurant in Kennesaw, and basically Thomas helped me create this like nuclear scenario plan.

And truly, we were prepared, we had this whole thing figured out, we were prepared, and we figured based on the numbers, okay, we're still working in the idea of man's economy, based on the numbers, we're like, we probably have a couple months until we are in serious trouble as a church.

So, I've got my plan, you know.

Thomas is like, this is gonna work, we'll we'll figure this out.

And then the craziest thing happened.

The very first month that that went into effect, we got a check from someone for$20,000 exactly.

Now, I want you to know that does not happen very often.

That is not a rare, that is to this day.

Like, that doesn't happen by all means, feel free.

Um I I will just, I mean it just makes everything easier, guys.

Just makes it all easier.

Let's build a bigger barn.

Um, but no, like that was a very rare thing back then, and my point is it's still a rare thing.

And it was$20,000 to the penny, the exact amount that our our new mortgage payment essentially was.

I called Thomas and I was like, dude, you will not believe what happened.

We got a donation for$20,000.

So that couple months that we felt like we had, like, got pushed back a month.

Okay.

The very next month, totally different person.

And by the way, I want to say this, I did not announce this from the stage.

This was not known by people.

This wasn't something like I had put out there, you know, at all.

It was something that Thomas and me and a few other people knew about, were praying about, but it was no one knew about this.

So the next month, totally different person, totally different situation comes, and they said, Hey, I had this kind of unique thing happen in my life, and it was like it was basically an inheritance, and they said, I want to give this to the church.

And it was a check for$20,000 to the penny.

Okay, month three.

Nothing.

But it's not like you can be mad at God in that scenario.

Like if you got a check in the mail for two straight months from totally random people for the exact amount of your mortgage payment, and then the third month you open your mailbox and you're like, hey God, what gives?

You know?

I thought we had an understanding.

You know, like that would be crazy.

But check this out.

Month four.

Someone gave us a check for$40,000.

To the penny.

I'm not joking, to the penny.

Yeah, it was crazy.

It was like God was like, hey, my bad on last month.

Um I got you.

Month five.

Month five, someone gave us a donation for$20,000, exactly.

And it ends after here, I promise.

Month six, this was the cool one for me, because a very close friend of mine, really good buddy of mine, um, who also did not know about this situation, but a really close friend had experienced a huge blessing in his business, and he wanted to have lunch with me.

And we're having lunch, and he says, Hey man, I just I want to bless the church with something.

And he hands me this envelope, and I asked him.

I was like, Is it for$20,000?

And he said, How did you yes?

That was the exact amount.

So here I am.

I have I have lunch with Thomas, and he's helping me figure out the nuclear scenario, and we're looking, yeah, man.

Well, clearly this is gonna happen, and da-da-da-da-da.

And in a few months, we'll have to go to the people that you know we're paying this too and say, guys, this isn't gonna work, help us figure things out.

We have this whole nuclear scenario, and it was a great plan.

So thank you, Thomas.

But God's economy works different.

And for the first six months, for the first six months of that new payment structure, God completely covered all of that.

And and the crazy thing was that six months, other things happened.

We grew as a church, and I had a conversation with the church about just the need for us to step up in a little bit.

Because in the early days, Steve and Susan, who started the church, they just kind of paid for everything, and we all got to just be like kids, like, we this is fun.

But it was like, hey, we gotta take this on.

This is our church.

And so things change and we and we've been good.

Like we've been good.

And it would have been awesome if those just kept coming.

But that would just be about having a bigger barn.

And that's not that's not what this is about.

And so God has met our needs, and we have enough.

We have enough.

And you guys, week in and week out, are faithful.

And this, by the way, this is not a challenge to those of you who don't do this, because I know that that's a good number of us don't, or haven't yet, whatever.

That's not, I'm not saying this to make anyone feel a certain way.

What I'm saying is, here we are, that was ten years ago, and in the last decade, in the last decade, those of you who have felt led by God to give, you've given.

Whatever he's put on your heart, you've never heard someone stand here on the stage and tell you how much to do or or pressure you or whatever, and God's given us what we need, and we have enough.

We don't have like way more than enough.

We're not like, what are we gonna do with all of this egg?

Like, that's not.

But every time my mind goes there, it's like, oh yeah, I don't need two barns.

That's not what this is about.

This is not man's economy, this is God's economy.

And so I'm just saying this to say that I have seen this work.

One of the biggest things we did as a church years ago, and many of you were here when we started this, is we started giving money away like we never had before.

We we as a church give 10% of everything that's given to us away every single month.

And if it builds up and there's a month where we don't have 10, you know, the 10% we there's not enough needs that we're aware of to meet, we save that up and then we we do big things with it.

We've done that for years and years.

I'll never forget years ago, we needed a new roof.

Those of you who were here in the old roof days, the leaky roof days.

Uh the building just had just no, if you weren't here back then, it just had like a mustier smell.

Just kind of, you know, smelled wet all the time.

That's a great smell.

You know, when you walk into space and it's like, hmm, it's wet.

Uh we just had a roof that leaked like crazy.

It was the old Kmart roof, and it needed replaced.

It was like$350,000.

We didn't have that.

Um, but God had proven to us that, hey, He's gonna take care of us.

And so I remember there was a woman in our church, and she'd had her husband and her son pass away really, really closely to one another.

And their roof was in shambles in their house.

And Sheila, who's our care pastor, came to me and she said, I feel like we're supposed to buy her a new roof.

And I remember, like, we need a new roof.

And it's like, yeah, that's exactly how it should go.

That before we worry about the thing we need, let's meet the need of this person, this wonderful woman.

And so we, as a church, we bought her a new roof.

And the very next week, a check came in the mail.

No, I'm just joking, I didn't happen.

No, it was like two years later, two years later, we were ready to replace our roof.

But it was so cool.

I remember in doing that, I was like, this is just like God.

You know, just like God that before we take care of our thing, he's like, hey, I got something I want you to do.

And I would be a liar if I said that it's every time that happens, it's like super easy for me.

Or every time in my own life when God's like, hey, give that person something.

There's part of me that's like, no.

I have, God, I don't know if you've been paying attention, I have four kids.

But as time has gone on, I will say that like that that voice gets smaller and smaller.

I'd just be a liar if I told you it wasn't there.

But it gets smaller and smaller because I've seen how God operates.

And and here's what I would just love to encourage you with.

2 Corinthians 9, 6 and 7.

I was told by my kids when I say that to go 2 Corinthians 9, 6, 7.

I don't know what that means, but I was told to do that.

I guess it's like a young person thing, so sorry.

All right.

Ask your kids.

Says, remember this.

I probably just participated in some meme that's inappropriate, and I'm gonna get like, this is gonna be all on things and taken out of context, whatever.

My kids told me to do it.

They said, Dad, it's not a bad thing, and I was like, okay.

Um, whatever.

How many of you in the room know what that was, by the way?

Is that bad that I did that?

It's not what does it mean?

My kids all week long, my kids have been going 6'7?

What does it mean?

Does it mean anything?

Are you not allowed to say what it means?

Okay, well, whatever.

All right.

I'm not old enough that my kids do things all the time and it's like they speak a different language, and I'm at home and I'm like, what are you guys doing?

And they look at me like I'm stupid, and then I feel stupid.

You know what I'm talking about?

Like teenagers, teenagers do stupid things and then they make you feel like you're stupid.

I don't know how that works, but it happened.

All right.

So 2 Corinthians chapter 9, 6, 7.

2 Corinthians 9 · chapter mention

Here we go.

Says, remember this.

A farmer who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop, but the one who plants generously will receive a generous crop.

You must each decide in your heart how much to give.

And don't give reluctantly or in response to pressure, for God loves a person who gives cheerfully.

You can trust God with everything.

You can.

And there will be people who tell you that if you give a lot, you'll be rich and stuff like that.

And maybe, I don't know.

I mean, God can do what he wants.

But the promise that we have in Scripture is really simple.

You cannot outgive God.

And if God calls you, if He calls you to be generous in any capacity, you can trust Him with that.

His economy works differently.

It doesn't make sense.

But we're called to be people who don't make sense.

We're called to be people who have a joy that doesn't make sense, who have love that doesn't make sense, who have faith that doesn't make sense, who have wisdom that doesn't make sense, and we're also called as people to have a generosity that doesn't make sense.

And and I'm not asking you to do anything specific.

I'm asking you to do one thing, I guess, specifically, is just have a conversation with God in your life and say, Lord, do I trust you?

Do I really trust you with everything?

And I have found personally that this is the one area of life that a lot of people are like, it's the last thing to go.

It's like, I trust you, Lord, with my soul.

I trust you with my eternal destination.

But leave my bank account alone.

I get it.

But you can trust him.

And if you will be a person, if you will be a person who surrenders every part of your life to him, if you'll be a person who says, Lord, I submit to you.

I give everything to you.

Everything I have, God, it all comes from you.

And so I just want you to know, Lord, I'm yours.

And whatever you tell me to do, I'll do it.

If you live your life with that attitude in your heart, what I will promise you is that you will not have a life of lack.

I don't mean there won't be times where things are tight or tough.

No, 100%.

That's the way life works.

But what I will tell you is that you will not have a life that is defined by lack.

You will have an abundant heart.

The people I know that have the most abundant lives in every way you can think of, just joy and love and perspective and wisdom and oftentimes financially too, they're just people who they just do what God says.

It's that simple.

They just they've surrendered their life to God and they're letting Him direct things and it's going great.

And even when it's hard, they have a trust and a faith that gets them through it where other people would be freaking out.

Because they trust God.

And God can be trusted.

And so, do you trust him?

And do you trust him with everything?

Do you surrender everything to him?

If you do, he will not let you down.

He won't.

He'll be there for you.

Again, worship team, you can make your way out.

Philippians 4.19.

The same God.

Remember, Paul's writing this from prison.

And he says, the same God who takes care of me, you could think that Paul would be like, God, you're not really taking care of me very well right now.

That wasn't Paul's perspective.

He's like, I have all I need.

I'm good.

He will supply all your needs from his glorious riches.

He's not bound by supply and demand.

Like, look at that, look at that miracle Jesus did with the food.

He can multiply.

He will supply all your needs from his glorious riches which have been given to us in Christ Jesus.

So we're going to take Lord's Supper and pray.

And then we've got a bunch of people getting baptized.

And so just asking a favor, I think we've got several.

Stay here for that.

Like make sure that when someone's getting baptized, going all in, they don't see like backs walking away from them.

Because this is our family, we want to celebrate that.

And we'll we'll do this quick.

This little meal that we take every Sunday, if you're new, by the way, these are at tables in the back.

You can go grab one if you want.

You're not going to mess us up if you do that.

But we take this every week.

And it's a way for us to get our eyes completely focused on Jesus.

And honestly, today, what a perfect example of trust.

Jesus trusted the Father.

It's time for you to give your life on the cross as an offering.

Jesus obeyed.

He obeyed.

Every single time in my life I feel that tension of God saying, Justin, trust me with this.

And I'm like, I don't know.

I should remember this moment.

And Jesus had a prayer with the Father in the garden.

If you know that scripture, where he's like, Lord, are you sure?

Are you sure?

Like, if there's another way, I'd love to hear it.

But then he quickly says, But not what you want.

Not what I want, rather, but what you want.

And so he submitted his life to the Father completely.

And then he died on the cross as a sacrifice for us.

This bread that we're about to eat, this is his body.

This juice we're about to drink, it's his blood.

And just imagine, where would we be if Jesus had held back?

Like, where would we be if Jesus had said, you know what, Father, I love you, but it's that's just too expensive.

That's too big a price to pay.

He held back nothing.

And because of that, we've been forgiven.

We have grace, we have mercy, we have a relationship with God the Father.

We're part of the family of God.

We have an eternity with Him to look forward to.

All of that paid for by a generous and obedient Jesus who trusted the Father with everything.

So what an example to follow.

And with that in that in mind, let's take the bread and let's pray.

Father God, we thank you for this bread and we thank you for your Son.

Jesus, we thank you for the sacrifice that you made for us.

You truly paid it all.

You paid it all.

You paid the price for our sin, for our shortcomings, for our struggles, and now, because of you, Jesus, we're free.

You say in your word that that freedom that we have, that relationship we have with you, it was bought for a price.

And that price was this, Jesus.

What a precious price you paid.

And we thank you for this.

And as we take this in, Lord, we ask that you fill our hearts with a generous spirit.

The Holy Spirit, you would fill us with that same generosity that Jesus lived with in every part of our lives.

Amen.

Let's take the bread.

Now the juice.

Lord, we thank you so much for this juice for what it represents.

What it means.

This is your blood poured out.

It's an offering that purifies us and cleanses us from sin.

And there's nothing more precious than I can think of.

And so, Lord, as we drink this juice, we again we say thank you.

And we ask, Holy Spirit, that you would fill us with that same generosity, that same willingness to surrender everything to you, to trust you completely and totally, and know that when we're doing what you ask us to do, we are well supplied.

We pray this in your name, Jesus.

Amen.