Money Problems Part 1

We are in a series right now called the Summer of Wisdom.

We're gonna take our summer and we're looking at the topic of wisdom.

Earlier this year, we were doing a series called Unbreakable Joy.

We're gonna pick that back up in the fall.

We were going through the book of Philippians.

We got three-fourths of the way through and then paused for this wisdom study this summer, but the two subjects really are deeply connected.

In fact, Proverbs chapter 3, verses 13 through 15 says, joyful is the person who finds wisdom.

Proverbs 3:13–15

Wisdom brings joy.

The one who gains understanding.

For wisdom is more profitable than silver, and her wages are better than gold.

Wisdom is more precious than rubies.

Nothing you can desire compares with her.

There's nothing you need more than wisdom.

Truly.

That's why there's joy when you find it.

When you have a problem, when you have a struggle, and you find the solution, you find a wise solution that fixes the problem.

There's an instant joy in that moment that is that's felt, it's intense.

Wisdom, true wisdom, brings joy.

Because wisdom is what we need to solve our problems, and we have those.

Anyone here without a problem today, like you have zero problems.

Any no problem people, no, no non-pro no zero no people problem in the room.

So that's good's good.

That's good.

I have problems, we all have problems.

In fact, as part of this series, we have a phone number that you guys can text to.

Um we'll put this up and we'll leave it on the screen for just a few a few minutes so you can save it if you don't have it.

Um but this is a number you can text your problems to, and it's not that just so you know, I'm answering all of these.

And there have been a lot, and it's been great.

I spent probably two or three hours yesterday uh answering the rest that I hadn't answered yet to make sure that every Sunday when I stand here, I think I've answered all of them.

If I missed yours, I am so sorry.

I will go back through and double check that.

Um the number is totally anonymous.

I have no idea who the people are, it's completely disconnected from any contact list of any kind.

And it's been amazing to read what you guys are going through.

And it's been a blessing for me to see that, and I've tried to take care and time with each one.

The thing is, I'm not like an advice columnist.

I don't know who Annie was, but people used to ask her these questions and she'd have the answers.

I'm not Annie.

Uh, but I'm confident that God's word has solutions to your problems.

That's the reality.

Like I don't have the answers, but God does.

And his word, scripture, it has given us the wisdom that we need for life.

I'm so confident in that that there's not one issue that anyone has, we've had some intense ones.

There's not one issue anyone has text in where I'm like, uh, I hate to tell you this, but the Bible's just silent on this.

You have, I can offer you no help.

No, God's word, he loves us so much that he has equipped us, he's given us the wisdom that we need for life.

And it's a really powerful thing.

And so the things that y'all are texting in, we're using those to actually determine what we're gonna talk about.

And today and next week, we're gonna talk about the subject of money because we have had so many people text in with questions about money.

The topic of today and next week is money problems.

We're gonna talk about money problems because that's one of the problems we often have.

If we can just be honest and vulnerable for a second, um, how many of us would feel comfortable raising our hands if you don't?

That's fine.

How many of us grew up in a home that had money problems?

Like we grew up, money problems were a thing that we were aware of.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's I've never met anyone who either themselves did not grow up in a home that had money problems, or at the very least, their grandparents did.

We're all at least one to two generations removed from pretty serious money problems.

In fact, my grandparents grew up during the Great Depression, so like they would sit here and go, You have no idea what money problems are, you have no concept of money problems, but that's something many of us were familiar with at a young age.

And I'm not sure how old you were when you first became aware of the reality in life that there's money and there's problems associated with it.

So uh I grew up not knowing that I was poor.

I don't know if anyone else has that experience where you didn't know you were poor, but you were, at least for a time.

When I was born in the early 80s, the 70s were not exactly an economically booming time, and and my dad was was new in his career.

He had made a major career change shortly before I was born, and so that was taking time.

And and my dad had been married before he married my mom, so he had two kids with his first wife, and there was child support and things like that.

And so, growing up as a little kid, like we lived in a trailer, and that's all I knew.

I didn't have an issue with that, but that was that was my life.

In fact, we lived in a trailer really close to a highway.

I once got in trouble because I rode a little vehicle uh across the highway.

It was across a double-lane highway, and I went to the gas station, got in a lot of trouble for that.

I remember that.

Um, but I have no I have no negative memories of like being like, I live in a trailer.

I'll never forget though, when I was about five or six, my dad, um, he would have been 35 or so at the time, finally got to that point where he he bought our first house.

And both my parents are from rural, very rural southern Missouri.

I grew up in southern Missouri, and so they didn't come from families that had money.

My dad worked really hard.

My mom too, she worked full-time.

They both worked insanely hard for us to have a house.

And I actually had my little brother drive by it.

Uh, he lives in the same town that I grew up in.

I hadn't seen this house in years, and he took a picture of it.

I'm just gonna show you this real quick because it connects to what I'm talking about.

Um, so this is the house that that my my dad bought when I was about five or six years old.

Um and it's funny, I haven't seen this in years.

It's a nice house, it's a really sweet, cool little house, like great.

But I remember that house being like a mansion.

Like, I in my memory, maybe because I was five and everything was big, when you're five, everything's big, right?

But I remember that house, and it's a great little house.

I have so many great memories in that house.

Like, that's a blessing to have a house like that.

But I in my mind it was like the biggest house ever.

It was just huge.

Because coming from a trailer, and we had a little rental home that we had in between the trailer and that, but they were much smaller in that house.

Like you had a basement, and I just felt like I don't know, whatever version of a five-year-old can have of we've arrived, that's what it felt like as a kid.

But we had we had money problems.

I just didn't know it.

My parents worked really, really hard, and I have to thank them.

They worked so hard and made big sacrifices themselves so that even though we didn't have much, I didn't really know that.

But then I experienced the other side of that as as well.

Because when I was 10, my dad got a really big promotion, and he became the vice president of a company called O'Reilly Automotive, and that was a change.

The house got bigger, and then he got uh he became the vice president of a company called Mercury Marine.

We moved to Wisconsin, they do like outboard motors for boats, and so we lived up there, and my dad was this big executive, and the houses got bigger.

And what's funny is I as I got older in my teenage years, and my dad was just killing it in the corporate world, and the houses are bigger and the neighborhoods are nicer, I learned that there's different types of money problems.

And I actually began to become aware of the pressure that my parents felt.

There would be times where, even though my dad had a great job, you could feel the tension related to finances in our home.

And it was tight, and you know, big things would happen.

And one time my dad lost work for a while, and he was in between, and that was tough.

And at that point in time, I felt, even though we had more than we had ever had, you still felt the tension of money problems.

I'm sure many of us grew up like that.

You experienced some version of that.

But let's be even more vulnerable and honest.

How many of us, if you're okay with it personally, you're like, I have had money problems.

At some point in your life, like, yeah, money problems, okay.

Been there, been there.

In fact, I was reflecting this week with Megan about 15 years ago.

I'll never forget this.

We sat in our living room 15 years ago.

We had just had our first child, and some some tough things had happened.

She had lost a job because the economy had tanked in like the late you know 2000s, 2007, 2008.

She lost work, and then she got rehired but part-time, and for a while it was really tough.

And and I was very young in my career, and it was just it was tough.

We had$20.

I remember that.

We have a baby, and we have$20.

That's all we have on our account.

That's it.

That was tough.

And God did some really cool things to help us out and get us out of that, and that's the story for for probably next Sunday, but but I get that.

I've been there.

And so today and next week we're gonna talk about money problems.

But it's interesting because when we use that phrase, money problems, that's a phrase that we have in our vernacular.

It's funny.

We use problems plural, money problems, but it only ever means one problem.

Isn't that funny?

Like if someone says I'm having money problems, you're never like, oh, you have so much money you don't know what to do with it.

That's never what they mean.

We say that phrase, yeah, they're having money issues, they're having money problems, and we say plural, but we always mean one problem.

And what is that problem?

What's the one money problem that we call money problems?

What is it?

Say it.

Not enough.

That's the only thing someone means when they say, Yeah, we're having money problems.

Not enough.

And the reason we're gonna do this in two parts this week and next week is because actually scripture describes multiple money problems.

It's different than our perspective.

Not having enough, needing more, being wise financially and how to progress in that.

Scripture talks to that a lot, we're gonna look at that today.

But not having enough money is actually not the primary money problem that scripture addresses.

And so today, we're gonna cover the secondary money problem.

The second most important money problem according to scripture, which is what do you do when you're struggling financially?

How do you get out of that?

How do you progress?

All that kind of stuff.

And then next week, we're gonna dive into the primary money problem.

And I really want to encourage you to be here for both.

Good news is you've already done half of that, so um, you're halfway there.

But make sure to be here for next week's message because it's a different perspective.

The Bible gives us a very different perspective on money than the world that we live in has.

But today, part one of money problems, that whole concept of how do I have enough to provide what I need?

How do I provide from family?

I've had so many people that have texted me some version of I want to provide for my family, I want to, I've struggled, I've tried to find work, I've tried to find a better job, I've I've interviewed, or or I have a good job, but the bills are more.

I don't know, have you guys heard of this thing called inflation?

Have you seen this?

Yeah, it's crazy.

Um, how many of you are in the the point where every time you go to the grocery store, you're you're like blown away all over again, every time.

Like you haven't gotten used to it yet.

You're like, what?

Excuse could you ring you rang that up wrong.

Like, but then we're the ones ringing it up.

And it's still wrong.

So how am I the one ringing it up and it's still that exp- I don't know.

Whatever.

It's tough.

What I will say is that what we're gonna talk about today, we're gonna look at five five key financial principles that we have in Scripture.

This is wisdom about money according to God's word.

But I'm gonna preface this.

It's kind of a hard preface.

Um, you're you already know this stuff.

But this will this will be something that needs to be reinforced.

Even if you're doing well financially, man, this this will remind you of maybe why and keep you on track.

If you're struggling, this can help you get on track.

But I'm saying this that you probably already know this to a certain degree, but I have no doubt that God's word is gonna give you a different angle on it, a fresh take on it.

I say you know it because it's kind of like getting healthy physically.

Like we all want there to be a magic, easy solution to that.

You know, like if you're like, I want to get in better shape.

How do I do that?

And if you go find someone who's in incredible shape, you go find someone at you know at the grocery store and like they're in great shape, and you're like, wow, how do I how do I do that?

Well, what we never do is just follow them around and buy the things that they're buying and put those things in our cart, right?

So that's maybe a good place to start.

Like, I'll just eat what they eat.

No, if you go find someone that's in great shape and you're like, wow, how do you do it?

We'd love for them to say, Oh, dude, let me tell you the secret.

And there's some easy solution.

It's that they eat right and they exercise a lot.

You're like, dang it.

I knew that, but I just want.

Like I've never, I've I've made this joke before, but it's a real thing that I did, and I'll I'll always be the butt of the jokes I tell.

Um, like I bought this ab machine one time that zaps your abs, like electric, like it's supposed to electrical pulses force your abs to contract, and it's like doing sit-ups without doing sit-ups.

You could sit on like watch TV and it'll just do it for you.

Anybody else ever buy that?

I know I bought it.

Anyone, yeah.

Did it work?

No.

It didn't work.

It hurt.

I know that, but I've still never seen my abs, and neither has my wife, so pray for her.

Okay.

We just live on faith that they're there.

They've gotta be.

They gotta be.

We just don't know.

No, this financial stuff, it is it's amazing.

The things that scripture is gonna speak to, they are they are sort of tried and true, but I will say this very few people live with all of these things working in combination.

And I believe that if you do, you will experience you'll experience health in your finances in a really powerful way.

So let's get let's let's get into it.

Five key financial principles in scripture.

None of this is rocket science, but it is a different perspective than the world has.

Number one, you're gonna love this one.

You ready?

Work really hard.

Work really hard.

I grew up in a home where my parents worked hard.

That's why it was really tough when my dad would say we were gonna do yard work because that was not like a hobby.

Yard work was work.

Like the word work meant work to my dad.

I don't know if any of you grew up in homes like that.

Like I he only had one speed and it was like everything.

Um but man, I grew up in a home where both my mom and dad worked really hard.

And scripture speaks to the the power of hard work.

Proverbs chapter 14, verse 23 says, work brings profit, but mere talk leads to poverty.

Proverbs 14:23

There's a lot of people that talk a lot about working hard.

There's a lot of people that talk a lot about how they're gonna make changes and they're gonna do something big, but but what actually creates that is is work.

Proverbs 12.11 says a hard worker has plenty of food, but a person who chases fantasies has no sense.

Work really hard.

Now, look, we live in a time where even if you're working really hard, inflation and all kinds of other things, it doesn't mean that life is easy.

It's not one thing, right?

This is five things that have to work in conjunction with one another.

But I will say that from my perspective, there's not an at least there's not an overabundance of hard work in our culture.

Like we value it, but I think we value it less than we we used to, at least as a nation.

And maybe that's good that we have some balance, like you want to have wise boundaries, you want to make sure you rest, and we've talked about that, like rest and all that, but oh God created this rhythm.

We talked about that a few weeks ago, and it's like work really hard for six days, and then take a day off.

And then, you know, in our culture, it's like work really hard for five days and then take two days off.

And then also vacations.

And and there's books like how to have a four-hour work week.

You know, there's that's a big book, how to do that, and then how to it's the reality is you can't bypass hard work.

And I'm sure most of us know that.

I'm sure most of us work really, really hard.

In fact, how many of you have had like at some point a side gig?

Like you're working and then you're working in your free time.

Oh my gosh, yeah, I've had several over the years.

Several.

I mean, kind of a constant thing in my life.

When Megan and I were first married, we were really short on funds uh because we were college students, full-time college students, got married, her dad let that happen.

I don't know why, but uh, I asked, he said yes, it was cool, we ran with it, but we didn't have any money.

And uh, and the craziest, this is gonna date me, this is gonna make me seem really old to some of you guys who are younger.

The craziest thing we ever did on the side to make extra money was we once proofread a phone book.

Um, those of you who were born more recently, let me explain a concept.

Back in the day, back in the day, phones weren't in your pocket, they were on your wall.

Uh and your house had a phone number.

And then what the city that you lived in thought was a good idea was that they would print off everyone's name and phone number in the city that you lived in, make that into a book, and then deliver that to every house so that every person had every other person's phone number.

And that was called the phone book.

And my boss at this company I was like interning at, it was like a marketing company, they did a lot of print stuff.

He was this guy, great guy, his name was Jack, and he would basically sell anyone anything.

He could sell anything, even if we couldn't do the thing he sold.

Like he would do that all the time.

He's like, Hey, I made this sale, we don't know how to do this, but we'll figure it out.

And so he sold the city of Smithville, Missouri, population 8,000 at the time, real small town.

Uh, but he sold Smithville, Missouri that we would print their phone book.

But we'd never done that before.

And we didn't have the software or the know-how.

So all he did was he said, Hey, we're doing their phone book.

It's a great job.

Lots of paper.

We did a lot of Dundra Mifflin was not a far cry from where I work.

Um, we've literally worked with paper.

And so he's like, it's gonna be big, but I I'm willing to pay you extra if if you and maybe your wife want to proofread this phone book.

And so what we did for several weeks was at night for fun.

Um we had the old phone book, and then we had this new list, and we read through each one name and number, check if it was correct, and if there was a new one, we inserted that in manually and we proofread a phone book.

But we needed money.

And when you need money, when you feel the weight of finances, you're willing to work extra.

I've done a lot of that.

Willing to work even in my spare time, even in my role now.

I've had times where we needed extra, and as a family man, as a provider, I'm like, all right, what can I do?

What value can I bring to other people?

I've helped a lot of kids with their jump shot in the last few years to help pay for my kids' basketball stuff.

Like, it's like I need you to pay me to teach your kid to play basketball so I can afford for my kid to play basketball.

That's basically how it's worked.

But you do what you gotta do.

Hard work pays off, but I will say that in my experience, while side hustles are great, nothing beats actual hustle in your your main focus work-wise.

I'm gonna share a story, and I gotta be, you gotta I just I'm gonna trust y'all.

I'm pulling the curtain back a little bit, so it's sort of awkward.

Um, but look, it's all good.

This is 10, 11 years ago, and I'm pretty sure uh don't try to be like, who's he talking about?

Don't do that too much.

Um, because I'm pretty sure that long ago, very few of us would even be able to think of who this person was.

But one of the hard things I've had to do in my role as the key leader of an organization is I've had to make decisions in certain times to let people go.

That's tough.

It's really tough when it's a church.

But you have to.

When you're a leader, if you are a boss, if you're a leader, you actually have a responsibility to make sure that the right people are in the right roles.

It's just the way it is.

And so years and years ago, I had this guy who was in a key role here at the church, and good guy.

But we had this young guy who still works here to this day.

He's still young, but he was younger, he was really young, and he was like brought on to be this guy's kind of helper assistant, work part-time, and help this guy out.

But the problem was my young guy just worked circles around the guy he was supposed to be assisting.

To the point where I began to become aware that this young guy was doing a lot of this guy's job.

And it all came to a head one day where I watched the really young dude just crush it.

He launched this thing, he had done all the work, and it was so well done.

It was such an example of someone working hard, owning it, doing an incredible job, that I thought to myself, I need to have the guy above him kind of like come and watch this to learn from this guy what hard work and dedication really looks like.

So I'm gonna have the the guy's boss come watch him learn how to work hard, and then I was like, no, I'm just gonna fire that guy and give this guy his job.

And I did that, and it was great.

It was.

It was hard, but it was great because this young guy, now you're all right, who was it?

You're probably thinking like it was Madison, wasn't it?

It wasn't.

Um it was a tough decision, but he just he worked so hard.

And I and I was in a position as a boss where I had to reward the hard work.

It would have been irresponsible for me not to.

In your business, wherever you work.

Now look, caveat, there's always caveats.

Proverbs speaks in generalities, by the way, so it's not saying in every situation, but generally speaking, more often than not, these things prove true.

You could be at an organization that doesn't value hard work, and if you are, you need to find a new place to work.

I mean, do it in the right way, but if you're working somewhere and they do not value or reward hard work, you gotta find another place to work.

You gotta start putting in applications, uh, update the LinkedIn profile, I don't know, but but that's those those organizations don't tend to succeed.

But if you're at a place that does value and reward hard work and you hustle, you work hard when you're there.

Like you give everything you have in the hours that that you're there, and you find opportunities to do other things, whatever it is, I'm telling you that gets noticed.

Like I notice it.

When when our staff works hard, and our staff works really hard.

We have a great staff at his hands.

They work hard.

But I'm saying it becomes obvious when you out, you always have the opportunity to outwork the people around you.

That's what I'm trying to say.

That is always on the table.

And you can do it.

A little guide that's helped me with this, and we'll move on.

Colossians 3.23.

This is a verse that's meant a lot to me over the years.

It says, work willingly, we could say passionately, work aggressively at whatever you do as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people.

When I was in college, I worked at Chili's, and uh and one of my first days or first couple of weeks, I had this like moment that ended up being a big moment for me at Chili's.

I mean, I I was I I became like one of the top seven waiters at the Chili's in Liberty, Missouri.

I'm just letting you know.

Easy top ten.

Easy.

No, I was like 19 years old, and it was the end of the day, and I was sweeping from underneath my table, and I I I felt a piece of silverware go into my dustpan.

And I'd been through training recently.

We were told in training that if you're sweeping in, there's silverware that goes into your dustpan, not food debris, and all that, just silverware, to reach down, pull it out, separate it, do not throw silverware away because that costs the company money.

But it's gross.

You know what I mean?

Like it's I'm sweeping all kinds of junk and food, and it's amazing how much of people's food doesn't end up in their mouths, but under their table.

It's really truly incredible, especially if they have kids, right?

And I've learned that the hard way.

Like how, like even in our house, like how is there so much under your chair?

How is that even?

Did you just throw it on?

And sometimes the answer is yes.

But like I'm scooping up all this just junk, and it's gross and nasty, and some of it's been there like all day long, and I have to reach in and I pull out this fork.

Well, I didn't realize that my boss was watching me when I did that.

And the reason I did that was actually this verse.

At the time, I was I was very focused on this verse.

I had read it, I'd done a devotion about it, and it was heavy on my mind.

I remember sitting there, and that fork went into the dustpan.

I was like, I don't want to pick up this fork, it's one fork.

Who cares?

And I I, in my mind, work as if you're working for the Lord.

Like, that's God's fork.

So I gotta.

So I reached down and I and I picked it up and I separated it, and my my manager, her name was Michelle, she saw that.

I didn't know that.

I didn't know she was watching.

And so she comes up to me and she says, Why'd you do that?

And I was I was confused.

I felt like I was in trouble.

She had a weird tone.

And I was like, Well, we were trained, like you said, to always separate the silverware because it costs money and wastes money.

And she goes, Yeah, but no one does that.

Why'd you do that?

And I said, and she was not a believer, I said, Well, there's this verse in the Bible that says, to work at whatever you do, is if you're working for the Lord.

And she looked at me, she said, So you're telling me that as long as you work here, you're gonna pretend like I'm God?

And I was like, I mean, kinda, I guess.

Like, yeah, up to a reasonable degree.

And she just went, huh, and walked away.

And I will tell you though, pretty quickly after that, I got better sections.

I would be you get scheduled, there were certain tables that were just better than others, and Michelle kind of became like my, I don't know.

She she hooked me up with all kinds of better opportunities, and I didn't worship her.

I want you to know that.

And then it happened.

I gave her 10% of all my tips, and then I just went about my day.

No, but that verse, listen, a lot of you are like, it's a pretty far stretch for me to think about my boss being God, and I get it.

But if you work as diligently for the people that you work for, as if you were working directly for the Lord, do that and see what happens.

That's number one, work really hard.

Number two, be patient.

Work really hard, be patient.

In other words, work really hard for a really long time.

All right, here we go.

That's fun.

Proverbs 13, 11 says, wealth from get rich quick schemes quickly disappears.

Wealth from hard work grows over time.

Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity.

This is Proverbs 21, 5.

But hasty shortcuts lead to poverty.

Sometimes when we are struggling financially, we are looking for the fastest possible fix.

Like, what can I do now?

Where is the easy button?

How can I just boom make this all better right now?

And and maybe those exist, and maybe in certain situations at certain times something happens and things work out, and you get a big promotion, a big raise, falls in your lap, great.

But but in general, in general, it is just wise decision after wise decision after wise decision over a long period of time.

And consistency is king, and if you do it over and over again, bit by bit, things get better.

Again, not exciting news.

Work really hard for a really long period of time.

Yay! But that's what works.

Like I said, 15 years ago, my wife and I had 20, we had$20 in our bank account.

That was it.

That was scary.

I'm sure many of you guys have been there and maybe even in worse shape.

And we're not there today.

We have more than$20.

And we're in a very different place than we used to be.

And when I look at it, I can't look back and just be like, oh, that one thing.

There have been lots of one things.

And it's been this weird combination of, I say weird, it's been this beautiful combination of God blessing us 100%.

I give God credit for everything.

But it's also, I think, God blessing us slash trusting us as we partner with Him and show time in and time out that we will work hard and we will do what is required of us.

It's this, it's not like we earn it and God like we deserve it.

It's also not like God give it to us, but we're not willing to work for it.

You know what I mean?

It's this combination of hard work over time, and then the Lord seeing that and trusting that and blessing that, and and it's just there's no easy solution.

I had a mom text in, and really great text, one of the texts that came in through this, and one of the points she made was that she's got a young child, a toddler, and she's like, we're struggling financially, and I just want to be able to provide for that child.

Sometimes there's things in life that make us feel a rush to get to a certain place.

Like you have kids, maybe you have four kids, hypothetically, maybe all four need braces, hypothetically.

And you're like, how do I make more money now?

Right now, legally-ish.

You know what I mean?

You have those.

Are there any phone books that need proofread?

I will do that if it will pay for braces.

Whether it's kids or something else, sometimes there's things in life that make us feel a rush.

And in those moments, we can be tempted to do some hasty things to try to fix it now, but that's not how it really works.

And by the way, those of you who are parents of young kids, I just want to encourage you, specific group.

Um, your kids aren't going to remember anything for at least four or five years.

Truly.

They will know you and they will know the love that you give them, and they will know what it feels like to live in security, but that security is not tied to a bank account or experiences and stuff, it's tied to their relationship with you.

So the cool thing is, God has given us this amazing thing with kids where they just don't remember stuff.

So you've got time, is what I'm trying to say.

We took our oldest son to Disney World when he was four, and we couldn't have afforded Disney World.

Like full disclosure, my father-in-law was a keynote speaker for IBM, and they had a big event at Disney, and he was one of the featured speakers, and so with that, they they he was able to bring us.

So we went to Disney World.

And my four-year-old son, who's now 15, remembers one thing from Disney World, and it was how scary the the Woody guy from Toy Story was.

Like he saw Woody and he was like, Woody.

And then the Woody kept getting closer, and the person in the Woody costume was like huge.

And it was like the most I it blew his mind because he saw Woody as a little toy, but Woody was like a seven-foot-tall mascot, and it really scared him, and he hid behind me.

That's his most distinct memory from Disney World.

I'm saying this to parents of young kids.

Sometimes you love your kids, you want to provide the world for them, so you rush things, and maybe you even like make some unwise financial decisions because you're like, I want to make sure they have this, and I'm telling you, they're not gonna remember any of it.

So just chill out.

Be patient.

God's given you time.

Make really wise financial decisions over the long haul.

Work really hard, and you know, when they hit six or seven, do some stuff, maybe.

Save up.

But I'm saying, don't let kids or any other situation in life, getting married.

Some of you are like, we're getting married and we're gonna have this elaborate wedding and then be extremely poor.

Right?

Like, chill.

You know?

Don't let anything in life make you hasty.

Because we don't tend to make wise financial decisions when we're rushed.

Give it time.

All right.

So number one is work really hard.

Number two is be patient.

Is this just blowing your mind, isn't it?

This is like wow, concepts I've never heard of.

I'm telling you, it works.

All right, next one.

This is you're gonna love this one.

Get ready.

Those of us wearing hats, hold on to them.

Here we go.

All right.

Save money.

Crazy, right?

Save money.

Proverbs 21, 20 says, the wise store up choice food in olive oil, but fools gulp theirs down.

I love that this was written 3,000 years ago.

Because life hasn't changed.

Wise people store, save.

I don't need it all.

Foolish people are like, give it to me now.

I got money.

It's like when your kids, if those of you have kids, they get birthday money, and it's how fast is that gone?

My daughter has an Amazon wish list that she saves to prior, prior to getting like her birthday gifts, because my kids have figured out exactly how much their grandparents give them for their birthday.

Now it's it's like, well, I know that Papa and Leila are gonna give us this much, and Donnie and Grumps are gonna give us this much, and so I've I've already I've pre-selected what I'm gonna get.

And it's gone.

But my daughter, my 11-year-old daughter, warmed my heart the other day.

She's starting to take on some little like not babysitting, she's too young for that, but she is uh, you got a family in the neighborhood that will have her come over and play with their kids while the mom is doing stuff at home, and Lily's like, yes, it's awesome.

And she's like, Dad, I want three jars.

For days, she asks us to go to Hobby Lobberry, get her three jars.

Jar one, give to God, which is really cool.

She give away.

And you guys are going, oh, like we're all supposed to do that, right?

I'm just showing you.

All right.

Jar one, give to God.

Jar two, save.

And she's like, I'm gonna save at least 80%.

And then jar three is spend.

And she wants to save up for a Volkswagen bug convertible car when she's 16 years old.

She asked me to look up the price, and it was$43,000.

And she went, Oh.

She started doing math in her head.

And then I saw her give up for a moment.

But no, she's back in.

But yeah, like even at a young age, it warms my heart.

But she's like, What, you're thinking about saving for the future?

The number one obstacle to saving is consumption.

We live in a, we've been trained, we have been trained from birth to consume.

Like, we're trained to do that as a society.

It starts, like, think about when you were a kid, or maybe those of you who who have raised kids, like you go to the grocery store, you go to any type of store, and right at the front there's these little machines, and you put a quarter in them, or today it's probably like three quarters, I don't know.

Inflation hits those two, and uh, and you you turn it and you get a little bubble with a toy in it, you know?

It's like a it's literally a piece of trash.

And but as a kid, you're like, you're like, mom, mom, god, can we have a quarter?

Can we have a quarter?

And my favorite thing now is we don't really use cash that much.

I'm like, ah gosh, I wish we did, but we don't.

But pretty soon they're gonna have tap to pay on those things.

Like, I know it's coming.

And so I'm like, I will have no excuse.

But you know, it's like basically here's what happens when you give your kid 50 cents or whatever it is to do that, they do it, they take the little bubble, it's a piece of junk, and it gets thrown away within three hours, or it's broken.

And so basically, you could have just taken, like, here, here's 50 cents, just throw it away.

But we're trained at a young age to do that.

We live to consume, and there's always more in our minds to spend than we have.

And so you'll have people that are like, I have no money, but I I have a smartphone and I have Spotify Premium because I can't listen to ads, and I've got Hulu and Netflix because they have different shows.

You know what I mean?

And it's like we we view unnecessary consumption as a necessity.

So it's really hard to save money when that's the case.

We get addicted to stuff.

It's it's actually to such a point now where, like in Cherokee County at least, when you see a new building, you're like new construction's happening, you're like, it's one of two things.

It's a fried chicken restaurant of some kind.

We live in Hickory Flat near an intersection that we call the chicken corners because it's Chick-fil-A, Zaxby's, KFC, Bojangles, and now they're putting in a Popeye's.

So, like, chickens are terrified of where we live.

They're they're they're horrified.

They're like, that is, you know.

But if it's not a fried chicken restaurant, what's it probably gonna be?

Storage units, right?

Can you think about this now?

Listen, some of us are like, whoa, I have a storage unit.

What are you saying?

There are perfectly valid reasons to use storage units sometimes, but culturally, holistically, we are a culture who buys so much stuff that we can't even fit it in the houses that we live in.

And our solution as a culture is not let's have less stuff.

It's like I know, let's pay money to put it in another place.

It's crazy.

Like when you think about it, it's actually nuts.

Like previous generations, can you imagine like your great-grandparents?

If they could like somehow be here being like, and you explain the concept of a storage facility to them.

I guess they had barns.

I don't know.

But the point is it's nuts.

It's nuts.

And so consumption, it's it's our enemy, and we are trained to consume, we are not trained to save.

But scripture teaches us that the wise store away, which doesn't mean storage units.

I realize, like, whoa, hold on.

Technically, the Bible says have a storage unit, if you think about it, because it did say the wise store.

No.

If you want to be well off financially, you want to be healthy financially, you can't spend everything that you make.

And I know that sometimes that's hard because life hits hard, and we're in a season right now where with our kids and everything going through, it's it's tough.

But there's always things you can cut.

There's always things that you you want to view as a necessity, but it is absolutely not.

And if you're in a situation where you're like, no, I've cut every single thing that's not a necessity and there still isn't enough, um, good for you first and foremost to do the hard thing.

God will honor that.

And there are situations and times where you need financial help and financial resources and financial counseling, and and we actually have some of that available as a church, we can help you with that.

But most people, in my experience, most people, even in really hard financial situations, if if you actually look at their bank account, because we've had these conversations, it's like there's a lot of stuff there that it's consumption, it's unnecessary.

So work really hard, work really hard for a long time, save money.

Who's having fun?

Who's like, I'm so glad I came to church today?

This is so exciting.

Yeah, wow.

All right.

The next one.

Get ready.

Oh, guys, number four?

If you thought number three was fun, you ready for this?

Avoid debt.

Yeah.

Avoid debt.

There we go.

Um, some of you are like, Dave Ramsey.

Uh I kind of like Dave Ramsey.

Sometimes he annoys me, but I like Dave Ramsey.

He's good.

He's good.

I like I don't he annoys me because I don't want to listen to his advice sometimes.

Um, and he's not God.

Like, Dave, if you're listening to this, you're not God.

I don't have to do what you say.

Uh if you don't who Dave Ramsey is, oh.

Google him.

Okay.

He's great.

Avoid debt.

I want to show you guys something.

I got a couple things to show you here.

Um this is gonna blow your mind.

Some of you know this.

There's a website that shows our national debt as a country in real time, and it's a ticker because it's always growing.

I captured this on my phone yesterday.

Okay, just this is just for a second.

This was yesterday, so we'll put this this up.

Um that's that's$37 trillion.

That's how fast it grows.

I didn't speed that up.

That's every second, and that was yesterday, it's way higher today.

Um, do you know how big a trillion is?

One trillion seconds ago, you may have heard this analogy before.

31,000 years ago.

That's how long.

Second.

One trillion seconds, like one, two, thirty-one thousand years ago, and our nation is thirty-seven trillion dollars in debt.

What is that?

How is that even possible?

That doesn't make any sense.

Literally.

Things don't make sense.

Did you know that it costs us as a nation almost four cents to print a penny?

And yet we keep doing it.

That's true.

Our country spends four cents almost to print pennies.

And you'd think that someone would have been like, let's stop printing pennies.

I found a great way to save money.

They're like, we need the pennies.

So we pay four cents to have something that's worthwhile.

It's crazy.

Our culture is so debt-obsessed that debt has become almost like it's like what we're best at in America.

I know this hits hard because a lot of us like debt's a big thing.

I get it.

I've been there.

Years ago, I saw a commercial.

You know how sometimes a commercial can like hit your heart so directly that even though it's a silly commercial for a product, it's like a philosophical awakening has happened inside of you just watching it.

I saw this commercial years ago.

I apologize for the low quality of the video.

It's very short, but this was one of those commercials, and even though I saw this at a fairly young age, it hit me, and I was just like, you have just completely encapsulated the way that life feels for so many Americans.

I want to show you this real quick.

All right, here we go.

I'm Stanley Johnson.

I've got a great family.

I've got a four-bedroom house and a great community.

I'm dead up to my I can barely be my planet.

Somebody help me.

So I saw that commercial 15 years ago or so.

It's probably when we had$20.

And uh and it like, I was like, wow, there's something about him going, I'm in debt up to my eyeballs with a big smile on his face.

Do you know what that commercial's for?

It's for a specific organization.

Does anyone anyone remember that commercial?

Does anyone have a memory of that commercial?

Okay, a few of you.

Uh guess what that commercial's for?

It's for uh, yeah, it's for lending tree.

So think about this.

Think about this.

That is a commercial for a loan company.

Because the solution to your debt is a loan.

If you work for Lending Tree, Polly's great company, I'm sure.

I'm sure it's wonderful, and I'm sure there's specific financial tools, and in specific situations, it actually makes sense to consolidate debt and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to offend you for work or living.

If you're the president of Lending Tree, very sorry.

Um, also, I know you don't give here if that's the case, because like I think we'd see that.

I'm just cheezing.

All right.

Um so we got a different problem, lending tree, president.

No.

Even the concept, like lending tree, the the logo for it is like it's like a money tree.

It's like money, it's like trying to make you believe money grows on.

It's no, it's the opposite of that.

Oh my gosh.

That's how debt obsessed we are as a country.

$37 trillion in debt costs us four cents.

We go in debt.

We go three cents in debt every time we print a penny.

And the solution to debt is more loans.

Oh my gosh, listen to what scripture says about debt.

Proverbs 22, 7.

Just as the rich rule the poor, so the borrower is the servant, some translations say slave to the lender.

Proverbs 6, 1 through 5, it's a little bit of a different situation.

It's talking about someone who has guaranteed someone else's loan, like you've basically co-signed on a loan.

My child, if you have put up security for a friend's debt or agreed to guarantee the debt of a stranger, if you've trapped yourself by your agreement and are caught by what you said, follow my advice and save yourself.

For you've placed yourself at your friend's mercy.

Now swallow your pride.

Go and beg to have your name erased.

Don't put it off, do it now.

Don't rest until you do.

Save yourself like a gazelle escaping from a hunter, like a bird fleeing from a net.

That's that's the intensity of getting out of debt.

That that's how intense scripture tells us to get out of debt.

Getting out of debt is hard, but it is so doable.

I I'm not gonna ask for a show of hands because I know it's a little personal, but I know many of us have worked really hard to get out of debt.

In fact, I'll shout this person out.

Because they don't go here.

They live in Missouri.

My little brother who sent me the picture of our first of the mansion.

Remember that mansion I showed you?

It was a lovely house.

I love that.

I'm not knocking.

That house was great.

It's just funny to me how as a kid it just felt so much bigger than that picture because of where we'd come from.

My little brother, I have so much respect for him because he spent about 10, 15 years essentially saying no to every little extra enjoyment.

I mean, to a certain degree, I'm sure he did things for enjoyment, but he said no to all kinds of stuff, chose to drive a much less nice car than he could have with his income, and just chose to essentially deny himself all kinds of momentary pleasure so that he could pay off all of the debt that he had, and all of his wife's student loan debt.

Like all of their all their debt together.

And they did it.

It took a really long time, but but he did it.

Zero debt.

And he worked tirelessly for that because he took that really seriously, and now he's in a really cool place.

He and his wife, they're in a really cool place.

It's hard, but I know many of you have done that, and some of you are like, it's impossible.

How could I get out of debt?

There's so many tools out there, there's so much wisdom, but the primary thing is to understand that you gotta debt has to be avoided.

Debt is definitely not the solution.

And there are certain situations in life where a house, maybe a car, like of course fine, but if you have debt, the scripture would tell you, like a gazelle fleeing a hunter.

That is how aggressively we are called to avoid debt.

Several years ago, we've got one more after this.

Um we had an interesting uh position we found ourselves in financially as a church.

And so we have this amazing building, this amazing facility, and the primary primary reason for that is because our founding pastor, Stephen Susan Craig, um they donated$20 million for this.

Okay, and that paid for almost all of it, but not all of it.

The rest, we did have a portion as a church that we paid for for many years, and it was uh not nearly as much as what they gave, but it was still a lot.

And so we we had debt.

And to be honest, when I started in the Leroy here, we had about$10 million of debt, and then there were some pretty amazing things that God did, and and actually um Stephen Susan did some things, and a lot of that debt ended up being forgiven.

It was really cool, but but a good portion of it we had to pay off.

But we found ourselves in this place where we we'd been making payments, and we had this moment where we realized that through through saving, trying to be really wise and really frugal as a church, which we've always valued, we had enough in savings.

And when I became the lead pastor, we didn't have anything in savings, really.

But we had enough in savings that we could pay off our debt in full, but it would mean no cushion.

I don't know how you guys feel about cushions, but I like them.

I like them a lot.

It's nice to have a cushion.

We used to have zero financial cushion here, and over the years we built up a cushion, but we realized, hey, we this is a great cushion, but this cushion we could trade in our cushion for no debt.

And it seems like a no-brainer, right?

Like in that moment, you're like, duh.

Oh, it's not a no-brainer.

Because cushions are so nice.

That peace of mind that what if something happens?

We got the cushion.

But we met together with the board and we talked about it, and we said, hey, listen, who knows when this opportunity could ever come up again and what it would mean for future generations here at the church and for the long-term health of the church.

And scripture teaches that, like a gazelle running from a hunter, flee debt, and so we we got rid of the cushion and we paid off the debt.

That was about five, six years ago.

And yeah, good.

And hey, and I say we, like those of you who give financially, like that was that was us.

That was we did that.

And what it means is now if you give, zero bit of that goes to paying interest on a loan.

None of the giving here goes to pay anything like that.

It all goes to do the things that we're called to do as a church, to do the ministry that we do, to the outreach that we do, it's all it all goes to that.

But man, was it nice to have that cushion?

And I'm telling you, even though I believed it in my heart, it's right for us to not have debt, it's right for us to be out of debt, I lost sleep over the idea of losing that cushion.

Some of us, you're in a place right now where you your cushion to debt ratio needs to change.

And you did pray about that.

This is I'm I'm not a financial advisor, disclaimer.

But some of us, we value a cushion, we value the peace of mind of like more than we understand, that as long as you're in debt, someone else has authority over you.

Like it's not your house, it's not your car if you don't own it.

And and pray about that.

And whatever degree that you can avoid debt and get out of debt and pursue that and make changes, scripture would say, make that a priority, go for it.

I got one more.

Who's excited?

Who's having fun today?

Yeah, oh man.

I knew, I knew that after today, people would be like, that's the best man.

That was there's nothing I enjoy more than talking about working really hard for a long period of time, saving money, and avoiding debt.

This is just sexy.

That's the word that I kept thinking.

Like, this is the sexiest topic.

People are like, man, wow.

Okay.

Um right, last one.

You guys ready for this one?

Honor God with your finances.

This is a tough one.

It's not really a tough one at all, but it's a tough one for me.

And I was actually talking to a friend of mine this morning about this.

And worship team, you guys can make your way up.

Um it's a tough one because I believe the next two verses that I'm about to read with every fiber of my being because I have well, number one, I've I believe in God's word being true.

I've experienced it.

When I live by it, life goes well.

When I avoid what it tells me to do, I pay the price.

So it's over time taught me it's true.

Number two, I've experienced this exact thing personally, and I've I've heard from so many other people who have as well.

But also many churches use this as a manipulation tool to pressure people to give money to a church.

That's just true.

There's always gonna be charlatans, there's always gonna be counterfeit pastors, and and they'll they'll use these scriptures and try to create pressure and create these emotionally driven, like right now, and get people.

That's there's there's no giving initiative starting today at all.

But I bel this is for you, is what I'm trying to say.

And I believe this, I've experienced this.

Here's what it says Proverbs 3, 9 through 10.

Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the best part of everything you produce.

And then he will fill your barns with grain, and your vats will overflow with good wine.

You'll have so many storage units, you won't know what to do with it.

That's what he's saying.

No.

No.

It's a weird concept.

Honor God.

And in their culture, that that meant to tithe.

Tithe means tenth.

Uh, just so you know, as a church, we do not ever and will never tell you what percentage you ought to give, but we do as a church believe in percentage-based giving.

That's a biblical concept, it's a tradition all throughout scripture, and it's this idea of recognizing that everything we have ultimately comes from God, and if I live my life, able to give a portion of that back to the Lord generously, which typically means via your church, but also giving away to other organizations or people in need, like it's really up to you.

That the Lord sees that and honors that.

And that's a tough one for us because we're like, I mean, I I uh I I believe that's true.

God is a provider, we we we believe that, but also like really Malachi 3:10.

Malachi 3:10

God says, bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there'll be enough food in my temple.

If you do, says the Lord of heaven's armies, I'll open the windows of heaven for you.

I'll pour out a blessing so great you won't have enough room to take it in.

Try it, put me to the test.

You know, it's the only time in scripture where God says to test him.

You're not supposed to test God.

Jesus said that when he was tempted by the devil, he's like, Bible says, Do not test the Lord your God.

This is the one time in the Bible where God says, test me.

And it's about honoring him with your finances.

So look, I know, like I said, this is where it's hard for me as a pastor because I've seen so many, oh, guys, the YouTube videos alone.

There's one recently where a pastor told his ushers to lock the doors until they raised$40,000.

And he said, no one's leaving until we raise$40,000.

I didn't even know that was an option.

I was so impressed.

I was like, you can do that?

You can force people against their will.

Ushers?

Um.

No, sometimes the church stuff gets really slimy and it's really sad.

Because there have been many high-profile people who have abused this, this beautiful thing, it's created so much distrust, and I hate that.

But I've experienced what it's like to trust the Lord with the finances.

A little disclaimer/slash preview of next week.

We're gonna start on the same topic next week because next week we're actually gonna talk about the primary money problem.

When we say money problems, we always mean one thing, not having enough.

Scripture would actually teach us that that is not the primary money problem.

The primary money problem is that money owns you.

We're gonna talk about that next week because God can free you from that, and that is a freedom you need.

Honoring God with your finances is a huge part of that.

It breaks the hold that money has on your heart, the fear and the worry and the control.

But I would be a liar as your pastor if I told you that scripture is not clear that the Lord honors us when we honor Him.

And there's a connection there.

There's it's interesting.

The most successful people that I know financially are also the most generous people that I know.

And it's easy to be like, well, yeah, because they have so much.

If I had that much, I'd be generous too.

But what's interesting is as I've gotten to know them and and whatnot, they they all honored God with their finances long before.

Long before they had what they have now.

That's something that they started when they didn't have much.

In fact, I won't use this person's name uh just because it could be wrong.

But there's a gentleman here who um has been a huge blessing to our church financially.

He's helped us out in some really incredible ways.

And years ago, we were doing the whole roof thing.

I talked about that last week.

We needed a new roof.

It was$350,000.

I will never forget that.

Um, it's probably way more expensive now.

But but he contributed a really large amount to that, and he had tears in his eyes.

And he told me his story that he grew up not having money at all.

And he said he he remembered this moment where he he had a desire in his heart.

He said, God, one day I want to be able to do something big for your kingdom.

I want to be able to give.

And at the time he was saying this, he was not successful in the world's eyes.

But he went before the Lord and he said, Lord, I I I want to be able to do something big for you.

And and he was working hard, he was doing all the things that we're talking about, working hard, being willing to work hard for a long period of time, save money, avoid debt.

But he made it a priority, first fruits, priority to honor God with his finances.

And there was something about that decision that he remembered years ago and that commitment he made to God, I will honor you with my wealth, I will honor you with my income.

Even if it's small, you will always get the first fruits.

And then he had this opportunity to do something big for our church, and you would think that, like, look, there's a certain check that if I wrote it, I'd hand it to you, and then like I'd kind of hold it.

You'd tell you like, not at all.

He was like, I can't, I am so excited to give this because this is the result.

He he realized he was emotional.

He's like, This is what I prayed for.

And the Lord honored him in that.

So we will never be a church that does the whole, hey, if if you give, God's gonna, God's, you're gonna get a check in the mail.

You might.

I've I've it happens.

I'm telling you, I've seen it, I've experienced it.

That's not what we're talking about.

And so, ushers, if you'll lock the doors and guys, let's bring the thermometer out on stage.

Um, no, I I just I would be a liar.

I would be a liar.

And a friend of mine this morning, Mike, thanks for the conversation we had this morning.

Was like, don't deny people the blessing of understanding that they work in cooperation with God and their finances.

So that's for you to pray about this week.

But what I'll say is as we wrap up, we got a baptism.

Um, yeah, interesting topic.

Had a lot of questions about money.

It's a tough topic because it's very connected to our hearts.

Next week, I'm telling you, you gotta be here next week.

Not because the message is gonna blow you away, but because what we're gonna talk about next week, I think, is the most important conversation you could ever have about money.

And we live in a culture where we are slaves in our thinking and in our mindset to what money is, and it's not what we think it is.

And the Lord wants to free you from that and make sure you're always free from that.

Next week is we're gonna deal with the real money problem next week.

But when it comes to those pressures that we feel, work really hard.

Woo-hoo, do it over and over and over again.

Yeah, don't spend all that you have, maybe cancel some subscriptions.

I don't know.

Like, save money, avoid debt, honor God with your finances.

And I will tell you this if you do all five of those things, don't treat it like a pick three of the five kind of thing.

Like, I'll do this one, this one, that one.

If you do all five, I am so confident that you will have healthy finances.

And I just I believe that because I've seen that and experienced that.

So with that said, we're gonna finish by taking Lord's Supper.

I know it's a little tri it's a strange transition.

Money and Jesus' death on the cross.

But I'll say this, and by the way, if you're new, we take this little meal every week.

And when you walked in, there's tables with with cups with bread and juice.

Go grab one now if you didn't, and if you feel uncomfortable getting up right now and doing that, that's fine too.

Just you'll know next week.

Um this really does connect what we're talking about in a big way.

Because we sang this morning.

If you're new to church and you're sometimes you sing worship songs, there's a lot of things in worship songs that you're like, I don't know what that means.

Uh what is Jehovah Jirah?

It's a title that God gives Himself in the Old Testament and that people gave to God.

I mean, God, yeah.

Semantics.

It's a name of God.

And it means it means our Lord, the provider, like God is our provider.

And this meal, ooh, does this bring this home?

Because when we talk about honoring God with our finances, committing a portion, like a, and honestly, a small portion, committing a small portion of what we have for use in God's kingdom.

You would think that God, you know, would give us a small portion of himself.

You know, you we give him a small portion, he gives us a small portion.

Doesn't work like that.

You know, he gives us everything, he gives us himself.

Jesus died on the cross, that's what this meal represents.

He didn't give us a portion of himself, he did not tithe his love to us, he gave everything.

Because he is a provider, he gives us all of himself, and he wants us to trust him with that.

So it's ultimately not about money, it's about your life.

Money's just a big part of life.

It is, but it's about your life, it's about understanding that you belong to God and he loves you, and as scripture says, he has purchased us for a price.

Paul never lost sight of that, that we have been purchased, that Jesus paid, in a sense, for our freedom, for our livelihood, for our relationship with the Lord, it came at a price, and this price was everything to him.

It was not a percentage, it wasn't a portion, it was all of him.

When we take this meal, even though it's small, we remember that he gives us everything.

We can trust him to be our provider because what more should he do to show us that he'll give us everything he can?

So, with that said, let's take this uh piece of bread, let's pray.

Lord, we thank you so much.

We thank you for this bread.

This represents your body, given as a sacrifice, killed on a cross, a payment, to purchase the forgiveness of our sin and our status as the adopted sons and daughters of the one true God.

We thank you so much for this, Jesus.

Let's take the bread.

Now, the Jews.

Lord, we thank you for this cup.

This is your blood.

It's poured out as an offering, cleanses us, covers our sin.

It's paid in full.

You paid it all.

We owe you everything.

And as we take this, Lord, just remind us that you are a gracious, giving, generous God.

And I think even when you ask us to honor you, it's just so that we remember who you are.

You're good.

You give us everything, and we love you, and we thank you for this, Lord.

Let's take the juice.