An Indescribable Gift!

2 Corinthians 9:6-15

November 20, 2016 • Mount Pleasant UMC

Sermon Study Guide

I was inspired again this week, as I often am around here. On Wednesday afternoon, our Tweenz gathered here, packed up the 520 Operation Christmas Child boxes you donated, loaded them into various cars and took them over to Christway Church, which is the first stop on their journey to children overseas. It’s the culmination of a year’s worth of work, and it made me think how many hands were involved in this project, from folding the boxes to bringing in donated items, from stuffing the boxes to bringing them here to the worship center, from loading them into the cars to taking them over to Christway—lots and lots of you were involved in this project, and it filled my heart with joy and thankfulness to think about that. As I watched our Tweenz engaged in this project, I saw such joy on their faces as they prepared these boxes, and it made me think of our Scripture passage for this morning. It’s a familiar verse, one that’s often quoted this time of year. Paul reminds the Corinthians that “God loves a cheerful giver” (9:7), and if ever there was a picture of “cheerful givers,” it was our Tweenz last Wednesday afternoon.

This morning, we’re wrapping up a short series of sermons centered on the question of “What Has Your Heart?” For the last couple of weeks, we’ve been talking about the things that grab onto our heart and often won’t let go, the things that compete for our attention. We’ve tried to visually demonstrate that with our race track up here—showing how stuff, money, social media, schedules and work all try to out-race our “first love.” As Christians, we know our focus, our priority should be on what Jesus wants for us, but there are so many competing loyalties out there, so many things vying for our attention. We tend to blame those things “out there” for our divided loyalties. However, as we’ve talked about the last couple of weeks, the problem is not really our money, or social media, or work, or schedules, or stuff; ultimately, the problem is our heart and what we choose to give it to. What Paul gives us near the end of 2 Corinthians is really a picture of what it means to truly be God’s people (cf. Wright, Paul for Everyone: 2 Corinthians, pg. 101).

So Paul is writing to a church that he has not always gotten along with. In 1 Corinthians, Paul had to take the church to task for some of their practices. When he was gone, people began to talk bad about Paul, how he was “timid” when he was with them, but was only “bold” when he was far away. They began to question his authority. They began to draw lines in the sand and swear allegiance to particular leaders in the church. Twice in 2 Corinthians, Paul makes reference to a “severe letter” he had written them, a letter that seems to have been sent in between what we know as 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians. Paul says he almost wishes he hadn’t sent it, but in the long run, he knows it did them good. Now, some think that letter has been lost, but many scholars today see a change in tone between chapters 9 and 10 of 2 Corinthians; the latter part of this letter is more severe than the rest. It’s possible that what we know as 2 Corinthians 10-13 is the “severe letter” that was mistakenly added on to the end of this letter when Paul’s writings were collected (Barclay, The Letters to the Corinthians, pg. 237). Either way, those chapters are even more evidence that Paul’s relationship with the Corinthians was not always rosy, even strained, at times.

And yet, in the section we read this morning, Paul is rejoicing that the Corinthians had taken part in an offering he was receiving for the Jerusalem Church. There is a lot of speculation about why Paul was intent on receiving this offering. Part of it may have been to provide aid to the “mother church” in the midst of a great crisis or famine, but if that’s the case, Paul wasn’t able to get it there quickly. Unlike today, when we can instantly send money to aid in a crisis, Paul would have had hundreds of miles to travel to get the funds there. Another possibility mentioned by several writers is that Paul is trying to show support of the Gentiles for the Jewish home church (cf. Barclay 236). His offering is a reminder that they are united in the one Gospel of Jesus Christ. In other words, he’s saying this: there’s not a Jewish Church and a Gentile Church. There’s only one Church, the church of Jesus. And certainly that’s a message the Corinthians needed to hear in the midst of their squabbles about leadership. So Paul writes them in this section to thank them for taking part in the offering, despite their own struggles. “I know your eagerness to help,” he writes to them, “and I have been boasting about it to the Macedonians…” (9:2).

In the latter half of this chapter then, in the passage we read this morning, Paul gives a framework for true understanding of generosity. When we focus on our first love, when our hearts are transformed by Jesus, then we will become different people—not only different from the way we have been, but different from the world around us. In a stingy world, we become generous people because, Paul says, we are thankful people. We are grateful people, not only for the blessings we have been given, but for the most important gift ever given: the salvation, grace and love we have found in the cross of Jesus Christ. It’s almost too much for Paul to contain, and in fact by the end of this chapter, he can’t contain his gratitude anymore as he shouts out, “Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!” (9:15).

There are three quick things Paul wants the Corinthians (and us) to understand about giving, and the first, in William Barclay’s words, is that no one ever loses when they are generous (Barclay 234). Generosity is a winning action because it’s like sowing and reaping. We get whatever we sow; farmers know this to be true. If they don’t “give away” the seed they have by planting it in the ground, they will have nothing at harvest time. If you’re a farmer, you can’t just stand by your field and hope something will grow. Oh, something will grow on its own, all right, but nothing useful. To get the crop you desire, you have to plant seeds and you have to plant generously. “Whoever sows sparingly,” Paul says, “will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously” (9:6). Words to the wise in this post-election world, because this principle is not just about money. If we sow goodness, kindness and peace, we will reap goodness, kindness and peace. If we sow violence, anger and hate, we will reap violence, anger and hate. You would have thought we had learned that lesson by now! You see, Paul’s word here is not just about the offering to be given to Jerusalem; it’s about the whole of our Christian life. If we are generous with whatever God has given us—our money, our time, our talents, our resources, our abilities—God will be generous back to us. We can only be trusted with more if we prove ourselves faithful with what we have now (cf. Matthew 25:14-30).

However, unlike what the television preachers try to tell us, what we receive back, the blessings we are given, is not necessarily going to be in money or wealth. It’s just as likely the blessings we receive will be nonmaterial in nature (cf. Chafin, Communicator’s Commentary: 1, 2 Corinthians, pg. 267). The New Testament talks about the believer being rich in love, rich towards God in terms of a strengthened relationship with our heavenly Father. Jesus hints that we will find ourselves rich in friends (cf. Luke 16:1-9). And we’re blessed so that we can be an even bigger blessing. The goal is not to enrich ourselves but to enable others to give praise to God. Paul puts it this way: “This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of the Lord’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God” (9:12). Does the way you give of yourself and your resources cause others to give thanks to God? Does it help your “first love” recapture your heart? If we’re just giving to get more money, we’ve missed the point of what both Paul and Jesus point to. And we’ve missed the second characteristic of the generous Christian.

That’s found in verse 7, where Paul says this: “Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” A cheerful giver—the word there is literally “hilarious.” God loves a hilarious giver. It’s an attitude and an expectation of God’s people that goes way back to the time of Moses at least. In the book of Deuteronomy, Moses tells the people, “Give generously to [the needy] and do so without a grudging heart” (15:10). The Roman philosopher   and statesman Seneca said that to give with doubt or delay is almost worse than not to give at all (qtd. in Barclay 235). God loves a cheerful giver—and calls us to such cheerfulness when giving. One author tells how, when he was a little boy, a beggar came to the door, asking for help. His parents were gone and he was alone in the house, so in an act of boyish enthusiasm, he broke into his piggy bank and gave the beggar everything he had. Later in life, as he reflected on that incident, he said he had never since felt such joy as he did in that moment of impulse giving (cf. Barclay 235). He was blessed because he gave cheerfully.

Last Sunday, I mentioned John Wesley’s concern that money would take over his heart, and how his solution was to give it away quickly. Wesley not only said that, he lived it out. Early on in his ministry he earned thirty pounds a year, but he found he could live comfortably on twenty-eight pounds, so he gave away two pounds that year. The next year, his salary as an Oxford Fellow doubled to sixty pounds, but he was still able to live on twenty-eight pounds, so he gave away thirty-two. And so it went that by the time of his death he was giving away nearly ninety percent of his income. John Wesley was a cheerful giver (Hamilton, Revival, pg. 135). More recently, Rich Mullins did a similar thing. Mullins was a Christian songwriter and singer who is probably best known for his song, “Awesome God.” But Mullins said he knew his heart, and that if he got his hands on the money he was making from selling records and performing concerts, it would change him. So he put his money in the hands of his management team, asked them never to tell him how much came in, pay him the average salary for a working person in America, and give the rest away. Rich Mullins was a cheerful giver. I wish I had that kind of trust; I struggle with it, but by God’s grace, I find myself a more cheerful giver today than I once was. What about you? Where are you on the cheerfulness scale? Because God loves a cheerful giver.

And we can be cheerful givers as we learn more and more to give not out of obligation but out of gratitude. We give our time, our talents, our resources, our money as a response to God’s gift. We do what we do as an act of thanksgiving to the God who pours out blessings over and over again. This week, of course, we will all likely gather around tables somewhere to eat way too much, to be with friends and family, and hopefully to give thanks to God for all the many blessings of the year. So often we fall back on the tried and true things to say when we ask what we’re thankful for: family, friends, the turkey and stuffing, football…this year, some may add thankfulness for the Cubs’ big win (am I right, Pastor Rick?). But I’ve been asking our staff and others around the church what they are thankful for that God has been doing in and around Mount Pleasant this year, because one of the things we most need is to be able to see beyond the gift to what God is doing with it (cf. Chafin 269). Last Sunday, I shared some of our dreams and hopes for the future. This morning, I want to share some “glory sightings,” ways God has been working in this place in 2016. We have reason to be a thankful and grateful people, because when God sets the table, it’s a rich feast (cf. Wright 103)!

Because I’m a keen observer of the obvious, I’ll start with the biggest and most apparent blessing God has given us this year, and that’s this worship space. I will never forget how, with great emotion, we moved on Good Friday evening from the gym downstairs up to this space to finish our worship, how the band was here singing, “Hallelujah, for the Lord God Almighty reigns,” and how we all gathered here on Easter Sunday to proclaim Jesus’ victory over death and God’s faithfulness to this church family. A couple of weeks later, it was a great joy to stand here with Bishop Mike Coyner and several of you on this stage as we dedicated this space to the worship of the one true God. Thanks be to God for the gift of worship space!

This past summer, we celebrated in baptisms and the renewal of baptismal vows for nineteen people. It was a beautiful day and a joyous celebration for all who were a part of that, many of whom are and have been a part of our Celebrate Recovery ministry. Celebrate is an important part of our church, as they gather every Tuesday and Friday nights, come rain or shine, to work on the recovery steps, to encourage one another, and to hold each other accountable. Celebrate is a ministry for all those who have hurts, hang-ups and habits—which, as we often say, pretty much includes us all! In September, we had the chance to recognize and spend a whole worship service seeing what God is doing in the lives of those who are part of Celebrate Recovery. Thanks be to God for all of those who want to see healing come to broken lives!

This fall, we reopened the preschool and have been just three students shy of “full.” There are a lot of families being introduced to and connected to Mount Pleasant because of the preschool this year, and that opens doors for outreach we might not have had before. I definitely think it influenced the high attendance at Trunk or Treat this year! Lori said this about the preschool: “We work with a great consultant from the State [who] is very…focused on helping us to be our best, and [we’re thankful for] men like Mike Pruitt and Chris Kocher who were proactive in helping to get smoke alarms installed, exit/emergency lights installed, and screens put on classroom windows. [We] couldn’t have done it without their faithful, willing hands. One more ‘best [thing]’…was the tremendous efforts of all who helped give the playground a much needed facelift.” Thanks be to God for the preschool and for willing hands to do what’s needed!

We’ve seen an increased focus on outreach and growth in discipleship this past year, across all age levels and groups. We’ve been diving deep into what Scripture expects from us as followers of Jesus and residents of the Kingdom of God. We’ve seen that in worship, in Sunday School, in LifeGroups, in BOOST and in other areas. Thanks be to God for faithful teachers and leaders!

In our children’s area, we changed to a new curriculum this year and have seen incredible growth in faith among the participants. They spent the summer serving and learning a musical which they presented in August, challenging us to be faithful in our mission and kicking off our series on “Facing the Task Unfinished.” All of that has been possible in the bright and cheery new space they have inhabited since early this year and the many, many faithful volunteers who serve each week in the nursery, in small groups, in Small Wonders and elsewhere. Thanks be to God for everyone involved in children’s ministry!

God has also been at work among our youth, as many of them have participated in the Chrysalis weekend and have experienced great spiritual growth through that experience and their regular small groups here. We’re seeing more openness and authenticity in those small groups, thanks in large part to the committed group of volunteers who show up every week, and we’re finding many of our youth serving on a regular basis in ministries like Grace Unlimited and Upward. This year, many of you may remember, we also received a $17,000 grant from the Center for Congregations that has allowed us to implement a “milestones” program, seeking to put in place significant faith milestones for each age. Thanks be to God for what he is doing among our youth!

And I could go on and on about the great worship we have been able to experience due in part to our awesome band and choir and other musicians, who faithfully lead us in worship each week. I could celebrate the average of 340 items that the Yarn Spinners have donated this year to touch the lives of those in need in our community; that’s a lot of crocheting! I could celebrate Upward and Bible School and the 812 Mission Project. There is so much happening here it makes my head spin sometimes. So…are you feeling thankful yet? I know I am. I’m humbled to be your pastor, and grateful for what God is doing. And I’m thankful for the way that is making me a better giver. You see, as I see what God does with what little I offer, it encourages me to find ways to give more of who I am and what I have so that God has even more to work with! Thankfulness, Paul indicates, changes our hearts and makes us generous people.

As we enter this week of Thanksgiving, I want to encourage you—or challenge you—to step up your thankfulness. Very often, our hearts (or our feelings) follow our actions, so as we act in a more thankful way, we actually become more thankful and more generous. That’s why Paul is thanking the Corinthians for their actions toward the Jerusalem church, whether they really felt like it or not. It doesn’t matter; the feelings will follow. What was true for them is true for us as well. So here are just a few opportunities for us all to increase our thankfulness this year. What about writing a letter of gratitude to someone who has made a difference in your life this last year? If you want to do that on a “Thinking of You” card, we’ll even make sure it gets to who it needs to get to. (When I was typing that, I first typed “thanking of you” cards—maybe that was an intentional slip?) Write that note you’ve been putting off, let someone know how much you appreciate the ways they have touched your life. And do put it in writing. As nice as an email or a text or a conversation is, there’s still something special about getting a note or a card in the mail. Plus, it’s something they can then read over and over again. I know I have a collection of letters like that which I pull out on difficult days. So find a way to express your gratitude toward someone else this week.

Another way to express your thankfulness to God for all he has done is to perform what some might call a random act of kindness—showing God’s love in action. Offer to babysit for young parents one evening so they can go out and have a nice dinner together. Volunteer to read to a child. Rake the leaves in your neighbor’s yard. Buy the coffee of the person behind you in line. Volunteer for a ministry. Two weeks ago, many of you submitted response cards to the Servant Catalog and indicated you were interested in serving in one or more areas. We haven’t gotten all of those tabulated yet, but you know you don’t have to wait to be invited, right? You can jump right in. Or you can go to the website and sign up to be a volunteer at the Night to Shine, the special needs prom we’re hosting in February. If we had all 125 volunteers secured this week, Jess would have a huge reason to give thanks on Thursday. And there are numerous other ways you can demonstrate your thankfulness to God this week. In fact, I want you to turn to two or three people around you and share one idea you’ve had to express your thankfulness. I’ll give you just a short time, but go ahead and share ideas with each other.

CONVERSATION

“Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly; and whoever sows generously will also reap generously…God loves a cheerful giver” (9:6-7). Every time we are generous with our time, our talent and our treasure, we are investing in something truly great, something that will likely outlast us (cf. Berlin, Defying Gravity, pg. 101). Our thankfulness leads us to generosity, so in light of all that God has done in and among us this year, what is your answer to God’s call to generosity for 2017? Last week, you were given pledge cards for the coming year; if you weren’t here and didn’t get one, the ushers have some available this morning. You can also go online and fill out a pledge card there with the link in the bulletin. But in just a few minutes, our pianist is going to come and play as I invite you to come forward and give your pledge to God through the church for 2017. This is an expression of our thankfulness, of the level of our generosity; it’s a witness to what has our hearts. Who will win the race this year, and how will you say, “Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!”? Let’s have a short prayer, then I’ll invite you to come forward with your pledge cards.