Creating a God-Honoring Financial Legacy

Now I want to talk about creating a God-honoring financial legacy. I believe that the best way to do this is to live by what I call the five S's of God-honoring stewardship. This is talk about leaving a financial legacy that honors God so that when you leave this earth, the Lord will be pleased with what you did with your stewardship. And by the way, let me help you understand you are not owners of your money and financial resources.

You're the steward of them. God doesn't ask you to give because he wants to shrink your wallet. He asks you to give because he wants to grow your faith. Hello and welcome to Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd, Senior Pastor of Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California. Here's something every believer in Christ should remember. We are stewards, not owners.

Our time, our money, even our lives are not our own. For the next two days, Pastor Paul will offer five keys to building a financial legacy, one that will honor God while also bringing blessing into our lives beyond all that we can imagine. Stay with us here or stop by pastorpaul.net anytime to hear today's message or any recent Destined for Victory message on demand. That's pastorpaul.net. Let's join him now as he shares today's Destined for Victory message, creating a God-honoring financial legacy. Psalms 90. Let's look again at verses 10 and 12.

Here's what it says. The days of our lives are 70 years. And if by reason of strength, they are 80 years, yet their boast is only labor and sorrow, for it is soon cut off and we fly away. So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

That's what this is about. Lord, help us to number our days, knowing our days won't go on forever here on earth. Help us to maximize the days we have here on earth, that we may apply wisdom to our hearts and to all that we do.

So in the opening message of the series, I intentionally caused you to feel rather somber as we talked about the fact that one of these days, all of us are checking out. The mortality rate of human beings is 100%, meaning we're all going to leave. And that's not a fun fact. Nobody has a barbecue and says, let's talk about dying.

Those aren't fun facts, but they're necessary facts. Because if you're not ready to die, you're really not ready to keep living. You got to stop and get prepared to die and get that in view so that as you act between now and your death date, and none of us know when that is, all of those actions will be intentional. That's our point. So last time, we talked about building a strong spiritual foundation, which is the most important thing. At the end of the day, Jesus said, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his or her soul?

So it can't be just about money making. It's got to be about being prepared for the inevitable, which is judgment. And so we want to be prepared for that. And I talked about three ways to build a strong spiritual foundation for your life. We looked at Matthew 633 and remembered it's important to prioritize God's kingdom. Jesus said, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and everything you need, God will add it to you.

But you got to seek first the kingdom of God. Then we talked about aiming to be well pleasing to God. Second Corinthians five and nine, Paul said, so we make it our aim.

I'm gunning for, my goal is to be well pleasing to God. And finally, we looked at Colossians 3 17 and reminded ourselves that we are to do and say everything that we do and say in the name of Jesus. And that doesn't mean simply saying the words in Jesus name. I pray when you're praying, for instance, it means everything you do, you do on his authority. You do because it is his will.

You do because it is consistent with what he wants you to do, to do and say everything in the name of the Lord. Now, I want to also talk about in this part to creating a God honoring financial legacy. Before you leave this earth, you want to create not only a spiritual legacy that you leave so that people who knew you know that you loved the Lord, but they also know that you were prepared to share your faith with others and, and all of us should be in the business of being a witness so that your, your relatives, your friends, your coworkers, everybody knows that is a man. That is a woman.

That is a young man, young woman who knew and loved the Lord. If you are a secret agent saints, you need to get out the closet. Do you know everybody else out the closet? What you're doing is still in the closet. Everybody out the closet, whatever they are, however freaky they are freaky. They, they freaking all out the closet. Come on somebody, nobody's ashamed of what they are. Why we got these few little Christians still sitting up in the closet talking about, praise the Lord.

No, no, come on out that closet. If you know Jesus, be excited about knowing Jesus. He came to give us life eternal and abundant.

Enjoy your life. Don't be a sad Christian. You need to be excited about knowing the Lord. So the spiritual legacy is very, very important that we leave behind. Now I want to talk about creating a God honoring financial legacy. I believe that the best way to do this is to live by what I call the five S's of God honoring stewardship.

So if you're taking notes, jot these down. This is, talk about leaving a financial legacy that honors God so that when you leave this earth, the Lord will be pleased with what you did, with your stewardship. And by the way, let me help you understand you are not owners of your money and financial resources. You're the steward of them. What's the difference?

A steward takes care of what belongs to somebody else. You say, what you talking about? I made this money. You might've made it, but it's not yours. The earth is the Lord's, the fullness thereof. And so you got to understand, yeah, you made it, but you're going to give an account to him. When you get a chance to read Matthew 25, can't take you through it.

In the interest of time, you'll see the parable of the talents. And Jesus told us that the one who owned everything took a long trip and he left with his servants, various amounts of talent that is capital to one he left five, to one he left two, to one he left one. And then he came back after a long time and they were to give an account.

That's you and I. We got to give an account for what we did with our finances. And you know, the one with five gave him a 100% return. You know that story and heard well done. And the one who was given two gave him 100% return and heard well done. The one who only had one said, well, you see what had happened? And that person was rebuked because instead of using it properly in a God honoring way, they dug a hole and put the talent in the ground.

In fact, the owner said, look, why would you do that? You knew I was coming back. You knew you were going to have to give an account. And so I want to make sure none of us are caught with our money having been misused during our lifetime. So let's look at the five S's of God honoring stewardship. I've preached these before, but it's important to preach it now in the context of keeping the end in mind.

The first way to have a God honoring financial legacy is to sow generously, sow generously. Proverbs three, beginning at verse five. Now we all know I intentionally started with these verses because everybody knows Proverbs three, five and six, trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not to your own understanding.

Amen. In all your ways, acknowledge him. He shall direct your path, but look at verses you don't read so much. Do not be wise in your own eyes. Oh, come on somebody trying to humble some of y'all.

You think you all that. Don't be wise in your own eyes where you think you smart. He said, fear the Lord and depart from evil. Verse eight, it will be health to your flesh and strength to your bones. Look at verse nine, honor the Lord with your possessions and with the first fruits of all your increase. Honor the Lord with your possessions, with the first fruits of all your increase so your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine.

What is Solomon saying there? He is saying everything he puts in your hand, you've got to worship him first by giving to the kingdom of God. Honor the Lord with your possessions. Seek first the kingdom. We saw last week, Matthew six 33. Seek first the kingdom means you give to the Lord before you give to the mortgage company.

Before you give to your landlord, before you give to the one who's financing your whip, your car, I'm sorry. It's God you give to him first and people who fight against tithing and you know, I still hear him every now and then. The Bible doesn't teach tithing as a mandate for the New Testament. Okay, it's not mandated in the New Testament.

What does the New Testament teach you to do? To give generously. You know what generous is? It's more than the tithe.

Generous is more like what you give to the mortgage company or the landlord. And the Bible's not even asking you for that. It's just saying be generous and the tithe is a standard that you see set up in even before the law. Don't tell me tithing is the law. Tithing predates the law. You see tithing in Genesis. Abraham tithed to Melchizedek.

Come on. Isaac tithed in a famine. In a famine he tithed. Some of y'all say I can't afford to tithe.

You can't afford not to tithe. Stay with us. The second half of Pastor Paul Shepherd's message is coming right up. We want to thank all of you who support Destined for Victory with your prayers and financial support, gifts that help Pastor Paul share the joy of the Gospel message with a growing audience. Destined for Victory is supported entirely by friends like you, so please prayerfully consider making a generous gift to Destined for Victory today. Give online safely and securely from our website, pastorpaul.net, or give us a call at 855-339-5500.

Again, the number is 855-339-5500. The Book of Proverbs tells us that the rich rule over the poor and the borrower is servant to the lender. We explore that idea next in the rest of today's message, creating a God-honoring financial legacy. Once again, here's Pastor Paul. But if you're going through a season and you say, Lord, I got myself in a real bad hole and I don't have the faith to give 10, well, what percentage are you going to give? Give generously and give intentionally to honor God. And say, Lord, as soon as for you who don't have the faith to tithe immediately because of the debt you're in, just say, okay, Lord, I'm so sorry. I jacked up my finances, but I'm going to give generously. And once I can, I am going to go on and do everything that's in my heart to honor the Lord with the first fruits. Amen. And it says with the promise your barns will be filled. How many know when you take care of God's business, he takes care of yours.

He takes care of yours. We got the Californian and church could only have sold 34 people. They could only give me $24,000 a year, 24K a year. I had moved to California from Philadelphia and my first rent was $9.95 a month. I had never heard of such a rent.

Back in 1989, I'm coming from Philly. We had a row home in the hood, crack house across the street, but they shut it down. And I had $200 a month mortgage in the hood.

I get over here, it's $9.95 a month for some lady I don't even know. And I had to make up my mind, are you going to practice what you preach? And I decided right then and there, if God brought me to California, I suppose he knows how to pay bills in California. And so that's what I did. I said, okay, we're going to tithe out of this $2,000 a month. That church got $200 a month every single month from their pastor. And I was praying that the Lord was going to take care of everything and he did.

And you need to learn, God's going to take care of you. All right, so the first S is to sow generously. Number two, shrink debt systematically. Shrink debt, I'm talking about how you can build a God-honoring financial legacy. God is honored when you get out of that debt you got yourself into.

Hallelujah. You got yourself into, the Lord didn't lead any of us into debt. We let ourselves into that.

Because you got to be honest, if you're going to be blessed, please be honest. We got ourselves in debt. You need to know America for most of its history, this was not a debt oriented society. Debt did not become normalized until after World War II.

You all got to understand a little history. Talk to your grandma, your great grandma, whoever you got, your old folk and your family, ask them how much they paid for their house and how they paid for their house. They didn't go to the bank, they bought a little house. First they started out a little renting somebody's room, whatever they had to do, and they put their money together and bought a house. Some of them will tell you, I've talked some folk in California, I bought this house for 20 some thousand dollars. I said, in California?

Yeah, back in the day. And so you got to understand, debt wasn't normal for a long time. We've got to get to the place where we stop normalizing what really shouldn't be there. And so shrink the debt you got. Proverbs 22 says, the rich rules over the poor and the borrower is servant to the lender. Servant, guess what? When you're in debt, you're a slave. I know we like servant because servant sounds better.

Very often when you see servant in your Bible, it really means slave and the translators just didn't want to take you there. We are slaves. They own you till you pay them.

In some way, they own you. And so we've got to understand the importance of shrinking debt. And there are wonderful ways we're learning from all the Christian financial leaders, Dave Ramsey and Money Matters, the guys who run the Money Matters ministry. There are several ministries.

So you find who helps you. One of our friends from First Baptist, Michelle Singletary, my wife and I recently taught a retreat there and she and her husband were there. And somebody asked me a question during our session about money and I answered a little bit.

And then after the session I saw Michelle was there. I said, how come you didn't raise your hand and tell me you were here? I wouldn't talk about money with you sitting out there. She's a columnist that talks about money.

Why would I sit up here talking about money and you sitting there? But we got to learn. She can teach you. She's got books. I mean, Michelle cold-blooded, I mean, she will cut up your credit card straight up.

So you hand it over. And just, I mean, First Baptist where she's a member, they're people, you know, when they see the financial stuff coming, they say, oh, Lord, Michelle is going to get us. But that's a church that has learned these lessons.

As a result, their budget every year is tens of millions of dollars. We're praising God. We are a $3 million budget church.

That's wonderful. We try and do right by a $3 million budget. They are talking tens of millions of dollars every year given to the kingdom of God. When they're building buildings, they'll say, well, it's already some percentage paid for. When they went into their big worship center, I think it was like 60% paid for, all that kind of thing. They just built a family life center, $23, $24 million paid for where they walked in.

Why? Because they've learned how to discipline their money and let God help them get their act together so that they can be blessed and they can impact the region for Jesus Christ. We got to do it the same way. So we got to start by getting ourselves out of debt. And we have to learn to delay gratification.

Come on, somebody. I know you want to drive nice, but you got to start by driving what you can afford. Your day is coming when you can drive nice. I knew when I got here, one day I'm going to drive nice. But when I got here, I ended up, I came across the country with a car I was paying for because I had a note in Philly. And when I found out I was coming to pastor here, I had a note, had to pay it off here in California.

That was one of the things I had to believe God for with that $2,000 a month. 300 of it went to whatever company that was. Dodge, I think it was. Yeah, I had a Dodge Dynasty.

Dodge Dynasty. It was nice, but it had like a $300 note out of that $2,000 I was getting. And $995 already went to this lady. So she got her $995. The kingdom got $200.

You see what I'm talking about? That's almost $1,200 of $2,000. I got $805 left to get through the whole month. Anybody ever had too much month at the end of the money? Too much month.

I'm not preaching what I have lived. Too much month at the end of money. And like, okay, Lord, here's all the bills.

What you going to do with these? Because I had $805, $300 had to go to Dodge. Now I'm down to $500.

We got two kids, five and three years old. Just getting ready to start. Yeah, they got me. And I said, Lord, how are we going to do this? God made a way. He blessed us to put them in Christian school, a tuition Christian school with me making 24K. And my wife and I had decided, she said, baby, we start our family. She said, if you need me to work, we'll figure it out. I said, no, I want you to be able to raise our kids the way my mother was able to raise us. I had a stay at home mother and I was just spoiled like that. I knew the joys of coming home from school and mom's there. And I said to my wife, she was a dental assistant when we got married, but when she was seven months pregnant with Alicia, she left that and she didn't have to go back until she wanted to. And so I said, just go on and raise these kids and God's going to help us. I don't need you. I'm going to make this happen. And we trusted God the whole way.

I'm not telling you what I haven't done. You got to do what you got to do. But in those days, I needed a second car because I got to California. I realized everybody needed a car out here.

In Philly, you could jump on SEPTA, the public transportation, and go anywhere you want. No, here, I needed a car. And y'all heard the story.

I don't have time to tell you. But we asked God for a car and I started looking for a used car. I said, God, give me something that we can afford and give me the money to buy it. He touched the hearts of some people who were in a prayer meeting and one day in a prayer meeting, clear across the country, they said, the Lord told us to start giving money every time we come to our little prayer meeting that they were having in a home.

And they started putting money together. And finally, when they had $1,700, they said, let's us ask the Lord what we're supposed to do with it. And somebody said, I believe the Lord wants us to send that to Pastor Paul in California. And they called me and they said, can you use $1,700? I'm telling y'all what God will do.

Can you use $1,700? I said, and they told me this story about their prayer meeting. They said, we just gather people from a couple of different churches.

We just get together and pray. And they told me a little story. And when they asked that question, I said, put it this way. If the Lord is telling y'all to give me $1,700, listen to him.

Because he know what he talking about. So generously shrink debt systematically. Those are the first two keys to creating a God-honoring financial legacy. The next three come your way tomorrow, so be sure to join us. If you need prayer today for your finances, for your family, for any reason at all, the Destined for Victory ministry team would like to join you in prayer. Visit pastorpaul.net and use the contact feature to share your prayer request with us. While you're there, be sure to sign up for Pastor Paul's monthly letter of encouragement, yours at no cost or obligation. Well, we have a great new resource to share with you today. Not that long ago, Pastor Paul and his wife Meredith conducted a fireside chat at their church, Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California. For three days, Pastor Paul and Meredith shared wisdom about how to improve and strengthen our personal relationships. Today, we'd like to offer you a booklet that highlights the major themes of their message.

It's called Creating a Relational Legacy. And it's our gift to you this month by request for your generous gift to Destined for Victory. Just call 855-339-5500 or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online. Or mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538.

Again, the address is Destined for Victory, Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538. Well, just because you have it doesn't mean you've got to spend it. Here's Pastor Paul.

What else do you have to do? You've got to save regularly. Saints, let's realize not everything God puts in your hands now is for now. That's next time in Pastor Paul Shepherd's message, Creating a God-Honoring Financial Legacy. Until then, remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.