Well you know Sean John Combs aka P Diddy Combs aka Puff Daddy Combs. Wish he'd make up his mind what his name is. But anyway, he was one time asked what he thought life was all about. And he made a statement you've probably heard, although you may not have known that he made it. He said, and I quote, it's all about the Benjamins, baby.
Meaning, of course, the Benjamins, Benjamin Franklin's picture is a hundred dollar bill. And you know, it seems to me this pretty well sums up the mindset of the average American. I mean every year millions of Americans play the lottery hoping to win the jackpot. Every year millions of Americans go to Vegas hoping to strike it big.
Every season millions of Americans register for the Publishers Clearing House Giveaway. And recently a USA Today survey found that when we talk to children in America, age 7 to 12, more than 80% of them daydream about being rich. The point is that money is a central issue with Americans. Now it may surprise you to know that money is also a central issue with God himself. In fact, you may find it interesting to discover that God actually talks more about money in the Bible than any other single subject. And the reason for this is because God knows that money is kind of like a chainsaw. If you use it right, well it can be a blessing and it can be a help.
And if you use it wrong, well you can get yourself in a peck of trouble real quick. And if you don't believe me, well folks, just ask Kenneth Lay. Just ask Bernie Ebbers. Just ask Martha Stewart. Just ask Richard Scrushy or Ted Kozlowski or Lot's Wife or Anna Niasse and Sephira or the rich young ruler and on and on the list. And that's why throughout the Bible, God tries so hard to talk to us about how to use money right, how to handle money so that money doesn't handle us.
Now this is what we're going to talk about over the next several weeks. And the reason we're talking about this is because in our ongoing study of the life of that great man of God, Moses, we've reached Exodus chapter 35 where we watch the Israelites as they're going to handle money correctly. They're going to handle money in a godly biblical way.
And you know, after watching these guys get so much wrong during their 40 years out there in the wilderness, it's actually going to be refreshing to talk about a case where they actually get something right. And so over the next couple of weeks, what we're going to do is we're going to talk about some of the principles in the Bible that God gives us about how to handle money in a godly and biblical way. Now before we dig in, let me say that I understand the deep sensitivity that people have when it comes to the church talking about money. I get that. That's why I had a seminary professor once who used to say as a pastor, he said, the only good time to talk about money is when you don't need to ask for any.
And you know that's exactly the case today, folks. We're going to talk about money for the next couple of weeks, but I'm not going to ask you for a dime because the purpose of this two part series, listen carefully, is not to fundraise for anything. The purpose is to educate all of us biblically.
So I hope you'll let your guard down and you'll just come and say, all right, let's learn together. Now as we begin, how about a little bit of background? Here in Exodus chapter 35, Moses has gone up on top of Mount Sinai for his second stint, you know, and he's gotten a second set of Ten Commandments and he's gotten a bunch of other laws and rules that God gave him and now he's come down the mountain. We pick up the story down in the valley as Moses starts talking to the Israelites about one of the most important commands God gave him up on Mount Sinai and that is the command to build the tabernacle. Here we go, Exodus 35 verse 4.
Now folks, the tabernacle was essentially a portable temple where the Israelites worship God, where the Israelites sacrificed to God until the permanent temple was constructed many years later in Jerusalem. Verse 5. And then in the next couple verses, Moses goes on to delineate all kinds of other things that are needed beyond gold, silver and bronze to construct the tabernacle.
Things like animal hides and linen and acacia wood and semi-precious stones and spices and incense and olive oil. Verse 10. Now let's pause here for a moment and notice that the key word in everything Moses has said so far in Exodus 35 is the word willing. Remember what he said in verse 5.
And this key word is repeated a number of times in this chapter. Verse 21. Then everyone who was willing came and brought an offering to the Lord. Verse 22. All the men and women who were willing brought gold jewelry of all kinds. Verse 26.
And all the women who were willing and had the skill spun goat hair into fabric. Folks, nothing could be clearer than the fact that this was a totally voluntary, totally free will, totally only do it if you want to do it offering. Alright? That's clear here. No compulsion.
Nobody was forced to do anything. Well what happened? Verse 29. So all the Israelite men and women who were willing, there's our word again, brought to the Lord free will offerings for the work which the Lord has commanded to be done. Chapter 36 verse 2.
Then every skilled person came to whom the Lord had given the ability to construct the tabernacle and Moses gave the workman all the offerings that the Israelites had brought to carry out the work of constructing the tabernacle. Okay. So far so good, right? Okay. Now watch. Verse 3 chapter 36.
And we got more. So Moses issued a command and sent word throughout all the camps saying no man or woman is to make any more offerings to the tabernacle. Stop bringing stuff, Moses says. Now, can you imagine walking into church one Sunday morning and the pastor gets up in front of the church and says hey you know what you guys have given to this church to the work of God here so liberally that honestly we got so much money we don't even know what to do with it all. There's no offering today.
Don't bring any more money until I tell you offerings are suspended until further notice. Can you imagine that? You'd like that, huh? No, you can't imagine that and I can't imagine it either. But this is exactly what happened here. This is exactly what Moses did. Amazing, huh?
Watch. And so the people were restrained from bringing any more because the offerings they had already brought were more than enough for all the work. The Hebrew word here to restrain means literally to push somebody back, to repel somebody, to hinder them from going forward and the implication here is clear that the Israelites wanted to bring more and Moses had to literally restrain them and say no, stop, no more, no more. Now let's ask the question exactly how much did these Israelites give, huh? Well in Exodus chapter 38 the Bible tells us the total amount that they gave. The Bible says in gold they gave 29 talents, in silver they gave 100 talents and in bronze they gave 70 talents.
You say, okay, okay. So yeah, how much is that Lon? Well just to give you an idea how much money this is, in 701 BC when King Sennacherib of Assyria invaded Judah, he told King Hezekiah of Judah that he said I won't destroy your city if you'll pay me a ransom. And that ransom was 30 talents of gold and 300 talents of silver, not too much more than the Israelites collected and gave here in the desert. And you know to get that ransom together you know what King Hezekiah had to do? First of all he had to completely empty the treasury of the temple but he still didn't have enough. So the second thing he had to do is completely empty his own personal treasury as the king and he still didn't have enough.
So then finally he had to go in and strip all the gold out of the temple of Solomon that had been overlaid on all the pillars and all the furniture and even with doing that he barely made it. Folks do you understand how much money this is? This was an outrageous and enormous, a staggering amount of money that these people gave. And you say well Lon, that kind of raises another question which is where in the world did these Israelites get all that money? They were former slaves, they hadn't been piling up stuff for years.
Where did they get all this money? Well, Exodus chapter 12 verse 35, the Bible says that as the Israelites were preparing to leave Egypt, the Israelites did as Moses had instructed them to do, they asked the Egyptians for their articles of gold and silver and clothing. And the Lord gave the Israelites favor in the eyes of the Egyptians so that the Egyptians gave the Israelites what they asked for and thus the Israelites plundered the Egyptians. The answer to that question where did they get this massive amount of gold and silver and other things is that all of this stuff originally belonged to the Egyptians. But as the Israelites were leaving Egypt, God transferred it from the Egyptians over to the Israelites and you know why he did that?
Don't miss this. He gave it to them so that they would have it later on when he asked them to give it back to him for the building of the tabernacle. You see friends, the Israelites didn't own all this stuff, they were just managers of it until such time as God wanted them to give it to him or do something else with it that he told them to do. And this is the crux interpretum, this is the sine qua non, this is the key issue when it comes to handling our finances biblically.
What we need to understand if we're going to handle our money in a way that it doesn't handle us, what we need to understand is that just like these Israelites, every cent we have has been transferred to us by God, entrusted to us by God, given to us by God to be used for his glory. It is not our money. It's his money. And just to prove that to you, when you leave here, you're not taking any of it with you because it's not yours. It's his. It's his. His money that he's allowed you and me the privilege of managing during the short time that we're here on this earth. And folks, if we're going to handle money properly as followers of Christ and handle it biblically, then this is the lens through which we have to see everything God ever gives us, namely that we are managers, we are not owners. Now, that's as far as we want to go in the passage today because it's time now to ask our most important question and you know what that is, right?
Everybody knows. So are you ready? You ready? All right, here we go. Nice and loud.
One, two, three. Yeah. You say, Lon, so what? Say, all right, this is great.
I'm glad they had all that money. Build the tabernacle, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. What difference does any of this make to me tomorrow morning when I go to work, I go to school, whatever? Well, let's talk about that, shall we? You know, remember what we said earlier? The key word was in all this passage, we said it was the word willing, right? OK, the one thing I want you to get today when you go home, if you don't get anything else from what I've said, I want you to walk out of here understanding that God loves willing givers to him. He loves people who get a bang out of giving to him. This is why Paul said in the New Testament, Second Corinthians, nine, seven, God loves a cheerful giver.
Now, folks, look here. Whenever God tells me that he loves something, you know what? That's what I want to be. And you know, it ought to be the same for you. If you're a follower of Christ, whenever God says I love this, friends, that's something you and I should want to be.
We should aspire to be. God says he loves cheerful givers. Now, to give cheerfully to the Lord, if it's done correctly, is based on two biblical truths. Truth number one, it's based on understanding, first of all, that giving to God is an act of worship, and we're going to talk about that next week. Second of all, being a cheerful giver is based upon a second truth, and that is understanding that giving to God is a form of spiritual investment. And that's what we're going to take the rest of the time we have today to talk about.
And this it doesn't get any more practical than this. Trust me. All right. Let me remind you what Jesus said. Jesus said, Matthew Chapter six, Do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But rather store up for yourselves treasure in heaven. Jesus said, Matthew Chapter 19 to the rich young ruler.
He said, Go sell all you have and give it to the poor. Give it to the work of God here on earth and you shall have treasure in heaven. Jesus said Luke Chapter 12. He said, When we give to the Lord, Jesus said, We make for ourselves purses which do not wear out treasure in heaven that is unfailing. Friends, what the Lord Jesus is telling us in these verses is that the day you came to Christ as an individual, God opened up for you a heavenly bank account in the pearly gate, savings and loan.
You understand what I'm saying? And what he's also telling you and me is that every time we use money here on this earth in a way that honors God in a way that advances the kingdom of God, whether we put money in the offering plate of a God honoring church, whether we send money to a missionary or some missionary organization, whether we use money to help homeless people or disabled people or refugees or orphans or people with AIDS in the name of Jesus. Whenever we do that, the Bible tells us that we're making deposits, that we're literally transferring money from earth into our heavenly bank account. The Bible calls this storing up treasure in heaven. And the Bible makes it clear that when you and I arrive in heaven as followers of Christ, that heavenly bank account is going to be there waiting for us. Now, for some of us, that bank account is going to be in pretty good shape. For others of us, well, that bank account is going to be on a respirator. But regardless of what condition it's in, it's going to be there waiting for us.
You say, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Are you saying that my getting into heaven is based in some way on how I use money down here on earth? Of course I'm not saying that. Folks, going to heaven has nothing to do with how we spend our money or how we do anything else here other than whether we trust what Jesus did for us on the cross, shedding his blood to pay for our sin. When we trust God and what he did on the cross for us, we are guaranteed heaven, and it doesn't make a bit of difference how we spend our money down here. Heaven is a free gift that God gives people who trust Christ. But, but, friends, don't miss this, the Bible also teaches that as followers of Christ, when we get to heaven, God is going to dispense various levels of reward based at least in part on the balance that exists in our heavenly bank account.
However, I want you to know that God's reward for cheerful givers is not just limited to heaven. Listen to these verses. Proverbs 3. Honor the Lord from your wealth, God says, and then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over. Malachi chapter 3, verse 9. Bring the whole offering into the storehouse and test me in this, says the Lord.
Man, I love that. You say, I thought we weren't supposed to test the Lord our God. Well, you're not unless he invites you to. And he invites you to right here. He said, you test me in this and you see if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing that you won't even have room to store. Jesus said, Luke chapter 6.
He said, give and it shall be given back to you. You say, by who, the government? What, are you kidding? What, are you kidding?
No, not by the government, by God. Give and God will give back to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over will be poured into your lap.
Watch. Jesus said, for with the measuring cup that you measure out to the work of God, God will use that same measuring cup to measure back to you. Now, Jesus in all these verses in the Bible, they're not talking about heaven here, friends. They're talking about God's reward here on earth for cheerful givers. And remember what Jesus said here. He said, hey, if in our giving here on earth we measure out to God with a thimble, well, then God's going to use a thimble to measure back to us. Jesus said, on the other hand, if we measure out to God's work here on earth with a dump truck, he said God will back his heavenly dump truck up to your house and he'll dump more blessing on you than you know what to do with. In fact, in Matthew chapter 19, the Lord Jesus even tells us the rate of return, that he pays on every dollar we give to him, everything we give to him, whether it's time or energy.
He says, whenever we give to God, Matthew 19, 29, we will receive 100 times as much in this life. 100 times as much. I'd say that's a pretty good rate of return, wouldn't you? Friends, 100 times as much is 10,000% return on everything you give. 10,000%.
You know what? For 10,000% return, Merrill Lynch would sell their bull. They'd chop him up and eat him for burger for 10,000% return. And yet this is exactly the investment opportunity that God offers every single follower of Christ. And look here, God is serious. He's not kidding. And if we've got any sense at all, any sense at all, we'll take him up on his offer.
I don't know how many of you guys have ever heard of R.G. Letourneau. Mr. Letourneau was a businessman, a Christian businessman, who in the middle of the 20th century owned factories that made earth-moving equipment. When he was a young man, Mr. Letourneau went forward in a church, and he made a decision for Christ, and shortly after that he made another decision, and that is that he and God were going to be business partners. In fact, there's a book called God Runs My Business that tells his whole life story, and Mr. Letourneau decided that he and God were going to be partners, and that God was going to get 90% of the profit, and Letourneau would take 10.
This is a true story. And so for years, for decades, every year, Mr. Letourneau would figure out what the profits were from his company, and he would give 90% of it off the top to the work of God, and he would keep for himself 10%. Do you know, by the end of his life, R.G. Letourneau had become a multi, multi, multi-millionaire, only keeping 10% of what he made. And you say, I don't understand, how can that possibly be? How can you give away 90% of your profit and become a multi, multi, multi-millionaire? Because, friends, 10,000% return times 10% of the profits is a lot of money.
That's how. God sent this man so much business, he didn't know what to do with it all, because he honored his Lord in the way he handled his money. You say, Lon, I have a hard time believing that story. Well, I don't care, it's true, but listen, but listen, get the book. Buy the book, God Runs My Business, and read the book for yourself, if you don't believe me, by R.G.
Letourneau. You say, Lon, okay, okay, you know what, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. Enough, wait a minute, listen. You know, I've given to God, Lon, and I've got to tell you, I've never seen 10,000% return coming back my way.
I'm sorry, but I just haven't. Well, friends, you know, when we make a statement like that, what we're really saying is that we don't really appreciate all the different ways that God makes good on his 10,000% promise. I mean, we get a raise or a promotion and we say, oh yeah, but you know, I worked hard for that. I mean, our portfolio is in great shape, and we go, yeah, well, but you know, I made some pretty smart investments.
I watched the market pretty carefully. Our health's been good, and we say, well, yeah, but you know, I work out a couple times a week. I keep my cholesterol low. Our children are well, we say, well, yeah, but we give them lots of vitamins, and our car's running well, and we say, yeah, but you know, I keep up on the preventive maintenance, and we survive the beltway, and you go, oh yeah, but I drive very defensively, and our children are walking with the Lord today, and we go, oh yeah, but you know, we had family devotions. Listen, you don't really think all that blessing came from you, do you? I hope you don't.
If you do, then forgive me for being so blunt, but you're stupid. That blessing didn't come from you. That blessing there, lots of people drive defensively on the beltway and get hit. Lots of people keep up on the preventive maintenance in their car, and their car's a lemon.
Lots of people watch their cholesterol and have heart attacks all the time. You don't really think that blessing's from you, do you? That's the grace of God, my friends. That's the mercy of God, my friends. That's God blessing your life, my friends. And a lot of Christians walk around, and they say, you know what? I don't see any 10,000% return God's sending me.
But you know, they live well, they eat well, they dress well, they ride well, they vacation well, their children are well, their income is well, their health is well. They walk around and say, I don't see why God isn't doing for me everything he said he was going to do, and God's up in heaven going, I don't see why you can't see everything I'm doing for you. Listen, we need to realize that God fulfills his 10,000% agreement with us in lots of ways other than sending us an envelope with a check in it with the postmark heaven and the return address Jehovah God. You understand what I'm saying? You say, well, Lon, you know, I got to tell you, man, I'm getting pretty nervous here. I don't know, but it sounds like to me you've gone on over to the prosperity gospel here.
That's what it sounds like to me. Now, you know better than that. Listen, we teach here what the Bible teaches, and the Bible teaches as followers of Christ. On the one hand, God sends enough suffering into every one of our lives so that we always have to trust God for something. You know what we teach. But friends, listen, that does not invalidate. That does not negate all the wonderful promises that God makes in the Bible to cheerful givers. That's also in the Bible, and it's also true.
And so let's summarize for today. God makes it clear in the Bible that he loves cheerful givers and that he rewards cheerful givers by giving them exorbitant interest on everything they give to him, money, time, energy, skill, all of it, and that he pays them those dividends not just in heaven, but he pays those dividends down here on earth as well. Now, when we understand this and when we really believe this, then friends, becoming a cheerful giver is easy.
It's easy. You say, well, Lon, I mean, of course. I mean, a person would have to be stupid to turn down an investment offer like this. Well, I agree with you.
You're right. They would have to be stupid to turn it down if they knew God was offering it to them. And that's the point of today's message, my friends, to make sure you understand what it is that God is offering you. You cannot outgive God. You will never outgive God.
I don't care what you give him. His promise is I'm going to take it, multiply it by 100, and I'm going to give it back to you. And friends, God's going to be true to his promise. You cannot outgive God. And, you know, I'm not sure if there's any I'm not sure if it's going to be possible in heaven to have regret.
I don't know. But if it is possible, I suspect the one thing that most followers of Christ are going to have regrets about when they get to heaven, at least one of the big ones, is going to be that we didn't transfer more funds into our heavenly account while we were down here. That really bothers me that when I get to heaven, I'm going to look back and I'm going to go, what's wrong with me?
What were you thinking? You know, you left all that behind. Why didn't you transfer it when you had the chance? Well, I can't transfer for you folks and you can't transfer for me. But we all ought to be transferring for ourselves if we believe what Jesus says, if we believe what the Bible says, God says the only thing you can take with you are the things you transfer into that heavenly account while you're down here.
And, folks, that should impel us. That should motivate us to take a really hard look at our giving habits here. I'm not telling you what to give. You give whatever you want to give. But I'm telling you that the only thing you're taking with you and the only thing I'm taking with me is what we give down here. So we ought to give this some real serious thought. God loves cheerful givers.
And he pays them big time dividends. And I urge you to believe that. God says it. And I urge you to take advantage of it. You know, next week we're going to talk about principle number two. We're going to talk about the fact that we can be cheerful givers when we understand that giving to God is an act of worship. And then we're done and we'll move on.
I hope we'll see you next week. Let's pray together. Lord Jesus, thanks for talking to us today about a very sensitive subject. And we here at McLean certainly understand that talking about money and the church is really a touchy issue.
And yet, Lord Jesus, how can we go around the one issue in the Bible that you talk more about than any other issue? And so I pray today that people will understand my heart and our heart that this is not about fundraising for anything. This is about teaching God's people how to handle a very dangerous commodity and how to handle it in such a way that it brings the blessing of Jesus Christ onto their life. And so, Lord, use what we've talked about today to change our lives.
Use it to change the very way we see our resources and the way we handle our resources. Lord Jesus, may we handle them in a way that honors Christ. And may we handle them in a way that brings enormous blessing on us and our families. Teach us to live biblically, Lord. Biblically, as your followers. And change our lives because we were here today and we pray these things in Jesus' name. And God's people said? Amen. Amen.
