Time’s Up, Part 2

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. What legacy are you leaving for others that are in your life? What kingdom are you leveraging your resources for?

Do you live as if eternity is real and it is imminent? If you did an honest assessment about what you are using your resources for, what kingdom is it pointing toward? And what kingdom are you pointing and teaching your kids to live for also? Welcome to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of pastor, author, and theologian J.D. Greer.

I'm Molly Vitovich. You know, something is going to be first in our lives and the Bible makes it very clear that it should be God. Today, Pastor J.D. continues the message that we began yesterday titled Time's Up. And it's to show us that while both God and money can be important to us, we simply cannot serve them both.

One has to step to the front and I'm sure you can guess which one. As we better understand our role simply as stewards of all of God's gifts, we can then better devote our short time on earth to serving our master and preparing for eternity. Let's jump back in where we left off in Luke chapter 16 today. Luke 16.

You ready? Here we go. Verse one. Jesus told his disciples there was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So we called him in and he asked him, what is this that I hear about you? Give an account of your management because you cannot be manager any longer because you're such a bad manager and you're so slack and you don't get up to 11 o'clock and you go out to lunch every day. And so the manager said to himself, oh no, he just got fired. What do I do? He's gotten his two week notice. My master is taking away my job.

I'm not strong enough to dig. What am I going to do? I know what I'll do so that when I lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses. So we called in each of his master's debtors and he asked the first one, people that owed his master money, how much do you owe my master? 900 gallons of olive oil, he replied. The manager told him, hey, I tell you what you owe him 900. Take down right now, sit down, take out your checkbook and make it 450. Then he asked the second one, how much do you owe? 1000 bushels of wheat, he's replied. I told him, take your bill and make it 800. What does that mean?

Let me put this in modern terms in case you were like the 900 gallons of oil and you just like, you know, throwing oil. An accounts manager for a really rich guy is giving us two week notice. Basically he's fire, but he's got two weeks left on the job. So he goes home and in despair, he says to his wife, wife, what am I going to do? And then he has a brilliant idea. He calls the boss's clients who still owe his boss money. He says, hey, I see here that you owe my boss $100,000.

I tell you what, sit down right here right now, write out a check for $25,000 and I will give you an official debt settled certificate and we'll just call it even. And he does that with every single person who owes his boss money, right? So after he's fired now, he's got a huge bunch of people who feel like they owe him a big, huge favor. Then Jesus in a really surprising twist in the story, verse eight, the master who just gotten hosed by the way, okay?

The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. I mean, seriously, if you've never read the Bible before, did you see that coming? Here is the son of God like, and that is a really, really smart manager, right? Jesus is such a great storyteller. Then Jesus explains the surprising lesson. You see the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. In other words, Jesus is saying, if you know that your current reality is coming to an end, wouldn't it be wise to use whatever moments you have left to prepare for the next reality?

If you've gotten your two week notice, isn't it wise to use whatever remaining time you have in that window to get ready for the reality that you're about to go into? Shouldn't you be making friends for the next reality? So what does that mean Jesus has for the money and the resources that God has made you manager over? I tell you, verse nine, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves in eternity so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings. Jesus continues, for whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with very much. Whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who's going to trust you with real riches?

And if you've not been trustworthy with somebody else's property, who in the world is going to give you property of your own? Jesus explains here that in some mysterious way that I'm not sure I totally understand, but some mysterious way, our faithfulness with our resources here is going to determine both our responsibility level and our enjoyment level and the life to come. The point is that God gave us what he gave us down here to steward. Steward is a word that just means somebody who manages something that belongs to somebody else. When you're a steward, you're not the owner, you're the manager. I mean, you all realize, right, that as God sees it, every single resource that you have, all of your money doesn't really belong to you, right? I mean, you understand that, right? I was watching a Will Smith interview, the fresh principal air guy, and the interviewer asked him, he said, when did your kids learn that they were rich?

Will Smith interrupted and said, let me just stop you right there. I'm rich, my kids are not. I let them use some of my money, but it is not theirs, it is mine.

And every parent said, amen, right? Same thing with us and God. God gave us what he gave us and has a purpose for them. My question for you is, be honest, is that how you see your resources? Do you see your resources as fundamentally yours or fundamentally God's?

Who really owns them? Because if you see your resources as yours, you will ask, how much of this do I have to give to God so that he won't curse me and I won't feel guilty? But if you see your resources as fundamentally his, you ask, not about 10% of it, but about 100% of it, what does he want me to do with this?

And what are the eternal purposes that he gave me these things for? If time on earth is short, if you've already been given your two weeks notice, and you have been, right, your two weeks notice is you're looming death. I don't want to be depressing in here, but death rate in America still holds steady at 100% and shows no sign of waning. Your two week notice may last, it may last 60 years, it may last literally two weeks, but all of us have been served a two week notice. And if that two weeks, however long it actually is of that two weeks compared to eternity, is as short as eternity must demand that it be, how should we be using that last two weeks? One of my favorite Psalms is written by, not by David, but by Moses, Psalm 90. And in Psalm 90, Moses prays a prayer that I have prayed regularly since college. Psalm 90, verse 12, teach us to number our days. So teach us to number our days carefully so that we may develop wisdom in our hearts. Notice the connection between numbering your days and the developing of wisdom. I love how Martin Luther translated that verse into German and then re-translated it back into English.

I'm not going to read it in German. Teach us to think daily about death so that we might finally learn how to live. It is only by thinking often about the brevity of life that you're ever going to develop the right attitude toward the days that you have. How long is eternity and how do you not look at your life like James says in James 4, that it's just like the morning vapor that comes out of your mouth when it's a cold morning and you blow out and it just appears for a moment, he says, and then it is gone.

Only when you learn to think that way will you develop the right attitude toward life. I told you the story of a guy that many of you never heard of, but he's very influential. And in fact, I quote him all the time. You don't realize I'm quoting him, but his name is C.T.

Stud. He was a professional cricket player in Great Britain in the late 19th century, which I told you doesn't seem that impressive now, but back in the day, that was the world's most popular sport. And he was like the LeBron James of cricket, right? He was the star of England's national team, but he begins to be haunted by the thought that his life is having no eternal significance. And so at the height of his career, like LeBron James right now, he backs out and just says, I'm going to go live in China. And then he went to India and then parts of Africa where eventually he died.

I mean, imagine somebody doing that now. Imagine LeBron James holding a press conference and being like, I'm taking my talents to Siberia because that's where people need Jesus. Of course, people all over the world asked him, why don't you do something like that? And I gave you the statement that he made that basically went something like, well, if Jesus was God and died to save me, then why shouldn't, why wouldn't I give up my life to bring his message of salvation to others? That's the part I share with you. Part I didn't share with you is that he wrote a poem, a poem that my dad used to quote to me all the time when I was a kid.

And that just makes its way into sermons now. And you never knew it was from T.T. Studd. Here's the poem.

T.T. Studd wrote this poem in explanation for why he was doing what he was doing. The poem said, only one life to live will soon be past. Only what's done for Christ will last. Only one life, yes, only one, to let me save thy will be done. And when at last I'll hear the call, I know I'll say it was worth it all.

Because only one life to live will soon be past. Only what's done for Christ will last. I can tell you just with incredible gratefulness in my heart that my parents drilled that into me.

I really think when it's all said and done, that's going to be the greatest legacy that they will leave for me. My dad was the plant manager of a textile factory. My dad's a member here at our church now. But he was a plant manager of a plant with about 900 employees in it. And I remember visiting him one time.

I was about 12 years old. And my mom drove us up. We went in the back parking lot where all the managers, where all the executive staff parked. And I noticed that my dad's car was way worse than everybody else's. All these other managers had the BMW and the Lexus, and nothing wrong with that if you drive one.

I'm not judging you. But they had all those things. And my dad had this car that, I mean, it was like 10 years old. And I walked in. I was like, dad, don't you make more money than all these people?

Why are they driving all these cars? And yours is like the worst one on the lot. And I just remember him looking at me and saying something like, son, none of that matters. That doesn't matter.

This stuff doesn't matter. He says, what matters is there's missionaries that we support, that we often would have in our home when they were home on furlough, and that we would pray for as a family at dinnertime. He said, that's what matters.

And so, yeah, we kind of dial it back over here because we want to be rich in those things there. I told you before, I remember him, on the years when he would get a bonus because their factory had done well. I remember him always sitting at the dinner table and wanting to discuss what we were going to do with that bonus. And every year I would be like, the J.D. Greer fund is deficient.

We should put it there. And every year I'd say, no, no, no. When God multiplies us like this, he does it so that we can invest it in the kingdom of God. My mom did it in her way, in her own way. She taught it to me. I remember one of the conversations I most dreaded having with her was when, as a senior in college, I sensed God calling me to go overseas.

And at that point I thought it was going to be permanent. And here they had invested so much to get me into college and to be my best. And I was going to just drop out of my law studies and go into pursue Christian ministry. And my mom and dad were both Christians.

I've told you that, but for some reason I just thought that this was not going to go well because I knew that they supported missions as a concept, but I was like, it's probably different when your own kid is going to go there. Like, hey, we want other people's kids to do that, but not my kid. And I remember just dreading it. And so I asked mom and I thought divide and conquer. So I was like, mom, why don't you meet me first because she'd be softer. And so I met her at a restaurant halfway between my college campus and our home. And I remember going in there and just trying to explain to her why I thought this was a good idea.

Finally, I just said, mom, I know this is probably really disappointing for you. I know you probably had this vision of me living really close and making a comfortable living and raising your grandkids in a place where you could see them every day, but I just really sensed God wants me to go live overseas where people don't know about Jesus. And then I just sat there. I was ready mentally. I thought it was going to have this argument and no, you can't.

And we've invested too much for you to throw it all away and go do that. I was maybe tears. Instead, what she remember her looking back at me and she said, JD, your father and I have been praying for God's will for your entire life. And if this is how God wants to use your life, we're not going to stand in your way.

And I can tell you that nothing would make your dad not prouder than knowing that you gave your life back to God for his service. Right? And I just, I was stunned. She wasn't done. Here's what she said.

Listen to this. We will have all eternity to enjoy the blessings of our family. So if we miss out on some of them down here, that's okay. Because we've got all eternity for that, but we've only got a few years to ensure that other people's sons and daughters around the world have a chance to be included in our family in Christ. Only one life to live will soon be passed. Only what's done for Christ will last. That is the legacy that I was given by my parents. And I can tell you it is greater than any other thing they could have left for me.

So one simple question I have for you. What legacy are you leaving for your kids? What legacy are you leaving for others that are in your life? What kingdom are you leveraging your resources for? Do you live as if eternity is real and it is imminent? If you did an honest assessment about what you are using your resources for, what kingdom is it pointing toward?

And what kingdom are you pointing and teaching your kids to live for also? It seems like in the last few years there's a concept that's gotten really popular. The bucket list comes off from a movie in 2007 where Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson were going to try to do all the things they wanted to do but never got to do before they kicked the bucket because they both got a terminal disease. So before you kick the bucket, what is it that you're going to do?

What's in your bucket list because you assume that after you die you'll never have a chance to do that anymore? But I've told you before, does that make any sense for the Christian? You see the book of Revelation tells me that at the resurrection Jesus is going to usher us into the new heavens and the new earth. And scholars say the word new means renewed. Renewed means that heaven is not some ethereal existence in the clouds where we all sit around in diapers with you know nerf bows and arrows and play our harps all day. Heaven is a renewed version of this earth perfected and without the curse of sin. And that means that all the things that I miss out on down here I'm going to get to experience a perfected version of up there. All the mountains, all the stars, the rivers, oceans, planets, animals, culture, arts, music, architecture, even extreme sports that I never got to experience here.

They're all going to be waiting for me there. In fact Revelation 21 26 even says that God will bring into heaven the glory and the honor of the nations which scholars say means he will bring into heaven the best of culture, the best Italian food, the best of Arabian and colonial architecture, the best art, Mardi Gras without all the debauchery, Disney World without the lines, okay, the Jersey Shore without New Jersey. You know all the things that we want without the curse. And by the way we don't know what we'll be capable of physically but Jesus's resurrection is supposed to give us a hint.

And in Jesus's resurrection body he could fly and walk through walls. So here's how I see it. I don't even think that I'm exaggerating.

Right? I've always wanted to climb, you know, Mount Everest or Mount Kilimanjaro. My wife has just taken out any of those off the table until our kids are 30. Okay, so by that point I'm probably not going to feel like it anymore. But if I never get to that down here that's okay because in heaven I'm going to climb the renewed Mount Kilimanjaro which is going to be a lot better anyway.

And when I get to the top I'll just probably fly on over to the heavenly Tuscany and have dinner that evening. So the point is you can put up your bucket list. You don't have to worry about anything you're going to miss out on and you can leverage your few remaining moments for eternity. You see there is one thing that we cannot do there that we can do here and that one thing is tell people about Jesus.

So if you want to put something on a bucket list you should make it that. It means the only wise thing to do with your resources, Jesus says in Luke 16, is to make friends for eternity. Use them to give people a chance to go from darkness to light. Use them so that people have a chance to hear that there is a savior who has defeated death on their behalf and has died to forgive their sins so they can be welcomed into an eternity of joy forever. As Keith Green used to say, this generation is responsible for this generation of Christians all around the world. Friends you understand this there are people all over the world that have never heard about Jesus and it doesn't bring me a lot of satisfaction just to say that one day 100 years 200 years from now all the people groups are going to be reached. I wanted to be reached in my lifetime. Why? Because the people alive on earth now are my responsibility.

This is the only chance they got. They got one chance to hear about Jesus and I am that chance and in that last day when our master returns the only thing that's going to matter to you is whether you were a faithful steward and used your resources for that purpose. And then Jesus makes a statement that we started this message with. The statement that embodies his most important teaching on money. Nobody you see nobody can serve two masters. Either you're going to hate the one and love the other you'll be devoted to the one and despise the other. You simply cannot serve both God and money. Both of them can be present in your life they can be. Both God and money can be present in your life but only one is going to be at the center.

Only one of those two will be first. One of them you're going to look to for happiness and security and therefore you will pursue it. The other one you will have more of a casual relationship with.

You cannot serve both God and money. One of them you're going to look to that's where I'm going to find happiness that's where I find security so you're going to pursue it. The other one you have more of a casual relationship with it. Is it God or money for you? Which is when which category? Last November we began a two-year journey called first. It was where we began to ask ourselves is God truly first in our lives? The basic idea was this lots of things can be important in our lives but only one thing can be first. And whatever is first in your heart is going to get your best. And you're going to be willing to settle for good enough and everything else and everything else you're going to settle for good enough. If what you drive or where you live or where your kids go to school if that's what is first in your heart that's going to get your best. And then things like the kingdom of God that's gets the leftovers it gets good enough. In fact the example I used last year if you remember this I was like you imagine the couple my wife and I were like this once where you're trying to get your first house and almost everybody had this conversation because the realtor shows you two houses or there's two kind of finalists and one of them is the house that you can afford and the other one is the house that you really can't afford yet but you really want to be in that house because it's just right and you got all these reasons why you want to be in it. And so you had a conversation that sounded like this you're like sweetheart we can we can we can get this other house this bigger house that we really want to be in but if we're going to do that things are going to have to change right. We're not going to be able to go out to eat all the time anymore we're not going to be able to to go to Starbucks all the time we're not going to be able to to get new cars anytime soon but you were like it's worth it you know to get in this house we'll we'll do this for this time so that we'll do good enough here so we can have the best here there's nothing wrong with that conversation at that time in your life I'm not some parents do that when it comes time for college like we can get our kid in the school but in order to do that everything else has got to change what I told you is this there ought to be a conversation like that every time you make decisions about giving to the kingdom of God if it's first in your life you ought to say hey we can do that if but it's going to have to cause these things to change over here if God is going to get my first and my best then there's going to be a lot of things in my life that are going to have to get good enough and I may be what I drive or where I live the kind of vacations I go on my listen my question for you has been for a year now we're at the halfway point at first is the kingdom of God important to you or is it first because only one thing can be first last verse in this passage look at this verse 14 the Pharisees who loved money heard all this and they were sneering at Jesus why were they sneering well it tells you why because they love money they love money and Jesus was attacking what they looked at for life and all of its blessings and that's what you do you sneer when somebody threatens you at your core notice then we're trying to argue they knew he was right they knew he was right sneering reflects the heart that says I just hate that you just went there so my question for you is is that you right now are you sneering right now are you sitting there saying I why do you got to go there I hate it when you go here why do you always got to talk about this and be honest is it because it's attacking the thing that you love and the thing that you depend on for life and security and happiness because if so you might have the same heart the Pharisees had I'm just asking I'm just asking is it because your money is so precious to you that you don't want anybody not even Jesus messing with him our goal at first is that we'd be a congregation of people who serve God not money who put God first not money and thus leverage our money for eternal purposes God doesn't need our money to accomplish his purposes but he desires our giving as a sign of a heart fully committed to him thank you for listening to Summit Life with JD Greer Pastor JD our resource this month is a different one for us we're always looking for new ways to help others integrate the truth of the Bible into their everyday lives so can you tell us a little bit about that latest resource yeah one of our goals here at Summit Life in fact I might think of it as our our primary goal is to take people deeper in the scripture so they go deeper into the gospel so we're always looking for new ways to integrate the truth of the Bible and how can you make it practically integrated into your daily life and so one of the things we've done for that is provided these 50 memory verse cards it's sort of like a nice deck of cards they serve as a tool to help you get scripture in front of you and make it easy to memorize these verses memorizing scripture gives you a great opportunity to share that verse with other believers I think it will allow you to be able to memorize 50 verses that will reshape how you think about God how you think about life and uh and infuse power into your prayer so we would love to get some of these to you um and this is a way of allowing you to be connected to our ministry um you can you can find out more about these and just start that conversation at jdgrier.com we'd love to send you this exclusive new set of cards today if you want to carry God's promises in your heart our new summit life memory verse cards make it easy to memory scripture they're perfect to use as a weekly resource throughout the year or as a daily encouragement these scripture cards remind us all of God's steadfastness and his unchanging promises and will help us commit them to our minds and our hearts ask for the all things new memory verse card set and coordinating magnet when you give by calling 866-335-5220 that's 866-335-5220 or you can give online at jdgrier.com i'm molly vidovich i'm so glad to have you with us today and be sure to listen wednesday when pastor jd explains what our decisions on money reveal about what we love and treasure in this world that's wednesday on summit life with jd greer today's program was produced and sponsored by jd greer ministries you