Stewardship: “the conducting, supervising, or managing of something; especially the careful and responsible management of something entrusted to one's care” - http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stewardship.
As a forward to this writing I will state in all honesty that I have not arrived in this area of stewardship. The Lord is still teaching me much, is growing me, and is helping me to learn more and more each day how he would have me to conduct my life in this area of giving. Yet, I am speaking here of much more than just financial giving, but of all giving of oneself to others. This lesson, thus, is for me, as well as for me to share with you, and I pray the Lord would teach me through it. So, let me begin, in order to set the stage for this lesson, with the first person to give of himself to the legitimate needs of others, and that is God.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).I heard a preacher once use this passage of scripture to define the word “love.”
He said, “Love is giving of oneself” - God gave his Son and his Son is God so God gave himself – “to the legitimate needs of others.” God gave himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, to us for our need to be set free from sin (penalty of and bondage to), and to be able to be in perfect communion and fellowship with him, and then to live with him forever.
“Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!” – (2 Co. 9:15)So, whether the legitimate needs of others are financial, spiritual, material, emotional, mental, etc., still this whole idea of stewardship and of love is one of giving of ourselves – our time, energies, resources, giftings, talents, etc. – to the legitimate (genuine; authentic; and reasonable) needs (essentials; and necessities) of others, as our heart response of gratitude to God for his gift of grace in our hearts and lives - that is beyond description.
2 Co. 8:7: But just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.
I believe this goes back to I Corinthians 13 where it states that if I have faith that can move mountains, or if I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, or if I am gifted in the area of prophecy where I can fathom mysteries and have a spiritual gift of knowledge, or if I give all I have to the poor, and/or if I give of myself as a living sacrifice to God, and yet I do not have love, then I am nothing. I am just a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. Since love is giving of oneself to the legitimate needs of others, then I need to excel in this grace of love.
2 Co. 8:11: Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means.
This is about follow-through. We can desire to do something with all sincerity of our hearts, but if we don’t follow through with it, then what good is our sincerity? I think here of the parable of the two sons. One told his father he would not do what the father said, and yet, on second thought, he went and obeyed him. The other son told his father he would do what he said, and yet he never followed through with what he said he would do. So, the moral of the story is that the one who obeyed is the one who did what the father asked, not the one who proclaimed loyalty but did not follow through. [Mtt. 21:28-32] Willingness and sincerity will only get us so far. We have to follow through, and we have to finish the race.
2 Timothy 4:7-8 says: I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.
2 Co. 8:12: For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what he does not have.
We are all different – I know this is a news bulletin! We have differing personalities, gifts, talents, resources, abilities, time, energy levels, etc. So, the principle here is that we give according to what has been given to us. Some of what has been given to us is natural (we are born with it or with the propensity for it), and some of what we have been given is supernatural, i.e. such as spiritual gifts that often go beyond our natural resources, abilities, strengths, personalities, etc. Yet, everything we have been given in this life is a gift from God, so to give according to what we have is truly to give everything we have to God for his use and as he chooses. Yet, this takes wisdom, too, because we are not supernatural beings and we still live in human bodies that get tired and that have limited resources and strength, etc. So, we need wisdom and understanding from God to know when to say “Yes” and when to say “No” and what things to say “Yes” to, and what things to say “No” to. Believe it or not, one of Satan’s greatest ploys against us is to get us busy doing “good things” but they may not be the “best things” God has planned for us, and they may even keep us so busy to where we miss entirely the best things God has planned for our lives.
2 Co. 8:21: For we are taking pains to do what is right, not only in the eyes of the Lord but also in the eyes of men.I like the order of this, because the order is essential here. We need to first and foremost do what is right in God’s eyes. We are not to be man pleasers but God pleasers. Many people get this in reverse and they are man pleasers first without considering whether or not what they are doing is pleasing to God and what he wills for their lives. Many who are man pleasers also get caught in the trap, sometimes, of trying to please everyone and thus get themselves in bondage to man instead of living as servants of Christ. This can often result in emotional breakdowns or mental and physical exhaustion as we try, in our flesh, to please everyone. So, we need to set reasonable boundaries for ourselves by inquiring of God as to what he wants us to do or not do so that we make sure, first of all, that we are pleasing him first and foremost, and then what we do for others will also be right in God’s eyes and will fit within his plan and purpose for our lives, and that should bring us peace.
2 Co. 9:6: Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.
God has given us everything we have, and we should give everything we have back to him, allowing him to decide how he wants to use our lives and use what he has given to us for his purposes and for his glory. It is not up to us to choose to give some and hold back the rest, thinking we have somehow pleased God by our service or by our gifts. So, if we sow sparingly, i.e. if we only give what we determine to give, we will only reap according to what we have given. Yet, if we give all God has given to us back to him on the altar of sacrifice, allowing him to determine our steps, then we will reap generously all the blessings he has in store for us because of our obedience to him in doing what he requires of us.
2 Co. 9:7: Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
This, too, fits with what I just shared above about doing what is right in the eyes of the Lord and also in the eyes of man. When we live our lives to please men above pleasing God, we can get into the trap of feeling as though we have to do this or that to please man, or that if he does this for me, I have to do that for him, or I know she expects this of me, so I must fulfill that expectation, etc., which then just brings us back under bondage to man, not to God. Then, we are giving to others out of some sense of obligation (socially or culturally) that God did not initiate, and it is bondage and is driven by fear of rejection of man.
2 Co. 9:8, 10: And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work… Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness.
This goes again to the idea of the natural vs. the supernatural. We cannot limit ourselves to what we are able to do just in the natural, but we should open ourselves up to whatever grace the Lord would choose to give us in the supernatural to go beyond what we think we can do or give, yet this must come by him and through him. In other words, it is not up to us to decide to give beyond our means and then have to borrow from others in order to pay our bills. It is not up to us to decide that we should be singing solos in church if it is so that we might get the glory. It is not up to us to decide to build God’s house for him if we are doing it in our own strength and according to man’s methods. This is about God’s grace supernaturally working in and through us for his purposes and for his glory, then we can abound in every good work he has chosen for us to do, and then he will be the one to increase the store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of our righteousness in others’ lives.
2 Co. 9:12-14: This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you.Lastly, when we love with God’s love by giving of ourselves to meet the legitimate needs of others, when we follow through with what we have said we are willing to do, when we trust in God’s wisdom to use the resources he has given to us for his purposes and his glory, when we have our lives prioritized to where God gets top billing, when we allow God to determine our steps, when we give freely from our hearts instead of out of a sense of misguided obligation that chooses to please man over God, and when we recognize that it is God who gives us all that we need to do the work he has called us to do, then not only will we be ministering to the needs of the people God puts in our paths, but what we do out of hearts of love for God and man will overflow into other people’s lives, as well. When a single seed falls into the ground and dies, it can produce many seeds. And, many more lives will be touched by Jesus than what we could possibly imagine in our wildest dreams. Amen!
Much Too High A Price / Jesus Paid It All / Phil McHugh and Greg Nelson
You paid much too high a price for me, Your tears, Your blood, the pain –
To have my soul just stirred at times yet never truly changed.
You deserve a fiery love that won’t ignore your sacrifice
Because You paid much too high a price.
Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe,
Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed me white as snow.
Full Lyrics: http://www.music-lyrics-gospel.com/gospel_music_lyrics/much_too_high_a_price_9499.asp
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