Well, we are continuing on in our study of the parable of the unjust steward. A very unusual parable, which is not easy to understand when you first read it. You have to abide in it for a little bit and work at understanding it. And I want to continue on with our study of this parable today by our examining together the phrase in verse 9 of Luke 16. And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by unrighteous mammon. Now, I don't very often talk about financial things here, either in Sunday school or from the pulpit, but there are many things related to that in the scriptures, and this parable is one of them. And in fact, the emphasis in this parable is on money and how we think about it and what we will do with it. So I think it will be good for us if we can understand this better so that as Christians we can think about what God is expecting of us as stewards of the money that he has given to us. I think it'll be good for us to begin by looking at this subject in terms of words that were spoken to Israel in Old Testament times. So I want you to turn with me over to Deuteronomy 8, and I want to read to you verses 7 to 18. Deuteronomy 8, verses 7 to 18. My first point to you this morning is that God has expectations of us. in relation to how we think about our money. Listen to what it says here in God's word. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs that flow out of valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey. a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron and out of whose hills you can dig copper. When you have eaten and are full, then you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which he has given you. Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandments, his judgments and his statutes, which I command you today, lest, when you have eaten and are full, and have built beautiful houses and dwell in them, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold are multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, when your heart is lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, who led you through that great and terrible wilderness, in which were fiery serpents and scorpions in thirsty land, where there was no water, who brought water for you out of the flinty rock, who fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and that he might test you to do you good in the end. Then you say in your heart, My power and the might of my hand have gained me this wealth, and you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant, which he swore to your fathers as it is this day. So God has expectations of us in relation to how we think about our money. And the first question that I have in the paper that was passed out to you just a minute ago is this, how should we as New Testament, New Covenant Christians think about the words, your God is bringing you into a good land? How can we apply these words spiritually to ourselves? What do you think? I'm not sure, but I always think that when God saved me, He actually gave me all the riches that are in Him. Amen. Yeah, God, when He saved us, gave us all the riches that are in Him, in Christ, it says, in a number of different places in the New Testament. I think we can apply them to ourselves by thinking of how God has providentially ordered each of our personal and family situations in and by his goodness and mercy that he has provided for all of our needs and that he has brought us into and given us a place to live and a job to work at and good food to eat. We should be a very thankful people thankful to God that he cares for us so well. Now let me just ask to start out this time, are you thankful this morning for all that God does for you, all that he has given to you, all that he continues to give to you? Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." We need to be very thankful, people, thankful that God cares for us so well. We should tell him that day by day. Question two, how should we respond to all the good things that the Lord has given to us according to verse 10 there in Deuteronomy 8? When you have eaten and are full, then you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which He has given to you. How should we respond to all these good things? What should we do according to this verse? It says, bless the Lord. We should bless the Lord. Psalm 103, bless the Lord, O my soul. And all that is within me, bless His holy name. grateful and heartfelt acknowledgement of the blessings received. Amen. Amen. A grateful heart acknowledgement of the blessings that we have received. That's very good. When we have eaten and are full, then we should bless the Lord, our God, for the good land all of those good things that He has given to us. And particularly by the way that He's fed us, it mentions here. Now that might seem like a little thing to us that live in a land of plenty. But honestly, it's not. And God can bring famines like He did in Egypt so long ago, where things got so bad, that all the people had to sell all their lands. They had to go to Joseph and beg him to buy them to be his servants. That's how bad it was back there. And all that because God wanted it that way at that time for those people. And it was so that he might test them like it says in these verses to see how they would Respond for all the good things that they had been given. So Joseph, what did he do? He stored up grain like the sand on the seashore. When the time came, he opened it all up, the granaries, and then he fed the whole then known world around him. I mean, wow, what an amazing thing to think about that he would do such a thing. But I'm just trying to show you that you and I, who have so much of plenty, should never take that for granted. We should thank the Lord each and every day. That's one of the reasons why we pray before we eat our food. We might give Him thanks. Oh, it's such a good thing. Such a good thing. Question three, according to verses 11 to 17, what are the particular temptations that Israel faced when God was so very good to them, and are we prone to these same temptations? Mention some of them and tell us how we can respond rightly to them. These verses 11 to 17, do you see what it is that they were tempted to? The peculiar, particular temptations that they faced when God was so very good to them? And are we prone to these same temptations? What say you? Thank you. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? Yes. But we prayed before we ate, and we prayed and thanked God after we ate. So that was, in effect, that was the core. But yes, we are prone to wander. What's that song say? Prone to wander away. Prone to leave the God I love. When we are doing well, often, our pride gets into our head, thinking, hey, I'm doing really fine here. Look at what I've done. Look at what I've got. I'm like the guy who said, I'll build a bigger barn. We live in a land of plenty and as Brian often prays about the suffering saints, the people are being murdered, slaughtered, eaten by dogs because of their faith and their beliefs and they won't recant. So we need to be careful because we too could fall into that if we're big headed and puffed up. That's right. I appreciate those words. It's apparent from verses 11 to 17, by the word, beware that you do not forget the Lord, your God, by not keeping his commandments, his judgments, his statutes, which I command you to today, lest when you have eaten and are full and have built beautiful houses and dwell in them, And when your herds and your flocks multiply, your silver and your gold are multiplied, all that you have is multiplied when your heart is lifted up and you forget the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. So we can forget the Lord. It is rather perplexing sometimes about how we do this, that we can forget the Lord our God. We can forget Him by not keeping His commandments, certainly, but we can also forget Him by not praising Him and thanking Him for all that He's given and what He's allowed you to accomplish in your job situation. I know you men work hard at this. and you ladies in the home as well. But we need to see that the Lord is the one who upholds us in our strength day by day, day by day. So we pray for these people in the prayer sheet. Some of these folks are younger people. We pray for them and some of the younger ones even die from physical maladies at young ages. And I just don't think we think about this enough in terms of God upholding us when it says, you shall love the Lord your God with all your soul, all your heart, with all your mind, and with all your strength. See, that's the first and greatest commandment. But with your strength, what a great thing. I will serve God with the strength that he supplies to me. by the grace that He gives to me, in accordance with His Spirit working in me." In other words, again, sometimes we forget that the Holy Spirit is right there with us in our heart and life, and observing our conduct, our thoughts, and leading us and guiding us into all the truth. He's delivered us from slavery and bondage, not physical, like those coming out of Egypt, but spiritual bondage to sin. What an awful thing it was for us, and again, I don't think that we think often enough upon it. I think we ought to, in terms of the people around us who are totally deceived. And they don't stop to think about the God who made them, the God who can deliver them from slavery and bondage to sin. This is amazing stuff. Question four, according to verse 18, what is the great truth that we should remember in terms of our wealth and God's blessing us in the covenant of grace? Those two things in terms of our wealth and then his blessing us in the covenant of grace. What should we remember according to verse 18? God is always the first cause of our strength and our abilities and the provinces and the circumstances of our life. He's behind it all in terms of if we have anything. I think about my father and other people you know. In the 1920s, our nation was prospering greatly. And almost in one day, thousands of people were flat broke. And that's the kind of thing that's why we need to hold a loose hand. Yes. Very good. Very good, Brian. Yeah, back in 1929, the stock market crashed. People lost everything in one day. And they went for the better part of 10 years like that. to come back out of it. So, what do we learn from those things? We learn that God gives and He takes away. He can establish, build, strengthen you and your job situation, particularly. Give you wisdom and understanding how you should act in your job so that you actually do good. You do well. at what you're doing. He gives you skill. He gives you wisdom. He gives you ability to do these things, to accomplish tasks of various sorts and to be contributing to others around you if you're in a company or even if you're on your own. He's still giving you this wisdom for you and your employees. So we should not forget that it was by God's power and might, the might of His hand, it says here in verse 18. that each of us has gotten this wealth that we have. Oh Lord, I'm so thankful that you work in my heart and life to cause me to remember this, that it is you who gives us the power to get wealth. And he does so in order to, by the way, see how closely these truths are right here together, that he might establish his covenant faithfulness to us through his giving us Christ. For it is in his giving us Christ that he has given us all things. All things, for life and godliness made us rich, as Maria Elena was saying, in spiritual things, as well as having many physical blessings and all the money and possessions that we have. Our response ought then to be that because God has been so generous with us, then that we ought to be kind and generous in terms of our church and also the poor. That we ought to remember the poor, as the Apostle Paul said, both in our church and outside of it. We ought to be kind and generous people. Why? Because God will test us in this regard, as it says in verse 16. In verse 16, He says, who fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and that he might test you to do you good. In the end, isn't that good? I think that's so good that it isn't just that he humbles us in order to test us, but it's in order that in the end he might do us good. by having tested and proved to us, because he knows all things, he doesn't need to have it proved to him what's in any man, but he does it for our sakes so that we might understand something more about him and ourselves. And so we should then Coming out of those truths, we should think about other people's needs around us and how we could be their friend by means of unrighteous mammon, our parable. Now, let me ask you, if you do this, that you are consciously thinking about poorer people than yourself and how you might help them. Now, God will often providentially so order these things that you will come into contact with someone who is poor or poorer and who you perceive that perhaps God has brought you into contact with them for a reason, not just simply that you might say, well, isn't that too bad that they're like that, but that you actually think of how you might help them in some way. I do think that that's what the Lord would have us to do on a daily basis in relation to people around us, just to ask ourselves, what is it, Lord, you would want me to do? You've placed this person in front of me or to my notice, and what is it? Is there something that I can contribute to their understanding or to help them in some way? And so the second point is, are making friends with our money, as it says in Luke 16, 9. And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by unrighteous man. And he's speaking this parable to his disciples, that when you fail, they may receive you into an everlasting home. So question five I have for you is when Jesus says, that we ought to make friends for ourselves by unrighteous mammon, that when you fail, what do the words when you fail refer to? When you fail, what does that refer to? That's exactly right, Brian, it's when you die. When you die. This word, In this word fail, and I'm referring to death, we need to understand that in death that our soul will be separated from our body. And therefore our stewardship upon this earth will end. Right there. Do you see that? There will be nothing more that we can do to please the master, our Lord Jesus Christ, because our body will fail and we will not be able to do anything more either to be more holy or wise or glorifying to God than we have been up until that time. It's all over. Everything's all over. Now, in one sense, that's a glorious thing. You know, we look forward to that, don't we, as Christians? I go to prepare a place for you. you know, that you may be with me forever. And we should look forward to that. We should not be afraid of that. We should look forward. It's far better to die and to be with Christ. But on the other hand, we also ought to think of what we can do while we still have time, the time that the Lord gives us, when we have life and breath and strength and health, and when we can do things. I'm 73 years old now, and it seems like that it was just yesterday that I was beginning my ministry here with you 21 years ago, this July. And I was 51 years old then, it was kind of late for me to get into the ministry. But I resolved to do what I could by faith for the Lord, as long as the Lord would allow me to be a pastor and to be here with you. And thank God, he's had mercy on me. in that regard. I'm very thankful to him, for all of you as well. Listen to Benjamin Keech on this topic that we're discussing. He says, After a short time you must fail, shall die. It is impossible to prevent it. And therefore it was their wisdom to provide against that time. Should a rich man be told of a certain truth, that in a very short time he should fail in the world, or as it is called, break, Benjamin Keech lived back there in the 1600s, mid-1600s, and be turned out of all that he hath, sure he would be full of thoughts how he should live in aftertimes. It would put him upon thoughtfulness for the time to come. He says, wise sirs, I am come here today to tell everyone, young and old, rich and poor, that after a very short time, you will all fail. There is no way of avoiding it. You that are rich, your riches will fail. You that are strong and in health, your strength and health will fail. And you that think that you are wise, your wisdom will fail. And you that are beautiful, your beauty will fail. And you that have the means of grace, the means of grace will fail. And you that have nothing but false hopes of heaven, your hopes will fail and be like the spider's web And you that live now and are brisk and lively, your life will fail. And is it not then your cheapest wisdom to labor for such friends as will not fail or get an interest in Christ? And then you can have all of these things come together, he says. Just incredible. I just, I can hardly believe these words, how good they are. Why? Because we have an account to give up. to God, each one of us, have an account to give up to God? Will you give it up with joy that you may be happy at death, not ashamed at His coming, the Lord Jesus? 1 Timothy 6, 6 to 12, if you want to turn over there with me. First Timothy six, six to 12. Now godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. Perdition is eternal destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness and pierce themselves through with many sorrows. But you, O man of God, flee these things and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, gentleness, fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. Question six, why is godliness with contentment a means of great gain? And what are the reasons given to us here that we should not desire to be rich? Why is godliness with contentment a means of great gain? giving me, asking the Lord to give me what I need to survive, but not so little that I curse Him, and not so much that I turn away from Him and say that I don't see God. That's very good. Give me neither poverty nor riches. It's a wonderful, wonderful verse there, isn't it? So yes, very definitely, it will keep us from covetousness. An inordinate desire for things that God hasn't given to us, maybe doesn't want us to have. And what are the reasons given to us here that we should not desire to be rich? That we will know God himself to be our portion and our hope in this life. and the next. Well, that's as far as we can go today, but we'll continue on in this good parable. There's many, many more truths to come out of this parable. Let's pray together. Father, we do thank you that you teach us, patiently instruct us in the scriptures, and you feed us. And you give us to understand just how intimately involved you are with our lives, each of us individually. And even all of us collectively as a church. And so we pray that we would receive these truths today and live not for the world, but for you. And that we would put you first in our lives and everything. in our thoughts, in our speech, in our actions. May we be filled with good works. May we look outside of ourselves to see those that have needs and study to know how we can help them. We pray and ask these things in your blessed name, Lord Jesus. Amen.