This is the text that Scott Brown will be preaching from today, Deuteronomy chapter 15, verses 1 through 11. At the end of every seven years, thou shalt make a release. And this is the manner of the release. Every creditor that lendeth ought unto his neighbor shall release it. He shall not exact it of his neighbor or of his brother, because it is called the Lord's release. Of a foreigner which thou mayest exact it again, But that which is thine with thy brother, thine hand shall release, save when there shall be no poor among you, for the Lord shall greatly bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee for inheritance to possess. Only if thou carefully hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe to do all these commandments which I command thee this day, for the Lord thy God blesseth thee, as he promised thee, and thou shalt lend unto many nations but thou shalt not borrow, and thou shalt reign over many nations, but they shall not reign over thee. If there be among you a poor man of one of thy brethren within any of thy gates in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy poor brother. But thou shalt open thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend him sufficient for his need in that which he wanteth. Beware that there be not a thought in thy wicked heart, saying, The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand, and that I be evil against thy poor brother. And thou givest him not, and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be sin unto thee. Thou shalt surely give him, and thine heart shall not be grieved when thou givest unto him, because that for this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thy works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto. For the poor shall never cease out of the land. Therefore, I command thee saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to the poor and to the needy in thy land. I would like to learn how to express the joy it is to bring messages from God's word to this congregation, because what seems to happen is what happened with the Thessalonians, the Apostle Paul said, when you receive the word, you received it as the word of God. And then you embraced it and then put it into practice. And it really is a joy to be able to open up the scriptures and know that from experience, that hearts are desiring to acquire wisdom from heaven, from this very precious A set of words that we had before us today, it really is a joy to know that when we read, when we study. that we have hearts ready to hear and to embrace the truth that's there. So it really is a very special thing for me today to be able to bring this text before you. As you know, as you've been tracking with us in our studies in Deuteronomy, we're in a section of Deuteronomy in the second speech in the book where Moses is drilling down to give very specific applications to the law, to the Ten Commandments, and he's He began in chapter 11 to begin sort of a transition from general principles to very specific issues. And in chapter 11, he reminds of two great things. One, the heart turned toward God and keeping all commandments. and also the blessings that are there. The very first appearance of the blessings and curses appears in chapter 11. This sets up really the next section of this speech, which was given by Moses at the end of his life. And he begins by talking about idolatry, abomination, destroying idols and not bringing abominations into your house. Then he moves on in chapter in chapter 12 to talk about worship and how he desires us to worship him. And then in chapter 13, he turns his attention toward false teachers who make claims. and analyzing, and he gives us principles for analyzing how to deal with those, even when they seem to be right in their prophecies. And then he moves on and talks about mourning. Don't mourn like the Gentiles mourn. Don't cut yourself and languish. Worship as one who knows and fears God. Now, he addresses the food laws and how God's children should eat. And then we've just engaged in the section about tithing. How should God's people handle their money with some level of regularity and passion for God? And now the subject of debt and lending in the poor is before us. You see how practical Moses is. He's getting into very, very critical and very detailed issues for us. And so here we are with the subject of debt and lending and the poor. And you can see he's continuing to expand upon matters regarding how we handle money and how we think about it. And this was a very big issue in the life of one personality and history that we're reading a biography of this year, George Whitfield. George Whitfield said that he hoped to grow rich in heaven by taking care of the poor on the earth. He castigated the rich by saying they would rather spend their spend their money on their hawks and their hounds and their comforts rather than to relieve one of their distressed fellow creatures. Whitfield was wise as a serpent, though, at the same time. He said, it's my constant practice to improve my acquaintance with the rich so that I may become a benefit to the poor. He had his prayers in his hands on the rich on the one hand, but it was opening his pockets to the poor on the other. In Delamore's biography of Whitfield, He speaks of the world that Whitfield was born into as a young preacher. He speaks of of England and the kind of life that was being experienced there. He says in a squalid confusion of buildings, fever laden haunts of vice and wretchedness, a maze of alleys and lanes fading into unwholesome vapor always overhung them. The dirty tumble down houses, the windows patched with rags and blackened paper. The airless courts crowded with quarreling women and half-naked children, wallowing in pools and kennels." This was the world that George Whitefield began to preach in. And what we find is that as the Great Awakening gained speed, the poor and the fatherless were taken care of like never before. Men's hearts were changed. Generosity broke out. the love of the Lord Jesus Christ was released. This text is about the generosity of the Lord Jesus Christ and how He desires His own people to have that same generosity. And on the one hand, while there was awakening in England and here in the colonies, there was continued squalor in France. And while the generosity of Christ was released here in England And here in the colonies, the response to the poor in one place was different than in another. As the generosity outpoured, as the Gospel transformed people's thinking, in France it was not the same. In France, the squalor, all that squalor gave birth to nothing but a bloody revolution. It was a revulsion of the Gospel and of Christ. And instead of generosity rising in the hearts of men, Madame Guillotine came and did her business upon the people of the earth there. But it was the gospel. It was the gospel that saved England. It was the gospel to save America from a bloody revolution. It was the generosity of God. It was the heart. of the Gospel that was preached by Whitefield and we so desire to preach today that unleashes the generosity of his people and changes the world in very particular ways. And so, Deuteronomy chapter 15 brings us right to the footsteps of the poor. and the languishing. Those who have run out of resources. And it shows us again another, as we've seen many times in Deuteronomy, another shadow, another shadow of the finished work of Christ that takes in everything from heaven to earth on a subject. And that's what we find here today. Everything from the generosity of God in heaven, released in the world through the Lord Jesus Christ, through His laws, through His commandments, and then finally fulfilled. And then, and then, forever established in heaven while we are found surrounded with treasure, treasure in heaven. And so, Deuteronomy chapter 15, 1 through 11, focuses itself on this subject. However, though, as we found in all of the other issues that are raised in Deuteronomy, they find themselves to be a fulfillment of a commandment, an application of a particular commandment. And Deuteronomy, chapter 15, fixes its attention on the Sabbath year, the suspension of deaths. It's a commentary on the fourth commandment, which casts a vision for rest, for delight, for doing good on the Sabbath. We've already covered the Sabbath day. Now, we're in the Sabbath year. We're still in the same range of teaching regarding the Sabbath rest. Well, the Sabbath day gives rest to the body and the Sabbath year gives rest to the pocketbook and to the entire family. And how different this world is that God would create. God is creating a world of generosity and hope. And a new day ahead. At the same time, though, the contrast is laid before us here in Deuteronomy, that there's another way to live. You can live under Pharaoh's rule as well. Pharaoh gives no Sabbath rest. Pharaoh takes, takes, takes until you are dead. And not God, though. God is saying, remember Egypt. Remember what happened there. And remember how different my rule is to his. And so in Israel, there were regimented, scheduled, culturally enforced periods of rest. There was the Sabbath day and then there is the sabbatical year, the seventh year, which gives rest from the land and from debt. And so in this section in Deuteronomy 15, we have an exposition of the fourth commandment and the issues of Sabbath rest. And of course, How do we interpret this? Well, we always have to interpret it at least with this filter. How does it show me how to love my neighbor? Every law is summed up in this principle, love your neighbor as yourself. And so, it's easy to see how the relief of debt and all the things regarding lending and debt and then dealings with the poor have to do with loving your neighbor. This is an easy one to see the application for. And so God gives this year, this very precious year, to remind mankind of His Kingdom. God's Kingdom is hardwired with freedom. God's Kingdom is hardwired for release and help and hope for the future. And so what he does in Deuteronomy 15, he says regarding debt and lending, I don't want my people under servitude and bondage any more than seven years. If they find themselves in financial calamity and they sell themselves as slaves or indentured servants to pay off their debts, as they should, I don't want them in bondage any more than seven years. Let my people go. Yes, it is an act of mercy. to lend or to receive in the form of debt. It is a blessing to be able to release yourself in servitude for a period of time. That the heart of God, the hard wiring of the universe from the heart of God is for freedom. It's for relief. It's for hope. It's for a new day out there. And that's what God is all about. I hope we get that somehow today. I don't know what burdens you're carrying today or what closed-in box canyon you think you might be in, but here's what you need to see today. is that there's another day out there. This is what God does. The psalmist says, you always fill my heart with songs of deliverance whenever I'm afraid. And that's the heart of this text here. It's the heart of the Gospel, really. So, the Gospel is all over this text. Love for neighbor is all over this text. Freedom, relief, hope. Generosity is all over this text. So let's go into it now. Verses 1 through 6 really define the first section. Verses 1 through 11 break into two basic sections, 1 through 6 and then 7 through 11. 1 through 6, debt lending and all that kind of thing. And then the following verses from 7 through 11. focus on the poor. And so we'll take each of these independently. So, in the first six verses we read, at the end of every seven years you shall grant a release of debts. This is a command, obviously, in verse one. And then he explains the form of release. Like this, every creditor who has lent anything to his neighbor shall release it, he shall not require it of his neighbor or his brother, because it is called the Lord's release. And then he qualifies it in verse 3, of a foreigner you may require it, But you shall give up your claim to what is owed by your brother. So there are a number of things that we need to consider in this first section, and that is, number one, we need to make a critical observation here, and that is that short term debt is permitted and it has an end as specified in the text. It's a release that is in honor of the Lord, release, the Hebrew term shamat means rest or to throw it down. It's like throwing down that note that is owed to you and letting it fall to the ground and be completely released as you would literally You would sort of dismember it from yourself. You would throw it down. It's no longer connected to you at all. That's the idea that he's giving. We often, you know, we're Indian givers, aren't we? By heart, that's what we like to do. We release, but it has a string on it. We like to pull it back and reclaim it. Well, that's exactly the opposite to this image here. It's a throw down and a complete dismemberment of it from yourself. forever. And this is not compulsory wealth redistribution as we see in modern times and in the Marxist state. It's totally contrary to the way that we think about debt and lending in our own day. We live in a world today where in America the 30-year mortgage is the norm. And lenders are beginning to adopt the 50-year mortgage here, particularly in the state of California. If you go to parts of Europe and Japan, you can now get a 100-year mortgage. They call them the Methuselah loans. You never pay them off. They're really equivalent to rent. You never touch the principal because it's so strung out that you'll never own any of it. And in Japan, it's the most popular instrument of debt going today. And you can go out on the internet and find all these arguments for why this kind of debt is appropriate. Here, though, we have the seven years. It's totally different. six years and then the seventh year is free. So we have to think, what is the heart of God regarding debt and lending? And we're not here to say that the 30 year mortgage is sin. That's not the point here. But let's at least think through what is in the heart of God regarding length of debt. Let's at least say he wants it way shorter than the Methuselah crowd. He wants it way shorter than whatever other crowd is beyond seven years. And so let's at least acknowledge that God has a different number than we do. And again, again, this certainly is not intended to be a condemnation upon anyone that has a 30 year mortgage or anything like that. But let's understand what the scripture says. There are specific words, there are reasons that he says this. And we shouldn't just throw it off and say, well, I like my way better. No, there is a limitation of debt here. And only what, well, we would call it short term debt is permitted here. The context here seems to indicate that there's a release that's permanent and that at the same time, this permanent release of debt is related to our consciousness of the needs of those who are suffering around us. Those who become insolvent. We don't press the face of the poor to the ground when they're insolvent. We let them off. That's the principle that is here. It gives a vision of mercy. It gives a vision of fresh hope and opportunity created by the people of God. We've seen how God's people have commands upon them to create visions of rest and beauty and delight with the Sabbath. Now we have one with the Sabbath year where there's a vision that God's people are helped to bring that hope and for a new day to other people as well. And so God is laying a very fascinating principle here upon us. It's a very realistic perspective. There are times of solvency and insolvency in people's lives. There are times when people completely run to the end. They have nothing left. This just acknowledges that. It acknowledges that what's required is the mercy of God applied in people's lives. And there's also not only this sort of big picture understanding of length of debt and also the mercy that's required in God's people, but there's also a principle here to guide God's people regarding debt and lending. We need to look at scripture very carefully to see what it says about these matters and to see what the contexts are and what is really being said and commanded. Now, here are a couple of things we need to understand. It is assumed in this passage that there will be debt and lending. There are people who say that all debt is sin. I just think this passage says not so. Debt is actually regulated here. There are ways of dealing with debt here. The people who say it's always a sin to be in debt have not read all of their Bibles. Because here, what we find is there's a regulation of lending. You know, first, if you borrow something, you're obligated to return it. If it's damaged, you must replace it. This is one of the regulatory laws of borrowing. In Exodus 22, 14, we learn that borrowers must make good in spite of their hardship. And if a man borrows anything from his neighbor, it becomes injured or dies, the owner of it not being with it, he shall surely make it good. There are other there. There are dozens of places where debt and lending are regulated. Another principle is this. Don't borrow if you cannot pay. Proverbs 22, 26 says, Do not be one of those who shakes his hands in a pledge. One of those who is surety for debts if you have nothing for with which to pay. Why should he take away your bed from under you? The principle there is don't borrow if you don't have a way to get it paid back somehow. Here's another principle. Don't repossess what you have lent. Deuteronomy 2410 says when you lend your brother anything, you shall not go to his house and get his pledge. Oh, boy, you know, I have some little experience with with the used car business and my friends who are in the used car business are often involved in going and getting their cars off of lots and driveways. And I haven't really thought through how all this applies in every situation. But there's a principle, though, is that you don't just go and grab it back. That's what Deuteronomy chapter 24, verse 10 says. For a good man lends. It's not sin for a man to lend, and it's not sin for a man to take. Psalm 112, verse 5 says, a good man deals graciously and lends. He will guide his affairs with discretion. The word can mean give or give and lend. Fifth, a merciful man lends. Psalm 37, verse 26. He is ever merciful and lends, and his descendants are blessed. Here you find the generous man who lends there in Psalm chapter 37. Some of the most terrifying words are for those who lend with interest. Charging interest is critical in understanding lending. In Leviticus 25, 25-37, we read, if one of your brethren becomes poor and falls into poverty among you, then you shall help him. Like a stranger or a sojourner that he may live with you, take no usury or interest from him, but fear your God that your brother may live with you. You shall not lend him your money for usury or for interest, nor lend him your food for a profit. The whole matter of interest is a matter of debate. And yet, you know, there were periods, particularly in early church history, that if you lent money at interest, the early church would not allow you a Christian burial because you lent for interest. You desired to get rich on your generosity. And if you go to Proverbs 28, 7, which says one who increases his possessions by interest and extortion gathers it from him who will pity the poor. Ezekiel 18, 7 and 8. Ezekiel 22 also has the same principle for charging interest by getting rich from your generosity. And it's unlawful to do that. Generosity should be free. We could consider the principle that borrowing may be dangerous or unwise because it can place one in servitude. Proverbs 22, 7 says, the rich rules over the poor and the borrower is servant to the lender. That's one reason why you probably shouldn't get in debt. Is it a sin? No, but it's a danger for sure. Lending is better than borrowing, saith the Lord. The Lord will open to you his good treasure and the heavens to give the rain to your land and season and bless all the work of your hand. You shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. So lending is better than borrowing by measure. Jesus himself spoke of borrowing in Matthew chapter 25. And speaking of the necessity of being good stewards, he says, you ought to have deposited my money with the bankers. And at my coming, I would have received back my own with interest. Even Jesus in this story of dealing well with the talents that God has given us, He says, you know, instead of hiding them, it would have been better to take your money to the bank. At least I would have gotten the interest on the money. Is it true though that God would like to have interest on the money? You figure that one out, perhaps. But the common question that people have regarding debt really comes out of the reading of Romans 13, 7 and 8. Render, therefore, to all their due, taxes to whom taxes are due, customs to whom customs, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor. Love your neighbor. owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law." So does that verse in Romans 13 mean that it's sin to borrow because the Bible says, owe no man anything. Therefore, it is sin to ever borrow. And my perspective on this is that this is just a summary statement that you pay what you owe. The issue is taxes. You pay the taxes that you are owed. That's the context. That's the heart of the message there. Romans 13 is not a study on borrowing and lending. It's a study on taxes and honoring the civil government. That's what it's about. And so I don't believe that this text is a patent restriction against all borrowing and lending. Rather, it gives a principle of freedom and responsibility toward the government. And it also establishes the critical issue on the table, and that is to love one another. If you owe, then owe them love among the people of God. Here in the text, the difference between the Jew and the Gentile is revealed. There are nuances here. You know, who is my neighbor? Who is my brother? Well, what you find is that the great excuse in the kingdom of heaven is that man's not my neighbor, that man's not my brother. Jesus said, Jesus actually took that one on and answered the question, who is my brother? Well, my brother is even my enemy. Leviticus chapter Chapter 25 makes it very clear, and Leviticus 19, that we're not just simply to take care of ourselves, but there are strangers that we are to take care of, people we don't even know we have to take care of. Leviticus 19, 34 says, The stranger who dwells among you shall be to you as one born among you, and you shall love him as yourself. For you were strangers in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. And so, this matter of giving really takes us to a very broad level of generosity. You know, there are a number of issues that we could take on in this whole subject of debt and lending. We could say this with certainty, that some borrowing can indicate a lack of trust in God for his provision. We want more than we've been given, and so we borrow ourselves to oblivion to get it. That's a principle that we can count on. Is it absolutely a sin to ever borrow? No, but it may show something of the heart that needs to be dealt with, or it could lead to the sin of not fulfilling your word because you've overextended and you cannot fulfill what you have committed to. And then you do become a slave to the lender. Scripture does argue for the foolishness of debt, but it is never made an outright sin, and it is regulated by particular principles. So borrowing money is permitted in scripture in a number of places. And so when we consider this, this text here before us that gives us sort of rules and regulations for it. First, there are dangers. Second, there are regulations. And third, we need to recognize that the harshest judgment in the whole matter of lending. Are those who charge interest or exorbitant interest or who break the back of the poor by their quote unquote generosity? That's where the judgment and the harshness of God comes. And if you read the prophets, you will see this enormous outpouring of wrath for those who grind the face of the poor. And it all brings us back to this principle of the gospel, that it is Christ who relieves all of our deaths. In the same way that God calls his people to relieve the deaths, he also has relieved our deaths as well. And so here we do have a picture of the gospel and the goodness of God. In verse four, There's a fascinating statement about the poor. He says, except when there be no poor among you, for the Lord will greatly bless you in the land, which the Lord your God is giving you. He's he's saying he's saying that this this command. Has to do with that, there may be no poor in the land, what do we make of that? Jesus said the poor will always be with you. How do we deal with that? And we had we had we had a great discussion about that on Tuesday morning. But there are a couple of things to point out here, and one is this. Perhaps it's true, when God's people are obedient across the board, that there may be no poor in the land. That's quite a possibility. The reality, though, is, as Jesus said it, the poor will always be with you. The poor will always be with you. We'll talk about that a little bit more when we get to this next section on the poor, when we pass through this section on lending and borrowing. But when God's people are obedient, as Matthew Henry said, the scandalously poor, the miserably poor would be preserved by the people of God in their cities. And so we know that this is true. Poverty is often an expression of unrighteousness. There are many ways that we could explain it. We could talk about wicked nations. The poor nations of the world, I believe, are poor because of unrighteousness in their governments. And they grind the face of the poor. And they do not care about their people. And so they create policies that destroy the poor. We see this in our own nation. We have many policies in our government that destroy the poor. They destroy the spirit and the energies of the poor. And there's a book that I read several years ago called Fatherless America by David Blankenhorn. Here's what Blankenhorn says. Who are the new poor in America? They're the single mothers who've been abandoned by men. Sin, sinful, covenant-breaking men are the greatest cause of the poor in America today. They abandon their women. They leave them unprotected. They leave them unprovided for. And they are poor. And they're poor because of sin. When God's people obey and when there's a revival in the land, men will provide and they'll care for those in their own house. They will care for women all their life long. God has made it so that in His world, there would always be a man to provide for a woman. all her life long, in an unbroken way, starting with her father, moving to her husband. And if he dies, the church of the Lord Jesus Christ will care for her. That's the way that God has it for women. But in America, the new poor are women who are abandoned by wicked men who care nothing but for the God of their belly. And so we find the principle here that if God's people were holy, then there would be no poor among you. But that's really not the case, as Jesus has so clearly said. And then in verses 5 and 6, we see blessings from careful obedience from this. He says, only if you carefully obey the voice of the Lord your God to observe with care. Do you see how Moses is always piling on careful obedience? Not, hey, follow my own heart. No, not at all. Be careful to obey. Be very detailed. Be very circumspect. Be precise about it. Be careful. Here in this one sentence, carefully obey. Observe with care all these commandments which I command you today. And then He makes a promise. If you do this, number one, I will bless you. just as promised. Number two, you will lend to many nations. Number three, you will not borrow. Number four, you will reign over many nations. And number five, they will not reign over you. Those are the promises that are given for those who take care of those who have debt. What would this do to the trade deficit if we obeyed these laws? And here, you know, this is clearly addressing the lender, not the lendee. Here, there's so much that we could deal with here. But I think what we need to understand is that in the heart of God is a principle of freedom and hope for the future. And God asks his people to give it to those to whom they have lent money. And then we then we move to the section of dealing with the poor. Like I said, in verses one through six, we find principles regarding debt and lending. And I hope we've answered that question. Is it a sin to borrow? No, it's not a sin. But I hope we've also answered the question, what are the dangers there? Because there are dangers. And then thirdly, what are the requirements of our own thinking about it if we are lenders and if we are borrowers? So he's covered some pretty broad territory here in this matter of lending and debt. Now, in verses 7 through 11, dealings with the poor among you. And what he does first is he addresses a problem if there is among you a poor man of your brethren within any of your gates in your land, which the Lord your God is giving you. So we now know that we've moved from debt and lending to poor to the to the issue of poverty. This early this morning, I sent everyone in the church a sermon by Jonathan Edwards on this on this text right here. And his sermon is a thousand times better than the one that you're hearing right now. And I so recommend it to you. Here's how he begins the sermon, commenting on verse 7. He says, "'Tis the most absolute and indispensable duty of a people of God to give bountifully and willingly for the supply of the wants of the needy. I trust that you'll read it and explain it in your households. The principles there are of enormous significance for us as a church, a church which has dealt very little with text regarding finances, the poor, debt, lending, tithing. We've dealt so lightly over the years with these that perhaps it is true for us that there's a little catch up for us to do. And of course, we know that there's a lot of catch up in really every area of life for us. But here we find before us a very important area. So I commend this sermon to you to read it and then to understand it. And the first thing that we see here is that the poor are being dealt with here in this passage. The Bible, the Bible has a lot to say about loving your brother. The Bible does have a lot to say about the poor. Partiality against the poor is denounced in Exodus twenty three three. You shall not show partiality to a poor man in his dispute. It's easy to find. perverted justice toward the poor. In Exodus 23, verse six, you shall not pervert the judgment of your poor. There is kind of an orderly calendar for the help of the poor. In Exodus six years, you shall sow your land and gather in its produce. But the seventh year shall you shall let it lie fallow that the poor of your people may eat. And what they leave, the beasts of the field may eat. In like manner you shall do in your vineyard, in your olive grove. So there's an orderly way of dealing with your possessions that should be considered that have to do with the poor. There's sort of a rhythmic calendar orientation that is in the mind of God as He counsels His people for having something left for the poor. And the laws of gleaning really provide for that. Leviticus 19.9 also speaks of gleanings. Impartiality for the poor is commanded. The ownership of God is affirmed regarding the poor in Leviticus 25. And if one of your brethren who dwells with you becomes poor and sells himself to you. You shall not compel him to serve as a slave as a hired servant and a sojourner. He shall be with you and shall serve you until the year of Jubilee. And then he shall depart from you and he and his children with him and shall return to his own family, and he shall return to the possession of his fathers, for they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt, and they shall not be sold as slaves." So, there are times of excessive poverty when one is willing to make himself a slave, but there's a way that you deal with him that's different than the way of the Gentiles. We know that kindness to the needy is commanded in Deuteronomy 24, 12. And if the man is poor, You shall not keep his pledge overnight. There's a way that you deal with a man when he is poor that's different than you might deal with one who is rich. Someone who is rich, you might keep it overnight. But with the poor, no. No, you don't squeeze him or pinch him in any way like that. Oppression is denounced. You shall not oppress a hired servant in Deuteronomy 24, 14 and 15. whether he's one of your brethren or an alien, you shall give him his wages and not let the sun go down on him. For he is poor and he has set his heart on it, lest he cry out against you to the Lord and it be sin to you." In other words, if someone is poor, you don't wait until the next day. You pay him before the sun goes down. You expedite the receivables to him. You make it happen. You roll it out quick if he's struggling. So it's different. Everybody else is on net 30, which means 90, but not with the poor. You put them on the fast track and you roll it out before sundown. You treat the poor differently. Celebrations that include the poor are ordered by the people of God. And Esther 9, 20, and more to Ki, establishes these things that you should celebrate yearly, the 14th and 15th days of the month. And it's a day of celebration and you bring gifts to the poor. Obviously, this is not something that's required, but the principle should be acknowledged that there are times of celebration in which the poor are favored and dealt with in a beautiful way. Mercy for the poor is required. Proverbs 14, 21. He who despises his neighbor sins, but he who has mercy on the poor, happy is he. Is any of our unhappiness related to our tight fist toward the poor? Perhaps that's a possibility. Proverbs 14.31 says, He who oppresses the poor reproaches his maker, but he who honors him has mercy on the needy. Proverbs 19.17 calls us to have pity on the poor. He who has pity on the poor lends to the Lord. How's that? That's treasure in heaven. You think God needs the money? Well, he's storing up these gifts in heaven. His treasures are mounting up there from his people who give, which is why Whitefield said, I desire to take the money from the rich so that my treasures would be in heaven. My orphans that I take care of here, I pray, will give me great riches in heaven. Because he who gives to the poor lends to the Lord. There's the generous eye of Proverbs 22.9. The generous eye in contrast to the evil eye in Deuteronomy chapter 15. This theme runs through Scripture. He who has a generous eye will be blessed, for he gives of his bread to the poor. Then there's the whole subject of generosity of giving. Proverbs 28, 27, he who gives to the poor will not lack. But he who hides his eyes will have many curses. It's so easy to have many, many reasons, many justifications for not giving to the poor. But here, he says, if you give to the poor, you won't lack. If you hide your eyes, there'll be curses. And so as you mount up the reasons why you can't give, just realize that there's a whole other aspect of this to consider. There's the matter of pleading the cause of the poor, opening your mouth. There's extending your hands to the poor in Proverbs 31, 19. This is the Proverbs 31 woman. The woman who's teaching a son. This woman who's teaching her son by her example. She extends her hands to what? To the poor. That's right. That's what the godly woman does. You're raising daughters here now. Let these daughters see by your own generosity, mothers. Are you generous mothers? Are you mothers like this Proverbs 31 woman? Or are you pinched and tight-wadded to a fault and you have no generosity except for maybe your own household? Well, that's a good place to start, but that's not where generosity ends. Mothers especially have to be cognizant of their own selfishness. If they would keep everything for themselves, and not demonstrate generosity so that their daughters would not grow up knowing what it even looks like to give until it hurts and to find the happiness that comes from generosity and letting your resources be spread abroad to whomever might have need. There is fasting for the poor in Isaiah chapter 58. There are destructive civil laws regarding the poor in Ecclesiastes 5.8. If you see the oppression of the poor and the violent perversion of justice and righteousness in the province, do not marvel at this matter. For high official watches over high official and higher officials are over them. It's my perspective that many of the laws regarding the poor in our land are oppressing and destroying the people of our land. And they are harming the hearts and the productivity because the disciplines are not there. And we now are experiencing a complete loss of all disciplines regarding biblical understanding of finance in the very highest offices of the land. And we will be cursed for it as a result. allowing the poor to languish in Ezekiel 16, verse 49. This was one of the great sins of Sodom. When you think of Sodom and Gomorrah, you think of sexual sin. That was not all of the story there. One of the great reasons for the judgment and the incineration of Sodom and Gomorrah was their handling of the poor. They did not care about the poor in Sodom. And so they did not care about any other area of morality either. But they were judged as a result of it. They had abundance of food and abundance of idleness. Neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy. There's taxation of the poor in Amos chapter 5, verse 11. Amos says, let justice roll down. Part of that is taxation to destroy the poor. And then there is selling what you have for the poor in Matthew 19, in the ministry of the Lord Jesus. And then there is preaching the gospel to the poor in Luke chapter 4, verses 18 and 19, where the Lord Jesus stands up in the temple and he says, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. Because He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted. To proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind. To set at liberty those who are oppressed. To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. This is the Lord Jesus is saying that we have to preach the gospel to the poor. It's not enough just to give. money to the poor, but he came to preach the gospel to the poor, which is the heart of the matter. Which is why Madame Guillotine came up in France, but Madame Liberty came up in America. Because the gospel was preached here. Because George Whitefield preached the gospel to every corner of this land. Over 80% of the people in the colonies heard Whitefield in his own voice. Imagine what it took for that to happen, to travel by horseback and on foot to every corner of this land. So that in the 1750s, 80% of the people in this country heard George Whitefield with their own ears. And what happened? He really level set the consciousness and the thinking of the American people to love the Gospel, to love the Word of God, to apply the commandments of God. And that's what happened in our land. The fruit, the bounty that we have today, I believe, is because of a Gospel revival that took place in the 1740s and the establishment of the authority of the Word of God in our land. that led to the American Revolution, which was based on all these principles of the Gospel, which is why all of our founding documents appeal to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That's why you couldn't get elected in this nation for years without being a confessing Christian, a confessor of Jesus Christ as Lord. It's the Gospel that sets the captives free. And that's what Jesus said when He says, the Spirit of the Lord is upon Me to preach the Gospel to the poor. We can remember James and Peter and John who desired to remember the poor. Galatians 2.9 We could remember James urging us to if our brother or sister is naked or destitute of daily food, that we cannot ignore them and say depart in peace. We can speak. We can speak of really the heart of the matter that's addressed in Revelation Chapter three, spiritual poverty. You say that you're rich and wealthy and have need of nothing. Do you not know that you are wretched and poor, blind and naked? And so, all of these commands regarding to the poor, all of these principles regarding to the poor always lead to the Gospel. They always lead to a generous God who has given His Son to pour out His blood for all of mankind so that all of our deaths would be set free. We could read of Cornelius giving alms. We could speak of the contributions being brought up for the poor in Romans chapter 15. We could talk about inviting the poor to feast and celebrate as Jesus spoke of in Luke chapter 14. But then, as He mentions this subject of the poor among you, then He speaks of the danger upon them. It's the danger of a tight fist and a hard heart. So, not only is this is this opportunity before us. Opportunity for the glory of God and opportunity for sin. But there's a great danger. And He defines it with very graphic language. He first talks about a heart. Think about your heart for a minute. And think about it beating and pulsating and sending blood throughout your body. But now think of it like stone. Think of that. What an amazing image that He gives. Your heart can be like stone And it can carry nothing. And then He moves from the heart to your hand. And then He gives us a picture of a clenched fist. A hand that will not open for the poor. So these two amazing images that are designed to strike us to the heart, to convict us of our sins, to show us the hardness of our heart and the clenchedness of our hands and to help us to see what sinners we are in the midst of all these commands. He begins with the heart, of course, of course, he would begin with the heart. Because the heart is the beginning of it all. And the problem with the heart is, as Jeremiah said, the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? That's what Jeremiah says in chapter 17, verse 9. And so God is warning us here about what can happen in two places, the heart and the hand. And he's warning us about objections of our hearts for generosity to the poor. And that all the objections in the world, they ossify, all the objections in the world calcify the heart and they make it unable to move any blood. And it's a warning that lack of love begins in our hearts. And who is my neighbor? Are the hearts always asking that question? And then the second warning about the hand. Nor shut your hand. You know, Jesus in Luke 6, 30, He said, Give to everyone who asks of you. And do not request your belongings back from him who took them. Treat others exactly as you would like to have them treat you. So there's a danger. There's the danger of the hard heart that goes like stone as a result of a dozen qualifications for why one's heart could not give. And then, in verse 8, there's an opportunity presented. So there's a danger. The heart and the fist. And then there's an opportunity to do good. He says, but you shall open your hand wide. And here we have another image. Children, can you open your hand wide, like really wide? I mean, the hand can be as wide as you can get it or it can be as tight as you can make it. And that's the idea. And he's saying, let it go wide. How far can you spread your fingers and your hands? Open it up wide and give willingly. Give willingly. So, that comes to the will. So, it starts with the hand, open wide. Then the will, not begrudgingly, but willingly. So, it has to do with an attitude. And then sufficiently. In other words, enough. So you see how he just continues to explain it with one phrase after another to help us to get it. We're so dull. So he's talking about sufficiently for his need, not what you think he needs, but for his need. That's what the Bible says. We often get caught up in our own our own evaluation. We measure ourselves by ourselves. And that's not that's not the measure here. It's whatever he needs. It may not be everything that he wants, but it's what he needs and sufficient for it. And then lending without hope of repayment. And then you find another warning against something that happens in the heart. A greedy plan. Beware, verse 9, lest there be a wicked thought in your heart saying the seventh year, the year of release is at hand and your eye be evil against your poor brother and you give him nothing. and he cry out to the Lord against you to become sin to you. So here is described a normal pattern of the human heart to be strategic about it. Hey, we have to think about this in terms of our own strategic problems here. And so he's warning against the lender having an evil eye to say there's a reason that I shouldn't give. You know, I'm thinking, you know, who knows what disaster may strike, you know, later on. I'm not going to give because I'm saving up for the disaster. And there's a there's a lack of understanding of the providence of God that economies do come and they do go. And we shouldn't make that be what pinches our giving and hoard it all up for ourselves so that there'll be nothing left to give, because there's this there's this tendency in our hearts to go calendar on the matter and to consider how we're working our own way through the world. That's a greedy. That's a greedy plan to trust yourself to make your own way instead of trusting in God. And and then there he turns to this other thing that we do, and that is that we multiply objections in verse 10. You shall surely give to him and your heart should not be grieved. giving and then regretting it. You know, buyers, sellers, lenders remorse. You know, you do it and then you think, oh, I made such a mistake. Don't regret it. Let it go, man. Let it go. God will take care of you. That's the idea. It's so easy to come and let your heart be grieved. Well, I shouldn't have given away so much. You know, when you have times of downturn, What godly men do is they say, I'm so glad I gave it away before the downturn because it would have been lost into oblivion if I had not given it away. And what a blessing it is to give it while you have it so that when it disappears, the giving has been already done. And that's the principle that he's speaking of here. And then in the second part of verse 10, A reminder of the blessing upon those who give. Because for this thing the Lord your God will bless you in all your works, in all to which you put your hand. Here's a promise of blessing. If you help the poor, God will help you. in all to which you put your hand." This phrase, to which you put your hand, you'll find this in Deuteronomy. We're memorizing a section where this phrase comes about. God has given us all something to put our hand toward. And what He says here is, God will bless you in all your works and in all to which you put your hand. That's a reminder of the blessing of God. And not to be fearful in giving. And then, in verse 11, the reminder of the prevailing opportunity. The poor will always be with you. You will always have an opportunity. There won't ever be a time in your life where you'll say, there's no poor. There's always poor somewhere. And that's what he's saying. And we wrongfully excuse ourselves when we say, I don't see any poor. Has that ever happened? Has that ever happened to us? I know some very close to me, very, very close to me. Maybe even me myself who have said that. And then there's a final command in verse 11. Therefore, I command you. Therefore, I command you, saying, you shall open your hand wide to your brother into your poor and needy in your land. So he begins with an acknowledgment of economic problems and shifts and cataclysms that bring people into debt. But God's desire that his people would bring hope and relief. Then he moves to the poor and gives a number of warnings and qualifications about how we should think about it. And then he ends with a final command. And then what we'll find is next he begins another subject, slavery, which we'll deal with next week. Jonathan Sides will come and give this message on this subject. And so here we find in Deuteronomy a picture of people who are in trouble. And everyone is in trouble. The lender is in trouble because of his hard heart and his clenched fist. And the receiver is also in trouble because he is completely run out of resources. And he has his own sins to deal with in the midst of receiving as well. And so this this text places all of us in grave danger before God. If you've broken one commandment, you've broken them all. And the judgment of God, the wrath of God is against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men who reject the truth and unrighteousness. And so we all deserve we deserve all the wrath of heaven for our breaking any of any of these laws that come from the heart of God. And yet we have to understand that all of these things point They point to the cross of Christ. They point to an outpouring of blood. Did the blood stop flowing in the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ? Did His heart go calcify on Him in our behalf? No. His heart beat and He poured out all of His blood for all of our sins, that all of our debts would be relieved forever. And we would not have them be pulled back on a little string of regret or Indian giving, if you would call it that. Robert Murray McShane preaches on this subject and he considers the question, if Christ saved his blood like we save our money, what would it be like? He says, Dear Christian, what would become of us if Christ had been saving His blood as some have been saving their money? He says, Dear Christians, if you would be like Christ, give much, give often, give freely, To the vile and the poor, the thankless and undeserving, Christ is glorious and happy and so will you be. It is not your money I want, but your happiness. Remember his own word. It is more blessed to give than to receive. Would you pray with me? Lord, we're so thankful for the. For the relief from bondage of our own. sinful thinking, the hard heart, the tight fist. But not You, Lord. Not You do we learn that from. From You we learn of the generosity that is there in heaven for sinners. How thankful we are. Amen.