Every Lord's Day, many Christians give to their church, maybe with a check, maybe with cash. Question is, what are the origins of church giving, and for what or whom is the offering meant? John MacArthur considers that on today's Grace to You. Welcome to a Friday edition of Grace To You. This week, John MacArthur has been explaining that the money in your bank account, well, it doesn't actually belong to you. It is a stewardship from the Lord. Of course, part of that stewardship concerns what you give to others. So the question today is this, how generous should you be? What people or organizations should get your money? And when would it be unwise to give away your money? Today on Grace To You, John MacArthur asks practical answers as he continues the study called, Whose Money Is It Anyway? And now for help with some money questions that you no doubt have wrestled with, here's John with today's lesson. When you think about coming to church, what aspect do you look forward to most? Now that might be somewhat of an indicator of where you're at spiritually, but I'm not really driving at that. Let's assume that it's something noble, not like being seen in your new dress, or seeing somebody you really wanted to see because you want to sell them a policy and life insurance, or you wanted to drive your new car and you had an opportunity, or you were looking right through church to taking the family to a new place for dinner. Not that kind of thing, but assuming the best. Assuming it had something to do with the ministry here in the worship center, or something to do with the class, or something to do with some kind of spiritual reality, what is it that you look forward to most? If you really understand Scripture, and you really understand what God has promised, the thing you should most look forward to is the offering. Any of you think of that? Well that's really what you ought to look forward to most because according to Scripture, it is a direct pipeline to blessing. In fact, every Christian should be eager, anxious, thrilled about the opportunity to give at the offering. if based only on two statements that Jesus made. If there was nothing else in the Bible but those two statements, they ought to cause us to line up for the offering. They ought to cause us to be generous and abundant and sacrificial. Let me give you just those two statements. Statement number one is recorded in Luke 6, 38. Jesus said this, give and it shall be given to you. good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, they will pour into your lap. For by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you." There's a second verse that we would add to it and that is Acts 20.35. It says, it is more blessed to give than to receive. In other words, what you give away brings you a greater blessing than what you receive. That should be enough. That should be enough to make us line up to give. Do you want to be most blessed? Then give. Do you want to receive pressed down, shaken together and running over so that your lap is filled? Then give. Those two monumental promises of blessing and generosity from God who is the source of everything, who is the giver of every good and perfect gift, who has the power to get you wealth, who gives you all that you have, those promises from God should make us sacrificially generous. Now apparently, and we have to say this sadly but truly, apparently many Christians don't believe those promises. They carry around the idea that they have to protect everything, they haven't a hang on to it. They become hoarders and they become stingy and they become self-indulgent and protective. And it's really a matter of faith. They don't believe the promise of the Word of God or they would give. It's a question of faith. It's a question of trust. It's a question of belief. You either believe it or you don't. If you do, you give because giving is more blessed and giving causes God to give back in greater abundance. We're going to see marvelous teaching about this matter of giving. In fact, this is going to be a model for Christian giving, a theology of Christian giving. We're going to meet some believers who both believed God and obeyed God. Now let me remind you of what we've already done. Before we talk about giving, we wanted to teach a little bit about what the Bible says about money. So we laid a foundation. We talked about the morality of money, the love of money, the right to money, the acquiring of money and the use of money. And we saw what the Bible taught about all of that. And this morning we come to the series on the giving of money...the giving of money. And everything we've learned up to this point is foundation we will build on and we'll build a theology of Christian giving. a theology of Christian giving. Let me read you the first three verses of chapter 8 and then we'll talk about some introductory aspects. Now, brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God which has been given in the churches of Macedonia. that in a great ordeal of affliction, their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality. For I testify that according to their ability and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord, or their own will." That introduces us to two chapters about giving, Christian giving. Now at the outset, let me make some things clear, and we're going to deal with some introductory things that I find absolutely fascinating in setting up an understanding of this text. At the very outset, we must remind you that believers early on gave to the church. They gave to the support of the church, basically in two ways generally. First of all, they gave that the leaders might be supported. They gave in order that the leaders might be supported, that is, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, those who are responsible for leading, serving, working in the church. And they no doubt supported those who worked alongside them. We find that, for example, in 1 Corinthians chapter 9. Paul already having addressed this aspect of giving to the Corinthians themselves and to all of us, listen to what he says in 1 Corinthians 9 and verse 6. He's talking about His own ministry, His own apostleship, His own work, His own labor and the labor of those who were with Him, Barnabas and others who traveled and served with Him, who were a part of His ministry team. And in verse 6 He says, do only Barnabas and I not have a right to refrain from working? Look, are we the only people who should be supported? Who at any time serves as a soldier at his own expense? Nobody. A soldier serves his government, his government supports him. Who plants a vineyard and doesn't eat the fruit of it? Who tends a flock and doesn't use the milk of the flock? In other words, he's saying there are certain things that we do that have a living built into them. And verse 8, I am not speaking these things according to human judgment, am I? Doesn't the law also say these things? For it is written in the law of Moses, you shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing. God is not concerned about oxen, is He? In other words, God is speaking in an analogy, but He's talking about something other than an ox. Or is he speaking, verse 10, altogether, for our sake? Yes, for our sake it was written, because the plowman ought to plow in hope and the thresher to thresh in hope of sharing the crops. In other words, the ox who plows should be fed for his plowing. The plowman should enjoy the crop, the thresher the same. There are built into certain functions and certain jobs the reward. And in verse 11 he brings it to its point, if we sowed spiritual things in you, is it too much if we should reap material things from you? In other words, you ought to support the preacher, you ought to support the Apostles and those who travel with him, and those who minister, and those who teach, and those who lead you. And down in verse 14 he says it more directly. So also the Lord directed those who proclaimed the gospel to get their living from the gospel. It certainly was true in the Old Testament economy, the priests received their living from the tithe that the people gave. And so he is saying, we support through the church the leaders and teachers that God gives to us. Galatians 6.6 says the same thing. Let the one who is taught the Word share all good things with him who teaches. Make sure that all the needs of the teacher are met by those who are the taught. And then in 1 Timothy 5, 17, again the same principle, let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double time, double pay, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching. Why? You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing and the laborer is worthy of his wages. So the church had the responsibility, as Israel of old did, to support its spiritual leadership. So when the people came on the Lord's Day, they gave for the ongoing support of their elders and pastors and spiritual leaders. But secondly, they gave for the general population of the church as well, to meet the needs of the people...to meet the needs of the people. Support of the needy was a very, very important aspect in the life of the early church because the early church was filled with poor people, with needy people, with widows, with orphans, with folks who didn't have a lot of resources and they needed to have their needs met. In fact, in 1 Timothy chapter 6, just beyond where we were reading a moment ago, Paul instructs the rich in verse 18, to be generous and ready to share and thus store up treasure in heaven. There was a great need for sharing. There were many people in the church who had needs, many poor people. Now I give you those two aspects of giving, one for the support of the ministry and leadership of the church, secondly for the support of the people in the church who had need. That was basically why they gave in the early church, those two aspects. And it is still so. We give for the leadership and the support of the staff and those who minister and lead and serve among us, including our missionaries around the world. We give also to include the facilities we have. Of course, the early church didn't have that. They met outdoors. They met in various homes. They met in the temple ground in public places. We give for the support of the life of the church and we give to care for those who have needs. That, too, an important part of the church. And in some parts of the world today, it's as important as it was in the early church, though in America we have most of our needs met because we live in such a flourishing society. But the principles for giving, then, have to do with those areas of giving. Give for the support of the church and the meeting of the needs of God's people in the church. Now as we come to the text of 2 Corinthians 8. And we're going to look at it now. The issue here is meeting the needs of poor saints. The issue here is not supporting the leadership, the issue here is meeting the needs of the poor saints. And, in fact, it has to do not with the Corinthians meeting the needs of poor saints in their own church, apparently they were already doing that, but the Corinthians meeting the needs of poor saints in other churches. In fact, in one particular church and that is the church at Jerusalem. In chapters 8 and 9, Paul is endeavoring to get the Corinthians to make significant generous gifts toward the poor saints in the Jerusalem church. That's the issue here. But what comes out of this is a general pattern for all Christian giving. It wouldn't matter what the issue was, or what the request was, or to what church the money was directed, or for what purpose, you see here the heart of giving, the heart and soul of Christian giving, a theology of Christian giving. But here, the specific issue is the church in Jerusalem and its poor saints. Now let me tell you a little bit about the church in Jerusalem. It had many, many poor Christians, many in great need. From its beginning, you remember, on the day of Pentecost, the church had to face the problem of extreme poverty among its people. It was as poor as poor could possibly get. It was not an upper-class church. It was an impoverished congregation of people. And I'll tell you why. There were three causes. They're very important as a background so you understand this. Cause number one was that the church was populated by pilgrims. That is, people who had made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the celebration of Pentecost. Pentecost was a Jewish feast. It followed 40 days after Passover. And you know, from knowing a little bit of Jewish background, that the Jews liked to migrate or to pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the great religious festivals. They came not only from around the land of Israel itself, but many of them came from all over the place where Jews had been scattered in what was known as the diaspora, or the dispersion. There were Jews scattered all over the Gentile world. They were called Hellenistic, LNA meaning nations or Gentiles. They were called Hellenistic Jews. They were Jews scattered in Gentile parts of the world. Whenever there was a big festival in Jerusalem, they migrated or they pilgrimaged to Jerusalem for that very event. we are introduced to these Hellenistic Jews right away on the Day of Pentecost in Acts chapter 2. The Holy Spirit comes, you remember, and the 120 in the upper room began to speak. They spoke in languages, they spoke the wonderful works of God, and it immediately says that everybody heard them in their own language, Parthians, verse 9, Medes, Elamites, residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, the districts of Libya, around Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs, heard them in their own languages." Now that just gives you an idea of where the pilgrims came from, all over the world they traversed into Jerusalem for this great event. And there they were, all these pilgrims gathering for this tremendous Pentecost feast. What happened? Three thousand people were converted on the day of Pentecost. Listen, many of them were these pilgrims. Over in chapter 4 and verse 4, five thousand men are converted, probably additional women converted. Now the church is in the thousands and many of them are these pilgrims. Now think of it this, very simple to understand. There was only one church in the whole world, and that was the church at Jerusalem, and it was only a matter of a few weeks old. There was no other place to go in the world to go to church. There weren't any other Christians in the world. There weren't any other apostles in the world. They had just been born into the church. The church itself had been born. They had just received the powerful expressions of the Holy Spirit. Miracles were a constant daily experience at the hands of the apostles. There was a joy and a euphoria and a bliss and an excitement and an enthusiasm that caused them not to want to go home. There was nothing to go home to. No church, no miracles, no apostles, no teachers, no nothing. Miracles as a daily occurrence, joy and exuberance, meeting every day from house to house and in the temple rejoicing and praising God and eating and celebrating communion and rejoicing in the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the birth of the church, the only church, the only Christians, the only fellowship, the only apostles. They didn't go back. Well, when they had come as pilgrims, they stayed in inns, but they couldn't afford to stay there permanently, and so they would have to vacate the inns they stayed in, or they stayed with Jewish relatives, people from their family heritage. But they couldn't stay there any longer because now they had become Christians. And that made it very, very difficult because now they would be alienated from their families. And though they were outsiders staying there and should have been treated with hospitality. Once they became Christians, they would no longer be received into those Jewish homes, and so they would be dispossessed. And where would they go? Well, they would have to go live with believers. And so they would have to move in with the Jewish believers who lived in the city of Jerusalem and its surrounding villages. Well, that little band of Jewish believers trying to absorb all of these thousands and thousands of converted pilgrims made a valiant effort to do this, but it was no easy task. It got very complex. As chapter 6 of Acts tells us, there were many Hellenistic widows. That means that there were many pilgrim widows who had come in, converted to Christ and stayed. And I'll tell you, you can be sure that the people who stayed tended to be the poor people, the widows, the orphans, and the people who had nothing to go home to. The people who would go back would be people who had an estate, who had a business, who had a very important job in government somewhere, who had great responsibility, who operated their own environment. Those people would go back to what was pressing for them. And so those would stay, most of those who would stay would be the poor who had nothing to return to. And so they're all really there on the hands of the Jerusalem church, the poor, the widowed pilgrims who stayed and had nothing to return to. James chapter 2 and verse 5 says, listen, my beloved brother, and here's another problem, did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom? When God went about to choose His own, He chose mostly the poor. First Corinthians 1, 26 to 28 said, not many noble, not many wise. He chose the base and the ignoble. And so the church was populated by poor people. He came to reach the poor, to preach the gospel to the poor. He said that Himself. Jesus did. So that's the first reason that the church in Jerusalem was extremely impoverished. The people were poor and now they had to take on the full support of all these pilgrims in their midst and it made it very, very difficult. In fact, they had so much difficulty just finding these Hellenistic widows that in Acts 6 they had to pick out seven men and put them over the responsibility so none of these new widows who had recently come in and were pilgrims got missed in the allocation of daily food. That church had to buy the food and prepare the food and distribute the food to all these widows. There's a second component that made them poor. The church was made up of pilgrims and secondly persecuted Jews. Jerusalem is the holy city. There's no question about it. And it is the most sacred place on the earth to devout Jews. It is there that they are more concerned about their religion than anywhere else. It is there that their exclusivism reaches its pinnacle, their legalism, and their animosity toward anyone who rejects Judaism. You can see it even to this very day. And if anything, it was even more fierce in this time. And the people who were converted from among the inhabitants of Jerusalem would be immediately rejected. even as they are today. When someone in an Orthodox Jewish family in Jerusalem comes to faith in Jesus Christ, they are immediately rejected. They are alienated. They would become the victims of hostile hatred, social alienation, excommunication from the synagogue, complete rejection. They would lose their businesses. They would lose their jobs. They would lose their source of income. Everything would disappear. They would be disowned by their family. And so what you had there was a whole lot of pilgrims with nothing and a whole lot of dispossessed Jews who had nothing either. Now let me throw in a third component, the Roman economy, the Roman economy. The economy of Jerusalem and the area around Jerusalem, the area of Palestine was as poor as any part of the Roman Empire. And don't for a minute think that the Roman Empire was wealthy. Rome was fine, but the empire was poor, very poor, and it was made even poorer by the Romans. who managed to extract everything out of all of the territories they occupied for their own aggrandizement. The economy of Jerusalem and the surrounding area was as poor as any in the Roman Empire. Now all of those things lead us to understand that a major problem in the Jerusalem church was a large population of poor Christians who just could not survive on their own. This is a concern to God. This is a concern to God. And I believe the Lord in part has chosen so many poor in order that He might teach us love at its most tangible level, and that is sacrificial giving and sharing. That's John MacArthur, president of the Masters College and Seminary, ending today's Grace To You lesson with a profound promise from Scripture, God takes care of those who give generously. Motivating truth from John's current series called, Whose Money Is It Anyway? John, so far in this series you've explained how generosity can be a cure for selfishness. It can certainly be an act of worship when you recognize that your money belongs to God, but there's something else that generosity can help believers overcome that might be counterintuitive to a lot of folks. Yeah, Carl, being generous with money can go a long way to eliminating money worries. That's right. People worry about money when they're trying to hold on to it. People who are eager to give it away don't worry about it. That frees them from fear. That frees them from anxiety. I remember many years ago, a man gave me some stock. I think I was 29 years old, just a kid, starting out in ministry. Some man said, I want you to have this stock. He gave me a pile of stock. I don't know much about it. And I thought, wow, this is great. Maybe this will grow and make a lot of money. And I watched it, and I watched it, and I watched it. And I just finally said, this is ridiculous. All I'm doing is looking constantly every day at what this stock is doing and worrying about it. So I made a decision. I gave it all away. I just gave it away. And guess what? I didn't worry anymore. I never looked at the paper again. I never had a thought about it. I gave it away. So there's a simple illustration about one occasion in my life when giving something away eliminated worry. There are lots of ways to get the worry out of your life and they're laid out in Scripture. I've pulled them all together in a book called Anxious for Nothing. Anxious for Nothing. That's right. That's a biblical phrase and it's a command, be anxious for nothing. This book has had wonderful ministry through the decades. We've sent it out a lot in Grace to You mailings. We'd love to get one in your hand. Here's the good news, free to anyone who has never contacted us before. Free, that's right. Contact us today. Call, email, write. Ask for the free book, Anxious for Nothing. No matter what tempts you to worry, finances, health, relationships, or something else, this book can help you take hold of the solution that only Christ provides. To get your copy of Anxious for Nothing, again, it's yours free if you're contacting us for the first time, please call or write us today. The toll-free number here is 1-800-55-GRACE. The mailing address is Grace to You, Post Office Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412. You can also send a request by email, addressing letters at gty.org. Again, Anxious for Nothing is yours free if you're calling or writing us for the first time. That number again is 1-800-55-GRACE. The mailing address, Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412. And the email address, letters at gty.org. Now, if you have been in touch before, you can still purchase a copy of Anxious for Nothing for $10.50. Shipping is free. Order the book, or perhaps John's all-time classic, The Gospel According to Jesus, or one of his recent books on worship, as you call 1-800-55-GRACE, or go to that website, gty.org. While online, remember that you can download any of John's sermons, including today's and anything that you hear on the radio. It's free of charge in MP3 or transcript format, 3,000 messages total, currently available at gty.org. And now for John MacArthur, our producer, Steve Ostini, and the entire staff, thanks for being here today. Hope you have a great weekend. Remember that you can see Grace to You television Sundays on DirecTV, channel 378, or watch it online at gty.org. And then do tune in Monday as John continues unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, here on Grace to You. Why should taking an offering be a part of a church service each Lord's Day? What's the basis for it? A question that John MacArthur will answer on Monday's Grace to You.