1917, he that hath pity upon the poor
lendeth unto the Lord, and that which he hath given will he pay
him again. Now keep that simple statement in
mind. He that hath pity upon the poor
lendeth unto the Lord, and that which he hath given will he pay
him again. Most people will never know how
this world works. It's sad, it's a shame, it's
tragic that most people will live their lives in this world
and not have any idea how it works. They see it as a rat race,
as a dog eat dog climb to the top, a mad dash to the finish
line, Every day they try to get ahead, you know, if I can just,
you know, if I can just get a little bit more, if I can get a little
bit more, I'll be okay. It's like one of those scenes
where, you know, money is blown up into the air, all these bills, dollar bills or tens or whatever
they are. And as they're coming down, everybody's
trying to grab them, you know, In real life, the truth of the
matter is, in real life, they trample one another, they elbow
each other, they would kill one another to grab what they need. People cheat and steal and everything
they can to get more, more, more. But the world doesn't work that
way. It doesn't work like that. Do
you remember Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel chapter four when he was
bragging about all that he had accomplished, all the great buildings
that he had built in the kingdom, that he had established, all
that he had achieved in life? And let me read you one verse
from that that shows what was wrong with that. He was successful
and he said, look what I've done. In Daniel 4.32, here's what was
told to Nebuchadnezzar. They shall drive thee from men,
and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field. They
shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall
pass over thee. In other words, the perfect amount
of time will go by, and then you'll know something. Until
thou know this. Until you know how this world
works, because of who it belongs to. Until you know that the Most
High ruleth in the kingdom of men and giveth it to whomsoever
he will. That's how it works. You don't
get what you can grab. You don't get what you can fight
for. You don't get ahead by cheating and stealing and whatever. It belongs to God and he gives
it to whoever he wants to give it to. That doesn't mean don't
go to work, but I'll tell you what it does mean. It means listen
to God, hear God, obey God, bow to God because he owns it all
and he'll give it to who he pleases. Most people will never understand
that. They'll never understand that.
Turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter 8, please. Deuteronomy 8, 11. We need to establish this principle
before we specifically address our verse this morning. Deuteronomy
8, 11. Beware now, this is a warning,
beware, and we're warned against real danger. God doesn't warn
in vain. There's a real danger of this
happening. Beware that thou forget not the Lord thy God, and his
judgments, his statutes, the way he says things are, what
he says do, which I command thee this day, lest when thou hast
eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt
therein, and when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy
silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied,
then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the Lord thy
God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt from
the house of bondage, the one who saved you, in other words.
You see the spiritual reality of this? We live in this world,
what's the purpose of living in this world? To get ahead,
to make as much as we can, to be successful, to get promoted,
to advance ourselves in this life. That's all fine and well, there's
nothing wrong with that. But there's a real danger of
forgetting God, who is the one who doles all of it out. He's
the one that gives it to you. Listen now, that heart will be
lifted up and you'll forget the Lord thy God that saved you.
He saved you. He's talking to his people here,
isn't he? Don't forget the one that saved you. None of it means
anything if he hadn't saved you. None of it means anything. It's
worthless. who led thee through that great
and terrible wilderness, verse 15, wherein were fiery serpents
and scorpions and drought where there was no water. The Lord told Moses to build
that brazen serpent, or they'd all died from the fiery serpents. The Lord told Moses to smite
the rock one time, or they'd all starve to death. God saved
him and saved him and saved him and saved him. And he said, if
you're not careful, you'll forget that I even exist. And you'll
start bragging on yourselves. Is that a danger for us? Who fed thee in the wilderness
with manna, who brought thee forth water out of the rock of
Flint. Flint doesn't have water in it
unless God says so. Verse 16, who fed thee in the
wilderness with manna which thy fathers knew not that he might
humble thee and that he might prove thee to do thee good at
thy latter end. He fed you with manna from heaven
to humble you. Think about that. Do you realize,
if you realize every day that everything you have, and we take
for granted just the air conditioning in here, the heat when we need
it, We take everything for granted, every little benefit that we
have in this life. How many of them are there? The
car that you drove here in, the rain, your home, your family, those
that you love. If you realize that God gave
you all of it, it'll humble you. It'll cause you to lift your
hand up to him and nobody else. It'll bring us down when we realize
it ain't us. It ain't us. That he might prove thee, the
last part of verse 16, to do thee good at thy latter end. And thou say in thine heart,
this goes back to where he said, lest thou forget. lest thou forget, and say in
thine heart, my power and the might of mine hand hath gotten
me this wealth, but thou shalt remember the Lord our God, the
Lord your God, for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth. Do you think about that yesterday,
or day before yesterday? That he may establish his covenant
which he swear unto thy fathers as it is this day. The gospel
covenant, the good news is God saved you
and today he's still saving you for Christ's sake. That's the
covenant, for Christ's sake, for Christ's sake. Everything
you have is from his hands. So clearly the Lord decides He
distributes money, wealth, power, goods, prosperity of all kinds. So rather than go into this world
dog-eat-dog and do things that seem to advantage yourself in
life no matter the means, because you see, we tend to justify the
means by the ends. As long as I get there where
I need to be, you know, then well, I just had to do what I
had to do. It don't work that way. The way it works is you acknowledge
God, and you give glory to God, and you ask God, and he gives
you everything you have, or ever will have, and you say, thank
you, Lord, for every penny of it. That's how it works. That's how it works. The Lord said in Haggai 2.8,
the silver is mine and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts. Now, there's nothing wrong with
talking about my money. We all say that commonly. I've got this much money or whatever. That's fine, as long as you realize
who it really belongs to. The one who owns everything also
said this, Matthew 25 40 the King shall answer and say unto
them barely I say unto you in as much as you have done it unto
the One of the least of these my brethren. You've done it unto
me. There's our text If you've given
it in mercy See that word in our tech to have mercy Have pity to have pity on somebody
in need. He lays down this principle,
an act of faith and mercy. Without faith, it's impossible
to please God. You're giving, you're helping,
and it doesn't say money in the text. It says have pity on them. There's a lot of ways to do that.
It never says money. That which you give, not necessarily
money. to give goods, to give your time,
to give anything of value, to devote yourself to helping somebody
in need, an act of faith and mercy in
helping a fellow human being who really needs it. Now, I've
said to you all before, there's a lot of reason to believe that
a lot of the charities, the organized charities in this world are a
scam. Some of them are a scam to different degrees or another.
And even individuals often fake their situation just to get out
of working and are quite successful at it. I get that and I avoid
that. I avoid that. But forget about
all that. We're talking about someone in
need. Someone in need. If you remember
the context of Matthew 2540, which I just read, you remember
that most of that didn't have anything to do with money. I was a stranger and you took
me in. I was in prison and you visited
me. I was thirsty and you gave me
a glass of water. I was hungry and you gave me
something to eat. None of it says I was poor and
you gave me some money. Because you see, you can't... It kind of exposes frauds, doesn't
it? When you say, well, I'll buy
you a meal. And they say, ah, no, I don't
want that. I've had that happen more than once. Kind of exposes them, doesn't
it? It's saying what we've seen often
in scripture that you will never be the loser For serving the
Lord and one of the things that the Lord considers service unto
him is to have pity To have mercy to be a giver Why is it so important to the
Lord well you who are married here this morning Or have been Why are you married? You ever
think about that? Why are you married? Is it just
a piece of paper? Well, you might answer because
we love one another. That's a good answer. That's
a good answer, but you know there's a higher purpose than that, don't
you? There's a bigger reason. It's because it glorifies the
Lord Jesus Christ and his love for his church. That's why you're
married. That's why. Have you ever truly
forgiven anybody of anything? I mean, really, you were wrong,
you were hurt, and you truly forgave them. You just said,
you know what, I'm a sinner, they're a sinner, They hurt me. I'm just going to forget about
it. I'm just going to act like it never happened. And the Lord
gave you the grace to do that. You know why you did that? Why
did you do that? Beyond just your relationship
with that person, there's a bigger purpose in there. There's a bigger
reason. Because it honors and glorifies
the one who forgave you. Is that not what the scripture
says? Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one
another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you. It's glorifying to Him. That's
serving the Lord. The Lord doesn't need anything
that we can provide for Him. He doesn't need anything. To serve Him is to honor Him
and what He did for us. by desiring to be like him, to
show forth his love in loving one another. That's how the father is glorified. He doesn't say this is how your
relationships will be strong. He says, this is how my father
is glorified that you bear much fruit. What fruit? joy, long
suffering, kindness, gentleness, goodness. What higher purpose is there
than to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ? So why would we give? Why would we help somebody that
really needs it in whatever way they need it? Somebody's down. Somebody's broken. And what we're going to talk
about this morning, it says the weak. The text that we're going
to look into in Thessalonians this morning says those that
are weak latch on to them, it says. Isn't that an interesting
exhortation? Latch on to them. When you're weak, when you're
down, when you're broken, that's what you need is somebody that's
strong to latch on to you. We're in this together. I'm here
to help. So in any way that somebody has
a need to have pity on them, like the good Samaritan came
where we were. It redounds to his glory. It redounds to the glory of the
good Samaritan himself who came where we were when we were destitute. And that story says he had compassion
on him. He had compassion. That honors our Lord. That glorifies
the one who is love. who is mercy, who is the giver of every good
and perfect gift. So may the Lord give us grace
to honor him in all that we do and to walk in faith, to walk
in the faith that everything comes from his hand, everything. It all comes from his hand. It'll
change your whole life If you walk that way It'll change your
whole life He will Having spared not his own son for us Freely we have received freely
give That's how the God Almighty's
glorified according to our Savior And may He give us grace to glorify
Him in the time that we have. Let's pray.