Now, we know that the apostle
Paul said that whenever he was trying to come to God by his
ability, that he was a covetous man. That's
what Paul said about himself. And after God saved Paul, Paul
gave more to the saints of God than any other man. And He's
still giving to us today because of how selflessly He gave to
the church of God. And this is what He learned and
this is what He teaches us. This is Paul speaking now here,
2 Corinthians 9 verse 8. And God is able to make all grace
abound toward you, that ye always, having all sufficiency in all
things, may abound to every good work. Look at verse 11. Being enriched in everything
to all bountifulness or liberality, which causeth through us thanksgiving
to God. I want to speak to you this morning
on the subject of God's ability. God's ability. We're going to
look at this in the context of giving, but our subject is not
so much about you and me. It's not so much about our giving,
but God's ability and what God is doing through this privilege
of making his saints cheerful givers. God saves sinners in
order to save sinners. God provides for his believing
child so that he uses us as instruments whereby God provides for others. And the amazing thing about that
is, is that God profits you and me in every way in the process. He profits us by using us that
way. You and I are together. We're
right here and we have the Gospel and we have a place to worship
our Redeemer because God saved other believers. Because God made His grace abound
to other believers so that God enriched them and used them to
provide for us. Believers who look beyond the
four walls in which they meet every week, week in and week
out. Believers who look beyond their own immediate need to the
need of others. Next weekend, we'll be down in
Danville, and you're going to see a large number of people
there. A large number of people there. I remember the first time
I went, I thought I couldn't get over how big that congregation
was. But I hope, Brother Don, before the meeting's over, I
hope he asks the members of that congregation to stand up. And
when he does, I want you to take note. It's about this size right
here. About this size right here. But
God is able. He's able to take a handful of
poor, needy believers and provide abundantly for other poor, needy
believers. That's what he's done for us.
It's exactly what he's done for us. He uses his children to support
missionaries. Brother Walter Groover and Brother
Cody Groover down in Mexico, I think something like 30 churches
has been established through that work down there. We'll never
see that. Some of you sitting here never
see it. Some of the folks who have supported it for years never
see it. I've seen some of it. It's amazing. But it's not about
seeing what becomes of it. That's not the end use. The disciples murmured against
Mary when she broke open that alabaster box and poured it on
the Lord's head. They said, for what purpose is
it? They couldn't see an end to it. They couldn't see, well,
how's this going to profit us? We're still learning from it
today. He uses them to aid other congregations
in the support of their pastors who can't fully support their
pastors. He uses them to spread the gospel
of His grace, to provide for the needs of the poor. That's
a great privilege God's given to His people. But make no mistake
about it, the ability to do it is God's ability. It's God's
ability. And He makes us to know that
before He uses us to do that. He will make us to know it's
God's ability. It's not our ability. It's God's
ability. That's what I want to talk about
today. That's how our text begins. This is what we're going to see
first of all. God is able. God is able. That's the first
thing. God is able. Here's the second
thing. What is He able to do? to make
all grace abound. Here's the third thing. To whom
is God able to do this? To you. To you. Here's the fourth thing. Why
does God do this? Why does he do this? That you
may abound to every good work, being enriched in everything
to all bountifulness. And what's the end purpose that
God does this? It's for His glory, which causes
thanksgiving to God. You see that? Thanksgiving to
God. First thing we see here is God
is able. God is able. Everything that's
good and everything that's of benefit to you and me is of God. God is able. We see it in creation. In the beginning, God. God is
able. He was able to create everything
that exists. Who hath measured the waters
in the hollow of his hand? Who has meted out heaven with
a span? You know what that is? You touch
your iPad or whatever and you do this, you know, and the window
opens. It spreads out as far as you spread your fingers. That's
a span. You look from one end of these heavens to the other.
That's the span. He just did like this. Spreaded
them out. Comprehended the dust of the
earth in a measure. Weighed the mountains in scales,
the hills in a balance. And who directed the Spirit of
the Lord to do this? Who was His counselor? Who taught
Him when He was doing that? With whom did He take counsel?
And who instructed Him? And who taught Him in the path
of judgment? And taught Him knowledge and
showed to Him the way of understanding? Nobody. God's able. He's able. Redemption was accomplished
because God is able. Christ was able. He's able in
wisdom. Who but God could devise a way
that He could justify hell-deserving sinners, show them mercy, and
yet be just and do it? Who but God would be able to
even do that, have that wisdom to do that? God's able in power. God was able to form His Son,
send Him forth and form Him in the womb of a virgin. He was
made of a woman. Who but God could do that? Who
but God could make Him who knew no sin, sin for us that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him? He's able. God's able in glory, who but
God in His glory could raise Christ from the dead and us in
Him and seat Him at His right hand till He make His enemies
His footstool. God's able. Redemption's accomplished
for God's people. It's accomplished. God's able. He's able to do so in bringing
the gospel to you to seek and to save those that are lost.
Who but God could work every detail out in your life to bring
you under the sound of the gospel and call you by His grace and
create life and faith in you? Who but God could do that? God's
able. God is able to save every one
of His children without the help of anybody and not lose one of
them. And he won't. He will not lose
one. God is able. What a great privilege then for
God to condescend to use worms like you and me to do anything. to do anything, but he's going
to make us see beforehand that he's the one who has the ability.
God is able. Everything, from the least minute
detail to the greatest thing, everything that has ever benefited
you and I, believer, is of God. It's because God's able. God
is able. Faith is believing God is able. You won't believe God. You won't
trust anybody to save you till you believe they're able to.
If you were caught up on a ledge somewhere, on a high-rise building,
and there's no way to get down, and somebody brought up a ladder
to you to get you down, you're not going to jump onto that ladder
and trust that ladder till you believe that they're able to
grab you and hold you and keep you and bring you down from that
place, right? You're not going to believe God
till you believe he's able. Faith is believing God is able.
God told Abraham Sarah would have a son. A woman almost a
hundred years old. She's going to have a son, God
said. And God believed. And Scripture says, He staggered
not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith,
giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded that what he
had promised, he was able also to perform. Why shouldn't he
believe that? Why shouldn't Abraham believe
God was able to create life in the womb of a dead sinner? Huh? He created life in Abraham. Why shouldn't he believe that?
Then he told him, now this is the son through whom redemption
is going to be brought. My son is coming through this
son. That's what I'm picturing in giving you this son. And he's
going to save all your spiritual seed, Abraham. Now you take that
son and you go up to the mount there and you offer him to me
for a burnt offering. And Abraham saddled up the wood,
got the fire, got everything he needed, took his servants
with him and took off and said, now y'all stay right here, we're
going up to the mountain. And the scripture says, accounting,
now that's accounting. Here's real accounting right
here. This is accounting. True accounting. Accounting that
God was able to raise him up even from the dead. Why wouldn't
he believe that? Abraham was dead and God raised
him from the dead. He was spiritually dead in trespasses
and sin and God had raised him from the dead. Why shouldn't
he believe God would be able to do the lesser thing of raising
his son from physical death to life? That's a lesser thing. A very much lesser thing. Faiths
believe in God's able. Now that's the first thing. God
is able. Do you believe God is able? God is able. Alright, what's
God able to do? Look at the next part there,
verse 8. God is able, here's what He's
able to do, to make all grace abound. Now this is the most,
the sweetest, comforting truth that we have. You try to always
keep this in remembrance in everything you do. God is able to make all
grace abound. There will come a time when we
won't need any grace, when we're with God in glory. We won't need
grace then. But while we're in time, we're going to need grace.
And as long as time exists, God will provide all grace and make
it abound. Make grace abound. That's assurance,
brethren. That's comfort. God, who is able
to make all grace abound, has engaged in a covenant relationship
in His covenant faithfulness with His children and promising
us He will make all grace abound to you, His child. That's what
He's promised. We see it in everything God's
created, don't we? God gave the sun. He made the
sun. He gave the sun. You know what
He gave the sun for? I'm talking about the sun in the sky. You
know what He gave that sun for? He gave it to give. That's what
He gave it for. He gave the sun to give light
and warmth and life back. And the sun has constantly never
ceased to give in abundance. Ever. God made the earth. He made the fruit-bearing trees
and plants and what have you. You know why He made them? He
made them to give. He made them to give us food
so we could have bread on our table. And those fruit-bearing
plants have never yet ceased to provide in abundance food
for people on this earth. I love it whenever men try to
act like we got some ability about ourselves. You know, this
year was supposed to be the largest corn crop ever produced in history
this year. And men was boasting about it,
about how far we'd come and how this was going to be the biggest
corn crop ever in history. God said, I'll just let the sun
shine just a little bit more and the rainfall just a little
bit less. And I'll show you, you got no ability. Now they're
saying it's going to be a record set this year as being the least
ever produced. God's able and he's able to show
us he's able. And we're not able. We're not
able. God, the only creatures that God has ever made that has
a problem with giving are sinners. That's the only ones. Everything
else he's made has given just like he's given it for that purpose. But sinners have a problem with
it. We have a problem with it. We see best how God's able to
make all grace abound by looking at this gift of eternal life
that God's given us. The good news of the gospel is
this. Now you listen to me. The good news of the gospel is
this. Salvation is all of grace. Grace is free. Grace is absolutely
free. Free grace, free justification,
free forgiveness, free pardon, not of debt, not of merit, not
of work to be earned, and not of work that can be earned. All
is a free God-given grace. Salvation is free. But don't
ever, ever think salvation didn't come without a price being paid. Never think that. Never think
that. The scriptures never describe
salvation as being something other than that which is highly
costly. Highly costly. Highly costly. Precious. God's unspeakable gift. How can you account and measure
the value of what God's given when it's called an unspeakable
gift? God gave his only begotten son. Only begotten son. The blood that Christ shed is
called His precious blood. You were redeemed not with corruptible
things like silver and gold. If you could heap up all the
silver in the world and all the gold in the world, the Lord said
Lebanon is not sufficient to burn. With all its mighty cedars
that it had, which were highly valuable in that day, Highly
valuable in that day. He said you take all the riches
all the cattle all everything you could heap up in this world
and It would not compare to the preciousness of Christ's blood
Not at all. It's called unsearchable riches
unsearchable riches. Riches that can't be counted.
Riches that can't be added up. Riches that can't be esteemed.
Riches that can't be anything. Nothing can be given in comparison
with it. Forgive me if I quote a lot or reference some today
from that story of Mary breaking open that alabaster box. I almost
preached on that today. Lord willing, I might preach
on that next week at the conference. But she came with precious ointment. You know why? It was the only
thing she had that could just somehow express her gratitude
for that precious blood that was about to be shed for her.
You see that? Precious, precious, precious
means it's rare, it's costly, costly blood. It's the blood
of God. the blood of God's own Son. It's
costly blood. It's precious because of its
rarity. You see, this blood wasn't shed
for everybody. It was not shed for everybody without exception.
If you have experienced the preciousness of this blood, the Lord said,
thank God. Thank God for this. This blood's
rare. It's not shed for everybody.
It's precious because of its sin-cleansing ability. This blood
completely washed away. You imagine taking, you take
a, you got a bloody hand, and you take water, and you put it
under a faucet, and you start pouring that water, and you just
watch the blood start washing away from your hand. Well, there
you were. There was God's elect just covered
over in sin and corruption and dirt and blood and just left
in our filth and our corruption and nobody wanted anything to
do with us. Nobody wanted anything to have anything to do with us.
And Christ came to where we are and He shed His blood. And that
blood just washed and washed and washed and washed until that
center was just white as snow. It's precious blood. It's precious
blood because it's conscience purging blood. This is the blood
whereby the Spirit of God comes and takes that old defiled, corrupt,
polluted mind that imagines God in some other way. That makes
you look through eyes with scales and hear with ears all stopped
up and corrupted. It makes you in your mind think,
I'm not having anything to do with that. Those people are brainwashed.
I've got news for you, you'll never have anything to do with
Christ until He washes your brain. You're going to have to have
your conscience purged. And only the blood of Christ can purge
you, and so that in the inner man you behold now with new vision,
Christ is all. Christ is all. This blood is
precious. It's precious because it's keeping
blood. We have an advocate with the
Father. We sin, and we sin continually. The hardest thing in the world
to me is to get up and preach to you when I see what a dreaded,
awful sinner I am. But when we sin, we have an advocate
with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is the
propitiation for our sins. There He stands in His hands,
in His feet, I think that's the only marks that Scripture gives
us of any trace of what was in this sin-cursed earth. I think
that's the only marks that the Scriptures bear out that will
be in glory, that will remind us, if anything, about this place
at all. It's those nail prints in His
hands and His feet. That's it. And that blood pleads before
the Father. He sees the blood. He sees the
blood so He passes over us and all our rebellion. This blood
is precious, precious, not to mention the suffering that He
endured having the beloved of the Father, who loved the Father,
who never sinned, who never did any sin whatsoever, who knew
how vile and awful and hateful and much he despised sin, and
yet he was made sin for his people and suffered the wrath of his
Father? And we want to act like we want
to serve Him in just the least little way we can get by with?
Precious blood. And all that we have, everything
that's been given to us, brethren, is by His free grace. Who maketh
thee to differ from another? What hast thou that thou didst
not receive? We were born in this world no
different than anybody else. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. The sovereign election of God
the Father, that sovereign choice given to us freely is what made
the difference. We're bound to give thanks all
the way to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because
God has from the beginning chosen you, chosen you to salvation
through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.
And He called you by our Gospel. He sent the Gospel and He brought
you into the glory of Christ. What's that? It's that grace
of Christ's redemptive blood that's freely given to us. Look
at 1 John chapter 4. 1 John chapter 4 and verse 9. And this was manifested, the
love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten
Son into the world that we might live through Him. Herein is love,
not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His Son,
the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us,
we ought also to love one another. What's that mean? How? Well,
how did He love you? When you didn't love Him? By
giving His only begotten Son? That His Son might die in our
room instead? We ought to love one another
that way. You see how abundant this love is? You see how abounding
this love is? You see how costly this love
is? What it cost Him? Look over at
1 John 5.11. 1 John 5.11. This is the record, brethren,
that God hath given to us eternal life. And this life's in His
Son, given. The grace of the Holy Spirit's
call was given freely to us. Look there at 1 John 5 and verse
20. We know that the Son of God has
come and has given us an understanding. He's given it to us. Given us
an understanding that we may know Him that's true and we're
in Him that's true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the
true God and eternal life. That's all been given to us,
brethren. the new nature, everything about
spiritual life, repentance, faith, love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
it's all the fruit of the Spirit freely given to us. What do we
have we didn't receive? All providence is freely given
to us. You ever consider that everything
that happens in this life is God's free gift to us? Health and sickness. Happiness and sorrow. Easy times and hard times. That's
God's gift to us. How can you say that's a gift?
Bad times and sorrowful times and pain and suffering, how can
you say that's a gift? Because we know that all things
work together for good to them that love God, to them who are
called according to His purpose. He's working it for good. He's
giving it to us. Before it's all said and done, you're gonna
see it was good. We're gonna see it's good. All
providence is a gift of God. All temporal substance we have
is all of grace, all a gift. Do some heavenly accounting.
Does anybody, do we, we don't balance our checkbook. Anybody
balance their checkbook anymore? We do it on the computer now,
but. Next time you balance your checkbook, do some heavenly accounting
and think. Everything I have, God gave me.
Everything I have, God gave me. Somebody say, well, now I worked
for that. I earned that. Come on now. Come on now. What happened whenever you were
without that job? What happened when you got laid
off? Then you found out I don't have necessarily have the ability
I thought I had. I am dependent on God, ain't
I? All things in nature, all things in grace, all things in
time, all things in eternity, all, all, all is the free gift
of God's grace to us. So going forward, from right
now, going forward, our needs may be great, but the God of
all grace is greater. Our fears may be great. Our temptations
may be great, within and without, but the God of all grace is greater.
Our discouragements may be great. I get so discouraged sometimes.
Don't you? Do you get discouraged sometimes?
I do. I try not to let you see it. But I do sometimes get discouraged. But you know what I find out
all the time? God's bigger than my discouragement.
And he's just, he just let me be discouraged for just a little
while to show me your abilities in me, not in you. I'm making
all grace abound to towards you. And He does. It is all abounding.
It's abounding. And now look thirdly at this.
Whose is to brethren? Whose this to? Toward you. Toward you. Well, I had to stop
there. I had to just hang up there and
say, that's got to be a point right there. We got to stop there
and get that. He's toward us. Toward you. God's ability is
coupled together with God's promise to do what He said He'll do.
Now that's His promise. I'll make all grace abound towards
you. And our covenant God is able.
He's able to supply all your need. Now that's great to know.
I'm glad to know He can do that. I'm glad to know He's able. But
you remember that believing He was able, when Abraham believed
he was able, he was connected with a promise. He believed that
what he promised he was able also to do. And he's promised
this. And he says, this is the greater
assurance to us, he's able and he's promised us he will do it.
To you, towards you. And nothing's gonna prevent him
from doing it. Nothing's gonna prevent him. Now, I can stretch
out on that bed and I can wrap up in those covers and I can
get a good night's rest. Can't you? Can't you? I can get
a good night's rest. If I just remember, just remember,
just have this always in remembrance. Because this is the first thing
we need to have. First things first in this thing
of being a cheerful giver is this. It's not substance. Not substance. Remember Paul
said, he said, if I gave my body to be burned and have not love,
it's being constrained by the love of God for you. His love
that says, I'll never leave you nor forsake you. His love that
says, I'm making all my grace abound toward you. You see, God
doesn't measure anything by how much. That's not what he measures
it by. Two mints, he said, is more than
all these folks gave. I had somebody try to speak oppressively one time,
tell me I know how much those folks are giving. I said, you
don't know how much anybody's giving. You don't have a clue.
You may see a physical amount, but you don't have a clue. That's
not what's measured. That's not how it's measured,
not how it's measured at all, at all. It's not substance, the
first thing we need. The first thing we need in being
a cheerful giver His faith to believe Him. Faith to believe
Him. The building of that tabernacle
in the wilderness. You go over there sometime, you
read Exodus 35, you read those first five verses. And if you're
not careful, you will think that that building of that tabernacle
began with Him laying up goods to have in store to build it. That's not where it began at
all. Not where it began at all. They could have done that. There's
folks around us building giant buildings and giant cathedrals
and giant places that just stand in awe to look at them. But it's
a work to try to be saved. And without faith, it's impossible
to please God. No, no, that tabernacle, building
of that tabernacle began with God giving them rest in the Sabbath. That's where it began. He said,
He gave them the command of resting in the Sabbath. That's where
it began. Faith in Christ, our Sabbath
rest, is where it begins. And I want you to look at Hebrews
3. This was a blessing to me. Hebrews 3. Don't you notice what
that rest is called? It's called His rest. His rest. Everything about it is His. He
chose to do it. He chose whom He'd do it for.
He came and worked out everything so that we can rest. He comes
to us and gives it to us. He brings us into it. It's all
His rest. Look, Hebrews 3.18, To whom swear
He that they should not enter into His rest? His rest, but
to them that believe not. Look down at Hebrews 4.1, Let
us therefore fear lest a promise being left us of entering into
His rest. Any of you should seem to come
short of it. Hebrews 4.10, for he that is entered into his rest,
he's also ceased from his own works as God did from his. You
see, you can't do any work for God until you stop working for
God. Now you can't. We can't. We can't
do anything for God until we start resting. We've got to start
resting. We've got to start looking to
our ability and completely. When He does this work, He makes
us to rest in the work of redemption that it's done. But then He's
going to grow us. If He's going to use us, you
think about Stephen and those other six fellows that they chose
to take up offerings from those that were giving and to give
and disperse them to the poor widows. You think of that. If
God hadn't made them faithful, and made them already trust and
to know God is able to provide for them. You know what they'd
have done? Those men would have done? They'd have oppressed those
that were given and tried to squeeze more out of them. And
then they would have said, well, those widows won't need all of
this. Now put a little bit in their pocket and give the rest
to the widows. They'd have cheated on both sides. That's right. But God made them able to rest
in Him and see His ability to bribe for them so much so Stephen
believed God was able so much so that he stood there and preached
the gospel till they stoned him to death. Now that's what we're
talking about. See God's ability? God's able.
He's able to do that. But when this rest comes and
we see God's able and we are resting in Him, we start working
then. We really start working. Did I just lose somebody? Did
I just lose you? Faith worketh by love. Faith that doesn't do anything
is dead. It's dead as a person that don't even take a breath.
That's right. Faith worketh by love. But without faith it's impossible
to please God. So first, we've got to cheerfully
do this work. We've got to stop looking to
our ability and rest in God's ability. Working by love is being
rooted and grounded in His rest. It is being fully persuaded by
this great salvation that He's already wrought for us that God's
able to make all grace abound toward us in all things. Who are we, brethren? He said,
I'll do this toward you. Who are we? Who are you? Look
at John 15. John 15. Here's who you are. Here's who I am. Right here. John 15. And look at verse 1. I'm sorry, look at verse 5. Christ is speaking here. This
is who you are. This is who I am. I am the vine. Ye are the branches. He that
abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much
fruit. For without me you can do nothing. Anybody got any vegetable
plants? Anybody got any that's producing
right now, producing tomatoes or anything like that? Do a test.
Be good for you and your whole family. Go home today and take
one of those little vines, one of those branches that's coming
off of the vine that's bearing fruit. Cut it. Cut it off the
vine. Throw it over to the side and
see how much fruit it bears. See how much it brings forth.
That's stupid. That's what God's saying to us
right here. I'm the vine. You're the branches. Without
me you can't produce anything. Nothing. Nothing. Absolutely
nothing. We couldn't give ourselves life.
He did it. We couldn't believe God. We wouldn't
believe God. He gave us willingness. We could
not believe God. He gave us faith. We can't produce
any fruit. He gives it to us. He produces
it. Fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ to the praise
and glory of God. All God's ability, all God's
abounding grace has been toward you, believer, given to you.
And He's able to continue to give you all grace and make it
abound. Strength to the poor. He's strength
to the needy in his distress. He's a refuge from the storm.
He's a shadow from the heat. This is our God we're talking
about. Now, here's the fourth thing. Why does God promise to
do this? I said to you, faith that believes
in Him works. It really does work. Why does
God do this? Why did He do this? Verse 9.
He says in 2 Corinthians 8-9, this is why He does it. That
you, always having all sufficiency in all, may abound to every good
work. being enriched in everything
to all bountifulness. That's why he does it. That's
why he does it. You imagine this, you think about
this. Let's say, let's say, Art, you
gave something to AJ. And you told him, you said, AJ,
go across the street over there. That poor woman's house over
there. and give her this, pay her light
bill. And AJ said, I better hang on to this. I better
hang on to this, because I'm going to need this down the road.
I better hang on to this. You paying the boys light bill?
You paying the boys everything. You paid them everything. He wouldn't be pleased with him.
He gave it to him to give to her, to pay for her, to help
her. She's poor, she needs it. Do
you understand what I'm saying? That's why he's giving it. Now
look here at what he says. That you always, not occasionally,
but always, having all sufficiency. You see, in order for God to
get all the glory in this thing, God has got to provide all the
sufficiency. or he won't be getting all the
glory. If we think we have the sufficiency, that we've provided
the sufficiency, we want glory in God. So God's got to make
sure we understand He's making all the sufficiency, providing
all the sufficiency. And then it says, in all things,
in the heart, God's the one who's going to provide all sufficiency
of faith to make us trust in His ability. In the hand, He's
going to be the one that gives all sufficiency so that you always
have something that you can use. In the ability itself, He's going
to give you the willingness. He's going to give you the sufficiency
and the willingness. He's going to give you the cheerfulness
to do it. And in the opportunity, He's going to present you the
opportunity. So that everything about it, God did it all. Everything. And God promises to abound towards
you. Why? That we may abound toward
every good work. He says I'm going to abound towards
you. So you can abound to every good work. Which are what are
those works? I'm not even gonna start to say
be as inventive as that woman who came in with an alabaster
box and said, I've got this. I'm annoying him with it. Nobody
else thought to do that, but her. She said I can do something. And she did it. Whatever it is,
you Whatever God gives you the opportunity to do, do it. That's
it. Well, let's look back there at
chapter 8 and look at verse 7. Look at verse 7. Now listen to
what Paul said there. Therefore, as you abound in everything,
in faith, and in utterance, and in knowledge, and in all diligence,
and in your love to us, see that you abound in this grace also.
See that? Abound in this grace also. When
we truly believe God, look over at 1 Chronicles 29, 14. This
is what happens. When we truly come to this place
where it's a cheerful thing to us, this privilege God's given
us, we see what an honor it is. We really realize then that our
giving is really God giving to us. That's what it is. It's God giving
to us. Listen to David. First Chronicles
29, 14. He said, Who am I and what is
my people that we should be able to offer so willingly after this
sword? For all things come of thee of
thine own have we given thee. That's where God brings us to
see. We ain't giving him anything. Nothing. Nothing. We can't give
God anything. Y'all know that. We can't give
God anything. He's all sufficient. When we
give Him our best, we haven't given Him anything. But what
He's given us, we can't give God anything. Nothing. You see, the great paradox of
grace, this grace of giving, is that by giving away, we actually
are receiving. God's Sin makes it hard to realize
this glorious truth. It really does. Because God calls
us to believe something which is contrary to our natural reason. Everything about how God deals
with us is contrary to logic and reason. It's perfectly logical. It makes perfect sense. It's
perfectly reasonable. but it's contrary to our fleshly
logic and our fleshly reason. Because we think giving, to our
natural eye, giving means we're lessening our inventory. We're
not increasing it. That's what we think. Imagine,
just imagine for one moment, just try to run this through
your mind. What would it be like if every single person on the
top side of this earth was more concerned with giving everything
they had away and not receiving anything? You wouldn't like anything. I wouldn't like anything ever. If we'd have full abundance,
full abundance, you wouldn't have to worry about it. You don't
have to worry about giving everything away. The next person comes along
and they give me everything. You would never have to worry
about it, ever, ever. The Lord said, it's more blessed
to give than to receive. Now men's corrupted this, I know.
I know, men have corrupted this. Corrupted it, corrupted it, corrupted
it. But if we give from a motive of thinking, well, the more I
give, the more I'm going to get back. That's like you go and
invest in a stock market. The more I invest, the more I'm
supposed to get back. Well, if you do it from that motive, you
will not give cheerfully. You'll give grudgingly, because
you don't want to do it really. And you won't be satisfied, content
with what you have, because you think, this don't compare to
what I gave. But I'm trying to tell you this,
this receiving's more than temporal things, brethren. It's not temporal
things. I keep telling y'all buildings
and chairs and pews and pulpits and houses and all that, that's
furniture. That's just furniture. Those
are props God's using to show us something much more important
than any of that. The blessing we get back that
God promises to provide is not a temporal thing, though He does
promise to provide. That's what this grace abounding
to you is here in this text means, temporal things. He does promise
that, but what we receive is greater than that. We enter into
God's faithfulness toward us. We experience God's grace toward
us. We experience and find out God
is true to His Word. You can't put a price on that.
That's what gives peace in here. That's what gives you peace in
here. That's what will make you walk into the next trial and
say, I don't have to just be beside myself and afraid because
God's going to provide for me. I got that inward peace of knowing
he's going to do it. And the believer delights to
make others blessed, delights to glorify God, delights to honor
his master. The man that does that, he's
the happiest man on this earth. You know why? He's entered into
this Word right here and he knows God is able to make all grace
abound toward me that always in all things I have all sufficiency
to abound in every good work. I got that peace of heart. You
can't put a price on it. There was an old man down where
I grew up, there was an old man in the congregation there, and
he was the church treasurer. And he said this to me when I
was probably 18 years old, something like that, 18 or 19. He said to me, he said, those
who are happy to give always have something to give. That is true. That is absolutely
true. Those that are happy to give
always have something to give. They're always happy to give
it. That's always just true. It is just true. You think of
how much, turn to Philippians 4, Philippians 4. Now I said
to you in the beginning, I said Paul is the one who, he said
how covetous he was. when he was in his religion.
Everything about false self-will, self-righteous religion is nothing
but idolatry. It's covetousness. It's trying
to have the glory that belongs to God in his power. His grace,
His redemptive blood, His will, His work, everything is coveting
what belongs to God. It's trying to make ourselves
say, we have the sufficiency and we don't need God. That's
what self-righteous, covetous religion is in the heart. That's
what it is. But when God saves us from that
and makes us see all our ability is in God, by free grace, and
it can't be earned, can't be merited, it can't be forfeited,
it can't be, you can't give it away. riches in glory that are
always abounding toward us brethren. But now Paul He gave more than,
when God saved him, he gave more to the church of God than anybody
we read about in the New Testament. Would you, other than Christ,
would you say that's fair to say? He gave more than any other
apostle in the whole New Testament. By God's grace, he did that.
Now, you take this theory that filthy, lucre, robbing, pillaging,
bastard preachers are preaching that says the more you give,
the more you're going to get. Well, Paul gave more than anybody.
Where did he end up? Did he end up with a big, giant
bank account? Did he end up with a big palace? Did he end up driving a luxury
car? No. You know where he wound up? In
prison. In prison. And before it was
over with, he got his head chopped off for preaching the gospel.
That's where he ended up. You say, They don't look like
God made good on His promise. Let's see about it. Look at Philippians
4.12. Here He is in prison. He's writing to the Philippians
because they sent a gift to Him. He's writing back to them and
He says this to them, I know both how to be abased and I know
how to abound. Everywhere and in all things
I have instructed both to be full and to be hungry. When I'm hungry, he said, when
I'm hungry, physically hungry, when my belt buckle's rubbing
against my backbone, I still am full. I'm full. In my heart,
I know God's gonna provide for me. I'm full. And he said, when
I'm full and feasting on filet mignon, I'm hungry for that grace
of God. Oh, Lord, don't take that from
me. And he said, I know how to abound, and I know how to suffer
need, and I can do all things through Christ which strengthens
me." There's the return God gave him on everything Paul gave. Right there. Right there. Peace
that passes all understanding. That's right. Unspeakable, right
there. That's what that is. And he gave
him something else. That gift that they sent to him, they sent to him, proved that
everything Paul had given to them in trying to labor to give
them the gospel, it proved the sincerity of their love for their
Redeemer and for Paul. And that too was a gift that
Paul was given by God for everything he'd given. That's better than
any temporal riches you can get. Look at what he said in verse
17. He said, not because I desire a gift, but I desire fruit that
may abound to your count." You see that? I just want to know
that God's saved him. I want to know God is saved.
I want to see that God says, you believe him, you trust him.
And he said, but I have all and abound. He said, I'm full having
received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you.
They sent him this gift. And look at what he called it.
An odor of a sweet smell. A sacrifice acceptable, well
pleasing to God. But my God, he reminds him now,
don't forget this my brethren, but my God shall supply all your
need according to his riches and glory by Christ Jesus. Now there's the final point.
They saw, Paul saw that they glorified God. They gloried in
God. And that's what made him, that
was the payment God gave to him. Now that's the final thing here.
What's the end for which God works this grace in his people?
What's the end cause? Look at verse 11. Being enriched
in everything to all bountifulness which causeth through us, now
that's an amazing thing, which causeth through us, God uses
us to do this, which causeth through us thanksgiving to God. You see, we all stand here, we
pray, and we voice our prayer. Here's what we voice when we
pray. We pray, Father, glorify your name. That's what we pray. Father, bring honor and glory
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Honor and glorify your name.
Now, is that what we want? Is that what we desire? Are we
just praying that to sound pretty? Is that what we desire in our
heart? Well, this grace ends right where it begins. This grace
begins with God giving to us. And this grace ends in thanks
being given back to God. God, through this grace, through
us, brings glory to His name. Brings glory to His name. Look
at verse 12. For the administration of this
service not only supplyeth the will of the saints. That's important. That's really a lesser importance
in this time. It's very important, but that's
a lesser importance. But is abundant also by many
thanksgivings unto God. Whilst by the experiment of this
ministration, while you actually go through with doing this, they
glorify God for your professed subjection unto the gospel of
Christ. And for your liberal distribution
unto them and to all men. And by their prayer for you,
which long after you, who want to see the exceeding grace of
God more and more in you. They pray and thank God for you.
They glorify God for you. So Paul ends here and he says,
thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift. You know what he's saying
there? We're not giving anything to
God. God's giving it all to us. You can't even put this into
words what He's doing. You cannot do it. It's amazing. Now all the motive we need All
the motive we need is to know God is doing this to bring glory
to His name. What other motive do you need? What an honor that God would
give us the privilege of being used to bring that glory to Himself. I don't need to know how you
see it. I don't. I don't need to see it. I don't
need to hear the prayers. I don't need to I don't need
any of that If I just know God I know God's
gonna do it He he did give it to Paul. He did show it to Paul
and Paul rejoiced to see it But think of how many he never saw
it in and yet God worked the same thing Did the same thing
the assurance is knowing God's gonna do this God is able to
do this and he will do this Father, we ask you to give us grace.
We ask you to make our hearts willing to be used of you for
this end. Glorify your name. Glorify your
name. Don't let us ever discourage
one of your dear saints who has this joy in their heart
and wants to do this. Cause us to hide that away, keep
that to ourselves, and to rejoice with them, not to be envious
of the joy they have, not to be upset because we might not have
the same joy in ourselves, but help us, Lord, to really rejoice
in the joy they have and their liberality because you gave it
to them. And you gave them that heart.
You gave them that joy. And let us rather go into our
closet and ask you, Father, if you will, Give us that same willingness. Give us that same heart of joy. Give us that same assurance to
know that in everything you're going to abound in your grace
to us. Even as you have in your blessed
son, that great and greatest unspeakable gift you've given
us. How we do thank you, Father, so much for your patience. We're
little children. We're just Oh, we're just little
children. These things are too big for
us, and they're too wise for us, and there's so much beyond
us. That's why we really don't believe
you like we should, Father. Because we don't, we just, we're
so helpless in ourselves. We try to judge it by looking
at ourselves, and we just don't, we can't hardly see how able
you are. Help us to see, Father. We thank
you so much for your grace towards other believers that you've given
a heart to send the gospel to us, to save these ones here,
and to bring us together, and to support us. and to keep giving
to us to see that we have this gospel. We thank you for them.
We thank you because you've done this grace in them. You get all
the praise and all the glory because you've done this work
in their heart. And we've been the beneficiary
of it. And we ask you, Lord, to make that grace exceedingly
abundant toward them more and more. Make it go towards them
more and more, Lord. that they might more and more
rest and be joyful in everything you've done for them. We might not be able to give
back to them in monetary ways and things like that that they've
given to us, but Father, we beseech you, would you give to them?
Would you give to them? an understanding and a peace
and a rest more and more in the great and glorious work of salvation
you've accomplished for them. Make them more and more to know
that if you'd spared not your own son, you won't spare anything
else. Thank you, Father. We thank you and ask you to forgiveness
of our unbelief and our our lukewarmness. We thank you for being long suffering
with us. that you do it for Christ's sake.
For his honor and glory, we ask it. Amen. All right, Eric.