2 Corinthians chapter 8. Now, we looked at 1 Corinthians,
a couple of messages from 1 Corinthians last week, and Paul wrote that
first letter to the church at Corinth to correct some errors
in doctrine and behavior that had come up. And we saw that
he did that simply by preaching Christ crucified for every situation. He only preached Christ to them.
And Paul sent that letter and he waited anxiously for the to
hear the results of that letter. And he got news that it was well
received. He was very happy to hear that
repentance had been granted, behavior had been corrected.
And then Paul wrote a second letter to them. And the theme
of this second letter is the same theme as the first one.
It's Christ crucified. Because in every situation, always
the message is Christ crucified. Christ crucified is the message
to be preached in every situation, in every meeting, at all times.
Paul told Timothy, Timothy, you preach the word. Be instant in
season and out of season. And Paul followed that, his own
advice. And this morning, we're going
to look at the topic of giving. And when it came to dealing with
the topic of giving, Paul dealt with it by preaching Christ crucified. Now, the church at Corinth was
the most wealthy church on earth at that time, yet they were stingy
in their giving. So Paul writes to them to teach
them about giving, and he does it by preaching Christ crucified.
And in this letter, Paul had a lot to say to them about giving. He devotes two whole chapters
to giving, and he mentions it other times in both 1 and 2 Corinthians. And the key to our passage this
morning in 2 Corinthians chapter 8 is verse 9. This is the key. Let's look at it and get the
key, and then we'll go back and look at the other verses and
see if they don't open up to us. He says in verse 9, for you
know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich,
yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty
might be rich. Now the Lord Jesus Christ is
the savior of his people. That's why he came to this earth.
He came to save his people from their sins. He did not come to
be an example. He came to be a savior. But in
saving his people, he set a wonderful example to us in giving. Now,
our Lord Jesus Christ was rich, yet he had to become what we
are. He had to become poor in order to save us. And when he
did, he gave us an example to follow in giving. Our Lord Jesus
was more rich than human language can explain. But let me give
you a few ways he was rich yet became poor. Number one, he was
rich in deity. The fullness of the Godhead dwelt
in him bodily. The Son of God became a man. That one who is God Almighty
became poor. when he became a man, when he
took on him the likeness of sinful flesh. The ancient of days became
poor when he became a babe of days. The son of God became poor
when he became the son of a worm, Mary. And you know why he did
that? He did that for the sake of his
people, for you who believe, so that he could redeem his people
from their sins. Second, he was rich in glory.
Christ, the Son of God, is the brightness of God's glory. He's
the express image of God's person, of His glory. Yet, He took off
that glory for a while. He stripped Himself of that glory
and became poor. He took on Him, not the form
of the Son of God, He took on Him the form of a servant. And
as a servant, he humbled himself to be obedient to his father,
to be obedient to his own law, even to be obedient unto death.
And he did that for the sake of his people. He did that, dying
the death that his people deserved so that they could be made rich
so they could have eternal life. Third, Christ our Savior was
rich in power. He upholds all things. by the word of His power. I mean,
you think of that. He just, by the word of His power,
everything is upheld. Everything is, consists and is
held together by His power. He does everything according
to His will in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants
of the earth. And none can stake His hand. None can stop His will. None can say to Him, what are
you doing? Nobody can say that to Him because He has all power. He has all power in creation.
He spoke the world into existence by the word of his power. He
has all power. He has all the power of God because
that man, Jesus Christ, is God. Yet he became poor. When he took
on him human flesh, he took on him all the weakness of our human
flesh. He emptied himself of his power. He emptied himself of his power
to help himself. Now, he worked many miracles
because he had the power of God, because he is God. Yet he never
worked a miracle for his own benefit. Because you can't do
it. He took on him the weakness of
our flesh. The creator, the one that spoke
water into existence, had to sit on the edge of a well and
ask a sinful woman to draw him a drink of water. The water he
created. The creator cried from the cross,
I thirst. So that his people would never
thirst. The creator emptied himself of his power as he hung there
on the cross and those scribes and Pharisees mocked him saying,
he said he's a son of God. Let him now come down from the
cross and we'll believe him. Understand this, he had the power
to do it. He could have done it. but he
emptied himself of that power. And he did it for the sake of
his people. You and I don't have the power
to deliver ourselves. So he used his power to deliver
his people from the power of sin, from the power of death.
Fourth, he was rich in possessions. He's rich in possessions because
everything belongs to him. He created it, it belongs to
him. The cattle on a thousand hills belonged to him. If he
needs something, he's not going to ask you and me. Everything
was made by him and for him. He's rich in possession. But
how he became poor. When he became a man, I mean,
that's humbling enough for the son of God to become a man. It
would have been humbling for him to become a prince, wouldn't
it? But he became not a prince, but
a poor man, a homeless man. He became so poor, he didn't
even have a place to lay his head at night. Even the foxes
have that. He didn't. That's how poor he
became that his people might be made rich. Fifth, Christ our
Savior is rich in union with his father. He has such a rich,
full union with his father. It's so rich, it's so full, he
and his father are one. Yet he became poor. He became poor when he willingly
became separated from his father. My God, my God, why is thou forsaken? We know the answer to that. He
was separated from his father for his people when he was made
sin for us so we'd never be forsaken by him. Six, he was rich in life. He's so rich in life. Christ
is life. He's life personified. Yet he
became poor for the sake of his people. Life itself died under
the penalty of the law for the sake of his people. So they'd
be delivered from the curse of the law and they'd never die.
And then last, there's so many ways we could talk about how
rich he is. I just picked out seven. He's
rich in clothing. Scripture says he's clothed with
honor and majesty. Yet he became poor, didn't he?
He died naked and alone, naked before men and before his father
for our sake, for the sake of his people, because we are naked
and alone before God if we're outside of Christ. So he died
naked before men and before his father so that his people would
be clothed in his righteousness. You see, he emptied himself of
everything that he is for his people. He emptied himself of
everything that he is to give us his righteousness and make
us rich in him. Christ became poor in glory so
that one day we dwell with him in glory. He became poor in power
to deliver us from the power of sin. He became poor in possessions
so that he could give his people everything that God has for a
sinner in him. He became poor in union with
his father so he could bring his people back to his father. In Christ, we have a union that
is so close with the father that no man can pluck us out of his
own. We have that because Christ became poor for us. Christ became
poor in companionship. He died alone. All his disciples
left him. He died so alone. so that he
could fulfill this promise to never leave and never forsake
his people. You see, everyone for whom Christ
died enjoys all the riches of God's mercy and grace. All of
them. We are so rich in the love of
God that we can't find the height of it, the breadth of it, or
the depth of it. It passes all understanding.
Now that's our Savior. How he saved us from our sin. And when he did that, didn't
he leave us an example that we'd follow in his footsteps? Christ
is our savior. He understand. I'm not saying
he died to be our example. He died to be our savior. He
came to be our savior. But he did give us an example
to follow. He's our example in love. Now. I know our love is a pitiful
excuse for love, but I tell you, we know something about love.
because he first loved us. He's our example in grace. We
know something about being gracious to one another because of his
grace so freely bestowed upon us. Our Savior is our example
in kindness. We know a little bit about how
to be kind to somebody else because of the kindness our Savior has
shown to us. Christ is our example in charity
to the poor. We have some desire to help the
poor because no one has ever been as poor as we are spiritually.
And look at the charity and kindness our Savior showed to the poor.
Now, if that example and that sight of Christ crucified does
not motivate your heart to generosity, nothing will. We're just, we're
wasting our time to talk about anything if that does not break
your heart and soften your heart in every way. And these verses,
when Paul speaks of giving here, he's only speaking to believers
because these things will only touch the heart of a believer.
He says, I'm writing to you who know the grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Well, that's only believer, only
believers know the grace of God in Christ. And believers, they
have a heart of generosity. They have a heart that desires
to give. And we'll see that here in a few moments. But we still
have to teach believers. We still have to teach God's
children about giving. We're not teaching tithing. We're
not teaching something you have to do. We're not teaching a mathematical
equation to work out to calculate your giving. We're not teaching
tithing. Tithing is a tax. We're talking
about giving. And we're not telling God's children
what they have to do. I'm not telling you you have
to give, because God's word doesn't tell you you have to. That's
what the law said, didn't it? The law said you have to give.
And you know why the law said that? Because the law was speaking
to a rebellious, stiff-necked people. They never would have
given if God didn't tell them they had to. He didn't give them
the tithe. But the gospel is not speaking to rebels. The gospel
speaking to God's children. He's speaking to save people
who have been giving a new heart. They've been given a willing,
generous heart. But even though we've been given
that heart, we have to be taught to give. A believer is willing
to give, but we have to be taught to do it. Now, before I get into
these other things about giving, let me say this. To this congregation. You are the most gracious giving
people that I know, and I thank God for you. But we still need
this teaching. Our younger believers need to
be taught giving, and our more mature believers need to be reminded
about giving. And if we look at this as the
teaching of Christ crucified, I promise you we'll get a blessing
from what Paul has to teach us here about giving. Now we got
the key. Now let's look at the rest of
the verses, beginning in verse one. Moreover, brethren, we do
you to wit of the grace of God bestowed upon the churches of
Macedonia. Now Christ our Savior is our
example in giving. And you know, we can be examples
to each other of giving too. These churches of Macedonia followed
the example of the Savior in giving. And Paul told us about
how they gave as an example to us. This is another example we
can follow in giving. When he says, we do you to wit,
that's an old English term that means to make known. We're going
to make this known to you. We want to inform you of this.
And Paul informs us of the way these churches of Macedonia gave
to support the gospel and to help their brethren who are in
need to give us an example of giving. This is given to us to
inspire us to follow their example. I'm going to give you three or
four things about this example. Number one, Here's why believers
give. Believers give because God has
been gracious to us and we give out of a thankful heart. The
churches of Macedonia gave generously because of the grace of God that
was bestowed upon them. God had been so gracious to them,
they wanted to give. It was their joy to give. Now
again, I speak to Hurricane Road Grace Church. God's been so gracious
to us. We sing that song, God's been
so good. Ain't God been good and gracious to us? Shouldn't
we desire to be generous in giving too? God's been so gracious to
us. Of course you're generous in
giving people because God's been so gracious to us. It's all because
of God's grace. All things are of God. So that
is why we give out of a generous or out of a grateful heart. Well,
second, Who is to give? Or just the rich to give or the
well-off? Who is to give? Well, every believer is to give,
regardless of their circumstances. Every believer is to give. Look
at verse two. How then in great trial of affliction,
the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded under
the riches of their liberality. Now, these believers of Macedonia,
they received the gospel in much affliction. much affliction.
They were in deep affliction because they believed the gospel.
They publicly took a stand and said, this is what we believe.
This is what we preach. And they were persecuted by everybody
in the region because of it. People said, their boss, they
came to work one day, said, you believe this doctrine of grace?
You believe this Christ? You believe this man Jesus of
Nazareth, the carpenter? You think he's the Christ? He's
the Son of God? You're telling me that man, he
died. They put him in a tomb. You're
telling me he's the Son of God and that he arose from the dead?
You're crazy. I'm not going to have a crazy
man work here. You're fired. Get out. Clean out your desk.
You're fired. They lost their homes. They had a mortgage on
their home. The bank came in and said, we're
foreclosing on you. Get out. Maybe their neighbors
gathered and threw them out. We're not having somebody like
this in our neighborhood. And they were in deep poverty
because of it. They lost all their possessions.
They weren't just hard up now. They were in deep poverty. But
they still gave. You see, they still gave. Everyone's
to give. No matter how much you're able
to give, everyone is to give something. You write this down. God always gives us enough to
share something, to give something. That's so. If you look at Mark
chapter 12, the Lord himself takes notice of giving when we're
in want. Look at this in Mark chapter
12. Verse 41. And Jesus sat over against the
treasury and beheld how the people cast money into the treasury.
And many that were rich cast in much. I bet they made a big
show, don't you, about how much they're casting in. And there
came a certain poor widow and she threw in two mites, which
make a farthing. Just nothing, hardly can make
any difference at all. And he called unto him his disciples,
and saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, that this poor widow
has cast more in than all they which cast into the treasury.
For they cast in of their abundance, but she of her want did cast
in all that she had, even all her living. She didn't have anything
left. That was the last bit of money
she had, and she put it into the treasury. And the Lord of
glory noticed her offering. You reckon she went home that
afternoon and went hungry? Not on your life, she didn't.
Not on your life, she didn't. The Lord noticed her giving.
So who is to give? Everyone's to give according
to that you have. Well, thirdly, what's the believer's
attitude in giving? I can imagine what the Jews attitude
was in Thailand. This is what I got to do. What's
the believers attitude in giving? It's joy, joy. Paul says in verse
two, how that in great affliction, the abundance of their joy and
deep poverty abounded under the riches of their liberality. Now
these believers in Macedonia, now they're being persecuted
for believing the gospel. They lost everything. I mean,
all their possessions, just nobody give them a job. I mean, they're
in real poverty. These are homeless people. Yet
they still gave in joy. It was a joy to them to give.
Now, that's the joy. This is a grace, the grace of
giving. It's a joy. And apparently, these
people in poverty gathered up a sizable gift, and they gathered
together and wanted to give it. And I give you a modern day example
of this very thing. A few years ago, I was in Mexico.
And you know, we go to Mexico, we take a gift, you know, to
the missionaries and also to help, you know, offset the cost
of housing us and stuff. And the people there are so poor. Many of them live in stick houses
and they're converting a lot of them to like concrete houses,
but very, very small houses, just so small. just like one
room and they just, you know, they don't have bedrooms. It's
just they hang up hammocks to sleep in at night. And then when
they get up in the morning, they take the hammocks down and their
bedrooms, their kitchen and their living room. It's just they're
so small, poor people. But you know how gracious they
are. I preached to one of those Pueblos. Cody came to me and handed me
a lot of money. Those poor people took up an
offering to give to this new creature. And I said, Cody, I
don't want to take this. They need this. And he said,
you take it. He said, this thrills my heart. They want to give. Now you take
this. You see, every believer wants
to give and has a joy of a thankful heart. And because of that, because
believers, our attitude in giving is a joy, We don't calculate
the minimum I gotta give because it's a joy. And that's my fourth
point. How much should I give? How much
should a believer give? Well, I tell you the key to that
question is the answer to that question is this. Believers give
of themselves. Now, we're not only talking about
the giving of money. Believers give their whole selves. We give our whole life. over
to the Lord. Well, if I give my whole life
over to the Lord, that includes my money, doesn't it? Look here
at verse three. For to their power, I bear record,
yea, beyond their power, they were willing of themselves, praying
us with much entreaty that we would receive the gift and take
upon us the fellowship of the ministering to the saints. Now
Paul talks here about their power, he's talking about their ability
to give. And everybody understands that they can't give much. They're
in deep poverty. But they gave according to their
ability. Paul tells us in his other instruction
in giving, you give according to that you have, not to that
you don't have. They gave according to what they
have. But Paul said they gave beyond their ability to give.
They gave sacrificially. They went without. The people
in poverty, who had nothing, went without to give to their
brethren in Jerusalem who were in need. And they did that because
their hearts were bigger than their wallet. You know why their
heart was bigger than their wallet? They'd seen Christ crucified.
They'd seen, by faith, Him sacrificed for them. And they gathered up
this gift and they brought it to the Apostle Paul. And those
men that were with him, they said, we heard about our brethren
in Jerusalem. Same things happened to them,
happened to us. We want to send this to help them in their need.
And Paul must have been a little reluctant to take it. You know,
I understand that they're in need, but you all need this too.
And they begged Paul. They insisted, Paul, you take
this and let us have fellowship in this. Let us be partakers
in this to help our brethren. And you know, more than likely,
they never met them. They never met. They just heard
these are our brothers, our sisters who are in need. We want to send
this to help them. Paul, let us have this blessing
to help our brethren. Paul said, all right, I'll take
it to them. They understood this. This is
not just a trite saying, this is so. It is more blessed to
give than to receive. And this was their joy to do
it. They gave beyond what Paul said was their ability to give.
Look at verse five. And this they did, not as we
hoped, but first, here's the key, gave their own selves to
the Lord and unto us by the will of God. Now, when this started
going on in Jerusalem, nobody had to tell Paul these churches
in Macedonia would want to give. He kind of expected, yeah, they're
gonna take up a collection. Because that's what believers
do, they want to give. But this gift was much beyond
what he expected them ever to be able to do. And he understood
the key to giving, the key to understanding, how much should
I give? is they gave their own self to
the Lord. They gave their souls to Christ
to save. Well, if I've entrusted my soul
to the Lord Jesus Christ, my eternal soul, I've entrusted
it to him. He's the only hope I got. There's
no plan B. There's no fallback. All my eggs
are in one basket. All my hope of the salvation
of my soul is in the Lord Jesus Christ. I just reckon if I trust
my soul to Him, I can trust my body to His care too. Don't you
think? That's what they did. God saved
their souls by His grace and they knew God's going to take
care of our physical needs. They gave and they didn't worry
about how they're going to make ends meet because they knew the
Lord's going to provide. They cannot give the Lord. Look
at verse 6. Paul says, In so much that we
desire Titus, that as he had begun, so he would also finish
in you this same grace also. This grace, this giving is a
grace. It's one of the gifts of God.
And Paul was so impressed with this gift that these poor people
of Macedonia took up that he sent Titus to go back to Corinth
to receive a gift from them too. Now, from what we understand,
Titus had been in Corinth before. And as he's preaching to them,
teaching them Christ crucified, he had taught them on this matter
of giving. And now Paul sends him back to
complete the work. Look at verse 10. Paul says,
in herein, I give my advice. For this is expedient for you,
who have begun before, not only to do, but also to be forward
a year ago, a year ago you're willing to take up this offering
and give to sin. Now therefore, perform the doing
of it. that as there was a readiness
to will, so there may be a performance also out of that which you have. Now they'd heard Titus preach
a year ago on this matter of giving. And like I said, believers
have a willing heart. They're willing to collect up
this gift. But Paul says, now do it. Now
I know you're willing, but this is part of the teaching we have
to give believers. I know you're willing. Now he
says, do it. Now it's time to do and give
what God's laid on your heart to give. It'll be a blessing
to you. Now look here at verse seven.
He says, therefore as you abound in everything, in faith, in utterance
and knowledge and in all diligence and in your love to us, see that
you abound in this grace also. Now this church at Corinth, I
told you this last week, how God had blessed them just with
gifts. So many spiritual gifts that
church had. They were rich in faith, faith
in Christ. They were rich in the grace and
the knowledge of the scriptures. They had many men there who could
read the scriptures and preach from them. They're rich in preaching.
They're rich in love. And all those are graces of God.
Now Paul says, see that ye abound in this grace, the grace of giving
also. And this is the work of the It's
just impossible for a believer to be selfish. It's impossible
for us to be selfish as long as we're looking at Christ crucified.
As long as I'm looking at Christ crucified as my sacrifice, it's
impossible for me to be selfish. Now, if I start looking at myself,
well, then I'll be selfish. But if I'm looking at Christ,
it's impossible to be selfish. So Paul says in verse eight,
Now, I speak not by commandment, but by occasion of the forwardness,
the willingness of others, and to prove the sincerity of your
love. Now, if I tell you I'm rich in
love toward Janet, but I stingy with her, you'd think, I'm not
so sure about that kind of love. Well, Paul said, you're rich
in love. The way you prove the sincerity of it is giving, being
willing to give, to give the best that you have. And Paul
says, no, I'm not commanding you to do this. This is not a
commandment. Israel had always been commanded to tithe, and
you see how well that worked out. Believers aren't commanded. Believers give willingly, not
because we have to, because we want to. And the scriptures teach
us to give. The scriptures never teach a
believer, command a believer to give. We're always taught
to give. And people get worried. People
in religion get worried about that. They say, oh, nobody will
give if you don't command them to give. Well, you're right. Natural people won't. They won't
give. That's why, you know why the
US government taxes us? Because I wouldn't give to it
if I didn't have to. I promise you I wouldn't. If
I could find a way to opt out, I would. But I can't because
it's their commandment to give or to give my money to them.
That's a tax. Believers are not taxed. Believers
will give. You just teach them to give.
You don't have to command them to. They'll give. Because the believer's
motivation to give is never a commandment. The believer's motivation to
give is always Christ crucified. Christ gave himself for me. He was rich and he became poor. that I, who am so poor and bankrupt
and nothing, might become rich through his poverty. Our motivation
to give is a grateful heart, a thankful heart, because our
Savior has given us everything. Look at chapter nine, verse 15.
This is how Paul sums up his instruction on giving. Thanks
be unto God for his unspeakable gift. A believer is willing to
give because God has given us the gift of his own son to be
our savior. Now the gift of Christ, to be
given the Lord Jesus Christ is such a gift, Paul says, it's
unspeakable. We don't have the words to say
how wonderful that gift is. So the believer's motivation
to give is love and gratitude. Now man's religion, when they
teach giving, They're not teaching giving. You know what they're
doing? They're teaching how to get. They say, you give and your
motivation is God will give you more in return. That's an investment,
isn't it? Isn't that the way Wall Street
functions? You give and we'll give you more
in return. Half the time it's a Ponzi scheme. It's always a
Ponzi scheme in religion. Believers don't give trying to
get something from God. We give because God's already
given us everything. So when you give, give out of
love, and that'll answer every question you have about giving.
You parents, nobody ever has to tell you how much to give
to your children, do they? No, we give out of love. And
often we give them too much, but we give them everything that
we can possibly give them. Why would you do that? because
you love them. Give to God the same way. Out
of a motivation of love and gratitude. How grateful are you for God's
grace to you? Then give accordingly. Now don't
give what you don't have. Don't go take out a loan to give. Don't give what you don't have.
Just give what God's given you out of thanksgiving to Him. And
that'll answer every question you've got about giving. All
right, Lord bless you.