Now our subject this morning
is just a continuation of our subject from last week on giving.
And the key to the passage is still verse 9 in 2 Corinthians
8. For ye 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 if we're going to follow
the example of our Lord in giving, what we're going to see in these
verses this morning, If it's necessary that we give willingly,
if we're going to follow the example of our Lord, we will
give willingly and a believer will give willingly. Now, we
take the time to teach giving because Scripture teaches giving.
But, you know, we never have to beg believers to give because
they just do. That's their nature. They give
willingly and it's easy to teach a new generous heart that just
naturally receives the teaching of this matter of giving. So
we're going to pick up in verse 12 where we left off last week.
For if there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according
to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not. Now in giving,
our motive to give and our spirit in giving is more important than
how much we give. The Lord accepts a gift from
a willing heart. Regardless of how big or how
small the gift is, he accepts the gift from a willing heart.
And the Lord won't reject us for what we don't have to give.
If the Lord's had mercy on your soul, you know that. He's not
going to reject you for what you don't have to give, because
we've got nothing to give. And he'll accept what we have
to give, regardless of how small it is. Look over Matthew chapter
10. In Matthew 10, verse 40, he that receiveth you
receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.
He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive
a prophet's reward. And he that receiveth a righteous
man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous
man's reward. And whosoever shall give a drink
unto one of these little ones A cup of cold water only in the
name of a disciple. Verily I say unto you, he shall
in no wise lose his reward. Even giving a cup of cold water
from a willing heart, if that's what you have to give, the Lord
accepts that out of a willing heart. You know, think about
it in your own case. If someone does you a favor,
does something to help you out, but gripes about it the whole
time. You know, I thought this morning about Wives asking their
husbands to help them clean up the kitchen and dishes and so
forth. You know, if I help Janet out, I mean, help her out doing
that, it's my house too, and gripe about it the whole time.
She just assumed I went in the living room somewhere because
of the attitude. The work got done the same, but
it's the attitude that makes the gift acceptable. You know,
my girls were little. I'd go out in the driveway and
wash the car. Well, they loved to come out
there and help. Drew them to me like a magnet. And mostly
because they wanted to spray, you know, me and each other with
the hose in the summertime, you know. And they weren't much help
washing the car. But they were so enthusiastic.
It was welcome with joy. Out of a willing, just because
of the attitude, the willing attitude. Now remember, we're
still following the example of Christ our Lord. Give according
to what you have with a willing heart. That's what He did for
us. What did He give? Everything
He is, He freely gave to His people, and He gave Himself willingly. He willingly became poor for
our sakes, that we might be made rich. He willingly laid down
His life. He willingly was made sin for
us. He willingly gave everything
that He is. And the Father accepted that
sacrifice. and accepts us in him, he gave
willingly everything that was necessary. Now verse 13, Paul
says, for I mean not that other men be eased and ye be burdened,
but by an equality, that now at this time your abundance may
be a supply for their want, that their abundance also may be a
supply for your want, that there may be equality. And all these
verses are teaching us is that everyone should give out of what
we have. Now, not everyone has the same
amount to give. We're not supposed to give the
same amount. Everyone gives out of what the Lord's given them.
And all the writers and things, and you read about these verses,
say everyone shares in the burden of giving, the burden of meeting
the needs of the ministry. But burden is not a good word
there, is it? It's not a burden to the believer to give. It's
a blessing. Everyone shares in the blessing.
You know, if we're going to move this piano, no one man can move
it. It's too big. It's too heavy.
But a group of men, varying degrees of strength, can pick that piano
up and move it with ease. Now, it's got wheels, so maybe
it makes the illustration a little less effective. But one man might
be able to lift 300 pounds. Another man might only be able
to lift 50 pounds. But together, it's moved with
ease. And that's the way it is with
giving. Everyone shares in what they have equally. But there's
an equality in giving and receiving too. One day, you might be the
one giving. Another day, you might be the
one receiving. You never know. At this time,
Corinth was a prosperous place and people in the church were
financially prosperous. But Jerusalem was in ruin. The
believers there were in deep poverty, need and want. Well,
the church at Corinth at this time had the means to send to
them to help ease their burden. But we just need to remember
how quickly things change. Next month, that situation might
be reversed and Jerusalem be prosperous and Corinth be in
need. Well, what's going to happen then? Well, the brethren in Jerusalem
are going to take up a gift to send to Corinth. There's equality
in that because of the love that we have for one another. And
it might not change next month, but it will change someday. Some
days, we're able, the Lord blesses us and we're able to give. Other
days, we're the ones in need and the brethren give to us.
There's an equality in that. Four says, as it says here in
verse 15, as it's written, he that had gathered much had nothing
over, and he that had gathered little had no lack. Now look
back at Exodus 16. This is a quote from Exodus 16
about the collection of the manna that the Lord sent to feed the
people. In Exodus 16, verse 16. Now this is the thing which the
Lord hath commanded. Gather of it every man according
to his eating, and Omer for every man. According to the number
of your persons, take ye every man for them which are in his
tents. And the children of Israel did so, and gathered, some more,
some less. And when they did meet it, when
they measured it with an omer, he that had gathered much had
nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack. They gathered
every man according to his eating. Now everyone gathered, and they
shared what they gathered, and measured out an omer to each
man, each person. And the man who gathered more
than an omer, gathered more than he could eat, he shared And he
had nothing extra. And he, for whatever reason,
couldn't gather an omer or couldn't gather enough for his family.
He lacked nothing because they shared in what they gathered.
Everyone had the same amount. Everyone had enough. Now, there's
two things that teaches us. First, this man has a picture
of Christ. He's the true bread from heaven.
And Christ is enough. He's enough for every one of
his people. Now we have different levels, all of us do have different
levels of graces. We have different strengths of
faith and love and joy and meekness and temperance. We have different
levels, strength levels of these graces. But we all have the same
grace. We all have the same saving grace. We've all been given different
levels of the same graces. We're all equally saved by the
blood of Christ. We're all equally loved. We're
all equally children of God because Christ is enough. in Christ,
we're all equal. Now, second thing this teaches
is the giving of financial things. You know, some people are blessed
with more riches than others. So the rich, they have more to
give. The poor, they have less to give. But everyone gives that
the ministry be supported. Now, remember, we're still following
the example of Christ in giving spiritually. We're poor. I mean bankrupt. Nothing to give. Christ is unspeakably rich. And
he gave everything to us in our salvation. We give nothing. He
gave all. So following the example of Christ,
the rich give more and the poor give less. And we don't hoard
that for ourselves. Aren't you thankful? Christ didn't
hoard all that he is to himself, but gave it freely to us. If
you're still in Exodus 16, look at verse 19. Look what happened
to the selfish person. And Moses said, let no man leave
of it till morning. Notwithstanding, they hearken
not unto Moses, but some of them left of it until the morning,
and it bred worms and stank, and Moses was wroth with them.
Now, some of them didn't listen to Moses. They tried to hoard
it up for themselves. And what happened when they tried
to hoard? They tried to hoard up God's blessing to them. Can
you imagine such a thing? Hoarding up God's blessing to
them. But they did. And they didn't benefit from
it. It stank and bred worms. And that same thing will happen
to us if we hoard up God's blessings to us. Now, by no means is this
condemning savings. Not at all. You know, you ought
to save and plan ahead and those things. This is not condemning
savings. at all. What this is condemning is selfishness. And we need to find the middle
ground for what the Lord's blessed us with. Because everything we
have is the Lord's anyway in it. Everything we have, God gave
us. And if the Lord's blessed us
with an abundance, I promise you, He gave it to us to share,
not to hoard up with a closed hand. So give according as the
Lord's blessed you. Now we understand Selfishness
is condemned. So that obviously makes us understand
that this is not excusing laziness. That, well, one man gathered
little. He didn't spend maybe much effort in gathering or whatever. He gathered little and he still
had enough. This is not excusing laziness
at all. You know, Paul told the church
at Thessalonica, if a man won't work, don't let him eat. If he's
not going to work, he's just going to be lazy. That's not
supposed to be a burden on everyone else, on you. But following the
example of Christ. Selfishness is not an issue. I know it still crops up in its
old nature, but following the example of Christ, the believer
doesn't see giving as a duty, as a tax we've got to pay. It's
a joy. It's a privilege to be able to
give back a portion of what the Lord's given us. Look in First
Chronicles 29. David understood this giving,
giving back what the Lord's given us, is a joy. It's a privilege. It's a blessing that the Lord's
given us. First Chronicles 29, verse 10. Wherefore, David blessed the
Lord before all the congregation. And David said, Blessed be thou,
Lord God of Israel, our Father, forever and ever. Thine, O Lord,
is the greatness. and the power and the glory and
the victory and the majesty. For all that is in the heaven
and in the earth is thine. Thine is the kingdom, O Lord,
and thou art exalted as head above all. Both riches and honor
come of thee, and thou reignest over all. And in thine hand is
power and might, and in thine hand it is to make great and
to give strength unto all. Now therefore, our God, we thank
thee and praise thy glorious name. But who am I and what is
my people that we should be able to offer so willingly after this
sort? David thanked the Lord that he
gave them out of his abundance that we should be able to offer
so willingly after this sort. For all things come of thee and
of thine own have we given thee. All we're doing is returning
unto thee a portion of what's yours already and we thank you
for giving us the opportunity to give. David understood this
is a blessing. The Lord always provides enough
for us to give something, doesn't he? He's so good, the Lord always
gives us enough to share. And believers do it willingly,
out of a glad, thankful heart. Now, verse 16, back in our text.
Paul says, but thanks be to God, which put the same earnest which
put the same earnest care into the heart of Titus for you. For
indeed he accepted the exhortation. Being more forward of his own
accord, he went unto you." Now Paul had asked Titus to go back
to Corinth to receive this collection, to finish this teaching on giving
and to receive the collection to take to Jerusalem. And here's
a sure sign that what Paul had in his mind, in his heart, is
the will of God. He went to Titus to talk about
this idea of his, and the Lord already put the same desire in
Titus's heart. That's the will of the Lord.
Clearly, this was the will of the Lord. And Paul thanks God
for Titus's willingness, because the Lord put this desire in Titus's
heart. You know, the Lord makes his
people willing in the day of his power. We love that verse.
We quote that verse that the Lord makes his people willing
in the day of his power. And he keeps us willing by his
power. That's his power that keeps his
people willing. And Titus's willingness to make
this hard trip is another example in giving. You know, we give
of our money, but also of our time and our talents and things,
you know, that we can do to help meet the need. Titus is following
the example of Christ in this matter. Yeah, this probably is
a hard trip. It might be fraught with some
danger. You know, they gather up this money, apparently pretty
large gift and you're traveling on these roads, you know, just
risk people knocking ahead for that money. Yeah, it might be
a hard trip. It might be a long trip. What
does that compare to what Christ gave for us? That's a short trip
compared to the distance our Lord traveled to become a man
in order to redeem his people. Oh, it's a short trip. Titus
is following the example of our Lord. And it's a blessing to
the church. He talked about something that
will encourage a person to give. It's thinking the blessings of
God that he's given us. This was a blessing to the church
at Corinth. God laid it on the heart of one
of his servants to come to Corinth to preach, to take up this collection. That's a blessing. And that's
just another thing that just makes our hearts overflow to
give back to what the Lord's given us. Now verse 18, and Paul
says, we have sent with him the brother whose praise is in the
gospel throughout all the churches. And not that only, but who also,
who was also chosen of the churches to travel with us with this grace,
with this gift, which is administered by us to the glory of the same
Lord and declaration of your ready mind. And here's this unnamed
brother. And there's another in verse
22, unnamed brother. And we have sent with him our
brother. whom we have oftentimes proved diligent in many things.
And no one knows who these unnamed brethren are, because they're
unnamed. But I'm telling you, there is
rampant speculation about who these men were. Some think they're
Luke, or Mark, or John Mark, or Barnabas, or Silas, or Apollos. I mean, there's just rampant
speculation about who these men are. But we don't know who they
are. And you know, that's good that
we don't know who they are, because this could be a description of
any believer. It could be a description of
any believer. Believers are known to be honest,
diligent, faithful people. Any of you would be trusted to
carry this large gift to some brethren in need. And this gift
that they took up, Paul says, this is just evidence of your
willing heart and your ready mind and your generosity. But
you know, these unnamed brethren could be anyone. And I thought
of all of you, I would trust any of you to gather this gift
and take it somewhere. You know, this summer, my daughter,
Savannah, worked a couple of jobs and she saved every penny.
She didn't spend a penny that she made. She saves it all up. At the end of the summer, she
took all the money that she had and she gave it to Chip Holbrook.
Just gave it to him and asked him, Could you find me a car?"
Chip said, well it might take a while. I said, that's all right.
She gave him every bit of money she had and walked away. I told
her when we were driving home, I said, you remember this. I
said, it's a blessing to know somebody like Chip Holbrook.
That you give him every cent you have and know it won't be
lost. That you'll get it back. that
you'll get something of equal value in return. Now, in Savannah's
case, she got something of greater value in return because Chip
found her such a good deal and just worked all that out. But
the point is, is any of you, I'd trust any of you with everything
I had because God's made a difference. If someone asked me one time,
so why do you lock your car when you come to the church parking
lot? You know, the church parking lot, why do you lock your car
for? Because everybody I trust is in here. You know, if everybody
was like you, I wouldn't have a key. I mean, I just wouldn't
need it. But everybody's not like you because God made a difference. This is the Lord's grace that
He's made a difference. But now, even though that's true,
we still operate in matters of finances now with total transparency. So no one could ever entertain
the notion that things are not done honestly. We do things with
total transparency, and the Apostle Paul did too. Look here in verse
20. He said, avoiding this, that
no man should blame us in this abundance, which is administered
by us, providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the
Lord, but also in the sight of men. And we have sent with them
our brother, whom we have oftentimes proved diligent in many things,
but how much more diligent upon the great confidence which I
have in you. Now, we do things in an honest way in front of
everybody, providing honest things. Look over a few pages, 2 Corinthians
13. In verse 1, Paul says, this is the
third time I'm coming to you. In the mouth of two or three
witnesses shall every word be established. You have two or
three men of, you know, honesty and integrity tell the same story. that you counted as true, just
as true as if you saw it with your own eyes. Well, the same
thing applies to this thing of giving. You know, if if two or
three men are handling, you know, this abundance of this gift,
then nobody can think, well, they all banded together to steal
it, you know. And that's important for people
of the world to see that they've seen what they think are religious
people. steal money for years, misuse
money for their own selves for years. I know the Lord made you
different, but they don't know that. So we do these things,
operate with just total transparency. And just like you don't put a
novice in the pulpit, just don't rush somebody into this position. Paul didn't. He proved this man
diligent in many things. They built up a reputation amongst
all the churches over a course of time. We put men and women
in these positions who are known by the church to be honest and
faithful, someone you can have great confidence in. This is
someone who can handle a large gift and remain above temptation. That's just good policy. That's the way Paul operates
here. And he says in verse 23, he says, whether any do inquire
of Titus, he's my partner and fellow helper concerning you.
Or our brethren, if they be inquired of, they're the messengers of
the churches and the glory of Christ. Now, Paul gives here
a word of recommendation for Titus and for the brethren that
are with him coming to Corinth to take up his collection. Look
back at 2 Corinthians 3. In matters of preaching, Paul
said, I don't need a letter of recommendation. My message is
my letter of recommendation. The people that I preach to,
you're my living letter of recommendation. But, it might be a good idea
for men who handle these financial matters to have a letter of recommendation. He said here in verse 1 of chapter
3, Do we begin again to commend ourselves? Or need we, as some
others, epistles, letters of commendation to you? or letters
of commendation from you, you are our epistle, written in our
hearts, known and read of all men, forasmuch as you are manifestly
declared to be the epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written
not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not in tables
of stone, but in fleshly tables of the heart. Now that's in the
manner of preaching, but in the manner of handling money, Paul
is wise to give a letter of commendation here. The church at Corinth,
they knew Titus. They've met him at least once
and they knew the Apostle Paul real well. But maybe these other
men, they didn't know. And it was just good for them
to know. These are men who are well respected amongst all the
churches. They're well respected by other
believers. And you can respect them, too.
If you get to know them, Paul says you will. These are men
who are known to be a credit to the glory of the Lord. So
you can trust him, he says. In verse 24, he says, wherefore,
show ye to them and before the churches the proof of your love
and of our boasting on your behalf. Therefore, Paul says, when these
men come your way, receive them as brethren. Show them your love
that I have boasted of. I have boasted about you, about
your love and your care for the brethren. Show them that. And
show them all my boasting about your generosity is true. Take
up this collection. Show them my boasting of your
generosity is true. And you know, I thought of you,
you know, as I went through these verses this week. I don't know
of people who are more generous and loving and giving than you. Just never heard of it. And every time I mean, any matter
comes up. If work needs to be done, if
money needs to be sent for something or spent for something, I mean,
it's just you're ready. And I'm thankful. That's that's
the Lord's blessing on you. And I'm thankful. All right.