by Jeffrey W. Hamilton<\/p>\n\t
I. We talk about giving of our best to the Master<\/p>\n A. I tried to show that such an idea was not about physical appearance, but spiritual\nservice.\n
1. We need to give the best of our time, the best of our effort, to God.<\/p>\n
2. We need to also support the church in doing God’s work in this area.<\/p>\n
B. We get bombarded daily with requests for help<\/p>\n 1. Mail, TV ads, telephone solicitations to support the orphans in remote\nareas, the police, the fire department, the schools.\n
2. Many good works are done and supported by voluntary contribution.<\/p>\n C. Too often we are distracted by the world’s causes and begin to think of the church\nas just one more good doing organization that needs money.\n
II. Giving is a part of our worship<\/p>\n
A. The aid given to the saints in Jerusalem glorified God – II Cor. 9:10-15<\/p>\n
B. Phil 4:15-18 – A sweet-smelling sacrifice to God.<\/p>\n
C. Attitudes in giving<\/p>\n
1. Prepared to give<\/p>\n
a. A readiness or willingness to give – II Cor. 8:11-12<\/p>\n b. I Cor. 16:1-2 – A setting aside money. This implies preparation\nand a plan. Not haphazard giving.\n
c. As a person has purposed – II Cor. 9:7<\/p>\n
2. A cheerful willingness to give – II Cor. 9:7<\/p>\n
3. A generous gift<\/p>\n a. The Macedonians gave generously even though in poverty – II Cor. \n8:1-4\n
b. A liberal distribution – II Cor. 9:13<\/p>\n
4. A proportional amount<\/p>\n
a. II Cor. 8:12 – Give what you have. Don’t go into debt.<\/p>\n
b. I Cor. 16:1-2 – As you have been prospered.<\/p>\n
c. Acts 11:29 – The relief was sent according to ability<\/p>\n d. The responsibility to give is not based on income, though the\namount should reflect your income. \n (1) Luke 16:10-12 – A poor person who is not generous will\nnot be generous if he becomes rich.\n
(2) The rich should give generously – I Tim. 6:18<\/p>\n
5. Your gift should cost you something<\/p>\n a. David refused to give God something that costed him nothing – II\nSam. 24:24\n
b. Generosity cannot be measured by the size of the gift.<\/p>\n c. The question is how much do you keep of what God has given you? \n99%, 95%, 90%, . . . ?\n
D. When to give<\/p>\n
1. On the first day of the week – I Cor. 16:2<\/p>\n
2. When someone asks – Matt 5:42<\/p>\n
3. When we have an opportunity – Gal. 6:10<\/p>\n
III. Giving is a cycle<\/p>\n
A. God first gave to us<\/p>\n 1. It is He who created us, made a world for us, gave us opportunities to\nwork. For all this we should be thankful\n
a. Eph. 4:28 – Work so we have something to give to others<\/p>\n 2. God gave us His own son. He purchased our salvation with the blood of\nChrist.\n
a. How trivial and insignificant is our gifts back to him<\/p>\n
B. God rewards the giver<\/p>\n
1. Generosity is returned at a later time – Eccl. 11:1<\/p>\n
2. The generous will prosper – Pr. 11:25<\/p>\n
3. As we give, it will be returned – Luke 6:38<\/p>\n
4. As we sow, we will harvest – II Cor. 9:6-10<\/p>\n
C. The cycle continues. The gifts we give, bring glory to God – II Cor. 9:10<\/p>\n IV. The \n giving we spoke of is in generality.\n
A. There is the giving to God, through the church<\/p>\n
B. There is the giving to God, through our aid to our fellow men<\/p>\n
C. Do not neglect our giving – Heb 13:16<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Jeffrey W. Hamilton I. We talk about giving of our best to the Master A. I tried to show that such an idea was not about physical appearance, but spiritual service. 1. We need to give the best of our time, the best of our effort, to God. 2. We need to also support the church in doing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[157,159],"class_list":["post-62527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermon","tag-contributions","tag-giving"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4884,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/giving-to-the-lords-work\/","url_meta":{"origin":62527,"position":0},"title":"Giving to the Lord’s Work","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 4, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"by Matthew Bassford Of all of the spiritual topics that we might address, one of the most sensitive is giving. First of all, it\u2019s about money, which always has been very important to people. Second, though, the Holy Spirit\u2019s words on this subject have been misrepresented and abused for 2000\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":55484,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/christian-giving\/","url_meta":{"origin":62527,"position":1},"title":"Christian Giving","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 4, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"by Richard Thetford Will a man rob God? There are some who rob God of what belongs to Him in the first place. In Malachi 3:8-9 we can read: \"Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, 'In what way have we robbed You?' In\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":50488,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/giving-to-god\/","url_meta":{"origin":62527,"position":2},"title":"Giving to God (Owen)","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 26, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"by Dan R. Owen, Ph.D. via\u00a0The Gospel Advocate, June 2017 Since the time of Abraham, dedicated followers of God have given of their wealth to the One who provides all wealth. God blessed Abraham with much and Abraham gave a tenth to Melchizedek, priest of God Most High (Genesis 14:20).\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":58152,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/more-about-those-strange-macedonians\/","url_meta":{"origin":62527,"position":3},"title":"More About Those “Strange” Macedonians","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 20, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"by Bonds Stocks via The Preceptor, Vol. 2, No. 1, Nov. 1952. \"Moreover, brethren, we do you to wit of the grace of God bestowed on the churches of Macedonia; How that in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded unto the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":46807,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/can-contributions-be-done-through-pledges\/","url_meta":{"origin":62527,"position":4},"title":"Can contributions be done through pledges?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 23, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Is pledging wrong, as a way of giving? That is, asking members how much they are willing to put forward for a certain project. They specify an amount, which is then collected at the right time. We must give on the first day of the week, that is set,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":58154,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/those-strange-macedonians\/","url_meta":{"origin":62527,"position":5},"title":"Those “Strange” Macedonians","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 20, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"by Bonds Stocks via\u00a0The Preceptor, Vol. 1, No. 12, October 1952. \"Moreover, brethren we do you to wit of the grace of God bestowed upon the churches of Macedonia; How that in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and deep poverty abounded unto the riches of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62527\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}