Living to Give

Over the last few weeks we have reflected upon "The Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations" proposed by United Methodist Bishop Robert Schnase. The five practices are: (1) radical hospitality, (2) passionate worship, (3) intentional faith development, (4) risk-taking mission and service, and (5) extravagant generosity.

Today we reflect upon the fifth practice: Extravagant Generosity. According to Schnase, churches that practice extravagant generosity "thrive with the joy of abundance rather than starve with a fear of scarcity. They give joyously, generously, and consistently in ways that enrich the souls of members and strengthen the ministries of the church."[1] They give not only of their treasure, but also of their talent and time. They are motivated to give generously because they serve a generous, giving God. They recognize that love is best expressed in self-sacrificial giving for the good of others. Truly, the greatest gift we have to offer one another is ourselves. And we give ourselves to others in response to God's self-giving to us in Christ.

A life of extravagant generosity is a fitting climax to the five practices. Each supports and sustains the other. Schase explains it like this:

Churches embrace newcomers with a sustaining sense of belonging when they practice Christ's Radical Hospitality. Through Passionate Worship, God shapes hearts and minds, creating the desire to grow in Christ. Through the practice of Intentional Faith Development, people make themselves available to listen for God's Word and for the Spirit to mature their understanding of God's will. Inner spiritual growth finds outward expression in Risk-Taking Mission and Service as people respond to God's call to make a positive difference in the lives of others. As people grow in relationship to Christ, they grow also in the practice of Extravagant Generosity offering more of themselves for the purposes of Christ and providing the resources that strengthen ministry and that help the church touch the lives of more and more people in the same way their own lives have been transformed by God.[2]

The Deceitfulness of Riches

The challenge of embodying Extravagant Generosity is great. It completely goes against the grain of a culture that often defines success, value, and worth solely in regard to one's net worth. Let's face it: In our materialistic consumer culture we tend to believe the cliché that "he who dies with the most toys wins." In such a climate, we tend to clutch, grasp, and keep everything for ourselves. We believe that abundance proves one's importance, promotes one's happiness, and guarantees one's security. "We assume that we are totally responsible for all the good that comes our way. After all, we have earned it. We deserve it. When asked to pray at the family dinner table, son Bart Simpson offered the following words: 'Dear God, we paid for all this stuff ourselves, so thanks for nothing.'"[3]

When our sense of identity, worth, and security rests on material possessions, we discover that no matter how much we gain, there is never enough. We always find that we need just a little more to be happy. In fact, we are tempted to define enough as "always something more than I have now." As a result, happiness and contentment elude us. Be honest: Isn't it true that many of us think, "If I had just a little bit more, everything would be alright - I'd be more happy, more secure, more successful, important"?

The tragic truth is that when we say, "In God we trust," the "god" we often trust the most is the green, gold, silver, and copper god we can hold in our hands. We are ravenous consumers dead set on acquiring as much as possible, rather than generous givers who aspire to share ourselves with others.

Our appetite for more and bigger is great. We are driven so much that we often buy things we don't need with money we don't have to impress people we don't know. "A philosophy based principally upon materialism, acquisition, and possessions is not sufficient to live by, or to die by."[4]

Extravagant Generosity calls us to trust God more than riches. It challenges us to believe that generosity is God's way to true life. It calls us to a life of giving. It frees us from the seduction of riches. Paul instructs Timothy:

As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life. (1 Timothy 6:17-19)

The problem is that we have a hard time believing that generosity is the way of life - "life that really is life." The possession of riches easily deceives us, and leads us away from truth and life.

The Rich Fool (Luke 12:13-21)

Jesus warned of the danger of insatiable acquisitiveness. When asked to settle a land dispute by someone in the crowd, Jesus warned his hearers, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions" (Luke 12:15). As was his custom, Jesus then told a story to illustrate his teaching.

The main character in the story is a successful businessman who through hard work and fortune had amassed a great amount of wealth. It is his success - not his sin - that creates a problem. He asks himself, "What should I do with this abundance?" This is a good question to ask. Unfortunately, his answer is absolutely wrong! God's response to his answer is, "You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?" What exactly did the Rich Man do wrong?

We completely miss the point of Jesus' parable if we view the Rich Man as especially wicked. He is not a monster. He did not acquire his wealth through oppression, deceit, foul play, or theft. He is not wasteful with his possessions. Indeed, he is quite frugal. He is not careless concerning his possessions. He has a plan. He is careful and conservative, smart and savvy. He is not unjust. So what is his problem?

Clues to his moral failure lie in the thought process that led to his destruction: "Then he said, 'I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry" (Luke 12:18-19).

The Rich Man thinks only of himself and his material well-being. Like the pathetic person of George Harrison's "I, Me, Mine," the Rich Man is concerned only with himself and his possessions. Six times, he says, "I will..." To the Rich Man, its all about possessions, and everything can be reduced to a possession, even his own life: "my crops... my barns... my grain... my goods... my soul." What's missing? God, others, humility, and a sense of stewardship. He has no thoughts for God. He expresses no concern for others. He thinks only of himself. Though he may give lip service to God, he lives a life of practical atheism. Neither God nor others factor in his decisions. His wealth is his god, and his decisions completely revolve around his idol.

It is an axiom that we become like that which we worship. When we place ultimate value in wealth and possessions, we should not be surprised when we view ourselves - and others - as just another commodity. A lifestyle of acquisitiveness feeds our selfishness rather than our soul, for certainly, acquisitiveness does not foster a life rich in God.

Note the deceptive power of riches. The Rich Man's decision seemed very wise and frugal to him, but the true evaluation comes from God. God calls him a fool.[5] His attitudes and actions are complete folly. Like the fool of Proverbs, he thinks only of himself, and behaves as if there is no God. He does not embody the ancient wisdom that "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." Like a fool, his grand plans are worthless. The tragedy of his life is revealed in its emptiness. Riches have taken the place of relationships. He has no one to speak to but himself. He is the true "nowhere man" - making all his nowhere plans for nobody.

The Rich Man is a fool because he succumbed to the deception of riches. He thought he would find security in his possessions. He trusted in his wealth. But his trust was betrayed. He placed too much stock in the illusory security of riches. His abundant possessions had become an idol and taken the place of God and blinded him to others. He placed his full trust in his idol, offering complete obedience to it with absolute focus and careful attention. Tragically, his allegiance to acquiring more and more kept him from attending to God. He hoarded his goods to buy security, but that security was an illusion.

An abundance of possessions can provide an illusion of control, but little more. As the rock group Kansas sang in their hit Dust in the Wind: "All your money won't another minute buy." If anything, an abundance of possessions begins to control and possess us - consuming our thoughts and clouding our horizons. If we place our security in our possessions, how much is enough? The more we have, the more we worry, the more we need, the less we control. We became slaves to our own consumption.

The worst consequence of greed is that it stifles interest in the kingdom of God. The Rich Man's selfish focus kept him from expressing any concern for God or for neighbor. His life was about his possessions. But life is about more than possessions. There are two ways to be rich. Jesus taught that we can selfishly store up treasures for ourselves or we can choose to be rich towards God. There is room for only one god in our lives. We must choose between God and mammon.

What Will You Do?

The question the Rich Fool pondered is one we all must consider: What will you we do with our abundance? Wealth and possessions are not the problem. They can be means for great good in the world.[6] They can also shrivel our soul.

It is fair to say that most of us are wealthy by the world's standards. In spite of all that has happened in recent months, we still live in the most prosperous country in the history of the world.

The question then arises: What will you do with your abundance? How will you use it? Will you pile up treasure for yourselves? Or will you be generous and compassionate? Can you learn the discipline of saying "this is enough"? Or will you give in to the endless abyss created by placing all one's trust in riches alone? And the most important question of all is this: What will God think of your response?

Eventually, our lives will be evaluated by God. All that we have is a gift from God. This includes even our own lives. We are stewards of the life and gifts God has given us. Jesus warns us not to be foolish with that with which we have been entrusted. Our plans are shortsighted if they fail to take into account God's evaluation of our lives. This was the mistake the Rich Fool made. Though our culture may label us a success, our deepest longing should be to hear from God, "Well done, good and faithful servant!"

Perhaps you've squirmed through most of this message. Take heart! We are all recovering idolaters. We must regularly repent of our waywardness, remember the truth, and reorient ourselves to the ways of God. One of the ways we do this is through worship. In worship, we share a story of the world that redefines success and meaning in regard to love of God and love of others. Worship reorients our definition of success and meaning and re-centers us around God and our relationship to others. Worship demands that we give primacy to God, not self - God, not stuff. God, not mammon, is our trust.

Another way we fight idolatry is through the discipline of giving.

The offering of money... [is] a key moment in our worship. We live in a culture that worships money and neglects or forgets God. We are meant to live worshiping God and slaying the idols in our lives--including money. When the time for the offering comes each week, the practice helps us remember what belongs to us and what doesn't, helps us understand what the Sabbath does to stewardship of all that we have.

It is not a cheap way of buying off our conscience or buying God's love. It's meant to be an act of surrendering our first fruits and facing down the power of money status, achievement, self-absorption. In the offering we practice turning over power.[7]

Through the offering, we learn to recognize God's gifts to us and share responsibility for the welfare of others.

Indebted to Others

We seek to show extravagant generosity in order to reflect our generous God. But there is another reason we do so. We are connected to one another more than we realize, and we are indebted to the extravagant generosity of others more than we can fathom.

Every sanctuary and chapel in which we have worshiped, every church organ that has lifted our spirits, every pew where we have sat, every communion rail where we have knelt, every hymnal from which we have sung, every praise band that has touched our hearts, every church classroom where we have gathered with our friends, every church kitchen that has prepared our meals, every church van that has taken us to camp, every church camp cabin where we have slept--all are the fruit of someone's Extravagant Generosity. We have been the recipients of grace upon grace. We are the heirs, the beneficiaries of those who came before us who were touched by the generosity of Christ enough to give graciously so that we could experience the truth of Christ for ourselves. We owe the same to generations to come. We have worshiped in sanctuaries that we did not build, and so to us falls the privilege of building sanctuaries where we shall never worship.[8]

Extravagant Generosity is not limited to finances. Generosity is giving of ourselves - not just our treasure, but our time and talents. Perhaps you are in a tight financial position and cannot contribute financially. You can still practice Extravagant Generosity. I invite you to support Immanuel with your prayers, presence, gifts, and service so that we can be a people of Extravagant Generosity.

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© Richard J. Vincent, 2008