Happy Mother's Day, everyone.
Is everyone celebrating, having fun celebrating Mother's Day?
That was very not enthusiastic.
Do we have a lot of disappointed moms out here today?
Happy Mother's Day?
There we go.
All right, just checking.
I have an amazing mother.
She's a very, very generous person.
I love my mom, and I think, you know, growing up,
I just saw again and again and again this generous heart in her.
This willingness to help out people when they had needs.
This willingness to, you know, if someone had a new baby,
to organize people to cook meals for them for weeks
so that they wouldn't have to worry about where's our food coming from.
And just this willingness to open up our house
and have guests come over and even move in with us.
And I think, you know, having this day be Mother's Day,
talking about generosity today is an amazing way
to remember our mothers in the way that they're generous to us.
And, you know, today we're talking about money,
which, you know, Mother's Day, talk about money, I don't know.
I didn't schedule that one.
But I think, you know, the theme of generosity
and on Mother's Day celebrating our mothers
by talking about generosity is a great way to honor them.
And so we're in Romans 12 again, just like last week.
And if you were not here last week,
Chris Thornton started us out talking about generosity,
and he did a great job laying the foundation
for why we're generous
and what it looks like for us to be generous.
So I'm not going to go over that foundation again as much this week.
So if you weren't here, you can check out the podcast online.
It's on the website.
But today we're going to look at our generosity.
Why should we be generous with our money?
And as we just read, we're looking at Romans chapter 12.
And I want us to see something at first,
that God's generosity motivates our generosity.
As we look at the first verse of Romans chapter 12,
it says,
I appeal to you, brothers, by the mercies of God.
And basically what Paul's talking about here
is he's referring back to the rest of the letter of Romans
that he's written so far,
which we've been discussing for a few months here.
And we talked about how we have rebelled against God.
We said, God, we don't want you in our lives.
We don't want to have anything to do with you.
We were separated from him relationally.
We were separated from him on a legal status.
We were guilty.
We were deserving of a punishment.
And God stepped in when we were in this rebellious state,
and he gave his life for us.
And he gave us this thing called righteousness
that Paul talks about a lot.
And we said this righteousness,
it's a new relationship with him,
a right relationship with him
that's given to us as a gift.
And he gives us this new legal status with him.
This, instead of being guilty,
we're free, we're innocent, we're saved.
Paul says it in another place,
in 2 Corinthians chapter 8,
that God shows his generosity to us,
that Christ, though he was rich,
he became poor for our sake,
that we, by his generosity, might become rich.
In God's mercies,
in God's salvation,
we see the generosity of God.
And Paul's saying that needs to be our motivation
for any generosity that we have,
because anything less than that is going to leave us short.
It's not going to give us the strength that we need to be generous.
And Paul says,
when we see the generosity that God has shown to us,
when we see the mercies that God has given to us,
there's only one acceptable response.
He says,
I appeal to you, brothers, by the mercies of God,
to present your bodies as a living sacrifice.
Now when he says bodies here,
he's talking about everything that we are.
We live as embodied beings, right?
Like, I don't do anything apart from my body.
I don't sit at home on the couch and think,
hmm, I'm going to visit my family in the States in my mind right now.
No, we have a word for what is happening there.
It's called not visiting my family in the States.
Because my body is in Hong Kong.
If I'm not doing it with my body, I'm not doing it, right?
We don't call up on the telephone and be like,
I'm making a telephone call with my soul
and hope that they understand what's going on, right?
Because we're embodied, we use our mouths and our ears
and we're there, right?
And so when Paul says, present your bodies,
he's talking about everything you are, you.
That's the acceptable response to God
and what he has done for us.
He doesn't say,
in light of the mercies of God,
empty your bank accounts, give it all to the church.
He says, no, give yourself to God.
And in some ways, I think it would be easier
if he just said, you know, give all your money.
And here's why.
Because that is something, we can do it,
we can achieve it, we can move on with life.
If we have enough money, we can get our names
put on some cool buildings because we paid for them to be built.
But really, it's just external actions
and it doesn't require any change of heart.
If he says, because of what God's done for us,
just empty your bank account, give it all away,
go on with life.
We can do that, we can move on.
We can check it off the box.
But he says, no, there needs to be a total transformation of us.
We need to give ourselves.
I was talking with someone this week
and he was actually saying,
you know, a lot of times in Hong Kong,
people have lots of money,
but they have skills and gifts and talents
that are more valuable than their money.
And a lot of people don't want to get involved in stuff
in the ways that they could be the most beneficial,
so they give their money
so that they don't have to give their skills
and talents and abilities.
Another time I was talking to a Hong Kong banker
and he said, you know, it's really easy for me
to just write checks and give to charities all day long.
I could write checks and write checks and write checks
until my bank account is down to zero.
But if I really want to make a difference,
if I really want to impact these organizations
that I'm supporting,
I have to get involved in strategizing with them
so that they can make the best use of the money
that I'm giving them.
He says, there's something more than my money
that's required if I really want to make an impact.
And that's exactly what Paul is saying here,
that God, he wants all of us.
He doesn't want just our money.
That's going to come with all of us.
But he wants our entire lives to be for him.
You know, there's a pastor in New York named Tim Keller.
And he has a story about a time
when he was talking with this lady
and she felt, she believed
that we have to be good people
and then God will accept us.
And that's what she had believed her entire life.
And this pastor was explaining to her,
that's not how it works.
Our salvation is totally dependent on God.
God does everything to save us.
All that we bring is our need for a savior.
And this woman, she had never heard this before.
It was revolutionary to her.
And she sat there and she thought about it
and she responded,
that is a terrifying idea.
And Tim Keller's like,
what are you talking about?
This is freeing.
This is amazing.
This is great.
And the woman said,
no, this is terrifying
because if there's anything at all
that I can do to contribute to my salvation,
that limits how much God can ask of me.
But if God does everything
that is required for my salvation,
there's no limit to what he can ask of me
because I completely, totally belong to him.
She nailed it.
And that's exactly what Paul is saying
right here at the start today of Romans 12.
That because God has saved us,
because he has reached out to us
when we were far away,
because he provided what we need for salvation,
and it's not dependent on us,
it's dependent on him.
This life that we have,
there's no limit to what he can ask of us.
And the only proper response that we can give
is to give our entire lives,
our entire selves to him.
But I think when we come to this point
and we think about what it looks like to follow him,
one of the things that's hardest for us,
one of the things that's most difficult for us
to give up is our money.
And I think there's a lot of reasons for this.
You know, in the States,
I don't know if they've got statistics like this
for Hong Kong.
I searched and couldn't find them.
But in the States,
the average Christian gives less than 3%
of their income away.
We serve a God who gave his life for us.
And yet we find it so hard to be generous
with our money.
And I think there's a number of reasons
that apply to us across the board,
whether we have lots of money
or almost no money,
for why we find it so difficult
to be generous with our money.
And so I've listed out some of these reasons
and I want to go through them with us today
and see why each of them doesn't really stand up.
The first one
is that far too many of us
have established far too many treasures
in this world.
And here's what I mean by that.
Jesus said,
wherever your treasure is,
that's where your heart's going to be.
So if we take all of our money
and we invest it in a certain company,
we're going to pay way more attention
to that company's stock
than we would otherwise
because our treasure is linked with that company.
In the same way,
if we take all of our money
and we dump it into a car,
we're going to pay lots and lots of attention
to that car
because it is valuable to us
because that's where our treasure is.
And for a lot of us,
we've spent our entire lives
investing our treasures,
our time,
our money,
our talents
into things that the world says are valuable.
Things that aren't bad in themselves,
but things that,
if we focus on them exclusively,
can turn our attention away from God
and towards them.
Things like education,
nice cars,
nice houses,
nice clothes.
not bad things.
But when we put our attention
on getting these things,
when we pour our treasures
constantly into these things,
our hearts follow where our treasures go.
And the more we invest our hearts
into these things,
the harder it is
to invest our hearts
into the things of God.
And as we follow our treasures,
we are drawn away from God
a lot of times.
And the more bound up
in the things of this world
our hearts are,
the harder it is
for us to begin to be generous
with God.
I think another reason
that we find it difficult
to be generous
is that we believe money
can bring us happiness
in a way that few other things can.
Money is powerful.
Money gets us stuff.
Money gives us security.
Money, we think,
will give us happiness.
There's an article
in the most recent edition
of Vanity Fair,
and it was called
Perfection Anxiety.
It was about how people
with lots and lots of money
think that lots and lots of money
will make them happy,
but really it just adds stress
to their lives
because everything
has to be perfect.
And once you get perfect stuff,
you have to buy
newer, better,
more perfect stuff
to keep up your appearances.
And he had this,
the author had this line
in the article.
It was deeply insightful.
He said,
we already secretly know
that money doesn't do
what it promises.
Nothing has ever given us
as much pleasure
as our pocket money
when we were 12,
or our first wage
at the end of that
first exhausting week
paid in folded cash.
Now we're 10 times richer,
but we're not 10 times happier.
If we had billions,
we don't realistically believe
that we'd be a billion times
better off.
As one art dealer said to me,
if you want to know
what God thinks of money,
look at the people
he gives it to.
We believe that having more money
will make us happier.
Maybe we don't believe
that having a billion dollars
will make us a billion times happier,
but we believe maybe having
a couple more million
might make us a couple times happier.
And so we seek it,
and we go for it,
and we go after it,
and we know,
if I'm generous,
there are things that I want to buy
that I can't buy.
There are promises
that money holds out to me
that I know I can't get
if I'm generous
and if I give stuff away.
And we hold on to this promise
that money has,
seems to offer us,
and we seek it,
and we go after it,
and we aren't generous
because we believe
that money will give us
these things.
And the author of that article,
he finished off the article
saying,
being able to afford
everything you desire
is not by any means
the worst thing
that can happen to you.
But depressingly,
and more profoundly,
neither is it the best.
This is vanity affair.
This is,
you know,
go out here to figure out
what insignificant things
are happening in the world,
right?
And they've got it figured out.
Money holds out this promise,
and it can't deliver on
the promise that it gives us.
But so many of us
hold on to this promise,
and we believe it,
and we spend our lives
seeking it
and going after it.
And it's empty.
It's hollow.
It's not going to give us
what it promises,
but because we believe
that it will,
we find it so hard
to be generous.
I think a third reason
that we find it hard
to be generous
is that we don't actually
believe that God
is generous with us,
or that he will be
generous with us.
You know,
Paul is saying here
in Romans chapter 12,
the primary reason
why we should be generous
is because God
has already been
generous with us.
He has given us
his life.
He has saved us.
And I think far too many
of us far too often
think,
yes,
I can trust in God
to provide for me
spiritually,
but I'm not sure
that I can trust in him
to put food on my table
or a roof over my head,
so I need to go out
and I need to work
for those things myself.
And we forget
the fact that
everything we have
comes from God.
Even the fact
that we're able to work,
right?
Like,
I don't know how often
you guys think about this.
It's something that
I don't think about that much.
But like,
there was nothing
that we did
to make ourselves
be born into the situation
in life that we were born into.
We could very easily
have been born
into a tribe
in the middle of the jungle
where we never had access
to jobs
or education
or the outside world.
Yet God allowed
each of us
to be born into a situation
where we could come here,
you know,
be in the place in life
where we are right now
where we have roofs
over our head,
where we have clothes to wear,
where we have food to eat.
All of that
is a gift of his generosity
that we did absolutely
nothing to deserve.
And yet,
I think far too often
we're afraid,
what if I lose my job?
I can't give away
what I have right now
because I need to know
that if things go wrong,
I can take care of myself
later on.
And we ignore the fact
that just as God
has taken care of us
up till this point,
he will continue
to take care of us.
And I think
sort of building on that,
but I think it deserves
its own separate mention,
we also don't believe
that other Christians
in the church
will take care of us
if we're in need.
Historically,
one of the biggest reasons
that people in the church
were generous
is because they knew
that when they were in need,
the church would be
generous to them.
So if you have like
Alex, Billy, and Chris,
and each of them
has jobs and families,
and then Chris gets sick
and loses his job,
Alex and Billy step up
and they give to him,
and then he gets back
on his feet,
he's doing okay,
and then Alex loses his job,
and Billy and Chris
give to him.
And everyone's able
to be generous
to each other
because they know
when they have needs,
everyone else
will be generous to them.
But today we live
in this society,
in this world,
in this church culture
where it's all about
us as individuals
or us as individual families.
And we're afraid
to help out other people
when they're in need
because what if I fall into need?
What if I lose my job?
Will people take care of me?
And I think,
realistically,
most of us
don't trust each other
to provide for us
if we're in need.
I once heard a story
about this pastor
in California,
in the States.
And he said he was
at a meeting
with all of the elders
from his church,
and they were talking
about life insurance
and how each of them
has life insurance
their families
are taken care of
if something bad
happens to them
and they die.
And all of a sudden,
one of the elders
speaks up,
and he says,
hey,
I'm going to go out
there for myself.
I'm going to say this.
You guys can cancel
your life insurance policies
because if anything happens
to any of you,
I will take care
of your family
as if they were my own.
And another guy
stands up and he says,
yeah,
I'll do that too.
If anything happens
to any of your families,
I promise that I will
take care of them
as if they were my own.
And they go around
the entire circle
and every man in there
stands up and says,
if you guys,
if anything happens
to any of you,
I will take care
of your families
as if they were my own.
And they all went out
and they canceled
their life insurance policies
because they knew
that they had
each other's backs.
And they said
they were able
to take that money
and give it away generously
because they weren't
concerned about
what would happen
if something happened
to them
because they knew
this group of people
that was in that room
had their backs
and had their family's backs.
I think for most of us
in this room,
if we had someone
say that to us,
we'd be like,
no way.
I'll believe that
when I see it,
but since I won't
be around to see it,
I'll hedge my bets
and keep my life insurance,
right?
We live in this society
that is very individually focused.
We don't believe each other
that we have each other's backs.
It's sad.
And Paul says right here
in chapter 12,
verse 5,
that we are one body
in Christ
and individually members
of one another.
Now,
if we think about that picture,
we're all part
of the same body.
You know,
in my body,
sometimes I get injured.
In November,
I had my knees injured
for a couple months.
And the rest of your body
can't go on
as if nothing happened.
The rest of your body
adjusts
because of that pain
in your knees.
Your knees are something
you don't really think about them
until they stop working
like they're supposed to,
right?
You take your knees
for granted all the time
and then you get pain
in your knee
and every single step
is agony.
And so for a couple weeks,
I'd be walking along
and if there was a railing there,
I would grab onto the railing
and spread the weight,
you know,
around my arm
and upper body
because I wanted
to take the weight
off of my knees.
The stronger parts
of my body
picked up the slack
for the weaker parts.
If I was walking normally,
I'd try and readjust
the weight on my feet
from the way
I would normally walk
so that it would take
the stress off the parts
of my knees
that were hurting.
I was more likely
to sit down
and take a rest
or take a break
which took a hurt
to my pride
but it gave my knees
a rest
and my knees
needed that rest
because they were injured
because my knees
don't exist
in isolation
from the rest of my body.
My knees are a part
of the body
and if that part
of my body
is hurting,
if that part
of my body
is not working properly,
the rest of my body
needs to adjust
because of that.
And Paul says
in the same way,
we are one body.
Some of us are knees,
some of us are arms,
some of us are eyes
and ears
and toes
but just like in my body
when my knees
started hurting,
everything else
had to adjust.
He says
if someone here
is hurting,
we as the body
need to adjust.
We as the body
need to step in
and take care.
Those of us
who are stronger
in that time
need to step in
and help out
the ones who are weaker
in that time.
And there may be a time
when we who are stronger now
have trouble,
have pain.
But that's why we have a body
so that we can support
one another
so we can pick
one another up
so we can help
one another out.
and I think this is something
that we have lost
in the church today
where we don't understand
that we are a body.
We see ourselves
as individuals
not as individual members
of a whole.
And I think if we understood
that we are a body,
if we knew
that everyone has my back
and so I can have theirs,
it frees us.
It liberates us
to go out there
and to live life generously
because if something
happens to me
and I lose out
on all that I have right now,
I'm not actually losing out
because I have other people
who will take care of me
when that happens to me.
And I think
because we've lost
this view of us
as a body,
we lose out
on our opportunities
to be generous.
Another reason
we find it so hard
to be generous
is that we don't see
what benefit
we're getting
from our giving.
We live in a world
where the questions
we ask with our money
are what profit
will I get from this?
How will this benefit me?
And generosity
by definition
does not benefit us.
It's other focused.
You're not going to
give out your money
as an investment
and get it back
with interest.
It's a gift.
And we find it so hard
to do that
because we've trained
ourselves so much.
I give something
and I get something
in return.
And generosity
is about I give something
so that someone else
can get something.
And our mindset
is so totally different
from what's required
for true generosity
that we can't wrap
our heads around
the idea
of giving something
away to help
someone else.
And there are
definitely more reasons
but the final one
that I came up with
for why we find it
so hard to be generous
is because being
truly generous
requires us
to get involved
in the lives
of other people
in ways that are
often discouraging
frustrating
and uncomfortable.
A lot of times
we can hear about
a need
and think
the easy thing
to do is to just
pump money into this.
Give money.
But a lot of times
people's needs
aren't due
to a lack of resources.
It's due to a lack
of understanding
of how to use resources
when they have them.
Or there's other issues
that underlie
the lack of resources.
resources.
And so just pumping
resources and money
into the situation
doesn't actually
fix the problem.
A lot of times
it can make it worse.
And we can give money
and give money
and find out
that the problem's
still there.
And then it becomes
frustrating
because I've done
so much for this person.
I've given so much.
Why isn't the problem
fixed?
And a lot of times
what's needed
for our generosity
is for us to step in
to get involved
in their lives.
You know,
Paul says in
chapter 12,
verse 13,
contribute to the needs
of the saints.
We can't know
what the true needs are
in each other's lives
unless we're deeply involved
in each other's lives.
We can see
surface level things
that appear to be needs
and try and address those
without getting deeply involved.
But a lot of times
they'll leave us frustrated.
to truly know
what the needs are,
we need to get involved
in each other's lives.
And when we do that,
it gets messy.
And we get dragged
into these messes
that we didn't create
that we're not responsible for.
It's frustrating.
It's uncomfortable.
It's messy.
But it's what's required of us
if we're going to be
truly generous,
if we're truly going
to look out
for the needs of others
and not just give
to satiate our guilt.
for having more
while they're having trouble.
One example of a time
that this could happen is,
and I've got to be careful
with this because there
might be people in here
who are struggling
with this issue,
but I know it's a very
common issue in Hong Kong
is that Filipino maids
will come over here
to provide for their families.
And they want to take care
of their families
and they want to give,
give, give, give, give, give.
But they've never been taught
how to budget.
So they give, give, give, give, give,
and give away more
than they actually have
and then they fall into debt
and they have trouble
with loan sharks.
And you know,
this is a situation
if you hear about it
and you think,
oh, this person's in debt,
I have resources,
I can help them,
and you give money,
but then the next month
you hear that they're in debt again
because they've just kept
giving, giving, giving,
giving, giving.
And what's needed there
is not just someone
to pump money in.
The issue isn't a lack of resources.
The issue is not knowing
how to budget,
not knowing how to say no
when people ask for money.
And what that person,
what that helper really needs
is for someone to step
into their life,
to come alongside them,
to say, you know,
here's how you budget money.
If someone asks you for money
and you don't have money,
it's not a shameful thing
to say, no,
I can't give you anything
because I don't have
anything more to give.
But that requires us
to step in to get messy.
And I think a lot of times
it's far too uncomfortable for us.
It's far too difficult.
And really,
if we're trying to be generous
for ourselves
and not for the good of others,
that type of generosity
will crush us.
If we're trying to run
on our own motivation,
our own strength,
and not looking at God
and His generosity
as our motivation
for our generosity,
that type of generosity
will crush us.
And God,
He wants us to be generous.
He wants us to give our money,
but He also wants us
to give ourselves.
Right?
We said that already.
But there's a part
of His mercies
that Paul talks about
earlier in the book of Romans
that I sort of left out
earlier in the sermon
when I was talking
about God's mercies.
Paul talks a lot about
God's mercies towards us
as individuals.
But he also talks about
God's mercies
to the universe as a whole.
In Romans chapter 8,
Paul says that God
is in the process
of making all things new.
That God,
that God is going
to restore creation.
That creation knows
about this
and it's crying out
like the pains of childbirth,
just waiting for something
new to be born.
that it feels
this,
this weight,
waiting for something.
Waiting for something
that it knows is coming,
but it doesn't know when.
And it knows
it's going to be amazing.
And someday,
God's going to finish
this work
and He's going to make
all things new.
But it says today,
He's calling us
and inviting us
to be a part of that process.
He's inviting us
to join Him
in what He's doing.
So when we say
we're,
we're inspired
by God's mercies,
yes,
it's God's mercies
towards us as individuals.
The fact that He's saved us
when we didn't deserve it.
The fact that He's purchased us.
But it's also
His doing
of making all things new.
There are a lot of things
that we as a church
want to do.
We want to reach out
to the western side
of Hong Kong Island.
We want to be in the schools.
We want to be in the universities.
We want to be involved
in homeless ministries
and inner city ministries.
And we want to,
we want to be out there.
And again,
these are things
that I think are awesome things
for the kingdom.
I get excited
when I hear about the things
that we as a church are doing.
And it's true,
God doesn't need us.
God doesn't need our money
to do the things
that He's going to do
in the world.
But there are certain ways
that we as a church,
Watermark,
want to be a part of that
that we can't do
without funding.
And so I want to,
I want to close today
by dreaming a little bit.
I want to think about
what could it look like
if we as a church
decided to be generous.
If we as a church
decided that we wanted
to partner with God
in what He's doing
in Hong Kong
and around the world.
And statistically,
I know there are many
exceptions to this rule
and a lot of them
in this room,
but statistically,
the more money you have,
the less likely you are
to be generous with it.
And so I want to dream big.
I want to dream
of what we could do
if we gave lots of money away.
And there are things
that I'm going to say
that some of us,
you know,
we can't do as individuals,
but if we feel passionate
about it,
we could get together
and these things
could become realities.
Right?
So I'm going to dream big
and then we're going
to close up.
The first thing
I want to throw out there,
church planting.
Watermark is a part
of a church planting network.
I don't know
if you guys know this,
but we're part
of a church planting network
that has a vision
of planting over 200 churches
in the next 10 years
in the Asia
and Australia region.
That's on average
over 20 churches a year
for the next 10 years
and hopefully
many, many more
after that.
These churches
will be in cities
that we as a church
cannot reach
from Hong Kong.
They'll be spread
all over.
They will reach
hopefully thousands,
tens of thousands,
maybe even hundreds
of thousands of people.
And every single one
of them requires
funding to get started.
What if someone
here today said,
I want to adopt
a church plant.
I want to sponsor it
for the first few years
until they can become
self-sustaining.
I want to give
or get a group
of us together
and together
sponsor a church plant.
And God could use
our generosity
to reach thousands
of people
around the world
in these new churches
that are starting
in countries
from Japan
to Thailand
to Australia
to Singapore.
All over.
Imagine the impact
that it could have
if we were generous
with what God
has given us.
Or another one.
I don't know
if you've realized it,
but we have a group
of Nepali kids
that come into church
here every Sunday.
And these kids
come from an area
of town
that's in desperate
need of educational
reform.
These kids go to schools
where they're taught
verbally and non-verbally,
you're a problem,
not a person.
These kids go to schools,
even though many of them
are very bright kids,
they go to schools
that crush any desire
for them to learn.
They go to schools
where, you know,
some kids in these schools
should be held back
because they haven't
learned the material yet,
but the teachers
don't want to deal
with discipline problems
that will be in the class
next year if the kids
stay back,
so they just push them
on to the next grade.
And kids in these schools
can be in sixth grade
and not even know
how to read.
This area of town
is in desperate need
for education reform.
They need a school
that will come in
and will teach the kids
that you have value
as a human being,
that you can contribute
to society
when you grow up,
that God loves you
and you have worth.
And there are people
in this church right now
who have a vision
and a dream
to start a school like that
in that neighborhood
that can reach out
to these kids,
that can drastically
impact their lives,
that can transform
a community.
But here's the thing,
the people with this dream
are teachers.
And starting a school
like this in Hong Kong
is very expensive,
a lot more than a teacher
could sponsor themselves.
Even if we found teachers
who could raise support
themselves
and come over here
and teach at the school,
you still need a venue,
you still need to get it
registered by the Hong Kong
government,
you still need to get
curriculum.
It's expensive.
But what if someone here
said,
I want to sponsor
a school like that
for the first two years.
I want to make
this dream a reality,
I want to impact
this neighborhood.
It's not something
that we're going to see
immediate results from.
It's not something
we're going to see
probably in the first
couple of years
results from.
But it's something
that in the course
of a generation
can totally transform
a community.
It's a way that God
can use us to be a part
of something much bigger
than ourselves in Hong Kong
if we decide
to be generous people.
Or maybe we put
these two dreams
of church planting
and starting a school
together and someone
either with lots of money
or lots of connections
says,
what if we just go
to that neighborhood
and we buy a building?
And inside that building
we start a school
and inside that building
we can start a new church.
And with any
leftover space
in that building
maybe we can put in
businesses that will
provide jobs for the community
or businesses that will
provide services
that will help the community
or affordable housing
for people in the community.
It would be amazing.
It would be awesome.
God could use our generosity
to transform
these communities.
I think, you know,
if that happened
it would be amazing.
We'd need a word
that's so big
that it's a word
you only use
when you have
no word for something
like supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.
I think these are
awesome, huge, big dreams.
They're possible
because we serve
an awesome, huge, big God
who has shown his love
to us in awesome,
huge, big ways.
But this type of generosity
isn't something
that we can just
force ourselves into.
Something we need
to understand
God's mercy to us.
We need to understand
the part that we play
in the work that he's doing
in the world
and see how he's inviting us
to be a part of it.
I just want to close
with that quote
from Vanity Fair again
because I think
it's deep.
I think it's
really, really
eye-opening.
He said,
if I can find it,
it's in here somewhere.
Well, he said,
we already secretly know
that money
can't give us
everything that it promises
to us.
no amount of money
has ever given us
the same amount of joy
that we had
when we had pocket money
at 12 years old.
No amount of money
has ever given us
the amount of joy
that we received
when we got that first
paycheck in folded cash
after our first
hard week of work.
We're 10 times richer,
but we're not
10 times happier.
And realistically,
we don't believe
that if we were
a billion times richer,
we would be
a billion times happier.
If you want to know
what God thinks
of money,
look at the people
he gives it to.
Let's pray.
Father,
we thank you
for your generosity
to us.
We thank you
for the fact
that you have loved us
when we did not deserve it,
that you have purchased
our salvation
entirely
at a cost to you
and completely
freely for ourselves.
We pray that we would
recognize the call
that we have
to give our lives,
our entire lives,
to you.
And that along
with our lives,
we would be generous
with our money.
We would not live
in fear of what
would happen
if something happened
to us after we were
generous.
That we would see
the work you're doing
in the world,
that we would partner
with you in that,
and that you would
use our generosity
to transform the city
of Hong Kong,
the continent of Asia,
and the entire world.
And in Jesus' name,
Amen.