Sunday, November 8 · Celebration Church
Manage Your Resources
The sermon turns on trusting God with what a person has rather than leaning on their own understanding, and on honoring him with the firstfruits of what he gives.
The passages
Trust in Yahweh with all your heart, and don’t lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight. Don’t be wise in your own eyes. Fear Yahweh, and depart from evil. It will be health to your body, and nourishment to your bones. Honor Yahweh with your substance, with the first fruits of all your increase; so your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will overflow with new wine.
Proverbs 3:5–10
Go deeper
What does it look like to trust God with the whole heart instead of leaning on one's own understanding?
Solomon sets two ways of deciding side by side. A person can lean on their own read of a situation, or trust a God whose direction sometimes looks like a detour, and the promise is that he makes the path straight. Even the wise king asked to be led rather than to lead himself.
Trust in Yahweh with all your heart, and don’t lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.
Proverbs 3:5–6
Then David the king went in and sat before Yahweh; and he said, “Who am I, Lord Yahweh, and what is my house, that you have brought me this far? This was yet a small thing in your eyes, Lord Yahweh, but you have spoken also of your servant’s house for a great while to come; and this among men, Lord Yahweh! What more can David say to you? For you know your servant, Lord Yahweh. For your word’s sake, and according to your own heart, you have worked all this greatness, to make your servant know it. Therefore you are great, Yahweh God. For there is no one like you, neither is there any God besides you, according to all that we have heard with our ears. What one nation on the earth is like your people, even like Israel, whom God went to redeem to himself for a people, and to make himself a name, and to do great things for you, and awesome things for your land, before your people, whom you redeemed to yourself out of Egypt, from the nations and their gods? You established for yourself your people Israel to be your people forever; and you, Yahweh, became their God. “Now, Yahweh God, the word that you have spoken concerning your servant, and concerning his house, confirm it forever, and do as you have spoken. Let your name be magnified forever, saying, ‘Yahweh of Armies is God over Israel; and the house of your servant David will be established before you.’ For you, Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, have revealed to your servant, saying, ‘I will build you a house.’ Therefore your servant has found in his heart to pray this prayer to you. “Now, O Lord Yahweh, you are God, and your words are truth, and you have promised this good thing to your servant. Now therefore, let it please you to bless the house of your servant, that it may continue forever before you; for you, Lord Yahweh, have spoken it. Let the house of your servant be blessed forever with your blessing.”
2 Samuel 7:18–29
But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed. For that man shouldn’t think that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
James 1:5–8
Why does Solomon tie fearing God and honoring him with wealth to health for the body and abundance for the barns?
The sermon's second move is about resources: what a person does with the first and best of what they have. Solomon puts the offering and the healing in the same sentence, and the picture is of a giver who holds back nothing first. The widow who gave her last coins knew the arithmetic Solomon is describing.
Honor Yahweh with your substance, with the first fruits of all your increase; so your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will overflow with new wine.
Proverbs 3:9–10
Jesus sat down opposite the treasury and saw how the multitude cast money into the treasury. Many who were rich cast in much. A poor widow came and she cast in two small brass coins, which equal a quadrans coin. He called his disciples to himself and said to them, “Most certainly I tell you, this poor widow gave more than all those who are giving into the treasury, for they all gave out of their abundance, but she, out of her poverty, gave all that she had to live on.”
Mark 12:41–44
Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me! But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In tithes and offerings. You are cursed with the curse; for you rob me, even this whole nation. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and test me now in this,” says Yahweh of Armies, “if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there will not be enough room for. I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast its fruit before its time in the field,” says Yahweh of Armies. “All nations shall call you blessed, for you will be a delightful land,” says Yahweh of Armies.
Malachi 3:8–12