Gateway Church's Podcast
The 90 Day Challenge
Well good morning We're in the middle of a series on finances remember we started back in January with break through That's Robert felt like the Lord spoke strongly to him that we wanted break through in several areas of our lives One of those areas would be in the area of faith and we spent four weeks on faith And then we for spent four weeks on family and then we went into freedom How can we become free and live before God without these bondages and chains that seemed to hold us three weeks ago? We started a series right now on break through in finances and pasture. Robert started with two sermons on the same title The ten financial commandments and so he's preached six of those financial commandments next weekend He'll be back and he'll conclude the ten financial commandments next weekend right here And then we'll have a complete series, but today I want to continue in that series and share with you really out of my own personal life Hi, I was talking to the Lord last night before I came up and I said Lord, you know a couple months ago I got to share on family and what how how big a self absorbed jerk I was you know And now you're asking me to speak on finances and tell everybody how much it fell Am I ever gonna get to preach on anything I do, right? He said I don't know son. Have you ever done anything right? I Said well, I did about 30 years ago. I'm celebrating my 30th year this year of being saved. I said someday I'm gonna talk about salvation because I've done that right By the way, I was one year old when I got saved so If you have your bibles on I wanted I wanted just take you to a couple of scriptures this morning and Kind of show you how he showed me I want you to turn to Luke chapter 19 We're gonna look at three or four or five verses there in a minute and then I also want you to turn to Haggad chapter two If you haven't found Haggad in a while it is in the Old Testament if you'll find Matthew just back up three books And you're there it's one of the minor prophets and Luke chapter 19 and Haggad chapter two Now I want you to understand where I've been financially Just just so you'll get a picture because I want to paint a picture for you this morning Jenny and I've been married 22 years this May and We have done everything wrong in the finance area that you can imagine If it's possible if it's capable of being done, we've done it We had a foreclosure in 1988 it's a painful experience. No fun. We're on the back side of that is it's a lot better than where we used to be We and when I woke up to the fact that we might be doing something wrong. We were $50,000 in credit card debt And listen it takes a real smart person to get to this place. It's almost brilliance And I woke up one day and I said, you know if I keep doing what I'm doing I may keep having what I've got Maybe we ought to change And the Lord said finally What he began to show me and I want to lay a foundation for you this morning what he began to show me We said son you're looking at finances from the world's standpoint from from a perspective of the world Now I have to tell you where we were when I when I woke up to this fact We had had a million dollars go through our hands in a short period of time and I had zero to show forth All I had was this Intermountable debt if we hiccup at all we went underwater. I Was the most angry man you had ever seen in your entire life? I'm trying to give some of you hope today When I would pay bills She would gather the children and leave My son can tell you he was just young enough to say that Pam bills. Let's go He's not a happy camper Hey, I was just I was filled with rage because I couldn't come up with any solutions for this to work and I really thought I had God's mind. I Was so far from it. He began to say to me. I'm gonna show you something when I came to earth I came for a purpose and he began to show me piece by piece and I'm gonna show you that inscriptive this morning Piece by piece and then I want to paint you a whole picture because Let me just turn to this verse right here. Don't turn there I just want you to read it. This is what Jesus. This is the purpose he came for in Matthew chapter 4 verse 17 This is what he said. This is the very first sermon he ever preached my fact is the very first sermon that he told the disciples when he sent him out by twos preach this sermon and When he sent the 70 baby Christians out by twos He said preach this sermon when he left after his death barrel and resurrection when he came back He kept talking about what I'm gonna show you right here in Matthew chapter 4 verse 17 It says from that time Jesus began to preach and to say repent for the kingdom of heaven as that hand This is what the Lord showed me see that little phrase the kingdom of heaven right there That phrase is in the New Testament 108 times Jesus spoke about it 87 of the 108 He said later in another verse he said for this purpose This is the purpose that I've come to reveal to you what I did not have in this area of finances I did not have a kingdom perspective. I had an earthly perspective And I was losing at that perspective really fast And what he said to me is if you want a breakthrough If you want to have a breakthrough in finances You are going to have to understand that there's a kingdom perspective that there's a kingdom look at what finances And what you're to do with your finances I talk about everything from a kingdom perspective if you want to know about salvation it comes out of the kingdom If you if you have his physical sickness in your body today, you don't need to seek his hand You need to seek the kingdom you may want to say seek the kingdom first and all these other things will be at it Listen, he talked about this all the time I think we're clueless today in the church about the kingdom He made many many comparisons the kingdom of heaven is like listen Jesus left heaven with his with his eternal perspective of it came to earth and says boys girl I want you to see You can have heaven on earth Remember, he told the disciples to pray Thy kingdom come Thy will be done where? Here on earth that's why he says it's that hand Now let me tell you about that word repent because that word repent mess me up I don't know about you I was raised in the nomination of church and when they use that word repent Repent for the kingdom it make me it make me jump every time Because I always thought that word meant you'd lower down dirty scumbag, you ought to change your ways You know I looked it up in the Greek and it doesn't mean that I was shocked I clicked on that word and I know Greek scholars I'm not trying to trick you at all I clicked on that one word and it says you know what you ought to reconsider you ought to change your mind Just think differently have a paradigm shift And here when I when I'm standing in this place of pain in my finances and I'm going to show you I'm going to show you today where I left the place of pain and went to a place of peace And I'm tired it was wonderful to be in this place of peace, but when I was here the Lord said I'm going to show you some financial principles from a kingdom mindset. How do you know every kingdom has a king? Every king sets up rules and and laws of operation for the kingdom. That's all Jesus came to show you He wants you to see the the laws and the principles of the finances from a kingdom perspective And when he began to show this I was right here in the place of pain He said I want to move you out of this place and this is where you are today I want to give you hope you don't have to stay here And he moved us into a place of peace and we stayed in that place of peace for for several years And it was wonderful my life and I was like, oh, this is so much better over here, but I'm saying where he's doing today He's moving us out of the place of peace into a place of purpose Listen, this is more this is more way more incredible than a place of peace because peace comes with it I didn't lose peace to get here I am now getting in the place of purpose and that's where I want you to see today So I want to I want you to see first of all point number one is that you must see it from a kingdom perspective If you're trying to look from the natural eyes, you'll never catch it. Tising makes zero sense in the natural eyes Why don't I just give my money away that that makes sense? I don't I need it See it makes no sense, but once you began to see it from a kingdom perspective and what the king of the kingdom said Then it's going to help you understand what God's saying So I want you I want you to look at four financial principles From a kingdom perspective the first one I want you to see is loot chapter 42 now Everything that I'm going to read to you this morning all these financial principles come from the king's lips Jesus now having you know that you can argue tithing his Old Testament You can say I thought about that. Okay. I want you to see it from a kingdom perspective from the king himself What's this Luke chapter 11 verse 42 principle number one Whoa to you Pharisees now he talked to the Pharisees quite often that word whoa is not wow That word whoa means whoa whoa whoa you're missing something here whoa back up Whoa to you Pharisees for you tithe man and ruin all manner of herbs and pass by Justice and the love of God these you also have done without leaving the others undone Did you see right there Jesus said tithing is right? Listen, I'm not trying I'm not I'm not trying to build a case on tithing I'm just trying to tell you if you want to have breakthrough and you're in finances in your life today If you're in a place of pain and you want to get out of that place of pain I want to show you right here from the lips of Jesus. He said tithing is right You want more detail about it? I'm just I'm building just a small case and I don't have time to build on each one of these if you want more evidence about this You want to study a deeper rich study go back to last August or September our pastor preached a message on ytide? It's found just go right there on our website gateway people calm download that message ytide It's in August September He preached on an entire series called live to give and in that message. He goes into great detail all the way from Genesis to Revelation He'll show you not only what Jesus said, but he'll show you what the prophet said He'll show you what happened in the wall. He'll show you all that. It's wonderful if you're struggling in this area Just just download it's free won't cost you a thing and Listen to what he says there Principle number one tithing is right according to Jesus now I'm going to skip principle number two because this is the one I didn't do very well So I'm going to skip over it. I'm going to come back to you and I'll show you why in just a minute principal number three Jesus recognized his offerings now one day he was standing in the and in the temple and they were they were giving Offerings they were they were bringing by gifts. We pick it up in Luke chapter 21 verse one It says this and he looked up saw the rich putting in their gifts into the treasury And he also saw a certain poor widow putting into mites This is what he makes a comment concerning that verse three truly. I say to you Jesus said that this poor widow has put in more than all For all these out of their abundance have put in offerings. I want you to stop right there. Do you see that word offerings? Principle number two Jesus recognizes offerings and who are those offerings for? Therefore God this is the tide or is this different? I'm trying to give you a kingdom perspective this morning if you're going to have breakthrough in your finances You're going to have to understand what Jesus recognizes. See he's the king Jesus recognizes offerings they were for God, but he says he finishes out verse four But she out of her poverty put in all of her livelihood. That's why she gave more. Can I tell you what an offering does? It gets God's attention You may prove it to you Solomon when he became king the required requirement to become king you had to make a sacrifice I think it was one bull if I know I know I know it's at least one it could be up to him This is what I know Solomon did he didn't offer the one or ten he offered a thousand Now is that a sacrifice uh-huh and what what was the response of God? Ask me whatever you want. He never said this anybody asked me whatever you want. I'll give it to you Do you think an offering might get God's attention? It does You remember when Jesus was born the three wise men brought gifts same identical word of this word offering They brought gifts and offering to God okay principle number three Jesus recognizes offerings principle number four Jesus also recognizes alms and alms are different from offerings alms are the same thing as charitable deeds What's this looking Luke chapter 12 verse 32? Do not fear little flock for it's your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom Here he is talking about the kingdom again You ought to do a word search on this you ought to do a word study on the kingdom of just look on the kingdom of the kingdom of heaven And the kingdom of God do it and begin to let God speak to you about his kingdom I'm telling you I'm in this right now and I can't get over it All right look at verse 33 sell what you have and give what? Now is this what's the difference between an almond and offering? Can we see the tide I want you to see this i'm trying to paint you a whole picture He said principle number one is you ought to tie Jesus said you ought to tie I'm gonna skip number two number three. He said I recognize offering so offerings get my attention principle number four alms What's the difference between an almond and offering? An almond is a charitable deed on almost a benevolent gift You remember the beggar who was sitting at the temple when peter and john came and they were going to the house of prayer And they were going to pray and he sat out there and what was he begging? alms He could not make a livelihood for himself so he needed somebody to help him Did you see right there where jesus said sell what you have and give alms? Jesus recognizes he sees it and peter and john said silver and gold have i none i know you need money But what i do have i give to you rise up and walk now if the beggar comes back to next day And sits at the temple gate after being hidden begging alms then he gets a conversation No longer is he gonna get on you gotta go to work now, but you've been healed go back to work So but jesus recognizes alms he recognizes tithing he recognizes offerings and he recognizes alms now This is where my story really picks up We were doing all this And we were not blessed I mean you read the blessed life The blessed life is about offerings and alms It's about giving it talks a little bit about tithing, but it talks Talks mainly about offerings and all and and i pastor robert I mean i've known pastor robert over 15 18 years now and i've been listening to his sermons and i went to him I said pastor robert i'm i gotta be real honest with you Your your message on tithing and your message i'm giving is second to none. I mean that it is incredible It just doesn't work Now you have to be a friend to say that to him I said listen. I don't know if it's one of those pulpit pew things, you know, it works in the pulpit But it don't work in the pew, but i'm telling from the pew standpoint bro. This is not working I said jenny and i've done everything you said we tithe and we give offerings and we give above and we give and we double tithe And we i mean all those things you talk about i mean I want some stories like you got, you know, i'm becoming a preacher and i got to have stories i'm got no stories It's bad to be a preacher and you don't have stories He said well that kind of bothers me. That's what i'm not trying to bother you. I'm just trying to tell you the truth It's good stuff good material, but it don't work He said i'm gonna pray about that i said do whatever you want He comes back in a couple of days and he says i prayed about what you said I said you did he said yep and the Lord spoke to me. I said great. What do you say? He correct you Are you off a little bit you missing something bro? He said no, but you are He said you missed in principle number two It's called stewarding He said jeff you're not living below your means here's your income and here's your outgo And he said the reason when you give offerings Yeah, you're not innocent blessed But the reason when you give offerings above your tithe the reason you don't see any return on that is because that's not your money Because you've already dedicated it to a house or to a car Or to that $50,000 credit card or to other things that you're trying to accomplish And because it's not yours, I can't bless it That's why you don't have any stories to tell He said what I assume people understand when I talk about tithing offerings and arms I assume I made an assumption that they know to live below their means Well, I want you to know Jesus makes no assumption. He speaks real clear to it look to loop chapter 19 I want to show you some of this second principle and then I want to give you just a couple of points And I'm going to end with the promise because I want you to know today If you're not stewarding well, I will make your promise today. That's like no other promise you've ever heard before The calvary can ride over the hill for you blowing the trumpet And you can be rescued we were Look at loop 19 Pastor Robert spoke two weeks ago On the parable of the talents. This is the sister story of that But I want you to see it and from a different light This is a story from an eternal perspective and I want to show it from eternity And I want to show it from the here and now I want you to see it from an eternal reward and I want you to see from a reward now All right, look at loop 19 verse 11 Now as they heard these things he spoke another parable Jesus talked his stories a lot to try to help people and help us to understand Because he was near Jerusalem and because the people of that they thought the kingdom of God would appear immediately You see this I'm telling the kingdom of God is everywhere you look Now watch this So he said to them in verse 12 A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return now stop look at that right there A certain nobleman goes into a far country to receive a kingdom for himself Jesus left heaven went into earth to receive what? A kingdom he wanted to reestablish the kingdom here on earth this kingdom is God Satan had taken it from adam and eve he wanted to reestablish it and then he was going to leave and then do what Return can you see it not only in the natural? Yes, there are kings that go and receive kingdoms, but there are also Jesus is the king who's coming back and he's going to return All right, see that so verse 13 So he called 10 of his servants and delivered to them 10 minus and said to them This is the command the king gave to the servants when he left do business until I return do business until I come Okay, you see that you see he's got servants that he's leaving behind Do you feel like Jesus has already left? Okay, do you know he's coming back? Okay, so you you can see an eternal perspective here, right? What did he give us a command to do while we're here? What did he give us to do while he was gone? He gave money and i'm going to show that and say he gave money to the servants to do business until he returns so Each week or each month or he's bi-weekly bi-monthly whatever when you get paid who's paying you It's coming from the king Okay, how much you see that look at verse 14, but the citizens of that country hated him And they sent delegation after him saying we will not have this man reign over us Does that sound like when Jesus was present on the earth? That everybody loved him They loved him so much they killed him Right Then you see this all right, so they said we don't want you ruling and reigning over us and they sent delegation We will not have you take over this kingdom that the sad part for them is they have no choice in this And my prayer for him is to have their eyes open so they can get in on the good stuff All right verse 15 and so it was when he returned say returned Jesus is coming back when he returned having received the kingdom when it's all set up He then commanded his servants to whom he had given the what Uh-huh, do you see that to be called to him that he might know how much every man had gained by trading now several years ago I'm in deep trouble Because I've not gained I've lost All right, you see why he wanted to change my eternal perspective He said I want you I want you to wake up. Yeah, then the first came to me saying master You're a miner the money you've given me has earned 10 minus every servant got one of the 10 And he said to him well done good servant because you have been faithful and little You will have authority over what? Is that now or is that an eternity? Do you see what you are doing right now has an eternal value to it What you're doing with what the king has given you has a has a implication of There's a reward on the other side with what you're already doing. I want you to get a heavenly perspective today This is not about how much stuff you can get right now It's about how much you can steward then the five came He said you'll be over five cities and the one came and said hey, hey, hey, I buried it I thought you and he said I take the one from him and do what give it to who? This is why won't you see there's a heavenly perspective. There's an earthly perspective. This is where I had missed it He said take the one from the one who did nothing with it and give it to the one with 10 He didn't say give him another city. He said give him the miner Why? Because he who stewards well will get more Why? Because he's a good steward Jesus is not going to keep Giving out to those who don't steward here. We were we were in this place of pain He had given us a lot and we hadn't stewarded anything My wife and I the saddest part of where we were we were not in unity I didn't know what was in her heart. She didn't know what was in my heart And we were just we were we were drifting further and further apart This is what I believe is probably the number one reason for divorce today. I was headed there fast And when we came to the table, I said to her baby. I want you to understand something. We're changing our ways I've lived in this place of pain way too long. I'm through living here I came to the table and I called her to the table and I said we've got to get a plan together Listen, I came out of sales. I know what it is to plan your work and work your plan We didn't have a plan and we didn't know what we were doing I had a couple several years ago come to me and they said jeff we can't afford to tithe I said really I said understand that said where did your money go? Yeah, I don't know I said well, let me tell you what we did We just sat down and began to track where our money went because we wanted to know one thing does it represent who we are we Needed to know we needed to have a system in place. I don't care if you call it a budget a cashflow analysis I know a budget seems like an ugly word to most people to us. We thought it would be prison My wife said I don't do that. That's so confining so constricting. I said well, I'm not living this way anymore I mean, this is where we were literally this is where we were she would go shopping You know ladies you've been out shopping before and you and she found one those incredible deals I mean, she called me on phone. Oh, honey. I've been out shopping and the lord led me to this dress It was on sale. I mean it was $300 and now it's only 50 and I mean they slashed it It's god. Can I buy it? I said honey, we don't have the money Then her voice would change. Did you play golf yesterday? I said I did She said how much did that cost? I said $50 She said we'll just count this as my golf You feel the tension It wasn't working You know, that's no longer in our lives Because we began to make a plan this couple that came to me. I said I want you to do me one one favor Not me a favor. I want you to do yourself a favor. I want you to write down everything you spend for the next 30 days Just write it down You don't have to categorize. You don't have to do it. Just write it down and bring it back in and I'll help you find out where your tithe's going I said, okay, so 30 days later. They came back in and said we don't need your help. We found our tithe I said really where's your tithe going? I said, well, um, talklebell McDonald's She said we we both work and we have two small kids and we were just going through all these drive-throughs And we didn't we didn't know I said how much did it add up? She said, I'm embarrassed to tell you It's $600 They didn't have a clue Are you eating your tithe It's not a healthy thing it will not pay long-term dividends So my wife and I we created our first month of budget And we're going to track it and we changed it for the next two months We kept changing until we got to something that really worked. Let me say what happened when we did this When we started catching the perspective that God wanted from heaven that if you'll steward what I give you I'll give you more But until you steward what I give you I can't give you more. Matter of fact, that's start taking away That's this principle And when we did this the first thing that we left was pain and we ushered right into the place of peace My wife said to me later. She said I did not know this could be so peaceful I said I didn't either and I'm the angry one This was so peaceful And we started having fun And we moved out of this place of of peace and now we're strategizing every dollar that he gives us We want to make sure it represents the kingdom Last September, I'll tell you I'll tell you a story. I told you I told pastor robert that it didn't work So I had to come back and repent When we started stewarding I came back last September the Lord led us to and again We don't do anything without unity now. She has a clothing lounge. She never even has to call me She goes grocery shopping. She never calls me. I don't get one phone call from the woman anymore About money. It's wonderful Last September the Lord spoke to us about giving to the miracle offering and she and I said you pray and operate So we we got separate numbers. We came together and I said what'd you get? She said you go first I said no, I'm not you go first and we had the fun little game and she finally we just kind of laid down the table and I It's amazing. We had the same thing We had a we had a down payment that we wanted to give as an offering to the Lord right then And then we have this 12-month thing that we and it's this identical And we were so excited. You know why for the first time it was our money It wasn't dedicated to anything else If we don't give it to the church, we can sit on it. We don't if we don't want to sit on it. We can blow it It's ours. We knew whatever we want to. It's not committed to anything So we came and we gave it it was so liberating to give something that was ours We left two weeks later to celebrate our 20th anniversary We flew to Puerto Rico and we spent a week at Puerto Rico and paid cash for the whole thing As a whole lot better than this place of pain And we flew back and when we got back to our house in our house with a check for The total amount of the down payment plus the 12 months that we're already going to commit it to give and was in one check I called up pastor. I said I just want you to know officially your teaching works It'll work for you too I'm going to close what's showing you one scripture out of high. I want you to flip over there. I got chapter two I want to give you some hope this morning High guys a book about two chapters long. It's about people that weren't obeying the Lord Just like we weren't obeying and stewarding we're obeying in three of the four principles But we weren't obeying in one area. So it's hide God's hands They have been told to build the temple and they weren't doing it because of the fear of the enemy Every time they started the enemy came and attacked them and they're like, we don't we don't like fighting We're peaceful people so we're just not building temple if it's going to cause as much ruckus And God comes to them and what I want to point out to you and I'm not going to read you the first three There are four dates in hagga, and I think it's important because I want you to see the the the kind of the Trans let's see how do I say this the progression that it takes in the four dates date number one is when God comes and says I want you to stop acting this way. I want you to build my house I put black meal do on you. You earn money. You put it in your pocket It falls out and there's nothing's growing like it should be there's there's there's light meal that I called a curse on the land And nothing's happening. Well, and you're without you're in the lack and he said I'm trying to get your attention Kind of like where I was I want your attention here And he said this was in the six month first day Okay The next word that you see about the date is the six month 24th day From the 21st day to the 24th date they didn't start working until the 24th day on the temple It took them 23 days to start working. Okay. You see that Then the next date in there in chapter two is the seventh month by the 21st day God comes back to him and says Hey, you're doing so good. Keep it up But the date that I want to show you Is the last date. I want you to see it. I got chapter two Because this one comes with a promise I got two verse 18 now consider from this day forward from what day from the 24th day of the ninth month now count back Day one was six day nine six day or six month first day Second date was six month 24th day last date is ninth month 24th day exactly 90 days See that Exactly 90 days from the 24th day of the ninth month from the day that the foundation of the lord's temple was laid Consider it is and any ask them a question. This is God talking to them is the seed still in the barn As yet the vine the fig tree the pomegranate and the olive tree have not yielded fruit What's it but from this day forward what Why? Because they had committed To being faithful to what he said I'll make you a promise you this morning if you'll commit to be faithful to these principles And I want you to understand something about stewarding it touches both ends If you don't steward, you're going to have a hard time tidying if you don't steward you're going to have nothing to give Stewarding really is the key Tithing gets your money blessed stewarding gives it pleat in a place that you can keep it blessed and be able to get it to multiply This is where the supernatural happened. I can tell you story after story after story about this 90 day challenge I've held up a mess of the 90 day challenge for this reason because I want to give you hope if you will commit To help to stewarding your money. I can I'll tell you one story good friends of mine had Got a really good job paying a lot of money bought a house according to that income and income drop Because they were tied theirs. They were givers, but they were just like me. They didn't steward And then they became become strangled And they put the house on the market It'd been on the market over a year and I kept gingerly nicely speaking to them. You need to change your ways It worked for us. It'll work for you. Finally, they they embraced it They were willing to lose all of the investment they had in the house They started what uh what we call a financial class is right here in your bullets And I just bring your attention to it if you want help in financial training. We're offering you a class We're not going to embarrass you in any way and i'm going to make you show us your budget We're not going to make you show us your debt not none of that We're just going to give you good tools to put in your hands so that you can do principle number two It's the whole purpose of why we're talking about this. We want to see you have breakthrough He started doing it They started the class the class last for 10 weeks plus a couple fellowships So it's right at 90 days when they started embracing this at the end of the night at the ninth day I kept saying on the ninth day you watch guys going to do something on the 90th day exactly They had several lookers never ever one offer in 19 months on their house On the 90th day they get a contract for full price On the 91st day they get two cash offers they said sorry you should have called on the 90th day Don't you have you red haga? Let me tell you what he told me in our clothes He suggested not about the money Because I can't tell you what it's done in my marriage I can't tell you what unity it's brought between me and my wife I can't believe we ever lived this way When we could have been living this way It's changed everything we've done The way we treat our kids everything All people Ask it embrace the 90 day challenge And put to work the principles of God Let's pray Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you for your kingdom principles. I thank you for your kingdom perspective Lord today, I especially ask That you help us move from places of pain and peace to that final place of purpose That we can reach the full destiny of what you've called us not only in our marriages And our relationships with our children but for all eternity and I ask it in Jesus name. Amen [BLANK_AUDIO]