Hope Church LV Sermons
Money Problems :: Part 1
In 1975, people across our country began referring to the Friday after Thanksgiving as Black Friday. And since that point, that specific Friday in November has kicked off a weekend of chaotic shopping all across the United States of America, to the point that now we just assume that on that weekend, a large segment of our society is going to go temporarily insane in pursuit of the perfect gift for Christmas. Now we're in church, so I want to have a moment of confession and I want you to be honest. How many people here participated this year in Black Friday weekend? Raise your hand. Ok, not too many sinners. I'm just kidding. A couple weeks ago when we were writing this message, Pastor Tom and Pastor Scott were kind enough to give me an education about Black Friday weekend. I'm kind of naive and I've kind of been sheltered and I learned some stuff in that conversation. Here's a couple of things that I learned about Black Friday weekend. I learned that even though we call it Black Friday, it actually starts on Thursday at 8 p.m., to which I say, ridiculous. Also learned that in addition to shopping on Thursday and Friday, Black Friday weekend also includes small business Saturday and Cyber Monday. I didn't know that. One other thing I discovered is that Black Friday weekend is something that a lot of people take very, very serious. So I did some research just to see how serious. Did you know that this year on Black Friday weekend, our country saw record numbers? This year, 247 million people went shopping in America on Black Friday weekend and those 247 million people spent 59.1 billion dollars. That's actually up 13 percent from 2000 and 11. This year on Black Friday weekend, I was looking around on Twitter and I saw that Eric Geiger put out a tweet that I thought was pretty interesting. We're going to put it up on the screen. He said this, "The irony of this week, on Thursday, be thankful for what you have, on Friday, rush out to accumulate more." I thought that was pretty funny. But despite Black Friday weekend having long lines and tons of stress and they're being fighting and in some cases minor injuries, people still love to participate. One reporter said, "We should rename Black Friday to be known as Black and Blue Friday." But what also happens on Black Friday weekend for a lot of people is that we buy things we really can't afford. We put too much money on credit cards and we utilize the layaway in order to get exactly what we want. And because our culture is so consumed with having the latest and greatest items for some people, this is a season that they end up breaking their piggy bank. This weekend we're kicking off a two-part series called Money Problems. And here's the thought that we're kind of going to wrestle with in this series. It's just money. So why does it cause so many problems? I'm sure if we went around the room tonight, many of us could identify a current issue or problem in our life that traces back that is rooted in the area of money. And especially what we've walked through with our economy here in Las Vegas, I think for most of us, we are sick and tired, if we're honest, of thinking about and talking about money. I mean, over the last few years, because of financial pressure, many people in our city have had to make some decisions that they never thought they would have to make. It's effective all of us in some capacity. And because it's affected us individually, our church has also felt it. We've seen literally hundreds and hundreds of families leave Las Vegas and move to other parts of the country just to find work in order to provide for their family. And so in light of all that taking place, here's what we want to do in this series. First of all, we want to establish a right perspective on money. We want to recap and calibrate with what the Bible says regarding resources. And the second thing that we want to do in this series is we want to see every person in our church take a next step towards financial freedom. Because the reality is regardless if you're here tonight and you're living in complete financial freedom, or if you're here tonight and you're living in complete financial frustration, there's something in this series for you. Because believe it or not, God actually has a lot to say through the scriptures regarding money. But here's what I know. Anytime a pastor starts talking about money in church, everybody gets nervous. I mean, I can stand up here, advance her time. We can stand up on this stage and talk about marriage. We can talk about the authority of scripture. We can talk about evangelism or missions. And everybody's like, "Hey, man, hallelujah." But you start talking about money. Everybody gets nervous. Listen, don't do that. We're going to have an honest conversation around God's Word. We're going to pull some principles out and we're going to respond as God leads us. If you have a Bible, turn with me to the book of 1 Timothy chapter 6. Just a moment, I'm going to read a section of scripture and I'm going to unpack part of it today. And then next weekend, Pastor Vance is going to come and he's going to teach through the rest of this text. The book of 1 Timothy was written by a man named Paul and he wrote it to a young man in the faith named Timothy who he was discipling in mentoring. And what we're going to read in this text is Paul's going to lay out for us some things we are to do as it relates to resources, but also some things that we should not do as it relates to our resources. So 1 Timothy chapter 6, I'm going to read verses 17 through 19. If you don't have a Bible, we're going to put this up on the screen for you so that you can follow along with us. Here's what the Bible says, instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy, instruct them to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, storing up for themselves the treasures of a good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of that which is life in deed. Beautiful passage of Scripture as it relates to resources. And what we want to do in this series is give you just some overall biblical principles about money. I'm going to give you one today and next weekend Vance will give you a couple more, but here's a key principle we're going to unpack tonight. Life is not about money. I want you to read that out loud off the screen with me on three, one, two, three. Life is not about money. For some people, that's a paradigm shift. You see, for a lot of people if they were asked, what's the goal in life? What does all of life center around? They would answer that life is about money. Life is about wealth. The way you know if a person is successful is look at their bank account. And that's not just true outside the church. That's true inside the church. George Barna did a survey several years ago. Here's what he reports, 51% of Christians, 51% and 54% of non-Christians believe that money is the main symbol of success in life. So if you're taking that survey into this room, that means that over half of this room believes the number one reason you're on the planet is to obtain money. That's a lie. And I can some in some way understand why people outside the church would think that. But what about believers? 51% of people who have a love relationship with God through Jesus Christ say the main symbol of success in life is money. Why is that? Here's the reason. One of the things that can very easily become the consuming passion of your life and my life is money. Andy Stanley said it this way, the number one competitor for your heart is money. The thing that's going to rival your relationship with God more than anything else is money. That's why it's so vital that you and I have a right biblical perspective on resources because the number one thing competing for your heart and my heart is money. So in this text, here's what Paul does, he addresses this teaching to a very specific group of people. He addresses this text to rich people. Now I know what you just did. You did what I did when I read this verse. I immediately removed myself from the conversation because here's what I thought, I'm not rich. Here's what you thought, pastor, I'm not rich. Well before you let that thought get too concrete in your mind, let me ask you a question. What does it mean to be rich from a global perspective? You see our measuring stick cannot be our city. Our measuring stick cannot be our country. From a global perspective, what does it mean to be rich? Here's what it means. It means people who have extra resources. You see when looking globally, rich people are those people who have extra resources. And I dare say across this room, when it comes to food, shelter, and clothing, we have extra. Here's what that makes us rich. Now you may not feel rich right now, but from a global standpoint, we're all rich. You see when Paul wrote verse 17, he was not thinking about people who have a home in the Hollywood Hills or hundreds of millions of dollars in their bank account. He was thinking about those people who have extra. CNN did some research several years ago and they were looking at the upper class, the middle class, and the lower class globally. You've probably studied some of that in our city or in our country. Well, they did it for the whole world and they sought to establish what, who are the upper class, the middle class, and the lower class globally? Here's what they determined. That when you think about the middle class globally, the median level income, the average is $1,225 a year. We're rich. I want to show it to you in another way. I want to put a map of the world on the screen. We've looked at this before, but this just begs repeating. Put that map up on the screen, guys. This is the world. Now, I want to show you this map with several filters on top of it. The first filter is going to be the filter of population. When you transition to population, you see the places in the world with the most people get bigger and the places in the world with less people get smaller. Obviously, India and China are the largest because they have the most people. All right, let me show you this map through another filter, the filter of energy usage. What do you notice? The United States gets much, much bigger and everywhere else gets much, much smaller. Let me show you another filter, the filter of global, gross domestic product or standard of living. What do you see? Where we live got bigger. Everywhere else got much, much smaller. I say all that to once again say this, regardless of how you feel or what a media culture says in America, the United States is a blessed people who have more than we need and we're rich. You see, resources are not the issue in America. Priority is the issue in America. So this text that we're about to dig into is for us because we have extra. And the way I want to unpack the rest of this text is I want to give you three reasons that life is not about money. Paul wanted to clarify in this text to all those people who have extra. He wanted to show them that life is not about how many resources you can obtain. Here's the first reason that life is not about money. Material wealth is temporary. Money is temporary. In verse 17, Paul not only addresses this text to rich people, but he puts a specific time period in this verse. He says instruct those who are rich in this present world. This phrase present world is only mentioned two times in the New Testament. One is here in 1 Timothy. The other is in Titus chapter two. And it literally means a present era which will soon pass away. Now why would Paul choose to speak to rich people and to add in this present era? Here's why. Because Paul understood that this present world is not all there is. And that what this present world deems as valuable may not necessarily be valuable in the era in the life to come. Listen to what Paul said earlier in 1 Timothy 6. He says for we have brought nothing into the world so we cannot take anything out of it either. He says we brought nothing. We're taking nothing. The word nothing literally means not even one thing. You could say it this way. Not one thing will we take with us of material possession onto the next life. Another text that really speaks to this is in Ecclesiastes chapter 5. Look at this verse on the screen. There is another serious problem I have seen under the sun. Hoarding riches harms the saver. We all come to the end of our lives as naked and as empty handed as on the day we were born. We can't take our riches with us. And this too is a very serious problem. People leave this world no better off than when they came. All their hard work is for nothing like working for the wind. There are people in our country, in our city and in our church who right now are working for the wind. Here's what that means. You're chasing something. You're never going to obtain. You're working as hard as you can to gather as much material wealth as possible. But what the scripture saying is this, you cannot take it into the life to come. Because material wealth is temporary. I want to show you a real life example from 2012 of how we can know this verse in Ecclesiastes is 100% true. I want to put a picture up on the screen. This is a good old fashioned landfill. What makes up a landfill? Every black Friday gift that has ever been purchased. That wonderful thing that you just found a couple of weeks ago that you're so excited about this year for Christmas, can I show you its final resting place? The landfill. It changes the way you look at your possessions when you recognize that eventually what you have is going to belong to someone else and is ultimately going to end up in the garbage. It changes the way you think about it. But as believers, we need a healthy understanding. There's nothing wrong with having possessions, but we must understand that our possessions are temporary. Our temptation is to focus on this present world, but our calling is to live for eternity. Rick Warren said this, you were not put on earth to be remembered. You were put on earth to prepare for eternity. Life's not about money because money is temporary. This is a really hard turn, especially if you walked in tonight thinking the number one goal of your life is money. And one of the ways that we found that people can make this transition to a new perspective is by giving you tools that you can continue to learn and process these principles. So this weekend, one of the things that we're making available is a book by a man named Randy Alcorn. It's called managing God's money. And it's a phenomenal resource just to help you learn and process this reality that life is not about money. He talks about this landfill principle in this book. We're going to have these available after service, they're $5. If you can't afford that, just go get one. But this is a phenomenal tool to help all of us continue to understand this principle that life is not about money. Here's a second reason out of this text. Material wealth is not trustworthy. Not only is it temporary, but it's not trustworthy. You see, because it's not going to last forever, we should not put our trust and our confidence in our things. Paul uses two more powerful words in verse 17. He says, "Instruct those who are rich in this present world, not to be conceited." The word "conceded" means having an exalted view of self. Here's the picture. It's the picture of someone looking down the economic ladder to those who have less and judging them and casting off an attitude of "I'm superior." It means to be haughty as you look down the economic ladder. The first time I came to Las Vegas was in 2001. My home church was a church that sent mission teams out to Las Vegas to help start this church. I was 18 years old. The only place I'd ever lived was in a town of about 100,000 people. Coming to Las Vegas was big city for me. One of the nights on the trip was just a free night. My whole team wanted to do was to go sightseeing, which meant we want to go to the strip. We've never seen buildings that big. We've never seen lights that bright. Me and a couple of my friends would go into one of the hotels, and immediately we went to the stores. We started walking through some of the most expensive stores on the strip. For me, I had never seen a pair of pants that cost $2,500. That was on my bucket list. I wanted to see that. We started going through these stores and looking at all these expensive clothing. I remember one store in particular I walked into, and I had on tennis shoes and cargo shorts and a T-shirt. I was 18 years old, and as I walked in, one of the employees kind of gave me a pretty funny look. I just disregarded it, and I just started looking at the clothes, and I was looking at jackets that were $5,000, shirts that were $1,500, pants that were $3,000, and then I noticed it was not only one employee giving me a funny look. Now there were four, and then one started to walk over to me, and I prepared what I always say in those kinds of stores. I was going to say, "No thank you. I don't need any help. I'm just looking." But as the guy approached me, he didn't ask me if I wanted any help. He said, "Boy, are you lost?" And I'll be honest with you. At that moment, I felt about that big. I felt judged. I felt small. I felt worthless. I felt as though he was on the status way above me, and I was way down here, and he was looking down and saying, "I'm better than you." Here's what Paul's saying with this word, "conceded." He's saying, "Listen, for all you guys who have more, who have extra, don't look at the people who have less than you and judge them, and think for one second that you're any better than them. Because you have more, your attitude should not be, "I'm better." Because you have more, your attitude should be, "How can I serve others?" That's this word, "conceded." You see, our drift because of our flesh is to esteem ourselves, and to base our worth off our resources. People within abundance of resources will be tempted to find their identity in those resources. Why is that? Because in most places where you find wealth, you also find pride. That's why a biblical understanding of our resources is so important. Listen to this application statement, "Apart from Christ, my abundance will produce arrogance." If I'm not living in tune with God's perspective on my resources because I have extra, I'm going to be arrogant. That's why we must burn these principles into our heart. The first word he uses is the word "conceded." Here's the second word he uses. Or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches. That word uncertainty is another powerful word that literally means not reliable. You see, regardless of the amount of money that you have, we should never put our trust in that money because it's fleeting. It can be here today and gone tomorrow. But here's what I know. The more wealth that you have, the more extra that you have, the harder it is to resist putting your confidence in that money. And the harder it is to honestly trust God. Listen, wealth is not a sin. But it is a great responsibility to the point that Jesus said this in Matthew chapter 6. He said, "No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth." Jesus could have put anything as the last word in that statement, but he chose to put the word wealth. Here's what that means. That on the throne of your heart, God and money can't be there at the same time. If Jesus is your Lord, that means bringing your finances under his lordship and understanding that knowing him is the goal of life, and he's given you those resources to be used in the context of his kingdom. Big difference. So before we look at this last reason, I want to ask you a couple of evaluation questions. And I don't want you to answer out loud, but I want you to be honest with yourself. In your heart, do you look down on people who have less resources than you do? Have you allowed money to become the consuming passion of your life? Have you put your trust and confidence in material possessions? You know, one of the things that our pastors often pray for our church is that God would teach us to be a generous people, that God would free us from this temptation of being so wrapped up in money that we lose sight of God's best for our church. That's what we pray. That God would continue to teach us this reality of generosity, continue to teach us that it all belongs to him. He's given some to us and what he's given to us we are to use for him. You see, life's not about money because material wealth is temporary and because it's not trustworthy. But the third reason that life's not about money is because material wealth does not satisfy. Money will not make you happy. Ecclesiastes 5 also says this, I love this verse. Those who love money will never have enough. How meaningless to think that wealth brings true happiness? Some people are thinking, that's in the Bible. That's in the Bible. Those who love money will never have enough. How meaningless to think that wealth brings true happiness. Let me give you a couple of examples. John Jacob Astor monopolized the fur trade in North America in the 1800s. And when he retired between his fur business and his investments in New York, he was the richest man in the United States and the first recorded millionaire. At the time of his death, he was said to be worth $20 million. Now, in today's terms, that would equate to $300 billion. On his deathbed, here's what he said. He said, "The greatest regret of my life is that I failed to purchase all of Manhattan. I am the most miserable man on the planet." You see, all of us think if we can just reach the next financial level, we'll be okay. Well, here's a man who was worth $300 billion. And here's what he's saying. Money doesn't make me happy. John D. Rockefeller was one of the wealthiest men in American history. Here's what he said, "I have made many millions in my life, but they have brought me no happiness." You see, it's one thing for me to stand up here and tell you that material wealth will not satisfy. But those statements are coming from two of the most wealthiest men in our country's history. And here's what they're telling us. Money will not make you happy. So if clearly life's not about money, and material wealth is not going to make us happy and satisfy us, what's life about? Well, according to the Scriptures, knowing Jesus is to be the ultimate pursuit of our life. That's the goal. That's what everything else in our lives should revolve around. And the only place that we can find true fulfillment and completion. You see, the only place you and I can experience real joy and everlasting happiness is in the context of a relationship with God. Jesus said this in John 17. He said, "This is eternal life. Here's the goal that they may know you, the only true God in Jesus Christ whom you have sent." When we understand that, that the goal is not money. The goal is a relationship with God. It changes the way that we see our resources. So in closing, I want to share with you a couple of very simplistic principles, really building blocks of financial freedom. I want to give you an overview, and then next weekend, Vance is going to really unpack these on a deeper level. But if you and I are ever going to experience financial freedom, these principles are going to be one of the reasons. You see, in order to experience health financially, we need a plan. And these principles are at the very core of that plan. These principles may be some of the most important things we're going to share in this entire series. Three statements about how God has called us to manage money. Here's the first one. Give to the Lord. We've been commanded by God to give a portion of our resources back to Him. Giving to the Lord is to be the first priority for us when it comes to resources. Proverbs chapter 3 verse 9 says this, "Honor the Lord from your wealth and from the first of all your produce." Scripts are teaching us that the very first thing we should do when resources come into our hands is to give a portion back to the Lord. The scripture calls it a tithe. A tithe is 10% of your overall income as a starting place. Now I recognize tonight that for some of us, that's unthinkable right now. And it's going to take some time to get there and that's okay. But what we want to challenge you to in this series is to take a next step. Whatever that might be, every weekend in our service, we take time to prioritize moments where we give financially into the Lord. Why? Because it's a big deal to us as a church and it's a big deal to Jesus. And for many people, they have a very distorted view on what biblical giving is really all about. You see, giving is more about the heart than it is about the pocket. If you're here tonight and thinking, "You know what? I'm not giving anything to that church." Listen, you don't have a money issue. You have a heart issue. Because for some people, they think, "If I give, it's going to threaten my quality of life." That's a wrong perspective. What we understand from Scripture is that giving doesn't threaten your quality of life. It protects your quality of life. What the Bible says is that if we'll seek first His kingdom, that our Heavenly Father will give us everything that we need. It's easy to think in moments when we talk about biblical giving that if you don't look out for number one, no one else will. That's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible says, "As we honor God with our resources, He will give us exactly what we need." The first simplistic building block for financial freedom is giving to the Lord. Here's the second. Save for the future. After we give to the Lord, our next priority is to be securing a certain amount of savings for the future. Proverbs 21-20 says this, "The wise have wealth, but fools spend whatever they get." The Bible is saying, "If you live off 100% of your income, the Bible word here is fool." Now, once again, for some of us, that's a big jump because right now you are living off of 100% of your income, and that's okay right now. Once again, we want to challenge you to take a next step in that process of getting to a place of financial freedom. Here's the third statement, "Budget to live." The remainder of our resources after we've given to the Lord and saved for the future, that's what we're to live off of. Proverbs 27-23 says this, "No well the condition of your flocks and pay attention to your herds, for riches are not forever, nor does a crown endure to all generations." For some people in the room, you don't know where your money is being spent. What the Bible is saying here in Proverbs 27 is you need to have a clear understanding of the condition of your resources because you do not know what tomorrow holds. Here's the problem though, biblically, for us, it should be give to the Lord, save for the future, budget to live. But here's the reality, for most of us, some of us, we live and use the resources there, and then if anything's left over, then we save a little, and if there's anything left over after that, then we give to the Lord. That requires a paradigm shift to get into God's design for managing our resources. Give to the Lord, save for the future, budget to live. I started by asking the question it's just money, so why does it cause so many problems? One of the reasons it causes so many problems is because the way we view our resources and the way we handle our resources are not honoring to God. And what we're learning from this verse right here in 1 Timothy 6 is that God has established a right way to view and handle our resources. And we must submit to that and understand tonight that life is not about money. [BLANK_AUDIO]