Stewardship Commitment 2005

I was tempted today to follow the example of the legendary pastor who decided he could best promote his parishioners’ generosity on Stewardship Commitment Sunday by preaching the shortest sermon he’d ever uttered.

It was only sixteen words long, lasted just eight seconds, and went like this: “Folks, the church needs money, and you have some. Give as much as you can. Amen.”

I chose not to.  Let us pray. 

O God, make us faithful stewards as we seek throughout our lives to carry on and fulfill Christ’s ministry of love and justice—giving food to the hungry, water to the thirsty, medicine to the sick, shelter to the homeless, and assistance to others in need. Through the name of Christ, we pray this. Amen.

Look at your hands.  When you were just an infant you came out with your hands closed.  And every time someone put their finger by yours, you would wrap your hand around it, hold on tight and not let go.  As a toddler you started grabbing rattles and little toys.  When another kid came in your direction and wanted to take away your toys, you held on tight and said “Mine.”

When you were in junior high school,, you hung on tightly to bicycle handle bars or batons or baseball bats.  In high school you hung on to the hand of Bobby or Betty and you were not about to let that go.  In college you hung on to a lot of different things – maybe some things we don’t want to talk about today – but when you left you held tightly onto your diploma.

When you started a career, you grabbed the lowest rung on the ladder and you hung on.  Then you reached for the second and then the next one.  Since then you have been climbing ladders, clutching.  

In retirement you’ll clutch the golf clubs or gardening tools, and the pension checks. Perhaps as you age you might need to clutch a walker or a cane.  

And then even in the last moments of some people’s lives, they clutch on to the edge of the hospital bed, hanging tightly onto this life.  

By nature we are clutchers.  We scrape and c law and work and fret and if we get ahead just a little bit we hold on.  It doesn’t matter who or what tries to convince us to release our grip.  We have a reflexive response when it comes to giving up something we believe is ours – No Way.  Not for him, not for her, not for God.

For most of us, clutching is just like breathing – it comes naturally.

What a difference between our hands and Gods hands.  In creation God lavishly formed and fashioned and created what was good and opened his hands and gave it to us.  Throughout all history, god has opened up his hands and provided food, drink, protection, blessing and love.  The psalmist declared “you open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing.   God’s generosity is not fading.  His resources are not drying up.  Bound in the very heart of god is his desire to shower us with goodness. 

When jesus came and saw the needs of the people he opened his hands – teaching, healing, touching, loving, feeding, and freeing.  And when he was nailed to the cross he didn’t wrestle for his life or clench his fist in anger.  He opened his hands.  

God always opens god’s hands to us in generosity.  God sincerely enjoys giving of himself.  When we receive god’s blessings and name all of them – so many of them we sit in awe and wonder –what a god.  What a generous and abundant god.  This is the lavishness that distinguishes god’s hands from ours.  

Look at your hands again.  Take a peek.  Do you like what you see?  Do you wish your hands looked a little bit more like god’s? don’t close them up or sit on them or look away.  Surely if god needs to change your hands, he will start with your heart.  

The bible is so clear about our actions on this matter…  

Just think about the boy with the five loaves and two fishes.  A common story that we have internalized about a jesus who can provide for all of our needs.  But what about the boy?  He had to make the decision to give up his lunch to jesus and by doing so, by making that decision to sacrifice his stuff, jesus used his gift to feed 5,000.  

We must risk trusting god with what we have and that is why giving is an act of worship.  We can say we believe but we don’t really trust until we respond to god with our actions. 

God gives us clear steps of action, clear ways to know we are headed in the right direction, clear responses to his gratitude --- 

Action Steps:

1. 1 cor. 16:2 Tells us “on the first day of the week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with his income, saving it up so that when I come no collections will have to be made.  
2. discipline yourself in giving 2 cor. 8:6 bring also to completion this act of grace on your part

deut 15:10 – give generously and the lord your god will bless you in your work and all you undertake.

This whole process, this whole campaign is about the movement from a people who grip and possess and hold on and clench and grasp… it is about moving from this posture to a posture of open hands because when we open our hands – what does god do?  When the boy opened his hands what did god do?  He multiplied it 1000 times over.  Micah tells us today 

10 Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. 11 I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit," says the LORD Almighty. 

God challenges us to take action today and test him…bring your tithe and see what God does.  Trust God.  Open your hands and you will be blessed beyond all measure, beyond all understanding, beyond your wildest dreams.  

A father tells a story of his college age daughter sneaking into his office when he was out to lunch one day.  She went in and quckly left post it notes all over his desk, under the phone, on the shelves and in the desk drawers.  For days after ward he was finding them in hidden places.  The notes said things like “I love you dad” and “there has never been a little girl who has loved her dad more” and so on.  

The father returned to his office after lunch and was stunned.  He just sat in his office chair and soaked in his daughters love… he felt it changing him and confronting hom.

You are in a relationship with God who does that all the time.  He paints the sky with a sunset to say I love you.  He answers prayers and says I loveyou.  He strengthens you when you are weak and says I love you.  He supplies daily provisions and says I love you.  Whne you are in desperate need of grace he opens his arms and says I love you.  

God’s generous expressions of love confront you every where you turn.  The question is… do you see them?  Do you ever sit back in your chair and let the message of his divine post it notes soak into your soul?  

Look at your hands one last time.  What is the truth about them?  One thing is certain enough.  If you deeply enough with a sense of god’s generosity your hands will start looking more like god’s hands.  They really will.  They will open up more frequently and to a wider range of needs.  They will stay open for longer periods of time.  All of the apples on the tree represent what god has put into our hands.  Our lives, our families, the beauty of the earth, our church, our friends, all of it has been handed to us as god’s beloved.  The question today is – does our response to God and this church reflect the bounty of what we have already received?  Will you allow god to unclench your fists and walk forward and respond to god’s generosity.  god is asking us this day to test him, to respond by bringing the tithe to the storehouse and to receiving the blessing of abundance.  Amen.

The great 16th-Century Protestant Reformer Martin Luther, of whom I spoke two Sundays ago, once said: “There are three conversions necessary in the Christian life: the conversion of the heart, [the conversion of] the mind, and [the conversion of] the purse.”

gospel lesson. The place is Jerusalem; the setting is the temple, bursting with pilgrims who’ve come for the Passover celebration; the time is just two days before Jesus’s last supper and arrest.

Back then, “no collection plate was passed during Temple services. People made their offering by announcing the amount to a priest [wouldn’t you love that!] and then depositing it in one of thirteen shofar chests. These chests were designed like a tuba with a wide mouth and narrow [descending] tube to discourage busy hands from taking out rather than putting in.… As Jesus watches quietly, many [rich folks] give impressive amounts. Then, he notices a widow enter the Temple court…” (Gary W. Charles, in Preaching Mark in Two Voices [Westminster John Knox, 2002 ], p. 202)

She, like most widows, is destitute, and she puts in just two pennies. Yet Jesus tells his disciples, “this poor widow has put in more than all of them; for [the others] have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty…” (Luke 21:3–4) Yes, it is the widow whose heart and purse have been converted; it is the widow who practices a selfless generosity in gratitude to God. And Jesus, having witnessed her act of giving, offers his judgment that it’s not the size of the gift that counts but rather the generosity of spirit with which it’s given.

So, the time has now come for each of us to witness to the conversions of our heart, mind, and purse—our conversions to the way of Jesus. And it's time for each of us to practice the cheerful generosity that arises from such conversions, remembering that it’s not the size of the gift that counts but rather the spirit in which it’s given.

Each of us is now asked to pledge a measure of the talent, time, and money that Christ has entrusted to our stewardship, offering these pledges of ours cheerfully in order to help dispel the suffering and sorrow overspreading our world.

Please spend a few moments reflecting quietly on God’s gift to you of love and grace through Jesus Christ. Spend a few moments reflecting quietly on what this community of faith, its sacraments, its fellowship, and its ministries of outreach mean both to you as an individual and to our community and the world at large. Recall that while 78% of your pledge assists programs of ministry through this congregation, fully 22% of your pledge will carry the love and justice of Christ to persons in need living far beyond our walls.

I invite you during this time of silence first to pray that God’s Spirit will kindle within you the same conversion of heart and purse, the same cheerful generosity of time, talent, and money that the widow exemplified and that Jesus embodied. For when the widow and Jesus have become the models for our stewardship, it is then that the conversions of our own heart and purse will lead us cheerfully to sharing fully with others the gift of Christ’s love entrusted to us.

I invite you this morning to consider pledging a fixed percentage of your income to the work of Christ through the Rutgers Church for 2005. The Bible urges us to devote to charitable giving a full tithe of our income—that is, 10%—and I invite you to consider offering up to half of that through this congregation. I invite you to consider pledging 3% or 4% or 5% of your income; or perhaps to consider increasing your pledge for 2005 over that for this year by 1% of your income. I believe that by doing so you will experience the joy that comes in Christ, the blessing that comes through cheerful giving.

Of course cheerful Christian giving is expressed through other means than just money. So I invite you during these next minutes to reflect on your available spare time, whether that be two hours a week, or forty hours a month. And then I invite you to pledge a percentage of your time to the work of Christ through the Rutgers Church, whether that be volunteering in our shelter or meal program, serving on a board or committee, teaching in the Sunday School, or offering daily prayers for the mission of Christ’s church. And this morning, I feel called to share with you my concern that the need for volunteers to staff our weekend shelter program is currently our #1 crisis in ministry. So I ask most earnestly that you consider making a cheerful gift of one overnight every month or every six weeks so that we can continue to offer shelter to those who have no home.

I invite you now to speak with God in prayer as you consider your pledge and fill in both the money side and service side of your cards.

Then during the offertory anthem, I ask you, as a sign of your resolve and commitment, to come forward from your pew to the communion table, the table of Christ, and to place in the plates that you’ll find there both your regular offering for this morning and your pledge of time, talent, and money for 2005.

I’ve mentioned before that it’s the custom of our brothers and sisters at the newest congregation in our presbytery, the Ghanaian Presbyterian and Reformed Church of Flatbush, to express their cheerful giving by dancing down the aisles toward the offering plates. And if any of you cheerful givers want to do that, please do so—or at least sway a little, or perhaps just swerve a bit!

Let us now express our conversions of heart, mind, and purse through our pledges of support for Christ’s ministry in our world.

[2 minutes of silence.]