Sermon Tone Analysis

Pre-Introduction:

At this time, we invite any children who desire to join my dear wife for a children’s service to follow her where you can hear a wonderful bible lesson and sing some uplifting songs about Jesus.

For those joining us online, you’re listening to the Services of the Broomfield Baptist Church.

This is the Pastor bringing the Sunday Morning message entitled "To Give or Not to Give.”

We invite you to follow along with us in your Bible in the Gospel of Luke, chapter Sixteen, and verses One through Thirteen.

Introduction:

Quote - “As small a thing as a penny will shut out from our vision as large a thing as the sun, and so does as small a thing as money shut out God.” [Rest, p. 64] [Dennis J. Hester, Vance Havner Sermon Sparklers, Outlines and Quotes, Vance Havner Bundle (WORDsearch, 2006).]

Your control of financial matters is a direct indication of your control in spiritual matters.

Purpose: Our goal, as free servants of God in Christ, should be complete freedom from financial pressures, and to provide a testimony of God’s power and love in His provision for us.

I.

The Spiritual Power of Scriptural Finances (Matt.

6:24).

A. Missing the Blessings…

Note: If a person has a closed mind towards seeing the spiritual effects of Biblical financial principles, will they receive the great blessings that come to those who are open toward what the Bible says about their finances?

Illustration: All to Him I Owe

Ye are bought with a price (1 Cor.

6:20).

1.

We are not our own, we have been redeemed.

But while we sing "Jesus Paid It All" let us remember the next line, "All to Him I owe."

Certain divine requirements grow out of our being bought with a price.

Such love demands my soul, my life, my all.

We are to glorify God in body and spirit—our selves—because we belong to Him (1 Cor.

6:19, 20).

2. We are to glorify Him in our service: "Ye are bought with a price; be not ye the servants of men" (1 Cor.

7:23).

3.

And Peter tells us that since we have been redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, we are to pass the time of our sojourning here in fear (1 Peter 1:17-21).

Self, service, sojourning—all to Him I owe, because He paid it all.

While we sing about the price that He paid, we had better check on what God expects for us, not to repay Him, but as the expression of our heart's love to Him who redeemed us.

[Day, pp.

214-15] [Dennis J. Hester, Vance Havner Sermon Sparklers, Outlines and Quotes, Vance Havner Bundle (WORDsearch, 2006).]

B. Promise of Blessings…

Note: Abiding by Biblical principles of finance brings a promise of blessings:

Transition: There is great spiritual power in having our finances where they ought to be according to the Bible.

Now notice secondly…

II.

The Serious Problems of Unscriptural Management (2 Tim.

2:4).

Note: When we control our own finances, instead of making God our financial manager, some problems that we tend to face as a result are…

A. The Problem of Debt.

o A Destroyer of Testimonies (both yours and God’s).

Note: Elijah had to help this poor woman, so that God’s name was run through the mud by His own prophet.

That’s pretty sad.

o A Producer of Bondage (to men instead of to God).

o A Limiter of Response (to God’s will and leading).

Illustration: Commitment - When prospects show up for church membership these days, nothing is said about telling the world goodbye.

It is said that they will grow out of all that, as we instruct them, but most of them do not; so we have a flock of worldlings, who are not about to give up their idols [Decision, p. 14] [Dennis J. Hester, Vance Havner Sermon Sparklers, Outlines and Quotes, Vance Havner Bundle (WORDsearch, 2006).]

o A Presumer of the Future.

B. The Problem of Dullness.

Note: Financial pressure dulls spiritual perception and hampers effectiveness in God’s service.

C. The Problem of Doors.

Note: A door is left open for temptations to be unethical.

Transition: There is tremendous blessing in having our finances where the Bible says they should be, and it also keeps us from some serious problems that come when we try to manage our finances and leave God out.

Let me give you thirdly…

III.

A Sure-fire Prescription for Spiritual Failure with Finances.

Note: “How to Fail in Business Without Really Trying” or “Get Poor Quick:”

A. The Debt Strategy:

o Credit Card Mania

o Borrow heavily for depreciating items to that you can commit God’s money to paying interest on items that are already worn out.

o Abandon spiritual discernment and spend carelessly for frivolous things so that when you really must have something, you have to get into debt to get it.

B. Solomon’s Six Slippery Steps to the Slums:

o Be Stingy

Illustration: Monkey with hand in Cookie Jar

o Get Rich Quick

o Be Stubborn

o Cultivate Laziness

o Feed the flesh

o Be crafty

IV.

Scriptural Proof Why God Desires Control of Your Finances (Prov.

23:4).

A. Everything Belongs to God.

Quote: “We can never be blessed until we learn that we can bring nothing to Christ but our need.”

[Day, p. 58] [Dennis J. Hester, Vance Havner Sermon Sparklers, Outlines and Quotes, Vance Havner Bundle (WORDsearch, 2006).]

B. God Is Best at It.

Note: He is a better financial manager and knows our needs far better than we do.

Illustrations: Feeding of the 5,000; Unfailing Oil; Un-empty Barrel; Water into Wine, etc.

C. God Wants Us to Behold His Power.

Note: God wants to demonstrate His love and power.

Illustration: Elijah was a man who had to trust God to bring him his food from the fowls, but was also able to call down fire from heaven!

The Lesson of Carmel: God's Power

The God that answereth by fire, let him be God (1 Kings 18:24).

The great day on Carmel had all the elements of a mighty moving of God.

1.

The promise of showers of blessing (v. 1).

2. The human efforts of Ahab and Obadiah to meet the need of the hour (vv.

2-16).

3. God's man who was in a sense the troubler of Israel as the disturber of a false peace (vv.

17-20).

4. The call to take a stand for God or Baal (v.

21).

5.

The test of fire.

Not "the God that answereth by finances or fame or feelings" but "by fire" (v.

24).

6.

The repairing of broken altars (v.

30).

"Then the fire of the Lord fell" (v.

38).

"There is a sound of abundance of rain" (v.

41).

Elijah prayed down both fire and water.

We need both today.

And we can have both.

When the fire of His Spirit falls from above, the floods of His blessing are sure to follow.

[Day, p. 76] [Dennis J. Hester, Vance Havner Sermon Sparklers, Outlines and Quotes, Vance Havner Bundle (WORDsearch, 2006).]

D. God Wants a Bold Witness.

Note: God wants to protect both our testimony and His too.

Illustration: Abraham and the King of Sodom or the the King of Salem (Gen.

14)

E. Godly Giving Brings His People Together.

God wants to unite Believers.

F. Godly Giving Brings God’s Blessings.

Note: God wants to use finances to guide us.

o Protection from harmful things.

Illustration: Malachi’s Message - “Bags with Holes”; the Devourer