Elevate - Airplane Mode - Live Generous

The focus of this information is on the importance of generosity and giving in the context of faith. The speaker explains that money is often associated with survival and provides for our needs, but emphasizes that it is God who truly provides for us. The speaker discusses the concept of spiritual discipline and the need to train oneself to engage in practices such as prayer, fasting, studying the Bible, and serving others. The speaker then delves into the biblical teachings on generosity, citing examples from the Old Testament and the New Testament, particularly the teachings of Jesus. The parable of the Good Samaritan is used as an example to illustrate the importance of loving one's neighbor and showing generosity rooted in love. The speaker also addresses the shallow nature of following religious laws without true compassion and emphasizes the need for genuine generosity towards God and others. Why does God focus so much on money and giving? Because it hits us at the core of who we are. Because we associate money with survival. Because money provides food and shelter and clothing. It provides for our children and for their education. It provides security for our future. It provides status and social acceptance. But here's the thing. Money provides none of those things. God does. Welcome to Elevate from Authentic Life Church in Mobile, Alabama with Pastor John DiQuatro. We hope it builds your faith and helps you to live a life for God that you've always wanted to live. We hope it inspires you to be a fully devoted, authentic follower of Jesus Christ. Enjoy the message and welcome to Elevate. We have been in airplane mode for the last several weeks. I believe this is our 8th installment of airplane mode. We all, of course, we know what airplane mode is on our phones, right? It disconnects us from everything that can distract us. But we need airplane mode in our lives. We need times where we separate from this world. This is a stressful world. This is a busy world. This is a world that can keep you just constantly worried and full of anxiety if you allow it. And there are times in our lives where we need to learn to separate from all that wants to give us stress and pressure and anxiety and to just focus on who we are as believers in Jesus Christ and invest into our relationship with Christ and pour out the love that Christ has poured into us. And we do these through spiritual discipline. And when we say the word discipline, it sounds like a negative kind of a word, but discipline simply means to train oneself to do something in a controlled and habitual way. Your human nature is not automatically going to do spiritual disciplines. It's something that you've got to train yourself to do. You've got to train yourself to get up early in the morning to want to spend time with God. You've got to train yourself to want to give or to want to worship or to serve. Any of these things that we've talked about, they're things that we have to teach our flesh to do. We have to put our flesh down so that our spirit can take over, right? And so we've covered lots of areas. We've covered prayer and fasting. We've covered Bible study. We've covered Sabbath rest and worship and simplicity. And last week we talked about the discipline of serving and what it means to be a servant and one that gives and that the only way to really be great in the kingdom of God is if we're willing to humble ourselves to be the servant of all. But today we're going to look at the spiritual discipline of generosity because God calls us to live a giving and generous life. Now settle down, this is not a sermon on tithing, right? Although finances is a part of being generous, right? But I'm talking about the discipline of living a generous life and there's more ways to be generous than just with your pocketbook. And so as I searched the Scriptures for the thread of truth about generosity, I was overwhelmed by how many Scriptures, teachings and examples of generosity there are in the Word of God because generosity is a core teaching in the Bible. It's a core thread all throughout the Old Testament. During the law, the law that God had given to Israel to follow in order to be His people, and there were things in Leviticus that we read about, like if your brother fell on hard times, you were commanded to step up and to help support your brother, not treat him like a hardship or a burden. And any money that you lent him, you were forbidden to charge interest to your brother, right? These are teachings we see in the Old Testament. Farmers were instructed that when they reap their field, that they were required to not reap around the edges of their fields so that the poor may come afterwards and they may begin to reap from the edges of your field so that they could be provided for as well. And so we see that all throughout the Old Testament. We see it in the wisdom literature of the Psalms and the Proverbs that giving and generosity are taught and encouraged and expected of a child of God. Proverbs 19, verse 17 says, Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and He will repay him for his deed. Proverbs 21, verse 13 says, Whoever closes his ear to the cry of the poor will himself call out and not be answered. Let these Scriptures sink in. This is the Word of God. Psalms 112, verse 5 says, It is well with the man who deals generously and lends, who conducts his affairs with justice. So we see it throughout the law in the Old Testament. We see it through the wisdom of King David and King Solomon in the Psalms and Proverbs. But we also see it all throughout the teaching of Jesus Christ. He continually encouraged giving and sacrificing what is ours for the benefit of God's kingdom or for the benefit of someone else. And we see it all throughout the teaching, not only of Jesus, but through all of the New Testament writers as well. And if you read through the epistles of Paul, at all occasions, generosity and giving are appropriate responses to what God has done for us, what God has done in our lives. So to try and distill all of the Bible's teaching into one message, all the Bible's teaching about generosity specifically, into one message is nearly impossible. And so today I'm going to focus on one of Jesus' teachings about generosity, but I think it's the most all-encompassing teaching that He has given us about it. So we're going to look at the parable, a very familiar parable for most of us. It's the parable of the Good Samaritan. And we find that in the book of Luke, chapter 10, beginning in verse 25, and I'll be reading from the NIV for this. And it says this, On one occasion, an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "'Teacher,' he asked, "'what must I do to inherit eternal life?' "'What is written in the law?' he replied. "'How do you read it?' he answered. "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, "'with all your strength and with all your mind, "'and love your neighbor as yourself.' "'You've answered correctly,' Jesus replied. "'Do this and you will live.' But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "'And who is my neighbor?' "'In reply,' Jesus said, "'A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho "'when he was attacked by robbers. "'They stripped him of his clothes. "'They beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. "'A priest happened to be going down the same road, "'and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. "'So too a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, "'passed by on the other side. "'But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was, "'and when he saw him, he took pity on him. "'He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. "'Then he put the man on his own donkey, "'brought him to an inn, and took care of him. "'The next day, he took out two denarii "'and gave them to the innkeeper. "'Look after him,' he said, "'and when I return, I will reimburse you "'for any extra expense you may have.' "'Which of these three do you think was the neighbor "'to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?' "'The expert in the law replied, "'the one who had mercy on him.' "'Jesus told him, go and do likewise.'" So we see here, in the beginning of this passage, where this person comes to Jesus to test him, and he asks, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And the man responds with the right answer. The greatest commandment in the law, right? To love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And to love your neighbor as yourself, which is the second greatest commandment. He answered correctly. Love God and love people. And Jesus agrees with him, but the man tries to dig further to find out what it really means to love your neighbor. So Jesus tells this parable about a generous Samaritan. And know this, that a Samaritan was not a friend to the Jewish person. And it's important that Jesus identifies that your neighbor is not just the people that look like you, it's not just the people of your same race, or of your same socioeconomic demographic, but your neighbor is anyone on this earth through whom you have the opportunity to come across. And understand that this parable is told in the context of teaching how to love. How to love God and how to love your neighbor. Because generosity, as we talk about generosity, understand that it's rooted in love. Anything that you give of yourself must be rooted in love. This is what Jesus is teaching. Love the Lord your God with all your heart. Love your neighbor as yourself. How do I do that, Jesus? Jesus, let me tell you this story. And so the man that was asking Jesus about this understood what it meant to be generous toward God. You see, the experts in the law, which is who this man was, were very familiar with the concepts of sacrifice and tithing and giving offerings. And so it didn't cause the man to blink whatsoever. Jesus addressed in them the shallowness with which they followed these particular laws and statutes in Matthew 23 verse 23. He says, Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices, mint, dill, and cumin, but you have neglected the more important matters of law, justice, mercy, faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter without neglecting the former. What Jesus is saying is, it's really good that you tithe. It's really good that you give a tenth of all of your increase. He's not telling them that it's bad, but He's saying the problem with you is that you don't show any compassion. You're doing it out of just obligation. You're doing it because it's a law. You're doing it because you want people to see how pious and spiritual you are. But still, on that same token, being generous toward God was kind of a given for the people of Israel, especially for the leaders. And it should be for us who believe as well, especially those Gentiles, right, that have been grafted in, have been reconciled to God, have been reconciled with Israel so that we are one big family now. So generosity, we also ought to practice that as well. So when asked who was our neighbor, Jesus replies with the story of the Good Samaritan. And we'll get into it. We're going to walk through this together. But let me just address this. What are some of the reasons that maybe we're not generous? Because we talk about generosity, but there's lots of reasons why we're not generous. One of them is simply that it's selfishness. Selfishness says that the most important person on the face of the earth is me. And so I've got to make sure that I look out for number one. I've got to make sure that all my needs are met. And I've got to make sure that everything is going well in my life. Selfishness can be a reason why we're not generous. Another one is a lack of gratitude. The Bible says that we have freely received, therefore we ought to freely give. Motivated by what? Gratitude. And I love so much the fact that we focus in this church on the gospel of Jesus Christ, and not a day is going to go by, not a Sunday is going to go by, whether in our worship time or in the preaching of the Word, or afterwards, that we're going to focus, we're always going to focus on the gospel of Jesus Christ, on the sacrifice that Jesus made, the fact that God so loved the world that He gave, right? He gave us His one and only Son. That God, in an act of generosity, provided us the way to be forgiven. And so, out of gratitude, we ought to be freely giving. Maybe we're not generous because we just don't think that we have to be. Maybe you've just never understood the concept and the principle in the Word of God about generosity, and today you're going to hear some of those things. And maybe some of the reasons we aren't generous is because American individualism and capitalism has become completely your worldview. So we look at the priest and the church worker. It says that as this man was beaten and robbed and laying on the side of the road left for dead, that a priest and a Levite come by. So we can maybe distill that into today's terms and say, the pastor of the church and his board all walked by this man who was bleeding half to death, stepped over him. They just ignored the problem. Because they were such great servants in the church, they felt like they didn't have to do anything else. That's a big lie, and it's easy to fall into. We fail to be generous towards God sometimes, and we fail to be generous towards others, and we justify it by saying, well, I do so much for the church. And we talked about this last week. What you do and learn and gain and are equipped to do here in this building is not meant to stay here. It's meant to go out to the four walls, that your life ought to be a generous expression of the love of Jesus Christ. So according to this parable that Jesus gave us, let's look at the ways in which we are to be generous according to Jesus' teaching. Number one, we need to be generous with our time. Luke 10, 33, the beginning of this story, but a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was, and when he saw him, he took pity on him. Now if you're like me, you're always in the middle. At any given time, you're in the middle of anywhere from two to twenty-five things at the same time. It's a fast-paced life that we live. When I'm here and I'm in the office, I've got a list of tasks that I'm working through. When I'm home, there's pets to care for and messes to clean and food to cook and repairs to make and bills to pay. I don't go for joy rides once in a while since I got a motorcycle. But typically, if I'm in a vehicle, I'm going somewhere and I'm usually in a hurry to get there. This is life, and I think we can all relate to this in one way or another. This Samaritan was traveling. Most likely, the Samaritan's destination was to Jerusalem. The man that was robbed was on his way back. It says that he was coming down from Jerusalem. He was on his way back from Jerusalem. And Jesus made a clear point to specify this, that the man that was robbed was coming from Jerusalem. Also, there was a priest and a Levite that passed by. Presumably, there was an occasion for people to be in Jerusalem, a festival or a time of sacrifice. That's the assumption, right? You've got this guy coming down from Jerusalem. You've got the priests coming back from Jerusalem. You've got the Levites coming back from Jerusalem. But let's look here at how generous this Samaritan was with his time, because this was a difficult journey. The Bible tells us that he was going the other direction. And if you're going to Jerusalem from Jericho, that's where these guys were on their way to Jericho. If you're going to Jerusalem from Jericho, it is an ascent. It's uphill the whole way. But it was dozens of miles uphill on foot. This Samaritan most assuredly would have been tired and ready to be home, but he stops to take care of this man. Verse 34 says that he tended his wounds. And then he took him somewhere where he could get him the help that he needs. And this man goes out of his way to take care of this guy. Now many of us would say, well, any decent person would do that. If I saw a person laying left for dead, hanging on to life by a thread, I'd take him to the hospital. I just wouldn't let him die. But look at what he does next. It says that the next day he took out two denarii to pay the innkeeper. So he didn't just drop the guy off at the inn and go about his merry way. He stayed the night there with him to watch over and to take care of him. That's being generous with your time. I can't imagine how many of us when we were in the middle of something and a situation arose where somebody else was in need that we would actually not just take the time to maybe give them five bucks or say a little prayer over them, but actually spend an entire day with them. Not come home for the night just to do that. But there's more. After he gives the innkeeper the money to care for his time at the inn, he tells him, he says, I want you to look after this guy. And I'm going to be back. And if he incurred any other expenses, I'm going to settle those with you. So not only did the man stop, take care of his wounds, he then takes him to an inn and then spends the night with him. And then the Bible tells us that he returned later to check up on the guy. Jesus is telling us something in this parable and it's more than just be nice to people. Because sometimes I think that's kind of like the shallow interpretation we get. Oh, we ought to be nice to people. He's saying if you are a person of love, if you are a child of God, then your time belongs to God. Your time belongs to God. And He ought to be able to use it in your life in whatever way that He sees fit. We need to learn to be generous with our time. And believe me, I'm preaching to myself today because we're all busy and we're all tired. But sharing God's love and giving of ourselves has to trump our schedule. It has to. Why? Because God has called us to be generous with our time. Not to be busy about only taking care of ourselves. Be generous with your time. Also in this story, we see that we are to be generous with our resources. In verse 34 it says, He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then He put the man on His donkey, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. Let me ask you this question. Whose bandages? Whose oil and wine? Whose donkey? They all belong to the Samaritan. And He was generous with the things that He had. You know, I love to go out to eat with my wife. And when we go out to eat, she'll usually order something different from me and you know, when I'm eating my food and I'm enjoying it, there just might be something on her plate that catches my attention. And you know, since we're married and we share everything, I naturally feel entitled to reach across the table to her plate just to sample her meal. And when I do, usually her fork comes hurling towards my hand to stop me. Because if there's one thing I've learned in 24 years of marriage, it's this. Dawn doesn't share food! She's getting better. One of the first things that we had to be taught as children was to share. We teach our children to share their toys. We expect them to share in the household chores. When one of our kids has candy and the other one doesn't, we tell them, share with your brother or your sister. It's a basic lesson for good, healthy social interaction. And there are many times in our lives when we have the resources to help someone, but we choose to keep what is ours. Listen, Christians can be some of the most benevolent and kind-hearted people. Somebody shares their woes with us and we say, oh, I'm so sorry. That must be so hard. And we give them all kinds of great advice and we might even pray, but too often we do nothing else to help them. Oftentimes we have the resources to help, whether it's a car to drive them or it's extra food in our pantries or clothes in our closet that we haven't worn. We oftentimes have the resources to help 1 John 3, 16-18 says, this is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down His life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and in truth. Write that down. 1 John 3, 16-18 and read it over and over and over and over again as you develop the spiritual discipline of generosity in your life. We need to get to the point of understanding that the things that we have do not belong to us. They're not ours. If we have surrendered our life to Christ, then what we have is His. And He needs you to be free to use it as He sees fit. Listen, your car isn't yours. It's yours. It's God's. Your house isn't yours. It's God's. You have a closet full of clothes, half of which you don't wear. Those are God's too. All those shoes that you have, they might not be the right size, but they're God's too. Do you think that He gives you all of these things just so that you can hoard it? To have just the right outfit for that one event that you don't know what it is, but you know when it comes. And so, you'll have the right shoes to match the right dress and to match the right purse. I'm not picking on women. This is just the example. But we have all of these things to take care of ourselves. No! Surrender it to God and let Him bless others through you. Live the generous life. Let God love others through you and through the blessings that He has given you. Listen, I know that money is tight oftentimes, but you can't just give somebody $50 to get them a bag of groceries, although $50 would buy them like a pack of crackers and a bag of chips or something nowadays. But many of us have ways that we can help because we have been abundantly blessed in so many ways. And I've found out that some of the most generous people are those that don't have a lot. They know what it's like to have very little, so when they have a little extra, they want to use it to help somebody else. The generous life is not just someone with a compassionate heart who likes to give. It's someone who has yielded everything they have to God and allows Him to use them as a channel to bless others. Be generous with your resources. Don't hold on to all those things for one day. Just know that if you've got a closet full of clothes and half of them aren't being worn and you're just waiting until you can drop 35 pounds to fit into them again, I promise you right now there's somebody in your life that needs those more than you do. I'm guilty of that too. In fact, I have two closets full of clothes. The third way that we need to be generous, and I'm going to hurry up here, I know it's getting late, but we do need to learn to be generous with our money. Verse 35 of Luke 10, it says, The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. Look after him, he said, and when I return, I'll reimburse you for any extra expense you may have. See, the Samaritan stops to take care of this guy, uses his own stuff, his own donkey, but now instead of rummaging through the guy's stuff for a stack of coins that the robbers may have missed, he pays for the man's stay out of his own pockets. But not only that, he comes back later to pay for any other expenses that the man incurred. This is generosity, folks. It's time. It's resources. It's money. But it's often the money one that's the hardest for most of us. Yet there are well over 2,000 Scriptures in the Bible about money. About how to handle money. About not being lovers of money. About not being tight-fisted with money. Why does God focus so much on money and giving? Because it hits us at the core of who we are, especially as Americans. Because we associate money with survival. Because money provides food and shelter and clothing. It provides for our children and for their education. It provides security for our future. It provides status and social acceptance. But here's the thing, money provides none of those things. God does. James 1, 17 says this, Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly light, who does not change like shifting shadows. I know that you might feel, because the paycheck that you cashed has the name of your employer on it. That it came from them. But I promise you, the fact that you are gainfully employed is a gift from God. God knows that if He can separate us from our reliance on money, then He will have our hearts. And this plays so much into the sermon that Pastor Neal preached several weeks ago about simplicity. That we don't just live to accumulate and have more and have more and have more, but we learn to live simplicity so that all that we have is at God's disposal. But He knows that if He can separate us from our reliance on money, then He's going to have our hearts. He'll have our faith. He'll have our trust. We'll be completely reliant on Him, which is what He has wanted all along. Matthew 6, 24 says this, No one can serve two masters. Either you're going to hate the one and love the other, or you'll be devoted to one and despise the other. But you cannot serve both God and money. Listen, don't hold onto your wallet so tight. And I'm not saying this, this is not even a message about tithing and giving to the church. And I don't want you to get that from this today. But learn how whatever God allows to flow into your life, to just hold it with an open hand. And here's why. Because with an open hand, it can flow to others. It can flow to the kingdom of God. It can flow to your neighbor. It can flow to those in need. But when your hand is open, the Lord can fill it. But when we close our fists, nothing can flow out, but nothing can flow in either. It's a divine partnership with God that when we are generous with what He has given to us, He says He'll give seed to the sower. And as we sow with what's in our hand, God can keep filling our hand and allow us to continue to sow. But we can't serve both God and money. It's got to be one or the other. God or money and not both. Thank you for listening to Elevate. We hope this message encouraged, inspired, and challenged you. Authentic Life Church is located at 3750 Michael Boulevard in Mobile, Alabama. Visit our website authenticlife.tv for more information about Authentic Life Church. If you'd like to learn more about what we have going on or to make a donation, you can also find us on Facebook. We'd love for you to join us on Sundays at 10 a.m. for our weekend service. We have excellent children's, nursery, and youth programs, so bring the family. For Pastor John DeQuatro, I'm Scott Chestnut. Thanks again for listening and God bless you.