The Spiritual Steward | 1 Corinthians 4:1–2

Stewardship is about faithfully managing what God has entrusted to us, recognizing that we are accountable to him for how we care for his gifts. Join us for a four-week journey through the biblical call to stewardship, a responsibility that goes far beyond financing. All right, week number four.

We're gonna close out our series on stewardship. It's called Stewardship Simplified, and I trust that's what's happened is it's been made a little more simple as we've thought about it from God's word over four weeks. In fact, we welcome all of our campuses in Lamoni and Carlisle, and of course Guttenberg, our gathering there, and then upstairs watching, and of course this room as well.

Let's all get under the weight of the word this morning in our final week. As we do, let's review the first three, shall we? We learned some things about stewardship. Let me just kind of walk you through them.

If you know them, feel free to say it with me. We learned, first of all, that stewards are faithful managers who invest diligently, Matthew 25, the parable of the talents. We also learned that stewards are gracious managers who give sacrificially.

That's from 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, a set of chapters that really talks about the churches and their organized, collective giving to help the needs of God's people and God's work. We also learned this just last week, that stewards are generational managers who value, fashion, and launch their children expectantly. And I think on this week, we especially kind of broaden the idea of stewardship.

We say it a lot that it's more than money, but often we only preach about money, right? But in this case, we took a chance to see that we are stewarding our children as well and how to do that, and Psalm 127 laid some good groundwork for both, we can call them temples and cities and families. You could say churches and families, but a really interesting chapter on how the raising the next generation really affects all of those. And we're stewarding that.

And today we're gonna see this fourth truth about stewardship, that stewards are spiritual managers. Who guard attentively. You notice the word manager has been used, it is a really good word to describe what a steward does.

It's the person who lives like they own something, but they know they don't. They know they're responsible, they know they're accountable, but they know they don't own it, but they live like they do. And so we're managers.

And in this case, this week, we're gonna see that they are managers who are spiritually minded, they're spiritual managers, and they guard attentively. Now the question you should be asking is this, what is it that they guard? Well, let's find out from 1 Corinthians chapter four. So with your Bibles open, find 1 Corinthians chapter four.

We're gonna look just at two verses that describe the spiritual manager, who they are and what they do. It's in these simple verses. You'll see the word faithful used here as well, which is why I think that stewards or managers, the most overriding trait is that of faithfulness, which as we learned in verse one is fruitfulness.

Those are synonymous terms in the Bible. We don't wanna cut that baby, we don't wanna divide that unnecessarily. Let's just understand that faithfulness is fruitfulness.

And here that word is used again in 1 Corinthians chapter four verses one and two. You're there by now. Follow along with me as I read these verses from God's word.

A person should think of us in this way, as servants of Christ and as managers of the mysteries of God. In this regard, it is required that managers be found faithful. Now let's go back and kind of unpack this a bit because I want to admit to you this is tucked inside of a larger context, a set of paragraphs.

I don't wanna just extrapolate it and springboard off this into things that don't connect to the text. And so let's make sure we understand these two verses within the paragraphs that they are settled. Notice he says a person should think of us in this way.

Who is the us? The us we go back to chapter three, primarily verse five. And he's speaking here of church leaders. So in your Bible, perhaps draw an arrow back to the previous chapter.

Look at chapter three, verse five, where he says this, what then is Apollos? Or what is Paul? And the text says they are servants. Do you see that in three, five? So if you go back over to chapter four, verse one, when he says a person should think of us in this way as, say the word with me, for one, as servants. So he's connecting.

And what's happening in Corinth was this. They were making celebrities of their church leaders when they should have seen them as servants. Not like America, of course, right? We're not dealing with that in this culture, are we? No hint of relevance, of course, right? But they were trying to uplift and magnify people like Peter, Apollos, Paul, and these were ones that were mentioned.

Look what Paul says in chapter three about these church leaders. He says they are simply servants through whom you believed and each has the role the Lord has given. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.

Question for you, who owns the growth of the church? Say it with me with passion, God. Are there those who plant? Are there those who water? Are there those who tend to the garden and till it, look after it by all means? But they don't own the garden and they don't own the growth. In fact, he goes on to say in chapter three, verse six and seven, he says, so then neither the one who plants, and this is good for all church leaders in the room to hear, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is, say the next word with me, anything.

Just relax, you can handle it. He's like saying, hey, you know, the guy that plants or the guy that waters, the folks that tend to it, work the soil, they're not anything. He's not being demeaning, he's just being appropriately placing, he's appropriately placing folks in their rightful chair.

He says again, end of verse seven, only God who gives the growth. So not only does he say, you're not really anything, he then exclusively says, only God, he gives the growth. So if you're a church leader in this room, thank you for what you do, but God owns the garden, he tends it, he owns the growth of it, he's everything.

We have a role, but we're not everything, amen. We're simply, say the word with me, we are servants. And he says in chapter four, that's how a person, and that would refer to the church.

So the church should think of their leaders as servants, not celebrities. He also says here, we're servants of Christ, so that means we answer to him, he's the boss, you could use that phrase, he's the owner of the estate. He's the one to whom we're accountable, responsible.

And we are, in turn, managers of the mysteries of God. So again, it's showing that God owns something, the word mysteries here refers to the gospel. If you're new to the faith or just learning about the word of God, understand the word mystery does not mean in the Bible what we mean often in movies today or in our literature.

We often think of something that's hidden, that you don't find out about, so the very last minute, and the point is to make it, is to conceal it. That's not God's heart or the word. The word here simply means incrementally revealed.

It means progressively unfolded. And that is the story of the gospel, which began in Genesis. The first mention of it is in 315, that God promised to send Messiah, the seed of the woman, and then the Old Testament is a story of God's prophets and his people, him keeping them and protecting them so that the seed would come through that line.

The New Testament then shows us how that was fulfilled, and so progressively, incrementally, God reveals his plan. He's not trying to hide it, he's just doing it over time. This is why it's called a mystery.

And he says here that church leaders are managers of this. We're servants of Christ, the main central character of the mystery, and God's servants in the church are the managers of this mystery. And so he says in verse two, it's required that these managers, twice has been mentioned, be found, what? Faithful, trustworthy, reliable.

And I would even say, diligently investing the gospel so that more folks come to Christ and believe in the gospel, that the kingdom is multiplied and reproduced and advanced. A couple of other notes about this verse that I think are quite interesting. The word servants here is not the normal word for servant in the New Testament.

The normal word for servant is the word deacon, or deaconess, however you wanna say it. It's just simply a word that means a servant of the church. This is a word that really connotes rank.

And I think Paul uses it on purpose, not I don't think, I know he does, on purpose, to help us understand that this is not the person in charge. This is not the owner of the growth. This is not the celebrity, the top dog.

This is just the one who's lower in rank. Now, there's some question as to what the word means. Some have said it just means someone who's lower in rank in the temple service, or in the service, let's say, of a building or of a industry, that kind of the employee who answers to someone.

There have been those who've said this word actually is referring to under oarsmen. And so in that culture, often in the, I guess it's the hull of the ship, there'd be the rows where they would have the oars, and you could call them under rowers or under oarsmen, but it'd just be rows of rowers. You've probably seen movies where they're pictured like this, right? And they're all counting and chanting and they're rowing.

Some have said this word is really the word used to describe those people under the ship, and they're just responsible to make sure the ship gets to its destination. They're not in charge of the ship, they're not the captain, but they're responsible to row it appropriately. So the point is both of these work.

So whether it's an under oarsmen, whether it's someone of lower rank who's just simply doing their job, the point is Christ is the captain, we're the servants of Christ. We have a row, an oar, and let's do our job. That's what he says to church leaders.

The word managers here simply is the word that means the one who manages or organizes the house. In fact, in the word manager, in the Greek language is the word house, oikos. It's part of this word in the text.

So it doesn't necessarily mean someone who lives in the house, he's talking about someone who runs the house. The best synonym would be an estate manager. And so Paul here is saying that this is how the church should see its church leaders as spiritual managers, as not the owners, but the ones who simply have a lesser, a subordinate role to our captain.

And we have an assigned job, and they're different. But let's do our jobs, let's manage well, let's do it faithfully, let's serve the church in the name of Christ. This is how a person should think of church leaders as servants, or to use our take home truth, as a spiritual manager who is guarding attentively.

They know their job, they're not a celebrity, and they've got to deliver the message, they've got to guide the ship, they've got to oversee the household well, because they know the master's returning. He's gonna call them to account. And so we are spiritual managers who guard attentively.

Now, let me just approach this from two more angles, and I'm gonna ask the elders to join me in a second. And your church leaders, at least some of them, are gonna take some questions from you, and also share some things with you about their own journey of stewardship. I think one of the questions we have to ask ourselves is this, because when we see this truth, no one here would deny it.

They're not gonna say, Todd, that's not what that verse says. I think we'd all agree. Church leaders are not celebrities, we're servants, and we have to guard attentively, guard God's people.

Hebrews says that church leaders are watchers of souls. We have to also guard the message, because here he says we are actually overseeing the mysteries of God. But the question is this, how then, Todd, do church leaders steward the mystery, manage the message, so to speak, and at the same time, shepherd the church? Sometimes we see these as disconnected.

Like there's a people issue, and then there's the gospel issue. This verse and this passage connects them. So let's ask this question.

I asked myself this question the last couple weeks. How does stewarding the gospel and shepherding people connect? If I'm really a servant of Christ who's supposed to guard attentively, deliver the message, and do my job rowing so the ship arrives at the right destination, guard the message, oversee the household, how do I do that, guarding the mysteries of God, managing that, and yet shepherding the people of God? I would say there are two main thrusts that I think are implied in the text. First of all, let's deliver the message accurately, amen? I've often called this pastoral integrity, or I say let's not be accused of pastoral negligence.

We've often said a pastor's duty. What we're referring to is the responsibility of a servant of Christ, a church leader, a pastor, to give the gospel correctly. And while in our hearts, in this room, it's probably not difficult.

You're all great ameners, at least in your heart. You could be more verbal, I'd appreciate that, but I know you in your heart, you're saying it, right? But our culture is not, they don't look pleasantly upon those who have a one-way perspective. If you hold to an exclusive way to God and you preach that message that Jesus Christ alone is the only Savior of all who believe, and only in his death and resurrection can anyone have their sins forgiven, you'll be called a set of names.

Blacklisted, and not by everybody, but the culture at large, it's very pluralistic, or it's very synchronistic. They want you to maybe say, well, you can believe that and this. We'll just kind of merge them all together.

That way, all of us feel good. You know, we all get a trophy. Everybody wins today.

Or they want you to be pluralistic and say, well, they may not all merge, but they can all be right. Like it's the same God in the end, so you have your way, you have your way, you have your way. So can I just say to you, a pastor's job as an under oarsman, as a rowman, is to make sure that this ship gets to the next destination, which is in the hands of the next generation, with the accurate message of the mystery of God.

That God, from before the foundation of the world, ordained that he would send his son, the second person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ, in the flesh, to live a perfect life and to pay for the sins of the world, 1 John says. His perfect life, perfect death, was the exact sacrifice that God needed to be able to forgive sin and reconcile man unto himself. Jesus Christ did every bit of that.

He was God in the flesh. He gave his life as a ransom. He died on the cross, was raised from the dead.

And the message from God now is this, all who believe in Jesus Christ will have their sins forgiven and be reconciled to me. That's what God says. And he's established that those who believe are his ambassadors to share that message.

We don't get to change the message. You don't get to write the message. You can create ways to deliver the same message.

Hallelujah for creativity. But you can't change the message. I can't change the message.

I have to simply deliver it accurately. Are you hearing me? There is one way to be saved from your sins. It's through the name of Jesus Christ, God's only son.

That's beautiful news. That's gospel news. And to anyone here this morning, whether you're in this room, another campus, or location, or listening later through our podcast, the second you turn to Jesus Christ and believe in him alone, in repentance and faith, turning from unbelief and turning to him in belief, and ask God to save you through Jesus, God will save you from your sins and forgive you for eternity.

That's great news. This is the reason that we so often give opportunity for folks to be saved, because that is a pastor's job. Yes, to edify the church, to teach the church, to feed the church, but part of feeding is making sure that the message of the gospel is clear week after week after week.

So when the current set of church leaders are in the grave, the next set of church leaders is wondering, what did they say? There's clarity, there's courage, there's conviction. So we connect stewarding the message and shepherding the church, first of all, in kind of a large way. Let's make sure we're always delivering it accurately.

The word clearly taught in all of its convictional power, the gospel exactly as God gave it to us, all right? That's the first thing. The second thing is this. I think church leaders are responsible to apply the message specifically, which means when the gospel comes into our life in all of its accuracy and then begins to change us, there's no exceptions or exemptions to its call.

The call to a disciple's life, like there's not an exception to that. When the gospel calls you and saves you, God asks you to lose your life for his sake. God asks you to count the cost and then follow him, to obey him, to do very specific things, not to save you, not to earn his favor, but out of a response of obedience because he has saved you.

Things like connecting to an allegiance to your church, to his church, locally expressed in an area, not being ashamed or afraid to gather with that body, to make a commitment to that body, to serve in that body, to give in that body, to live in a fashion that represents his name. You know, we're told multiple times in the New Testament to walk worthy of the name, and I've told you this several times. That phrase simply means to make sure that how you're living matches up with the name God's given you.

It's a call to a non-hypocritical life, a call to balance and equality between what we say and what we do. And so this is the specific way the gospel leads into us. And so think about this current series in stewardship.

No one gets a pass from God's call to live like you own it, but knowing you don't. No one gets to be an exemption from managing all that you have for God's purposes. You don't get to tuck something away in the basement or put it in your back pocket and say, well, this doesn't count.

This is kind of an area that I'll take care of. No, every bit of our life, from our money to our children, to our possessions, to our time, all of it belongs to God for his purposes. And so a pastor's job, a church's job is to bring the gospel to bear upon that so that we are sacrificial, we have the right perspective, we love each other.

Does that make sense? So we're bringing the gospel to the big areas to make sure that we're believing rightly, and we're bringing the gospel in the small areas to make sure we're behaving rightly. That's what a servant, a spiritual manager does. That's how they guard attentively.

They deliver the message accurately and apply it specifically so that God's people, part of the flock, the fold, are well-fed, well-led sheep, looking at Christ and being pointed to him. So that's why we say, and will you read the take-home truth with me, that stewards are spiritual managers who guard attentively. I'm gonna unpack that last part about applying it specifically, letting the gospel really dig into us, change us in very specific ways by inviting our elders to join me now, and we're gonna just talk through some of this together.

How is the call to guarding the gospel and yet shepherding the church, how is that done well? And then we're gonna take some questions from you, so if you have some questions, feel free to text them in. You have the number there in your weekly. Some have already been texted in, so we'll take those as they came.

Whatever we don't answer live, we'll take on the podcast Tuesday. And then I think as we close things out, we just wanna let you hear maybe some things coming up this year in regards to stewardship. So we'll have the guys introduce themselves first.

We're gonna stay close up here if we can, so we're in the light for the camera's sake, for those who are watching upstairs and our campuses. So let's introduce ourselves first. Some will be sharing mics, and then we'll ask them each, first of all, what are some ways that they're connecting the role of stewarding and then the church, of course, the gospel and the people, how that's working for them.

So we'll start with Scott. Scott Cirozan. Hi, Scott Helms.

Dale Height. Brett Stiles. And I'm Travis Walker.

Fantastic. So guys, let's just kind of randomly, maybe two or three of you, kind of connect these two things that perhaps we could see as disconnected. Like here's our job to guard the gospel, to manage the mystery of God, and yet here's the people of God over here.

How, as an elder, do you bridge the gap between those two, per se? I'll go ahead. I think that the part personally is just to, and it's kind of weighty, is to just make sure when you're dealing with people that you're accurately encouraging them based on scripture and not just what your idea is or even what worked for me or something, that there's just such a responsibility there to just encourage people and make sure that the advice is biblically based. And that, I find, is a fairly heavy weight to carry.

A good thing, but that's probably the primary issue I think of. Yeah. Anyone else want to lean in on there? Travis, you and Scott weren't at first service, so you want to lean in there? I'll start.

One of my specific roles as an elder here is to oversee our membership and our baptisms. And so I feel like that's kind of a good blend of the two. Like it is about people, people join as members, people get baptized.

But the line that I have to hold is the clarity of the gospel. So we were even able to do that this morning in membership classes. We had a group of people share their testimonies and me and my team that lead those classes, it's our job to hold the line and to make sure that they understand the gospel.

And so it's a people thing, but it's also a product thing. It's a fact thing. And both of those have to play a very specific role in order for this church to function well.

So I feel it, every membership class and every baptism testimony. It's very difficult at times to hold the line when you feel the weight of people and their situation. I was thinking about you and Brett this morning.

Brett runs our creative department, but Scott, you own a creative kind of company. And that's what you do, graphics. And I'm not even sure how to describe it.

It's how so dumb I am on this, but that's what you do. I know that. So I was thinking about if you own that kind of company, you've got to always come up with new content.

You've got to think of ways to deliver the product. And so while this is waiting for us, we don't have to come up with new content. Amen to that.

Hallelujah, right? Like, it's okay to be creative in how we deliver it. I think that's what their department does. There's nothing wrong with that, but we don't have to figure out like, okay, Monday morning, what am I going to say Sunday? Like, I never have that thought.

Like, where can I go this coming Sunday? So in that sense, it's not weighty, and I love that, but it is weighty in the sense that sometimes you're sitting across a table from somebody and you've got to share with them, well, actually, the way you're living, without being married, you're together, and you're enjoying intimacy, like the Bible would say that's sin. So you've got to, how do you say that well? How can you hold them and help them take the next step towards doing the right thing, and yet not bend because you feel pressure? So anything you want to add to that, Mr. Creative Guy? No, no, I would just say, yeah, just piggybacking on what you guys were saying, I thought of what you always say, it's the word that does the work, and it is, it's the word that drives those conversations, too. We don't, we just point people back to what does the word say, instead of encouraging out of our own thoughts or ideas, we're just encouraging out of what's the Bible say about that? Amen.

I want each of these guys, too, if they could, just to share briefly some of their own journey in generosity. You may call it a stewardship path, how has the Lord worked in their life to bring them to a better understanding of stewardship? There are two guys not with us, Gary and Mike are both out of town, so they're not with us, but these guys are representative of our elders, and so I'm just gonna start on this end, I think, this time. Travis, just briefly, walk us through some of the ways God's brought you along on your stewardship journey.

Yeah, I got married very young, right out of college. I had tons of debt and no income, and so it was just really a challenge to kind of figure out how all that worked. I would definitely see, as God has helped me just grow in this area, I would see, like, if you're a line chart guy, you can kind of map it out.

My trust in God has grown, and then, equally, my stewardship of my stuff has grown. So, it's like parallel lines. Like, as my trust in God has grown, I've seen it lags behind, for sure, but my stewarding of my things has grown.

Those are inseparable in my mind. It's not, I haven't been able to grow in my generosity or my stewardship of my things separately from my trust of God. That just seems how the equation works in my head, and if I wanna grow in my stewardship or my willing generosity, the answer to that is growing my trust of God, because he has constantly reminded me over and over, I've got you.

You'll have no needs. Like, I'll take care of everything. I've got your family.

I've got your bills. I've got your future. Like, he has just proven that for the last 20 years.

I've got you. I love you. I'm your Heavenly Father.

Yeah, you can give everything away. I've seen those lines just so parallel in my life. Brett? I'd say for me, seven or eight years ago, connecting the words steward or manager, like we've been talking about, and the word ambassador, that was really key for me.

I heard someone, I read a book just on that, and the idea that an ambassador is sent on behalf of the ruler, or for most of history, the king. Not for us today, but. So when an ambassador shows up somewhere, they represent the king.

And so when people see them, how they act, they are representative of who sent them. And so connecting that with stewardship in a lot of, every way, managing the things that I have, whether it's my family. Externally, people see how you steward and manage your children, but also to them, internally.

They're seeing me, how I treat them, and they're thinking, well, this guy is an ambassador. Their first idea of a father is me to them. So the misconceptions they have about God the father will be because of me, and my poor ambassadorship, and poor stewardship.

And so that extends to everything, and I think an example I thought of was like, if I'm at Burger King, and I'm upset, and I say, let me see the manager, the guy that comes out, I'm connecting him with Burger King. If he has a poor response, I go back to my table and say like, man, Burger King is horrible. I don't say it about that guy specifically.

I don't even know that guy. But I connect him immediately to the whole organization, when in reality, he probably doesn't even, he's just working a job. But he is an ambassador for Burger King in that moment.

And the same is true for me. Whether it's my finances, whether it's my relationships, whatever it is, people are watching me, and I'm an ambassador for Christ. And so if I have a poor moment, which we all do, and I never make that right, then people don't look at me and say like, oh, Brett's a, you know, they think, why would I be a Christian? They're gonna connect, that gets connected so synonymously, whether right or wrong.

So thinking about being an ambassador, and even in relation to this last part, you kind of mentioned about being a shepherd, I think if you don't see yourself as an ambassador, as a pastor, then you can just see yourself as a, like a guard. And if you only see yourself as a guard, then you treat people who maybe are violating the line differently than if you see yourself as an ambassador. You might have a conversation with someone who you have to hold the line with, and if your only goal is to hold the line, that's easy to do if you don't care about who you represent.

You can show up and you can let them know real quick that they're violating that line and what you think about it and how it should be, but that doesn't really represent the king well. And so yeah, ambassadorship has been a great thing for me to think about in regards to stewardship in every area of the things that I have to manage. Dale? Talk about stewardship, personal stewardship journey.

Yeah, sure. So yeah, so we've been coming to this church for about 17 years. And when we first started coming, it was probably the way I govern finances when we first started was out of a lot of fear and uncertainty of the future.

And so we wouldn't really give a whole bunch. And that was probably a sin that I had to, that was a sin that I had to deal with. We would probably give around 20 bucks every other month maybe, something like that.

And we really felt that we can't really afford this and those kinds of things and those kinds of conversations happening. But coming to this church, becoming members, falling underneath this leadership, who falls underneath the authority of God's word, we began getting taught what tithing is and what giving sacrificially is and things like that. So we started looking at our finances and saying, okay, we would like to do 10%.

That's a pretty decent goal. And so what I started to do, what we used to do was I would take 10% and then I'd say, okay, X amount is gonna go to missionaries, X amount is gonna go to maybe some local organizations and then give here, give there. And then at the end of it, I'm like, okay, now we have, oh, right, our church as well.

So we give our church and then our church would get like maybe $50 a month or something like that. And we did that for a few years. But again, getting this teaching from our church.

Now, what I just said isn't necessarily wrong. It's not unbiblical, it's not sinful or anything like that, but this church teaches and asks its members to give to and through your local church. And so that would mean you give to missionaries through this church.

So you give offering and the church gives a percentage to our partners and maybe some local organizations. Now, it doesn't mean you can't give above and beyond that, but so we felt convicted and so we looked at our finances and we restructured some things so that we could give maybe more accurately or more sacrificially giving tithing to this church and then giving above and beyond that to local partners or local organizations and things like that. And so that's kind of what we do now.

All the stories have been very incremental in their growth, how the Lord just kind of walks us step-by-step in that history for you and all of y'all. That's good, I didn't interrupt you. I'm sorry if I... No, we're good.

Scott. Well, I was just excited when we decided as a group to do this little series because I wish I would have heard it when I was in high school and middle school, in college even. My wife and I both went to Iowa State.

We got married. She was still in school for a couple more years. She changed her major a couple times so she was on the six-year plan instead of four-year plan.

And I had graduated, we just got married. We were in the second cheapest apartment you could find in Ames. The cheapest was just unlivable.

The second cheapest still had carpet in the bathrooms and kitchens so that's enough. I mean, you get it when I say that. And so we were trying to live on very little.

Me trying to be the good new husband put our first budget together. So we still have it, by the way. Like writing down everything in pencil.

Okay, I think I figured it out. Here's our budget. And I took it to Felicia and like Travis was saying, we had college debt, we had all that stuff too.

And I get the budget done and I take it to my wife and she's like, okay, this looks good. But where's tithing? And I was like, what's tithing? I had watched my mom when they passed the shiny gold plate drop an envelope in there. I never had the guts to ask her how much was in that envelope.

But I remember just watching that and I was just so thankful for my wife. Not in that moment, actually I was a little bit like, oh my goodness, there's room in this budget. Like literally there's no room in this budget.

We had everything cut out. I had one round of golf per year in there. And I love golf and one round is not a lot.

So anyway, so there wasn't a lot to cut out. And I was just like, I had all those thoughts of, we don't have the money. Like we'll tithe when we have the money.

We can't do it. Look at the number, like the math just isn't there. And praise God, she was stubborn and didn't move.

And praise God, I wasn't overly stubborn and I moved and realized like I have to, as Travis said, trust the Lord. I have to trust the Lord. And it's gonna, you know, he'll work it out.

And by the grace of God, I don't know how, it was one of those sorts of things. We get to the end of the year and we didn't just pay all of our bills. We had money left over.

It just, it's one of those God math things that doesn't even make sense. So I'm so thankful that he put us in that situation and that she was faithful. And you know, that's kind of how it started for us.

That's good. Scott. Okay, so when my wife and I got saved back in like 83, I think it was, shortly after that, like maybe a year or so, we started thinking, you know, we need to give to the church.

And we were at same scenario, broke, just starting a family, trying to figure out life. And so we thought, okay, we'd give like $10 one week and maybe $20 another week. And you know, if I had a really good week or something, we might be able to give a little bit more.

But it was real sporadic and it didn't, I don't know. It didn't, it just seemed real weird, I guess, for us. Nothing to really count on.

And we weren't very good budgeters to begin with. So basically, during that time, I was a little confused that, oh, the New Testament, I can give out of my heart. Well, my heart doesn't really feel like giving a whole lot right now because we don't have much.

And so I was listening to Christian radio at the time and they, I think it was Focus on the Family or something, had a guy on there and he said this and it just stuck with me even to this day. But he said, do you want to live on 90% of what you make with God's blessing or do you want to live on 100% of what you make without? And it just like, it hit me. It was like, oh, okay.

Well, $20 probably isn't gonna do it. And later, I'm gonna read the verse that really supports that. It's in Malachi 3, verse 10.

Bring the full tenth into the storehouse so that there may be food in my house. Test me in this way, says the Lord of armies. See if I will not open the floodgates of heaven and pour out a blessing for you without measure.

I will rebuke the devourer for you so that it will not ruin the produce of your land and your vine in the field will not fail to produce fruit, says the Lord of armies. And then it says, then all the nations will consider you fortunate for you will be a delightful land, says the Lord of armies. So there was a promise in there that came with the obedience of doing that.

So we started that really out of faith because it didn't seem like we could do it. And so we just started doing that. And with this series, I've been challenged to look back and say, okay, did that work? I guess I haven't taken the time.

I knew I had a blessed life, but even the last couple of weeks, I've been thinking, wow, God has blessed our whole life up through this point so faithfully. Now it's not prosperity gospel kind of thing because we had rough times. We had financial tough times, some real tough times.

But what I realized is the tough times that we had was because of me. It was my selfish ambitions, stupid decisions, things that I didn't really take before the Lord where I decided to go down different paths financially that just were not right. And we paid the consequences for those.

I think of it like a parent, if your child is really disobeying, do you take him to the store and buy him a nice gift? I mean, generally you withhold things so that they will turn back. And so God would withhold things, blessings, so to speak, because really, mostly my sin. And then when I would come back, he would just start that blessing train again, I guess.

So I can just say that through our whole life, we just seek continual blessing. Now, is it all related to that? Obviously, it helps us obey. If we obey in that, it helps us obey in other things in life as well, so.

Those are good stories, and I think our people love getting to know you guys more. Now, this question dealt with a lot of our financial aspects. You heard their stories that way.

I want to speak on Scott Searson's behalf and just say that these men also steward more than just their money. In fact, I've known Scott for 20 plus years and his family. And there was a time when, as a business owner, he had a customer very upset with him.

And he was concerned that, I think Scott felt like he was probably in the right, but this customer was confident too, and they were kind of in a conversation. He came to me as his pastor, and he said, hey, what should I do? And he didn't really need my advice because he told me what he thought he ought to do. And I said, I think that's a very, I think that's amazing.

So he felt like he should take the high road and say, you know, for the sake of the name of our company and the name of Christ. These folks knew he was a Christian. He said, it seems like it'd be more prudent for me to guard, like you were saying, Brett, the representation factor going on here and probably take the hit if that's what happens, be willing to kind of go the extra mile because there's more at stake here than just a bottom line dollar.

I don't know if you remember that moment. You do? Yeah, I remember. And I remember looking at that saying, wow, Scott's not just managing his money.

Scott's managing his testimony. It was like a really good moment for a pastor to see a fellow Christian concerned about something more than just money, but how I'm entrusted with this name that God's given me, Christian. So as you hear our stories, I just want you to know it's not, we're not just a money moment here, really.

It's kind of a part of stewardship, but there's other examples of trying to manage all that God's given us. And we're learning too. We're a work in progress for sure.

Anybody want to add any more of their stories before I go to the live questions? Okay, great. Let's take a few questions here from you all. Here's what's come in.

And again, whatever does not get answered here, we'll try to tackle on the podcast. So in the parable of the talents, what do you think motivated the two servants who were faithful? Brett, I'm gonna throw this your way to begin, and then we'll let anyone else, we'll let one person follow up if they have a question. If they want to.

So I think what motivated them was the nature of the master. Now, even we have some disagreement on what that means. Personally, I think that the negative description you hear from the unfaithful servant is an accurate description of the master, but what we get is the servant's negative perception of his character.

I do believe, actually, that the character of the master is a demanding boss that demands a return and reaps where he doesn't sow, because at the end of the parable, that's what happens. The guy who doesn't get the return, he doesn't get a pass. You either get one or you don't.

And so I do think that's true about the master, and so I think that that reality motivated the two faithful servants in a different way than the unfaithful. And so, yeah, that's how I see it, but I think you have a different kind of take on that reality. I would agree, generally.

Yeah, I would be more of a larger picture and say that the surety of accountability is what motivated the first two. So it'd be similar. But yeah, I have a little disagreement on the nature of his accusation, but we always say around here, you can disagree on minor things and be great friends, and I'm doing it now with someone in my family, right? So we're good there, right? That's how I learned this trait.

So anyway, but I think we agree on this. The surety of that accountability that you would answer to the master, the verse I think of, and I think it's the Corinthians as well, that each of us must give an account to God so no one in this room gets to bypass that. So that weighs heavy on me, and I'm excited.

You think about the Lord will call us to account, so I want to lay everything I can at his feet and have done everything possible to see his kingdom grow and those purposes be magnified. So yeah, I think that is why they were motivated. Anybody want to follow up on that at all? Maybe a different perspective? Because we really don't know the answer.

The text doesn't tell us explicitly why. So these are opinions. You can have a different one, and we'll be fine.

You guys have another one or? I think that, I guess, the way I read it is these servants had, I mean, this is probably my military background, but they received this mission from their boss, and they made a plan, and they executed these orders. It was pretty clear. He wants this to occur, so they're going to go do these things.

They had a very high-demanding boss. I actually like having a high-demanding boss sometimes because I'm like, I know exactly what this person wants. And so I can do those things, or at least I have to figure out how to do those things.

And so to me, their motivation is they know what the boss wants, and so they're going to do it. I was thinking about you this week, in fact, Dale, in regards to the word servant. Should it mean subordinate, a lesser role? And I was thinking about you as a military guy.

And Dale's retired from the military, and I have always felt like military people make great church members. And it's for this reason. It's because they can take orders great.

Most Americans think they're consultants to your ideas. But military folks seem to do what he said. They like clarity, and they can hear it and say, I know my role, and I'll just do that.

And so I've really enjoyed working with military guys. I was wondering, you may have even a deeper insight into stewardship because where you're working really didn't belong to you at all. I mean, it was the American people, in one sense.

Share some insight on this role of servant from a military perspective. Yeah, so serving or being a good steward, manager, those kinds of things. What I go to is, maybe this might be a decent analogy.

I think I can bring you guys in on this to understand what I'm trying to say. But an analogy that I thought of when Todd was going through the parable of the talents was being a good steward of what you're given. So if you've ever been in the military, you're given some equipment, and you have to maintain accountability of it.

Particularly if you have a weapon, you must maintain accountability of that weapon. You gotta know where it's at at all times. Even if it's short-lived, no harm, no foul, loss of accountability, if you're a soldier and you lost that weapon, even if it's for a second, and then you turn around and grab it, you just had a really bad day.

Like you put it down, you walk around the corner, you go, oh, I forgot I put that down. You go over there, and if somebody saw you, your day has changed. And that's because, if you think about it, why is that such a big deal? Well, you don't want the enemy to get a hold of your weapon.

You don't want to have that lost. I actually have a story, which I won't get into now, but it was where two bases shut down looking for one lost weapon. And it was the middle of the night, and we're being told that some generals are getting woken up, and those kinds of things.

And so the point is, why is it such a big deal? Isn't it just my problem? Well, the answer is no, because that weapon doesn't belong to me. It belongs to the United States Army. I have to be a good manager of that weapon.

I have to be a good steward of that weapon, right? Well, the same thing goes for what we do here, and what God has given us with all of our stuff, including our own children. Our children, they don't belong to us. We don't get to do whatever we want with our children.

We don't get to raise them however we want. We have to raise them according to God's word, because these children don't belong to us. They belong to God.

And so we have to be good stewards of our children and raise them in the way in which they should go, so that when they are old, they will not depart from his word. Just like weapons, if you lose a child, your day is changed. Yes.

Not a good day. That's very true. If you lose a child.

Yes, so yeah. That's helpful. That's a good illustration.

Thank you. Let's take another question, can we? Should someone give if they're severely in debt? I'm gonna go to my left here and let you start, and you can follow. How does that sound? Yes is the answer.

You want God's blessing. Now, there's more than just giving, and all your stupidity goes away, right? So you need to learn how to manage your money. So there's more to getting out of debt than just giving.

But I think giving should be in there. Whatever the percentage is or whatever, that's between you and God. But I think there should be a form of giving built into your plan, even through debt reduction.

So, and then hopefully with debt reduction, then you can get into joyfully giving even more. But, so my answer is yes. I think it just kind of ties back into some of the same things we were sharing on our stories.

That's probably the hardest time, or the, I shouldn't say that. It's probably the easiest time to justify not giving. It might not be the hardest time, because you think about the rich young ruler, and all that he had.

When that's your treasure, it's gonna be even harder to give away. So, yeah, I would agree. If you're in that situation, it's not gonna be easy.

But it is what God commands. What if someone's debt wasn't because of their dumb decisions or their stupidity? Let's say it was a medical emergency, and they just now were suddenly laden with over $100,000 of medical expenses from, let's say, a cancer case, or maybe a parent who was admitted to a facility. I mean, they're just all kind of things that maybe someone, without even their own fault, like, I'm now responsible.

Can you walk through that, maybe like, how they would approach that with humility? Thanks, Todd. Yeah, you're welcome. I think the same principle applies.

Amen, amen. You're gonna, in that situation, I believe God's probably looking at those situations going, trust me, let me show you how I can take care of you. So again, I think, like that scripture I just read, God says, test me in these things.

And so I think that would be an example. Would it be very difficult? Absolutely, but a lot of times, faith on hard things is tough to do. But God's just waiting to bless us.

Amen. The verse that just comes to my mind is trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding, which I think is what comes in a lot in these situations.

My own understanding and my budget, or the situation, or what have you. And acknowledging him, and he will direct your paths. So yeah, I think when you said it's not your fault, debt that's not your fault, I mean, college kind of falls in that too, right? Like, you didn't do anything wrong, but it is a debt that you have to pay, and God'll work it out, I think.

Trust is the word that just keeps resonating today. Can I add one thing? Sure. I think, like, if the answer to this question is no, like, if you're in debt, you don't have to do this, what we're really trying to say is, well, the argument then would be, well, there are exceptions to obeying God in this area.

And I don't know if, I don't wanna be in that vein of trying to make arguments against why we should not have to obey something that's in the Bible. And so I think just generally speaking, when going beyond financial situations, like, you don't wanna say, I'm the exception, I don't have to obey anything, or anything specific in the Bible because of my specific situation. Like, let's just obey God's word.

Yeah, amen. Let's do one more, then I'm gonna have these guys share with you some things on the radar for 2025. One more question is, are child dedication ceremonies required in order to steward your children? Travis, I'm gonna throw this your way, and then we'll let Brett follow up.

No, no, I don't know what they mean by a specific ceremony. I think your example, was it last week where you prayed over your child? That was a ceremony in some regards. There's a public ceremony in front of your church family.

So I think it is a helpful practice to, just before God, to dedicate your child to the Lord, maybe privately. So I thought your example was a good one of that. I didn't know if you publicly dedicated them later, but I think that's a good application to that.

It would be helpful in your first few days, weeks, months, whatever that is, to just you and your spouse pray and dedicate this child to the Lord. That's probably my answer, but yeah. It's not like baptism or communion or something? It's not an ordinance of the church.

Nope, not anything that God required or demanded for the church to practice. That's good clarity. Brett, you wanna follow that up at all? Yeah, I think the ceremony is what's in question.

Like, we would all agree, like, yeah, dedicating your child to the Lord, that's a great thing. I don't think anyone's like, I don't know if you should do that. But last week, we went home.

My wife was like, are we bad people? We didn't pray in the hospital room over our baby? I was like, no, we're not. I think we're okay. But I think it is like, the dedication is between you and your family, whether that's a prayer in the hospital room, whether that's something between you and your spouse.

I think the ceremony is an outward expression of what you're already committed to. And I think the danger is that we get it flipped around and we have the ceremony and never do anything to steward our kids because we just let the ritual or the, yeah, the practice, the tradition stand in place of actually doing something in our own heart and lives. That's when you would get in trouble.

Amen. Just for the record, I made sure with Julie that she knew we were gonna do that before she went to the hospital because I know that at that moment, it would not be wise to say, hey, can I just take a moment? And I thought, we're gonna have this all planned out ahead of time if we can. She said, sure, and we were good to go then.

So yeah, that's not a spur of the moment thing you wanna do right at delivery, I'm sure. So anyway, hey, guys, lay out for our church a few things coming up in 2025 that maybe avenues to keep growing as a steward. Scott, I know there's one that we've been talking about for a few months as elders that I think the church would like to know about.

Sure. Well, I'm gonna take, I'm gonna switch with Dale because last time he didn't do what he was supposed to do. What I'm gonna talk about is, kind of relates to the whole, the questions about the debt and things like that.

So the church is gonna do a financial peace university teaching. They're bringing somebody in to do that. And so whoever really wants a refresher on how to budget, how to plan and what have you, or especially if you're in debt, that's totally necessary.

And that's a great tool that the church is gonna provide for helping you through that. Travis, you wanna bring some details of that? I know it's been on our weekly and stuff, so yeah. Yeah, sure, Tom Grogg, he's one of our members here.

He'll be leading that class. It's the first, it starts the first Wednesday of February. It's during the Awana Middle School youth group hours from six to 7.30, here upstairs in room 201.

I believe it's a nine-week class. And there's a week we have to take a break. So it's actually a 10-week class where we'll meet nine times.

My testimony is, I think financial peace university was the tool God used to help us rid a lot of debt. So I could not recommend financial peace university more to you guys. If you're available, please be a part of it.

It costs $20 a couple. That would be the best $20 you've ever invested in your finances. Amen.

Dale, how about some other things that may be on the radar of our church that we're gonna be trying to look at? Yeah, one of the things that we discussed and prayed over and decided as elders is we were going to take 2025 and start paying down and paying off some of our debt as a church. And so I think we're at the debt that we do have is 1.2. It's about that, right. About 1.2 million.

And we made that decision. And we didn't make that decision in the past because of the interest rate and the situations that we're in. But some of those things have changed.

And so, and I can't get too precise on those details. The finance team could probably get way better with that in RJ. But we did make that decision to start paying off that debt and focusing on that for 2025.

Yeah, and I feel very confident this church could knock that out in a year. I really believe that. Through generous, radical generosity.

And like you said, I appreciate your insight about things have changed. And you make even more insight of that. But just interest rates when we were getting, they were great on the return and low on the charges.

And then we had to renegotiate those loans. And so now we're having to pay more interest and we're not getting as much on the other side. So we said, hey, let's just get this debt paid off.

And it's about 1.2. I think we can knock it out in a year. So we're praying and we're gonna lead to that direction. But anything you wanna add to that? No, you're spot on.

Like Todd was saying, the interest rate that we had on that, we could actually, investing that money in CDs and such at the time, we were actually making more on the CDs than we were paying in interest. And then on the business loan, it had to be reassessed. And so that rate went up significantly.

And now there's not that delta there anymore, so. Let me tell you why I feel confident that God could do that if we trust him and then respond as he leads us. And you may hear this as a little prickly, but I'm just gonna share what is a fact.

If the research is true, in Ankeny, the average household income is about $100,000. There's a more precise figure that RJ gave me. That's average.

So if you're thinking, well, that's not me, I understand what you've been thinking, well, that's lower than what I make. The point is, that's an average specific to Ankeny based on the number of givers that we have annually. If everyone gave 10%, 10%, our budget would be above $4 million.

Last year, it was 2.1, and we only missed our budget by $3,000. I found that out last week. That was a lot of generosity because our budget went up a good bit last year, and we only ended up 3,000 short.

So thank you, first of all. I think we have a very generous church, but I do think we have room to grow. And what if we all aimed for 10%? There's about a $1.9 million still in our pockets.

If those facts are true, right? Don't be offended, don't be prickly. Just hear it as perhaps some research and facts that I think 1.9 is greater than 1.2, don't you? We could knock that out this year if the Lord just continued to move our hearts towards generosity. Now, on the heels of that, let me just share with you, there are multiple ways to give.

And I'm not talking about methods like online or in person. I mean different ways to give. There's what's called planned or regular giving.

And I trust, and we trust as elders that all of you are involved in that as a member of First Amendment. There's planned generosity, planned regular giving, where either you bring cash or a check or a three-year digitally. It's just regularly done.

That's a way to give. There's also a thing we call opportunity giving. When you hear about needs and then you're aware of them and the Holy Spirit prompts you, you give above and beyond to help meet an opportunity.

It could be one that's a need, like, oh, we've gotta take care of that, or it could be something where it's more like growth, like, hey, we should do that. That would give us greater expansion. One of my prayers this year, and I'm not sure how long this will take, it might take five, six years, but I hope we can begin to research what it looks like to begin some type of endowment fund.

I don't think that's actually the word we should use. It's the only word I can think of to explain what I'm talking about, but some kind of fund that would grow from a seed that was given for planting more churches. Right now, we have great partnerships with North America Mission Board, SIN Network, our own convention here in the state, but if we had some kind of seed fund by which we could help start more churches, I think one of the great needs in planting churches is how do we get the ball rolling in an area? And so we've, these guys have been very generous.

We have a lot of good partnerships, but it seems like it's always, you know, we're scratching for a dollar when you try to get something rolling. I thought, what if we could generate a fund that could be seeded in some way that would generate income, but the seed was never bothered? Could that help us in the decades to come plant more churches? So I call it the 435 Endowment Fund. I'm not even sure that's the right name or a good name.

435 is the name of our church network that we started and got a part of, but wouldn't it be great if we could just see a seed fund started and then grow so that we're never forgetting, you know, the fields that are white to harvest around us? So there's planned giving, there's opportunity giving, and then there's estate giving. Let me just do it again. I'm gonna kind of be very frank with you.

Estate giving is when you think about what your money and your resources will do after you're gone. The research says this, and I'm not real familiar with this. RJ's kind of clued me in a good bit, but he says in the next 10 to 12, 15 years, and it may be less, it may be more, but it's in that range.

Within America, there's a massive transfer of wealth on the way. From the older generation that's looking at ending into the coming generation, and the scare among many, and I would use the word, first of all, financial people, but I've had some pastoral people, the scare is that the incoming generation's not ready to handle the amount of money that's gonna be passed down to them. Now, I can't speak to that, I don't know, but if that's true, that there is a massive amount of wealth about to be transferred from one generation to the next, I just wanna ask this question.

Is it leaning against the purposes of God? I'm not saying we shouldn't care for families and have generational impact in mind at all, but I would say this, can we lean that money towards God's kingdom as well so that there are eternal treasures and benefits? Are you with me? So I'm just thinking, are there people at First Family who know that they're within 10, 15, 20 years of their life ending on this earth, and they wanna leave their wealth in a way to ensure that God's purposes within this local body are continually pursued? If so, man, just talk to us. I think we have the right people in place and some connections. We can talk about estate giving.

That's just, again, part of ways to give. That all leans into stewarding what God's entrusted to you, and that is our responsibility, right? We're managers, faithful, gracious, generational, and spiritual managers.