BubbaSmith.net

¹⁰ For God is the one who provides seed for the farmer and then bread to eat. In the same way, he will provide and increase your resources and then produce a great harvest of generosity^[e] in you.¹¹ Yes, you will be enriched in every way so that you can always be generous. And when we take your gifts to those who need them, they will thank God. ¹² So two good things will result from this ministry of giving—the needs of the believers in Jerusalem^[f] will be met, and they will joyfully express their thanks to God. - II Cor. 9:10-12

I absolutely love these two verses! Before I go over how much money you should give, I think it’s important to  go over the outcomes of your giving. Because too often, people think the outcome of their giving is that the church gets richer and they get poorer. Nothing is farther from the truth. Here are some of the outcomes of your giving:

People Will Praise God – if this was the only outcome, wouldn’t that be worth it? Think about it . . . if you’re a tither and a giver, every time you see someone praising God, every time you see someone who has had their live changed, an addiction broken, or a marriage restored through the ministry you give to, you had a part to play in that.

People’s Needs Will Be Met – In Acts, it says that when everyone was giving as they should, nobody in the entire church lacked anything! What if we all trusted God with our finances? We’d change the world! We’d put an end to poverty! We could meet every-one’s needs!

God will give you more money to give! - It may seem like God uses some people more than others . . . and He does. Why? Because the people God will use and bless the most are the ones who obey Him. If you’ll obey God in the area of your finances, He’ll send more financial resources your way so you can be an even bigger giver!

You Learn that it is far better to Give than to Receive - If you’ve ever done anything for someone financially in a way they can’t pay you back for, I don’t have to tell you this, you already know – Nothing compares to giving to others. I promise – if you start giving to people in this manner – you’ll become addicted and you’ll go from earning to make a living to earning to make a giving!

²⁴“No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money. -Matthew 6:24

God Wants Your Heart

When it comes to giving, God is far more interested in having your heart than your money. Jesus said wherever your treasure is, that’s where your heart is. For instance, in the area of finances, I’ll be able to tell matters most to you in life by looking at your bank statements. What does your spending say about you? How you spend your money will show me whether you’re trusting God with your finances by putting Him first or if you’re trusting in yourself and your money. You can’t do both.

If you asked any pastor around the country if you should be a tither and a giver, I promise you they’d tell you yes, regardless of whether or not you attend THEIR church.

Why? Why would they tell you to be a tither or a giver if their church is never going to see a penny of what you’re giving? Because they know being a tither and a giver is for your benefit, far more than it is for the churches benefit. (I’ll go over the benefits of giving in another post).

People who think it’s all about the church or pastor wanting their money are missing the entire point of giving. Giving is all about yielding your heart to God and trusting Him with everything that’s important to you.

God wants all of your heart, all of your soul, all of your mind, and all of your strength. God wants to be first in your life. My question to you is – is He? If He is, you’re finances will reflect that. I like what Pastor Nathan says, “He’s either Lord of all, or not at all.”

Tomorrow I’ll go over the three types of giving in the Bible – tithing, offerings, and alms giving.

Check out this video from LifeChurch.tv:

I got the privilege to go to NewSpring’s Unleash Conference today. It was an incredible experience. It was amazing to see what God has done here! This will be a 2-part review! One with a summary of key takeaways and another of the practical ministry takeaways. Here were my big takeaways:

It’s All About Making Jesus Famous One Life at a Time - This is NewSpring’s Vision. It is beyond evident that the vision is burning in the hearts of every staff member and volunteer. Everything they do as a church, is done with the intention of changing people’s lives. When I say everything… I mean everything!

Quit Playing Games and Start Preaching the Word - I love how simple Newspring is. I.E. The youth – ALL they do is preach, worship, small groups, and a summer camp. It’s all centered around pointing teenagers to Jesus. Period. I love it!

People Act Like they Don’t Know Christ, Because they Don’t Know Christ - Let me clarify! They had a 5th grader that went to their childrens ministry for the first time. He saw a PS3 and Wii and said, “They have a PS3! A Wii! This s*** is awesome!” Those are the people we’re trying to reach, we need to have people like this coming to church! Instead of correcting them, let’s love them and point them to Jesus. They’ll only change as a result of knowing Him!

People Can Believe in You and Go to Hell - I love Perry. He was saying that we should never try to get people to believe in us or think we’re awesome. We need to constantly be getting their eyes off  of us and onto Jesus. He’s the only one that can save them.

Celebrating Wins is Critical – Every staff meeting they start with sharing victories in their church. Then they celebrate them – this fuels them with passion every week becasuse it helps them recognize they are doing what God called them to do!

They Don’t Know How They Grew! - Twice in their church their attendance has doubled in a one week span… from 400 to 900 and 4,000 to 8,000. What did they do? Nothing… They have no idea how it happened! Perry always relays it like this: Leadership is as easy as listening to God. Then do what He  says! Perry said, “If you can explain what God is doing in your church, He’s probably not that involved in it!

I loved being at Newspring! I know it definitely fired me  up to come home and do more for Jesus. I’m so glad they are doing what God called them to do and inspiring the body of Christ while they do it!

Tomorrow I’ll talk about the practical things I learned that we can implement in our ministries!