Biblical Principles on Money

In Luke 16, Jesus makes some statements that have caused a lot of confusion. People argue over what does he mean in these statements. Let's go there in Luke 16. Let's start in verse 1. He tells us this parable. If you just read the parable and you stop, it sounds like an odd, sort of unethical parable. What's the point he's making? He says to his disciples, there was a certain rich man who had a steward. An accusation was brought to him that this man was wasting his goods. He has someone as a manager of his business. He gets this message that his manager is actually doing unethical things and mismanaging his business.

He calls this steward in. He says to him, what is this I hear about you? Give an account of your stewardship, for you can no longer be the steward. In other words, you have to now bring your accounting books. I'm going to look at everything. You're not in charge anymore until I do research. Well, the thing is, it was true. This was a dishonest man who was running this man's business. Verse 3, then the steward said within himself, what shall I do?

For my master is taking the stewardship away from me. I cannot dig, and I'm ashamed to beg. In other words, this was an easy job. I don't want to go out and do hard work. I sure don't want to have to go on welfare. So what am I going to do? Now, it's interesting. He doesn't go and say, I'm sorry, I was dishonest.

I've got to get out of this mess. Now, what can I do? I resolve what to do. When I put out of the stewardship, they may receive me into their... Oh, I'm sorry. Verse 4. He says, after he thinks it's a story, he says, okay, I have an idea. I know what I'm going to do now. So when I lose my job, it's all going to be taken care of. Verse 5. So he called every one of his master's debtors to him, and he said to the first, how much do you owe my master?

And he said, a hundred measures of oil. He said to him, take your bill, sit down quickly, and write 50. In other words, he's changing what's going on. He's saying, okay, I know you owe our company, you know, a hundred dollars. Well, this would be a lot of money. A hundred thousand dollars. But I tell you what, because you're such a loyal customer, we're willing to write off 50,000. And so he gets out the document. He makes it a legal document.

He signs it as an officer of this company. Well, this guy, he's now his best friend, right? He goes on, he says... So he said to him, take your bill, write 50, verse 7. Then he said to another, how much do you owe? So he said, a hundred measures of weight. He said to him, take your bill, write 80. So now he brings the books to the accounting, and the master looks at the book, and he can see immediately what he's done.

He's had no problem getting a job, because he just bought off everybody that did business with this company. He's bought off. He stole from his masters what he did. What he did here is steal, but now he has no problem. He's going to be taken care of. He knows he's going to get a job. Verse 8, so the master commanded the unjust steward, because he had done shrewdly.

Wait a minute. That almost sounds like the bad guy here is the good guy in this parable. And then he makes this statement, for the sons of this world are more shrewd in their generation than the sons of life. Now, if you stop there, you would say, wait a minute. What he's saying is that the unjust steward is more shrewd than the Christians, the sons of life. So we need to be more shrewd, like him.

If you stop there, that's what you think. The point he's making is we need to be more dishonest. We need to be more shrewd in our business, more cutting of edges, more shading the truth like they are. But it's not his point at all. And this is why this parable sometimes is so misunderstood. You can't just stop there. You have to read the rest of it. And the rest of it is going to be what the sermon is about today. Because this leads up to his point. So how do we, as Christians, how are we to interact in a business sense?

How are we to interact with money? What are we supposed to do in this business world which is basically at its core dishonest? At its core, it's great. I can show you all the great sins and terrible aspects of communism. But let's be honest. We can also talk about all the great terrible things and sins of capitalism.

Because it plays on its freedom. It plays on, or people use it to carry out greed. And to carry out dishonesty. So what does he say next? He says verse 9, And I say to you, another statement that just seems strange until you put all this together, I say to you, make friends for yourselves of unrighteous manmen, that when you fail, you may receive you to an everlasting home. Manmen just means money. Make friends with unrighteous money so that when you fail, which you're going to, you can receive each other life.

I think about that a bit. Make friends with rotten, dirty money so when you fail, you can have eternal life. What he's saying here, and we'll see it in the rest of what he says, is that physical things that God gives us, money, you know, owning a nice house, owning nice clothes, owning a car, is not evil in itself. In fact, these things are there for us to learn the difference between good and evil.

If I have ten dollars in my pocket or a hundred thousand dollars in my pocket, that's neither good nor evil. What I do with that can be good or evil. What I do with it, and what I do with ten dollars, can be just as evil as what I do with a hundred thousand dollars.

So the things that God gives us is part of the spiritual training ground we have. So when you fail, when this life doesn't, we all don't become millionaires, we all don't have great power, we all don't have great status, we all don't wear the beautiful diamonds every place we go. If that doesn't happen, you can receive eternal life because you've built and developed a whole different set of values than what are the common values of the world we live in.

Now let's continue on. You'll get to see how this plays out. I mean, he starts with this sort of in-your-face, sort of strange parable, and then builds off of that to, and now let's talk about principles. He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much, and he who is unjust in what is least is unjust also in much. So here's his point. If we and I can't be faithful to properly manage whatever physical things God gives us, if we can't understand how to properly use money, wealth, no matter what the amount is, whether you live in a hut with a dirt floor or a three million dollar house, the principles we are to learn are exactly the same.

And God can teach us exactly the same no matter which one you're in. He says, but if you can't be just in a little bit, if just a little bit will make you dishonest, just to get one new contract, just to get one new car, just to do this, you're willing to lie or steal or cheat. He says, how can I trust you with the kingdom? How can I trust you with the kingdom? So make friends with this stuff, because it's with this stuff that God says, I'm teaching you the reality of the real world. And if you can't live in this, you can't live in that one either.

Money. Man, a sermon about money. I don't give sermons about money too often. We're going to have money today. We all have some, right? I mean, probably everybody here, probably even some of the little kids, at least a nickel in their pocket. We all have some money, and money can be a curse, and money can be a blessing depending on what we do with it and how we use it.

Jesus then says in verse 11, Therefore, if you have not been faithful in the unrighteous money, who will commit to you the trust of the true riches? If you have not been faithful in what is another man's, who will give you what is your own? That is, if we cheat other people, or we cheat our employer, we cheat our employer, then God says, how do I know you won't cheat me, or cheat others in my kingdom? Because if that's what you do now, that's what you'll do then.

Now verse 13, you see the real meaning here, where he begins to show the real meaning of his parable. No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. He didn't say you can't have God and money. He said you can't serve God and money.

The little things. I know if you saw the news today, those three boys from UCLA, three basketball hunters, were over in China, and they shoplifted. Now, why would you shoplift? You are there as guests of that nation. You are there representing all of us, and you shoplifted sunglasses. Now, they are very expensive sunglasses.

And, you know, I'm sorry. You are three guys, 6'4", in a nation of people that are average 5'6".

They're going to see you, okay?

And it took the President of the United States to get them out of jail. They've knocked their kids, send them home, and they say, okay, you can have them. What are we going to do with them? You know, we're going to feed them and take care of them, or stick them in jail. You take them.

If you would steal sunglasses in another country, as an employer, I'd think, how can I trust you with anything? As a member of the Board of Directors of that school, I'd be saying, how can we trust them not to cheat on their test? How can we trust them in anything? And, you know, it's interesting, watching their apologies, they recognize that. Two of the three boys said, we've got to earn trust now. How does anybody trust us in anything?

The one I'm not sure got it, but two of them got it. How can anybody trust us now on anything? Because we did something so stupid.

I don't know if you saw the apologies. I thought it was interesting. Two of the three said, and we thank the police in China because, you know, basically, they could have thrown them in jail and never let them out. And they didn't. They reacted real nice when the U.S. government asked, and they let us go, and did custody of the U.S. And they said, we thank their judicial system, too, because they didn't have to do that because we were wrong. We were wrong, and they could have kept us there. And we thank them for that. So there was three scared boys. Hopefully, at least two of them, I think, maybe learned something. You and I can't serve God and money. We can have money, but we can't serve it. And we live in a world, and we live in a country that serves money. Everything is about the economy. You know, I think that we would elect any president, no matter what the moral standings or the real beliefs of that president was, as long as they kept us making money. It's all about the economy, stupid. Remember that? It's all about the economy, stupid. So we're going to talk about money today, and how you and I can use the scripture to build some biblical wisdom about money. But you say, okay, I'm going to give you some ideas about budgeting and so forth. At the end, I'll give a couple, a few basic principles of managing money. But what I want to go through is a bigger concept, and that is how, what Jesus is talking about here, how does money and the use of money reflect as part of our character? What does that reflect as part of our Christianity? I'm going to go through five spiritual aspects of our lives that are reflected in how we use money. And there are areas of our lives that, if we look at ourselves and we find ourselves being dishonest, or if we find ourselves doing certain things, we have to say we have a problem in these areas. The first one, oh, okay, spiritual area that has to do with money. The first one is one you probably wouldn't even think of, and that is our faith in God. Luke 12. Go back a few pages.

Luke 12.

Now, I'm going to read, I'm going to start in verse 13, because I want to set up why Jesus says what he does. I mean, usually we read what he says, which is a parable, but I want to see why he sets this up. Then one of the crowds said to him, said to Christ, Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. Now, inheritance is a very important issue, and it's an issue of law. You can go into the Old Testament, and there are all kinds of laws concerning inheritance. So when he comes to him, he's asking him, he says, You are a teacher. You can make these kinds of rulings.

Now, Jesus here said, okay, you need to take this to the Levites. You need to take this to the elders. So he refuses to make a judgment. But he said, A man who made me a judge or an arbiter over you. And then he makes this comment, which would be to both this man and his brother. Now, he makes this comment to every family member involved in this. Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's life does not consist of the abundance of the things he possesses. He said, be real careful here about covetousness, because in the end, you know, the Old saying, He who dies with the most wins, I used to hear that people say that, wins what? You're dead!

Who is the, you know, he who dies with the most stuff wins. That is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard, okay?

The abundance of the things he possesses. So he hits at the heart of the real problem here, and that is covetousness. I have seen, you know, when you've done, you know, scores and scores of sermons, or funerals, I have been shocked how many times I've seen families come together for a funeral, not see each other for years. Sometimes haven't even seen the dead person for 20 years. And they tear themselves apart over who gets what. I've seen people go into the dead person's house at night and steal everything in the house.

I've seen people argue and get so upset that they never talk to each other, as far as I know, the rest of their lives. Years go by and they won't even talk to each other. They argue and they fight over somebody else's stuff. And I'm owed this, or I'm... no, no, I don't make as much money as you, so I should get it. They all have arguments for it. She was my favorite. You know, you didn't call her in 10 years, I mean, she was your favorite. And I watch it, and it just makes you sick with your stomach. When my parents died, I told my sisters, you take whatever you want. Whatever you want.

If there's anything left, I'll look over and see. Of course, they start picking through, oh, this is dad, you want this. You know, they're picking out things and giving to me. But I didn't even want to discuss it. I wanted them to be happy. You can't... how do you destroy family relationships over stuff? Right? And they knew what I'd want. Here's dad's Bible. You know what that... Here's this. You want this. It's his personal thing that connects you and him. So they just picked him out for him. And everybody was happy.

You know, they got a truckload each, and I got a truckload. And I was absolutely happy. Because they were happy.

And that's what Jesus said. I'm not even getting into this.

Because this isn't about right and wrong. It's about covenants. Then he gives us parables. Then he spoke a parable to them. The ground of a certain man yielded plentifully. And he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops? So he said, I will do this. I will pull down my barns and go greater. And there I will store my crops and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease. Eat, drink, and be merry.

Now, if you own a piece of property, and you're doing well, or you have a business, and you decide to expand it out, he's not saying it's wrong to expand out what you have. He's not saying it's wrong to, you know, Oh, I'm going to build a bigger room on my house. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with selling a house and making up money to buy a nicer house. That's not the point he's making here. This man's whole viewpoint, remember what sets this up. A family fighting over who gets the dead person's properties. They're things. They're stuff.

And he says, Okay, here's the man who has everything. And he's building and building and building, and it's like, good. Now I can retire, and it'll be great. Honestly, how many times have you seen somebody spend the last 10 years, you know, from 55 to 65, and all they can talk about is retiring. They hate life. They hate their job. And so I say, Oh, when I retire, when I retire, they retire at 65 to 67, they have a heart attack and die. I've seen it happen 100 times.

They actually waste their life. Waiting for what? Well, now I can sit around and do what?

I have no purpose to even live. He says, But God said to him, verse 20, Fool, this night your soul will be required of you, then whose will those things be which you have provided? Say, You got the most. What do you win? Here's the point of the parable, verse 21. So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God?

The point is, is it that the man was wrong in having some physical things? And in this case, the name is probably fairly wealthy. Being wealthy is the sin. Being poor is the sin.

So what you do with what you have is the issue.

And the point here is, it says he wasn't rich towards God. I say, Oh, I guess what he wants then is God wants us to give him money. Let me ask you something. What does God really need with our tithes?

You think God is looking at his accounting book and saying, Oh man, the church in Murfreesboro, they didn't pay their tithes this week. The universe is going to shut down.

What does God need with money?

It's the fact that we love him and share with him. That's what's important.

This is an issue of faith. When people come to me about tithing issues, I just tell them, You have to have faith to do it. It's your faith.

If you don't have the faith, you won't do it. If you do have the faith, you won't do it.

Do we have faith? See, to be rich towards God, then you can't say, Well, good. I'll give God some money. I'll give a really big offering at the next holy day, and then me and God were just like this. What does he need with that? What are you trying to do? Buy God off?

It's our lies we have to give here. And giving of our money is part of giving of your life. Why is it part of giving your life? Because we like it so much. We love this filthy maven. And we clutch it and say, No, no, I don't want to give it to you.

It's so amazing if you love God how easy giving an offering is. And you usually feel bad because you wish you could give more. It's easy because you love God. God doesn't need our stuff. You can't buy your way in. All good. I'm a rich person. I'll get a bigger position in the kingdom because I paid more in tithes than anybody else. And if that's your attitude, it's meaningless. You might as well not even pay it as far as your relationship with God. I mean, do it because you're commanded.

We're rich towards God. That's why the next part of this is about... It's very interesting because the next part of this is you'll find it in Matthew as part of the Sermon on the Mount. Luke got bits and pieces of Jesus' life much later, and he wasn't there. And sometimes he just puts it together like a giant jigsaw puzzle. I love the way he sticks things together. There's one point where he takes three parables all on the same subject and sticks them together. We don't know when Jesus gave them. He probably didn't either. But they made a nice collection of an explanation of the point Jesus was making. So I don't know if this is something different than Jesus said. In other words, it may be something he said just at a different time. We all repeat ourselves. Or maybe he just pulled it out and stuck it here. We're not sure why. But he gets stuck here for a purpose. And I would guess this is my theory, is that Jesus was repeating himself. You know, what he said in the Sermon on the Mount, he repeats here. Because he says, therefore he said to them. In other words, in conclusion he said this to them. So I would guess he's just repeating himself. I taught you this before. How many times have you all been carrying this congregation for quite a while? You've heard all of us speakers quite a bit. And you'll hear us repeat ourselves. And you'll hear us even say. I've said this before, but this is important. Right? So Jesus repeats it. Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, nor about the body, what you will put on. Life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. He doesn't say, okay, then just wear rags. He goes on, and if you read this whole section which goes clear down to verse 34, he says, trust that God's going to take care of you. Now you have a part to play. If you make really, really bad economic decisions, you will suffer because of those. And God won't bail us out. He doesn't always bail us out. He may bless us, and we may blow the blessing. That happens sometimes, too.

Or something comes to you, a trial comes on you that's not even your own doing. The company you've been working at for 30 years shuts down, sets down, and you're out of work for six months. And then you get a job paying, you know, a third less than what you used to get. Those things happen in life. But remember, this is all part of the learning process. What's hard is we'll look at somebody else in the congregation and say, how come that person makes three times more money than I do and has never lost a job, and instead of saying, God, please won't you bless me, it's God, please won't you curse them?

Won't you? You know, how come this person gets us all good and I don't? Because God's answer is, what's that to you?

What's that even matter to you?

He ends this whole discussion here about anxiety, about our physical things with, do not fear, verse 32, do not fear a little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom, or back to these eternal values. He keeps saying, look at the eternal values, because sometimes everything's going to be pretty good physically, and sometimes it's not. That's just life. And what you do with your money when you have a lot is just as important as what you do with your money when you have little. In fact, having lots of money can be a curse. And not having enough money can be a curse, right? And he says, you're going to be in life through this at different levels, at different times. Sometimes you talk to people. It was interesting when I worked in advertising, how many businessmen I worked with who owned their own businesses, and how many of them had failed one, two, three times before they had a successful business? Went through 15 years of living in almost poverty, living in a room above the store. And now they have it made. Everybody resents the fact that they make a lot of money.

And yet, they struggle and struggle many times for years. So we all go through this, up and down, unless you're just born into it. I don't find too many Christians born into wealth. You know what I said? That guy doesn't call a lot of people born into wealth. He says, so what you have in give alms, provide yourselves money bags which do not grow old. A treasure in heaven that does not fail, where there's no thief approaches or moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart won't be also. So we have this faith issue. Do we hold on to eternal values? Because if you hold on to eternal values, you will not sacrifice those values in order to make gain. You will not sacrifice those values in order to have a little bit more money. Or the bigger house or the car. You won't. You just can't do that. Because you live by the values of the kingdom. Faith. The second of the spiritual aspects of our lives that money plays a very important part in is honesty. How many times have you heard someone say, don't take it personal, it's just business. That's just business. That's what business is done. I even talked last week a little bit about, there's one example I gave about business in the church, in part, bitterness. And now sometimes in the church, we expect more out of each other, and we take advantage of each other in the church. Which we should not do. We shouldn't take advantage of people outside the church or in the church.

We should treat everyone fairly and honestly in everything we do. The book of Proverbs, and you can do a study on this, the book of Proverbs contains many, many Proverbs about honesty. I just wrote down two of them. Getting treasure by a lying tongue is the fleeting fantasy of those who seek death. That's Proverbs 21.6. Think about what that just said. Think about what Solomon writes here. Getting treasures by lying, no, by cheating people, is the fleeting fantasy of those who seek to die. Those who will kill you. God will not be with us, and death is the result. Proverbs 13.11 says, wealth gained by dishonesty will be diminished, but he who gathers by labor will increase. Wealth gained by dishonesty will be diminished, but he who gathers by labor will increase. You know what? One of the basic concepts of biblical wealth is you earn it by work. Work.

Get rich. Quick schemes. Not always. Most of the time have some element of dishonesty.

Really, really be careful when someone comes up with a get rich quick scheme. You know what they are. People come up and make money real quick and you do this and we'll build a pyramid. You've been through those. The church goes through those. Sell this product. This stuff is natural toothpaste and it'll grow your teeth back. This is great stuff.

We order so many cases and then you all become distributors.

There's always an element. Not always. I can't say that, but there's many times an element of dishonesty. The biblical concept of wealth is gained by work.

Labor. That's what I mean. Work. You work to get it. You earn it by producing something worthy of getting money. You produce something worthy of getting money.

You give up value.

Which also should tell us something about this honesty. This whole subject in itself, I'm just hitting these five areas to think about. This is a whole sermon in itself. The concept of honesty and how we treat people. How do you treat your boss? You know, when I can remember my dad telling me a story when we used to stand floors. That he used to just wait. He said, I used to look forward to the time when his dad, when he'd stand floors, would leave him in a house and go to another house and let him do it himself. Because he said, man, that'd be a great time. I could go out, put my feet up, light a cigarette. He says, I could just take it easy. Because he was always pushing me.

And then one day, I remember we were working in a big hall. We'd refinish the floor and we had to put another coat of varnish on it. He said, you know, you're pretty good at varnishing. He says, I'm going to go to another job. He says, I'll be back a couple of hours. And he left. And I remember thinking, oh, man!

As I, you know, it was a lambswool applicator. I'm just, you know, as I, man, I could take it easy. This is great. And exactly two hours later, he shows up and I'm standing there and he says, well, you got it done exactly on time. And I think, well, what was that break I was going to take? And then he told me, he says, that's exactly what I did. He said, dad taught me you do the work. He said, you were ready now to work.

You know, at 16 or whatever, what's that? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I couldn't do it. I had to get it done. It wouldn't have been right if I didn't have it done. And I had to have it done on time. When you and I cheat our employer by not doing the job right, by not putting it a little extra, by just, you know, sitting around talking for an hour, we're stealing from him.

He's paying us money. We're stealing from him. Honestly, it's a much deeper concept than we think.

How we use our money, how we earn our money is one of the ways God is measuring us. We just read the parable for the kingdom. If we can't be faithful in this little, how in the world can we be faithful in this?

A third is generosity.

Remember, I haven't done one for a number of months, but for a while there I was sitting out just about every week a life lesson from Proverbs in my passage up there. I just had that time to do some more. I need to do that. Because there's still lots of things in Proverbs I didn't cover. But I mentioned in one of those life lessons about a woman that's in the Guinness Book of World Records. Her name is Hedy Green. Hedy Green is famous because she was the first woman millionaire.

She was so miserly and so just plain mean to people. She was known as the Witch of Wall Street. I published that in a little article one time on the Internet. And boy, did I get hate mail for this. Wall Street's a good thing. How dare you say that? Okay, just look at the woman's life. It's true. She was a great investor. But she was so miserly, she wouldn't rent an office. She worked out of sort of like a little janitor's closet.

She wore the same black dress and same black underwear until they wore out every day. And then she'd go buy a new black dress and a new black underwear. Her son had a broken leg. He needed operation. She had him cut it off. It wasn't worth the money. She was famous. She wouldn't spend a dime. And when she died in 1916, they said she was the world's wealthiest woman and probably the most unhappy woman on the face of the earth. She had no friends. Everybody hated her guts. And she had nothing except a huge bank account. She had won with the most. I won! I got the most! And wasted her life. We're not called to be misers. And by the way, generosity produces a whole lot more happiness than stinginess. Generosity produces a whole lot more happiness. You get an immediate reward from generosity. Here's a few of the proverbs about generosity. Proverbs 14.31. You don't have to turn to all these, but I'll read through them. He who oppresses the poor reproaches his Maker, but he who honors him has mercy on the needy. Listen to what he says here. When you oppress the poor, you oppress God. You ever think about that? When we oppress the poor, we oppress God. He who honors him, in other words, honors God, if you look at the context, is aware of the needy. It takes care of the needy. Proverbs 22.9. He who has a generous eye will be blessed, for he gives of his bread to the poor. Proverbs 21.13. Whoever shuts his ears to the cry of the poor will also cry himself and be not heard. That's a curse. Proverbs 29.7. The righteous considers the cause of the poor, but the wicked does not understand such knowledge. The wicked just ignore the poor. Generosity is not based on how much money you have. Generosity is simply a willingness to happily share what you have. It's to share it. You ever see a little kid with a peanut butter sandwich, and they're at school, and the other kid doesn't have anything, and they tear their sandwich in half and give half? That's generosity. They can give him a million dollars and give him half a peanut butter sandwich. They're both happy.

It's just this willingness to share. But I can't. I've got my filthy looker. I've got my filthy mammon in my hands, and if I share some of it, I lose it. I lose it. Generosity is part of the character of God. Aren't you glad? Are we not thankful that God is generous? He said, what's he given me lately? Well, one thing, you're alive, but everything you have God owns.

God owns my suit, because it's made out of stuff He owns. God, everything I have God owns, and He just loves to share. He's here. Here's all this stuff. See what you can do with it. I don't think we understand that when Christ comes, and this earth is being ruled by Him, He's not going to hold back creativity and technology. I mean, it's going to be guided in the right direction. And He's going to say, hey, kids, see what you can do with all this stuff, because why didn't He give it to us? Well, we just read. He gave it to us so that we can learn. This is part of our learning process. Matter is not evil. When we go through the history of the early church, we'll do one whole class on Gnosicism where they believed matter was evil. It created a whole way of thinking that's still powerful in the Catholic Church today.

Matter is not evil. It's become evil, because what Satan and us do with it. But of itself, and He said, money is either good or bad of itself. It's paper. Money has real value if you're freezing to death, and you convert it.

If you survive freezing to death one night because you burn $10,000, it's the best $10,000 you ever spent. See, everything gets in a different perspective when you really see what it is.

Now, this brings us to our fourth point. And this is a little bit of a counterbalance to generosity. And that is, understanding that money, part of the spiritual aspects that we're supposed to learn, these attributes we're supposed to learn through money, is that we are to have a work ethic. Remember I just read, where we're to earn our wealth through labor? God expects us to work. You know, work ethic, that phrase literally means the belief that hard work is a moral benefit.

I believe that people who are lazy do not receive a moral benefit. In fact, they have a moral defect. Laziness is a moral defect. Now, some people work harder than others, that's just their personality. I'm talking about laziness, okay? The unwillingness to work at all. The unwillingness to work at all. There's a fascinating problem that came up in the early church. Second Thessalonians.

So we are to be generous to those in need. And you know what? Every one of us, at some time in our lives, is somebody in need, aren't we? And sometime in your life, you're somebody in need. You lose a job.

I never forget when Kim and I were first married. Lately, we've been talking a lot about when we were first married, how we think about it now, we had no idea how poor we were. We really didn't. And one day, some relatives showed up, knocked on the door, came into our apartment, and we had a big three-bedroom apartment because it was Section 8 housing, what they call Section 8 housing now. But we didn't have enough furniture to put a little bit, a couple things, in one room. So the other three rooms were empty. We had our living room, which was our living room, bedroom, everything was in one room. And they all showed up, and they all cleaned out their attics. And they all had furniture! And they brought over all this furniture, and they unloaded all this furniture, and it didn't matter if it was scratched and beat up or whatever. It was just great! We had all this furniture. We were so happy to have it.

I don't know why I brought that up. But anyway, second to the third.

It was great! I mean, we were talking about what a great time it was. Now we were both working hard, but we both started out at the bottom of the rung. And we both started making money very quickly. I mean, within six months, a year, two years later. But it took a few years before we were really on our own. I know why. We all need help. That's where I came from. We were so happy. We need some help. They all laughed, brought it over, unloaded it, said goodbye, and left. There was this, you know, aunts, uncles, my parents, all these people brought this through, cleaned out their attics in their basements. We had all their discarded furniture. We all need help from time to time. But this isn't talking about a simple need for help. Second Thessalonians. And let's go to chapter 3 verse 6.

He's talking about a very specific problem. We're having to look at this now and figure out what was the problem in Thessaloniki he's dealing with. But we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you would draw from every brother who walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which you receive from us. That's a pretty strong statement. He says, look, there are certain people in your congregation you need to just say, no. We're withdrawing from you. They're asking them to leave the congregation. That's a strong thing. Well, these people must be what? They must be adulterers, idolaters. They must be thieves. I mean, what are these people's problems? He says, for you yourselves, you see, wow, what's he... If you don't know what the problem is, it seems like he's changing subject. He's saying in a sentence or two that he's not. For you yourselves know how you ought to follow us... He's talking about himself, Paul, and others that were with him... When we were not disorderly among you. He says, so these disorderly people, you can... Well, explain what they're doing by our example. We were not this way, Paul says. So look at my example, and you'll know what I'm talking about.

Nor did we eat anyone's bread free of charge, but worked with labor and toil night and day, though we may not be a burden to any of you. Not because we did not have authority, but to make ourselves an example of how you should follow us. Paul says, I had the right to take your money as pay, because you see other places where he did when he went to churches. He says, I didn't do that in your church. He says, in Thessalonica, I didn't take pay from the church. He says, I had to work at night, and so at day, and we know he was a tentmaker. He says, I did two jobs. I took care of your church, and I worked at, you know, I did my tentmaking job. Why did I do that? He says, I did that because he says, I had the authority to say, pay me, as you're, as I'm here as the pastor. He says, but I didn't do it. Why? He says, because I had to give you an example how not to be disorderly. You know, disorderly means you're actually causing problems, okay? You're causing disorder. You're causing chaos. You're causing a division in the church. So, we know something about this disorderly happening in this church, disorderly in the church, and it's based on, Look, we came here and took a, I took a second job to show you how not to have that problem.

Now he goes on. Verse 10, For even when we were with you, we commanded you thus, If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat. Now, I was not saying if someone's on bad times, or someone cannot work. There's people who cannot work. He says, if someone who can work refuses to work, then the church is not supposed to help them.

We can actually contribute to someone's sin by contributing to their laziness. Now, this doesn't, I put generosity first here because this is real important. It's better to be over generous than stingy. But in our generosity, and we have this work ethic, we have to expect others to have a work ethic. Now, that doesn't mean other people are going to work as hard as you, or have the same abilities as you. You see what I mean? We're all different. But this is an issue of refusing to work, is other people's responsibility to take care of me. And what Paul says in the church, if someone believes this, everybody has a job to take care of me, but they can work. Well, you've been out of work. We're helping you, taking care of you. We helped take care of you six months ago by nine months ago by... When was the last time you looked for a job? Well, I'm not looking for a job. I prayed about it. I'm waiting for God to give me one.

Sorry, you're not getting any more church assistance. You're not.

He gave you nine months' worth, but you're not looking for a job, which means that... What? Well, I like the church taking care of me. It gives me a chance to catch up on my Marvel comic books. That's really not made up, but anyways, we won't go there.

Yeah, I mean, this is pretty amazing. I mean, I have never asked somebody not to come back to church because they wouldn't work. I mean, it's because people... A few times I've asked somebody not to come back to church, or either they're causing division, or they're just caught in a grievous sin and they won't stop. But Paul said, you know, someone just keeps taking advantage of the brother. No, I have asked people not to come back because they were taking advantage of people. They would move in with somebody until they kicked them out. Then they moved in with somebody, kicked them out, and I found out that they collected thousands of dollars from people in the church. And I'd gone to him and said, don't come back. Or one time, I took a man. So where's your family? He told me what state it was in. I said, good. I said, I think you need to go visit your family. He said, that would be great. So I bought him a bus ticket. Me and the deacon went down, the bus station, gave him a bus ticket. I gave him $20 out of my pocket for food.

I had a call a month later from the ministry and said, I can't believe you sent him here.

He said, all he's trying to do is move in with everybody and take everybody's money. I said, well, you're a problem now. I said, I suggest you find out where someplace in the country you'd really like to see. Seattle, Washington. I tell you what, here's a bus ticket to Seattle, Washington. Give him $20 for food and he'll happily go. I don't know where the guy ended up. We probably sent him all over the country. He's probably still traveling. A bus ticket and $20 for every minister he finds. He goes on here. He says, for we hear that there are some who walk among you in a disorderly manner, not working at all, but are busybodies. Now, those who are such, we command and exhort through our Lord Jesus Christ that they work in quietness and eat their own bread. That's a pretty strong statement, isn't it? Because if we don't have a work ethic, now there is a time to retire. I'm not saying that's a lack of work ethic. When you've worked all your life, there's a time to retire. Even the priest in the Bible retired at age 50. They did lesser work, but they didn't do the heavy work after 50. But we are to work when we can. And because there's a moral benefit to work, we are better people when we work. Men really know that, and you wives, you know when your husband's out of work, it affects him. If he has any character to be out of work, it affects him. Because he understands that work is part of his character, is part of what God requires of him, is part of this money thing. We're not working for the money. We're working because work is good. And money is part of it. We need the money. But I've seen people make a lot less money a year than somebody else, love their job, and they're a lot happier. And this guy makes a lot of money, hates his job, and he goes through life absolutely unhappy. And this guy comes home sweaty every day, you know, dirty, and he's happy because he's working. He's using his talents. I've always thought, you know, I never wanted to work construction because I just hated doing it, except I thought it'd be fun to be a bricklayer. I don't know why. And that's the one thing I've never done. I've never been a bricklayer. Maybe when I retire, I'll become a bricklayer.

I can tell you what Darris McNeely's dream is when he retires. He won't mind me telling it because he's in public. I've heard him say it. Down the street from where he lives is one of these real fancy car washes. And he said, you know, come up, you take the guy's order, you mark it on his window, and you get to wash these really nice cars. He said, you know, jaguars come in and you get to wash it in vacuums. He says, that's what I want to do. It's simple, and when it's done, you say, wow, does that car look good? And they drive. He says, that's what I want to do when I retire. I want to wash cars. That's a fancy car wash down the street.

I said, as long as you say, as long as you tell them, have you watched Beyond Today? Have you watched their car?

Some proverbs about laziness. Proverbs 13.4, the soul of a sluggard desire, sluggard, which is a lazy person, and has nothing but the soul of the diligent shall be made rich. Proverbs 21, 25-26, the desire of the slothful kills him. Once again, we get back to these ways of death, and the Bible keeps talking about these character traits that produce death just as much as stealing or being an idolater. These ways produce death. His hands refuse to labor. He coverts greedily all day long, but the righteous gives and does not spare. One thing about a lazy person, they covet.

You know, the righteous are giving. They don't tell you to covet. They're working hard and giving. They don't have time to covet when you go with that. They're working hard and giving. The last point is contentment.

This very famous passage in 1 Timothy here, that we know of Paul, read quite often for different reasons. 1 Timothy 6.

And verse 6. Now godliness with contentment is great gain. We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we shall carry nothing out. And having food and clothing with these we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich, there's nothing about us that is wrong to be rich. But when we're driven to be rich, we can end up in a problem. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptations and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. Wow!

Our attraction to be rich can destroy us.

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

We have to be very careful that we realize that in this life there are, just like in all of the things, ups and downs. You know, one of my favorite thoughts when I get a little bit too... Bible passages, when I get a little too anxious about money... When I get too anxious about money, I always go to Sermon on the Mount. And then I always go here, Proverbs 30.

There's a number of proverbs here by a man named Agar. We don't know much about him, but some of his proverbs are in the Scripture.

Verse 7.

It's a prayer. So I looked at this prayer and prayed this prayer at times, when I maybe think I should have more. When I get the gimme's, you know, gimme, gimme, gimme. When I get the gimme's, I always go back to this prayer. Proverbs 30, verse 7. Two things I request of you. Deprive me not before I die. See, before I die, God, there's just two things I ask. He's brought life down on the physical level to two things. Remove falsehood and lies from me. And that's interesting, you know. Both ways. You know, let me not lie. Let me only tell the truth. Let me be a totally truthful person. Let me be absolutely, completely honest. That's what he wants. Let me be honest. And two, give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with the food allotted to me. Don't make me poor and don't make me rich. He says, I figured this much out. Lest I be full and deny you, I get so wealthy I don't need you, and say, Who is the Lord? Or lest I am poor and I steal and profane the name of my God. Other times I just pick that up and read it to God. When I'm too caught up in things, help me not to have so much that I forget you, and help me not to have so little that I forget you, and help me to be happy with what you do give me. And now I've got to get back to work. Lest I say, OK, I say the prayer, then I get it back to work. There's work to do. There's things to do that God wants done. Or there's things in my house that need fixed. There's work to be done. Now, we don't have to be workaholics either, but that's another problem. Contentment. The ability to find contentment in where we are in life. Let me just mention, then, as I sum this up, I won't go to a lot of scriptures, but this is something you can do for yourself. Four basic principles of money management. We're talking about money and these big concepts. I'll give you at least some things to work on. One is plan for the future. Just because we're not to have anxiety about the future, doesn't mean we're not supposed to plan for the future. And, of course, Proverbs 6, 6-11, where he says, Go to the ant. They prepare. We have to prepare. If you don't prepare for tomorrow when it comes and you don't have anything, it's, well, why didn't you prepare? In other words, you and I can't live totally in the moment so much that we don't think about the future.

Because when the future comes, and it will, I'm looking at... I'm going to work a long time, but... somehow my health gives out, but... I'm 70 in nine years. That's the age of retirement for most ministers. I just pray, God, give me just more. I'll just keep... Then go to 80, you know. But the bottom line is, at some point, I have to be prepared for that, which will be a lower standard of living. That's it! I'm going to have a lower standard of living. That's okay. That's part of life. I have to be spiritually, emotionally, and financially as much as I can be prepared, and God takes care of the rest. I'm not going to live... I know I'm not going to be living under a bridge someplace. Unless the economy has collapsed, then we'll all be living there together. I'll be under the bridge with my congregation. And that'll be okay, too! Right? That'll be okay, because we're all there together. It's okay. That's what will happen.

Two, be careful about borrowing and lending money.

There's lots of proverbs. Proverbs 22, 7 says, It's a little over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender. And I tell you what, there's nothing that destroys young people's ability to really grow in wealth over time than debt.

Credit card debt will kill you because you're paying for past things.

And sooner or later, you don't have enough credit card to pay for present things. You just pay for the past. Who must always be paying? Oh, yeah, we took a great trip, you know, for our second anniversary. And six years later, we haven't done anything for our anniversary since because we're still paying for the second anniversary.

So credit card debt will hold you back as much as anything.

And of course, the problem is, we live in a society that everything is based on one thing. For this society to function, you and I have to spend money. If we don't spend money, the economy will collapse. It's all based on you and I spending money. So everybody's trying to get you and I to spend money. And they're always telling us better things that we can have, and how we'd be better people, and more sexy, and if we just might spend money, just spend money! You'll be six foot four? You'll be a guy that women will just walk up and just want to meet you? If you just wear this cologne? Right? You'll grow! If you wear this cologne?

I've tried it, it doesn't work. No, no, I...

I'm having a whole bottle on one, so it just doesn't work. The credit card destroys us. We also have to remember, you can't in five years, unless you have an outstanding job, which some people do, you can't have what your parents had, and it took them 35 years to get there. You can't do it in five years, unless you just happen to have a fantastic job. We all have to understand the even different stages of life. You know, I told my wife the other day, she's complaining about how much furniture we have now, so I said, remember when we had none? None! We had a folding chair and a fold-up bed. And now we have so much, we can't walk around the house. We're getting rid of furniture. Okay, different stage of life.

We have to be careful about trying to also realize, life is a matter of growth, even financially. Another Proverbs talks about, be careful about cosigning for other people's debts. Do not ever... I've only cosigned for debts that I was willing to pay for, completely if I had to, without being upset. So the only debts I've cosigned for were some college debts for my kids, because they needed to go through college, and I was willing to pay for it, if I had. Without feeling bad. Otherwise, I don't sign for other people's debts. It's not being cruel. If you take my money too, and we're both under the underpass, what good is it done? Now, that doesn't mean I should be generous. You understand? But we have to be careful. And then the fourth point, this is absolutely necessary. One is, you know, if getting control of your credit cards is number one, number two is you have to learn to budget, and you have to have the self-discipline to live by a budget. And that means there are times you say no.

I've told this story before, but I can remember one time when we first got married. One of the few times I saw my wife cry. She just didn't cry much. But we've been real tight for a while.

I was going to the junkyard every two weeks to buy $5 tires, just to keep my car in tires, you know. They'd last about two weeks before I had to buy new ones. I finally made enough money, you know, and I got new tires. That was a really big day. We were going to get new tires in the car. But there was about like a month or six weeks or something. I had to go in every two weeks to buy tires at the junkyard because I didn't have enough money to buy a new set of tires. And they were blowing out about every other day. So there was a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant that every Friday all the workers and where she worked and I worked went to, and they served macaroni and cheese and fish sticks because they were all Catholics. It was Friday. It was like $3. And we didn't have enough money to go get macaroni and cheese and fish sticks. And she started to sort of weep, you know. Sorry, she said, yeah, man alive. And you don't have enough money to do that. We're working hard. But, okay. Six months later we could go and have macaroni and cheese and fish sticks and realize it wasn't that great anyways. But, it's like, man alive, what are you people eating here for? We have enough money, we're going someplace nicer now for lunch. But, you can't live, you have to live within that budget, and you have to be self-disciplined to live in it until you have more money. Or less bills. Sometimes you make lots of money, but you have too many bills. If you've actually got with people, they go, here's the problem. You make this much money, and you have $75,000 in credit bills. Credit cards. Until you pay those off, you won't have no money. So, you go through six months or a year of nothing, and then they're paid off, and then all of a sudden it's like, wow, where did all this money come from? Well, you're spending thousands of dollars every month and paying off credit card bills on things you don't even have anymore. So, we have to have a budget. So, it's important to remember, whatever our present financial state, this too will change, whatever you're in, to stay focused on what this physical thing, what they teach us, and its faith, honesty, generosity, work ethic, contentment, and applying Biblical principles for some Biblical management.

Let's summarize here. Let's just finish with Proverbs 13. Proverbs 13, it sort of wraps all this up in one proverb. Remember this. Proverbs 13 verse 7. There is one who makes himself rich and yet has nothing, and yet there is one who makes himself poor and has great riches.