Fellow
Redeemed in Christ Jesus,
At the NFL Combine last week, coaches and GMs
scrutinized a couple hundred college players hoping for a career in pro
football. These players lifted weights, ran dashes, and leaped vertically.
These activities measure and test the players’ skills.
How we manage the gifts God has entrusted to
us is the measure of our lives in Christ. We might call our lives in Christ the
use of our spiritual skill sets. One of those skill sets is stewardship. How we manage the hours of the day, the
abilities we apply to our vocations and our financial resources, all to God’s
glory, is a test or a measure of where we are in our sanctification.
The Lenten Season with its oases of
resurrection hope on the Sundays is a good time to review our stewardship as
God’s children. Lent is about repentance including our failures to be good
stewards. Our weekly Easter celebrations are about the forgiveness of sins; our
justification that compels us among other things to be stewards that are more
faithful.
We begin with a look at something that
prevents us from being more generous especially with our offerings of money. We
are afraid we are not going to have enough for ourselves if we give more to the
Lord. We are afraid we are going to run out.
The lesson of Elijah and the widow in Sidon
ought to convince us otherwise. Don’t Be
Afraid, You Won’t Run Out. We fear we do not have enough to share. The Word
of the Lord promises a continuing supply.
The LORD tested Elijah’s faith by telling him
to rely on a Gentile widow for his daily bread in the midst of a famine. The
LORD measured the widow’s faith by asking her to give up from the little she
and her family had in the pantry.
As we consider the application of the miracle
that followed, we must see the LORD’s hand moving the scene. He sent Elijah to
the widow. He directed the widow to provide for his prophet. The LORD’s ever
supplying hand prevented the flour from diminishing and the olive oil from
failing.
Elijah came to the widow and asked her to give
him water and bread. The widow was afraid she did not have enough bread to
share with Elijah. Even as a fellow
believer with Elijah, her fear nearly got in the way of her sacrifice. It
nearly got in the way of the abundance that was to follow.
The Lord has sent us to this place and to one
another. The Lord tests us with the offering plate. The offerings plate is a
measure of our love and trust. It is a test of our willingness to sacrifice what
we have to provide the saving gospel of Jesus Christ to others. Fear gets in
the way of that sacrifice. We believe we will run out of what we need for
ourselves if we give more to the Lord in our offerings.
The big difference between the widow and us
is that the Lord does not ask us to give up from our want. I don’t know that
any of us are wanting. Are any of you down to one last morsel of meal and oil
baked into a small cake? Are any of us
going home today, eat our last little bun-sized loaf of bread, and then die?
The Gentile widow is more like the widow who
put her last mite into the temple treasury than she is like us. Two widows
relied on the Lord to take care of them. Both relied on Elijah’s words, “Don’t
be afraid.”
Don’t
be afraid. You won’t run out. Your offering is a measure of your reliance
on the Lord. Fear gets in the way of our generous and regular sacrifice. Fear
that we will run out of what we need to spend on ourselves is a hurdle that
prevents us from increasing our offerings on a regular basis.
Now is the time to throw off that fear. Now
is the time to increase your offerings as the Lord moves us forward together as
members of one body, united in Christ. Don’t be afraid. The word of the Lord
promises a continuing supply.
Elijah gave the widow reason not to be
afraid. You think that is all you have left? Not at all.
You will have so much that taking care of me first, then, your family will not
be a problem. That was a test for the widow about the Lord’s words through
Elijah. “But first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and
bring it to me, and then make something for yourself and for your son.”
Things would be all right when she did that
because, “For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘The jar of
flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the LORD
sends rain on the land.” That is exactly what took place. That is the
miracle of the LORD’s continuing supply. First, there was the miracle to
provide in the drought and famine, and then the rain would again water the
earth and make things grow for food.
The LORD promised and provided the widow and
her son and Elijah a continuing supply of bread. Bread represents all the
necessities we need to sustain our bodies and lives. We generally provide that
bread to our families with money.
“If I give more to the Lord, I might run out
money to provide food for my family” goes the argument we have with ourselves.
We may use the same argument as a congregation. We may not have enough
offerings so we’re afraid we can’t do the ministry the Lord has laid out for
us.
Don’t
be afraid, you won’t run out. The simple answer always to have what you need
is to give first to the Lord just as Elijah told the widow to make a cake first
for him. The simple answer to have enough money as a congregation to do the
ministry he has given is for all of us to give more first to him and then take
care of ourselves.
The word of the Lord promised a continuing
supply to this little household and its guest in Sidon. He promises us no less.
Fear makes us lift only light weights, makes us walk not run, and prevents us
from making great leaps of faith. Be generous and regular in you offerings. Don’t be afraid, you won’t run out - of
anything. Amen. <SDG>