Grace Giving

2 Corinthians 8:1-6

October 17, 2004

 

Most of us can endure sermons on topics such as hell, judgment, and eternity. Part of our brain seems to shut down at the mention of the words, so that apart from the Spirit's urging, we can yawn our way through. But when money is mentioned, that's another matter! It's not that money is more important than the other subjects; it's just closer to where we perceive ourselves. Hell, judgment, and eternity seem to be a million miles and ten universes away, but money affects us each day. It's on our minds, affects our motivations, enchants our senses, and drives our ambitions.

 

I'm not commending such an attitude. But what I'm seeking to do is demonstrate that in the modern mind, money takes precedence over most everything. The way we pursue and use our resources reveals the presence or absence of God's grace in the heart. Jesus saw the same thing in the first century world. He declares, "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" (Matt. 6:21). Or, as Randy Alcorn put it, "As surely as the compass needle follows north, your heart will follow your treasure. Money leads; hearts follow" [The Treasure Principle, 42].

 

That's just where the grace of God makes the difference. Saving and sanctifying grace overflows into the grace of giving. One's income level does not factor into the equation. Grace in the heart ignites the grace of giving so that the believer finds joy in launching his material resources into service for God's kingdom. How do we enjoy the grace of giving?

 

I. A call to grace giving

 

Paul had no small task ahead of him in trying to get the Corinthian church on solid footing. His first epistle reveals a list of internal problems characterized by the Corinthians' disunity, selfishness, pettiness, and worldly living. Their fa�ade of spirituality crumbled before the probing and instructing words of the Apostle. Yet right at the end of the epistle that deals with the centrality of the gospel, church discipline, practice of the Lord's Supper, spiritual gifts, and finally, the truth about the resurrection of Christ and the believer, Paul talks with them about giving.

Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so do you also. One the first day of the week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper, so that no collections be made when I come. When I arrive, whomever you may approve, I will send them with letters to carry your gift to Jerusalem; and if it is fitting for me to go also, they will go with me (1 Cor. 16:1-4).


In spite of their problems they had the responsibility to participate in giving, along with the other churches. The aim of this particular offering was for this Gentile church in Greece to help the impoverished Jewish church in Jerusalem. Part of Paul's rationale in such an effort was to help the Gentile believers appreciate the debt owed to the Jewish believers that had laid the foundation for their spiritual transformation (Rom. 15:26-27). "For if the Gentiles have shared in their spiritual things, they are indebted to minister to them also in material things." And so the churches of Macedonia and Achaia "have been pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem."

 

But an even greater aim of the Apostle was to teach the Corinthians what Randy Alcorn calls, "the treasure principle," that is, "God owns everything. I'm His money manager," therefore, "My heart always goes where I put God's money" [23, 41].

 

It seems that this principle came more difficultly for the Corinthians than for the Macedonians (Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea). We would suppose this due to the Corinthians being in dire financial straits so that giving took a backseat to surviving. Yet, just the opposite was the case. Paul tells us of the Macedonian believers' "deep poverty." The region of Macedonia had been a wealthy state due to gold and silver mines during the heyday of the Greek Empire. But Rome had stripped their wealth by taking over the mines, and additionally, by adding high taxes and increasing costs of housing and food. "The country was like a lacerated and disjointed animal," describes one writer [Rogers, Linguistic Key, Revised, 408, quoting A. Plummer]. They understood the depths of poverty. On the other hand, Corinth sat at the center of the trade route between the East and West. The narrow isthmus connecting the Ionian Sea and Aegean Sea, along with the ports of Cenchrea and Lechaeum put Corinth in the middle of plentiful jobs and a booming economy. Yet the impoverished Macedonians led the way over the wealthy Corinthians in giving.

 

So, what made the difference? Here is where 2 Corinthians 8-9 offer the lengthiest and most practical section in all of Scripture on the subject of giving. It is important to think for a moment on what we don't find here. We do not find manipulation or arm-twisting techniques to squeeze money out of the Corinthians. Nor do we find legalism that robs the soul of satisfaction in giving, making it instead some attempt to achieve righteousness before God. We don't find promises that we'll have lots of extra money to play if we learn to give. Instead, what we find is the most joyous motivation for giving - being recipients of God's grace.

 

The Corinthians had begun a year earlier to prepare a gift to be sent to the poor saints in Jerusalem. But it seems that the influence of false prophets that had crept into the church brought questions to their minds about the propriety of making such a gift. The false teachers sought to divert funds to their own pockets and perhaps a few greedy people among them had second thoughts about the planned gift.  So Paul seeks to correct their attitude and action regarding giving, and in the process sets forth the clearest teaching on grace giving.

 

1. The necessary qualifier

 

To begin with, when we speak of "grace giving," we are immediately transferring the ability and glory of such giving to the Lord. It is giving that is the result of grace at work in the heart. Grace qualifies us for grace giving because the Lord is at its roots!

 

"Now, brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God which has been given in the churches of Macedonia." Paul makes three uses of the Greek term "grace" in the six verses of our text. The first points to the grace of God at work in saving and sanctifying us as Christians, the next (v. 4, "favor") refers to the sanctified desire felt in giving, and the third (v. 6, "this gracious work") considers the whole picture of giving. We will find the term used numerous times throughout chapters 8 and 9. It is interesting that grace plays such a big part in everything the Apostle has to say about giving. And rightly so, since that which qualifies us to give graciously and generously is the grace of God. It is no wonder that Philip Hughes calls the grace of God, "the mainspring of their generosity" [NICNT: 2 Corinthians, 287].

 

The grace of God preceded the gospel into Macedonia. Paul was trying his best to head into Asia with the gospel after his ministry in the Galatian region. But the Holy Spirit stopped him, and in a vision he heard the call to carry the gospel into Macedonia (Acts 16:6-10). Once there, the Apostle and his team found a group of women meeting for worship outside the city of Philippi. Jewish influence in the city was minimal since there were not enough men to have a synagogue. Paul preached Christ and "the Lord opened [Lydia's] heart to respond to the things spoken by Paul." More believers followed, and fruitful ministry took place in spite of Paul's imprisonment. After Philippi, Paul preached Christ in Thessalonica, then Berea with many responding to the gospel. God's grace had come to Macedonia!

 

Up to that point of this divine invasion, there would have been no thought of taking one's hard earned goods and sending them to strangers - and what's more, Jewish strangers in Jerusalem. But the grace of God qualifies us for grace giving. Hearts that were selfish, greedy, and stingy were transformed by the grace of God.

 

Don Whitney tells about a friend in the construction business whose wife was a Christian but he was not. He said that he would never join a church because he knew they would always be asking him to repair something. Additionally, he had bad memories of churches making high-pressure appeals for money when he was a child and had decided that he wanted nothing of that. But all of this changed when the grace of God met him in a sudden, dramatic salvation! He looked for things to repair at the church. He began giving ten-percent and more of his income for the Lord's work. Grace had the transforming effect to change him into a grace giver [Spiritual Disciplines Within the Church, 124-125].

 

That's why I insist that the one qualification for grace giving is to have experienced the grace of God in salvation. Paul builds on that consideration in verse 9, "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich." God's grace shown to poor sinners through Christ has made us rich in relationship to the Lord and rich for eternity with a divine inheritance that can never be exhausted.

 

I came to know the Lord and the experience of His saving grace the summer after my 9th grade year in school. The next summer I had my first paying job. I made a whopping $50 each week! But as soon as I cashed my check, I put aside a tithe and an offering. I wanted to do it. No one told me to; it was a motivation that came because grace had transformed my heart. Grace qualifies us to be grace givers.

 

2. The surprising quantifier

 

Grace also quantifies what we give. Researchers for many years have charted the reality that the larger one's income the less one gives. It is strange and seemingly contrary to any rational sense. Some of the biggest givers in percentage of gifts are the poorest in their incomes. That was true of the Macedonians: "that in a great ordeal of affliction their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality." Here was this strange intersection of abundant joy and deep poverty mixing together into an overflow of wealthy generosity. The word "liberality" implies a single-mindedness in generous giving. Amazingly, their poverty had no negative effect upon their giving. The reason is quite clear. The grace of God overflowed in them. It is grand proof that the key to giving is not the size of one's income or availability of resources but the effectual working of God's grace in the heart. Grace at work leaves the believer with a single-minded, joyous generosity in giving.

 

I've seen this quite often in other countries. I've witnessed the generosity of believers in Russia, Ukraine, Jamaica, and Brazil, knowing that their income would be only a pittance compared to that of the average person in America, and yet they gave generously. One particular scene in Russia stunned me. I was aware that the believers that I had been visiting with lived on $200-300 each month. I did not understand how they did it. And yet when I was leaving the country, out of gratitude for my ministry among them, they gave me gifts that surely they could ill-afford! There was no begrudging such a chance to give but they did so with great joy. Abundant joy and deep poverty produced through grace an overflow of generosity. That can only happen by the grace of God at work in the heart.

 

So, grace calls us to display its wealth and joy through giving. No price can be put upon the grace of God shown to a sinner. Generous giving is the natural response of the heart that knows the grace of God. Does your giving reflect the evidence of God's grace?

 

II. The practice of grace giving

 

But this kind of generosity on the part of those in deep poverty puzzles us. When I hear about the believers in the Igresia Batista Internationale de Fonseca in Niteroi, Brazil supporting a missionary couple to Spain, it stops me in my tracks! How do those from poorer nations who often live through the kind of runaway inflation that has topped 1000% commit to give outside of their own setting? Paul helps us by explaining the practice of grace giving.

 

1. In the case of abilities

 

The most common response to exhortations in giving is to do an immediate counting of the bank account. What can I afford to give? How much am I able to give? That seems pretty legitimate. However, the Macedonians broke out of that mold. "For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord." No one twisted his or her arms to give. No capital financing campaign took place. Grace welled up within the Macedonian believers and they did what startled even the Apostle Paul. He testified to the veracity of his story as though he was being cross-examined in a courtroom. Yes, they gave according to their ability, however small that may have been. But they did not stop. They gave "beyond their ability!" Whatever the measure of their gift, Paul knew that it was not according to mere human ability where people figure on what they can do without in order to decide how much to give. Anyone can give according to his ability. But only by grace can give beyond their ability.

 

Here is one of the challenges that we face in grace giving. Because of God's grace at work in the Christian, because of the reordering of his priorities to reflect Christ's Lordship over his life, because of the desire to "invest in what has lasting value," the Christian is able to give beyond normal abilities [Alcorn, 16]. The only explanation for this is the enormity and effectiveness of God's grace in his life. As we plan our giving, we must take into account the enabling, stretching ability of God's grace.

 

2. In the case of attitude

 

This makes more sense when we consider what grace does as it operates in our lives. Grace changes our attitude toward things and material possessions. The Macedonians, though impoverished, "gave of their own accord." Their attitude toward what they possessed changed due to the effective work of God's grace. The implication is that their giving came voluntarily without any sense of coercion or being made to feel guilty.

 

I think that we must admit that quite often churches have operated on the guilt system. As long as people's consciences can be pricked a little with a tinge of guilt, they can be manipulated to give. But the Bible takes a much different approach. Rather than being manipulated from some external stimuli, the believer is motivated from within - not by a personal sense of altruism but due to the work of God's saving grace in his heart. That affects the attitudes that once were enslaved to materialism and greed.

 

If we truly believe "God owns everything" and that we are just "His money manager[s]," (as Alcorn put it, 23) then the whole attitude about giving changes. Rather than deciding how little we can get away with giving, we being to think in terms of how lavishly we can give as an expression of love and adoration for the grace of God shown to us through Christ. Giving becomes the outward expression of love for Christ.

 

3. In the case of ambition

 

The Macedonians were not timid about giving! Not only did they give beyond their ability but they also begged to do so! "Begging us with much urging for the favor of participation in the support of the saints," wrote Paul. The construction of the sentence shows that this was not a one-time request. Instead, they kept on badgering Paul to be able to join in helping the Jerusalem believers, until he gave in to their requests. Notice how he describes the ambition bound up in their giving. They saw it as a "favor" to them to be able to do such giving. It seems that this should be reversed, and be a favor for the Jerusalem Christians. But no, not when grace bubbles forth from the heart! They thought that they would explode if they could not help out these brethren! They thought so highly of the work of giving that they considered it to be "participation," or perhaps better, "fellowship in the service of the saints." Even though the chance of any of them making a personal visit to Jerusalem would be unlikely, they knew that they would enter into deep, intense fellowship with these Jewish believers through the generosity of giving.

 

We are able to do the same. When our gifts head to Kenya or Liberia to help with church planting or to Training Pastors International to help John Balmer as he trains hundreds of pastors in Ghana, Liberia, and Zimbabwe, we enter into fellowship with them. As a matter of fact, John wanted me to convey a message from these Christian brethren, over 1500 of them, to let us know that they pray for our church by name regularly. We've entered into fellowship with them through giving, and they in turn with us through prayer.

 

Here is our ambition in giving generously. We desire to share together in what God is doing both here and across the world. We are participants together in a global work. As Michal Avila served in China this summer and the team that Pastor Todd led to Mexico, and the trip that Mark Loftis and I will make next week to Niteroi, Brazil, as you have given for the work of global missions you have partnered or fellowshipped with the brethren and their ministries. You have a part in something much bigger than any of us. Grace giving makes it possible.

 

III. The foundation for grace giving

 

Paul had not asked the Macedonians for a contribution nor did he expect them to do so in light of their extreme poverty. Yet here we have a remarkable picture of the effect of God's grace in the believer. These Christians "begged" Paul to let them give toward the needs of the Jerusalem church. That is unexplainable in the eyes of the world. But it is quite understandable when you know the grace of God. Notice the foundation upon which grace giving is built.

 

1. Right priorities

 

Giving is a spiritual discipline just like prayer, Bible intake, and service. But it is never to be mechanical. I think our future studies in chapter 9 will bear this out clearly. Yet for the moment, what does it take to ensure that giving is not mechanical or legalistic? Notice how Paul describes the Macedonians, "And this, not as we had expected, but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God." Giving possessions or money was not the first agenda for these believers. Giving "themselves" to the Lord took priority. As they belonged to Jesus Christ, then all that they possessed belonged to Him. As they consciously gave themselves to the Lord, they knew that it meant nothing withheld from His use. They could gladly give materially because Christ owned it all. Tasker is right in stating, "Christian joy arises from the sense of sins forgiven and from the assurance that the sinner now enjoys the favour of God; and Christian liberality springs from a heart conscious of the infinite generosity of God in giving His Son to redeem mankind" [TNTC: 2 Corinthians, 111].

 

Randy Alcorn tells the story of the conversion of Sam Houston, the renowned soldier and politician. "After his baptism, Houston said he wanted to pay half the local minister's salary. When someone asked him why, he responded, "My pocketbook was baptized, too"" [59]. Put quaintly indeed, but the truth is right on target, when Christ is Lord, He is Lord over all that we have. We must use our resources as managers rather than owners, since what we have belongs wholly to Him.

 

2. Proper motivation

 

Now Paul comes back to the Corinthians' situation. He motivates them by illustrating grace giving in action. "So we urged Titus that as he had previously made a beginning, so he would also complete in you this gracious work as well." Here was the process the Corinthians witnessed: (1) Grace comes from God; (2) grace is received by the believer through Christ; (3) grace enables and motivates the believer to service; (4) grace is manifested in joy and generosity; (5) finally, grace overflows in thanksgiving offered back to God: a full circle that begins, circulates, and ends in grace. It was the Corinthians turn to step up to the challenge of "this gracious work" of grace giving.

 

Conclusion

 

And it is our turn as well. We've benefited by the generosity of other believers over the years investing in us, and our future. Now we have the challenge to be grace givers.

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