We Believe in the missionary God

We’re at the end of our series on things we believe. We’ve looked at our vision, we’ve looked at our mission. We’ve considered stewardship and giving, discipleship and prayer. Our last topic brings us almost full-circle.

We believe in the missionary God.

This is not just about believing in the mission of God, or the mission mandated to the church. When we say: We believe in the missionary God, we’re saying something about the nature and purposes of God that ultimately must be reflected in the people who call themselves the community of God’s people.

A missionary God calls a missionary people

The story of Abraham

Most of us know the story of Abraham. Of how God called him to leave his home and family to journey to a new home, a home God would give to him. We know about the promises God made to him: to have a son, to be the father of many nations. We know about the great test of faithfulness that Abraham faced when God called him to sacrifice his only son, and we know too the faith Abraham expressed even at that time and the vindication he experienced from God. As we trace his story we see a fallible man whom God loves, reveals himself to and move towards a life fully lived for his purposes. And, in the story of Abraham we expressed the missionary heart of God.

John Stott says of Genesis chapter 12 that: The previous eleven chapter lead up them [ the opening sentence] ; the rest of the Bible follows and fulfils them.

Chapter 12 contains the first occurrence of a covenant promise that will be repeated over and over again in the OT: I will be their God, and they will be my people. It is in chapter 12 that God reveals his missionary character.

Chapter 11 takes us to Babel, the high point of human expansion and endeavour to this point in history. But God’s plans are not human plans. He calls a man, Abram, to turn around and walk in a different direction, to go against the flow of human expansion and rebellion. He calls him to follow God faithfully and wholeheartedly.

The promise is simple. If Abram is obedient, if he is faithful, then God will lead him to a land that will become his home, he will make him into a great nation and his children will become the vehicle for God’s blessing of people across the whole world. The promise is made clear in Gen.22:18 through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me. No wonder Abraham becomes a focal point for both Old and New Testament writers.

The nature of God’s blessing

Ultimately the nature of the blessing that God wants to give is expressed in the New Testament most famously in John 3: ...that whoever believes in him will have eternal life. God’s greatest blessing is not wealth or power. It’s not health or even long life. It’s not influence or great skill or ability. It isn’t even a great ministry. God’s greatest blessing is eternal life. Its forgiveness for sin and a promise of a place in God’s great house forever.

A missionary God wants a missionary people

In truth, the missionary God calls his missionary people.

• Go into all the world and make disciples
  
• As the Father has sent me, so I send you
  
• You shall be my witnesses...
  

According to Jesus we are like a vine, designed to bear fruit and when we do we glorify our Father in heaven.

If mission is part of God’s character then it ought naturally to be a part of the nature of the church that bears his name. To be the people of the missionary God we need to be a missionary people. And to be a missionary people we must follow the example of the missionary God.

Jesus defined his mission:

• Bringing the kingdom of God near (Matt. 4:17)
  
• Fulfilling the Law and the Prophets (5:17)(Later Jesus would answer a question about the greatest commandment with the words: To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind, and to love others as you want to be loved. He went on to say: All the Law and the prophets hang on these two commandments. (22:37ff))
  
• To bring forgiveness
  
• To call sinners rather than the righteous
  
• To reveal the Father
  
• To build his church
  
• To give his life as a ransom for many
  

In Luke’s gospel he defined his mission at the beginning of his ministry by reading from Isaiah:
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, the oppressed will be set free and the time of the Lord’s favour has come.

How does this translate into lifestyle?

#1 Recognise that God has called the church to be a missionary community

#2 Choose to seek to live a missional life(More about God than about self.)

#3 Follow Christ’s example (Love others, serve them.)
#3 Pray persistently and consistently for opportunities.
#4 Invite others to join the journey

This is what Isaiah had to say: Feed the hungry, and help those in trouble. Then your light will shine out from the darkness, and the darkness around you will be as bright as noon. (Isa.58:10)

We Believe in Tithing

Probably the most well known verse in the Bible on the importance and significance of tithing are found in the final book of the Old Testament.

  "Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me. "But you ask, 'How do we rob you?' 
"In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse—the whole nation of you—because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.

These are strong and challenging words, but what relevance do they have for the church of today? Well I believe they have enormous relevance. If you want one positive reason to practice the Biblical principle of tithing, then surely these verses give it to you.

RT Kendal wrote a book about tithing. It was subtitled: A call to serious, Biblical giving. Whatever we think about the issue, we should certainly consider giving as a serious part of our stewardship of all the resources God has given to us. 

In his book RT Kendal quotes another writer who says: When a fellow says, “It ain’t the money but the principle of the thing,’ it’s the money.

Nothing bothers us more than thinking someone is about to tell us how to live our lives or spend our money. We’ve earned it, we should decide what to do with it. But is that biblical? If we’re serious about wholeheartedly following God, then can we shut him out of our finances?

Tithing myths

#1 If you tithe God will make your rich.

We don’t give to God in order to get his blessing on what we do. We give as a loving response to his love for us. It’s a sign, not a merit badge.

#2 Tithing is part of the Law of the OT and we’re no longer under the Law.

True we’re no longer under the law, but Abraham wasn’t under the law when he chose to give away a tenth of the goods he’d recovered when rescuing Lot to the king of Salem as an honour gift.

And in the New Testament Jesus takes the religious people to task for tithing but ignoring other aspects of a life pleasing to God. When he does so he tells them that they should pay attention to both the weightier matters of the law (justice, mercy and faith) without neglecting tithing (Matt.23:23). And Jesus is not just saying, if you can, but he says you ought to tithe. In Greek it’s the same word applied here as it it is when Jesus says to Nicodemus You must be born again if you want to see the Kingdom of God.

Paul on giving: What do you think Paul meant when he said each person should put aside an amount in keeping with his income? Do you think that Paul, an educated Jew and a devoted follower of Jesus Christ would suggest that your giving should be done only in line with what you could afford, or do you think that he’s reinforcing the idea that there’s a reasonable proportion of income that everyone should consider as the appropriate amount to give?

#3 A tithe (10%) is all that God wants from me, when I’ve given that, there’s no more giving to be done.

In biblical terms, 10% is a guideline starting point. It’s not the top end of what we should give, it’s not a kingdom tax that we pay.

What kind of givers is God looking for?

• Willing ones (2 Cor. 9:6)
  
• Obedient ones (Mal.3)
  
• Generous ones (Luke 21-the widow’s offering) Not only was she generous but she was sacrificial too.
  

What stops us from tithing?

Selfishness: Are our reasons for not giving simply excuses to keep it for ourselves?

Are we afraid that we won’t have enough money to meet our needs?

Are we unwilling to follow a Biblical principle? Rebels at heart.

Can we not imagine that God will bless us?

Do we believe:

• That God can, and will, meet all our needs (Phil.4:19)
  
• That he has a positive plan for us (Jer.29:11)
  
• That the kingdom of God should be our priority (Matt. 6:33)
  
• That we should count our lives as worthless compared to knowing Christ (Phil.3)
  
• That to live is Christ (Phil. 1:21)
  
• My life is worthless to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus (Acts 20:24). And therefore that means that, in the word of the song we sing, “Lord, I am not my my own, no longer my own”
  

What is it we fear that keeps us from tithing?

One simple reason to tithe

Because of what it will do for the work of God’s kingdom on earth. Personally speaking I’ve always considered the local church as proper place for my tithe. Anything else I want to support, I do so beyond that.

How do you get it right?

How do you work out what to give to God? If not a tithe, how else would you measure your giving? The tithe is helpful, not because it tells us what will appease God, but because it stops us getting our giving out of proportion. You could give what’s left after you’ve met all your expenses each month. But then what do you do when you spend a little more than you intended? Do you simply give a little less than you intended? You could decided what’s manageable whilst still leaving you enough to spend how you want. You could soften the financial challenge by including your time or factoring something else into the equation.

First you have to decide what your reasons are for not following the Biblical injunction to give 10% of your income back to God. I put it this way around because it’s a harder question to answer than deciding what percentage of your income to give. Second you need to take a good look at what you are currently giving and why you currently give as you do. Third you need to work out a plan to get to where you understand God wants you to be form where you are.

Personally I have a simple plan. Each year, as we do our tax returns I check our P60’s to see what we’’ve earned in that year. Then I look at what we’ve given away and do the simple calculation. If it’s above, I leave it for another year, if it’s below I put it right.

But what if you’ve never tithed, and you’re in debt and you can see no way to go from what you currently give to what you now believe God is calling you to give?

Set a goal. If it take 5 years to get to the point where you tithe Biblically then set about it today. Don’t wait for the day to come around when you can afford to tithe, because believe me it’s highly unlikely that that day will ever arrive. decide now that you are going to make thins a non-negotiable habit for the rest of your life.

Second, work out what 10% is and deduct this from your income whether you give it or not. The point here is to look at what income you would have to live on if you tithed. You might be surprised to discover that 10% isn’t that much when you get right down to it. And if you practice now living on 90% you’ll be preparing yourself to truly give it way in the future.

You might also find you can move to a tithe sooner than you thought. It might be difficult, and it might take some time, but it’s not impossible.

And what if God is true to his word? What if he will do what he promises if we will show our commitment through tithing? What if we “brought the whole tithe into the storehouse”, and God opened heaven’s blessing to us.

Is that not worth the risk?

We Believe in Fellowship

National Statistics for the UK show that: 20% of people say they have neither a ‘satisfactory friendship network’ nor a ‘satisfactory relatives network’.

It was the poet John Donne who wrote:

No man is an island entire of itself.

The poem goes on to say: any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind.

According to Rick Warren it is through fellowship that the church grows warmer. In other words, relationships develop and deepen through regular contact. This is not rocket science, in fact we all know that in order to build good relationships the two things we need are time and proximity. Fellowship is a key characteristic of what it means to be the people of God together on a journey. There is no escaping it.

It was in sharing fellowship that the early church developed it’s communal life. Because they were together they could pray together they could share together the joys and struggles of living lives dedicated to God. It was because of fellowship that Luke could describe the early church as a community in which no one was in need, and historians of the age would marvel at the love shared among those early followers of Jesus.

The reason the Bible doesn’t give us much instruction about how to live the life of a lone believer is because we are made for community. We were meant to be in a community of faith. We are, to use Rick Warren’s phrase, Formed for God’s family.

The OT is the story of the people of God as they journey through the wilderness, make their home in the Promised Land, lose and return to it. Jesus spoke about the kingdom of God, about those who followed him, who listened to what he had to say, as his family, his brothers and sisters. Paul writes to the churches of God in Corinth, Ephesus, Galatia, Philippi, Thessalonica, and Colossae. He speaks often about loving each other, comforting each other, encouraging each other, even correcting and rebuking each other. His favourite image to describe the church is a body where every one plays a part. Even when he writes to an individual, Timothy, Titus, Onesimus, it’s in the context of being a community.

Fellowship is important because we were designed to share life together.

Fellowship is important because we are exiles, we don’t belong in this world, this kingdom this host empire in which we find ourselves. If we feel like we do belong, then we’ve become too comfortable.

Fellowship and the credit crunch

How does being a family affect the way we live in these times of insecurity and instability in the markets? Is it every man or woman for themselves? Do we revert to a “Charity begins at home” mentality? Or do we make a stand and say we part of a bigger family. We carry responsibility for a wider family.

Being God’s family in troubled times is a tough choice. To remain generous and outwardly focused is harder when the going gets tough. But God has called us to live differently in the world. To have security in him, not ourselves, not the financial markets, not bricks and mortar but hope and faith.

Let’s finish with a prayer for our troubled times:

Lord God, we live in disturbing days:
across the world,
prices rise,
debts increase,
banks collapse,
jobs are taken away,
and fragile security is under threat. 

Loving God, meet us in our fear and hear our prayer:
be a tower of strength amidst the shifting sands,
and a light in the darkness;
help us receive your gift of peace,
and fix our hearts where true joys are to be found,
in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen