Broadway Christian Church ·Columbia, Missouri

Morning Worship ·April 17, 2005

Fourth Sunday of Easter

Prayer of the Day

Within your whole family on earth, O God, we gather as your church for worship, for fellowship, for service, for mission, and for renewal as disciples of Jesus.  Teach us again that everything we are and everything we have is really yours.  Thank you for placing it in our care for a while.  Amen.

Scripture
II Corinthians 9:10-11

 Now God who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness.  You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.

The Broadway Christian Church Puppet Ministry presented a response

 to this Scripture, which was both humorous and poignant.

Message
A Bushel and a Peck
Rick Frost

Our children have brought us a wonderful message through their puppet presentation declaring the generosity of God and about that spiritual truth which says that “whatever we sow, whatever we plant, whatever we give, whether it is apple seeds, or kindness, or money, it always, always comes back to us a bushel and a peck.”  And as Paul said, “Why does that happen?  Well, so we can go on and be generous on every occasion, not just occasionally, not just sometimes, but on every occasion producing thanksgiving to God.”  It is a powerful message, kids, and we thank you.

We adults are going to have the chance to test that out.  We have the chance to test it out today, or later this week.  Hopefully all of us will by Consecration Day, May 1, just a couple Sundays away, when we, as the adults of this church, lovingly, and gracefully, and generously fill out our pledge cards and make a financial commitment to God through this church that will all go together and underwrite the ministry and mission of Broadway Christian Church for the coming year.  It is a ministry and mission we believe will produce thanksgiving to God, and as the kids said today, will enrich the life of the giver in every way. 

Now, what I want you to hear today is that is not just a hope of ours.  Biblically, theologically, it’s a spiritual truth.  It’s a biblical principal that you and I can count on.  What we have to do is try it.  We have to test it out.  It all comes down to all of us putting our name on the dotted line, making that financial commitment, and then seeing what happens.  So, kids, thank you all very much for that wonderful message. 

It occurred to me, as I reflected on what I knew these young folks were going to do, it might also be a good day to offer a stewardship message for our kids.  We have a significant number of our kids in this worship experience right now.

Let me offer just a couple of things in the next few minutes that hopefully might be instructive.  First of all, kids, I want to ask you to learn how to manage your money.  Everybody got that figured out?  Is everyone doing that really well?  That’s really where we have to start, as our adult friends know.  We have to learn, as we grow up, how to manage our money. 

God has been and is the One who enables us to work and to even earn whatever it is that we have.  We also know that God expects us, all of us, to manage what it is that we have.  That’s what stewardship means.  To be a steward is simply to be a manager.  Being a good steward is being a good manager.  That is something we learn all the way through our lives.

Secondly, let me encourage you to plan ahead when you want to buy something.  When you want to buy something, save up for it, and shop around to see if you can find the best value for that dollar, because that dollar has been a dollar that has come hard.  Remember that your money, according to the Bible, is a trust that God has given you.  That means that we are supposed to handle that trust wisely and to do so in a way that God directs. 

That means that there are some things you are going to have to avoid.  One of those big things to avoid is credit cards.  You know what?  I can’t believe there are people in our society and institutions who target these kids with credit cards.  They are sending credit cards, free, to these kids right before you – hundreds, thousands, millions of them.  Folks, if you can’t afford it, don’t buy it.  Forget that idea that somehow you are going to become wealthy somehow overnight… that you are going to be able to pay for this and enjoy it later on.  There is next to no chance that anyone in this room is going to become a professional athlete.  There is next to no chance we will become a famous actor or a rock star.  There is next to no chance that anyone in this room is going to win the lottery.  But there are a lot of folks out there who are hoping to do just that.

Now you know and I know that success is much more likely to come to you if you will focus on those God-given skills, those God-given talents, those gifts that God has given you.  Develop those.  Grow those and work hard.  Work hard, and make good decisions, and be good managers, and you will have amazing things.

Number 3:  What I want you to hear is that you, too, along with all of these other people in this church who may be a little bit older than you, need to begin, if you haven’t already started, to give generously and joyfully, yourselves.  You need to give back to God a portion of what you receive and what has been entrusted to you.  You need to do that in a spirit of joy and blessing.  Just think about all of the things you have received that have been such blessings in your life.  What I want you to hear is that we invite you to join with all of the other kids in this church, all of the other youth, all of the other adults, all of us together, in making a financial commitment, a pledge, because when we put it all together, it makes a huge difference.

Now, I know all of us like a little junk food.  There is a time when we like to have some Cola and Cheetos.  Did you know that the people in this country, not kids, but the people in this country spend more on junk food than they do on giving to God and God’s work in the church?  Can you believe that?

So everybody, not just the adults, has a card.  We want to ask all of you – men, women, and children – to fill that card out prayerfully and joyfully and to offer it to God for God’s work in this place.  Fill it out with whatever you decide to give, and, according to today’s Scripture, you will receive a bushel and a peck.

When we give… when we learn how to sow… and when we do not sow sparingly, but with gusto and generosity, it’s amazing what comes back. 

And as you said, or rather what that little worm puppet said, “You will be enriched in every way, so that you can go on and be generous on every occasion producing thanksgiving to God.”

And we all say together… “Amen.”

Benediction

Oh, Lord, you’re good to me.  And so I thank you, Lord, for giving me the things I need; like the sun and the rain, and the apple seed.  You, Lord, are good to me.  Amen.