Dealing with Double-mindedness

Matthew 6:19-21, 24-34

Matthew 6:19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also…. 24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. 25 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? 28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. 34 “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

This is our eighth sermon on the Sermon on the Mount. It seems that I preach from today’s text or its close parallels in Luke’s Gospel about once a year. It is a rich text and can go a lot of different directions. I will try not to repeat myself too much. I will focus on five brief excerpts.

Passage 1. “…lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven….”

Jesus has an investment plan for us. He says that we should invest (literally, lay up treasures for ourselves) in heaven. How do we invest in heaven?

We invest in things that help increase people’s faith, hope, and love, things that draw them to Jesus, things that make them more like Jesus, things that engage them in doing Jesus’ work. Does that sound vaguely familiar? I have borrowed those phrases from our newly adopted mission statement. In short, we invest in the mission of Christ’s church. We invest our human resources, including our time and our money, in doing things in this life that anticipate the perfect future that will be in God’s new heaven and new earth, in doing things that win friends who will fellowship with us around the Messiah’s table in eternity.

Last Sunday afternoon, we adopted a mission statement, a vision statement, a plan statement, and a set of two budgets. The baseline budget is the kind of budget we can use if we merely maintain our giving at the level of 2009; no, we can’t spend every budget line to the max at our 2009 giving rates, but that is almost always true in church budgets; not all spending plans come to fruition; not all budget allowances need to be spent. The allowances are present to allow the spending that may be needed as events unfold. When we turn from the baseline budget to the growth budget, the specific proposals for increased spending come from the requests that were made for the work of our Ministry Teams: Evangelism and Compassion, Discipleship, Worship, and Friendship and Hospitality. We instructed our Board to aim for an appropriate balance of growth in numbers, spiritual maturity, mission, administrative capacity, and pastoral care, and we authorized them to begin from the baseline budget and to gradually implement as much of the growth budget as they can within the limits of what is financially possible, prioritizing and reallocating to achieve the balanced growth goals. The Board is not about to indulge in deficit spending. The Board can act on our instructions only to the degree that we increase our giving.

What do we get if we as a congregation increase our giving? Well, we have given the Board some leeway to prioritize and reallocate to maximize our growth with available funds. But, according to what we put in our growth budget, we expand and enhance our youth and children’s ministries; we use some money to strengthen the Wednesday evening worship which we hope will become the foundation of the church’s second worship service this fall. We increase the amount of money available for Christian education curriculum to meet the needs of expanding numbers. We budget money for improved audio-visual equipment to serve our worship services. We begin to pay for the Friendship and Hospitality food that David and Mary Ann Bell and others among us have been supplying from their own pockets. We increase the amount of money available for advertising as we begin to brand our church in line with the Mission/Vision statements. We increase the amount of money available for buying choir music and for paying guest musicians to enrich our worship services. Of course, the Board may reallocate some of this, but they should do so only to maximize our balanced growth potential.

Over time, all this should draw more citizens into Christ’s kingdom and more members into this congregation. In short, it is a way that we can invest in heaven. It is a way we can help people join us on our one Foundation, our faith in Jesus Christ. Eddie Keever had heard about how quickly this church paid for a new roof a couple of years back. He quipped: “We paid for the roof; now it’s time to pay for the foundation.” Not a bad thought. Giving toward spiritual growth and mission goals is investing in heaven. It is our spiritual foundation.

Passage 2. “…where your treasure is, there your heart will be also….”

Some people teach that if our hearts are in something, we will invest in it. That may be true. But Jesus knows that it works the other way around too. When we invest in the redeeming love of Jesus Christ, we start caring more about the progress of that love. We begin to pray for the outreach efforts of the church. We begin to put more time and energy behind our money in building a community of hope through Jesus Christ. Giving more helps us care more.

Passage 3. “No one can serve two masters…You cannot serve God and money.” If we are serving two masters, if we are serving God and money, we are double-minded. If we are double-minded, we are unstable in our all ways; we cannot expect to accomplish much. How many of you have ever worked in a situation where you were not sure who your real boss was? One would-be boss told you to do one thing, and the other would-be boss told you to do the opposite. It is hard to accomplish much in a situation like that. Jesus tells us to make God our boss, and then we will know whom we are serving. We are serving whatever expresses the loving heart of God reaching out to a lost and broken world.

Passage 4. “…seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness….”

We cannot understand and apply the Sermon on the Mount without first understanding that the kingdom of God is at hand. At hand means here and now as well as in the eternal future. The kingdom of God means that God reigns, that God is in charge and that we are not. The kingdom of God being at hand means that we can experience God’s love, God’s power, God’s providence, and God’s protection in our daily lives right here and now, in and around Berryville, Arkansas—or wherever we are.

Today, we are dealing with problems related to money and double-mindedness. We cannot deal in the Jesus way with those issues or any of the other issues raised in the Sermon on the Mount until we trust that God is in charge. That is why the culminating point that Jesus makes in this passage is, “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” What he is saying is, if you will make living your life in accord with God’s reign your most basic assumption and your top priority, then your material circumstances will fall into line with your being a blessed child of God.

That is not to say that there will not be difficulties. Jesus is not giving us a formula for how to win friends, influence people, and always be healthy, wealthy and worldly wise. If that was his goal for us, he and his apostles did not set very good examples for us. We have to remember that Jesus’ idea of a blessed life is measured by beatitude attitudes, not by cash value. But, oh what blessing there is in living life in the Jesus way! You can’t buy that blessing, and neither can you beat it!

Passage 5: “Do not be anxious about tomorrow….”

Some of you are puzzled about how we can increase our budget for 2010 when our 2009 giving and spending did not match our 2009 budget. Let me tell you a true story. When I went to pastor Warren Hills Christian Church in Indianapolis, I discovered after a few months that they were in much worse financial situation than they had revealed when we were negotiating. They had for the past several years been cutting their budget to match their pledges, and then their actual giving would shrink by more than their budget cuts. It was a downward spiral that would soon bring their existence to an end unless something changed. When what you are doing is not working, do something else. Some of the leaders persuaded the Board and congregation to vote for a larger budget. They raised the budget about 25% and the giving increased about 15%. That was the biggest jump, but each year they either increased the budget or showed what we could do with increased giving, and each year the giving increased. Our giving never matched our budget, but our growing budgets helped us increase the giving that was available for us to spend in Christ’s mission. As long as we stretched in faith each year, our giving increased. Then one year, one of our largest contributing families pressed for substantial increases in our outreach giving. They probably would have seen to it that we reached the ambitious goal. But a couple of Board members vehemently opposed the budget increases, and it scared the Board back into a cautious pattern. The large-giving family left the church, and the growth in giving stopped. The church growth stalled as well.

What I learned: A stretching faith can build a church, but anxiety can kill a church, or at least reverse its growth. Let’s choose faith.

I am well aware that not all of us can increase our giving. But some of us can. In order to achieve the goals we have projected in the growth budget, we would need about $1200.00 a month increased giving and a little bit more to cover any losses or declines in giving by others. Let’s imagine that 15 households gave an average of $100.00 more per month. Of course, to get that average, some would need to give more to make up for those who could not give that much. But we might even have two or three households who could cover the whole increase to give us a jump start. In any case, I believe that it is an achievable goal if we decide to pursue it.

Let’s be honest. What is needed is an overhaul to our attitudes about giving to Christ’s work. On the bottom line, it is really an issue of hope, faith, love, and commitment. Through the remainder of 2010, we need to take our time and money and go with Jesus wherever he leads. If we will go with him, he will go with us…all the way to the goal.