The US Mint Offers A Great Opportunity

The US Mint is trying to increase the public’s interest in numismatics otherwise known as coin collecting. It’s interesting how they’re doing it. Of the nearly 2 billion America the Beautiful quarters put in circulation this year the mint has dispersed among those only 2 million with a “W” mintmark for the West Point mint. Since there are 5 ATB quarters in 2019: Lowell, Massachusetts, American Memorial Park in Saipan, War in the Pacific Memorial on Guam, San Antonio Missions for Texas, and Frank Church’s River of No Return in Idaho, that means there are only 400,000 each of these “W” mint mark 2019 quarters out there. There’s a 1 in 185 chance that you might find one, and, because of the rarity, they’re selling for as much as $70 to $200 per quarter based on condition – a hefty return on investment for 25 cents! For $10 a roll you get 40 quarters to look at, and an opportunity to have a little bit of an early Christmas. What the US Mint is doing is wise as they try to get us to look at our money more closely.

The same thing is true for most churches at this time of year. The fall harvest season is usually the time for stewardship programs. As we approach Thanksgiving and Christmas we don’t want to forget the guest of honor at His own birthday party! To whom do we ultimately owe our thanks – God! So, take a hint from the mint and look at your money more closely. It can make a huge difference in fulfilling God’s ministries for the Kingdom.

Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi are the three post-Exilic prophets of the Old Testament, and they each preach a lot about us putting God first. With specificity, Haggai (1:2-11) tells the people to get busy rebuilding the Temple that had been destroyed by the Babylonians. For 20 years they had been looking at a pile of rubble and saw it as too mammoth a task to undertake. They focused on themselves and their “paneled houses,” while God’s house remained a ruin. Haggai told them to get their priorities in order. Malachi does the same thing. He tells the returning exiles that they have been robbing God, and when they ask how, he tells them it’s in tithes and offerings. In the midst of rebuke, he offers hopeful words. In Malachi 3:10, God speaks through Malachi and says, “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 there will not be room enough to store it.” Wow!

What’s interesting is the wording in how all three of these post-Exilic prophets encourage the people to put God first. More than any other writers in the Bible they use a specific designation for God: “Lord Almighty”! They want to inspire the people to give God his due because this is no wimpy God, but one to be revered. In Haggai’s 38 verses “Lord Almighty” is used 14 times; in Zechariah the same name is used 53 times, and in Malachi it is 24 times! These prophets were speaking to a people without a king for the first time in 650 years, or rather to a people who had always had a king, but forgot WHO that king is – the Lord Almighty! Our giving reveals whether or not we remember who our King is!

We are a greedy bunch and use any excuse to not give to the church. Boiled down, our excuse is usually greed and selfishness. We need to remember what Jim Cramer said on the TV show “Mad Money:” “Bulls make money! Bears make money! Pigs get slaughtered!” Money can be made whether the stock market is on a high or a low, but if you or I get greedy, we’re going to lose and lose big! We all want to do well on our investments, and investing in the ministries of the church are the best investments that we can make.

Recently I went through the refinancing process to lower both my interest rate and length of amortization. It was a good deal! It dawned on me that refinancing is exactly what we as Christians do with every stewardship campaign, indeed every Sunday and every day as we fulfill our promise to uphold the church with our prayers, presence, gifts, witness, and service. We are literally giving the church our capital to spend on its ministries. Those ministries are worth our investment. Our giving answers an important question, “Do you know how to tell the difference between a flower that’s alive and one that’s dead?” The answer is, “The one that’s alive is growing.” Our resources grow the Kingdom. Our giving refinances God’s goals. Churches that are growing are filled with people who know that we make a living by what we get out of life, but we make a life by what we give. If the US Mint wants us to look more closely at our money, we certainly need to follow God’s advice to do it, too.

United Methodists and Missions

What do you want to happen in 2016? Get started now or it will never happen! I would contend that our whole year takes shape by what we do or don’t do in January. We set the stage for the whole rest of the year. If we want better relationships then start now. If we want a better world, start now. If our biggest desire is for a grand remodel on our homes, or the best family vacation ever, start saving now. We turn the calendar to inspire us to have fresh starts. One of the best ways to beat the after Christmas blues, is to start getting ready for the next one.

I have found that one of January’s biggest temptations is to think about our needs before anything or anyone else. The winter months put us into survival mode and it leads to selfishness. For instance, many people just got over the hump of paying last year’s pledge to the church so they’re not that compelled to think about doing it now. The reality is, however, that if we want a great 2016 we have to think about giving our lives and resources away now. Jesus in Luke 9:24 said, “Whoever wants to save his or her life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.” So start the year off right by asking how you will give yourself and your resources away for Jesus. Don’t wait until the fourth quarter. Do it now!

Of course, the question arises, “To whom should I give my resources?” A wealthy man asked his pastor what he should do with his intended bequest of $50 million. This faithful church member knew that his pastor would be able to help him decide where to leave the money. The pastor reminded the man that the man had served on the hospital’s board of directors for years so it might be the perfect place to give the money. The man only half-way nodded in agreement, leading the pastor to suggest another place. “What about the local university?” the pastor asked, knowing that this philanthropist dearly loved higher education. The man replied, “No, I don’t think I’ll leave the money to the hospital or the university. They’re great institutions, though. I’m going to leave it all to my church.” The pastor asked incredulously, “Why?” The man’s response was amazing: “If I give all my money to the hospital or the university, they won’t build a church. But if I give it all to the church, they will build a hospital and a university.”

He was exactly right. History proves it! There are over 70 United Methodist hospitals in the United States and hundreds more overseas. There are 102 United Methodist colleges and universities in the U.S. and hundreds more around the globe. Claflin University, Columbia College, Wofford College, and Spartanburg Methodist College were all founded and continue to be supported by United Methodists in South Carolina. Duke and Emory are two other United Methodist institutions that are in nearby states and fit in both categories as hospitals and universities. Give to the church and missions will follow. Over and over again, Christians have given themselves to Christ and to the world. We have been blessed with Jesus’ example and admonition, “Do unto others as we would have them do unto us.”

This coming weekend at St. John’s we will host a “Missions Impact Celebration.” We will hear missionaries from nearby and faraway. They will share compelling stories of what God has been doing, and it will be up to us to be partners with them. Our church gives hundreds of thousands of dollars to missions. We’re doing what Jesus dared in Matthew 28: 19, “Go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” What we often leave out in our quoting of this Great Commission is the next verse, Matthew 28:20, “and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

In my mind there’s a direct correlation between these two verses: discipling includes obedience. Whoever said that the church is a “voluntary society” missed this correlation. In Luke 9:23, Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he or she must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” In other words, discipleship is a daily matter between you and God. This coming Sunday, you get to prove it as you make your pledge to our above-and-beyond mission partners.

Another passage of Christ’s comes to mind in Luke 6:38, “Give and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” A farmer had a cow who gave one pail of milk each day. The man invited guests for a party. In order to save his milk for the special occasion, he refrained from milking the cow for 10 days. He expected that on the last day the cow would give 10 pails of milk. When he went to milk the animal he found that she had dried up and gave less milk than ever before. Simply put, “Hoarding doesn’t help!”

 

Putting My Money Where My Mouth Is

Christ the King Sunday is always the concluding Sunday of Pentecost season and the last Lord’s Day before we begin Advent. It is even more appropriate that Thanksgiving Sunday and Christ the King Sunday coincide! We have so much to be grateful for in response to God’s providence, none of which would be possible without recognition that Christ is King. Caesar isn’t King, nor any other world leader or system. Jesus is Lord of Lords and King of Kings and when we hang onto that reality all of our difficulties pale in comparison. Because Christ is King we can have hope for today and expectancy for tomorrow.

So many stores have been promoting Christmas earlier and earlier because it affects their yearly bottom line. This coming Sunday is finally when it’s appropriate for us as Christians to begin a hurry-up of our preparations for the holidays. Therefore, it is entirely sensible for us to crank everything up a notch. We have waited long enough! This conjunction of celebrating that Christ is King and Thanksgiving is the only time when I’m glad to start thinking about making detailed plans for Advent season and Christmas. We will have moved from what the church calendar calls ordinary time to an extraordinary season where we can make things right before the year ends. There are people that we need to forgive, goodbyes and hello’s to say, visits to make, and debts to pay. We better make the best of these closing weeks of the year. They will never come again.

Therefore, this is when I better gauge my personal bottom line spiritually, financially, emotionally, and physically. If Christ is King in my life what does that do to my scheduling and priorities. If I am a thankful person, how does that prepare me to celebrate the Lord’s birth and get ready for His Second Coming? Like many, this is an important time for me to assess how I have been faithful all year. This is the time of the year when churches send out year-to-date contribution statements, receive pledge cards, and count the cost of doing ministry and make budgets. We need to respond by counting our blessings and giving back to God what is God’s. I dare not forget the Guest of Honor at His own birthday party. I should ask right now what end-of-year gifts I need to make. I need to put my money where my mouth is!

This world is filled with more takers than givers. A pastor was visiting one of his parishioners. He took his young daughter with him. As they visited an elderly couple, the man gave her a handful of peanuts. Expecting her to show a spirit of gratitude, the girl’s pastor-father asked his daughter, “Honey, what are you supposed to say?” Sincerely, and with her eyes fixed upon the older gentleman, she asked, “You got any more?”

How easy it is to expect more and more without expressing our gratitude in return. This coming Sunday and Thanksgiving week is a marvelous opportunity for us to say, “Thank You,” to God. What we decide this week in honoring Christ as King will go a long way in making or breaking our entire 2014 and our Christmas. Too often we are like the child who received a dictionary on her birthday from her grandmother. After considerable time had lapsed without a word of thanks, the grandmother wrote her to make sure that she received it, “I hope you liked the dictionary I bought for you?” Her granddaughter wrote back, “Yes, and I just can’t find the words to say thank you.”

Just as she had the words literally given to her by which she could have given thanks, so has God given us talents and treasures to use in saying “Thanks!” to Him. If we will just do it! There are really no excuses to our negligence or procrastination. December 31 is just around the corner and each of us as individuals will close the books on another year. What will our ledgers say about our faith and faithfulness in 2014? When you’re passing out thanks this coming week, don’t dare forget the One who gives you eternal life. One young man said to his father, “Guess what? I can say please and thank you in Spanish.” His father asked, “How come you never say it in English?” Let’s use every language of the heart, soul, and body to offer our praise and gratitude to God. Christ is King! Give thanks!

Want to Go to Heaven?

Last night I wasn’t far from the convenience store that sold the over $400 million dollar lottery ticket to a guy who was on an errand to buy some hotdog buns. Without finding any, he decided to purchase $20 in lottery tickets instead. He won and has chosen to remain anonymous. I surveyed the charge conference members last night to see if anyone had an especially big grin on his face, hoping to spot the big winner. I know the UMC is against gambling, but, you know, the devil has had the money long enough. It’s time for Jesus to get his due! Without observing anyone with a rags-to-riches look on their face, I dared to press the issue and outright ask if anyone wanted to come forward and let us know they won. No takers!

But when reading the epistle text from I Timothy 6 for this coming Sunday, I see that we’re already rich enough: “Godliness with contentment is great gain (I Tim. 6:6).” There’s nothing wrong with money but loving it is “a,” not “the” root of all kinds of evil (6:10). There’s plenty of ways for money to lure us away from faith. I Timothy 6:10b says, “Some people people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” It’s not that life or poverty has attacked them with problems. They have “pierced themselves.” It’s fascinating, but true. We can want and want and want, and let our faith be replaced by fret, and pretty quickly we’re sunk spiritually and our financial condition is no better either. Our griefs are compounded.

In contrasting worry with faith, Jesus promoted the life of faith over an incessant desire for what we think that we need. He says in Matthew 6:33 “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” In essence Jesus is stating the same words that Paul so beautifully writes in I Timothy 6:17 Paul says, “Command those who are rich in this present age not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God…” and a moment later he really gives every church stewardship campaign a boost, “Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure… for the coming age,” and here’s the part that really lights me up – the “so that” at the end of verse 19: “so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.”

Wow, if I give generously and quit worrying about money and spotting lottery ticket winners to solve all the world’s ills then I will “take hold of the life that is truly life.” That is one of the greatest promises in the Bible! Who wouldn’t want the life that is truly life?

The best formula to gaining riches isn’t hitting the jackpot but giving what you have away. Listen to Luke 12:32-34 where Jesus says “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted…” Listen also to Jesus’ words in Luke 6:38, “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Now, that’s a great formula for Godly gain!

Of course there was someone else with a different formula. They said the sure-fire way to get rich is to get 50 female pigs and put them together with 50 male deer. If you do it you’ll have 100 sows and bucks! Ouch! So sorry! No, the only certain formula to be content and blessed is not in the worrying or hoarding, but in the giving to and for God to a hurting world. Simple as that.

Someone was offered an option if they wanted to go to heaven or hell. First they visited hell. There were throngs of people sitting across from each other at banquet tables loaded with mounds of sumptuous food. Each person had 4-foot-long chopsticks in their hands. Everyone was emaciated, gaunt and starving even though the table was loaded down with a feast. Then the person went to visit heaven and, guess what, it was a nearly identical scene: throngs of people at banquet tables loaded with food with 4-foot-long chopsticks in their hands. The only difference is that all the people in heaven were well fed, happy, full to their heart’s content. The visitor asked why things were so different for the people in heaven than they were for the people in hell especially since the circumstances appeared the same. The answer was pretty simple. The people in hell were trying to feed themselves with their 4-foot-long chopsticks and physically couldn’t get the food in their mouths. The people in heaven used the same chopsticks to feed each other and were as happy as could be.

Where would you rather go – heaven or hell? If heaven, you’d better start practicing here! Taking hold of life that is truly life – giving is more important than getting! Amen!?!

Radical Love

Little Boy at Clinic

I’ve been reading David Platt’s book Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream. In the context of having just gotten back from impoverished Nicaragua, this book has me really thinking about the US, our hedonism, and maybe, just maybe, the obsession with metrics in United Methodism.  How much does our desire to be big in numbers align with Jesus?

 Jesus was a small church pastor not a mega-church one! He pushed people into radical discipleship by making it difficult to be a follower, not easy. Remember Jesus’ words about “Foxes have holes… but the Son of Man has no place…” or “Take up a cross and follow me.” Church history tells us that for the first 400 years of the Church, an average of 1,000 Christians died every day for the faith. That is staggering!

 Jesus, no doubt, ran off a few more people when he said things like “Sell all your possessions and give to the poor,” or “Eat my body and drink my blood.” Wow! Think how these phrases translate in our modern US context. Sell what you have and give it away, and Bite Me! It’s like what David Platt heard from his preaching professor, “Tonight my goal is to talk you out of following Jesus.” It is a scary thing to actually follow Jesus Christ. It is not easy. It is not for the faint of heart.

 Think about this event from John Wesley’s life: “He had just finished buying some pictures for his room when one of the chambermaids came to his door. It was a winter day and he noticed that she only had a thin linen gown to wear for protection against the cold. He reached into his pocket to give her some money for a coat, and found he had little left. It struck him that the Lord was not pleased with how he had spent his money. He asked himself: “Will Thy Master say, ‘Well done, good and faithful steward?’ Thou hast adorned thy walls with the money that might have screened this poor creature from the cold! O justice! O mercy! Are not these pictures the blood of this poor maid?’”

 What did Wesley do? He figured out how much he could live on without extravagance. When his income passed that level he gave the rest away. At one point Wesley was making over $160,000 a year in today’s dollars but he was living off the equivalent of $20,000. Amazing! How different would the world be if we did the same thing? How different would Nicaragua be? How different would the US be? Sounds radical and sounds like Jesus to me!