Giving All

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
October 14, 2007

Giving All
Exodus 23:19
Mark 12:41-44

Could God’s expectation be any clearer?
“The choicest of the first fruits of your ground
you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.”
Exodus 23:19
That’s the lesson.
That’s what the Bible teaches us:
the word of the Lord.

The choicest.
The best.
Not what’s left over after you’ve had your fill,
not the remnants,
not even second best.
The choicest.
The best.
The first fruits.

We are to bring them to the house of the Lord our God.
We are bring them because God expects us to:
we SHALL bring them.

God expects us to
because what we bring to God
belonged to God in the first place.
When we bring our firstfruits, our best,
we are not bringing God a gift,
we are returning to God a portion of what is his.

Ah, but that’s not how we tend to look at
what we offer God, is it?
We offer God what we feel we can afford,
what we feel we can afford after we’ve taken care
of the essentials, all those bills that find their way
to our homes each month.
That’s the reality we live with.

After all, if we are a little short,
or if we miss a payment in what we are supposed
to bring the house of the Lord,
it’s not as though we’re going to get a past-due notice,
or a nasty telephone call.

And so God gets something from what we have left
at the end of each month.

And still God stands before us in expectation,
with his direction so clear:
we shall bring the choicest, the best:
we shall return a portion,
a tithe!
A tithe: ten percent!
Not giving to God ten percent,
but returning ten percent.
Returning to God ten percent
of the one hundred percent
we have received from God,
each of us: you and I.

It couldn’t be simpler.
And yet we struggle with this notion.
We’ve struggled with it for three thousand years.
And in the process dismayed God,
frustrated God,
and even angered God.
Speaking through the prophet Malachi,
God vented his anger:
“Will anyone rob God?
Yet you are robbing me!
But you say, ‘How are we robbing you?’
In your tithes and offerings!...
Bring the full tithe into the storehouse…”
(Malachi 3:8ff)

When you each joined the church, you made a promise:
you each promised to be “a faithful member of this congregation,
share in its worship and ministry
through your prayers and gifts,
your study and service,
and so fulfill your calling
to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.”

That’s what you promised.
Do you remember?
You promised to be a faithful member of this congregation,
to participate regularly, faithfully in worship on Sunday.
It is here in worship where our lives as disciples
are grounded, the foundation of faith built.

You promised to be a faithful member of this congregation
by sharing in its ministry:
by being actively involved
in the different ways we are called to serve,
each of us responding to where God calls us to serve,
using the unique gifts God has given each of us.
It could be singing in the choir,
or looking after our buildings and grounds,
or working with our children,
still others assure that our finances are in order.

For the past few weeks we’ve been encouraging you
to fill out a Time and Talent interest sheet
as a way for you to honor the promise you made.
At last count, fewer than 20% of the congregation
have returned their forms.
Why haven’t you returned yours?
Perhaps because you did not get one;
perhaps because you are already very active
and thought you didn’t have to;
Perhaps because you’ve simply forgotten to fill it out.
Whatever, the reason,
fill out a form so we can create a helpful database,
to match interests with needs.
There isn’t a ministry team that could not use help.
Fill out a form in response to the promise you made,
made to the church made to every other member,
made to God.

This week our Stewardship Ministry Team
sent out pledge cards as the third part
of our commitment of Time, Talent, and Treasure
to the work of the Lord.

Presbyterian churches always seem to struggle
with Stewardship campaigns.
We struggle because we think of Stewardship as fund-raising,
and that always seems so unseemly in churches,
as though we were public television stations:
“Isn’t the choir great?
Don’t you want more music like that?
Your pledge of support
will assure more anthems just like that.
Phone now: operators are standing by…”

Stewardship isn’t about fund raising, though.
The money you put in the plate isn’t a gift.
Stewardship is about our faithful response to God,
Stewardship is something that we are engaged in
each of us, every moment of every day.
Our commitment of our Treasure is simply
one way we respond to God
as good and faithful stewards and disciples
returning a portion of what God has given us.

If you sit down with a financial planner
he or she will tell you that the first thing
you should do when you get your paycheck
is put money into retirement savings,
then, next, put aside the money you need for your regular bills:
the mortgage, utilities, car payment, insurance,
food, clothing, children’s education,
something for vacation and entertainment.
Then, with what’s left over,
if there is anything left over,
put a little aside for charity.

That’s good financial planning.
Follow that plan and Suze Orman would give you a top grade.

But that’s not faithful living as a disciple of Christ,
as a child of God.
Make your Stewardship commitment
out of what’s left at the end of the month
and the response you’ll get from God
is right there in Malachi.

No, as sensible as financial planners might be,
we are called first to set aside our best for God.
Our choicest, our first fruits.
God first.

The widow gave her all,
offered her very self in response to God’s blessings.
She held nothing back.
That’s the example our Lord calls us to follow.

We are at a crossroads for our church as we look to 2008.
The past decade had its ups and downs,
especially with turnover in staffing.
But things are stable now,
and we are ready to look to the future
to think and pray about where God is calling us
and what we will need to do to respond.

We are ready for a new vision of the future,
ready to close the book on Vision 2010
and the wonderful things we did as part of that vision plan
so that we can pray about and plan for a new vision.

What has become clear to me over the past 15 months
is that we need to set a goal for ourselves to
restore the position of Associate Pastor.
The congregation very reluctantly gave up that position
a few years ago,
but from everything I’ve heard about that decision,
it was hoped that it was a temporary move.
How temporary?
That’s up to us.

It will be temporary
if we make it a goal to restore the position.
If we commit ourselves to having an Associate in place
in two or three years.

Why do we need an Associate Pastor?
The first answer is simple:
a church of our size needs two ministers.
We are more than 400 members,
and we hope we will continue to grow.
That’s more than one minister can handle,
even with ample amounts of Fair-Trade coffee!

More specifically, we need an Associate
to honor the commitment we have all made
to the young people of our church:
We have had five different Youth Directors
over the past five years.
We have not had even a nibble
in our attempt to fill the position,
which really should not be a surprise:
How attractive is a part-time, 15-hour a week position,
that doesn't pay much?

Aren’t the young people in our church worth more than that?
Can’t we do better for them?
Don’t we speak of them as our future?
The Associate Pastor would have as
his or her principal responsibility the Youth:
and not just Middle and High Schoolers,
but also the growing number of young people
we have in college, and
the singles who are in their 20s and early 30s
who have finished school and have moved back
to this area to start careers.
This past summer a group of a dozen
'"twenty-somethings"
got together and dubbed themselves
the “Not-So-Youth Group."
They are eager to organize outings for fellowship,
as well as growth in discipleship.
They would love to have an Associate Pastor
work with them.

To call an Associate Pastor,
even one straight out of seminary
will require I estimate at least $75,000 per year
by the time we pay salary, housing, taxes, and benefits.
That sounds like a lot of money
but we can do that
if we just increase annual giving by about 15%.
Surely we can do that over the next two years!
Surely we can do that if we make that our goal!

We have other needs as well.
This is a thirty-year old facility,
and just like your homes,
it requires constant upkeep and maintenance.
Just ask Mike Mahoney, the chair of our Property Ministry Team,
about the upkeep and maintenance of this facility.
And it doesn’t come cheap.
We spent more than $30,000 this past year
to replace heating and air conditioning units in one wing, and more than $50,000 to repave the parking lot --
and that only took care of the back lot;
We still need to do the front.

Those are just a few of the major needs we have
here in your church,
our Church,
the house of the Lord our God.

You have your Time and Talent form.
You have your Pledge Card.
You know what God expects,
what our Lord calls you to.

What you do, your response,
is between you and God.
The Stewardship Ministry Team doesn’t know.
The Session doesn’t know.
I don’t know.
Only God knows.

“The point is this,” Paul teaches us,
“the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly,
and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.”
(2 Cor. 9:6)

God has given us his all:
in his love, his grace,
his mercy, and his goodness.
God has given us his all
in his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

God stands before us here and now,
looking for our response.
God stands before each of us, you and me,
with his simple command:
“The choicest of the first fruits of your ground
you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.”
Exodus 23:19
He awaits your response.
AMEN