Measure You Give 1983

I once had a vision of Jesus, which was the driving light of my life. But somehow, that vision has grown dull. I had a confidence in God, which nothing was able to shake.

But now there are these shadows of doubt and confusion. Is it because the honeymoon is over, and now I'm walking through the wilderness? Or, did I lose this vision because of actions of my own? Reading from Mark 4, verse 24, And he said to them, Take heed what you hear. The measure you give will be the measure you get.

And still more will be given you. For to him who has will more be given. And from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

Put in simplest terms, the kingdom of God consists of really two things, receiving and giving. We enter the kingdom by receiving life from God. We hold on to that life from God by giving it away.

But if we try to take the life which God gives us and clutch it, we lose it. Reading from 1 John, verse 11, He came to his own home, and his own people received him not. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who are born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

Those who received him, he came in, and then he gave them this power. Now they have it. But they will keep this power only by giving it away.

1 John, chapter 5, verse 11, This is the testimony that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life, and he who has not the Son has not life. But to have the Son and try to hold on to him and keep him, like money in the bank, is to lose him.

The only way we keep the Son is by giving him away. Revelation, chapter 3, verse 20, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him and he with me.

Again, we receive him, we open the door, Jesus comes in, now he's there. But he stays only as we give him out. And so today, we gather in the name of Jesus.

And he fulfills his promise again for us, that when we come together in his name, he's there. We bring our troubled consciences, our broken hearts, our twisted minds, our sick bodies. He touches us, gives us fresh life, gives us his body to eat and his blood to drink, sends us on our way rejoicing.

But all these blessings he pours into us so generously again today, remain ours and increase in us only when we begin to practice the fundamental principle of the kingdom of God, that you get what you give. Take heed what you hear, the measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given you. For to him who has will more be given, and from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

Now we have a very difficult time, all of us, making that reality in our living, because from the time we were infants, we have learned to live by a totally different rule, the rule of Satan's kingdom. In God's kingdom, you get what you give, but in Satan's kingdom, you keep what you have, and you have whatever you have by getting it, taking it, and once you have it, you build a wall around it, you guard it with a knife, you don't let anybody get near it, and you try to expand your own kingdom. Life in this world, Satan's kingdom, is like a giant game of Monopoly.

You start out with so much money, you start rolling the dice, and with a combination of skill, luck, and conniving, you know, you try to beat the other guy. You get Baltimore, Park Place, New York Avenue, or whatever it's called, Illinois, you know, and then you get the boardwalk in Park Place, you know, then you get some houses, Redding Railroad, put on some hotels, and then he lands on your property, and you clean him out. But the strange thing about this game of Monopoly is that even when you win, you lose.

You know, take it in life. Jesus says, Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust corrupt, and where thieves break in and steal. Things haven't changed.

That's what we found, okay? So we get a nice, shiny new car. See, only cost $5,700. Beautiful.

You know, but pretty soon, rust. Oh, you say, wait a minute, I'm going to have a Z-Bart, you know, no rust. All right, then you're parked, you know, at the Farmer Jack parking lot to get some groceries, you come out, somebody plowed into the rear quarter panel and drove away.

That's okay, I have insurance. You know, but no matter what you do within three, four, five years, it's going to behave like it did and another few more years and it's in one of the junkyards. You buy a house, same thing.

Nothing wrong with having a house, but, you know, it's the hassle of making the roof tight so it doesn't leak and, you know, fixing the furnace. Now you're successful at this. You own half of the state of Michigan and three quarters of the state of Texas.

You have oil tankers sailing around on every ocean. Marvelous. Then you die.

Okay, we got to find a seat for John. Just a minute. You brought a new customer, beautiful.

You're a missionary. Wait a second. Okay, John, good to see you.

Glad you came too. I guess we'll have to split you up. We'll put the new customer right there, fourth you from the back, and we'll put this one, John, is that all right over there? Okay, you bet.

Praise God, John made it and he brought somebody with him. So you got these oil tankers sailing all over the place and everything is going great. You got money all over.

You don't know what to do with it. Then you die. And what do you take with you? You don't even take your body.

The only thing you take with you across to the other side is what you gave away. Make friends for yourselves by means of the unrighteous mammon, Jesus says, that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal habitations. And so the kingdom of Satan that we're so accustomed to, we breathe the atmosphere, we think it starts all too often, is surrounded by and being invaded by the kingdom of God and the kingdom of God operates on a totally different principle, totally different.

The kingdom of God operates on the principle of you get what you give. You get what you give You're judging everybody, it comes back, you're getting judged. You give condemnation, you're sour and cynical and critical of everything and everybody, then you can't understand why everybody's so negative towards you.

You give forgiveness, you show forbearance and pretty soon it starts coming back. You give in mercy to people who are in need or whatever the situation is, mercy comes back to you. The law of gravity.

So Jesus says in Luke 6, 37, judge not and you will not be judged, implying that if you do judge, you will be judged. Condemn not and you will not be condemned, implying that if you do condemn, you'll be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven.

Give and it will be given you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap for the measure you give will be the measure you get back. Now the reason we have such a hard time sustaining this vision of Jesus, which has been given to us, it keeps getting tarnished and weak, it shrivels, it dies, is because we try to take the vision of the Lord that God gives to us and conserve it the way we conserve things in this satanic kingdom.

We hold on to our vision, but, you know, we live as if we were playing Monopoly. We're still shrewd, conniving, negative, cynical, and we seek our own advancement in thousands of subtle ways in areas that we call spiritual or Christian, and we end up with grief and blindness. Because when we're given the vision of the Lord and any blessing from God, that blessing remains ours only as we learn to give it.

Constantly to give it. You can't give it too much. The more you give, the more you get.

Take heed what you hear. The measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given you. For to him who has will more be given, and from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

Now Jesus is practicing and Jesus has lived that way. Who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. I have equality with God.

Nobody's going to take this from me. It's mine. That's my right.

That's not how he does it. He empties himself, pours himself out, takes the form of a servant. Being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, he humbles himself immediately unto death, even death on a cross.

He gives, gives, gives. Wherefore, God has also highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name. The measure you give is the measure you get.

That, in the name of Jesus, every knee should bow and every tongue confess things in heaven, things on earth, things under the earth, and on the third day the Father gives him life and raises him from the dead. He offers up to the Father a corruptible body and on the third day God gives him an incorruptible body as he raises him from the dead. He offers himself up in weakness and on the third day the Father raises him in power.

The measure you give is the measure you get. So Jesus teaches us to live this way too. And he's very clear about it in the parable we find in Luke chapter 19 starting at verse 12.

He said, therefore, a nobleman went into a far country to receive kingly power and then return. Calling ten of his servants, he gave them ten pounds and said to them, Train with these till I come. But his citizens hated him and sent an embassy after him saying, we do not want to be called to him that he might know what they had gained by trading.

The first came before him saying, Lord, your pound has made ten pounds more. He said to him, Well done, good servant. Because you have been faithful in a very little, you shall have authority over ten cities.

The second came saying, Lord, your pound has made five pounds. And he said to him, because you are a severe man, you take up what you did not lay down and reap what you did not sow. He said to him, I will condemn you out of your own mouth, you wicked servant.

You knew that I was a severe man taking up what I did not lay down, reaping what I did not sow. Why then did you not put my money into the bank? And at my coming, I should have collected it with interest. He said to those who stood by, Take the pound from him He has ten pounds.

I tell you, to everyone who has, will more be given. But from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away. So how did they gain with these pounds? He has one pound to start with.

He gains with it by giving it away. He gives it away, comes back as two. Gives it away again, with the one pound who's going to hang on to it.

He wraps it up in a napkin, he's going to preserve it. He's not going to lose it, but he does lose it. And so today, in this place, as we gather in the name of the Lord, the parable becomes reality.

Jesus comes into our midst and gives us each a pound. Use it. For instance, we come with our broken heart and our troubled conscience and our sick body and our twisted mind and all our needs and we lay these things out before him.

All of us here have something we came with that isn't right. And we cry out to God for help and we get help. He's merciful to us beyond our comprehension.

Then the service ends. Now if we take this mercy which we've been shown and begin immediately to show it first of all to each other, we begin to show mercy to the person in the flock that we have a hard time accepting. The person who is always bugging me.

And we continue to show mercy at home. For goodness sake, for sure to Mother. It's Mother's Day.

Show her a little mercy. And to father and to children and to brothers and sisters. And then on our jobs or in our searches for jobs or whatever, wherever we're dealing with people all week long the more mercy we show the more it keeps pouring into us.

Now we have two talents or two powers. Now we have three. Now we have four.

We come back next Sunday and because we have been giving it out all week long we're in a position to receive a double portion of God's mercy. But if on the other hand having received the mercy service ends and we wrap it up in a napkin. It's mine.

And we go back to our old monopoly ways. You can't have it. It's mine.

And I'm looking at this person with disgust and that person with cynicism and this person with absolutely a sour attitude and this is how I go through the week. I show no kindness to my wife or my husband or my child or my parents or that aunt that hasn't seen me for three years and she's only a mile away. Then this mercy which I've been shown shrinks and shrivels inside the napkin and when we come back next week we're in no position to receive because the measure you give is the measure you get back and even more is given you.

To him who has will more be given and from him who has not even what he has will be taken away. Putting it another way this pound that we're given is Jesus himself. In this place as we open our hearts it's the Lord who comes into our midst.

He visits us in the bread and wine. Jesus comes to us personally in the word in the hymns in the prayers in the Holy Spirit coming among us and he renews his grip on our hearts. Christ in you the hope of glory he who has the son has life he who has not the son has not life.

The son has come in I've opened the door he's eating with me and I with him. Service ends. Immediately we begin to share Jesus with each other.

The name of the Lord crosses our lips. We give each other encouragement to trust in him and all week long we speak that name fully and gladly. Not only do we speak the name of Jesus but we manifest the nature of Jesus in our actions.

The way he is begins to come through the way we behave and the more we give him the more we have him. We come back together again next week and because we gave him away we're in a position to receive a double portion of his presence. But if when the service ends having received the Lord we wrap him up in a napkin and go back the name of Jesus now doesn't cross our lips until we sing him next Sunday.

We never talk about him it's not proper. Somebody might be embarrassed they might get nervous if I talk about Jesus nor do we manifest his love or his nature. All week long we're playing Monopoly then we come to church next Sunday and we open our hearts to receive some more.

We're in no position because the measure you give is the measure you get and even more is given to you. To him who has will more be given and from him who has not even what he has is going to be taken away. One other example would be to say that this pound that each of us is given here today is hope.

Oh how needy we are of hope to have some vision of the glory that lies at the end of the road and so today the Lord opens our eyes and we see the city of God waiting at the end of the journey. We eat this bread and we drink this wine body and blood of Jesus and we're getting a foretaste of the banquet hall of God at the end and our hope is renewed. We have reason to live something to go forward to now.

Tomorrow morning we wake up with something to live for but if when the service ends it's over we don't show it. I mean what we really need to do when the service ends is take the hope and share it. Give it to somebody else.

Be an encouragement. First with each other and all week long. People who just need some hope.

Nobody ever gives them any hope. Nobody ever gives them any encouragement. They just struggle on with long faces and dull hearts.

And here we come like a little ray of sunshine. We give them some hope sometimes in the form of a few dollars that they need. Sometimes in terms of a visit.

Sometimes a meal at our dinner table. Whatever it is we give them hope and as we do the hope we have increases and when we come back next week we get a double portion. But if we wrap the hope up in the napkin and we go back to our old ways here come those Christians hide the beer here come the hypocrites pull down the shades.

You know, so often we're a threat to people. Oh no, not again. Here they come.

They see us coming up to ring the doorbell and they hide in the kitchen until we're gone. If we go through our lives as wet blankets then the hope that we wrapped in the napkin shrivels and when we come back next week for another shot of it we're not in a position to receive because the measure you give is a measure you get back. And so very simply but something that really fits in every one of our lives the vision of the Lord that has for many of us become dull it's obviously become dull obvious by the way we're living and the way we speak and don't speak that vision will grow and increase in brilliance and in power as we give it away.

But if we take that vision and wrap it in a napkin when we open up the napkin it'll be so shriveled up it won't be good for anything. God help us to take the vision and grant that it may increase as we live by the ways of the kingdom the law of the kingdom and quit playing monopoly. And he said to them take heed what you hear the measure you give will be the measure you get and still more will be given you for to him who has will more be given and from him who has not even what he has will be taken away.