The Suffering No.9 Priority & Privilege

Okay, 2 Corinthians and chapter 9, and it continues on the theme of stewardship. I'm reading from an RSV to throw you all into abject confusion, so it will cause you to follow closely. Now it is superfluous for me to write to you about the offering for the saints, for I know your readiness, of which I boast about you to the people of Macedonia, saying that Achaia has been ready since last year, and your zeal has stirred up most of them.

But I am sending the brethren so that our boasting about you may not prove vain in this case, so that you may be ready as I said you would be, lest if some Macedonians come with me and find that you are not ready, we be humiliated to say nothing of you for being so confident. So I thought it necessary to urge the brethren to go on to you before me, and arrange in advance for this gift you have promised, so that it may be ready, not as an exaction, but as a willing gift. The point is this, he who sows sparingly will reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.

Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that you may always have enough of everything, and may provide in abundance for every good work as it is written, he scatters abroad, he gives to the poor, his righteousness endures forever. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your resources and increase the harvest of your righteousness or benevolence.

You will be enriched in every way for great generosity, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. For the rendering of this service not only supplies the wants of the saints, but also overflows in many thanksgivings to God. Under the test of this service, you will glorify God by your obedience in acknowledging the gospel of Christ, and by the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others.

While they long for you and pray for you because of your surpassing grace of God in you, thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Let the poor say, I am rich, because the Lord has done for us. And now let the weak say, I am strong. Let the poor say, I am rich, because the Lord has done for us.

I'd be glad if you'd have your Bibles open at 2 Corinthians in chapter 9. We're working our way through this book of Corinthians, and I guess it's a philosophy that we've been committed to at the tab now for many, many years, that is allowing scriptures to create its own agenda. I mean by that that if you make your way through a book, whether it's the Old Testament or the New Testament, or a selective passage of Scripture, and you minutely go through it, it does mean that you are bound to confront issues as the Holy Spirit wrote them into Scripture, as opposed to the preacher coming along and maybe ministering on themes that are dear to his heart, but perhaps not proclaiming the whole counsel of God. So we move into our study from the letter that Paul wrote to the Corinthians, and in one sense it's hooked into what we found in the previous chapter.

The eighth chapter for the Apostle is speaking about finance, our stewardship, how we cope with the whole challenge of handling our monies. Now before we can say anything in terms of the exposition of this chapter, I want to bring two controlling maxims to you, two controlling principles, because they will govern the whole of Paul's argument, and they should really govern the whole of your attitude to how you handle the finance that comes your way. On Corinthians in chapter 4 gives you the first proposition, which is as basic as you'll see to Paul's argument in this ninth chapter of 2 Corinthians.

On Corinthians chapter 4 and verse 7, For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have? This is the punchline. What do you have that you did not receive? In other words, the Apostle Paul is, by implication, stating the truth of the doxology. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

What do you have that you didn't receive? The technical word is contingent. We are all contingent, dependent, utterly reliant on our Maker. All that we have, all that we ever will be as a result of His benevolence.

The very breath that you breathe, the length of your life, the car that you drive, the job that you have, the pension that you draw, the friends that are yours, they are there whether you recognize it or not, as an expression, as a token of God's love, God's grace to you. What have you that you didn't receive? Bear that in mind. And then, what I call the second controlling principle in Paul's argument is tucked away right at the end of that ninth chapter of the second letter.

Thanks be to God for His blank gift and for the blank fill in, the word that describes something that is beyond human ability to comprehend. For the apostle has the gift of our Lord Jesus in mind. And how do you qualify that gift? So you see, you've got these two principles.

Everything you have comes from the Lord. And in terms of the best gift of all, He is the one who is the donor. And the gift is so great that human language, the most advanced computer, cannot evaluate, cannot describe it.

Now, if you fail to comprehend Paul here, you'll not understand him all the way through. In fact, I'll go so far as to say this. If you haven't begun to grasp this, then you're only at the paddling end, the shallow end of the Christian faith.

Now, with that in mind, let me give you a little bit more resume from last week for the benefit of folk who were not here. The apostle Paul, the most illustrious character, he was an itinerant minister. I mean by that, he rarely stayed.

Occasionally he did, but not very often in a place for very long. The most durable sojourn, so to speak, the longest stay was probably at Ephesus. He did spend 15 months or so at Corinth.

But he was such a busy man, he had to go from place to place, establishing churches. Now he moved in Gentile country, that is, lands away from the Holy Land. But he was a Jew.

And the apostle Paul, though he was peculiarly, it was almost a sense of the humor of God, this nationalistic Jew, although he was a Jew, he ministers amongst Gentiles, but he never forgets his Jewishness. I told you that George Whitefield was a great preacher in the 18th century. And one of the things that made life almost intolerable for him was the responsibilities that he felt for the orphanages that he had founded in Georgia.

Whenever he came to the United Kingdom and preached at some of those mass rallies that were there, when he took the remarkable step of moving into the open air and preaching the gospel, when he took an offering, it was always to send the money back to Georgia, to the kids in the orphanage. And similarly with the great Charles Spurgeon. He had these wonderful philanthropic projects in London at the turn of the last century, London almost destitute in terms of the poor classes, no one really caring a fig about them while Spurgeon did.

And he established his orphanages and his almshouses and what have you. And it was always a burden to Spurgeon that he had enough money to finance those projects. Now you see, I mention these things because it's a little overlap into the 18th century, into the 19th century of the Apostle Paul.

Here he is and he's moving around Galatia, he's moving around Macedonia, those places are meaningless to you. They're like the countries, if you want, of the Middle East and Europe in those days. And although Paul moves around, he never forgets the Jews and the mother church in Jerusalem, which has been hit by economic problems.

And the reason, well, I spelled them out for you. You didn't become a Christian in such an exclusive society as that and still keep your social and economic ties if you're a businessman and you became a Christian in Jerusalem, you cut your throat, business speaking. You cut any possibility of continuing as a businessman.

And so here is this church and it's getting poorer and poorer at the physical level simply because, well, they are Christians. And here was this church in Achaia where Corinth is found. And Paul had been there and he told them about the Christians in Jerusalem and the needs that they had.

And the Christians in Corinth said, well, we must do something about this. And the apostle Paul stimulated them to being generous. And then he left Corinth.

The whole project did not come to fruition by any means. It is a long way to go. But Paul has to move from Corinth to Macedonia.

And there in Macedonia, you remember, he's waiting for information about the Christians in Corinth and his brother Titus. His brother in the spirit, Titus, comes along and says, relax, Paul, it's okay. They're working things out in Corinth.

They've had your letter of correction and all is well. And Paul is relieved. Do you remember how he says that in the opening chapters of this second letter? How relieved he was at Macedonia when Titus came and brought him news of the situation in Corinth.

And now? Well, he intends to come back to Corinth. And in the first five verses, he delivers of this ninth chapter, he delivers what I've called, simply for the convenience of a peg to hang some thoughts on if you're taking notes, a prompt for the memory. I'm about to come back to Corinth.

There is no need, as the RSV gave it, as Peter read it. It is utterly superfluous for me to remind you of what? Well, of this philanthropic project of gathering together sufficient finances for the poor Christian people in Jerusalem. You see, when Paul had been commissioned to be an evangelist, Peter and James and John, you can read of it in the Acts of the Apostles.

They said, it's all right to go and preach the gospel to the Gentiles, but remember the poor. And when Paul reflects on that in Galatians, he said, I was zealous. I was glad to do that.

Remember these poor Christian Jews to whom the Gentile churches at the human level owed everything. There's no need for me, it's utterly superfluous, to remind you of this philanthropic project that you so eagerly responded to when I first dangled it in front of you. Indeed, he says in the second verse, I've been boasting about your generosity to the Macedonians.

You know, I would be less than honest, and I'm not wanting to be patronizing, to say that this church is known for its generosity and for the way it gets behind schemes and projects. And I'm glad about that. I'm glad I can honor the Lord by referring to the faithfulness of some of our people.

But the apostle is concerned that this flush of generosity, this immediate commitment to a project, shall be constantly borne in mind and brought to fruition. Now Paul is a diplomat, you see. To be a Christian, you don't have to be boorish.

You don't have to be an obnoxious person. Some people think that what they receive is persecution. Actually, for some folk, what they receive is almost what they deserve from the way they behave.

You see, you can courteously bring to the attention of Christian people their defects. You can give them a little nudge that makes a point without making them feel knee-high to a grasshopper. So here, says Paul, look, there are some men coming from Macedonia.

I have been boasting to them about you. And on the way to Jerusalem, we're coming through Corinth. Now, we're going to collect the monies that you started to collect.

Now, just in case you hadn't quite achieved the objective, I am sending on, verse 3, the brothers in order that are boasting about you in this matter should not prove hollow. In other words, when I got the Macedonians, having sort of praised you to the heavens, when they come, I don't want you to be embarrassed. So I'm sending some of the Corinthians back to remind you of what you said.

This isn't subtlety. This is diplomacy. This is being a Christian leader.

This is using tact and discernment, prompting the memory, prudence, if you like. There was the preparedness of purpose, as far as the Corinthians were concerned, when they heard about this project. But was there the preparedness of completion? So says the apostle, I thought it necessary to urge the brothers, verse 5, to visit you in advance and finish the arrangements for the generous gift you'd promised.

Then, when the Macedonian Christians come with me, it will be ready as a generous gift, not as one grudgingly given. You see the wisdom. You see the love.

You see the pastoral heart. I never got so mad with the BBC. I nearly put a brick through my television screen.

On one occasion, some trumped-up commentator on a religious program tried to make the apostle Paul out as being a sort of narrow bigot without any feeling whatsoever. A man who, when he's confronted with the possibility of leaving the beloved elders of the Ephesian church and never seeing them again, and finds as a result that they are crumpled in an emotional heap on the seashore of the Mediterranean Sea, as they say goodbye to Paul. He's not a bigot.

He's not narrow. He's large-hearted. He has partaken something of the dispositions of our beloved Lord.

And this is why we should handle, this is how we should handle such circumstances as these, as brothers, as leaders, reminding folk of, well, what I told you at the beginning, all that you have, it's from him. And compared with what he has done for you, there is nothing that you can do to repay. All you can do is to make a sort of response in terms of a token.

Lord, I give you this, not in any way to match your indescribable giving, not in any way as though I'm responsible for what I have, because all that I am is yours. Lord, I give you sacramentally a gift, my time, my life, my finance. And so Paul puts a prompt to the Christians, a prompt for the memory.

And then, if you like, from the 6th verse through to the 11th, there's a principle for life. Remember this, he says, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. Do you know that little word, niggardly? Not too sure what the origin of that word is, but it actually gets across what Paul is saying, niggardly.

When you think of a niggardly person. I mean, if someone came to you after the service and put their arm around you and said, you're a really niggardly person, you wouldn't feel particularly pleased, would you? I mean, you don't know what it meant, but it doesn't sound very nice. It means miserly.

It means always watching the small change. It means being stinted in the way that you deal with people. Remember this, says the apostle, setting down a principle for life.

Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. Whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Do you remember our beloved Lord? With the measure you meet, quoting the authorised version just to keep Len Bickerton happy, with the measure you meet, it will be measured out to you.

That remark was due because our dear brother Len brought us an excellent word from the AV, complementary to a word we'd already heard this morning at our first service, reading the beautiful language of the authorised version, the apostle Paul's prayer in Ephesians. The idea of you selecting the capacity of blessing by showing in your Christian disciplines of finance and investment of time the blessing that will come to you is quite incredible. Let me have another run at that in case you didn't understand.

Says the apostle, here is the principle. It's the principle of harvesting. When you sow generously as a sower, remember our Lord, a sower went forth to sow, and he's got a big basket by his side.

Can you really think of him saying, I'm only going to put one seed out at a time. I mean, he'd be there all night, wouldn't he, and the rest of the week. No, he takes a liberal amount and he casts it one side and he casts it on the other side.

Those of you who are into horticulture will appreciate by now just how ignorant I am of the subject. But you get the point. The farmer sows generously.

Now here is the principle in terms of the use of our time, the use of our finances. Whoever sows niggardly will reap niggardly. Whoever sows generously will also reap generously.

Because one of the attributes that I taught you last week of God is his incredible generosity. Not so? Look, I don't do this for effect. How many people here would honestly, not because you've been asked to do this from the pulpit, though I am asking you now, but as an honest response.

How many here would tell me that you have been amazed by the generosity and the faithfulness of God in your life? Would you raise your hands? Now, thank you, put them down. Those of you who are hearing this addressed by tape, the vast, vast majority of our congregation gave an assent. In other words, we have hundreds of people who are assenting to the fact that God has dealt generously with them.

So God asks us to deal generously with the things that we have that we can invest in his kingdom. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion. If you're stingy, if it's hurting you too much, then forget it.

God only loves an ecstatic giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you. You see, these Macedonians who'd given so generously to the cause in Jerusalem, they gave, well, because God had given them grace.

Look at verse 1 of chapter 8. Now, brothers, we want you to know about the grace that God has given the Macedonian churches. Now, God who gave grace to the Macedonians so they could help the churches in Jerusalem will also give grace to the Corinthians. God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things, at all times, you hear the repeat of the word, having all that you need, you will be able to abound in every good work.

You say, but I don't have a lavish sum of money. Look, the principle of Scripture is not so much quantity, though those who do have large resources ought to be asking why they have the resources and what they're going to do with them. It's quality.

Look, you say you have nothing? Here is our beloved Lord. He's in the temple, you remember? And He's in a little place where they can't see Him, but He can see them. And there's a woman who comes and she's a widow woman, she's got very little, but what she has got, she tumbles it out from her purse into the temple coffers and then come along and say, Our Lord, these men who are very well healed.

And there's a fanfare of trumpets as they throw in their hundreds of shackles. And our Lord says, I tell you, it wasn't the quantity that was registered in heaven, it was the quality. And the quality of the gift of this woman far outshines the theatrical giving of these businessmen.

There's a little lad, all right? He's got a mom, and she loves him, and he loves her. And one day, like moms do, school holidays, she gives him some sandwiches. And he sets off, he goes into the wilderness area, into the scrubland, to play perhaps with his mates.

With the curiosity of a little lad, he's intrigued by a large crowd of people who pass by. So nothing much generally happens of this sort of interest, so he hooks on to the crowd. And he starts to listen to a man teach, the like of which he, even as a little boy, has never heard anyone else teach before.

And he's there for hours. You know that I'm referring to the miracle in John chapter 6. The point comes in that afternoon when our Lord is told by his disciples, these people have been here for hours, they've got nothing to eat, and the day is well spent. Can we send them fainting away back to their huts? I use shorthand.

The little lad offers his sandwiches. There's not quantity, there is quality. What are these amongst so many? The input of the disciples, and Jesus has a little chuckle.

Haven't they learned yet that sincerely given, a little in his hand can become a lot? Were they not there during the time when water was changed into wine? Give it to me! And so he breaks, and he breaks, and he breaks, and you imagine the little boy's face. I wish I'd had a camera and been there. That would have been the shot of the century.

Ah, sandwiches! When I tell my mum about that back home, wow! I don't know whether she'd use mother's pride, but my, she certainly would have been proud of her son when she heard what had happened. Look, it's the principle of harvest. The acorn is given over to Mother Earth, and from the acorn comes the oak.

I only had one acorn. I planted it. Along came the oak, and with the oak there was the fruition.

There are more and more acorns. Not ones, not twos, but hundreds of acorns. And within, encapsulated within every acorn, there is the potentiality of an oak.

You see the point? It only needed one acorn for a forest. It only needs one qualitative gift placed in the hands of the sovereign God for him to bless and to bless and to bless again. We're not in the language of commerce in terms of the stock exchange.

We are dealing with a holy, omnipotent, infinite God who is blessed in his heart when people in Corinth and Macedonia are concerned about Christians in Jerusalem. He is blessed in his heart when people on the south coast of Worthing get their teeth into projects that will help the advance of the gospel out in the subcontinent of India or China or what have you. And it doesn't matter if it's a widow's mite.

It's not the quantity, it's the quality. But for some of us, it's the quantity and the quality. You see, there are those Christians who have been blessed in the most remarkable fashion.

Have you ever thought of writing your epitaph? You know, chiseling it into the stone. In the North Derbyshire where I come from, at least I come from South Yorkshire but the border is just a few miles from my home city. You see all the villages there and there's a tombstone in one of the villages and carved into the tombstone is the epitaph of a nurse, of a domestic from last century.

She'd obviously been a very, very committed and hardworking person with overbearing employees. And so she had chiseled in, don't mourn for me now. Don't mourn for me ever.

Don't mourn for me never. I'm going to do nothing forever and ever. Here is the epitaph plucked from Psalm 112 where we read earlier, of the man who has been singularly and significantly blessed by God with this world's possessions.

He has scattered abroad his gifts to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. God has his Josephs.

God has his Abrahams. God has the rich and he has the poor. And to the rich he gives a solemn charge.

Your riches and your ability to make money are honorable provided that you use the fruit of that. But in a fashion that honors me and the Apostle and our Lord Jesus from time to time, a fellowship with those who have been significantly successful in the realm of the business world. And far from pointing an accusatory finger of them and saying, you have bowed to mammon, they say, in effect, here is your opportunity.

To take the largesse of what you have, what has been entrusted to you in a way that it has not been entrusted to others, because perhaps you have the ability to control this lust that others have had for wealth. You have had the ability to be given this particular gift of successful business enterprise in terms of advancing the kingdom of God and being faithful in the finances that you handle. So the epitaph of the rich, God makes it possible for the scattering abroad his gifts to the poor so that the righteousness he has received as a grace gift from God shall last in effect forever.

Those, you see, in the 10th verse who recognize what the Apostle Paul has been arguing thus far will already have got to the principle of this 10th verse before they read it. He, 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 see, God deals faithfully with those who are faithful to him, enriching them in every way, spiritually.

I, and sometimes materially, though this verse gives no grist to the mill of those who preach the perversions of the prosperity gospel, all that our Lord says is that I will remain faithful. And if materially you have more than others, then recognize the source of your gifting is from me and you have even greater responsibilities. A prompt for the memory, a principle for life.

Finally, a praise for God. Look at the 12th verse through to the 15th verse. In the authorized version of the Bible, it does encourage you to live your life as a praise to the glory of God.

Now, says the Apostle, thinking in terms of this particular project of the Macedonian and the Achaean contribution towards the needs of people in Jerusalem. Although it will bless them, the more important factor is this, it will bless God. This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God's people, but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God.

Why? Because the Lord loves the ecstatic giver. Why? Because it is a reflection of what he is. He is the generous God.

He who lends to the poor, he who gives to the poor, lends to the Lord, says the book of Proverbs. You look into the Old Testament and you will see that time and time again, references made to the Jewish people to look after those who are leading them spiritually and to look after those who are impoverished in terms of this world's possessions. And the principle is applied in the New Testament.

In fact, it's not just applied, it's heightened. You see, here is our beloved Lord. What's his terminology? Well, he's the Son of God.

That means he's God's representative. He's also the Son of Man. Now, I cannot go all the way with that remarkable woman, Mother Teresa, who is indeed a very unusual character and we honor what she does in the streets of Calcutta.

I can't go all the way with her mystic theology, but I do believe that she is right when she states that God is on the side of the poor. That there is a sense in which our Lord identifies with the down and outs, with the offscourings of humanity. Therefore, says our beloved Lord, you take a cup of water and you give it to those without.

You take food and you bring it to those who are hungry. You visit the man, the woman who is in prison. Inasmuch as you have done it to one of those, you have done it to me.

Why? Because the hurt and the pain of the world I feel. And when you help to reduce this, then you are working in effect for my service and you are gladdening my heart. And when the world is confronted by such acts of philanthropy, they ask why.

Why is it that these people are so concerned? And the answer is they're concerned because, well, they've clung to the old rugged cross. They are the new believers. They are the new disciples.

They are part of this emerging, spectacular body of people. The Church, which one day will reduce the Roman Empire so that the Church will become the strongest organism that there is by the time of the third century. When men and women see the Church operating as the Church should operate, then praise and honor and glory goes to the God of the Church.

This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God's people, but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God. What did the Jews dislike? They couldn't stand Samaritans.

What did they dislike more than Samaritans? Gentiles. What did they say of Gentiles in our Lord's day? They are dogs. So our Lord tells the story of the good Samaritan, which won him no popularity, but significantly exposed the principle.

Now don't you see, here the Apostle Paul has the idea of the good Samaritan at the back of his mind. Only for Samaritan substitute the word Gentile, the good Gentile. These Jews in Jerusalem, they're afflicted.

They, in effect, are in great need. What do they require? They require help at the physical level. Who is going to supply the help? What a wonder.

The Gentiles. Gentile Christians supplying help for Jews at Jerusalem. This is ecumenicity as it ought to be.

This is the body of Christ functioning as it ought to function. This is the church being the church. Can you imagine, with jaws agape, the reception of these monies? Incidentally, the offering was successful.

Read Romans 15 and you'll discover that. Paul was given money by the Corinthians as well as by the Macedonians. The whole party of trustees, they got to Jerusalem and they gave the money.

Can you imagine the utter astonishment? Not just on part of the Jewish believers, but on part of the non-Christian community in Jerusalem. What is causing this? And the opportunities given for an explanation of the gospel were all one in Christ Jesus. Gentiles, though we be, we're sons of Abraham.

We have a like faith as Abraham has. This Lord Jesus has united the Jew and the Gentile. His is not to bring hostility between the camps, but to integrate them.

So that people realize there is only one body of Christ. There is only one people of God. Now, says the apostle to these Corinthians, to these Macedonians, work it out.

Not just theologically, but pragmatically. Show, by the way, that you respond to need. How you have embraced the truth of the gospel.

And, says Paul, you've got the greatest of all stimuli to do this. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift. Verse 14, in their prayers, these Jewish Christians, having received from you, they will pray for you.

And in the light of what God has done for you, can you do anything less? I come full circle. I'm more or less through. I started off with two principles.

All that you have, I repeat, all that you ever will be, is as a result of his grace. There is no way that you can out give him. There is no way that you can out match him.

You'd be a fool to try. But, my friends, there are opportunities for you to be remarkably generous. Ecstatically happy in being able to give towards the kingdom of God.

George Duncan, you remember that great old preacher from Keswick days, who's still around, though he must be into his eighties now. He once said that the church will be poised for revival when the vicar, minister, call the leader what you want, announces the offering, and they all jump up in the congregation and say, Hallelujah! Because there is an opportunity to give. In a moment or two, we're going to take an offering here.

And I repeat what I said last week. These messages are not contrived by me. The timing is chosen by the Holy Spirit.

We're going to take an offering, and I haven't preached this because I want more money in the offering. I do want you to examine the way that you control your finances. That I remain clear about and honest about, and it applies to me too.

You see, very often at the tab, and I'm not criticising it, after all, in one sense, I take the responsibility. We sometimes sort of lose the offering in terms of, well, the kids are in and we're singing a few choruses and so on and so forth. And we forget the tremendous honour that it is to be able to give to the cause of Christ.

So right now we're going to bow our heads in prayer for a moment. We're going to ask the Lord to work through some of the implications of what we've been sharing this week and last week. And then I want our organist and pianist just to play something appropriate.

And we will take an offering. And as we give, I want you to pray. I want you to pray for the men, the women who have the responsibility of handling huge finances that sometimes comes through the tab.

A cheque for £30,000 came my way just a few days ago. We have enormous responsibilities in various parts of the world, as well as here. What we're asking for is that you will pray that men and women who have the responsibility of administering finances will be given a charismatic gift by God to apply them properly.

And I want you to think not so much about what you're giving, but about what you're retaining. And how you will apply that in terms of your responsibilities at home, to your friends, and in relation also to what perhaps the Lord would have you to be doing. Making correctives as and when necessary.

Father, we remember the widow woman who fed the Prophet Elijah and gave all that she had, even at the risk of her poverty and the death of her son. We think of Sarah and Abraham who gave, but they gave out to the largeness of their hearts when men visited them and they were able to share. Lord, we're somewhere between the widow woman in the story of Elijah and Abraham.

And whatever position we find ourselves in financially, we want Lord to be honourable in the handling of our monies. But Lord, it's not just monies that you want, it's also time. Lord, some of us God forgivers, we spend more time watching the television than what we do in prayer.

More interest in the golf and cricket and football than what we are in, in the things of God. At least if we work out the time that we give to the former over against the latter. Help us to make a corrective.

And Lord, we do want to thank you for your indescribable gift, our beloved Lord Jesus. As the Congregation of Thinking People, we do recognize that all we have and all we ever will be is as a result of your grace towards us. Amen.

Sing a joyous praise, Christ the Lord In all the world forsake His wisdom, faith and power And in our only portion make A shield and shower Make a prince whose will be Is our gracious God And He will save us to the end Through Jesus' blood He by Hisself has sworn We are His own children He shall on eagles' wings Above to the clouds ascend We shall behold His face We shall His heart adore And sing the wonders of His grace Forevermore Triumph and glory Give thanks to God May Father, Son and Holy Ghost May evermind May Abraham's son and us Rejoin the heavenly race And celebrate in awe of God His endless grace Amen.