River Road Church Baptist

Dr. Cecil E. Sherman

July 13, 2003

“The Impulse to Give”

II Corinthians 8:1-15; 9:6-8

Just barely, I follow the lectionary.   This is a suggestive, textual guide to pastors throughout the church year.   I did not decide to speak to you about money today, it was thrust upon me, and I was pleased.   I think we need it.  

I was startled to see a little news item in Baptists Today that said in 2001, 8% of church people said that they were tithers.   That number had descended to 3% in 2003.   I can’t swear to the validity of the pole, but I suspect it has some accuracy.   This is a subject that needs to be addressed.   We’re between pastors; it’s a time when we can grow lax in our disciplines.  

I want to talk to you today about the impulse to give.   Now the background of the text is fairly straightforward.   Jerusalem Christians were in need; their need is described as extreme.   Paul was asked to go about the churches raising money for an offering for the Jerusalem church.   He did and some churches gave extraordinarily, generously.   The churches in Macedonia are sighted and that would be Filippi, Thessalonica, Berea, and perhaps others.   The offering had been brought to the attention of the Corinthian church a year before; that sighted in the 10 th verse.   They seemed eager to give when the subject came up, but something happened.   They did not follow through on their impulse to give.  

Our text is Paul’s second appeal; it consumes chapters 8 and 9 and is really a workbook for church fundraisers for all times.   It’s a remarkable passage, 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, only a portion of which were read to you today, because of the length.   I want to play with the idea of what makes us want to do a good thing and then not do it.   In one sense the subject is larger than giving.   How many of you have ever planned to write a thank-you note, put it off, and didn’t get it done?   Don’t answer that!   How many of you ever planned to find somebody who stood at a fork at the road and directed you a right and it really was a word fittingly spoken.   I’ve had that impulse, but not often enough have I followed through.   On and on, that kind of illustration could go.   You see, I begin believing that all of us intend to do the right thing.  

Now you may say, well you’re naïve.   No, this is a church crowd.   You’re good folks, except when you’re not.   It is rarely because you don’t know what to do.   You don’t learn much new from me.   Oh, perhaps a little detail about the text or something of that order, but I don’t really change your basic understanding of right and wrong very much, because it’s already in place and it’s already in pretty good shape.   You see, I think you really do intend to do the right thing, so what happens to the impulse to give?   You see, the road to hell is paved with good intentions is a Proverb you all know.   All of the good things you’ve intended to do, laid end to end, they reach from here to there.   What happens?   Now, I will not deal with all of this text, I’m going to deal with themes that are related to it, specifically about the impulse to give.   How does it break down?

Well, in the first instance, we plead circumstance.   Now, if you understood my situation, I really think you’d understand why I have not followed through on this, but I will to it when times get better.   That’s the kind of rationale we use.   When I went to be pastor of a church in Fort Worth, they had not had any kind of an improvement in their properties in almost 30 years.   Inner city church didn’t have one single space of off street parking.   Third and fourth floors of the religious education building were condemned by the Fort Worth Fire Department and given the pull of the people in that church, you know it was way past any kind of standard.   Did they need to do something?   Yeah.   I presented it and they all said, “You know we need to do something, but now is not a good time.   Fort Worth is in a recession.   Oil, real estate, banking; 1986, 1987, 1988, there was some truth in that.   Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas, were in kind of a little regional depression, and circumstance was to put this off.   My job was to get them to function, no matter.  

The illustration in the text is the Macedonian Christians.   The Macedonian Christians gave, though they were suffering a severe affliction, whatever that means, and they were in poverty.   And yet, they gave more than Paul ever expected them to give, making the case that people give out of here not there.   If you’ve got heart, you can find money.   It’s a matter of record.   Poor people give a right sizable percentage more of their little than prosperous people do of their much.   It’s here.   Any pushing back of giving to this church does not rest in circumstance.   This region, this community, and the 2,200 members of this church, have the capacity to do anything they set out to do.   It’s not circumstance, it’s not because when times get better; it’s in here.   It’s where it’s always been.

There’s a second idea in the text.   Our impulse to give breaks down because we don’t act promptly.   It had been a year since Paul introduced the idea of an offering, the idea was put on the shelf, and nothing was done.   He’s trying to take the idea off the shelf, pump it up again and make it go. Timing is pretty important when you’re trying to get something done.   When people are ready to move, get out of the way.   Let it happen right then.

Keith Parks came to First Baptist Church, Nashville, to make a plea the first week in December for a mission offering back in happier days.   He did a real good job.   There was a guy there, dead now, who had more money than most people.   He gave less money than most people.   When Keith got through, Jack said, “That really got to me.   I’m going to give $1,000 to that offering.”   I did something smart that night, I said, “Jack, why don’t you write the check right now?”   He sat down and moved his dinner plate over and wrote his check right then, I stuck it in my pocket.   If Jack had gone home and thought about it, believe me it would have been $100.   You say, “Well, you just sort of picked his pocket.”   Hey, that impulse that Jack had is as good as Jack ever was.   That’s my job.   I want you to hear that again.   That impulse is the best you.   That’s a photograph of that man at his very best.   Grab it right then!   Sometimes you rise, you lay aside your humanity, and you really do look like, act like, a child of God, and when that time happens, don’t go home and rationalize, you better jump.   That’s the best you!   When church gets you in touch with the best you, church has done you a service.

Third idea; distance connects us, or distance disconnects us.   Pardon me.   It’s a long way from Corinth to Jerusalem.   Paul had to make the case that need in Jerusalem was a cause to give in Corinth.   Given their capacity to travel or their want thereof, how many of you think had ever been to Jerusalem?   What’s their problem to do with me?   Now, I can disconnect, but any impulse I have to give will be enormously reduced.   But, I remember down in Franklin, Virginia, in 1999, when the town flooded, and the impulse to give all over Virginia was beautiful, and you followed through.   That’s because you saw those people as neighbors.   In September 2001, tragedy in New York City and Washington, and a whole lot of people you didn’t know had the capacity to give and gave generously.   You saw those people as neighbors, you didn’t disconnect; actually you connected!   They’re like us.   In fact, I saw more heart in that city than I’d ever seen as a tourist.   I liked what I saw.   They cared about each other and they stepped up.   If you can connect, you can give.   Now the idea in the Christian religion is, that beyond regionalism and tribalism and even beyond religion, there is a commonality, a unity.   God is the Father of us all.   They’re sisters and brothers.   This is true; it’s particularly a test for us right now, as pertains all people Muslim.   If we’re not really careful we’re going to say they’re different from us.   And when we say that, we deny one piece of our doctrine.

Last idea; we draw back from earthy motivations.   Suppose I said to you, “Do you know what the people down at Second Baptist Church gave to this offering?   Now why don’t you do as well?”   Some of you would say, “Shame on you, you shouldn’t use that as a motivation.”   What do you think Paul did?   Corinthians, I want to tell you what the folks up north did.   In Filippi and in Thessalonica, and Berea and I don’t want you to look like cheapskates.   Come on!   Give like they did!   Oh, you shouldn’t do that, that’s tacky!   You know why you need to talk like that?   Because, some of your giving is tacky.   Interims can get away with stuff like this.   That didn’t bother Paul.   Paul said, “Compare yourself to them.”   You say, “Oh, for goodness sake; good manners!”   Good manners?!   What about good church?   Paul’s the guy who said, “Now, you’ve never seen Jesus, but you’ve seen me.”   Okay, do it like I do it. That takes some stuff.

I recall the first time we had a three-year giving campaign in a church where I was the pastor.   We were going to have a three-year hard push to raise money.   A guy flew in, he’s the consultant; he flew in and said he wanted to have lunch with Dot and me.   We took him to lunch on a January day and he said, “Okay, there are two things you’ve got to get straight.   Number one, if you try to be squirrley about this offering, if you try to go cheap, there’s not anything I can do to make a success of it.”   I said, “You got any more good news?”   I mean he just set the whole thing right down on me.   He said, “The second thing, you’ve got to stand up in the pulpit and tell those people what you’re giving.”   I said, “I don’t take off my clothes in public.”   He said, “Well, you will this time.”   That stunned me.   There came a Sunday when Dot and I, big church, 11:00 a.m., Sunday morning, stood up and told them what we were going to give.   The president of a local reality company went out the door that day and you’ll pardon the earthiness of his comment.   After Dot and I had witnessed our pledge he said, “Damn.   Didn’t figure you for that much.   I’ve got to home and rethink what I’m going to give.”   I want to tell you, the God’s truth.   Dot and I gave $25,000 to that offering and that guy and his wife gave $26,000.   If I could have given $100,000, he would have given $101,000, if it would have broken him.  

Why did I tell you this?   Because that’s the way people are.   We’re unwilling to be reasonable.   We kind of slip into a silly Pollyanna world.   You say, “Well, I don’t want anybody to give until they want to.”   Okay, why don’t you take that reasoning with your 10-year-old child going to school?   Do you think he’s eaten up with hunger to learn?   No, you send him to school and hope he catches on.   What do you do about your child brushing your teeth?   Well, I don’t make my child brush their teeth.   If you don’t, their mouth will smell like the bottom of a birdcage.   You better do something about that.   You make the child do the right thing until they want to do the right thing. This is the truth and this is the truth we mask at church behind all kinds of words.   The effect is we become beggars when there is a world of plenty about us.   The things we profess to love, we play with. Why do people break down?   Because, they don’t deal with motivation at the level where we are.  

Now, is this the sum of the text?   Not at all.   There’s much more in that text.   I told you, it’s a gold mine for a pastor who wants to lead a church to give.   But, this dealt with the impulse to give.   I believe that you know the right thing and your best self wants to do the right thing and you talk yourself out of it.   When church works it amends conduct.   I want you to do what the best part of you already wants to do.   You know what’s right and good and the work of this place is to get you from knowing it, to doing it.

CES; Lisa King, mt