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1 Timothy 6:6-19
6 Of
course, there is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; 7 for we brought nothing into the world, so
that[a] we can take nothing out of it; 8 but if we have food and clothing, we will
be content with these. 9 But
those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many
senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all
kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from
the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.
11 But
as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith,
love, endurance, gentleness. 12 Fight
the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life, to which you were
called and for which you made[b] the good confession in the presence of many
witnesses. 13 In the presence
of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony
before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you 14 to keep the commandment without spot or
blame until the manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 which he will bring about at the right
time—he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of
lords. 16 It is he alone who
has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen
or can see; to him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
17 As
for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or
to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly
provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18 They are to do good, to be rich in good
works, generous, and ready to share, 19 thus
storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so
that they may take hold of the life that really is life.
(The
pastor takes a bag of rice, and carefully counts out ten measures of the rice
placing each measure into a pot.)
I bet you would like to know why I
just poured ten measures of rice into this bowl.
Well, I’ll tell you.
Later.
Right now I’ve got some news to
share with you.
I’m going to Hawaii!
I don’t know when! But “someday.”
It may be ten years from now. Or it may be next year. All I really know for sure is that I’m NOT
going this year. Sad but true. Right now, I don’t have the time to go. I don’t have the money. There are all sorts of reasons why I can’t go
this year.
But someday!!!
Someday I am definitely going to Hawaii – as soon as I
get the time. As soon as I get the
money!
And if it works out, I hope I can
afford to take my wife with me!
Now I know you have a wish list of
things like that you want to do in your life.
There are places you want to go.
There are things you want to do.
What happens when the things we put
off in our lives are the things God wants us to do?
Have you ever had that
experience? I bet you have. God is calling you to do something and your
response is to say, “I’ll be glad to do that, Lord. Later.”
We must learn to do that as
children.
Mom or Dad told us to clean our room,
“Later.”
Mom told us to brush our teeth. “Later.”
Dad told us to cut the grass. “Later.”
The teacher told us to do our term
paper. “Later.”
God tells us to love others. “Later.”
How many things has God told us to
do that we keep putting off?
Well – most of us aren’t
there yet. Maybe someday. But not today.
Today we are in our
discontent. Today we have food and
clothing, but we have to have more. And
more and more!
But someday, later, we
will be content with what we have.
We also read in today’s
lesson that we are not to trust in money, but in God.
Well, someday. Maybe later we will put our trust in God, but
not now. Now we want more money because
we look at money as a means of success and security.
We also read in today’s
lesson that we are “to do good, to be rich in
good works, generous, and ready to share.”
Well, someday. Maybe later when we have more money, then we
can begin to be generous.
Let me ask you a question.
How rich are you right now?
Are you rich, poor or in the middle?
Think of a guage - like a gas gauge that you might have in your car. But this gauge represents your economy. Not the nation’s economy, but yours. Where are you in this gauge? Rich, poor or in the middle?
Most of us would say, “We’re in the middle.” Very few of us would admit to being poor
because we know others who have less than we have, so we don’t see ourselves as
poor. On the other hand, few of us would
say we are rich, because we’re not in the same league as Buffet, Trump or other
billionaires.
But just to be sure, raise your hand if you think you
are on the rich end of this guage.
I didn’t think anyone would raise a hand for this one
– because you are too smart to admit you are among the richest people in the
world – especially when you are about to ask to fill out a pledge card.
Imagine your gauge puts you at 13%.
Imagine!
Wouldn’t that be so cool to be among the 13% richest people in the
entire world.
In fact someone in this congregation may be among the
13% richest people in the entire world.
Now I would think that if you are in the richest 13%
of the world, then you are in a small club and you are probably doing pretty
well for yourself.
In a world of 6 billion people – in order to be among
the richest 13% how much money do you have to make every year?
A billion?
Nope.
Half a million?
Nope.
A hundred thousand?
Nope.
You have to make $11,490 per year.
That figure, by the way, is how the US Government
defines relative poverty in this country for a household of one person. In a family of 4 people, the poverty level is
$23,000.
Think about that.
If you are in poverty in this country, you are still among the top 13%
richest people in this world.
I’ll tell you where I am. I’m a preacher. I’m in a job in which everyone not only sees
my salary, but even the middle and high school kids get to vote on it. Anyone who is an active member has a
vote. And my wife is a public school
teacher. Two professions not own for
making a lot of money.
Take either me or my wife and look at what we make per
year – and we are in the top 1% of the richest people in the world.
This is easy to find.
In the bulletin and on the screen at the end of this sermon, there is a
link you can go to on the Internet.
Globalrichlist.com. You go there and enter your annual income – or you
can do it with your net worth. There
will find how you stand with the rest of the world.
I suspect almost every single person in this room is
among the 1% - maybe 2% - of the richest in the entire world.
We have so much.
And yet, when it comes to being content with what we
have, we keep saying – later. When I
have even more, then I will become content.
And when it comes to being generous, we keep saying –
later.
When I have more, I’ll give more.
I’ll give to missions.
I’ll support youth ministry. I’ll
give to the poor. Later.
OK, are you wondering what this pot of rice is all
about?
I brought it to illustrate a story about one of my
experiences in India.
I went to India on a mission trip a few years
ago. I visited a number of schools. I visited a number of churches.
In this one neighborhood where I went to preach at a
church all of the homes were nothing more than tents. The tents were made of moldy, rotting
cloth. Everything was jammed together. There was hardly any room to walk between the
tents. There was no water system, no
well. People drank water that was
running along the gutters of the streets.
And in the midst of this slum was a little church.
It was nothing more than a concrete block
building. Four walls with a
doorway. The roof was nothing more than
some metal sheeting laid on the top of the building.
It measured about 10 feet wide and 20 feet long.
You could have moved that church and
put it into the narthex area of our church and still had room on each side.
Inside there were 30 people. They were all crammed together, sitting on
the floor and they gave me a chair to sit in at the front of the church. If I had crossed my legs I would have knocked
out three people on the front row.
We did everything Christians do in worship.
We sang.
We prayed.
I preached with an interpreter.
And there was an offering.
I’ve seen poverty.
I’ve been to third world countries.
I’ve worked in Haiti.
And in Haiti, the poverty is universal. But here – the poverty was so deep. These were the poorest people I’d ever met.
Here in America, poverty is defined as
earning $11,490 per year in a family of one.
In this country, 96.1 percent of American
households living in relative poverty have a television to watch, and 83.2
percent of them have a video-recording device in case they cannot get home in
time to watch the football game or their favorite television show and they want
to record it for watching later.
You know how they define poverty in India? I was told that the definition of poverty is
to have less than a full meal per day.
And there are these people gathered in this tiny
little church.
And when it was time for the offering, every single
person gave.
They gave eagerly.
They reached and strained to put their single coin
into the offering.
One lady had no money.
She gave a single, tiny bag of rice.
After the service, I asked what they used the offering
for.
Part of it was to pay the pastor’s salary, which was
not much.
Part of it was to buy Bibles for the church.
Part of it was to go to Missions. Imagine that!
Missions!
They can’t feed themselves, but they are giving to
missions.
And then part of it goes to feed the poor.
Feed the poor?
I can’t imagine that there are people more impoverished than these
folks!
And then I asked about the lady who gave the bag of
rice.
I was told she never had any money to give. But IF she had food to eat during the day,
she would carefully measure out the food and set some of it aside.
Every day – IF she had food to eat, part of it was set
aside for the offering. A tenth of
it. A tithe.
And on Sunday, when she came to church. She would bring her bag of rice as an
offering – so it could be used to feed the poor.
Imagine doing that on Monday, and Tuesday, and
Wednesday, and on up to Friday.
And imagine not having any food at all on Saturday.
Church is tomorrow, but there on the table is the rice
you’ve set aside every day. It would be
tempting to reach into the bag and cook that rice. Skip church. Or go to church and skip the offering.
But no, she never did that.
The pastor told me she always brought the bag of rice.
And here we are.
The poorest among us is still among the world’s richest – and yet we
keep saying “later.”
Our New Testament lesson tells us, “There is great gain in godliness combined with contentment.”
But we say, “we’ll be content
later. When we have enough.”
Our New Testament lesson
tells us, “if
we have food and clothing, we will be content with these.”
But we say, “Later.”
Our New Testament lesson
tells us, “As
for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or
to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly
provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be
rich in good works, generous, and ready to share.”
But we say, “Later. When we have more, when we have enough, then
we will become generous.”
You know, I kept thinking about that woman. I kept wondering when we, here in America, will
be as wealthy as that woman. When will
we have enough so that we can be as generous as she?
Copyright 2013, The Rev. Dr. Maynard Pittendreigh
All rights reserved.
Sermons are available online and can be found by
visiting www.Pittendreigh.com
