Free to Serve

Hammett On Work I

A few weeks ago I got the chance to hear a short lecture on a biblical theology of work from professor John Hammett of Southeastern Seminary. He broke an approach to work into four parts: 1) Work as created and intended by God. 2) Work as distorted by the Fall. 3) Work as transformed by redemption in Christ. 4) Work and the consummation (referring to the new heavens and the new earth).

Here is a summary of his first point: work as created and intended by God.

    A. Work is something given to us before the fall (Gen. 1:28). Since it was given by God and existed in a world that God called good, work is essentially good.

    B. Work is more than what we are paid to do. So a mother taking care of her kids is working in the biblical sense. A retired person still has work to do. 

    C. Work includes the "cultural mandate." This is the directive given by God to fill and subdue the earth. That includes making the most of the world we live in. It means investing ourselves in science, art, agriculture, etc. All of this is "culture" and God gave us a "mandate" to work with it and, in a fallen world, to improve it.

    D. Work specifically includes creation care, both harnessing the resources of creation (Gen. 1:28) and caring for creation (Gen. 2:15). So part of being a steward is wisely using versus abusing the world we live in. I recently saw an interesting movie called Temple Grandin about an autistic woman who used her gift to design a more human system to prepare cows to be slaughtered. This seems to be a good example of creation care.

Sandy Springs and Wealth

Mount Vernon Baptist Church is located on Mount Vernon Highway just a couple miles from the heart of Sandy Springs. Sandy Springs is north of Atlanta and, up until 2005, Sandy Springs was Atlanta! 

A study that came out last month indicated that Sandy Springs is the ninth most affluent city in the country. I noticed there were some big houses around here. That explains it!

What is a pastor in Sandy Springs supposed to do with this kind of news? Here are my thoughts:

(1) Keep preaching the gospel. It is a sin to discriminate the rich as surely as it is a sin to discriminate against the poor. We all need the gospel. Sin is an equal opportunity employer. The primary mission of the church is to preach and pray. That is what we do and what, by God's grace, we will continue to do.

(2) Remember that the church is more than Sandy Springs. I certainly want us to target Sandy Springs with the gospel. I want us to be a source of light and hope to the community in which we live. Nonetheless, Mount Vernon is part of the greater Atlanta community. This means we draw people from beyond Sandy Springs. We need to remember that. Sandy Springs is our home and we are grateful for it, but not everyone who comes to church is from this affluent city.

(3) Know that not everyone in Sandy Springs is affluent. There is large immigrant community here. Most of the residents of Sandy Springs are simply middle-class Americans going about their daily business. We have many wealthy residents but we have many who are not. Most of our church is not wealthy. The average rarely the norm.

(4) Know what our idols are. Most everyone struggles with love of money. Simply driving past beautiful homes can stir ungodly thoughts up in our hearts. Out Mount Vernon, we should be aware of this and fight against it.

(5) Keep studying the Bible. A few weeks after this report came out, our Wednesday night Bible study group found itself in James 5:1-6 where James has some harsh words for those who are living in luxury and self-indulgence. God's timing is perfect. We are presently reflecting on our own hearts and how we can look for signs that we, too, love money in ways that don't please God.

Statistics or not, we live in a wealthy country and we will, one day, be held to account for how we used every cent the Lord has allowed us to possess. This is a sobering thought and a call for wisdom so that we can serve and give generously.

Money Matters

At MVBC we started the month of December by laying out several financial goals for us a church:

    1. Continued stewardship of existing resources.

    2. Sacrificial giving from every MVBC member.

    3. Meet or exceed our December giving goal.

    4. Giving that meets our weekly budget.

    5. Foundations debt paid off.

Goal number three is only one of many goals, but is very important because a big chunk of our tithes and offerings are received in December. What a joy to be able to announce that we have exceeded this goal! I thank God for the generosity of this local body of Christ. Please join me in praying that we would continue to give generously and cheerfully.

It can be difficult to talk about money in the church. We tend to separate the sacred (Scripture, church, praying) from the secular (sports, money, work, leisure). Scripture doesn't do that, though. Passage after passage yells out that our heart and and our wallets are connected. This is why Jesus commended that widow, isn't it? When the rich gave so much, the widow was commended for giving everything: "They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything--all she had to live on." 

Yes, we need to be prudent, we must be prudent. We should be like the ants, those "creatures of little strength who store up their food in the summer" (Prov. 30:25). But there should also be generosity, radical generosity, that stretches us so that it is obvious to our own conscience and to the world around us that we are dependent upon the Lord. 

I've seen this kind of radical generosity at MVBC and I pray it continues. There is a very helpful book that explores more deeply the connection between money and the heart, dollars and our destiny: Money, Possession, and Eternity by Randy Alcorn. Randy is rightly convinced that we cannot follow Jesus with addressing our "stuff":

To understand the truth about money and possessions, to understand life at all, we simply must understand the true nature of earth and heaven. We must clearly behold these two kingdoms with their two kings, two citizenries, and two treasuries. If we don't see this we are destined, at best, to a superficial or even token religious experience. If we do see, the door is unlocked to the exhilirating realm of Christian discipleship, where 'following Christ' is not a comforting but meaningless buzzword, but an electrifying, life-changing reality" (26).

This is what we are working for at Mount Vernon. The "electrifying, life-changing reality" of following Christ. By God's grace, we are on the way!

Reformation in Giving III

"Why give to the local church?" Some may decide that they are going to give 20% of their income to "ministry." Maybe they support a friend who works for Navigators. Then there's that missionary family that visited years ago that they now support monthly. Then there's the local pregnancy center that is doing great work and needs an annual gift. Then there's the high school student going on her first missions trip. Isn't that a worthy investment in the Kingdom? So, when all is said and done, an individual may give 15 percent of his income to these worthy causes and the final 5 percent to the work of the church. How should we think about the responsibility to give in light of the options we have?

Reformation in Giving II

When my wife and I were first married, we sat down to work on a budget and the issue of tithing to the church came up. We both had jobs, but even our combined salary wasn't anything impressive. When I sat there looking at our finances, I wasn't asking, "Now how much can we give away?" Instead, I was asking, "How much do we have to give." Both of us agreed that a tithe was an appropriate amount to give to our local church. But we weren't sure if that should be a tithe of our gross (pre-tax) income or our net (after-tax) income.

Of course, my goal was to keep all I could. So, seeing no specific scriptural commandment on the issue I suggested we tithe on the net. My wife's inclination was to give all we could, so she suggested we tithe on our gross income. Not wanting to seem morally or spiritually inferior I quickly agreed that was a good idea. 

Reformation in Giving I

There have been many conversations about finances at Mount Vernon as we seek to meet our budget. Times are tough. My desire through it all is to focus our attention on the need for sacrificial giving from every member. We will not all give the same amount, but if each gives sacrificially, regardless of the economic climate, our budget will be full to overflowing. 

This kind of change can't happen overnight. Let's say a family has been living off of 98% of its income for twenty years. How, all of a sudden, is that family going to give 8% more to the church--at least overnight? In our personal budgets, it is amazing how quickly expenses that were once considered discretionary now seem fixed. That's why the church needs a reformation in her attitude toward giving. We want to be a congregation full of Christians who give generously, cheerfully, and sacrificially. 

This raises some important questions. First, what does Scripture say about how much of my income I should give away to "the Lord's work"? Second, what does Scripture say about how much of what I give away should be given to the local church? These are important questions.

Let's begin with how much of my money I should give away to "the Lord's work."