Giving What God Is Due

Sermon by Rev. Laurel Bobb

  A woman had a business that she franchised out to others. They were to carry on the business in the way she had always done, and they were to give her 10% of the profits they had made, plus reinvest some of their portion into growing the business.

The woman went out of the country for an extended period of time, but she sent her aides to check on how things were going and collect the portion of the profits that were due her. They sent the aid back with a message that she’d never get anything from them, since business had been bad and profits were down, and they really couldn’t afford to give her anything. Besides, they were the ones doing the actual work, so they didn’t think they should have to give her anything.

The woman then decided to send another stronger, more convincing aide, but again the franchisers would not give the woman her fair share. She thought, "This will never do; the business I began and made a name of--they reap the benefits of my hard work. I will receive my portion." She decided to send her child, Terry. After all Terry would one day inherit the business and must learn how to deal with people.

Terry went to the franchisers and asked for the woman’s portion. They treated Terry dreadfully and even put out a successful contract on the woman’s heir. Over in England the woman became aware of what had happened. What should she do to those franchisers?

If you said she should have them arrested & sent to prison, or the electric chair, your answer would be very similar to the answer the chief priests and Pharisees gave to the question about the parable Jesus put before them. They pronounced judgment upon the workers.

If you will we are also franchisers. The difference is we didn’t pay anything for the privilege. In fact we have done nothing to earn this privilege. God chose us in grace. Everything we have is all gift. We are privileged in being called by God into his kingdom to share in its riches.

God does want a return on his investment. He wants our hearts and lives. The problem in our story and in the parable Jesus told is that the workers were afraid, they were unwilling to risk, and they were greedy. Aren’t we often each of those things? We think to ourselves, "How can I afford to tithe, let alone go beyond a tithe?" We worry we won’t have enough to take care of our families, although for most of us that fear is unrealistic. When it comes right down to it most peoples’ problems are that they won’t have those things they’d like to have rather than not being able to provide for their family’s needs. We also don’t want to risk investing in the kingdom because we wonder, "What if we give so much and it doesn’t bring in new members?"

But God wants us to risk for the sake of the kingdom because risking our treasures will bring our hearts closer to where we really want to be--closer to God. We will be forced to rely more on God and his provision. God doesn’t really need our money, but God knows we need to give it. We need to give it to show how we value him.

In our parable and our modern-day story the people didn’t want to give the owners what was rightfully theirs. They wanted to usurp the owners property and authority. It’s the same problem humanity has had since the beginning of time. What did the serpent in the garden of Eden say to Eve to tempt her to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? He said, "God knows that in the day you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

We all want to be our own little gods. Unfortunately we aren’t cut out for it. We’d go crazy with the responsibility, so God works with us a little at a time, inviting us to return the portion of our blessings that is due him. Little by little, he calls us to draw closer and closer and give away more and more of our earthly treasures to receive much more in heavenly ones.

Those treasures include participation in the work of the kingdom. God expects us to till and keep the vineyards in which he has placed us. We will have to give an accounting of the fruit that we harvested, and what we have done with the land. Have we tilled it so it would yield a greater harvest? Have we pulled the weeds and kept the plot fertilized? Have we sown more seed?

God asks us to empty our hands so we can be free to accept the gifts he wants to give us. We don’t deserve these gifts, but God wants to give them to us anyhow. He wants to give us his peace and joy, which is difficult to grasp when we are clinging to all those things that the world tells us we should be reaching for. He knows what we really need isn’t all that stuff, but him.

The chief priests and Pharisees in our parable were asked what they thought the owner would do to the untrustworthy tenants. In placing judgment on the workers in the parable they also pronounced judgment upon themselves. Notice Jesus didn’t even say that that indeed was what the landowner would do. In fact the climax of the parable comes when they kill the son, and the son becomes the cornerstone. The result of their terrible deed brought tremendous grace.

Jesus gave his life even for those who wanted to kill him. Granted those people are still free to reject his offer of grace, as are we, but that didn’t stop him from dying for them. Christ died for the love of untrustworthy people, of people who will not give his Father his due. He keeps on extending the offer to get with the program and divest ourselves of those things which really don’t belong to us anyhow, so that we can hold onto the things of true value. He loves his vineyards and wants them to be exceedingly fruitful. He wants his workers to help bring in that harvest. The harvest is made of souls in the kingdom. This harvest is precious to God. You are precious to God. But there are others who haven’t been brought into the harvest yet. There is work that remains to be done.

Christ now entrusts to us the work of spreading the good news of the kingdom. God would like some return on his investment or at least a show of gratitude. How willingly do we give him a return on his investment? How well are we managing his property?

Do we give 10%, 5%, or the typical American 2% of our incomes? Some of us give nothing, and some of us give far more. With this new building program some are being asked to stretch as much as to double what they are now giving. Is that a possibility for you? Would it really be asking too much? Since God owns it all anyway, it really isn’t asking more than his due.

What does God want us to do with these facilities with which he has blessed us? Does he want us to hoard them and let them get run down, or would he rather we expand our ministry and outreach into the community so that more souls can come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ? Does God want youth to have a safe place to come and bring the struggles and questions of life? Does God want there to be an inviting place for study and spiritual growth? Does God want somewhere the community can be invited to come in a non-threatening atmosphere to learn that church people aren’t as weird as they thought? Does God want us to expand our children’s ministry to include day care or preschool? Does God want us to reach out to seniors and provide adult day care? Does God want us to open our building to other comunity groups, or expand our scouting program or open a soup kitchen?

I believe God wants us to have and be all of those things. God wants us to dream big dreams for the kingdom. God doesn’t want us so much to ask why we should think about doing these things, as to ask the question, ‘Why can we not do these things?’ This is the return on his investment he desires. If we are unworthy stewards, we may find ourselves on the other side of the protecting wall.

The good news is we can always come back. God sent his Son to die for us and raised him so that we would see that all that he said and did was true. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes. In gratitude, then, we should show how much we value him by giving him a return on the investment he made in us through our giving of our time, our talents, and our money, trusting him to meet all our own needs and knowing that he will reward us for being faithful.