Will you please turn to 1 Corinthians 16? Just the first two verses:
Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the assemblies of Galatia, so do ye also.
Upon the first day of the week let each one of you lay by him in store, as he may prosper, that no collections be made when I come.
And will you please turn to 2 Corinthians 8, verse 9:
For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might become rich.
I repeat it:
For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might become rich.
And then 2 Corinthians 9, verse 7:
Let each man do according as he hath purposed in his heart: not grudgingly, or of necessity; for God loveth a cheerful giver.
Let us have a word of prayer.
Indeed, dear Lord, we are standing on holy ground. This is where Your presence is, and we are, by Thy grace, in Thy presence.
Teach us how to approach Thee with humility, and yet with faith. We do pray that the light of Thy countenance will shine upon each one of us.
Search us, O Lord, and teach us how to walk in the way that is pleasing to Thy heart. We want to honor Thee; we want to glorify Thee; and we want Thee to be glorified in us.
We ask in Thy precious name. Amen.
We have been considering together 1 Corinthians for quite some time. We mentioned that the Corinthian church had lots of problems. The reason is because, even though they were saved by the grace of the Lord Jesus, yet they continued to live in their own flesh.
It is their carnality that is the biggest problem. Why is it that carnality is the biggest problem? Because it is the very opposite of our calling.
So 1 Corinthians begins with a wonderful, glorious calling. God is faithful. He has called us into the fellowship of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
In other words, what God the Father and God the Son have shared equally, together, unselfishly, fully, and completely with each other in the Spirit from eternity, that fellowship has now been extended to us believers.
We are being included in the richness and fullness of the fellowship of the Father and of the Son. Now, just think of that. What a calling that is.
And carnality is the greatest reason why this fellowship is not full.
So we find in 1 Corinthians that, even though this church is full of problems, yet the apostle Paul took a positive approach. In other words, he is trying to show us what that fellowship is, that we may be delivered from everything that is so low, so contradictory, so unholy, and so displeasing to God.
As we have said before, when you come to the end of chapter 14, to me it always feels like that is the end of the letter, because Paul said that everything should be done decently and in order.
If everything among God’s people can be done decently, beautifully, harmoniously, peacefully, with one accord, with one spirit, with one mind—even though it was a speech—and there is a divine order among them, what more can you say?
But then we find that there are two more chapters following. One chapter we mentioned last time: it is on this matter of resurrection.
Among the Corinthian believers, there were some who did not believe in resurrection. And if anyone did not believe in resurrection, it was a direct attack on the very meaning of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
So Paul reiterated what the gospel is: Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; He was buried; and He was raised from the dead according to the Scriptures. He appeared to a number of people to show that He is living.
And because He lives, so we live also. And that is very important.
From there, we fellowshiped together on this matter of false teachings. Throughout church history, we find that false teaching is always there. As we said before, wherever there is truth, there is falsehood; or, you can even put it another way: when there is falsehood, there must be truth somewhere.
It is very, very important for God’s people, especially in these last days, that we be vigilant and watchful; that we be faithful to the Word of God and faithful to the Spirit of God, Who will explain His Word to us.
Furthermore, we need the protection of the body of Christ. That is fellowship—the blessing of fellowship.
Now, after chapter 15, you would think that 1 Corinthians should end. But strangely, you find Paul mentioning another thing, and it is a matter of collection.
Now, I do not personally believe that the Corinthian church asked Paul about that question, even though the Bible says, “Now concerning the collection.” It was not something that the Corinthian church asked Paul about.
Why? Because we find that, due to their carnality, even though they responded when Paul mentioned this in their midst at the beginning, they did not fulfill it. So Paul here tried to mention this matter of collection again.
Now we know that this was something always in the heart of Paul. Paul always had in his heart the poor, because this is the Spirit of Christ.
You remember what is said of our Lord Jesus in Isaiah 61:1:
The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me;
Because He hath anointed Me to preach good tidings unto the meek.
The fulfillment of it is found in Luke 4. At the beginning of our Lord’s ministry in Galilee, He went into the synagogue in Nazareth. They gave Him the book of Isaiah, and He found the place—that is, Isaiah 61—and He read it.
He said:
The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,
Because He anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor.
So, in other words, you find that it is the very Spirit of Christ: He always remembers the poor. And a servant of the Lord, Paul, had the same burden in his heart.
You remember in Acts 15, after that Jerusalem Council, the three pillars of the church in Jerusalem—James, Peter, and John—gave their right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and Paul.
They said to Barnabas and Paul, “We go to the Jewish nation, and you go to the uncircumcised, to the nations; but always remember the poor.”
Paul said that this was something he was always diligent to do. That is in Galatians 2. So you find that in Paul’s heart there was always the poor—he remembered them.
If you read the book of Acts, in the beginning of church history, you find in the church in Antioch, in Acts 11, that a prophet came down from Jerusalem. His name was Agabus.
He prophesied that there would be a great famine over the whole habitable world, and it happened in the time of Claudius.
And you know what the church in Antioch did? They gathered relief and sent it to Jerusalem by the hands of Barnabas and Paul.
So you find that later, wherever Paul went on his missionary journeys, he always tried to help God’s people, especially the Gentiles, to think of the poor in Jerusalem and Judea.
He did that in Galatia, and he did that in Achaia, and he did that in Macedonia. So here he mentioned this matter of collection.
At that time, the believers in Jerusalem and in the Judean country seemed to be in poverty, while the churches in the Gentile world seemed to be more prosperous.
Paul always reminded those believers everywhere, “Remember the poor,” and he took collections.
Evidently, when he was first in Corinth, he mentioned this matter to the believers. In their first love and in their zeal, they promised that they would do it.
But unfortunately, because they continued to live in their own flesh, they very soon forgot it. That is the reason why, towards the end of 1 Corinthians, Paul had to remind them about this matter of collection.
He even suggested to them a systematic way of giving. That was to help people who did not have the habit of doing it, or who intended to do it but tended to forget.
“On every first day of the week”—that is the day when God’s people meet—“you lay aside at your home a part of that with which the Lord has prospered you, so that when I come, I do not need to collect it.”
That is what you find in 1 Corinthians 16.
Now, did the Corinthian believers respond? Not at all. Even after he reminded them of the collection they had promised, they did not do it.
Not only did they not do it, but when you read 2 Corinthians 11, you find that there were some false apostles, wicked workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Jesus Christ.
They enticed the Corinthian believers away from Paul, from Christ, and unto themselves. So, in other words, they not only did not listen to Paul, but many among them began to despise Paul and reject Paul.
You remember how Paul wrote a strong letter to them. Then he sent Titus to them, and through the ministry of Titus, thank God, they repented. They repented according to God.
Eventually, you find in 2 Corinthians that he was able to share with them this matter of Christian giving.
So, brothers and sisters, what we will do this morning, instead of talking about special collections for special needs, is go to the very basis of Christian giving.
Christian giving is very, very important—not only to our personal life, but even to our life of fellowship.
I would like to present it in the simplest way that I can. I would like to ask four questions:
Number one: why give? What is the reason that Christians should have the habit of giving?
You know, so far as human nature is concerned, giving is not natural. Yes, we say, “Give, give,” but, “Give me.”
We are thinking of giving to me. That is human nature. Giving out, giving away—well, it is a loss to me. We do not like it.
But, brothers and sisters, therefore we need to know why we should give.
Very simply, we give because God is the greatest Giver. That is His character.
You remember in James 1:17:
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with Whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning.
Every good gift, every perfect gift, comes down from above, from the God of lights, with Whom there is no variation. That is to say, He is constantly, always giving, and there is no shadow of turning—no refusal to give. That is our God.
Dear brothers and sisters, I think there is one text that tells us everything about giving, and that is John 3:16:
For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have eternal life.
That is the way God gives. He gives because He loves to give, and He gives everything. He gives even His only begotten Son.
He Who spared not His only begotten Son, will He withhold anything from us? That is our God, and that is the very Spirit of our Lord Jesus.
So you find in 2 Corinthians 8:9:
For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might become rich.
When you think of the grace of our Lord Jesus, how do you describe it? It is not something vague. It is something very real, very living.
He said, “You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Now, what is the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ? For your sake—for our sake—He, being rich, became poor.
How can you describe the riches of Christ? All the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily. You cannot describe it. It is infinite.
All the glory, the honor, the power, everything—love, righteousness, holiness, separateness, fullness—the unsearchable riches of Christ. That is the way Paul put it.
And for our sake, He became poor. He was willing to give up all His riches to be that poor carpenter of Nazareth.
He was willing even to give up His own life, to be crucified on Calvary’s cross. He gave His all.
He Who is the richest Person in the whole universe voluntarily became the poorest person in the world: born in a manger, died in a stranger’s place, buried in a stranger’s tomb—nothing.
Why? That by His poverty we might be enriched.
If our Lord Jesus had kept His riches, we would be in poverty forever. But He was willing to become poor to enrich us. That is giving. That is the spirit of giving.
Brothers and sisters, if there is no other reason why Christians should have the spirit and the habit of giving, I think one reason is enough: our God, our Christ, His very nature, His very character, and what He has done for us.
And we who have received from Him such riches, such mercy, and such grace, should we not respond with the little that we are able to give, to express our appreciation and, at the same time, acknowledge that everything belongs to Him?
Everything comes from Him. We are grateful. Therefore, we want to express that we acknowledge that everything comes from Him. Without Him, we would have nothing.
Now, what is Christian giving? In the Old Testament, in Genesis 14, after Abraham delivered Lot from the four kings, after he won a great victory and received many spoils, Melchizedek came forward.
Melchizedek, the king of Salem, the king of righteousness, the high priest of God, came forward with bread and wine, reminding Abraham that it was God Who gave him that victory.
And you know what Abraham did? He took one tenth of all the spoil and gave it to Melchizedek. In other words, he acknowledged that his victory came from God, not from himself.
Everything was given to him by God, and he gave one tenth to express his gratitude.
Go to Genesis 28. Jacob—that supplanter—was fleeing away from his home. He was so tired. In the wilderness, he laid his head on a stone and slept, and God appeared to him.
God said, “I am the God of your father. I am going to bless you. I am going to increase your seed, and even your seed shall bless all the nations. I will give the land to you.”
You remember how Jacob woke up, and he was frightened. He said, “Surely the Lord is in this place; and I knew it not.” It was terrible, considering what he was.
Then he made a vow, still bargaining with God. He could not even imagine the immensity of God’s love and grace. He was so limited by his own little self.
He said, “Now, if You will keep me all the way, give me clothes to wear and food to eat, and allow me to come back safely, then You will be my God, and I will give You one tenth.”
Now, even with this Jacob, there was some appreciation, at least—but on condition, of course.
But when you come to Leviticus, to the end of Leviticus 27, from verse 30 onward, what do you see? You see that God put them under law.
Under the law of God, they had to give one tenth of their land, one tenth of the produce of the land, one tenth of all the fruit of the trees, and one tenth of all their domestic animals—one tenth, without choice.
Under law, they were required to give one tenth to show two things:
But the children of Israel rebelled against God, and one of the things was that they forgot their tithes.
So when you come to the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi 3, you find God saying:
Will a man rob God? Yet ye rob Me.
But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee?
In tithes and offerings.
In other words, if you read the Old Testament, you find that if an Israelite was faithful to the Lord and loved God with all his heart, at least he gave the tenth, and over and above it, he gave heave offerings, love offerings, and all the other kinds of offerings.
And God said:
Bring ye the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house, and prove Me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.
Now, that is the Old Testament. When you come to the New Testament, praise God, there is no requirement of one tenth. Are you happy about it?
You cannot find anywhere in the New Testament that God demands one tenth. So you can keep your whole amount, right? Not at all—just the opposite.
Because we are not under law; we are now under grace. Do you think that because you are not under law, therefore you can be lawless?
Under grace, God demands your all. Under law, you are required to give only one tenth; but under grace, it is your all.
Romans 12 tells us what we are all familiar with:
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service.
Present your bodies—not just a limb. Present your body, your whole body. It represents your whole being: what you are, what you have, what you shall be—everything.
Present your body a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God. It is your spiritual worship, your reasonable service.
Brothers and sisters, under law there is a requirement of one tenth. But under grace, it is the spirit of giving.
God does not require you to give one tenth. God says, “Where is My Spirit in you? Do you have the same Spirit as Mine?”
“I have given My life to you, and the life has a nature. It is a nature of giving, not of keeping.”
So God says, “Now, it is not a matter of one tenth. It is a matter of ten tenths. Present your bodies a living sacrifice.”
Your whole being is given back to God as an expression of acknowledging that God gives you everything. It is your response and your appreciation of Him.
It is not a requirement. It is not a demand of law. It is a beseeching, a begging from God.
God begs you: if you are moved by His love and constrained by His mercies, what else can you do? You are His altogether.
That is the spirit of giving. Are you willing to become poor that others may be enriched? That is the reason for giving.
Number two: what is giving? I am afraid our whole concept of giving is wrong.
If you read 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, you will find that when the apostle Paul mentions giving, he uses a few special words that we would never think are connected with giving.
The first word is this: giving is grace.
Read 2 Corinthians 8, verse 4:
Beseeching us with much entreaty in regard of this grace and of the fellowship in the ministering to the saints.
And verse 6:
Insomuch that we exhorted Titus, that as he had made a beginning before, so he would also complete in you this grace also.
Throughout this chapter and the next chapter, you find that Christian giving, in its right interpretation and meaning, is grace. Giving is grace.
Now, why is that? This word “grace,” according to the Greek, carries three meanings:
Grace is something so gracious, so beautiful, that it draws out from you joy and a pleasant feeling. Now, that is grace.
Therefore, God is grace. Christ is full of grace. When we look at Him, He is so beautiful, so gracious, so attractive, that He draws out from us admiration, love, and adoration toward Him.
That is grace.
And then grace is an expression, because when something is done freely, openly, without condition, gladly, cheerfully, universally—that is the way God gives. That is the way grace is expressed.
Then there is the response of grace. Those who have received grace should be gracious.
You remember the parable our Lord Jesus used: how a servant owed his master a tremendous, immense amount that he could never pay back. Yet when the master forgave him, he went out and found another fellow servant.
He took him by the throat and said, “Pay!” It was only a little amount, and he put him into prison.
And the master said, “If you are not gracious, all right—grace is withheld. You will go to prison.”
Brothers and sisters, that is what grace is. Think of God: He is grace. He is beautiful to behold.
He gives freely, without condition, and universally. His grace should touch our hearts and transform us, that we may be gracious too.
So giving is grace. So far as we are concerned, we receive such grace from God. How can we not be gracious too?
And how do we express our graciousness? By giving—not withholding, not taking, but giving.
So, first of all, giving is grace: the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. He Who was rich became poor for us, that by His poverty we might be enriched.
Number two: giving in the Scripture is described as blessing.
You would think receiving is blessed. Who would think giving is a blessing? But God looks at it very differently.
It is more blessed to give than to receive, because God is the One Who always blesses, Who always gives. So to Him, giving is blessing.
He blesses us by giving His only Son to us. It is a blessing.
You know, when we give, we think, “My, if I give, then I will lose something. I will be reduced.”
Because blessing to me is increase, but now it is decrease. How can it be a blessing?
So you find here in the Word of God that He uses a parable. He says giving is like sowing—sowing seed.
When the farmer is sowing his seed, by outward appearance he is losing. He is losing.
But if he does not sow, he cannot reap. And if he sows sparingly, he will reap sparingly. If he sows liberally, he will reap liberally.
So the Bible says giving is like sowing, and therefore it is a blessing.
If a farmer, especially during a famine, holds on to all the grain and says, “I need it. I need to eat it,” and refuses to sow, what will happen? He will die quicker.
When he sows, his heart may be broken because he cannot see the harvest. But wait until there is a harvest.
So the Word says, “He that soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he that soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.” It is a blessing.
If you hold back, the more you hold back, the less you will have. That is all you have. But if you give, God will give you more because He says that you are trustworthy. Then you can give more.
It is a blessing.
Number three: what is giving? It is fellowship.
You find in 2 Corinthians 8 that it is grace and fellowship. It is fellowship; it is sharing.
God does not want us to be individualists, thinking only of ourselves. He put us in the body of Christ. He wants us to share what He has blessed us with.
The more you share, the more He is able to supply you so that you can share more. The more you withhold, the less it will become.
Not only in the matter of material things, but in spiritual things it is the same. You will be like the Dead Sea—receiving, receiving all the time, and never giving. It is a dead sea; no living thing will be there.
You have to be like the Jordan. Whatever is received, you give out. Whatever you receive, you give out. It is living; it is running.
Brothers and sisters, fellowship.
And what is the blessing of fellowship? The blessing of fellowship is that not only are you set free, but others are enriched.
Because you are willing to give, God can entrust you with more. And because you give, those who have received will bless God for you.
Now, is that not a wonderful blessing all around? What a fellowship that must be.
Brothers and sisters, our whole concept of giving is so confined by our human frailty. May God open our understanding to see that it is grace, it is blessing, and it is fellowship.
Then the third question: how do we give?
From 2 Corinthians 8 and 9—I hope you will read them when you go home—you find, first of all, that you give yourself to the Lord first.
Like the Macedonians, you know, they were in deep poverty. Yet out of their deep poverty, they had such a Spirit of Christ in them that they wanted to have a share with their lacking brothers in Jerusalem.
They asked that they might have a share in it. But they gave themselves first to the Lord, and then they gave to us.
So, brothers and sisters, how do we give? If you do not give yourself to the Lord first, even if you give, God is not pleased with it.
Because it is not out of Him; it is out of yourself. Some people may be naturally more generous, but that does not mean that when they give, God will be pleased with it.
It has to come out of His life. Therefore, first of all, give yourself to the Lord.
Anyone who does not give himself to the Lord—the Lord says, “You do not need to give. You can keep it for yourself.”
So number one: how do you give? Give yourself to the Lord.
Number two: give in secret.
In Matthew 6, our Lord Jesus said, “Do not give like a hypocrite.” When they give, they blow the trumpet in the treasury as well as on the street: “See, I am giving.”
That is the way the world gives. They give for a name. The Lord says they have their reward.
But when you give, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. Now, you say that is impossible. How can my left hand not know what my right hand is doing, or my right hand not know what my left hand is doing? It is me.
It is metaphorical. It means that you give secretly, as unto the Lord.
You do not give to man. You do not give for a cause. You give it to God.
So you are not asking for a return. You do not want your name in the newspaper. No. You give it as unto the Lord.
Now, sometimes I know it is impossible to be an unknown giver, but try to be an unknown giver as much as you can.
Even when you may be known, do not take it as your credit, because all you give is from the Lord, not from you. That is the spirit of giving in secret.
Number three: give cheerfully.
Because God loves a cheerful giver—not grudgingly, not as something squeezed out of you, not something that you are forced to do, nor grievously.
Do it gladly, joyfully. God loves a cheerful giver.
You may give to the extent of weeping, but in your heart there is joy.
And number four: God says, give what you have, not what you do not have. You do not need to borrow in order to give.
What He has given you, you give gladly. There is no compulsion.
God does not require today that you have to give one tenth. But can we be less than what the law requires?
There is no law, nothing to be forced. Everything is according to your relationship with the Lord.
I am afraid, brothers and sisters, that many of us, if we really understand what giving is, may have to change our lifestyle.
We say, “We have nothing to give. My family—everything—I need every penny of it. I cannot give anything.”
All right. If you cannot give anything, God says you do not need to give. That is okay. You are not under law; you are under grace. But look at your lifestyle.
The way we live needs to be changed. God have mercy on us.
Oftentimes, it is the poor who give. The rich do not.
And then, for the sake of some who may be weak, give systematically. What the Lord has prospered you with, set apart something in order to help cultivate the habit of giving.
So that is how you give.
And finally: where do we give?
Giving is a spiritual exercise. Because it is a spiritual exercise, it is more than just a matter of giving. By giving, you learn a lot before God.
It is something for which you have to go to the Lord and ask Him, “Where shall my giving go?”
It is not just according to the needs, because the needs are everywhere. How do you know where the little with which you are entrusted should go?
It is a spiritual exercise. It is a serious thing. If you really exercise it before God, suppose God gives me one dollar. It does not mean that if I throw it away, I have solved the problem and done my duty.
That is not the way of giving. What God has given to you is a trust. You are a steward.
You need to know the mind of the Master in the use of that money. So it is not a careless throwing away.
You have to exercise before the Lord. Nobody is going to tell you where to give. You have to seek the Lord about it, so that you know where you should give.
Pray about it. Seek the Lord about it. Not that whenever you hear, “Oh, here is a need,” you say, “All right, okay.”
There may be a real need somewhere that is your responsibility, and you are not fulfilling it. You have to pray. It is a spiritual exercise.
But there are certain things we should remember. In Old Testament times, you find the Lord saying, “Bring your tithe into the storehouse, that My house may have food.”
Translate that into New Testament terms. Now we are in the assembly together, and as we are in the assembly together, there is a responsibility.
We need to give to the assembly, because giving is more than just an individual thing. It has its corporate character.
When we give to the church, as it were—to the Lord through the church—then the church, as a corporate being, will seek the Lord as to where that fund should go. It is a corporate thing.
So we need not forget the house of God.
Oftentimes, we may give to individual things, deciding where the money will go, and let the house of God be desolate. But you are using the facilities, enjoying all the good of it, and never taking any responsibility.
That is wrong. That is unrighteous.
So that is something we need to understand. There is a house of God to which we need to give.
And of course, even with the house of God, it is not just for maintenance. We also give to the Lord’s work, to the poor, and to all the needs of the gospel.
There are many needs everywhere. The demand is great.
With all the modern techniques trying to get some money out of your pocket, we as believers must exercise carefully before the Lord, that we may be trustworthy stewards of God.
So, dear brothers and sisters, that is all I can share with you this morning.
Look to the Lord, and by His grace may we have the spirit of giving, just like Christ. It is my prayer that, by His grace, that Spirit will fall upon us.
Let us pray.
Lord, forgive us for our carelessness, for our unfaithfulness. Have mercy upon us. Give us Thy Spirit.