“Earn. Save. Give: Earn All You Can” Proverbs 10:4

We are now in the second week of our sermon series about how as Christians we relate to money. Last week we started looking at some pieces of John Wesley’s sermon “The Use of Money” in our current context and we will continue doing so today.

When we talk about a Christian approach to money we cannot help but talk about scripture. The problem with money, or any other topic, is that too often we talk about what we think scripture says about money without actually reading it, and as a result, we get all twisted inside. Or we take a scripture out of the context in which it was presented and turn it around to try to make it applicable to us.

When I was little, my brothers and I had a lovely couple who would baby sit us each week. They were like a third set of grandparents. When we arrived at their homes their were rituals and patterns to how we spent our time. One such ritual came after dinner but before our dad picked us up - we would put together puzzles. Only I wasn’t very good at puzzles. I was the type of kid that would try to bend a puzzle piece into submission instead of looking for where it actually fit into the picture. Far too often I think this is how we treat the beautiful gift of scripture. 

Scripture does not say that money is bad. It does not say that money is the root of evil. What it does say we need to stray from the love of money. Do you catch the difference? There is something distinctly different between loving money and using money. What might that look like in today’s world?

I think in order to have a right relationship to money, we need to have a right relationship with work. Why do we work? Most people would say that we work to get money. And on one hand that is certainly true, we need money to survive. But we also work in order to live into our God given call and passion. When we work simply for the sake of work, we sometimes let work replace our love for God. Slowly our need for more and more things, which can be called materialism, seeps into our heart until we let things replace God as well. Whenever we start to see money as something more than to provide for our needs and to do good for others, we run the risk of letting money become more than it is truly for. 

My dad and I recently had a discussion about how we misuse money and the scripture associated with it. He has taught Sunday School and Small Groups for years and is amazing at it. He was telling me how he responds when folks start to quote Jesus saying that we will always have the poor with us. He immediately has them flip to Deuteronomy 15 - which Jesus is quoting from. There we read “Give liberally and be ungrudging when you do so, for on this account the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake. Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.” The Pharisees, disciples, and folks present would have known just from the few words he was quoting that he was telling them to give liberally. Give liberally for Jesus - because for the disciples he may not always be present. And for us we want to be the best reflection of him in the world we can be. 

Just like we often manipulate the words of Jesus, we also misunderstand and misuse today’s teaching from Proverbs. We hear - that a slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes the rich. We would be tempted to immediately blame the poor for poverty - especially systemic poverty - but that isn’t what Wesley wants us to see. Instead Wesley wants us to ask what is truly rich and truly poor. How does God want us to work in a way that makes us not just rich in terms of money, but rich in spirit. 

First, Wesley tells us: Gain All You can by Honest Industry. Use All Possible Diligence in Your Calling. The truth is not just pastor-folks are called friends. We all are called. We are called to live lives worthy of our calling. I have a sister in law I have no doubt her call in this life is to teaching. She has the patience of a saint and wants children to learn. I have another sister in law who is called to be an occupational therapist and rejoices with folks as they make progress towards healing and wholeness. That is a call. We don’t earn money for the sake of money, but the sake of the higher purpose that money is used for - living into our calling. We can have all the money in the world, friends, but if its just about the money and not about the call - have we lost something in the process? 

Two,  We are taught to: Gain all You can by common sense. Wesley says, “You should be continually learning, from the experience of others, or from your own experience… to do everything you have to do better today than you did yesterday”. All too often we don’t strive to do things better today than yesterday. In fact, we act downright foolish. We are foolish when we live today like the sum of our lives is what we own. What material things we acquire or want. We act foolish when we think the point of money is simply to have more money. We act foolish when we think that how we spend our money doesn’t matter. We act foolish when we think that our money has nothing to do with God. The truth is we are called to be wise stewards. To use our money to do good. The truth is money is a gift from God but we are absolutely responsible to God for how we use it. Do the ways we gain and spend money show common, God honoring, sense and a commitment to God and our neighbor?

Third, we are to Gain All you can without paying more for it than its worth. What does it gain for us, brothers and sisters, if we earn money but lose things that are dear to us in the process? A few years ago I got sick. Like really sick. After countless doctors appointments and medical tests I was diagnosed with a stress-related illness. As soon as I cut back on my work I began the process of becoming healthy again. Friends, God does not call us to work at the expense of our health. 

God also doesn’t call us to work to the point where we are always working. We need Sabbath. I’ve stated before that I grew up in a home where Sabbath couldn’t always be Sunday because of my mom’s job. But we still were intentional about a day of rest. We need a way of living that breaks the cycle of constantly being on the go and at the demand of others. We are called to work but also to have a time of rest for the sake of our soul. 

Friends, we are to earn all we can but in a way that preserves who God has created us to be.  Let us seek to live in a way that honors God.