Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Grace and Money

Episode Date: December 3, 2024

If we’ve experienced God as a God of grace, how does that change our attitude toward money? The early church was an economic subculture that was radically different from the culture around it. In fact wherever the early church is described, we see the Christians’ drastic generosity—so drastic that it seemed unreasonable to those outside the church. Why were they so different? The answer is an experience of God’s grace. Grace revolutionizes 1) our attitude toward money, 2) our procedure, and 3) the benefits of giving.  This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on November 8, 1992. Series: The Attributes of God. Scripture: Acts 4:32-37. Today's podcast is brought to you by Gospel in Life, the site for all sermons, books, study guides and resources from Timothy Keller and Redeemer Presbyterian Church. If you've enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to make a gift to Gospel in Life this Giving Tuesday, you can do so by visiting https://gospelinlife.com/tuesday.

Welcome to Gospel in Life. Today is Giving Tuesday, and your gift to Gospel in Life will help more people, both here locally and in other parts of the world, discover the life-transforming power of Christ's love and mercy. To make a gift today, visit gospelinlife.com slash Tuesday. That's gospelinlife.com slash Tuesday. The book of Acts chapter 4 and I'm going to read from verses 32 to 37. All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power, the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord

Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. There were no needy persons among them, for from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales, and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need. Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas, which means son of encouragement, sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles' feet." This is God's word. All fall, we've been looking at the different attributes or characteristics of God. We've looked at His faithfulness and His mercy and His holiness and His wrath and His judgment and His supremacy and so forth. Today, I'd like to talk about His grace,

but I'd like to do it in a way that I really ought to do it all the time, but there's not enough time, and that is to take a look at how one of God's characteristics makes a huge impact on a very practical area of our lives. I could really do this every week, but ordinarily I'm more interested in giving you the broad understanding of who God is. Today I'd like to depart a bit from that and take a look not so much at the attribute of God's grace, though we're going to talk about it, as much as to look and see how the attribute and how the quality of God's character called His grace, if it actually makes an impact on your life, changes your understanding and your use of your money. Do something nice and concrete today. That's why I chose money. Something that's nice and measurable, you

see. It's hard to measure, you know, love and forgiveness, but it's a lot easier to measure money. So we're going to look for today and just say how, if God is a God of grace and if we've experienced him as a God of grace, how does that change our attitude and our understanding and our use of our money? Here in this passage I read, we read something that I'd like to take a moment or two to really press, and that is that the early church and the early Christians were extremely, they were extremely visible, visibly different from everyone else in their attitude toward their money. It says, no one claimed that

any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. This is telling us that one of the main ways in which the world understood that Christians were different was in their economic mindset and the church was in a certain sense an economic subculture that was radically different from the economic culture around it. You see in the midst of this passage and also in Acts chapter 2, in fact, wherever the life of the early church is described, we see that the Christians' drastic generosity, unmistakably drastic. You might say in many ways it was an unreasonable to the outsider generosity. Generosity of unreasonable

proportions was actually like an engine that drove a cycle or a dynamic that actually had a tremendous powerful influence on the community around it. There was a cycle of impact and the engine of that cycle or that dynamic was this drastic and unreasonable generosity. Not unreasonable from my point of view or the Bible's point of view, but from the world's point of view. In verse 31, 32, and 33, you see it in this passage. In 31, we're told, though we didn't read it here, that they were filled with the Holy Spirit.

In verse 32, it immediately says, as a response to or a result of being filled with the Holy Spirit. In verse 32, it immediately says, as a response to or a result of being filled with the Holy Spirit, they no longer considered anything that they had their own, and they shared everything. And then in verse 33, we're told that whenever the apostles preached about Jesus and who he was, it had tremendous impact, and people came. Why? Why? Because the message was backed up by the lives of the people and the lives of the people were characterized by an unreasonable and difficult to account for and unaccountable generosity. You see the same cycle in chapter

2. If you go to chapter 2 of the book of Acts, you'll see, first of all, it says in verse 45, 46 and 47, the same thing. In 45, it says, all the believers were together and had everything in common, selling their possessions and goods they gave to anyone that had need. Then in verse 46, it says, they broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad hearts. Then in verse 47, it says, they enjoyed the favor of all the people and the Lord added to their number daily. Same thing. Radical, unreasonable, unaccountable generosity with their funds led to a deep oneness, a fellowship and a loving community. They broke

bread in each other's homes with glad and generous hearts. And that led to people coming into their fellowship every day. It led to tremendous powerful influence and impact on the people around. What was the engine of the success of the early Christians? How did those early Christians develop into a powerful organization, spreading all through the Roman Empire and turning a very harsh and cruel pagan society into a compassionate and charitable society? It happened because of that unreasonable and unaccountable generosity. The people on the outside, the people on the outside looked and said, we don't get this.

Nobody gives money away like this. Nobody's attitude toward their money is like this. It says in verse 47 of chapter 2, they had favor with all the people because anybody from the outside realizes that society is going to work a lot better if you have a lot of people with this attitude, but where did it come from? They couldn't understand it and that's why they listened whenever the preachers of the community preached the message of Jesus Christ. People listened because they said, how can we account for

the radically different way in which these people regard their income? It's not just in the earliest church here. In the year 252 AD, there was a tremendous plague in the city of Carthage. And one of the more interesting stories that come down to us from that day was that in Carthage during that plague, people were leaving the city, if you were healthy, the healthy ones were leaving the city in droves. They had to get out because of the threat of contamination and losing everything they had. And in the middle of that panic, the great Christian leader Cyprian drew together all the Christians in the center of that town. And that town had persecuted the Christians and had hurt

the Christians. And Cyprian said, if we're going to do what Jesus did, who though he was rich became poor so that through his poverty we might become rich. Then he says, I call you now to fan out through this town and to give both personal and financial aid and care and comfort to all according to their need, not whether they're Christians or not, not even whether they were your enemies or not. We're called here to follow what our master did. Fascinating story. They would not abandon the city in the midst of the plague. And another quote that some of you have certainly heard from me before because one of my favorite,

but just a powerful, powerful piece of evidence. One of the early Roman emperors, Julian, who tried to stem the tide of Christianity and revive the pagan religion, couldn't do it. And in his disgust, he wrote one of his friends to talk about why the Christians were just succeeding and why they were spreading. And he says in a letter that's come down to us, Julian says, their success lies in their charity to all. They take care not only of their own poor, but ours as well. I quote that every year. If you haven't heard that, it's because you weren't here last year in November. But you know why I quote it? That is proof positive.

Listen. It's proof positive that the one thing, there were others I'm sure, but one of the main things that differentiated Christians from everybody else was the way in which they used and their attitude toward their money. And it was one of the main things that gave the Christians success in a world that really looked at them as very, very odd and strange. It was one of the things that gave them their power and it was one of the things that befuddled the world and changed their attitude toward them. How are we doing on that?

Now the question is, the question that comes up, of course, is, as we will continually ask ourselves, why we're Christians so different? And the answer I've already given you, I don't try to fool you, the answer is an experience of God's grace. Christians, unlike every other kind of religion, Christians have a religion of grace, and every other religion has a religion of moral effort and summoning up your courage and doing better than other people because every other religion is a religion of self-effort and moral effort and good works, and Christianity is a religion of grace.

And as a result, Christians' attitude toward their money is different. Let me show you. Grace revolutionizes, first of all, our attitude toward money, and then secondly, our procedure and the benefits of giving. So let me just go through these three things to show you. First, if you've experienced the grace of God, it gives you a completely new attitude toward money. It's a completely new attitude toward money. It's a completely new relationship

toward your money. We're told in verse 32 here, no one considered his possessions his own. No one considered that any of his possessions was his own. You remember some years ago, Bill Cosby was on a commercial. I forget who it was for, but it was a commercial put out by some investment company that wanted you to give them your money so they could invest it for you and help it grow. I forget what investment company it was.

But in the commercial, Bill Cosby said, you know why I want to give my money to these competent people? Do you know why I want to give my money to people who really know what they're doing? Do you know why I want to give my money to people who know how to manage money? You know why? Because, do you remember that commercial? Because it's my money, he said. And of course, some marketing research person had told him that if he says

it's my money that that's really going to ring a bell in most people's hearts and of course it does. Because unless you understand what I'm about to show you in the gospel, that's how you feel about your money. It's mine. I worked hard for it and I don't have nearly enough of it. I really deserve to have a lot more. I see other people who don't work nearly as hard as I do and who seem to have come into it. See, everybody feels this money is my money and it's really not as much as it ought to be anyway. That's how everybody feels. But if you're a Christian, you have a completely different approach to it. You look at your money and you say, it's not mine anyway. I don't look at it as mine.

I don't feel that it's mine. I don't see it as mine. If you're not, if you haven't had an experience of grace, in other words, when someone comes to you and asks for money, you're peeved, you're irritable, you're touchy about people asking you for money. You don't like it. If, on the other hand, you're a Christian, or if you've had a real experience of God's grace as a Christian, when people ask you for money, you might feel sad because you can't give to them, because you say, well, I've only got a limited amount. But you're not peeved, you're not touchy. Let me show you why.

Scrooge. Remember Scrooge? Now, what happened to Scrooge, remember Scrooge? Now, what happened to Scrooge? The spirits took Scrooge and they showed him his greed and then they showed him his doom. And in that final climactic scene he's seeing his life after he's just died. And he's seeing the people around him how they're miserable because of his greed. And he sees finally his own grave, and he sees a wasted life, and he sees an absolutely lonely tombstone in an open grave, and suddenly he falls into it, and all of a sudden, what? It's Christmas morning. And he thought he was dead, now he's alive.

And he thought he'd lost all that money, and now it's back. And he thought all those people's lives have been ruined by him and yet they're still there what happens to him that Christmas morning his attitude toward his money is completely changed why he's actually had in the story an experience of grace what's the experience? A second chance. It was undeserved,

it was unlooked for. He thought he was dead, he thought everything was gone, and all of a sudden, a second chance. Now, as I'll show you in a minute, that's not a whole lot of grace, but it's still grace. And as a result, he looks at his money totally different, in a totally different way. Here's what happens. He is now gleeful, like a little kid, scheming to get rid of his money. Gleefully thinking about how he's going to shower people with gifts and how their lives are going to be changed through those gifts. He can't wait to do it. He still sees Scrooge kind of rubbing his hands and cackling, but over something different.

The new Scrooge has been changed by grace so that his attitude toward his money now is, it's not mine. The Bible says the very same thing. This is the point, this is what we're trying to get across, this. The Bible says, if you've experienced God's grace, you too will have a revolutionarily different way of regarding and looking at your money. You know how we like to talk in many companies about the money being the bottom line. Why is it the bottom line?

The bottom line, because it's the thing that really, really, really tells you how you're doing, right? That's what the bottom line is. Yes, yes, you can say there's a lot of disorganization in the company and yes, there's people at each other's throats and yes, we blew this and we blew that, but what's the bottom line? Have we made more money? The bottom line tells you whether or not we're making progress or not. It tells you how you're really doing. Well, believe it or not, even the Bible says money

is the bottom line in your life. Yes it is. You can talk about how much you love God, you can talk about how much the grace of Jesus Christ means to you, you can talk about how much you love your brothers and sisters in Christ, but the bottom line, the thing that's unmistakable, the thing that's down there at the bottom that tells you where your heart is and what you really, really believe is where you spend your money and what your attitude toward your money is. That's what it tells you. And let me show you, if Scrooge had his attitude toward his money changed simply by the grace of a second chance, how much more should our attitude to our money be changed by an experience of Jesus Christ

grace? Because Christ grace is not just a second chance. Do you know what the grace of Jesus Christ is? It is not one more chance to redeem yourself. It is not one more Christmas to be a good person. The grace of Jesus Christ is not to appear before us and say, look at me. I'm honest, I'm compassionate, I'm generous, I have a servant heart. Live like me and you can redeem yourself. See, that's the grace that was given to Scrooge and even that was enough to change his attitude toward his money.

But no, Jesus doesn't come and say, look at me. Be as generous and as caring and as compassionate as me. Now, nobody misunderstand me here. If Jesus Christ came like that, if he came to be a model and an example to us so we could redeem ourselves, he is an utter failure. I wish he'd never come because nobody can care like Jesus cared. And nobody can love like Jesus loved. And nobody can give like Jesus gave. And if he is my model and he gives me one more chance, all he does is show me that I can never redeem myself. As a model, he discourages me. He doesn't encourage me. He devastates me. He demolishes me. And he leaves me in the darkness if that's all.

See, our Christmas carol is different. The real Christmas carol is not. One more chance to be good. The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ came and died to pay the penalty of our failures. And if we receive him, his record becomes our record. He doesn't say, one more chance to do good deeds. Oh, no. Instead, he says, don't you see? Your doing will never get you there. Looking at me proves that.

I have done all the good deeds for you. I have lived the perfect life. I have lived the perfect life. I have died the perfect death. I put myself in your place and took your penalty so that if you trust in me and you lay your doing down and you trust wholly in me, the Father will welcome you as complete in me. Lay your deadly doing down, down at Jesus' feet. Stand in Him alone, gloriously complete."

That's what the hymn says. Now listen, don't you see that goes so far beyond Scrooge's grace. Why aren't we then, so far beyond him, in our attitude to our money? What immediately happens, immediately when that experience in our attitude to our money, what immediately happens, immediately, when that experience of grace comes into your life, your bottom line changes. Of course it changes. First of all, you start to say, look at what I've really got. Martin Luther used to get up every day and he used to get up and he used to look up to heaven and he used to say, you are my goodness, I was your punishment. You assumed everything I deserved and was so that I can receive everything

you deserved and are. Luther used to get up every day and say, I'm rich. I'm adopted into the family of God. I have an imperishable inheritance. I'm going to shine like the stars in the kingdom of my father. And even now, I've got his holy power and joy has come into my life through the Holy Spirit. And it's begun to grow. And it will eventually swallow up all my foolishnesses and all of my sadnesses and all of my weaknesses. I am rich. Now, when you say that, you immediately look at your material possessions and you say, this is a small thing compared to what I've got and will never lose. And not only that, you look at what you've got and you

say, this is all grace. This is all grace. I was in my grave and suddenly it's Christmas. And that changes everything. It melts away your possessiveness. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians, Paul says when he's asking the Corinthian Christians to give to hunger relief, he says, I'm not commanding you to give, I'm just looking for the sincerity of your love. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, who though he was rich became poor, so that through his poverty we might become rich." What's Paul saying? Paul's saying there is never any need to lay guilt on a person to get them to be generous who's experienced the grace of Jesus. You know, he says, I don't have to command you.

I'm just looking. You know the grace. There it is. Hi, I'm Cathy Keller. Today is Giving Tuesday, which is an artificially made update, but that's okay. I'm grateful for the gifts that God will provide today for our ministry.

In thinking about the emphasis that Giving Tuesday puts on generosity, I was reminded of Tim's very first stewardship sermon as a brand new pastor back in 1975. His theme for that sermon was, no matter what you invest in, however low the investment risk may be, or however strong the thing you're investing in is, it will eventually deteriorate. The only things on this earth that will last eternally are people and the word of God. When you make a gift to gospel in life,

we are stewarding your gifts in four primary ways that I believe have lasting value. One is turning sermons into new books like the Gospel on the Move and developing new content like our quarterly journal of which I'm the editor, our marriage podcast and our translation project which is very exciting to me. You'll hear more about that I'm sure in the future. Two, delivering Tim's teaching to a global audience through our website, radio broadcasts, podcasts, and YouTube channel.

Three, supporting the gospel movement that God is growing in New York City through Redeemers churches and ministries, which will launch a new Brooklyn church probably in the spring of 2025. And four, helping Redeemer city to city grow gospel movements in cities around the world. So today, as you consider giving to many good ministries and organizations, would you consider how God might be calling you to support gospel in life? To make a gift today, go to gospelinlife.com go to gospelinlife.com slash Tuesday, which is pretty easy, gospelinlife.com slash Tuesday.

Thank you for your faithful generosity to Gospel in Life and for partnering with us to bring the gospel to more people around the world. Jeff read the story of the rich young ruler. Another example that really is actually difficult to understand unless you realize the principle we're talking about. Here comes the rich young ruler and he comes to Jesus and he says this, if you remember from the passage. He says, Good Master, I've obeyed the commandments all my life. No adultery, no lying, no stealing, no defrauding, I honored

my parents. Is there anything else though I have to do to make sure I have eternal life?" See he comes to Jesus and he says, you know, I've been a good person, is there anything I've left out? Jesus says, yeah, one thing. And then he says, sell everything you have, one thing. And then he says, sell everything you have, give it away, and then you'll have treasures in heaven. Now what he said there will make no sense to you unless you understand the principle of this text, the principle we're getting across now. You might say, oh my gosh, he's trying to say you've got to sell all of your goods in order to be saved. No, he's not. Instead he's saying this, my dear young man, who he loved, remember what the text says? He looked at the man, he confronted him

because he loved him. He says, my dear, you have a lot of money and yet you've got nothing, it's all gonna burn up. If you could only see that if you have me, you've got everything. You could have my record, you could have my forgiveness, unless you see that my dying love is your real treasure. Unless you see that frankly, salvation and internal life is not a matter of doing or adding one more thing to your good life, but rather it's a matter of throwing it all over and trusting holy in me until you see

that if you have me, you've got everything. You cannot inherit eternal life. And Jesus is saying, if you understood that I am eternal life, your attitude toward your money would be very different. Remember how God says to Abraham, Abraham put your Isaac on the altar, what does he mean? He didn't really want Isaac to die. In fact, as soon as Abraham said, okay, you are the most important thing. If I have you, I've got everything. If I have you, I have all the love. If I have you, I have all the wealth. And as soon as Abraham understood the Gospel,

and that is, eternal life does not come through adding but rather throwing everything over and having everything in Jesus. As soon as Abraham understood that, God says, you don't have to kill Isaac. And probably that's what would have happened to the rich young ruler. If he had understood that in Jesus he has everything, he would have said, sure, if you want me to give it away, whatever. And Jesus would have said, well, no, no, you probably don't need to now. Don't you see the bottom line?

What's the bottom line? You will always give money effortlessly to that which is your God. If you see that your salvation is in Jesus, then your attitude toward your money is, I want to give it away in radical and drastic proportions. I want to change people's lives through it. It's not mine. On the other hand, if your salvation is your clothes, is your looks, if your salvation is romance, if your salvation is your own status, if your salvation is security in life, then you're going to hold on to that money and it's going to go effortlessly to those things which are your real God. Your

money is a bottom line. It tells you where your salvation is. It tells you what your real religion is. If the idea of giving away great proportions of money to the church or to the poor just appalls you, it shows that your heart's someplace else. If the idea of spending a lot of money on a new home sounds like a great idea because it's a good investment, but it's putting a whole lot of money into the poor, a whole lot of money into the church, it's not. It just simply shows you what your real salvation is and where you really think your grace comes from. Grace revolutionizes your very relationship and your attitude toward money. Secondly, grace not only changes your relationship to your

giving, it also changes the procedure of it. Look at Scrooge before and after his experience of grace. Before, he's like all of us. You know how we give to charity? You know how we give our money away before we experience God's grace? Our giving is passive and spontaneous. Look at Scrooge. People have to come to him and ask for him. That's how we all are. We're passive. First of all, we don't feel like, you know, this is my money, so really, if somebody wants it, they better come and get it, but I'm not going to be looking for ways to get rid of it. And besides that, I don't have that much of it. And we're always sort of wallowing in self-pity about it. And

we're feeling very possessive about it. And therefore, we're passive until somebody comes along and just tugs those guilt strings and, you know, and puts that slide up there of that little kid. And then suddenly we start to feel something and we feel the guilt basically. And what happens is we're passive but as soon as we get the guilt strings being tugged, we immediately reach in and see what we spontaneously give, which means whatever we happen to be able to afford of the day. Either the cash in the wallet or even looking in the checkbook and say, well how much have I got? I guess I can afford to give this much. We're passive

and spontaneous. Totally different after Scrooge has experienced grace and you will be totally different after you've experienced the grace of Christ. Instead of passive and spontaneous, you will be active and intentional. Being active and intentional is not just a good idea. Being active and intentional is a result of experiencing the grace of Christ. Look at Scrooge afterwards. He's looking for ways to get rid of his money. He's proactive. He's intentional. He's planning. He's scheming. Scheme about how to get rid of your money. Think about it constantly. Make plans. That's the way anybody who's experienced the grace of Christ is. Look at what he's done for me. Look at how God planned to pour out his riches on me, freely by his grace. So I'm going to

plan too. And so that's the reason that Scrooge is planning. Now, this is what's interesting to me. If you're passive and spontaneous the way most people are about giving, you don't need to know what I'm about to tell you. If you're active and intentional, you can't be active and intentional unless you've made a decision beforehand of the percentage of income you're going to give away this week, this month, or this year. Do you see that? If you're passive and spontaneous, you don't need to make any plans, so you don't need to think about that. But if you're active and intentional, if you're a grace giver, a giver not out of guilt, you know, not out of somebody who's just

just ringing your heart, but a person who gives out of grace then you will have thought out ahead of time how much money you're going to give this year. You're going to think of your percentage. Oh, now it's very easy for some people and it's harder for others because a lot of you don't know what your income is going to be but you still, if you're active and if you're intentional you've got to have a guideline. That's the reason the Bible gives us a guideline. The guideline is in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, it's the tithe, 10%.

In the Old Testament the people of God were told to give 10% of their income to support the ministry and to support the poor. And that 10% was their first fruits. You remember they were an agricultural community. They weren't getting paid in cash. And therefore, their money was really the harvest. Well God got the first fruits and that meant he got his off the top. We have a tendency of course to decide what we want to do and how we want to live and then we give God the leftovers. Instead,

the way the scripture says, if you're active and intentional, you decide what you're giving God and then you work on the leftovers. Active and intentional, now the 10 percent, a lot of people have argued about that because in the New Testament there's not much discussion of the tithe. Some people have said, what does that mean? I'll tell you what it means. Since we are more indebted to God, more blessed by God, receive more mercy from God under Christ than those folks ever did in the Old Testament, it's inconceivable to imagine that whatever God expects from us would be less than the

ten percent. And therefore, all honest and reflective and fair-minded students of the Scripture have always said that the Old Testament ten percent would be a minimum, a minimum guideline for somebody who lived under Christ. Now, you can't be legalistic about this when people say this before after taxes, I don't know. Another thing that people say, does this mean it's got to all come into your local congregation? No. Oh no. Does it mean that for example if I'm a member of Redeemer I've got to give all this to Redeemer? No, I'm not really after that whole thing. It's not there for me

as a pastor to say it's all got to come in here. Well, you say then where does it go? What counts? I don't know that either, but don't you realize? It's a guideline. It's a rule of thumb. And until you are active and intentional, you don't need a rule of thumb. But today if you understand that you must be active and intentional, you will have to get one. The fact is that if you begin your economic life using the tithe as a guideline for your proportional giving, it's something that's not that hard to start with. You just treat the money as if it's not there.

But for most of us who have come into a Christian mindset in the middle of our adult life, we very often find, very often, that it's an impossible thing to do immediately and still pay our debts, pay our bills, provide for our family, and therefore the tithe may be just something you're moving towards, something you hope to get to, something that you make specific steps, but the idea is to be proactive, to be intentional, to plan, to be active and intentional, not passive and spontaneous, to have a goal and

to move toward that goal. Now lastly, we said if you've experienced grace, it changes your relationship toward your giving. Secondly, it changes your procedure, so you're active and intentional. Lastly, it changes, grace changes the benefits of giving. If you haven't experienced God's grace, what are the benefits of giving? Jerry Lewis put it once during one of his telethons, I heard him say, if you give, then tomorrow you'll be able, and I think he's right about this, I'm not making fun of him at all. He says, you'll be able to look in the mirror tomorrow and say to yourself, you are a caring person. Now, somebody might say that's a manipulative thing to say. The fact of the

matter is that's true and that's about as much of benefit, that's about as great a benefit as you get if you're doing it simply because Jerry Lewis got you feeling guilty by dragging a lot of really pitiful looking kids in front of the screen. And they need it, they need it, they need it. There's nothing wrong with that. He's got to get it, the kids need it, he uses guilt. That's the only way you can get money out of people who haven't experienced the grace of God.

So what's wrong with that? But that's all the benefits you get. See, your conscience doesn't bother you the way it did yesterday, because I gave. The benefits are completely different now. It says right here in the middle of the text, great grace was upon them all. Great grace. You know what that means?

Look, the benefits are to others and to you. First to others. People all around New York City, I can always, you can see it just walking around, I've been looking over the years for ways to take their money and to put it into, invest it into things that continue to bear fruit on past the end of their lives. They put their money into foundations that will do good. But usually the foundations have trustees 50 years after the foundations are started that have gotten none of the values of the original founders anyway. They put their money into schools and colleges, same thing happens. You know, Harvard University was founded, you know, to just fill all of America with Bible-believing gospel preachers.

Did you know that? Go take a look at it. There was a lot of people for the first hundred years that gave their zillions of dollars to see that so that they could make sure that their money really did what they wanted it to do for years and years to come, which it doesn't. So you can put your money into foundations, and you can put your money into schools, and you can put your money into charities, and you can put your money into foundations and you can put your money into schools and you can put your money into charities and you can put your money into all sorts of things. You can have plaques put on buildings because you want to put your money into something that lasts, something that will continue to keep on giving. Luke chapter 16 tells us, Jesus says,

make sure that you make friends in heaven with your money so they will receive you when you come to their dwellings. And in that tiny little verse, he says a mouthful. Here's what he says. He says, it's possible for some of you in this room that someday you will step into the corridors of heaven and immediately some people will rush up to you and say, you know, I've never met you. But you took some of your money and you put it into a ministry that brought me here.

It awakened glory in me. It fostered glory in me. It brought me to Christ. Your money is burned up. Your money is gone and yet it's right in front of you. Your wealth is still here because your money created a wealth that will never perish. It stands before you. Thank you for using your money like that. Don't you see? Don't you want to put your money into something that

lasts? Go to your broker and say, I want to put my money into something that lasts. I doubt that he or she is going to think of this. They're not going to be as long term as this. There's no way they can even come close to this. A billion years from now, do you want your wealth to still be with you? It's possible. Great grace. Putting your money into the cause of Jesus brings great grace to people's lives. But then secondly, it brings great grace to people's lives. But then secondly, it brings great grace to

you. Some of you do not give as much as you should because you're worried about your money because you don't have much of it. And some of you, this is what's so ironic, whenever I look at people and they talk to me about this, they say, I can't give. Some people can't give because they don't have enough money. Some people can't give because they got too much. Those of you who say, I don't have enough, that means the money has you by the throat. You're so worried. You're so worried. You're insecure. But grace, the experience of God's grace changes that. The experience of God's grace makes you say, hey, he gave me his own son. He's not going to let me starve now. I can be generous. I can't tithe this year, but I can be generous.

And when you do that, you're liberated. Great grace comes to you because money no longer dominates you. You're free from the worry because of your generosity. But on the other hand, some people have a lot of money and they're spending it on their lifestyle because their lifestyle is so important to them and things and comfort and pleasure is so important. Well, the money's got you by the neck too. It's got you by the throat too. Change your lifestyle. Restructure it so you can't do many of the things that you like to do because of your generosity and because you want to awaken and foster glory in other people's lives, and then you will be free too. Great grace will be on you. You'll have that freedom. Christian friends, let me ask you just these

three things. Do you see the power of money over you receding because of your generosity? Do you see glory being awakened in other people through your money? Are you like Scrooge? Are you gleefully seeing your money change people's lives? That's what I'm asking you. Have you come to the place where you are...anybody who knows you realizes, just like in the early church, the world realized, you're different. You are incredibly generous, incredibly hospitable, incredibly welcoming. Where do you get the power for that? Does anybody look at you like that?

And there might be some folks here, and there probably are, I hope, who want to know what they think about Christ. They're not really sure what they think about Christ. Now, use this as a test. I've been saying all along, money is the bottom line, right? Are you finding this a tremendously irritating sermon? Do you feel like it's unbelievably cheeky of a minister to come up and talk to me about things like this? Does the idea of giving away 10% of your income every year to charity into the church strike you as ridiculous? Is there no resonance in your soul for it? Well, it's a bottom line. No condemnation here. You don't

need to give your money away. You need to find the Christ that turns you into a person of radical generosity. I don't want your money. I don't want anybody's money here. I'm not after your money. I'm after your blessedness. The Bible says it's more blessed to give than to receive. I'm after your blessedness, not your money. But you in particular, if you're not sure where you stand with the Lord, we certainly don't want your money. We want you to find Him. Because actually you're in the same shoes as the rich young ruler. The rich young ruler, he thought that all God really wants is for you to be a moral, decent person. Is that what you feel too? That's all. All God

wants is for you to be a moral and decent, then you'll have the same attitude toward money that the rich young ruler had. Christianity is never in addition to what you already have. Christianity is not just a little boost to make you a little better person. Christianity is explosive. It explodes in your hands. It wipes away what you already have and puts something brand new in there. It says Jesus is your Savior entirely, you're saved wholly by grace, and therefore you follow him entirely and it changes your attitude toward everything. Things that used to be very precious to you, now you snap your fingers out. They're not that important

because you've got him. And until that's true for you, none of this stuff I'm saying to you will make much sense. That's okay, find him. Don't think that I'm saying, better give, that'll get you to heaven. It's the exact opposite of everything that Jesus said and of everything I mean. You want to change your life, find him. And when you find Him, it's going to turn you into a dynamo, awakening and fostering glory in other people, changing their lives as you empty yourself and yet become richer and more full of grace, just as Jesus, who though He was poor, became rich after he impoverished himself for us.

Let's pray. Father, we ask now that you would grant that we might all see the importance of our attitude toward our money in our relationship to you and in our own happiness. We pray that you'll help us to all apply what we've just heard here to our hearts by your Holy Spirit. We ask it you'll help us to all apply what we've just heard here to our hearts by your Holy Spirit. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Thanks for listening to Tim Keller on the Gospel in Life podcast. Today is Giving Tuesday.

To make a gift today, visit Gospelinlife.com slash Tuesday. That's GospelInLife.com slash Tuesday. Today's sermon by Tim Keller was preached in 1992. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel in Life podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.