Jesus’ parables on money

Anne Graham told of a story about a man who bought a bird that can sing. But after bringing the bird home, he discovered that the bird can’t sing. So he went back and ask the shopkeeper. “I am sorry”, said the shop keeper, “you need to buy a ladder and put it in the cage. The bird needs to climb the ladder to the top and then it will sing”. So the man bought the ladder, brought it home and placed it in the cage. He watched. He waited. Nothing happened. He went back and confronted the shopkeeper and was told this time that the bird needs a mirror. “OK, give me the mirror”. Said the man. He placed the mirror on top of the ladder and waited. Still no song. He went back to the store and this time was told that the bird not only needed a ladder, a mirror, it also needs a bell. However, after putting the bell, the bird still didn’t sing. He went back to the store and asked the owner what was the problem. The bird needs a swing. The man bought the swing and happily installed in the cage. He watched excitedly as the bird climb up the ladder, take a good look at the mirror, ring the bell and jump onto the swing and swing. Before it could open its mouth to sing, the bird fell to the bottom of the cage, broke its neck and died/ Furious, the man brought the dead bird to the shop and asked for a refund. “What do you mean it is dead? Did you feed him? The bird needs food to sing”. How often it happens to us that we forgot to feed ourselves but tirelessly pursue the thing of this world. Climbing the ladder, equip ourselves and making a name for ourselves and pursue the pleasure of this world, we forgot to feed on spiritual food. In search for the song, many ended dead.

To many of our youths here, when you leave school and begin work, you will join many others in search of your song. You will pursue money, happiness and pleasures in this world. Just make sure that you have your priority right, you need the right food.

Society places a great deal of importance on physical wealth. If we are not careful, it is easy to get caught up in material pursuits such as that new car or that new pair of NIKE tennis shoes. Even though having nice things is enjoyable, it is not where the greatest importance should be placed. Money itself is not a bad thing. It is the attitude towards it that makes the difference. I do not deny that money is important. While money cannot guarantee you happiness, no money will definitely make you unhappy.

The Scriptures has a lot to say about money. In fact, 16 out of the many of Christ's parables, deal with money. More is said, did you know, in the New Testament, about money then about Heaven and Hell combined? Five times more is said about money than about prayer. On the subject of prayer and faith there are 500 plus verses, on the subject of money and possessions there are 2,000 verses.

Because there are many verses touching on this subject, on the surface the Scripture would seem to be confusing. For example, proverb 21:20 says a wise man has a surplus in his home while a fool has bare cupboards. Another Proverb says that a poor man has God’s blessings, and a rich man is a fool. The Lord himself also mentioned about how difficult it is for the rich to enter into the kingdom of heaven. And at the same time we also read about him dining and feasting in the rich people such as Lazarus’s home and the tax collectors (Luke 6:29). In Luke 9:3, when the Lord sent out the 12 disciples, he told them: Take nothing for the journey, no staff, no bag, no bread, no money. Yet, we read about they carry purse, They even have a treasurer, Judas who is in charge of money. Then in His parables, one He rebuked a rich fool who built larger barns to store his surplus and in another he rebuked the man who failed to invest a large surplus wisely. So which is correct. Of course we know that the Scripture is always right and is never in conflict. The most important thing is that we read the Scripture with an open heart and the Lord will show us the way.

Because of time constraint, what I will do this morning is to quickly go through 3 parables of the Lord on the subject of money and from there pick up a few simple yet vital truth that all of us can learn. Bearing in mind that today is Youth Sunday and the message is gear towards them, although it is also applicable to the older youth like you and me.

The parable of Ten Minas (Luke 19:11-27)

- The money are entrusted to us, like a master putting money in the care of the servants.
- The money does not belong to us. The servants said it clearly, Your minas (16,18) and the third servant (20) said “Here is Your mina.”
- Don’t hide the talents given to you. Don’t be lazy. Or you will be called wicked.
- Even though all servants are given the same amount, each gained different amount based on their ability.
- As long as there is effort, there is reward.
- The master praises them for being faithful and not shrewd or smart entrepreneurs. He said you good servant and because you are trustworthy in a very small matter, I give you more. The reward was great.
- But what is the purpose of gaining more money. We move on to the next parable

The parable of the shrewd Steward (Luke 16:1-13)

- The master commented the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. He was impressed by his ingenuity and craftiness.
- Non Christian behave better as non Christians compare to us Christian behave as Christians
- Use the money and resources given to us to help others and to gain soul
- When Moses was instructed to build the tabernacle for God to dwell in, we read about the people came forward with materials and skill. God raised up skillful craftmen that were filled with the Spirit. Bazalel and Ohalieb. They gave so much that Moses had to ask them to stop. EX 36.
- A few generations later, when David was preparing the temple for Solomon to build, he asked the people to offer money, materials and everyone gladly did it. Although it was not God initiative, we read that at the completion of the temple, the holy presence of God was in the temple.
- Fast forward again, just about 2000 years ago, the Lord Jesus Christ gave the great commission and he said: “I will build my church”. Yes, the church is growing, today we are an imperfect church, but the Lord added daily to the numbers those who were saved as we read in Acts. Since then, money and lives were spent for the advancement of the gospel. The world we are in today is definitely more affluence and no excuse for not using our resources to advance the kingdom.
- The message is quite the same as the previous parable. Again our faithfulness counts. Even with little things
- No servant can serve two masters. God demands our steadfast faithfulness.
- Suddenly the message is clear, Yes, we want to gain more money but that is not our main objective in life. We certainly cannot let money replace our God.
- This lead us to the next parable

The parable of the rich fool (Luke 12:13-21)

- A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions (v15)
- To store up treasure in heaven and rich towards God
- Don’t trust in our wealth
- Be content. In hotel we say “if there anything else you need that or do to make you happy, please let me know.” . “ Is there anything you need or do to make you happy, we will show you how you can live without it.”
- Continue reading this chapter, the Lord told the disciples, not to worry but seek ye first the His kingdom and all these things will be given to you.

Conclusions:

Our money, treasure, possessions do not belong to us. We are only the care taker.
We are to be faithful in using the money and possessions given to us
We are to use the money for God. It is for the advancement of His kingdom.
We are to serve God and not money.
We are to be content and be rich towards God so that we can give him the full Lordship.

Money is important. As we read in proverb 10:4, Lazy hands make a man poor, but diligent hands bring wealth. Don’t stay poor but at the same time don’t make money your priority. Proverb 28: 19-20. He who works his land will have abundant food, but the one who chases fantasies will have his fill of poverty. A faithful man will be richly blessed, but one eager to get rich will not go unpunished.
Don’t be like the bird in the cage, in the pursue of money and richness, keep looking for the ladder, the mirror, the bell and the swing and forget about the important thing and mission here on earth. We will end up like the bird, exhausted and dead.

Faith in the workplace


Tomorrow is Monday, the start of another week for us either in a paid or unpaid work that involve the world. Most of us are Christian and something else – office worker, homemaker, mechanic, teacher, sales personnel and so on. The average Christian spends less than five percent of their waking time at church. Yet we emphasize so much in this five percent and very little in the world of daily work. Christianity is not merely something that one practices within the walls of the church. Rather, living out one¹s faith is a 24/7 matter and that surely includes our life at our workplace since work occupies such a large proportion of our lives. Dwight Moody once said that out of 100 people, 1 will read the bible, but the other 99 will read Christians. Even in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ, people around him look at him from the angle of his profession. “Isn't this the carpenter?” They asked in Mark 6:3. Likewise, people around us will question: “Isn’t this the teacher?”, “Isn’t this the Accountant?”; “Isn’t this the lawyer?”.

The question is this: Is our faith transforming our work or is our work changing our faith.

Following Jesus by taking our faith into the workplace is not going to be easy in today pluralistic society. It is however, a ground full of opportunities for us to exercise our faith. I believe there are three simple principles that can help us in our workplace. These three principles are taken from the story of David and Goliath. David’s attitude at work (ie. fighting Goliath) is what we should emulate. Confront with a big task at work, where is our faith? The Israelites’ attitude was “Wow!, so big, cannot fight, sure lose”; whereas David’s attitude was “wow!, SO BIG, CANNOT MISS, SURE WIN”.

The three principles are CONFIDENCE in our faith, COMPETENT at our work and have CHARACTER at our workplace.

1. CONFIDENCE in our faith

How easy it is for us to forget we are Christian whenever we are in a minority position. So many times we choose to bury our light under the bed because at our workplace, we feel so small, we could be the only one who is a believer in our work place. Suddenly our God is not so great anymore. Here in the Church, we sing with the loudest voice, we sing holy holy God, powerful and everlasting and tomorrow these verses mean nothing at all.

How can we display our faith if our confidence in our God waiver?

Let me share with you the story of Coca cola. How a giant cola company made the biggest blunder just because suddenly they lost their confidence in their product.

As you know, the Coca-Cola Company is the world's largest cola maker. There are literally hundred of cola in the world: RC cola, Pepsi Cola, Star Cola, Inca Cola, mecca Cola and even our own Malaysian Sabah Gardinia Cola. Since the 1800 when coca cola first introduced to the world, it has always sit on the number one position. According to one survey, it is a product recogizable by more than 94% of the world population.

Coca Cola nearest rival is of course Pepsi Cola. These two companies have been keen competitor for hundred of years. In the 1980s Pepsi began a series of campaign that portrait it as a choice of the new generation. They used a lot of young and famous people such as Michael Jackson, Britney Spears to take a sip at Pepsi and declare to the world it is the cola of their choice. Pepsi- the choice of a new generation became a famous slogan.

This of course has a great impact and put a lot of heat on Coca Cola. Sales of Pepsi shoot up dramatically.

Then Pepsi came out with a very successful and brilliant marketing work - blind sip taste. The randomly selected tester is first blind folded and he is given 2 cups of cola. Taking a sip and savoring the taste, Pepsi is able to show that almost 6 out of every 10 tests, the blind folded tester preferred Pepsi. This was shown repeatedly on the TV. There is no data manipulation, there is no hidden camera, consumers began to doubt on their taste. If in a blind test, I like the taste of Pepsi, why am I buying coke all the time? Coca Cola was even more worry, isn’t us the real thing, isn’t our cola give us that refreshing unbeatable taste that place us as number 1?

Coca cola’s confidence in their product dropped like a bombshell. They have to do something. They began a new formula and do their own secret test. This new formula was a sweeter variation with less tang, it was also slightly smoother. After spending about US4 million dollars and thousand of blind tests, they are ready to introduce to the world a new and improved coke. So on April 23rd, 1985, in front of more than two hundred TV and newspaper reporters, the new coke was introduced. The Chairman of the company has a renewed confidence and he declared that “This is the surest thing we have ever done”.

The change to the world's best selling soft drink was heard by 81 percent of the United States population within twenty-four hours of the announcement. Within a week of the change, one thousand calls a day were flooding the company's eight hundred number. Most of the callers were shocked and/or outraged, many said that they were considering switching to Pepsi. Within six weeks, the eight hundred number was being jammed by six thousand calls a day. The company also fielded over forty thousand letters, which were all answered and each person got a coupon for the new Coke. Many American consumers of Coca-Cola asked if they would have the final say. Many coke drinkers became outrage that the very coke that they have enjoyed is now not available and this new coke taste awful. People brought trucks load of old coke and stock up their basement. Association of old coke drinkers was formed. When Pepsi heard that the Coca-Cola company was changing its secret formula they said that it was a decision that Pepsi tastes better. Roger Enrico, the president and CEO of Pepsi-Cola wrote a letter to every major newspaper in the U.S. to declare the victory. Later he even wrote a book called “The other guy blinked-How Pepsi won the Cola war”.

On July 10, 1985, eighty seven days after the new coke was introduced, Coke bowed down to the demand and brought back the old coke. They have to because market share continued to drop and consumer protest was everywhere. To save face, they called the old coke classic coke but continue to market the new coke as Coke. However, the new coke never took off and production eventually stopped.

The comeback of old Coke drove stock prices to the highest level. Coke eventually claims back the lost market share, and to today remains as the number 1 cola in the world.

Pepsi is smart to use a blind sip test. In taste tests, drinkers were more likely to respond positively to sweeter drinks, and Pepsi had the advantage over Coke because it is much sweeter. When you sip a little you may prefer that sweet taste but when you drink it as a whole, sometime the sweetness will overcome you. There is nothing new in this, but Coke’s confidence was shaken and they taught us a valuable lesson. So often, we may be put in a position such that we begin to doubt our belief and our confidence in God faded. If our God is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6); and agree with Peter that, “Lord, to whom shall we go, You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God ” (John 6:68 ) – we must go out there and bring this confidence and not to blink when the outside force seem so strong.

I will come back to this principle a little while later. For now let’s turn to Principle No.2.

2. COMPETENT in our work

We can display as much confidence in our faith at our workplace, but it means nothing if our competency at work is lacking. If you ask me to choose between Dentist A who is a Christian but lousy dentist and Dentist B who is a non-Christian but excellent in his dental work, I will advise you to visit Dentist B.

Col 3:23 says “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men”. Such should be out attitude when we report to work each day. We are our God’s representative. Ambassador of Christ.

Every job has critical skill requirement. Christians or not, if we are hire to do a job, we better be good at it. Ecclesiastes 9:10 reads “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might”. This is also very relevant in today’s competitive environment. That’s why we must always improve and sharpen our skill.

Let’s turn to 1 Samuel Chapter 17 and read the story of David and Goliath. David is a confident boy when he saw Goliath. Saul and all the Israelites were dismayed and terrified (1 Sam 17:11). David asked, “who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?” (1 Sam 17:26) but his brothers started to turn the issue around and scolded David (V27,28).

Look also at how David displayed his competency when he defeated Goliath. Verses 34-37 tell us that David has been trained and do well in fighting the wild beasts. Fighting this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them (v36). David also added that the Lord protect him likewise (V37). In fact David is so good at what he has been doing that he did not even require the extra gears given to him by Saul (v39). David told Goliath in verse 45, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel whom you have defied. This day the Lord will hand you over to me.”

Again, I repeat, when the Israelites army saw Goliath, they said “WOW, so big, cannot fight, sure lose!” but David didn’t think so, when he saw Goliath, he said, “WOW, so big, cannot miss, sure win!”

To display our faith in the workplace, we must carry the attitude of David fighting Goliath. Have confidence in our God but also competent at doing our job.


3. CHARACTER at our workplace

Our character at our workplace speaks volume. Again, we can be the best programmer or best accountant at work, but if we cannot be trusted or is known for deception, our faith means nothing to others at our workplace. Integrity at workplace cannot be compromised.

Back to the choice of the Dentist I mentioned earlier, if Dentist B excels in his dental work but one of poor integrity, I will advise you to look for another dentist.

The Bible has plenty of instructions on building Christian characters. We are told not to conform to the standard of this world. David refused to wear Saul’s gear (1 Sam 17:39). No, we do not have to wear the world’s uniform. The Apostle Paul’s Epistle talks about rules for holy living, this is in Colossians. In Ephesians, he talked about be imitator of God. How our characters should be pure, no foolish talk, coarse joking. We are to be honest, love righteousness and justice. Likewise, James and Peter also have something to say about Christian living. Even the old testament has laws and regulation that guide the Israelites. For example, the ten commandments.

This is probably the most difficult part in our workplace as most of us work in a non-Christian organization. When our colleagues start a gossip, do I join in or do I stop them or walk away? Foul language can easily be learned. Greed, inconsiderate may become norm. Are we feeding our new nature?


Conclusion

Having these three simple characteristics in mind can prepare us to exercise our faith at our workplace. If our co-workers witness our confidence in our God, that we are a competent worker who have integrity and full of Christian characters, it is more likely that he will listen to us. Let us remember these three principles as shown to us by David, it will challenge us as well as encourage us to stand up for our faith.

Psalm 100

Psalm 100 A psalm. For giving thanks.

Let us begin by reading the first verse of Psalm 100 and 66. Wait a minute there is no Psalm 166. If you are looking for it, you have not read your Bible enough to realize there are only 150 Psalms. What I mean is to read the first verse of Psalm 100 and the first verse of Psalm 66. Let’s read 66 first.

Shout with joy to God, all the earth! Psalm 66:1

Now turn to Psalm 100.
1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
2 Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.
3 Know that the LORD is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.

Psalm 100 is known as a Psalm for thanks giving and sometimes also refer as a Psalm of praise. But I recently found out that of the 150 Psalms, about 70% of it takes the form of lament and only a minority focus on praise and thanksgiving.

When you read the Psalm, it is like a roller coaster ride of emotion and moods fighting against each other. On one end we read about a deep despair and doubts and then on the other end we read about the soaring confidence and praise to God. Doubts. Paranoia, meanness, delight, hatred, joy, praise, vengefulness, betrayal – you find it all. The Psalms give us a comprehensive record of life with God through an individual accounts of the author. It is like a spiritual journal of a personal letter to God. 73 or about half of the Psalms are attributed to David. By reading his Psalm we see that David maintained a very personal relationship with God. By comparing the Psalm he wrote and then compare with the historic record in 1st and 2nd Samuel, we caught David’s spiritual and personal journey with God.

His psalms form a record of his conscious effort to orientate his daily life to God. We on the other hand, fill our day with activities after activities and then try o carved out sometime for spiritual activity such as coming to church and worship. Worship to David and the Psalmists was the central activities in life, not something to get over so that we can get back to our activities. They made God the center of their life so that everything relate to God. It is the other way round.

And so when we read Psalm 100 we can truly appreciate the thanksgiving and the praise because it is as real as the author can experience which he instructed us to do.

1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
In praise, the creature happily acknowledge that everything good and beautiful and true in the universe come from the creator. Here it tells us that praise need not be sober and reflective. We are to shout for joy to the Lord and in Psalm 66 shout with joy to the Lord because the world cannot contain the delight God inspires.
We shout for our team, our child for joy. But not just us, it did not say only the supporter of Jehovah is to shout for joy. All the earth is suppose to shout. We will see why later in verse 3.

2 Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.

Verse 2 give us the attitude of gladness and the action of come to him with joyful songs.

Worship involves attitudes and actions.
Attitudes of awe, reverence, respect, adoration, gladness
Actions of bowing, singing, praising, jumping, serving, giving, preaching …

Singing (Psalm 30:4)
Shouting (Psalm 35:27)
Making a joyful noise (Psalm 98:4)
Laughter (Psalm 126:1-3)
Thanksgiving (Psalm 100:4)
Standing (Deut 10:8)
Kneeling (Psalm 95:6)
Clapping (Psalm 47:1)
Dancing (Psalm 149:3)
Uplifted hands (Psalm 63:4)
Making music on instruments (2 Sam 6-5)

Matt 5:8 - “This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me” (Matthew 15:8). Can’t be hypocrite.

Worship is both a subjective experience and an objective activity. Let me share with you what Warren Wersbe had written in his book real worship.

In John 4:4. the Lord Jesus said that his worshippers must worship him in spirit and in truth. In spirit (not capitalized) is the subjective part and in truth is the objective part.

So when worship God, we let our spirit take control. When John says worship in spirit and in truth, he is talking about worship God through our personal experience. Worship should be a result of our response to God. In short, it is our personal relationship with Him. Don’t misunderstand me here, we must not neglect the Holy Spirit to guide us. I believe the Holy Spirit will not violate our personality but use it to express our praise to god. This is why no two believers can have identical worship experience even though they participate in the same service, at the same time, in the same venue. My worship experience this morning is not the same as Eng Hock or Simon or Alvin because we all have different personal experience and relationship with the same God. Eng Hock was jumping and clapping when we sang “Hallelujah to The Lamb” just now, I wasn’t but we both worship with gladness, although the degree may be different. So it is very subjective.

On the other hand, objective truth cannot be changed, even though our understanding or our experience may change. Verse 3 reads: Know that the LORD is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Two things to take note. Number 1 is that truth is important. It is such a sad affair that million of people are worshiping God without the correct truth. Hence knowledge is important. Here it reminds us that God made us. It reminds us of the relationship of creature and creator. We know that He is the God who made us, hence as the creature, we enjoy the creation and honor the creator. The Holy sovereign God is eternal. Matter is not eternal, hence we don’t worship the creation but the creator. Remember we are his. As sheep of His pasture reminds us again of a God who will take care of us.

We must equip ourselves with knowledge about our God so that we can worship him. Knowing the truth such as Trinity, salvation, holy Spirit and His son, Jesus Christ. Also He is a living God, Christ is sinless , God is love and willing to forgive, the resurrected Lord cannot be changed or compromised. We sang Hallelujah to the lamb. The truth is the Lamb takes away our sin. So when we worship Him this morning, we must not under mind this truth. Here all of us in the church must subscribe to the written truth in the Bible. We must keep the right balance. Bible knowledge must come with personal spiritual experience. While we must not base our theology on experience neither must we debase our theology by divorcing it from experience.

4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.

Worshipper must be active participants. We are to give thanks and to praise His name.
I. Thanksgiving is the Only Appropriate Response for What God Has Done for Us.
1) Thanksgiving requires us to focus on the blessings that God has provided.
2) When we stop focusing on the blessings God has provided, we lose our perspective regarding thanksgiving.
3) When we lose our perspective regarding thanksgiving, our relationship with God will begin to suffer.
4) Thanksgiving is the only appropriate response if we wish to maintain our relationship with God.
II. Thanksgiving Brings About A Change of Attitude In Our Lives.

Thanksgiving leads to humility, dependence on God in prayer and joy.
III. Thanksgiving Spurs us to Action for the Welfare and Benefit of Others.

5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.

However, we are called to worship our God is not a one way street command. God himself prove to us that He is worthy of our praise because He is good and He is faithful forever.

Complaining and questioning slander God, and they also reveal pride. We are freed from these bad attitudes when we hold on to one simple truth: God is good. He is always good. He can't be any other way. His nature is good, and He always acts in accordance with His nature. We must hold steadfastly to our knowledge that God is good because appearances will sometimes indicate otherwise.

We don’t have to go far. Psalm 103 sum up nicely why God is good.

Psalm 100 not only called us to worship but also tell us how to worship. The Psalmist, in an especial manner, invites believers to praise God, because he has chosen them to be his people, and has taken them under his care.