Ryan Hale

The Thessalonian believers had experienced some severe persecution. If we look back to the first part of Acts 17, we see that some of the Jews there in Thessalonica had believed as a result of Paul and Silas’s teaching and preaching, but several others had formed a mob and even started a riot in the city, looking for Paul and Silas in order to beat them, likely even to kill them.

They didn’t find them as they had hoped at Jason’s house, so instead they took Jason and dragged him out of his house and before the city officials, accusing him of accommodating these “troublemakers”, Paul and Silas, who had simply been teaching the word of God in the synagogue for the last three Saturdays, the last three sabbaths.

So unfortunately, not only was there a severe threat of violence, there were also legal and financial troubles as a result of believing. Jason and his frinds who had believed had been taken before the officials and were even forced to post bond in order to be released.

So this is the context in which Paul had sent the Thessalonians a letter from Corinth, just a few months later. Paul had to escape from Thessalonica, and then subsequently from Berea because the Thessalonian Jews had even chased him there, moving down to Athens, and ultimately on to Corinth where he was working at the time. He wrote back to the Thesslonians to encourage them in their faith, that they shouldn’t give up, that they should keep going, because it was in the middle of the persecution, and maybe even directly as a result of the persecution that they were experiencing, that the message of their faith was amplified:

You became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. The Lord’s message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere.

1 Thessalonians 1:6-8

Paul praises the Thessalonians because he knows what it means to be persecuted for their faith. Now, the Thessalonians were also experiencing the same, except they were living it, at home, even in their time. We might say that Paul had experienced persecution for the work that he had done, and we would be correct in saying this, but the Thessalonians, and people in many other cities like them, continued to experience the persecution that Paul experienced as well. And yet they continued to live their faith there locally. It was worth it to them. It was worth all of the hassle, the pain, the suffering, the loss, because they could have both now and eternally that which they couldn’t have before: a joy in Christ given to them by the Holy Spirit.

They had joy in Christ that was given to them by the Holy Spirit. It isn’t some type of happiness that is momentary and fleeting. No, it is a joy that is lasting, that goes on even despite the difficulties, despite the suffering in which they found themselves.

When we see this type of joy, it makes an impact on us. When you see joy in the midst of turmoil, in the midst of difficulty and suffering, in the midst of persecution, you immediately wonder why. Why would this person be joyful when they should be sad? Why do they seem to have a source of life within them that sustains them when they should instead be complaining because of their circumstances? Their life seems upside-down. It seems strange. Joy instead of sadness in the midst of problems? There is something else that is happening here that we aren’t seeing…

This joy that the Thessalonians were experiencing was an important reason that their message was ringing out from them. Yes, they were telling others. Absolutely they were speaking. They must.

Yes, they were experiencing the work, the power of the Holy Spirit. They were likely seeing miracles in their midst.

But it is extremely important that we understand the context in which these people became believers and were continuing in their faith. Despite their circumstances, despite their difficulties, despite the persecution that they were experiencing every day, they had joy, a deep and profound joy in Christ. And so when they spoke of their faith, or when they spoke of what God had done in their life, their words were not theoretical. They were experiential. You could see those words in action. You could understand that there was something that had truly changed.

And so their faith became known everywhere. The Lord’s message rang out as a result of the faith that they were living, in joy in the midst of the persecution. The Thessalonians became an example to everyone. The Macedonian churches – at the least, those in Philippi, in Thessalonica, and in Berea – and those in Achaia, the church in Corinth and possibly other believers and other churches as well. Their faith became known everywhere and the Lord’s message rang out from them as they took their example from Paul and Silas and in their joy in Christ, they became an example for all of the other churches as well.

Last night, I had the opportunity to answer a question from a friend who is a new believer that had come out of Islam and his own type of atheism to eventually place his faith in Christ. He had a question about the work of the Holy Spirit as he was trying to understand the difference between the three persons of the Trinity, the three ways in which God shows himself to us.

My friend had asked what the Spirit does within us and I explained that, first and foremost, it is the Spirit of God that makes us alive before God. In our sins, we are dead and in Christ we are made alive, placing our faith and trust in his death and resurrection. As we do that, the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit is given to us and we are marked as God’s people with a seal, a seal that represents the promise before God that we are his.

Of course, this comes straight from Ephesians 1 and 2 where we see that Paul says that we were dead in our transgressions and sins and yet, despite being dead, God makes us alive – spiritually alive – in Christ. As we stand before God, he sees us in Christ. He sees us alive.

But if we are in our sins, we are dead. There is nothing more that we can do. There is nothing that can be further done on our own to make ourselves come alive. We are dead.

But Christ makes us alive. He acts upon us as the one who can make the dead come alive, giving us the Holy Spirit as the seal, the confirmation, the actual life that is within us. It is the life that only God can give and it is the life by which we live as those who follow Jesus.

Of course, in this Easter season, it is an appropriate time to remember what Christ has done. Last Sunday marked “Palm Sunday”, remembering when Jesus entered into Jerusalem seated on a donkey as the people triumphantly waved palm branches in a demonstration of the coming king. This Friday will mark “Good Friday”, remembering Jesus’s death on the cross. And this coming Sunday will mark Christ’s resurrection, when Jesus was raised from the dead.

And so it is appropriate to remember that Jesus was the first amongst us who are raised from the dead. As we say that we are following Christ, we do, of course, mean that we desire to do what he says to do. In this way, we follow him, obeying him, demonstrating our love for him, just as he says that we must by doing what he commands us to do.

But there is another very important sense also in which we follow him, at least one other sense in which I want to note as I read from the story of Christ’s resurrection this morning. We follow Jesus in his death and resurrection.

“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him.

Mark 16:6

If we remember that we were dead in our sins, and yet we were made alive in Christ, we can understand that we are actually spiritually following a similar path, similar steps that Jesus followed. Without deserving punishment, Jesus died as a perfect sacrifice. He did not sin, but yet he was killed on the cross, shedding his blood for our sins.

We, on the other hand, did deserve punishment. We deserved the death that we received because of the sins that we have committed. Thanks to God that he made a plan that would allow our sins to be paid for by Christ himself!

So we give thanks all the more because Jesus not only paid for our sins, he was raised from the dead. He was resurrected. He came back to life, and so in this same way, we follow Jesus. Because he paid for our sins, he allows us to come back to life as well. He allows us to live, and live forever. Like him, we no longer experience spiritual death. We will go on to live forever, eternally with him.

This is the amazing gift that he gives us. He gives us life. Life that continues on forever. Life that rips us away from the kingdom of darkness to come into the kingdom of God. Life that allows us live for him forever, glorifying him, living for him instead of living for myself. Once I was dead, but now, like Jesus, I have been risen to life to live in this way and for this purpose forever.

Joseph of Arimathea was a member of the Council, one of the leaders from the Sannhedrin who had just been part of the group that had sent Jesus before Pilate, the move that ultimately sent Jesus to his death. From what we can tell, it doesn’t seem that Joseph spoke up for Christ before Jesus had died. Maybe he didn’t realize that it would go this far. Maybe he wasn’t sure what he believed. Possibly he was intimidated into not speaking up. We don’t really know.

But Joseph now knew that Jesus was dead. An innocent man had been nailed to the cross and left to die. Jesus’s blood was on their hands, and Joseph knew it. He knew that they, the Jewish leaders, had done this and he couldn’t let the disgrace continue.

It was a dangerous time, though. The Jews had been fine with killing an innocent man, and the Romans were indifferent about whether any Jew lived or died. They simply wanted peace. They primarily wanted to maintain their empire and maintain the civil status quo. No one person, or even group of people, innocent or otherwise, would stand in the way of accomplishing these goals.

Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body.

Mark 15:43

It took great courage for Joseph to go to Pilate to ask for Jesus’s body. He could have been called out as one of Jesus’s followers. He could have been identified as one to be counted amongst the enemy. After Jesus’s death, his followers could be next, hunted down and killed.

This was, in fact, the very question that the Sannhedrin considered just a few weeks later. They had arrested the apostles, who by this time had received the Holy Spirit and had gone public with the start of the church in Jerusalem, and they wanted to kill them.

Then subsequently with the arrest of Stephen, they went through with it. They killed him and a persecution broke out against the believers.

So Joseph would have known the danger that he was in. He would have understood the climate within which he was acting. He knew that it would be a great risk to be known as the one who was caring for the body of Christ.

Yet he went. He took great courage. He went boldly to Pilate. He was waiting for the coming of the kingdom of God. He thought that Jesus may have been the one to restore the kingdom to Israel, but those hopes now had been shattered. Yet still they had killed an innocent man.

Will we act with such boldness? With such courage? Even in the face of danger? Or even if not danger, in the face of embarrassment? Or at the potential loss of status? Or money? Not because we are identified with our church or potentially a particular political statement, but because we are identified with Jesus. Is Jesus worth so much to us that we would give up those other things? May it be that we would go boldly, that we would live with courage because of our identification with Christ.

As Jesus celebrated the Passover with his disciples, he made some simple statements that I think we can frequently overcomplicate based on our religious traditions and misunderstanding of the bigger picture of what Jesus was about to do, both in the next few hours as well as in the coming centuries:

First, as they were eating dinner together, Jesus picked up some bread, broke it, and began to hand it to his disciples:

Take it; this is my body.

Mark 14:22

Very simply, Jesus was telling his disciples that his body would be broken, just as he had broken the bread.

Next, he picks up a cup of wine and passes it to the entire group and they all drank from it. He told them:

This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many

Mark 14:24

There are a few things to note here. First, he says that is the blood of the covenant. What covenant?

God made covenants – or you might in another way say “agreements” – with his people. He would be their God and they would be his people. He did it with Abraham. He did it with Moses.

God would be their God: watching over them, leading them, protecting them, guiding them, and more. Meanwhile, they would obey him. They would follow his commands and do what he said that they must do.

This was the essence of the old covenant, an agreement between God and his people, the people of Israel.

Now, Jesus is saying that he, himself, is establishing a new covenant. He is now making a covenant that will supersede the covenant that was made previously between God and the Israelite people.

Keep in mind…only God can make a covenant between God and his people. And yet, here is Jesus making the covenant, demonstrating that he himself is God. He is saying that this wine within the cup that he is sharing with his people represents his blood that is being poured out for the people. This blood is what will bring redemption. It is what will cleanse his people, giving them forgiveness for their sins. This wine represents this new agreement, that anyone who puts their faith in the blood will now be his people. This is the agreement: Through Jesus, God will be our God and we will be his people.

But there is an even bigger picture to this story than Jesus offering salvation. There is an even bigger picture than Jesus revealing his identity in this moment. Jesus makes a prophetic statement to finish his point to the disciples with the lesson that he gives through the bread and the cup:

Truly I tell you, I will not drink again from the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.

Mark 14:25

Even at this moment, we are waiting on Jesus to return. He is the bridegroom and his people are his bride, and there will be a great marriage in heaven with a great banquet to celebrate the marriage of the Lord to his people. In fact, if we read in Revelation 19, we can see a representation of exactly that for which we are waiting:

Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting:

“Hallelujah!
For our Lord God Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and be glad
and give him glory!
For the wedding of the Lamb has come,
and his bride has made herself ready.
Fine linen, bright and clean,
was given her to wear.”
(Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of God’s holy people.)

Then the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!” And he added, “These are the true words of God.”

Revelation 19:6-9

There will be a great banquet for the bridegroom and for the bride. Jesus will be at the wedding banquet as will all of those who are the Bride of Christ, those who are part of his kingdom. Jesus is the Lamb that was slain. It is his banquet!

So this is the time in which he will drink the cup anew in the kingdom. That is the day in which the Bride will be united with her Bridegroom, the day in which the fulfillment and completion of the kingdom of God will come to pass.

As we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we must keep in mind that there are profound things that Jesus is saying. He is declaring things that have already happened. He is declaring the agreement that God now makes with his people through the blood of Christ. And he is foreshadowing that which will yet happen as we look to the day that everything will be finished and we will one day be united with him. Maranatha – come Lord Jesus! May you drink the cup one day new in our presence as your Bride.

I learned something about agriculture and growing fig trees today. I was curious why Jesus was so upset with the fig tree when he saw that it had leaves, but then, upon looking closer, he found that the tree wasn’t bearing any fruit.

Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then he said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard him say it.

Mark 11:13-14

What I learned today is that when a fig tree has leaves, it should also be in the process of growing fruit. On the other hand, if it isn’t the season for figs, you shouldn’t see leaves on the fig tree either.

So what was the problem in this case, with this fig tree? The problem wasn’t necessarily that the tree wasn’t producing fruit. The problem moreso was that the tree was producing leaves, making it look as if it should be producing fruit, and yet there was no fruit to be found. It had the right look for producing fruit, yet no fruit was being produced.

In Jesus’s time, this may have been a representation the spiritual situation, the spiritual context in which Jesus found himself with the nation of Israel. They were supposedly God’s people. They were supposedly serving him, yet they didn’t obey him. They were proud. They didn’t truly want God, they wanted the benefits of being God’s people without actually knowing God or living according to his commands, in relationship with him.

In short, like the fig tree, they were producing all of the leaves, and yet they were producing no fruit.

The fig tree represented the nation of Israel.

We see the evidence of this, in fact, interspersed with the story of the fig tree. Immediately after Jesus initially encounters the fig tree, he enters into Jerusalem and overturns the money changing tables and of those who were selling sacrifices. The temple, the place where Jesus does this, was intended to be a holy place. A place of prayer. A place where sacrifices would be offered. A place where God would be worshiped and glorified. The majority of the activity, though, was actually commercial. People were more concerned about making money in that space than they were in being near to God.

The temple looked like it would be a place that would serve God – like the fig tree, it had all of the leaves – but it was producing no fruit. It was not serving God. It was not necessarily a place to worship God. It was serving man. It was giving to man a way to vend religious goods and services.

A second example, after Jesus and the disciples pass by the fig tree a second time and find it shriveled up, is the question related to John’s baptism. The Pharisees had come to Jesus, asking him by what authority he had been doing the things that he had been doing. Who told him that he could go and overturn the tables of the money changers? Who told him that he could upset the business of those who were selling the sacrifices?

Even in these leaders coming to Jesus to ask this question, we see the example of the fruitless fig tree. They were the religious leaders of the people of Israel, not Jesus, and they wanted to exercise their authority over Jesus and the religious systems of Israel. But if they were truly producing fruit, they should have recognized that what Jesus had done was from God. Jesus’s actions should have caused them to sit and cry out in repentance, not come to judge him and ask him by whose authority he had been acting within the courtyards of the temple.

But Jesus pushes it even one step further. He asks them a question: Was John’s baptism from God or from man?

They don’t know.

And yet they should have known. They should have recognized John’s call to repentance as being directly from God. They should have been the first in line, repenting of their sins.

But the truth was that they didn’t understand the ways of God. They couldn’t understand the ways of God. It wasn’t possible for them to do so because they were spiritually blind. They were spiritually deaf. Their hearts were hard and incapable of understanding that the call to repentance was for the entire nation. Not just some people. All of the people.

These Pharisees, though, were like the fig tree. They had the right look on the outside, they had all of the “leaves” that made them look correctly, but they were not producing fruit.

I think it is important to know that the example of the fig tree may not only represent the nation of Israel. It was a warning to them, but it is also a warning to us. God’s people should all heed the warning of the fig tree. Are we looking right on the outside? Are we producing leaves so that we simply look like we are producing fruit? Do we look like a healthy follower of Christ without producing the fruit of Christ within us or through us?

We need to be sure to learn the lesson and heed the warning of the fig tree. We cannot fool God. He will look for the fruit, and he will either find it or he will not. Will we be a people that will bear fruit? Or will we simply be a people who are producing nothing but leaves?

The father had come to find Jesus. His son had been trapped in a cave of deafness and muteness, not able to hear nor speak. However, this father heard that there was a man who was able to heal and he hoped that this man would be able to change everything, to allow his son to hear and to speak again.

But the father nearly made a fatal flaw in his interaction with Jesus. He made his request by saying “if you can do anything…”, then going on to ask Jesus to heal his son.

“If you can…,” Jesus repeated questioningly. Are you sure you want to say it that way?, Jesus seemed to reply. Everything is possible in Christ if you believe.

And here is where I think we can all relate to this father:

Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”

Mark 9:24

The father didn’t know if he could believe it or not. They had agonized over the fact that their son couldn’t hear them. They were incredibly sad that they couldn’t speak with their son. In fact, it was probably even a family embarrassment that their son was known to be possessed by a demon, even one that wanted to regularly kill him.

The father wanted to believe, but he had suffered through so much. He had so many disappointments. He didn’t know for sure, yet, if he could trust that Jesus really could do this, that he could really heal his son.

He believed.

Yet he also admitted that he didn’t fully believe.

I think many of us can relate. There is a big difference between saying that we believe and acting upon those beliefs. There is a significant gap between theoretical understanding of the good news of the Gospel, and completely living and basing our lives on the that same Gospel. We believe, and yet we need to ask Jesus to help our unbelief. We aren’t certain that we can trust him, yet we know that we should. Our entire culture and everything in our world tells us that we must depend upon ourselves, and yet Jesus says that we can come to him and depend on him.

We believe, and yet we need to ask Jesus to help our unbelief.

I turn 51 today, and if I were to make a wish for this birthday, it would be that I would be able to fully live out the belief that I have. It would be that I would be able to truly believe and that would be known and understood because my belief became a reality. But to do that, I must continue to stay connected to Christ, continually asking him to help me overcome my unbelief in each circumstance. Will I trust him today? And tomorrow? And the next day? Lord Jesus, I believe. I pray that you help me overcome my own self when I demonstrate my unbelief.

I needed to read this story this morning. The disciples were clearly not understanding who Jesus was and what their response should be. Jesus had previously fed more than 5000 people from a few loaves and fish and his disciples had picked up 12 full baskets of bread that were left over. Now, he fed more than 4000 people and they picked up 7 full baskets of bread that were left over.

In both cases, there was a confrontation that followed the events. In the case of the 5000, it was with the crowd of people who followed Jesus to the other side of the lake, wanting to make him king so that they could have more bread. They loved to eat free bread! But Jesus wanted them to understand who he was, so he began to explain himself, saying that he was the manna, the bread that came down from heaven. He said that the people must eat his flesh and drink his blood if they wanted to live. That was the only food and drink that he would offer them beyond what he had given them already.

Now, after feeding the 4000, the confrontation this time was with his disciples. Jesus had told his disciples that they should watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and of Herod. They should be looking out for religiosity that simply demands another sign, then demands another sign, then demands another sign. If only they had another sign, then they might believe. In short, this “yeast” was that of unbelief despite knowing what was true, despite having seen things that only God could do with their own eyes.

The disciples didn’t get it, so Jesus spells it out for them and calls them to account:

Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them: “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear? And don’t you remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”

“Twelve,” they replied.

“And when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”

They answered, “Seven.”

He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”

Mark 8:17-21

Jesus is telling them to not be like the Pharisees or Herod. Don’t be the people that have eyes and perfectly good vision and yet do not see. Don’t be among those who have ears and perfectly good hearing and yet do not listen and comprehend what you are hearing.

And what is more… Do not forget.

Remember what I have done.

And this is the lesson for me this morning. In the middle of difficult times, in the middle of challenges, in the middle of one problem after the next, I need to remember that God has done miracles before. He has been faithful over and over. He has taken care of us, taken care of all of us, even in the midst of difficulty. And he will do it again.

My role, what I must do, is believe.

Yes, I must act. I must continue forward. I must do what he has called me to do. But Jesus promises that he will go with me. He will be with each of us. And it will be his power that will work all things out. Now, will I walk today in that belief? Or will I walk in anxiety and unbelief, living instead by the yeast of the Pharisees and Herod? That is the question for me today and the same question for each of us throughout our lives. Upon whom am I depending? Me? Or God? I pray that I will depend on him today. His strength and not my own, for his glory.

Our tendency is to build ourselves up. Our tendency is to show ourselves to be great, to have accomplished many things. Our tendency is to try to make ourselves look good in the eyes of other people.

Paul tells the Corinthians that he has the credentials. In fact, he wears the credentials on his body. He has the scars that he has obtained by the preaching of the Gospel, and carries around the scars for the preaching of the Gospel. He has worked hard, been in prison many times, been beaten and flogged, and near death several times.

He has received the severe punishment of 40 lashes minus 1 five times. Five times!

Beaten with rods, pelted with stones. Shipwrecked. A day and a night on the open sea. Danger on every side, he has gone without sleep, without food, and without shelter.

These are Paul’s credentials. But these are not the credentials of someone who is powerful. These are not the credentials of someone who has become rich or built himself up as he has traveled to preach the Gospel. These are the credentials of someone who has poured himself out compeltely for one cause, for one simple idea: That Christ would be glorified in him and would receive all of the glory because of the people that would believe in him and live for him.

That’s it. It is worth all of that for that one reason. Paul lives his life for that reason, and that reason alone, and so he boasts of his weakness. He isn’t a strong man. From an earthly, human perspective, he is actaully quite weak, but everything he is doing, he is doing for the glory of God.

If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness.

2 Corinthisna 11:30

If Paul will have something to boast about, he will actually boast as a result of his weakness. That is his goal. That is his desire, that he would be known only for the power that he has because of the power of Christ within him. It is easy to see the weakness with which he is living his life and doing his work. But looking at his life, you can see the incredible effect, the great result of this work in his life. Not through strength. Not through riches, and not through any power that Paul has obtained. Instead, this result came as a result of his weakness and the power of Christ working through him.

This must also be our aim, to live as those who are weak. Not because we are deliberately trying to be weak, but because we are living singularly for the glory of Christ. We must no longer live to build ourselves up, but we live to build up Christ. We no longer live for our glory, but for his.

This is the transformation that God makes within us as we continue to grow in our faith. We no longer live for ourselves, but we live for him. We no longer look to increase ourselves, but we give Christ every part of our lives. This is who he has created us to be and what he has created us to do, to live as weak vessels, completely dependent upon him, for his glory.

Paul isn’t completely sure that the Corinthians are ready to give. He has been talking them up, bragging about them to the people in the Macedonian churches, but in truth, he does have a little doubt in his mind that the Corinthians are ready to follow through, ready to actually give to see through the collection for the church in Jerusalem.

So he is writing to the Corinthians to prepare them. He is also sending Titus and at least one other person to them to prepare them. He wants to make sure that they will be ready and that the Macedonians will continue to be encouraged by their brothers in sisters in Christ in Corinth, encouraged that they are doing this together as one body and not just on their own.

So Paul encourages the Corinthians that they can be like the one who supplies seed to the sower in the field:

Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.

2 Corinthians 9:10-11

This got me thinking this morning: What is Paul’s real goal in speaking this way to the Corinthians?

I believe, of course, Paul wants to motivate the Corinthians to give. He wants them to understand how their giving can be like sowing seed in a field with the goal of reaping a harvest.

Then I thought: How do Paul’s words get twisted in our day today?

Reading small portions of even that which I have quoted above, and taking those words out of context, you could easily read him to say that if you give money, you will get even more money.

And this is exactly how many of our “prosperity gospel” preachers or televangelist-types today will preach, saying that those who are listening to them will, in the end, receive more and more money. They tell people that if they just give…and if they just keep giving…God promises that they will receive. Their “harvest”, which they interpret as their own personal bank account, will increase. They make people believe that God wants to give them more money.

But that is not what Paul is saying. He says that their righteousness will increase. He is not talking about a harvest that necessarily includes a bigger bank account. He is talking about investment and return in the kingdom of God. He is talking about sowing and reaping righteousness. He is ultimately talking about living for God’s glory. Not the glory of the one who is sowing. Not even the one who is providing the seed. No, instead, he is talking about the one who is the Lord of the harvest, God himself. He is the one who will receive the glory. It is for him, not for us.

So, do you wish to enlarge the harvest? The harvest of the kingdom of God? If so, then you must give from which you have been given. From that which you have received, you must sow again. Your funds. Your time. Your life. That is what Jesus did. He took the life that he was given and he gave it for us. The return on his investment, the harvest, were the souls of the people for whom he died, that would then be given to the Father. The harvest of the Jews and the Gentiles. And now that is what Paul is calling the Corinthians, and each of us, to do as well. Not to enlarge our own harvest, but to enlarge the harvest for the Lord of the harvest because it all belongs to him.

Paul was working on a donation that the churches would offer to the church in Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the home of the first church, the mother church, if you will. Jerusalem was the city where the apostles were continuing their work, but they were continuing the work under persecution and under significant financial stress as well.

So Paul’s desire was to share with the church in Jerusalem, and as he shared this desire, the vision to share with the church in Jerusalem, Paul began to also hear from the other churches in their desire to share in the work. And the response from the Macedonian churches was astounding:

For I testify that they gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability. Entirely on their own, they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service to the Lord’s people.

2 Corinthians 8:3-4

The Macedonians were not rich. In fact, they were quite poor, yet their hearts had been changed such that they wanted to participate in giving. They wanted to be generous. In fact, they urgently pleaded with Paul so that he would accept their gift. We don’t know if Paul had suggested that they not give, or possibly give less, but it seems that may have been a possibility. Yet the Macedonian churches truly wanted to participate. They truly wanted to be a part of what was happening. They urgently pleaded with Paul that they could give.

So Paul used this example as he wrote to the Corinthians to help them understand the heart of giving as a result of the change that Christ has made within us. Jesus had given all in his love for the Macedonians, and now the Macedonians are giving all that they could give for the body of Christ.

This is the change that Christ makes within us when we realize the truth of salvation that he has given to us. Not only does he give us eternal life, but a new heart. This changes everything, and as a result, makes us want to no longer live for ourselves, but to live for him and for his glory. We no longer want to keep everything for ourselves, but we want to give everything to him and for him.

This is the example that Paul is putting on display for the Corinthians. He is helping the Corinthian church to see that God has so completely changed the hearts of the Macedonian churches that they would plea with him to receive the gift that they had prepared, asking him to take their money such that it would be a blessing for the people living in Jerusalem.

What does this teach us? What do we do? How have we been changed? Are we living in this same way that we would urgently plea that someone would receive the gift that we have been called to give?

Or do we live for ourselves? Do I instead simply live for me?

We each, whether we make a lot of money or a little, have the privilege of sharing with another. This could be through our finances, or it could be through our time, or in giving what we have. Each person has received and so each person, as a result of what Christ has done in them, should also give. And in giving from what we have, we do not only give from our plenty, but we give urgently and pleadingly because of the great gift that has been given to each of us.