MONEY
MONEY AND WEALTH
DR. JIM DIXON
NOVEMBER 18, 2007
MATTHEW 6:19-33
Well, I hold in my hand a dollar bill. It might be exactly this dollar bill that I held up here last week. And on the backside of the dollar, you see the great seal of the United States. On the great seal and on the back of the dollar you see three Latin phrases. The first is “E pluribus unum.” This phrase came from the first committee on the great seal—Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin. E Pluribus Unum literally means “out of many, one.” Out of many states, one nation.
The second Latin phrase is “Novus ordo seclorum” Novus ordo seclorum literally means “new order of the ages.” You see, at the end of the 18th century the concept of a nation established on democratic freedoms was radical. It was a Novus ordo seclorum, a new order of the ages.
The final Latin phrase on the dollar bill and on the great seal of the United States is, “Annuit coeptis.” Annuit coeptis literally means, “he has favored our undertaking.” This is God talk. This is a God thing. He, God, has favored our undertaking. And of course, this Latin phrase is placed over the divine eye, the so-called eye of providence. Now, there’s some controversy surrounding our currency and surrounding the great seal of the United States. I mean, some people want to know if some of the symbolism is tied to the European enlightenment. Some want to know if some of the symbolism is tied to Masonic orders, and particularly to the 33rd degree order of Masonry. Some conspiracy buffs want to know if any of the symbolism is tied to the sinister Illuminati.
All of these are speculations. But there’s no doubting this: there’s no denying that on the great seal and on our American currency, there’s a lot of God stuff. There’s a lot of God talk. And in fact, if Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin and John Adams had had their way, there would be more God talk on the great seal and on our currency. Those three men were part of the first committee. Over a period of six years, the great seal of the United States was developed, and it involved three committees. But that first committee was Jefferson and Adams and Franklin. And Jefferson submitted a proposal that on the great seal and on all of our currency there would be this image of the children of Israel passing through the wilderness, led by the divine cloud and the pillar of fire. Jefferson’s dream was that the great seal would portray the providence of God leading His people. That doesn’t seem to fit the modern version of Jefferson’s understanding of separation between church and state.
Benjamin Franklin’s dream was that on the great seal and on our currency there would be portrayed Moses, arms outstretched dividing the Red Sea and the Red Sea closing in on the tyrant, who was the Pharaoh of all Egypt. Franklin wanted the message to go out on the great seal of the United States and on our currency that we believe in God and that God hates tyranny on the earth.
John Adams wanted the great seal and wanted our currency to portray an image that would show a man choosing between good and evil, between right and wrong. The founding fathers, wanted us to look at money and think of God. What an incredible thing.
The founding fathers wanted us to look at the great seal of the United States and actually think of God. And on our currency, of course, we see those words, “In God We Trust.” And those words were placed on all American currency in 1864 and have continued on our currency for all of this time. They were placed there by Salmon Chase, who was the Secretary of the Treasury under Abraham Lincoln. And of course, ultimately, Salmon Chase became the chief justice of the United States Supreme Court. That phrase, “In God We Trust,” became the official motto of the United States on July 30th, 1956.
But God and money… when you look at money, do you think of God? And when you open your wallet or look in your purse and you pull out a dollar bill or a $10 bill or a $100 bill, do you immediately think of God? When you pay your bills, are you thinking of God? When you make purchases, are you thinking of God?
Well, biblically we should be. Now, last week we looked at the relationship between money and soteriology. Soteriology has to do with salvation, the study of the means of salvation. How can I be saved? So, we looked at money and soteriology the first of four great areas of theology. And we looked at the words of Jesus as Jesus said it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into heaven. That was about money and salvation and the warning that money can kind of hinder salvation.
We looked at the parables of the rich fool, the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, the parable of the talents, and the parable of the pounds. We saw again that money can be dangerous; it can be a reflection of a soul that is far from salvation. Money can hinder salvation. We looked at the rich young ruler who came up to Jesus and said, “What must I do to be saved?” And how Jesus ultimately told him, “You must sell all that you have. Give it away. Give it to the poor. Come follow Me and you’ll have treasure in heaven.” And then we saw how Jesus made a similar statement to all of His disciples: sell your possessions. We saw how Jesus said to the multitudes, “Unless you renounce all that you have, you cannot be My disciple.” We saw how the word Lord connotes, in terms of its root meaning, owner, and that lords throughout the ancient world where those who owned properties and lands. The word “lord,” “rios,” means owner, and when you call Jesus Savior and Lord you are acknowledging His ownership. When you come to Him and you receive Him as Savior and Lord, you renounce everything. You renounce everything and He becomes the owner of everything—the owner of our families, the owner of our houses, the owner of our bank accounts, the owner of every dollar we have, the owner of our very souls.
And then we become stewards. We have this worldview as Christians, that we are stewards and He is the owner, and one day to Him we will give an account. And so we have this relationship between money and soteriology.
Then we took a look at the relationship between money and eschatology. We looked at what the Bible has to say about money in the end times—at the eschaton, at the last days, at the consummation. We saw the prophecies of scripture that in the last days people will be lovers of money rather than lovers of God, “philarguria” instead of “philotheoi;” lovers of self rather than lovers of God, “philautos” instead of “philotheoi;” and lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, “philodonos” instead of “philotheoi.” We saw that there’ll be a problem in the whole realm of love at the end of the age, that human beings will just love the wrong stuff and that this will infiltrate the churches. And then in the churches we will love the wrong stuff and we will love self and pleasure and money rather than God. In the words of Jesus in the Olivet Discourse, “In the last days, the love of mankind will grow cold.” There will be a problem with love. We’re just going to love the wrong things.
We saw how the parable of the talents and the parable of the sheep and the goats has to do with loving God and loving people. And then comes the final judgment. And so we saw how the church is in crisis. We saw how, in the Western world, Judeo values and Christianity itself is diminishing. And this has to do with money and the church and the members of the church of Jesus Christ loving self and pleasure and money more than God. We’ve lost our potency. We’ve lost our power on the earth.
So today we take a look, first of all, at the category of ecclesiology and the relationship between money and ecclesiology. Ecclesiology has to do with the church—the Ecclesia, the biblical Greek word for church. What does the Bible tell us about the relationship between money and the church?
Now, just recently, a man named Aubrey De Gray, professor at Cambridge University, has written a book on immortality called Ending Aging. De Gray’s argument is that through science and medicine we can affect cellular function and we can increase longevity so that an average human lifespan might extend to 1000 years. Now, the medical community, the scientific community at large, debunks the theories of De Gray, but he makes for interesting reading. There’s been articles on him in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and the Washington Post. Of course, as Christians, we can look back in the Bible and we can see that in the prediluvian age, some lifespans extended to close to a thousand years. And some Bible scholars think, well, maybe they reckoned the years differently, or maybe something happened with regard to cellular function in the aftermath of the great deluge the dispersion of the cloud canopy which had enveloped the earth. There is lots of discussion and lots of debate.
We can all agree on this: even if we lived a thousand years, that wouldn’t be immortality. Even if we lived for a thousand years on this earth, that wouldn’t be immortality. If you had a career for 40 years, retired for 20 years, then took another career for 40 years, retired for 20, and did it again and again and again with countless careers for a thousand years, it still wouldn’t be immortality. See, God has immortality. God is immortal. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever, the Alpha and Omega. God has decreed that His church would be immortal. Those who are citizens of His church are immortal. This is the decree of God: the church is immortal.
So Jesus said in Matthew 16”18, “I will build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Literally He said, “The gates of Hades.” And what are the gates of Hades? Well, some have thought maybe it refers to the powers of hell, and certainly the powers of hell can be part of the connotation of gates of Hades, and certainly the powers of hell will not prevail against the church of Jesus Christ. But this expression, “the gates of Hades,” has primarily to do with death, because Hades was simply the keeping place of the dead. It was not hell. Hades was simply the keeping place of the dead where people were kept for the final judgment. And Jesus is saying, “I will build My church and it will never die. Death cannot conquer it. My church is eternal, immortal.”
He has decreed this. We who belong to Him and who have entered His church are eternal and immortal. And His church, you see, is His bride, the Bible tells us, and precious to Him. “I’ll build my church. It’ll be My bride.” It is eternal, immortal, and beautiful to Him, and it should be precious and beautiful to us.
I look at the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus says a lot about money. Matthew chapter five, Matthew chapter six, and Matthew chapter seven—three full chapters—are all words delivered by Jesus and much of it is focusing on money. That’s why some have called the Sermon on the Mount, “The Sermon on the Amount.” Of course, there’s a little bit of humor in that. But Jesus begins chapter six in the Sermon on the Mount by telling us that we should all give, and that our giving should be secret. We shouldn’t give publicly. God who sees in secret will reward us. So Jesus begins His discussion of money by promising that God rewards us when we give.
Now we come to verse 19 in chapter six, and Jesus begins this long section on money. “Do not lay up treasures on earth. Lay up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rusts consume, where no thieves can steal. Lay up treasures in heaven. Where your treasure is there will your heart be also.” Jesus is beginning this section on money reminding us that, with regard to money, we really need to serve heaven. Our focus needs to be on the things of heaven. It’s all about heaven, and everything we do with our time, our talent, and our treasure should be focused on heaven. Then when we get to heaven, we will be rewarded.
Then Jesus moves on to make a kind of strange statement. In verse 22 Jesus says, “The eye is the lamp of the body. If the eye is sound, the whole body will be full of light. If the eye is not sound, the whole body will be full of darkness. And if the light in you is darkness, then how great is the darkness?” I’m sure when Jesus made this statement, there had to be a bunch of people scratching their heads. I mean, what did that mean? But of course, the real problem is the Greek word “haplos.” “Haplos” is translated sound or healthy in the RVV. Some translations render “haplos” generous or liberal. But the primary root meaning of the word “haplos” is single. So what Jesus is really saying here is, “If your eye is single, your whole person will be full of light.” He’s talking about a singular focus on heaven and the things of heaven.
You cannot have this double focus. You can’t make both earth and heaven your priority. You need to focus on the things of heaven. So in this passage on money, as Jesus is going through the role of money and the importance of money, He’s telling you have to have a single eye; you have to focus on heaven. And so then He moves naturally into verse 24, He says, “No man can serve two masters.” You have to have a single eye. No one can serve two masters. You would either love the one and hate the other or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
He uses the word mammon, which is a Hebrew word transliterated into Greek, but it simply means money or wealth. You can’t serve God and money. This is so important. It’s all about God. And so then Jesus naturally moves into the parable of the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, and you’ve all heard that parable. Yet so often people forget that it’s all about money. Don’t trust money, don’t serve money, and don’t live for money. Trust God. Live for God. Serve God. God feeds the birds of the air. God clothe the lilies of the field. God will feed you and clothe you.
Seek first heaven. Seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness. I mean, this is all in the context of money and it’s pretty clear. So the question is today, what am I living for? What do I seek? What do I serve? The challenge of Christ to His people is to live for His kingdom, to serve His kingdom and to use your money accordingly. Use your money for His kingdom—to serve Him and live for Him.
Of course, the primary extension of the kingdom of God in this age of the world is called the church. When you come to Hebrews chapter 12 and you see the new Jerusalem and all who will inhabit it, this is the summation of the kingdom of God. It includes innumerable angels in festive gathering. So the angelic hosts are part of the kingdom of heaven. And then it includes the assembly of the firstborn registered in the heavens. But the word for assembly is “ecclesia,” which means church. And the firstborn is Christ. So the church of Christ is in the heaven. So you’ve got the angelic host and you’ve got the church all within the new Jerusalem. Then finally you have the spirits of just men made perfect. And some scholars believe those are the Old Testament saints. Some believe that the spirits of just men made perfect are, perhaps, good people who have lived throughout the centuries but never heard the gospel of Christ. We don’t know. But we do know that the primary expression of the kingdom of God in this age of the world is the church. And Jesus said, “I’ll build My church and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.” And so Jesus, I know with all my heart, says to us today, “Seek first My church.”
“Seek first My church.” And of course, the church is not just places of worship. The church includes Christian schools such as our Cherry Hill Schools—elementary, preschool, and middle school here, and Valor across the street—and Colorado Christian University. It’s all part of the church. Parachurch Ministries like Youth for Christ, Young Life, Campus Crusade, and Fellowship of Christian Athletes are all in a sense part of the church. And we ought to seek His church. We ought to serve His church. We’re going to live for His church. So you come to the parable of the talents in the Olivet Discourse and you got this one guy who doesn’t do very well at the final judgment. And of course, in the parable Jesus is the subject and He is the Lord. He is the Master who’s gone on a journey, and someday He promises He’ll come back, and He’ll judge all the servants.
So Jesus will come back. But this one servant was judged by Jesus, and Jesus uses three words to describe him. The first word that Jesus uses to describe this rejected servant was “achrestos,” and “achrestos” literally means useless. “You useless servant. You are no use to your Lord, no use to your master, “No use to My kingdom, no use to My church.” You did not prosper Me and My cause. You did not serve heaven.” Useless. A second word that Jesus used to describe this man at the final judgment is “okneros.” “Okneros” means slothful. Jesus is saying, “You are too lazy to serve your master, too lazy to serve your Lord. You are too lazy to serve My cause, My kingdom, My church.”
The third and final word Jesus uses to describe this guy is “poneros,” which means wicked or evil. But it’s not the word “kakos,” which is a Greek word that means intrinsically evil. “Poneros” means evil in its effect. So Jesus is saying, when you don’t serve the master, when you don’t serve His cause, when you don’t serve heaven, when you don’t serve the church, your life is evil in its effect.
So how are you using your money? How am I using my money? Who are we serving? What are we living for? Now, last week, after each of the three services I had people come up to me, and some folks said, “We understand what you’re saying about money and salvation and money in the end times. We hear you. But you need to understand, we’re kind of in financial crisis and we’re in debt. We can’t pay our bills. We’re just struggling to survive. We’re in a season of our life we just can’t give.” Of course, I understand. And far more importantly, God understands that we may have a season of our life where we’re struggling to come out of debt and might not be able to do everything we would want to do.
But you see, the issue is way deeper than this in our culture and in our time, because there are so many people in this culture and in this nation and in this congregation who will always be struggling with debt. There are so many people who will never have the money to support the cause of heaven. There are so many who have adopted lifestyles and made choices in the past and those choices and those lifestyles will always have them in debt. So you see, Jesus is demanding something radical of us. I mean, He’s demanding something really radical. He’s saying that many of us need to change our lifestyles and our standard of living. Make money—make it honestly and in a noble way. Make money. But use money to serve the cause of heaven. And if you don’t have the money to serve the cause of heaven, change your lifestyle. Buy a smaller house, live more humbly, but live for Christ. Serve His kingdom, His church. Serve heaven, because that’s what it’s about.
And you know, we’re going to live and die and the world won’t care. The world’s not going to remember me. The world’s not going to remember you. You might as well live for things that are eternal, things that are immortal. You might as well live for God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You might as well live for His church, for He said, “I will build My church and the gates of Hades will not prevail.”
Secondly and finally, I want to take a brief look at the relationship between money and missiology. Missiology has to do with missions. What is the mission that Christ has given us? What is the mission of the church? What is the relationship between money and missiology? In the Bible, there’s a lot of controversial passages and one of the most controversial is the end of Mark’s Gospel. This is a very controversial ending. Mark chapter 16 is the last chapter in the book of Mark. How does this gospel of Mark end? Well, in most Bibles, Mark chapter 16 ends with verses 15 through 18. Verse 15 is the Great Commission. In verse 15, Jesus says, “Go into all the world, preach the gospel to the whole creation.” That is the Great Commission, Mark 16:15.
Then Jesus, in the next two verses that conclude the gospel of Mark, says some things about demons and tongues and snakes and poison. And did Jesus really say these things? Well, the evidence is conflicted because you go back to the earliest manuscripts and some of the early manuscripts end the Gospel of Mark at chapter 16:8; other early manuscripts end the Gospel of Mark at chapter 16:14, just before the Great Commission. Other early manuscripts end the Gospel of Mark at chapter 16:18 with the Great Commission. Snakes, poison tongues, demons.
But of course, the curious thing is when you look at the shorter ending of Mark, which ends at verse eight, the early manuscripts have added a statement. The statement that they’ve added to the shorter ending is this: “And after this, Jesus Himself sent out by means of them from East to West the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.”
So they added the Great Commission back in. They were thinking, “With this shorter ending, we lose verse 15, but we want to include the great commission.” And so they brought it back in, but they didn’t need to. They didn’t need to because the Great Commission is clear in the Bible. In Matthew 28, what did Jesus say? “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go therefore into all the world and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things I’ve commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the close of the age.” In Acts chapter one, what did Jesus say? “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be My witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth.” That’s the Great Commission. Jesus no doubt gave the Great Commission to us that we are to take the gospel to the nations.
Of course, it takes money. It takes a lot of money. Now, there is a connection between ecclesiology and missiology—a connection between the church and outreach, the church and missions. The church is called to support missions, and missions is all about birthing churches. So ecclesiology and missiology both serve each other. So you come to Philippians chapter four and you see Paul, a missionary, and Paul is writing to the church at Philippi and thanking them for their fragrant gift, their extravagant offering. He is thanking them for the money and for supporting him in his mission. And what is his mission? To build and established churches. So the church supports him and he supports the church. Ecclesiology and missiology are going on all the time.
Now at this church we support missions and outreach. Gene Kissinger, head of our missions and outreach department, is sitting with his wife, Lorna, right before me. And of course, of every dollar you give to our operating budget about 20% in some sense goes to mission and outreach. We’re supporting missionaries in nations all over the world and we’re reaching out to the poor in the inner city and in cities all over the world because we care about the suffering and the afflicted. So of every dollar you give here, much of it goes out. And even when we build a building like the atrium (we just completed the atrium) a lot of money given to the atrium we sent into the inner city with your approval. So we sent about a half million, $500,000, out of the atrium money into the inner city of the poor because ecclesiology and missiology is all one now. And it all takes money. God cares greatly about money. God cares greatly about money because money serves the cause of heaven on the earth. It builds the church; it carries the gospel, if the people of Jesus are faithful.
I want to tell you a little story (and with this story we’ll bring things to a close). You can travel today to Modena, the city in Europe. There’s a great cathedral there in Modena. You go into the great cathedral, and you’ll find this enclosure that is has with huge bars of iron. It’s an iron cage, and nobody can get in. It’s locked. But inside that iron cage in the Great Cathedral of Modena, there’s a bucket. The bucket is over a thousand years old. 1,002 years ago, in the year 1005 AD, soldiers from the city-state of Modena came to the outskirts of the city-state of Bologna and they stole the bucket from the city.
Well, the citizens of Bologna found this out and they were enraged. One year later, in 1006, historians tell us the great war broke out over the bucket. “The Bucket War.” In 1006, Bologna said, “We want our bucket back.” The war lasted 18 years and covered the earth with blood. Thousands and thousands died. The emperor of the Holy Roman Empire himself became involved. Emperor Henry II and his son, who was king of Sardinia, brought his armies in support of Modena, and Modena had the services of the emperor’s son. But Bologna, in the midst of war, captured the emperor’s son and threw him in a dungeon. The emperor said, “Release my son, and I will give you massive amounts of gold.” And they said, “We don’t want your gold. You can’t have your son unless you give us our bucket back.”
The war was 18 years. And historians tell us that it drained the treasuries of two once-great city-states. And it was all over a bucket. You can look at history and see a lot of stuff like that. I love history; I’m fascinated by history. I love the lessons of history. I think there’s humor in history and I think there’s pain in history; there’s no denying that. But you hear a story about those two once-great city-states and you cannot help when you think of that war but think of Jeremiah chapter two, verse five, where the prophet says, “You are striving after worthless things, and therefore you yourselves have become worthless.”
And isn’t that true? As you look at history and as you look at our world today, so many people are striving after worthless things, and they’re of no earthly good. They are striving, giving their lives, and striving after worthless things. They are doing the same thing day in and day out—getting up, feeding their face, reading the paper, going to work, coming home, watching TV, eating some more, going to bed, and doing it over and over again year after year, decade after decade. Finally, there is a memorial service. So many people are striving after worthless things.
Here’s the challenge as we conclude this two-week series on money: live for something worthwhile. Live for something that’s eternal. Live for that which is immortal. Serve the Lord; serve the master. Serve the cause of heaven. Serve the kingdom of heaven. Serve the church of Jesus Christ in all its diversity. Serve it and let it be evident by the way that we use our money.
This church is kind of struggling right now in terms of money. In our ministry budget we’re hundreds of thousands of dollars down, and for the first time in many years we’re in the red instead of the black. I don’t mean to be an alarmist and I don’t mean to use alarmist rhetoric (I mean, I have pastored this church for 25 years and I know that this has happened before, and I also know that whenever there’s a downturn in the economy people tend to give less). I know that there are ministries struggling all over our country. But I tell you, there’s no excuse. It doesn’t matter what the economic times are. There’s no excuse. I think we’re lovers of self and pleasure and money rather than lovers of God. I think we give too little. We love God too little. We strive after worthless things. I think we’ve not renounced all and embrace His lordship and followed Him. You want the church of Jesus Christ to grow and go forth in power? Then give. You want to someday hear Jesus say, “Well done, good and faithful servant”? Give your time, give your energy, give your talent, and give your money. Give your money. I tell you, this is what life is about if you have God’s worldview. Let’s close with the word of prayer.