 Morning Radiant Church. Hey, we wanna welcome Portage, so good to be with you and everybody who's online. This morning I wanna invite you to open your Bibles with me to Malachi chapter three. This is a continuation of our series entitled First Love. And for those of you who are wondering how long we're gonna be camped in the book of Malachi this weekend and next weekend are the final two installments of our First Love series. So today we are going to be looking at chapter three and the title of the message is The Tithe Matters. You know, they tell pastors that there's three things that you should not talk about in church. You should not talk about politics. You should not talk about money and you should not talk about sex. Well, the good news is we're not talking about politics today and we're not gonna talk about sex today but actually I think the church should probably talk more about all of those issues because how many know that if we don't talk about them, then we give the full blank page to the world to describe and define those things. And we need to really see those things through the lens of the kingdom of God. Today we are gonna be talking about how God views money because as you'll see very quickly in the book of Malachi, God has some very strong opinions and also some spiritual truths that the world does not understand, it does not comprehend, that are actually counter cultural, kingdom cultural, I believe, and counter cultural from the way that the world sees things. But here's the deal. The deal is that the world's view of money is a cursed view of money and economics. But how many know that God is a God, not of cursing but a God of blessing? God wants his people to live under the divine blessing of the kingdom of God. And so this morning I want you to look with me in Malachi chapter three, we're gonna read six verses together. Beginning in verse number six, here's what the Lord starts by saying. He says, for I the Lord do not change. Just stop right there. Anybody glad that God is not an arbitrary God, that God doesn't change his mind, he doesn't roll off the wrong side of the bed and he's not in a bad mood one day and a good mood in the next. God is consistent, God is steady, God is eternal and he is unchanging. Can I get a nine AM amen to that? All right, there we go, feel good now. All right, he says, for I the Lord do not change, therefore you, oh children of Jacob, are not consumed. From the days of your fathers, you've turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. But you say, how shall we return? Will a man rob God and yet you are robbing me? But you say, how have we robbed you in tithes and in contributions? You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me the whole nation of you. Therefore bring the full tithe into the storehouse that there may be food in my house and thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts. And see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you such blessing until there is no more need. I will rebuke the devourer for you so that it will not destroy the fruit of your soil and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the Lord of hosts. Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts. Actually like how in verse number 10, the new century version translates it. It says, bring to the storehouse a full 10th of what you earn so that there will be food in my house. Test me in this, says the Lord all powerful. So God is dealing with the issue of finances with his people Israel. And as we've seen all throughout the book of Melachi, God is concerned not about the external observation and obligations of what it means to be the people of God. He's concerned with the heart condition because as we know, we know this to be true in our lives and it's obviously true in ancient Israel's experience with God is that you can do all the right things outwardly but yet have your heart far from God. As we saw in Melachi one, two and first parts of three, God is concerned about honor. He says, where's my honor? And they said, well, how haven't we honored you? And what about worship? And God says, you're giving me your lame, you're blind and you're sick as offerings. You're not giving me your best. And he's concerned about their trust and their observation of God's word because God says it, but they're not really giving credence to it. And it's even reflected in their family and in the way that they honor vows and covenant and marriage and all of these different things. But yet Israel's response is always God, what do you mean? We're still going to church. We're still giving you offerings. We're still listening to your law being read in the temple. We still have a priesthood. We're bringing you our sacrifices, what we have. We're doing all those things and God is saying to them, no, I don't have your first love. I don't have your first love. I don't have your heart anymore because you're not trusting me like you trusted me once upon a time. When I was the God that brought you out of Egypt, you trusted me. When I was the God who did signs and wonders and miracles, you trusted me. When I was the God who performed miracles and defeated your enemies before you and gave you material blessing when you wanted it, you trusted me. But now because there is a delay in the fulfillment of the promises that I've made to you, because today you're going through some difficulties, you're now questioning my goodness and because you're questioning my goodness, you're distancing yourself from me in your heart. Do you know that in any relationship, what goes first before the external words and actions is always the heart? Jesus said in marriage, He said that divorce actually happens because of hardness of the heart. Can I tell you today that the reason why we have distance between us and our relationship with God is because somewhere along the line, we let our heart grow cold. You see, as Timothy Keller says, all sin, it doesn't matter what kind of sin it is, all sin always begins with a character assassination of God. It always starts there. Is God trustworthy? Is God good? Will God keep His word? Can I trust God? Where is God? All of those things are us looking at God and saying, God, you're not doing things the way I think you ought to do them and therefore I'm going to take matters into my own hands. How many of you know we have a tendency to do that? We have a tendency to take matters into our own hands when things don't happen the way we want them to happen in the timeframe that we want them to happen. Really what God was saying is this, is that first fruits given to God reveal a first love of God. When we give God our first fruits, that's what the tithe is. When we give God our first fruits, we're actually revealing that there is a first love in our hearts towards God. Now, if you're new to Christianity, if you're new to the church or you're new to the Bible in general, but especially like Old Testament prophets like Malachi, you might read that word tithe and say, well, I don't really understand what a tithe is. I know that in church we take offerings and those kinds of things and the finances go to support church and missions and those kinds of issues like that, but what is a tithe? Well, a tithe is a principle that we find all throughout the pages of scripture. It's not just contained in the law, even though it's included in the law, but it actually is a guiding spiritual law that you find all the way in the Old Testament. In men's life like Abraham and his grandson Jacob you find it in the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, practiced by the people of God all throughout the Old Testament, but also in the New Testament. Jesus mentions it in the Gospel of Matthew, the writer of Hebrews mentions it. It's all throughout the pages of scripture and the reason why you find it in principle all across the panoramic view of scripture is because the tithe represents more than monetary donations. It represents a view of trust and dependence. A tithe actually means a tent. That's why the new century version uses bring a full tent and it's not just any tent, it's the first tent where the people of God, God told the people of God, I am your covenant provider, I am your protector, I am the purpose giver, I am God. I want you to build your life around me. That's what worship is. Whatever we build our life around is actually what we're worshiping. And he says, I want you to build your life around me. Therefore, what I want you to do as a practical expression of that in your daily life is I want you to take everything that you earn and I want you to take the first 10th of it, the first part of it, and I want you to bring it to the house of God where you worship me, where I've chosen to make my name abide and I want you to give it to me and honor it to me, because actually God's not saying I don't want you to give it to me. He's saying I want you to return it to me because as Lord of your life, I'm laying claim to it. I'm saying that I'm Lord of your life when the first 10th belongs to me, so bring it to me. And then everything that you give over a 10th is called an offering. Now Abraham gave a tithe of everything from the spoils of battle that he went into, he gave it to the Lord. Jacob, when he built an altar, he gave a tithe of everything. Leviticus and Deuteronomy, it says, you shall, as farmers, as an agricultural society, you shall bring a tithe when you reap your harvest, when your herds give birth, when your goats have little babies, you shall take the first, the best, the unbloodish, and God says it belongs to me. Why? Because what God promises to his people is this. Number one, I am your supernatural provider and protector. And when you honor me with the first 10th with the tithe, I'm promising that I'm gonna put my supernatural blessing on the other 90% that you have and I'm going to prosper it, protect it, and I'm going to multiply it so that all the days of your life, you will know that you belong to me. But Israel had forsaken that. Israel had stopped doing that. And the reason why they had stopped honoring God with the tithe is because they didn't trust God. They were becoming self-sufficient. And here's two immutable truths that God starts in this whole discourse by saying, he says, number one, it's immutable, I am the Lord and I do not change. How many of you know we change but God doesn't change? And the second thing that he says that's immutable is this. He says return to me and I will return to you. Now why is that significant? Because God always promises that when we will turn our hearts back to him, he always will return back to us. And in this regard, God is saying to the people of Israel, you used to tithe, you stopped and I want you to return to me. By the way, it's the only place in the entire book of Malachi. God deals with worship, God deals with honor, God deals with his word, God deals with marriage, God deals with justice. He confronts Israel in all of these areas but the only place in the entire book of Malachi that God gives that may prescription and says this is how you return to me is financial. He says return to me. And you say how do I return to you? And he says by giving your tithe to me. Now I don't know about you but if I think about spiritually getting right with God, money is not the first thing that I think of. I think of prayer, I think of faith, of scripture, I think of going to church again and all those things are great. Why in the world is God hung up on finances? Let me tell you why. It's because God knows if he has your money, he has your heart. God knows this, if I have your money, money touches everything in your life. Money touches every area of your life. It touches your family? How many know that in today's world divorce rates are incredibly high? 50% of marriage is in America and in divorce. Do you know the number one issue in marriage? Money. How many know that money touches your children? Have anybody in this room raised kids? Children equal expensive. Raise your hand, right? Portage, you guys too? Okay, children are expensive. And let me just tell you, my experience, nobody told me this as a parent of young children is when your kids are little you think, oh, I can't wait till they get older. No, they get more expensive. Used to be able to buy them a big wheel, now it's a car. It used to be like pay for little league, now it's pay for college. Pay for a wedding, oh my Lord. It's like, turn HGTV off, don't get any crazy ideas. So money touches marriage, money touches family, money touches your future. Because what's gonna happen when you're 65, 70 years old? Who's gonna take care of you? We've got our hopes and our dreams for our future, for our grandchildren, it touches that. Money touches our health, healthcare issues, health insurance, money touches every part of your life. And so when God says, I want you to tie, it's not because God's in heaven like some divine mafia boss who needs everybody to pay him for his protection. He's not like, I make a deal with you, here's what's gonna happen. I am Jehovah Yahweh, I'll never change and I'll protect you, but it's gonna cost you 10%. This is not heavenly Sopranos. God made all the gold in dem-dare hills. Here's how God views gold. He paved heaven with it. He sees gold the way you see asphalt. He doesn't need your gold, but what he does want is your heart. And so when God says return to me, and the way that I want you to return to me, the first step is by tithing again. He's got two reasons for that. Number one is he knows that if he has your money and he's first in your life financially, he knows that he's got your heart because if you're giving to him first, what you're doing is aligning your life around him instead of lining your life around fear or lining your life around your future or lining your life around some other source to meet all of your needs for your family, for your health, for your future, for your kids. We can look at money, we can look at our job, we can look at relationships, we can look at ourself as our source, but when we put God first with our finances, we're saying, God, Jesus, you are Lord and I trust you to take care of all of these other issues in my life. That's the first reason. Number two, the second reason is, he says, bring all the tithe into the store so that there might be food in my house. God wants you to be a part of making it possible for other people to be spiritually fed because God cares about other people. Do you know the first greatest commandment? Jesus said, love the Lord your God with all your, with all your soul, with all your mind and your strength. Second commandment is love your, do you know how you love your neighbor? You love your neighbor by living a sacrificial life and that includes your finances. And on the planet right now, there are over two billion people that do not have access to the name of Jesus. And it is our responsibility and our generation to get the gospel out there. Let me give you some statistics that will rock you. Wealthiest nation on the face of the earth. Number one, United States. Wealthiest Christians on the face of the earth. Number one, American Christians. We have more than any other Christians anywhere else on the face of the earth because we're the wealthiest nation on the earth. Do you know that in America today, only 6% of American Christians died? 6% of American Christians died. And if you read Malachi and take it literal because we say we believe the Bible, right? God says that when we're not tithing, we're actually living under a economic curse. It's not because God's cursing us, it's because we're choosing not to align our life under God's supernatural blessing where he is supernaturally biased for us. And when we honor him with the first tent, he says, I'll make it possible by my blessing that you'll be able to do more with the 90% than you keep than if you had kept the whole 100 and did it on your own. So God says you can do more this way. So we're living under a cursed economic system which means we're limited to the same horizon that unbelievers are limited by because we're limited by our own insight, our own wisdom and our own economic system that we're a part of. Do you know that statistics say this? That if just the American church, just us, if just American Christians would tithe, we would be able to pay off every church. We would be able to pay off every Bible college, every mission outpost. We'd be able to translate the Bible into every language that has not yet been translated and support fully every missionary on the mission field globally around the world and probably within one generation fulfill the great commission and see Jesus come back. And that's just the American church. And let me tell you something, American Christians only make 20% of the Christians globally. If you are the devil and you want to destroy people's life and you want to keep the name of Jesus from being glorified globally and you want to make sure that the great commission is not fulfilled in this day, what's the number one issue you are going to go after? You're going to go after putting mute and cancellation on Christians' generosity in the wealthiest nation of America. How do you do that? By getting their heart shifted in some other direction. How many of you have ever shopped or grocery shopped in Myers or Walmart? Raise your hand if you've ever done that. Okay, that's everybody, right? If you're not from West Michigan, then you don't know what Myers is necessarily, but you've been to a grocery store experience. How many have ever done one of these? You got your cart all loaded up and you're heading towards the checkout lane. You're not going to do the self-check because you got 14,000 items in your cart. And so you're looking for the shortest lane. Have you ever gotten into a lane and the lane is slow? And then the lane next to you dwindles down to almost nothing and you say to yourself, I'm going to switch lanes. Has anybody ever done that? Raise your hand if you've done that. Okay, so what do you do? You back out and you go over to this lane. Only to be disappointed because you thought there's only two people in front of you and then the person in front of you has got 900 coupons and needs a price check and a repackaging and the lane you got out of all of a sudden you would have been out 10 minutes ago but you made the bad decision to switch. What is the answer to do when you're stuck in that lane? Let's go back to the original lane. Well, here's what we do with our finances. We get in the God lane and we say, God, Jesus, I trust you, you're the Lord and the savior of my life. And I'm going to trust you with everything in my life. And we get in line and we build our life around the access of God in his kingdom and his promises. But then we see other lanes that are moving faster. And we look at our lane and we say, you know what? This isn't kicking in. God, sometimes it feels like you're not answering my prayers. I've been tithing, this is challenging. I don't know how I'm gonna make it all happen. It takes faith. Faith is the substance of things, hope for the evidence of things that we don't see. We're in the kingdom of God lane. We see other people being blessed. We see other people with a lot more wealth and resources. They're not tithing. And the devil whispers in her ear, switch lanes. So what we do is financially we switch lanes. But as soon as we switch lanes into the world's way of doing things, we quickly realize that it's a cursed economy. And that's where Israel was. They had switched grocery store lanes. They had put all their groceries in the basket of believing that they in and of themselves were self-sufficient. They did not need God's supernatural blessing on their finances, on their economy, on their lives. They could do it themselves. And they were in this lane. What is God saying to them in Malachi three? He's like, you got into the wrong lane because you assassinated my culture. You did not trust me. You did not believe in me because you've got a hard heart. And God is saying, return to me. What's he saying? Switch back into the other lane. Come on, trust me. It's interesting that in this section of scripture, this is the first time I've ever seen this. And I can't tell you how many times I've taught on tithing over 25 years of being a pastor, not only because it's something that we regularly need to talk about with Christians, because Christians and unbelievers don't understand the concept and the principle in a world dominated by consumerism. But I teach on it because it's been a life-changing reality and a revelation has changed Jane and I's life. First time I've ever seen this though, it says in verse number six, for I the Lord do not change, therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. What did I see in there? It's the fact that God refers to Israel by their old name, which is Jacob. Why doesn't he say you, O Israel, are not consumed? You remember in Genesis 28, Jacob's name was changed to Israel. Israel means one who rules and reigns with God. Jacob means subplanter, one who tries to take the position of another. Actually, the reason why Jacob got his name is, remember he was a twin, he's in his mother's womb, and his brother Esau is being born ahead of him, so what does Jacob do? Jacob reaches out and grabs ahold of his brother's heel, trying to pull him back in so that he can get ahead on his own. And here's God saying to Israel, calling them Jacob, saying you're trying to do to me what Jacob, your forefather, did to his brother Esau, which is you're trying to take the place of the one who's supposed to be first. You're trying to take the place of the one who's supposed to be first. You're trying to take matters into your own hands and get ahead. You know, that's exactly what happens when as Christians we say, God, I love you, Jesus, I love you, but you know, the tied thing, that's really challenging. The tied thing, that's hard to do. And I'm just going, I'm going to trust you, Lord, with my soul, I'm going to trust you with my body and I'm going to trust you with my eternity, but there's no way in the world I'm trusting you with my finances. That's my issue. You know what we do right there? We're grabbing ahold of God and we're saying, God, I want to be first, not you. We become Jacob. Now, what I will say is this, is that every single one of us in this room today, tithe, you tithe. It's always funny to me to look out at hundreds of people when I talk on certain subjects, because if I talk about joy, people are like, yes, I needed joy. Talk on worship, you can see those who are worshipers. There's like, I don't know, yeah. When you talk on finances, there are three groups of people. There are those who are tithers and right now I can almost like identify because you're just like, yes, I'm so glad he's teaching on tithing, yes. Because you've experienced the joy of seeing God miraculously move in your life and you want other people to experience that. Then there are people that are in the middle going, well, I've never heard this before. Where has this been? And you're looking at the Bible and in fact checking me on Google and right now you're like, whoa, this is brand new. We need to think about this and talk about this. And then there's a group of people who are a little Jacob-ish. You're like, if I didn't know when he was gonna talk about money in church today, I'd have stayed home. How dare you talk about money in church? Just stick to the gospel pre-chart. And you think your scowl throws me off, it just makes me pre-charter. I'm actually really excited to have some of you scowling. It's awesome because I know that the dross of Jacob is rising to the surface and what God wants to do is he wants to skim it off and he wants you to do what he says in Malachi chapter three, test me. Says the Lord, test me, put me to the test. Do you know that the tithe, let me give you three things that the tithe is that will help you. Number one, the tithe is a test. It is a test. It is a test of your conviction and your dependence on God, but it's also a test for God at his own invitation to prove that he is covenantally faithful. The number 10 all throughout the pages of scripture is used as a number of testing. It's used as a number of testing. Book of Revelation, you shall be thrown into prison for 10 days so that your faith is tested. In the Old Testament, Joshua leads the children of Israel into the promised land, 10 cities of the Canaanites. The first city that they come to is Jericho. God says it belongs to me. Don't touch it, don't take any of the wealth. Utterly destroy it, kill it. Give all the wealth into the storehouse, just it's mine. It's a test. 10 times they stoke the furnace in the book of Daniel for the children, you know, the Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego or Rackshack and Benny if you watch Veggie Tales. They stoke the furnace 10 times hotter. Testing, tithe is a test. It's a test for you and it's a test for God. One of the major killers of men and women in North America today is heart disease. I don't know if you're anything like me genetically. My family has issues with heart disease and so pharmaceuticals, one of the big markets for pharmaceuticals are statin drugs that help people so that they don't have heart attacks and lowers cholesterol and different things like this and one of the newer developments that they have is a heart, what's called a heart CT where they can put you into a CT testing and they can scan your heart ahead of time to tell whether there's potential blockages or issues in your heart because nobody wants to just go through life. Typically it's just kind of, well I hope I don't have heart disease and then one day it just hits a normally healthy person, they have what's called a widow maker and it takes them out and then the autopsy reveals that they had plaque buildup in their heart that was blocking the flow of blood that causes a heart attack. Now you can do a heart CT scan where they can look at it and they can say, oh we need to put a stent in or we need to do something here to open those passageways. Heart disease doesn't have to kill people physically and listen, heart disease doesn't have to kill people spiritually. Number one killer destroyer devourer of Christians is spiritual heart disease. Well how do you know if you have heart disease? There's no CT scan for your soul, can you imagine if there was if they could put you in and it's like, oh you got some serious soul issues. Whoa I mean look at that unforgiveness, that bitterness, woo, we're gonna need a rotor-router that bad boy and you got some scars there and some unbelief and some doubt there and I don't even know what that thing is but we're amputating it. I mean can you imagine putting your soul under a CT scan? God has given us a test though to make sure that our heart is first love connected to God. What is the test? It's the tithe. See cause every single time that I receive a paycheck, Jane and I get a paycheck, we get auto deposit. First thing that we do is we honor God with a tithe. We take the first 10th and we set it aside and say God, we remember that you are first in our life. We remember that you take care of us. We remember that you promise to protect us, that you are our purpose giver, that my financial stability and well-being is not in my own hands. Sure I need to budget. Sure I need to do the natural things that I need to do but the world does those things. I am a person walking under the supernatural hand blessing and protection of Almighty God and I don't care what the economic downturns on stock market looks like. God's stock market never has dips and it never has valleys. Isaiah nine says of the increase of his government there shall be no end. I wanna operate under the kingdom of God economy, not a broken world Wall Street economy because God will always take care of me. It's a test of my heart and here's how it's a test when I begin to struggle with giving it and paycheck to come every two weeks. When if I struggle with it, that's an indicator that something's wrong with my heart but when I don't do it, it's also an indicator that there's blockages between me and God. Number two, the tithe is actually an alignment of our hearts. We decide who we're going to align with. Are we gonna align with the kingdom of God or are we going to align with the American dream? The American dream says I've got freedom to do whatever I want to and I can be a self-made man and I can pull myself up by my bootstraps and if I'm smart enough, I'm in the right place at the right time. I know the right people then I'm going to be able to just, I'm gonna begin, I can become filthy rich. The kingdom of God says this Matthew six, he says, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and then all of these other things will be added to you. What other things? All the things the American dream promises. God doesn't want Christians walking around miserable. Oh, life's so hard and I'm giving to God but it's really hard and God's never gonna be in debt to you. God's not opposed to you having things. God's not opposed to you being financially stable. God's not opposed to you having beautiful homes and boats and vacations, being able to leave an inheritance for your kids. He's not opposed to any of that. He's just opposed to those things having you. He's just opposed to those things becoming the dominant point of focus of your life. When we center our lives around the kingdom of God, when we seek God first, what we're saying is God, I'm trusting you. The priorities of my life are you. The kingdom of God is my priority. The great commission is the reason why I've been put on the planet and when you prosper me, God, you can trust me. I'm going to be generous and God says, good, I know I've got your heart. Now, what do you need? I'm gonna give you everything that you need for the purpose that I've placed you on the planet. Do you know when Jane and I planned a radiant church, we had $0, zero people, zero experience, zero buildings. We had zero. And I was 24 years old, I was making a great income at a very large church in Grand Rapids, corner office, assistant, 100 voice choir, television programs that I was a part of, all the potential in the world. And God just challenged me. He said this. He said, if you will build my house, Lee, I'll build yours. And so we moved down here and we planted a church and everybody's like, all pastors are just in it for the money. Can I just promise you we were not in it for the money? That is not why we went into ministry. That is not why we did it. But I can tell you that 25 years later of serving Jesus in full time ministry, there's never been a day ever that I've ever not had what we needed. There's been some times we needed to stand in faith and believe God for the little things that he has always been faithful and just and true to meet all of our needs. And you know what? He brings no sorrow with it. Can promise you we've tied on little and we've tied done much. And there's been times where it's been a test. But listen, if you can't tie down little, you won't ever be able to tie down much. I've had people tell me, well, someday pastor when I win the lottery, I'm gonna tie. No, you won't. I promise you. Not unless you can tie down your minimum wage because if you struggle with one, the zeros are gonna cause it to be a little bit harder the next time around. Third thing that you need to know about tithing is here's in God's divine wisdom and providence, why he came up with this concept. Tithing is an antidote. Tithing is an antidote, it's a vaccine. You know, medical science has amazingly gotten rid of a lot of diseases that used to kill people through vaccines. Vaccines are a weakened form of a virus or some sort of infirmity that if it was at full strength would kill you. But what happens is as you receive the vaccine, it strengthens your immune system to be able to fight off the real thing when it is introduced into your system to keep you healthy. Things like smallpox and typhoid and measles and mumps and all those kinds of things. Some people are like, well, we just don't see measles attacking anybody anymore. Well, you wanna know why? It's because people take vaccines and we've eradicated those things and our life expectancy has gone to a whole another level. Can I tell you there's also spiritual vaccines and antidotes? Well, what are they? And what do they protect you against? The greatest disease facing American Christians today, listen to me, is the love of money. Now, go to third world nation and they're still as susceptible to it, but it's just not as prevalent in their culture as it is in ours because we have so much. Paul writes this in 1st Timothy 6, he says, but those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. And then it says this, for the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Notice he doesn't say money is the root of evil, he says it's the love of money. That's a root of all evil. It's through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves through with many pangs. Here's why we need a vaccine for the love of money. When we talk about the love of money, why would we love money? It's because money is the only thing that is a almost perfect counterfeit to what God wants to be in our life. Jesus said this, you cannot serve God and, say it with me. Say it one more time. Money, money, money, money. It's actually the word translated that Jesus says money is, the King James gets it right, it's called mammon. Mammon is more than money, mammon is actually a Syriac word, an Aramaic word that refers to a deity that promises wealth, prosperity, and protection. So there's actually a spiritual dimension to money that we have a tendency to worship it in the way that we're supposed to worship God. And here's why, because money is the only thing that Jesus put up in comparison to God. He didn't say you can't serve God in sex. Even though sex is a big issue in our day, it's not the same. He didn't say you, Jesus didn't compare and say you cannot serve God and greed. He didn't say you cannot serve God and idols. No, he said you can't serve God in money. Why did he pick money? It's because money is a perfect counterfeit to who God is and who God wants to be in our life. How? Because money gives an illusion that if you get enough of it, you can do anything that you want to, have anything, be anything, and go anywhere. If I have enough money, I can live out my dreams. If I have enough money, I can go anywhere I wanna go. If I have enough money, I can own anything I want. Instead of having to pray and ask God's will, instead of submitting our life to God and saying, God, you're the purpose giver. God, you're my protector. God, you're my healer. If I have enough money, I can heal any disease. If I have enough, I mean, the uber rich, why do we admire them so much? Because it's almost like they can be their own God. That's the illusion that money creates. And it's the fruit that the enemy tempts us today with. That if we'll serve money, it'll give us whatever we want to. That's the love of money. We need an antidote to that. What is it? The antidote to the love of money is putting God first in our finances. Saying, God, money is not my God, you are. Money is not the thing that's gonna determine my future, you are. Money is not going to be my healer, you are. Money is not going to build a hedge or protection around my family, you are. Money is not gonna be what is my security at 65 years old, you are. It's the love of money. And the last thing is this, the tithe is an opportunity. It's an opportunity for us to see God move miraculously in our life. He says this, I will open for you the windows of heaven, which means I'm gonna give you access to heavenly resources. I'm gonna rebuke the devour, which is spiritual protection, and your vine shall not fail to bear fruit. It's blessing. Stand with me all over the room if you would. I want you to hear two things. Number one is this, the tithe does not assure you of financial resources, the tithe assures you of heavenly blessing. Heavenly blessing is God putting his hand on your life. Heavenly blessing is saying they're in covenant with me. Therefore, if somebody attacks your house, they're attacking me. Somebody attacks your finances, they're attacking me. Somebody attacks your health, they're attacking me. This is God speaking. God partners up with you in covenant when we put him first. This isn't something we do to be saved. This is something we do because we're saved. If I were to tell you this morning that last week when I was in an airport, I ran into a guy named Steve Bezos. Anybody ever heard of him before? Wealthiest man in the world owns Amazon. How many have used Amazon, by the way? Raise your hand. Well, if I were to tell you that I've got great news for you, I've got an access code for everybody. And if you go home and you plug this access code in, you can have whatever you want that is in an Amazon warehouse. How many of you would be excited and want that access code? Raise your hand. Okay, write this down. Ready? I lied. But as excited as you would be about that, you should be much more excited about the fact that I may not have met Steve Bezos, but I've met Jesus. And he's given a promise and an access code that says when we put him first in our finances, you don't get access to 100,000 square foot Amazon warehouse. You just get access to heavenly resources at your need whenever you need them because God is your Father. And he says, I'm gonna throw open the windows of heaven. Pour out blessing that you cannot contain. And here's what God says, test me, test me, test me. Put me to the test. That's my challenge for you this morning. Is if you are a tither, today I want you in your heart to remind yourself, it's not just about writing the tithe, giving the tithe, it's about first love. And if you used to be in the grocery lane, putting God first in your finances and you've switched lanes, God calls you today to return. Get back in the God lane. Come on, get back in the God lane. And if you're here today and you say, I've never ever done it before in my life, what do I do? Put them to the test. I dare you to do it for three months. I dare you to do it today. Don't wait until next month. If you consider the clouds, you'll never sow your seed. Today to return to the Lord and say, God, you are Lord of my life. You are, I want you to be Lord of my finances. So today I establish it. Do something today and consistently put God to the test for the next 90 days. I guarantee you, not because I'm good, but because he's good, I guarantee you, you will see God open the windows of heaven over your life. I wanna pray for us. I want our prayer team to move into position if they would. All over the room, over at Portage as well. Online, thank you. Let's bow our heads this morning. Heavenly Father, soften our hearts. You're not just looking for a financial relationship, but there is no relationship unless you're Lord of every place of our life. You're either Lord of all or you're not Lord at all. Holy Spirit, quicken our hearts. I don't want anybody to make decisions based out of the wisdom of men or the convincing speech of a man. I want us to be convicted by the spirit of a living God who's inviting us to trust you as our Father. Today, Lord, many multitudes in the valley of decision. I pray that you would give us faith, give us courage to put you first. And Lord, most importantly, I pray that whatever needs, whatever situations we're facing, whatever voices of fear are speaking to us, I pray that your voice would be louder. Faith would be louder. Courage would be louder. The voice of our Father inviting us closer to return would be louder than any other voice in our life. Help some of us to make decisions today, Lord. And even beyond just talking about the tide, Lord, whatever issues we're facing, I pray that today you would cause us to draw near to you and make you Lord of all of our lives. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.