Living Letters of Christ’s Reference
Good Morning Friends,
Around the Chickee Hut at Bible Study yesterday morning we got into a pretty interesting discussion about asking for money. It was prompted by the passages in Corinthians below but also our experiences in how people give and especially about how church and ministry people ask for gifts. Some shared their experience of building a case for the need and then asking for support to match its budgets. Others shared how they had been asked for gifts prompted by the heart as in today’s scripture. One person who was most interested in the question said he had been raised in a church that basically just checked a person’s taxes and then sent a bill for ten percent.
One had been told by a televangelist that God would bless him for giving but did not quite believe and further shared that he was tired of hearing a weekly sermon on giving money. Many agreed that giving for the wrong reasons or to the wrong approach of charity could be toxic. Ultimately we figured that God was going to support what God wants to happen and people were going to have different motivations and emotional needs, but that for the asker and the giver alike, the whole experience has a way of growing and testing our faith as we hopefully become walking, Living Letters of Christ’s Reference.
Scripture: Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
2 Corinthians 3:1-3 (NIV)
I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church in Cenchreae. I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of his people and to give her any help she may need from you, for she has been the benefactor of many people, including me.
Romans 16:1-2 (NIV)
Thanks be to God, who put into the heart of Titus the same concern I have for you. For Titus not only welcomed our appeal, but he is coming to you with much enthusiasm and on his own initiative. And we are sending along with him the brother who is praised by all the churches for his service to the gospel. What is more, he was chosen by the churches to accompany us as we carry the offering, which we administer in order to honor the Lord himself and to show our eagerness to help. We want to avoid any criticism of the way we administer this liberal gift. For we are taking pains to do what is right, not only in the eyes of the Lord but also in the eyes of man. In addition, we are sending with them our brother who has often proved to us in many ways that he is zealous, and now even more so because of his great confidence in you. As for Titus, he is my partner and co-worker among you; as for our brothers, they are representatives of the churches and an honor to Christ. Therefore show these men the proof of your love and the reason for our pride in you, so that the churches can see it.
2 Corinthians 8:16-24 (NIV)
Message: Many peddle the word of God for profit or power these days. But the business of evangelism for the most part has become less personal than in Paul’s day….more transactional than transformational. For some the function has shifted to small groups and organizations who realize that relationships not giving programs change people. In the early church it was the norm for people to become involved in the lives of converts even as Christ had become involved in theirs. We get a sense of it in today’s scripture and see the personal impact that was apparently evident to all. In our schedule driven society that kind of commitment and impact of relationship has almost become extinct. I though have been blessed to experience people of faith committed to the heart of the matter. We get a sense of it in Paul’s letter of reference he sends with Titus to receive the collection at Corinth. We hopefully get a sense of it as we are changed in and through the ministry God has placed on our hearts.
Pray we not only share the gospel but our lives. Pray we carry a letter of Christ in us not one about him. Pray we have been entrusted into our care, as a result of the ministry in which we engage, a living letter of Christ’s love. Pray our message is drawn up and delivered in the Spirit of Christ. Pray it is not written in ink but with the Spirit of the Living God. Pray it is written on the tablet of the human heart instead of one of stone. Pray we have the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit in our ministry. Pray we look at the inward change of the heart as evidence of the Holy Spirit. Pray we look to changed lives not sensational feats of charity that evidence the true sign of Spirit led ministry.
Blessings,
John Lawson
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