L ORD, Show Me How to Live! “Multiply” series
2011 December issue: Sermons from 2011 November, Harvest Church - Pensacola
Sometimes it’s good if things don’t add up. When God is in the equation, we can end up with way more than we expected. Learn what can happen in our lives when we shift our thinking and start to Multiply.
Published 2011—12 Volume 1, Issue 2
Background image of flower from
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Harvest Church-Pensacola Pastors in action Published 2011—12
Matthew 7: 24, 26, 27 Message
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Inside this issue: God’s Plan for Your 3 Finances Principles of Multi- 5 plication Developing a Cul7 ture of Generosity
These words I speak to you are not incidental additions to your life, homeowner improvements to your standard of living.
If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock.
They are foundational words, words to build a life on.
If you just use my words in Bible studies and don't work them into your life, you are like a stupid carpenter
Mark 4:24 Amplified Bible Jesus said,
Addendum:
11
For Further Study, Tithing
6
“Be careful what you are hearing. The measure of thought and study you give to the truth
that you hear will be the measure of virtue and knowledge that come back to you, and more will be given to you who hear.”
When a storm rolled in and the waves came up, it collapsed like a house of cards. ►THESE DEVOTIONS WILL HELP YOU TO WORK GOD’S WORDS INTO YOUR LIFE!
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2011 November 6 sermon by Pastor Bobby Lepinay
John 10:10 “The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is that they may have life, and have it to the full.”
Big Idea: God has a plan for your finances — and that plan is that they would be blessed!
Multiply-1: God’s Plan for your Finances You can be free in every area of life ...including finances! ►Declare: “I am free from the spirit of fear; I have the spirit of faith!” ►Study this subject with the goal of developing a mind-set of abundance. If you have a mindset of lack, you must labor to replace it with the mindset of abundance! God wants you to be blessed in your finances because they affect other areas of your life. For instance, financial distress can affect your health. God wants you to prosper and be in health! “Blessed” = Brak ah “Blessed” = endued with God’s power and favor
John 10:10 tells us that Satan is the one who brings lack, poverty, and bondage. These conditions lead to hopelessness. Jesus came to bring life and hope. How to Know if You are in Bondage: You feel resistant to the truth and want to run from it.
Recommended Book: “Taboo: God & Money” by Craig Walker
This has nothing to do with God’s love for you; it does not affect your relationship with Him. You can be saved but still be in bondage in your finances ...and God will still love you! You can be saved, but still be miserable if you are disobedient to God and His word on finances. Disobedience leads to living a cursed life. Obedience, however, brings blessing. The old nature is to be a stingy miser — Don’t live by your old nature!
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How Do I Get God’s Favor and Power on My Finances?
1. Put God First One way to put God first is tithing.
The flesh walks in agreement with Satan; it doesn’t want to tithe or obey God.
Deuteronomy 14:23 (Living Bible):
Disobedience causes shame. People who tip God instead of tithing feel shame when hearing teaching about the tithe.
“The purpose of tithing is to teach you to always put God in first place in your life.”
Don’t be condemned by this message! Instead, get excited about getting free!
Malachi 3:10 — Living Bible “Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in my Temple. If you do," says the LORD Almighty, "I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won't have enough room to take it in! Try it! Let me prove it to you! “
This is the only place in which God tells us to test Him.
2. Manage What God Has Given You Luke 16: 10-12 “If you aren’t faithful with small things, you won’t be faithful with big things ...If you can’t be trusted to take care of earthly matters, why should you be trusted with heavenly responsibility?” 10% to God (tithe) 10% to me (savings) 80% bills/expenses
Just because you are blessed doesn’t mean that you won’t waste what God gives you. You must develop discipline! Lack of discipline is a spiritual issue! It qualifies or disqualifies you from service. “I’m just…” means that you are undisciplined and making an excuse for it.
If you are undisciplined, then go before God and admit it. Ask for His help. You have to be disciplined in how you handle your finances in order to be a good witness for God on this earth. Make your payments on time!
3. Trust God to Give You Even More! 2 Corinthians 9:10,11:
►Declare yourself free from
“He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed ...the more you give, the more God will prosper you, so that you can be more and more generous, living the life of a giver. All praise to the ultimate Giver!
strongholds: free from the stronghold of lack, free from the stronghold of lack of discipline, free from the stronghold of poverty, etc. You are free!
God is the ultimate Giver. He is the God of abundance ...and He wants us to reflect His nature to the world!
HC
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2011 November 13 sermon by Pastor Bobby Lepinay
Mark 6: 41-44 Jesus took the five loaves and two fish, looked up toward heaven, and asked God's blessing on the food. Breaking the loaves into pieces, he kept giving the bread and fish to the disciples to give to the people. They all ate as much as they wanted, and they picked up twelve baskets of leftover bread and fish. Five thousand men had eaten from those five loaves!
Mark 8:1-9 About this time another great crowd had gathered, and the people ran out of food again. ..."How are we supposed to find enough food for them here in the wilderness?" his disciples asked. "How many loaves of bread do you have?" he asked."Seven," they replied. So Jesus told all the people to sit down on the ground. Then he took the seven loaves, thanked God for them, broke them into pieces, and gave them to his disciples, who distributed the bread to the crowd. A few small fish were found, too, so Jesus also blessed these and told the disciples to pass them out. They ate until they were full, and when the scraps were picked up, there were seven large baskets of food left over! There were about four thousand people in the crowd that day...
Multiply 2—Principles of Multiplication When Jesus is present, anything can happen! He is the Multiplier! The principle of multiplication is found in the person of Jesus Christ! Loaves
People
Baskets Leftover
5
5,000
12
7
4,000
7
1
???
???
When Jesus multiplied the loaves in Mark 8, this was not the first time that He had done this miracle. He had fed 5,000+ people (probably less than a month earlier). This repetition places emphasis on what Jesus is doing in these verses. One lesson that we learn from these verses is that the less that Jesus has to work with, the more He delights to do! Jesus says to us, “The less that you have to bring to Me, the more I delight to do!� We see a principle from this: The less natural, the more spiritual! God delights to do through weak things/people the things that He could never do through the strong.
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The 2 Principles of Multiplication Joshua 7:1, 10-13 But Israel was unfaithful concerning the things set apart for the LORD. A man named Achan “To catch the reader's had stolenplace somean of attention, interesting sentence these things, so the or quote from the story LORD was very angry here.” with the Israelites. Achan was the son of Carmi, of the family of Zimri, of the clan of Zerah, and of the tribe of Judah. ... But the LORD said to Joshua, "Get up! Why are you lying on your face like this? Israel has sinned and broken my covenant! They have stolen the things that I commanded to be set apart for me. And they have not only stolen them; they have also lied about it and hidden the things among their belongings. That is why the Israelites are running from their enemies in defeat. For now Israel has been set apart for destruction. I will not remain with you any longer unless you destroy the things among you that were set apart for destruction. ...For this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Hidden among you, O Israel, are things set apart for the LORD. You will never defeat your enemies until you remove these things.
1. Only What Is Blessed Can Multiply Malachi 3:8-10 Message "Begin by being honest. Do honest people rob God? But you rob me day after day. "You ask, 'How have we robbed you?' "The tithe and the offering - that's how!' And now you're under a curse - the whole lot of you - because you're robbing me. Bring your full tithe to the Temple treasury so there will be ample provisions in my Temple. Test me in this and see if I don't open up heaven itself to you and pour out blessings beyond your wildest dreams.
Brak ah = Blessed: To be endued with God’s power and favor Ka tor ah = Cursed: hindered; bound; limited; stopped
In Joshua 7, Achan was cursed because he took what belonged to God.
The tithe is the first one that leaves your hand. The order — not the amount — is what releases blessing on your finances. It is a matter of honor: You honor whoever you give the first part to. It is consecrated, blessed, when you give the first part to God! You “bring” — not “give” — the tithe because it is not yours to give. The tithe belongs to God.
2. Only What Is Given Can Multiply Matthew 13:8 “But the seeds that fell on fertile soil produced a crop ...some 30, some 60, some 100 times as much as had been planted.”
The loaves & fishes multiplied when they were given away. If the disciples had eaten it, then it would not have multiplied.
Take Note!: The tithe makes your finances bless-able; giving makes them multiply.
God-obedient giving, beyond the tithe, will always have a return on investment (ROI)! HC
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2011 November 20 sermon by Pastor Bobby Lepinay
Multiply-3: Developing A Culture Of Generosity It takes time to create a culture. You can’t just wave a magic wand to create a culture of generosity! However, God is able; He can help us develop this culture! Many of us were born into families that had a culture of stinginess. The culture of the home-life was stingy; our families were prone to say “No” rather than “Yes.” Some of us came out of churches with a small-minded, nit-picky culture of stinginess…always dividing people and arguing about the cost of the carpet or about spending on some other small thing.
►The way to identify a culture of stinginess: It is marked by “No!” rather than “Yes!”
The Holy Spirit wants to break the spirit of fear and poverty that was caught, taught, and passed on to many of us by our family-of-origin culture or by our former church culture. For those who have held on to this culture, He wants to help us turn loose of it. Some people have almost celebrated being stingy; but God wants us to know that He is the most liberal, generous Being – and He calls you to be in His image. The Holy Spirit wants to work in us to replace a mindset of fear with the spirit of faith, replace the mindset of lack with the mindset of abundance, and replace the culture of stinginess with the culture of generosity.
Practice generosity! Generosity is just random. It is just saying “Yes!” It blesses people. It doesn’t have to have a reason. Generosity doesn’t make people pay for everything; it just gives.
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2 Corinthians 9:6 – 11 6
[Remember] this: he who sows sparingly and grudgingly will also reap sparingly and grudgingly, and he who sows generously [that blessings may come to someone] will also reap generously and with blessings. 7 Let each one [give] as he has made up his own mind and purposed in his heart, not reluctantly or sorrowfully or under compulsion, for God loves (He takes pleasure in, prizes above other things, and is unwilling to abandon or to do without) a cheerful (joyous, "prompt to do it") giver [whose heart is in his giving].
[whose heart is in his giving]. 8 And God is able to make all grace (every favor and earthly blessing) come to you in abundance, so that you may always and under all circumstances and whatever the need be selfsufficient [possessing enough to require no aid or support and furnished in abundance for every good work and charitable donation]. 9 As it is written, He [the benevolent person] scatters abroad; He gives to the poor; His deeds of and
If you want to be a friend of God, be a generous person! He loves, takes pleasure in, and prizes a person who is generous. He is unwilling to abandon you or do without you if you are a cheerful giver! God is with us all, but being a cheerful giver makes you one of God’s special friends! Verse 9 tells us that our deeds of justice and goodness and kindness and benevolence will go on and endure forever – They will keep multiplying! Verse 8 tells us that God (who is a supernatural Being) gets in on the process as we give, and He adds the “super” to the natural. He multiplies as we sow. Obeying and practicing 1 Corinthians 9 will break the spirit of fear off of you; it will break the mindset of lack; and it will cause you to develop a culture of generosity!
Faith must have actions – without action there is no faith. A Christian acts on God’s Word. There is a progression to our actions: Kindergarten: Action #1 in the life of faith is be saved and be baptized. Action #2 is tithing.
Growing in Faith: Giving
justice and goodness and kindness and benevolence will go on endure forever! 10 And [God] Who provides seed for the sower and bread for eating will also provide and multiply your [resources for] sowing and increase the fruits of your righteousness [[which manifests itself in active goodness, kindness, and charity]. 11 Thus you will be enriched in all things and in every way, so that you can be generous, and [your generosity as it is] administered by us will bring forth thanksgiving to God. There are two things that we must watch out for (Paul called them “other gospels”): The Prosperity Gospel – This says “Give; and God will make you rich.” Prosperity gospel believes that wealth is a sign of our Covenant with God, that the wealthy are more spiritual than the poor. The Poverty Gospel – This heresy believes that the wealthy are wicked; it is spiritual to be poor. Never cater to a spirit of poverty – always challenge and expose it!
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God wants to bring you into the truth: There are rich righteous people, and poor righteous people. There are rich wicked people, and poor wicked people. God never condemns having money – only the love of money. Rather than loving money, God wants us to love generosity and create generous cultures in our families, churches, businesses, cities, and world. We all often have seasons of plenty and seasons of lack. It is part of life.
► Look at how often you say “No!” Ask yourself: Is this how you want the Holy Spirit to treat you? He isn’t afraid of spoiling His kids!
► Develop the habit of loving to say “Yes!” Practice having a culture of generosity.
Create a generous culture in your city & nation!
How Do We Create a Generous Culture:
NOTICE:
Thus you will be enriched in all things and in every way, so that you can be generous!
1. We have to truly believe that this is the nature of God and that we are called to reflect Him to the earth. 2. We have to practice God’s way of increase: the law of sowing and reaping. A. Those who are dependent on the world’s system of increase are going to suffer. B. There are three ways that we increase: i. Working and earning – you should work; you should earn. These are good. However, it the economy gets bad, then people might lose their jobs. You can’t always depend on your job or ability to earn. ii. Saving & investing – Proverbs 6: “Consider the ant.” However, if things get hard and the jobless rate increases, people won’t have much to save or invest. iii. God’s way of increase: Sowing & reaping. This way releases the supernatural. iv. You have to faithfully do all three of these methods. Have a job and earn your salary, save & invest from your earnings, and diligently sow. If the first two ways are hit in a calamity or a natural disaster, if you haven’t been doing the third then you are left to your own devices. However, if you have been faithfully sowing and reaping, then even if the first two methods are cut off God will take care of you. He will provide.
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The 3 Principles of Sowing & Reaping: 1. You reap what you sow. ►Galatians 6:7 – Do not be deceived. God cannot be mocked. A man will always reap what he sows. ►You will reap in kind: If you sow judgment, you will reap judgment. If you sow unforgiveness, you will reap unforgiveness. If you sow mercy, you will reap mercy. If you sow an apple seed, you will reap apples. If you sow money, you will reap money.
2. You reap more than you sow . ►Luke 6:38 – If you give, you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full measure, pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, and running over. And with whatever measure you use in giving – large or small – it will be used to measure what is given back to you. ►God will bless you with more than you sowed. ► 2 Corinthians 9:6 – Remember this: A farmer who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop. But the one who plants generously will get a generous crop. You must make up your own mind on how much you should give, not reluctantly or out of pressure, for God loves a cheerful giver.
3. You reap in a different season than the one in which you sowed. ►Galatians 6:9 – So let us not grow weary in doing the right things. Do not become discouraged and give up. You will reap a harvest of blessing at the appropriate time. ►Don’t get weary in sowing and reaping; don’t get weary in sowing words of encouragement; don’t get weary in raising your kids; don’t get weary in doing the right thing. You will reap a harvest of blessing if you don’t give up – Keep on sowing! ►All seeds have different harvest times. Marigolds germinate in 6 days and flower within a month or two. They quickly come up. Bamboo, on the other hand, grows very slowly…In year 5 it explodes and grows up to 5 feet! That is why you must keep on sowing.
Practice giving – You will never, ever out-give God! HC
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Addendum: For Further Study
Questions About Tithing 1. What is tithing? Answer: “Tithe” means “a tenth part” 2. What is the difference between a tithe and an Offering? Answer: A “tithe” is the first part of my income.
An “offering” is anything that I give in addition to my tithe.
3. Why should I tithe?
Above pictures are from Google Images
Answer: Because God commands it.
Because Jesus commended it.
“A tenth of all you produce is the Lord’s.” (Leviticus 27:30)
“Yes, you should tithe; but you shouldn’t leave the more important things undone either.” (Matthew 23:23)
Things to Note About Tithing 1. Tithing reminds me that everything I have was given to me by God.
“Always remember that it is the Lord your God who gives you the ability to produce wealth.” (Deuteronomy 8:18) 2. Tithing expresses my love to the Lord. “Each of you should bring a gift in proportion to the way the Lord your God has blessed you.” (Deuteronomy 16:17) 3. God says that refusing to tithe is stealing from Him! “God says, ‘Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing Me!’ But you ask, ‘How do we rob You?’ God says, ‘In tithes and offerings ...Bring your whole tithe to My house.’” (Malachi 3:8-10) 4. Tithing gives God a chance to prove that He exists and wants to bless you! “Bring your whole tithes to My storehouse. Test Me in this’ says the Lord, ‘and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pout out so much blessing that you won’t have room enough for it!’” (Malachi 3:10)
HC
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Harvest meets every Sunday at the Bayou Rave theater. For meeting times, see our website at www.harvestpensacola.com
Psalm 25:1, 4