Balanced

That is the name of the bible study that we are in on Sunday nights with our small group. I am finally sitting down to write about the last two weeks of the study! It is defiantly one of those studies in which I wish I could watch it over again!

First, I'll start with last week. 1 Chronicles 29 was the passage. It's long but all important.
^"10 David praised the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, saying,
"Praise be to you, O LORD,
God of our father Israel,
from everlasting to everlasting. ¹¹ Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power
and the glory and the majesty and the splendor,
for everything in heaven and earth is yours.
Yours, O LORD, is the kingdom;
you are exalted as head over all.
¹² Wealth and honor come from you;
you are the ruler of all things.
In your hands are strength and power
to exalt and give strength to all.
¹³ Now, our God, we give you thanks,
and praise your glorious name.
¹⁴ "But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand. ¹⁵ We are aliens and strangers in your sight, as were all our forefathers. Our days on earth are like a shadow, without hope. ¹⁶ O LORD our God, as for all this abundance that we have provided for building you a temple for your Holy Name, it comes from your hand, and all of it belongs to you. ¹⁷ I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity. All these things have I given willingly and with honest intent. And now I have seen with joy how willingly your people who are here have given to you. ¹⁸ O LORD, God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac and Israel, keep this desire in the hearts of your people forever."

Verse 12 says wealth and honor come from you and you are the ruler of all things. David is testifying (for lack of a better more modern term) that God really gave him everything he had anyway! Verse 14 and 16 David is so excited that he can even give this much to God but he also knows that what he is giving to God, came form God. In verse 17 David says that none of the giving and building of the temple matters if the intent of the heart is no right, which is true for everything in life. David had such a great perspective! He was so wealthy and so giving to God and he wanted the things like his motivations to be pure because he knew that was what would matter when he stood before God one day.

The question Andy asked us last week to ask ourselves was, "How can I honor you with my money." He said don't think about what you can afford, as in, I can afford this so I must be honoring God with my money but truly humbling yourself and asking God if you are honoring God with your money.

Andy made a very good argument. Ok, I grew up in church and so I know that you are supposed to tithe. Andy said if someone let you borrow their car would you just take care of 10 percent of it? Well, no you woudn't and we are "borrowing" God's money while we are here on earcth, right? If we beleive everything we have is His then we are borrowing our money from God and we must be responisble and honor Him with all of our money and not just tithe 10 percent and feel like we have done our part. This was an eye openeing concept for me simply because I have never thought of concept before. It definfitly sheds a different light on what I spend my money on!

Another point he made had to do with habits or obsessions and if we go shopping once a week for however many hours, at the end of a year, how many hours would you have gone shopping? Was it for stuff you needed or for things to make you feel more secure and to keep up with the fashion that changes all the time? Does this honor God? I just have to say that this one was the hardest for me. I LOVE to shop and I love fashionable clothes. Now, luckily God has placed me in a marriage with a husband that keeps me accountable and I do not live anywhere never a mall and I have kids and it is impossible to drag them there. I know that shopping for me is not a sin but the questions I have to ask myself are ,"Does this shopping trip honor God with my time and money" and "What are my motives?"

Money like everything is not something that you can surreneder a little bit over to God. We hold on to the 90 percent that we "think" is ours. You must give this area all over to God besides it's His anyway! We don't do it bc we think God is going to take from us instead he wants to give to us!! He doesn't want our stuff but our heart

In the last part of the video last night he said, "Hurry up because time runs out! The older we get the mire we get it and the less time we have!"

So, I am in the process of asking God to teach me how to honor Him in everything I do but specifically with my motives for how I spend my money.