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Sermon: Earn All You Can · North Raleigh United Methodist Church Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well, today we're going to begin a new series for a lot of the month of November, and it is simply called All You Can.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's based on John Wes' sermon, and we're going to talk about that a little more, called The Use of Money.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: And we're going to talk about these three points that John Wesley gave in a sermon: earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: But you see, we can't take it like John Wesley's hearers could.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: That was one sermon.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: We got to spread that out over three weeks.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: Contemporary Methodists, y'all can't, you can't take it as long as John Wesley was going to preach.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: So we're going to spread that out just a little more and cover each of those this week.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: If you've been around a United Methodist Church, you may have heard this earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can, because it's really sound practical advice.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: We're going to weave it in with these scriptures from Matthew 25 for these three weeks.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: So we invite you to hear God's word as we consider this series together and how we are called to relate to our finances and how God is inviting us to do that.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: We're going to start with Matthew 25 today, starting in verse 14.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: I invite you to hear these words.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: This is often called the parable of the talents.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: In the Common English Bible, I'll be reading it's the valuable coins, but we'll get more into this idea about talents as we go.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: The kingdom of heaven is like a man who is leaving on a trip.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: He called his servants and handed his possessions over to them.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: To one he gave five valuable coins.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: To another he gave two, and to another he gave one.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: He gave to each servant according to that servant's ability.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: Then he left on his journey.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: After the man left, the servant who had five valuable coins took them and went to work doing business with them.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: He gained five more.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: In the same way, the one who had two valuable coins gained two more.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: But the servant who had received the one valuable coin dug a hole in the ground and buried his master's money.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now after a long time, the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: The one who had received five valuable coins came forward with five additional coins.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Master, you gave me five valuable coins.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: Look, I've gained five more.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: His master replied, Excellent, you're a good and faithful servant.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: You've been faithful over a little, I'll put you in charge of much.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: Come, celebrate with me.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: The second servant also came forward and said, Master, you gave me two valuable coins.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: Look, I've gained two more.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: His master replied, Well done.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: You're a good and faithful servant.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: You've been faithful over a little, I'll put you in charge of much.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Come celebrate with me.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: Now the one who had received one valuable coin came and said, Master, I know that you are a hard man.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: You harvest grain where you haven't sown, you gather crops where you haven't spread seed.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: So I was afraid.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I hid my valuable coin in the ground.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: Here, you have what's yours.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: His master replied, You evil and lazy servant, you knew that I harvest grain where I haven't sown, and that I gather crops where I haven't spread seed.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: In that case, you should have turned my money over to the bankers, so that when I returned, you could give me what I well what belonged to me with interest.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Therefore, take from him the valuable coin and give it to the one who has ten coins.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Those who have much will receive more, and they who have more, and they will have more than they need.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: But as for those who don't have much, even the little bit they have will be taken away from them.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: Now take the worthless servant outside and throw him outside into the darkness.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: The people there will be weeping and grinding their teeth.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks be to God.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: Let us pray.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: O Lord, let the words of my mouth and the thoughts and meditations of all of our hearts be pleasing in your sight.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: For you, O Lord, are our rock and our redeemer.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: So it was around 1760 when John Wesley first preached this sermon that got titled The Use of Money.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: And ever since I learned about this sermon, I have been intrigued by its timeless practical advice.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: He gives three simple rules about money.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: You see them on the screen there.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: Earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: And in his introduction in that sermon, John Wesley said this.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: He said, The love of money we know is the root of all evil, but not the thing itself.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: The fault does not lie in the money, but in them that use it.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: It may be used ill, and what may not, but it may likewise be used well.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: It is full as applicable to the best as to the worst uses.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: So this is important as we begin today.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's not that John Wesley or the church is saying that money is evil.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: Rather, Wesley says here, right, money can be used for good or for evil.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: To Wesley, money is simply a tool.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: Like a hammer, it can be used to fasten something together and do good.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's what happens when lots of people use hammers, maybe not me as much.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: Or it can be used to break something down and to destroy.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: So Wesley says it's a tool.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: When we consider his sermon and advice, today is simply part one.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: Earn all you can.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: You see, by the time John Wesley was preaching this sermon, some in the Methodist movement were moving up in the world.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: The movement that started, that started among the working class, the blue-collar workers of its day, had started to become more mainstream and gotten a little bit bougie, right?
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: So when John Wesley says, earn all you can, it sounds like great news to the Ebenezer Scrooges of the world.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Gain all you can, go capture your share of the market, get your advantage, take out anyone else along the way.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: That's what the preacher told us to do.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: And just hold on, John Wesley preaches.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: He says, earn all you can, but not at the expense of life or health.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: He gives examples of people working in arsenic mines in his day, being exposed to that harmful chemical, knowing that it was going to affect their very health and even their lives.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: He said, earn all you can, but some people are having to work 60 hours in one position over a desk while they write, and that's not good for their posture and for their livelihood.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: You see, John Wesley on the side was also kind of a doctor since he traveled around so much.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: He said, earn all you can, but without hurting your mind or really your conscience.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: He talked about not breaking the laws in how you earn your money.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: He talked about not paying appropriate taxes to the crown in that day.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then he said, earn all you can without hurting your neighbor.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: He talks about not taking advantage of your neighbor.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: When you know something is worth this and you try to sell it to him for that, don't take advantage of your neighbor.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: He talked directly to the people who were developing spiritus liquors in his day, saying that they were taking advantage of them by getting them addicted and in a cycle that was going to lead to their poverty and not their well-being.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: So John Wesley, in those caveats, in those but, he puts a lot of the earning that goes on in our economy on pause.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: You see, our Western capitalist mindset that all of us are in, because it's the air we breathe and the water we swim in, it's built on the concept of scarcity.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: If you've ever taken an economics class, right, the principle of scarcity looms large.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to get your shares of the economy.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: In God's economy, there is abundance.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: There's enough for all.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's not about getting shares in God's economy, but about sharing in God's economy.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: You see, John Wesley was a committed disciple of Jesus, also with very neurotic tendencies.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like very neurotic.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: If you've ever read John Wesley for even a little bit, you know that he had some very stringent rules and some very particular ways of talking about the faith.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: He was trying to balance what we know as the Protestant work ethic that John Wesley would pretty much wholeheartedly agree with, with the concept of the ethics of the Christian faith.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Listen to his description when he talks about earning all you can.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: If you're someone who puts things off or procrastinates, John Wesley, well, he's got words for you.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: He says, gain all you can by honest industry, use all possible diligence in your calling, lose no time.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: Every business will afford some employment sufficient for every day and every hour.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: That wherein you are placed, if you follow it in earnest, will leave you no leisure for silly, unprofitable diversions.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: No putting off from day to day or from hour to hour.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Never leave anything till tomorrow, which you can do today, and do it as well as possible.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: Do not sleep or yawn over it.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: Put your whole strength to the work.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: Somewhere some of you are like John Wesley sounds like my grandpa telling me, right?
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: No putting off from day to day or from hour to hour, right?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um never leave anything till tomorrow, which you can do today.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: And while John Wesley is a little over the top in these descriptions, he is also right about the value of hard work.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: When you get to be part of a project or making something that you can be proud of, work can be a delight.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: No, I don't want to forget about those of us in this room who are not currently earning money through a job.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: Many of us in this room are retired.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: But for all of us, there is still work to be done.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: If you are retired, Wesley's Earn All You Can, I think is a great calling to have a reason to get out of bed in the morning.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: If you are caregiving for someone, do it as if it's to the Lord.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: If you are not able to go to the food bank and serve like you used to, or take that mission trip like you used to always do, how can you support those ministries still?
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: If you were limited by my mobility or by diagnosis, pray daily for specific people and ministries and let them know you are praying with them.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: John Wesley, I think, will be fine with the notion of retirement, meaning retirement from a job that produces income.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: But there is no retirement in the life, in the vocation of following Jesus.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: You are still a valuable laborer in God's vineyard.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: You can still multiply the talents that God has entrusted to you.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: Speaking of those talents, I'd like to move to this parable then from Jesus.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's often called the parable of the talents.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: And this term talent is interesting.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' day, a talent was about 15 years of earnings for a typical laborer.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: I read this week that someone handing you a talent would be the equivalent of someone handing you one million dollars.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: Now, our English term of talent, meaning gifts or skills, is derived from this parable.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: For we quickly realize in this parable that we are not simply talking about money.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: So the landowner, he's gonna go away on a trip.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: And he leaves his servants, right, differing amounts of talents.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: Gives one five talents, right?
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: Gives one two, gives to one one.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I and I can picture the one talent man after maybe he doesn't find out that the other two got such so much, but I remember when I was 14 or 15 years old, I had saved up for many, many years to buy a keyboard kind of like that one right there, except for it was 30 years ago, so it wasn't also a computer.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: And um and I had saved up, and I my grandpa was gonna help me purchase the rest of it, and I went to the bank and got out$500, right?
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: I had five Benjamins in my hand, and I felt like one of those guys in a heist movie, right?
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: Who's got the suitcase or the briefcase and opens it up and there's all the bills.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I was convinced that I was living large and also that I had to get as quickly as possible from the bank to the music store before that$500 just disappeared, right?
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: The landowner doesn't leave any direct instructions.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't tell the servants exactly what to do, how they are to invest the money, what funds they should consider, right?
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: If it should go in this type of account or that type of account, he doesn't tell them.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: But this was a common practice in that day.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: So the servants would know how to make money on the capital that was left to them by the landowner.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: Doubling the money was considered a good return for the effort.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: So that's just what the first two servants do, right?
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: They make 100% on what the landowner entrusted to them.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: And the response to them, both the five-talent guy and the two-talent guy, is the same.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: Excellent.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: You are a good and faithful servant.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: You've been faithful over a little, I'll put you in charge of much.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: Come, celebrate with me.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: It seems like the landowner is not concerned with how much profit exactly is made.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: The guy that made two talents got the same praise as the one who got five.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: Rather, it's that the servants have put themselves to work and invested.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: They are stewards over what the landowner gave to them.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: But the one talent guy, he starts with a litany of excuses when the landowner comes home.
• 14:36
  unknown: Right?
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: His opinion of the landowner is one only of fear.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so what did he do?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: He dug a hole in the ground and he put the talent in it and buried it, right?
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: And he digs it up and hands it to him and says, Here's your talent.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: We sort of feel bad for this guy, and we might expect some compassion from the landowner, but instead he reprimands the servant, kicks him out, and it sounds harsh to our ears, but doing nothing was inexcusable.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_01: In these wisdom parables of Jesus' day, and that's what this parable is, the sin that the servant showed was squandering an opportunity.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: So even though there weren't direct instructions for what to do with the money and how to invest it, faithfulness here involves initiative and risk.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: Friends, what if the parable is telling us this?
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus is the landowner.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: And when he ascended, he left his world to us.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: He has given us each talent, literally in the money that we earn and in the talents and skills and unique gifts that God has given to us.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: And our landowner is going to return.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: What will we have to show for it?
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_01: One of the great challenges of working life is seeing its purpose.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: I've talked with and counseled many people who feel like the only purpose of their jobs feels like making ends meet or getting that paycheck.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: One of my friends refers to it as returning value to the shareholders, right?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's how he refers to his daily work, very facetiously.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: And in some ways, this first directive from John Wesley says, that's okay.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to support yourself and your family.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: This responsibility is God given.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: When we are able to be employed and earn a paycheck, it can make us proud.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: If you ever remember that first paycheck you ever got and you said, Whoa, I'm actually making money, and not just that piddly allowance I used to get, right?
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: Even if we don't find great meaning in the work itself, how we work also matters.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: Our attitudes, our relationships with coworkers, our dealing with customers, our staying patient on endless Zoom calls, right?
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: All of it.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: But the hope is that we can begin to see our earning and see our work as part of God's work in the world.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: The dream is that we can participate in God's economy, earning a return on the talents that God has given to us.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: At the end of 1 Corinthians 15, the great chapter on the resurrection, Paul penned these words.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord, because you know that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: In the Lord, your labor is not in vain.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: This is the promise that we carry.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: Our labor is not in vain.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Our world's definition of making as much as we can leads to emptiness.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: We know this.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: You know someone in your life, I guarantee it, who has made earning all they can the sole goal of living.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: And they are miserable.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: The story of tabloid journalism is pretty much of people who earned all they can and then have screwed up their whole lives, right?
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: But we are promised and we are working as followers of Jesus that our work will bear fruit in time, eventually.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: As I was preparing this sermon, a song came to my head.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's called Your Labor Is Not in Vain.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so I want to share it with you today.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: There we go.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's what happens when you get a new fangled one.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not in vain, though the ground underneath you is cursed and stain, your planting and reaping are never the same.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not in vain, your labor is not unknown, though the rocks they cry up, and the seed may groan.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: The place of your toil may not seem like a home.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not your own.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: I am with you I am with you.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: I am with you I am with you for I have called you, called you by name.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not in vain.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: The vineyards you plant will bear fruit, the fields will sing out and rejoice with the truth.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: For all that is old will at last be made new.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: The vineyards you plant will bear fruit.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: I am with you, I am with you, I am with you, I am with you, for I have called you, called you by name.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not in vain the houses that you labored to build will finally with laughter and joy be filled.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: the serpent that hurts and destroys will be killed, and all that is broken be healed.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: I am with you, I am with you, I am with you, I am with you for I have called called you by name.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not in vain.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: Your labor is not in vain.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: Providing God, help us to trust our working lives to you.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: We pray that the work of our hands each day can be dedicated to you.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: We give this week over to you, inviting you to guide our hands, our speech, and our attitudes.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: We trust that you are the giver of all good gifts, including our paychecks.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.