Thoughts on Money from Piper

The point is this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that you may always have enough of everything and may provide in abundance for every good work. II Cor 9:6-7

In God's mathematics the best way to increase a sum is to subtract from it.

Verse 6: "He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully."

Most people operate on exactly the opposite principle to this one, namely, We will have more if we give less. But the Bible says, You will have more if you give more. This doesn't sound like good mathematics. Ten minus one is nine. And ten minus zero is ten. So if you want to have ten instead of nine, you subtract zero from the checkbook on the first day of the week. Right?

Wrong! The problem with that math is that it leaves God out. That's what I am trying to change this morning--to put God and his promises back into your finances. God says: if you subtract more seed from your bag you have more than if you subtract less seed from your bag. That's God's promise to you. Put him to the test. If you ask, How can this be?, we will see more as we move on.

This not some prosperity gospel--it is not a business principle to cash in on God's amazing interest rate. But it is an opportunity for joy in delighting in what God loves, since He loves cheerful givers.

God loves for you to be happy in your giving.

Verse 7: "Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver."

This is an utterly wonderful truth about God. You may feel it if you imagine what the universe would be like if God were not like this. What if God were like a father who was basically irritated by happy children? What if on Christmas morning a little child has wrapped up some clay hands in a praying position that he made in pottery class at school with a poem to his mother that says,

I made these hands the size of mine,
And make a promise too.
Would you please take them as a sign
That I will pray for you.

And what if he is so excited about giving this gift to his mother that he can hardly sit still and says, "Open this one next, mommy, open this one!"--and the father snaps at him, "Just shut up and be still. She'll get to it!" Or worse, what if his joylessness was so great that he said, "What are you so excited about! They're just some crummy praying hands"

If God were like that the universe would collapse into a black hole of nothingness for me. So you can see why I love verse 7. God loves a cheerful giver. God loves when his children are happy in their giving. God joins every childlike saint on the edge of his throne to see and savor the joy of every gift given and every gift received. God cannot be irritated by excessive joy in giving because there is no such thing. The heavens are the limit, and he is pushing us in this text to as much joy as we can possibly experience.

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How strangely irrational this seems in light of our current cultural values which attempts to find happiness and purpose in possessions and self-gratification. But that we might find happiness and purpose when giving away our hard-earned money is unheard of. Yet God loves people who realize their treasures are in Heaven and are eager to be generous. And I think this is why we are sometimes given more than just enough. We are given enough to live, and an abundance to give.

God's power and grace combine to give cheerful givers enough for themselves and abundance for others.

Verse 8 (literal translation): "God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that by having all sufficiency always in every way, you might abound for every good work."

The point is that God gives us more than we need, and the reason he does that is not so we can store up the excess, but so that we can provide for good works--the poor, missionaries, ministries. The verse can be summed up: God gives enough for us, abundance for others.

Or to link it up with verse 7: the reason God gives you more than you need is not so that you can reduce your joy by keeping it, but increase your joy by giving it. Remember, in God's wonderful way of calculating, if ten minus one is more than ten minus zero, then 15 minus 6 is lots more than 15 minus zero.

Verse 8 makes crystal clear what the meaning of wealth is. Wealth is the God-sent possibility of multiplying the joy of providing for every good work."

"When we gunna wake from our naivety,
To find that there's more than a world full of me.
When we gunna snap from this funk that we're in,
To find that there's freedom only when we give."
~PJR

Excerpts By John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: www.desiringGod.org. Email: mail@desiringGod.org. Toll Free: 1.888.346.4700.