THRIVE Devotional Week 5 Lesson 1 Investing My Time

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1 Week 5 Lesson 1 Investing My Time Scripture reading Hebrews 12:1-3 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us. Hebrews 11 is called the Hall of Faith chapter. It is filled with stories of many Old Testament believers who served God with their lives here on Earth. These are believers who THRIVED. They moved forward for God against great obstacles. Though they were not perfect, they served God and were successful in representing Him in their generation. They invested their time in things that were eternal. Hebrews 12 pictures these saints as though they are in an arena watching us as we serve their God here on Earth. We are in the game. We are on the playing field. You and I have now been given our time to serve Jesus. The question is, what are you doing with your time? Investing in God s kingdom begins with investing our time. We are each given 24 hours a day. Someone has said we will either spend our time wisely or waste it on trivial pursuits. Those we admire in Scripture, invested their time caring for others and sharing God s truth with others. How have you been investing your time? Let me give you some suggestions: 1. Invest time with God daily in the Word and prayer. 2. Invest time with your spouse, developing that marriage relationship for God s glory. 3. Invest time with your children, teaching them that the Christian life is the most exciting life that they could possibly live. 4. Invest time in your work, being the best employer or employee you can be. 5. Invest time in your church, serving God and others for the glory of God. Many will waste their time running after the things of this world that will pass away. We are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, who are cheering us on. Let s invest our time wisely so we might THRIVE in His kingdom.

2 Week 5 Lesson 2 Investing My Talents Scripture reading Romans 12:4-15 For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: So we, being many, are one body in Christ Romans 12 lists seven different spiritual gifts that God has given to individual members of the local church. Let me list them: Prophecy Preaching Ministry Helping Teaching Teaching Exhortation Encouragement Giving Giving Ruling Administration Mercy Showing care Every believer has been entrusted with talents that relate to their spiritual gifts that they can use for Him. As a believer, if I want to thrive in the kingdom of God, I must determine to invest those talents and use those gifts for the kingdom of God. I don t know what your talent or gift is, but God does and you will too. For instance, if you have the gift of encouragement and have the ability to sing, you could use your talent to sing in the choir and encourage people. If you have the gift of mercy and you are talented in the area of talking to people, you could use your gift and talent to encourage people on a one on one basis in counseling. If you have the gift of administration and are talented with technical abilities, you could use your gift and talent to reach scores of people through the radio or internet ministry. The question I would like you to ponder today is how am I investing my talents and my gifts for the glory of God. God wants us to invest our time. God wants us to invest our talents. Next time, we will see that God wants us to invest our treasure. God wants us to THRIVE!

3 Week 5 Lesson 3 Investing My Treasure Scripture reading Matthew 6:19-24 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. As a young man growing up in a Christian home, I watched my mother and father tithe every single week to their local church. I remember wondering to myself, why in the world does God require us to give Him our money? He has got all the money in the world. He doesn t need ours. Of course, this is true. So, why does God want us to give? Why doesn t He just open the windows of Heaven and pour out what we need to do His will? The answer is very simply stated here by the Lord Jesus Himself. Jesus does not want us to be living for the things of this earth. He wants us to live for that which is eternal. Jesus says where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. We value that which we invest in. David said, neither will I offer unto the Lord my God of that with doeth cost me nothing 2 Samuel 24:24. God wants us to value our relationship with Him. He wants us to value our eternal home and live for the eternal, not the temporal. God has established that His people will finance His work here on this Earth through giving back to Him a portion of what He has given to us. When we do, our heart is drawn towards the eternal, God is glorified in our life, and we will THRIVE in His kingdom.

4 Week 5 Lesson 4 Investing Through God s Time Scripture reading Malachi 3:8-12 Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. The nation of Israel is called by God to be a holy, separated nation unto Him. Under Mosaic Law, everyone in Israel was to bring a tithe of their possessions to the temple once a year. They were also to bring to the temple a tithe of all their increase once a year. Every third year they were to bring another tithe of their store to the temple. In this passage of Scripture, God is rebuking them for not doing this. He is telling them they are missing out on the blessings and promises of God, because they have disobeyed. If they do obey, He will pour out blessings that they will not be able to receive. This was, of course, under the Mosaic Law. Before God established the law, God had already established the principle of the tithe. Abraham, the Father of the Faithful, tithed to Melchizedek, the High Priest of God. Jacob promised to tithe to God if God blessed him. In the New Testament, Jesus continually rebuked the Pharisees for their legalism. The one thing He commended them for was the fact that they tithed. I really believe that one key to thriving in our finances, as we serve the Lord, is learning to tithe faithfully. When my wife and I came to Las Vegas forty-one years ago, we made a determination to take one-tenth of our income and give it to God. Though we had very little, we have watched God bless us in many ways financially. I believe one of the reasons is because of our commitment to tithe. Tithe is taking one tenth of your income and giving back to God recognizing that everything comes from Him. When you tithe, you will THRIVE.

5 Week 5 Lesson 5 Investing Through Faith Promise Scripture reading 1 Samuel 1:9-11 If thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of thine handmaid, and remember me, and not forget thine handmaid, but wilt give unto thine handmaid a man child, then I will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life The wonderful story of the birth of Samuel teaches us many things. We learn that God hears and answers prayer. We learn that God is a miracle working God. We learn that when we come to the end of our ability, God will show us His ability. Hannah was a frustrated, middle-aged woman who was unable to have a child. She wanted the blessing of God in her life. She wanted to be able to raise children for the glory of God. She was barren and unable do so. She didn t give up. Instead, on their annual trip to the temple, Hannah went into the temple and wept before God. By faith, she made a promise to God. She said, Lord, if you give me a baby boy, I will give that baby boy back to you. I call this faith promise giving. Every June at Liberty Baptist Church, we encourage people to do the same thing Hannah did. We ask them to ask God to give them the means so they can give back to Him. Every year, I encourage people to pray and ask God to put a number on their hearts and then to make a commitment to God concerning that amount. At different times, in my life, that amount has been large and it has been small. Faith promise is not sacrificial giving, and it is not my tithe. Faith promise is my investment of my time in prayer, asking God to entrust to me a certain amount of money. Then I can turn around and give it back to Him. Through this method, our church literally gives hundreds of thousands of dollars to missionaries every year. Are you involved in faith promise giving? If not, let me encourage you, even today, to ask God what He would have you give to missions. Make a promise to God that if He gives to you that amount you will give it back to Him. You will be amazed at the doors He will open to supply you with finances, so that you can give to missions. May you THRIVE as you give by faith.

6 Week 5 Lesson 6 Investing Through Grace Giving Scripture reading Luke 6:27-38 Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again. I was introduced to the principle of grace giving while in Bible college. Chuck Millhuff, a Nazarene preacher, who I became acquainted with through the Sword of the Lord, came to Liberty Baptist College and preached a message called Giving Living. In that message, he said that there are three principles that we find in this passage. Firstly, God is our source. Secondly, you need to plant to grow, give to get. Lastly, you need to expect a miracle. He challenged us as young college students to give generously and expect that God would give in return. God changed my life through that message. I took some major steps in giving things away. Though God did not always supply in the way that I thought He would, I have marveled over these forty-four years as God has supplied our needs, day in and day out. Grace giving goes beyond the tithe and even beyond faith promise. Grace giving is seeing the need and being willing to sacrifice in order to meet that need. It is believing that God will supply your needs. If you have allowed your life to be a channel of His blessings, that is how God wants us to live. It is said by some that J.C. Penney, early in his career, made a commitment to give 90% of his income away and live on 10%. What an example of grace giving and look how God took care of him! He became one of the largest retailers in America by practicing the art of grace giving. I encourage you to invest in the kingdom of God. Invest your time. Invest your talents. Invest your treasure through tithing, through faith promise, and by learning how to live the life of giving by grace. I hope to see you Sunday. Let us THRIVE together!