One Year On

It was our first wedding anniversary on Sunday.What an awesome year it has been. We've managed to do a lot in our first year of marriage, including:

• 2 Overseas Holidays (Fiji & NZ)
• 3 Short breaks closer to home.
• Tiarnee finishing her degree and starting teaching.
• Learning to live together.
• Growing as people together.

I've heard people say that the first year of marriage is the hardest but I'm not completely sure if that's true. I don't say that because this year has been easy, marriage is hard work. But it's been a privilege, and a blast so far! We (or at least I!) don't regret it in the slightest! Marriage streches you and grows you in ways you can't imagine before it. But I fully believe that God has used it to make me a better person.

I can't wait to see what God has in store for our future. It's all very breathtaking and exciting and right now, I'm loving the ride!

Sermon Notes

This is the sermon that I preached at the Kaniva Church of Christ on the 24th of October.

Introduction

If you didn't guess from our bible reading this morning, our topic for this morning is: 'money'!

Money. Something that's around us constantly, we use it daily. Money brings us both pleasure and pain. Most of know at least something of money and how it works, but how much do we know of God's outlook on money? The bible talks about it frequently, but do we know shekels and denarius are relevant to us know?

Because we're talking about money, I have 2 pieces of money here:

1. A 2006 Australian 50 cent coin.

2. A 1966 'Round' 50 cent piece.

Apart from the obvious 2 differences in these coins:

• Age – 40 years
  
• Shape
  

These 2 coins are worth different amounts! But Jonny aren't they both 50 cent pieces? Yes they are! Allow me to explain.

1. Coin #1 is a plain old ordinary coin.

2. Coin #2 was a commemorative coin released in 1966 to mark the introduction of decimal currency into Australia. (Some of you may remember that event!) This coin is 80% silver. Hence, if you weighed it, you would discover that it contains about 1/3 of an ounce of pure silver. This makes this coin worth between $5- $6 based on its silver content.

Interesting. But Jonny, what does this have to do with the bible?

Well, I'm so glad you asked!

You see, unlike our currency now, coins in biblical times (& even up to 1900s) contained actual gold silver and yes, occasionally bronze. So our 1966 coin is similar in many ways to the coins used in biblical times. This brings me to my first point!

1) Our wealth, our money and our possessions belong to the Lord!

Psalm 24 clearly states this by proclaiming: "The earth is the Lords and everything in it, the world and all who live in it!"

Psalm 50 takes this idea into more detail as it says:

Psalm 50:9-12 (New International Version)

⁹ I have no need of a bull from your stall
or of goats from your pens,

¹⁰ for every animal of the forest is mine,
and the cattle on a thousand hills.

¹¹ I know every bird in the mountains,
and the creatures of the field are mine.

¹² If I were hungry I would not tell you,
for the world is mine, and all that is in it.

But perhaps this point is made most directly when God says to Job in Job 41:11

Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me.

Or is Haggai 2:8

"The silver is mine, and the gold is mine" declares the Lord God Almighty.

As you've heard, the bible is clear our wealth does belong to the Lord and because of this we're told to be thankful for it. Which is my second point.

2) Be thankful for the wealth that God gives us.

This exhortation to be thankful for our wealth occurs in many places through the bible. But the one I'm going to focus on, is the first reading we heard from Tiarnee earlier, Deuteronomy 8.

In this passage, God is reminding the Israelites of everything good about the promised land he has delivered to them. He speaks of the wonderful farmland, and the great wealth in that land. In verses 17 & 18 he says:

Deuteronomy 8:17-18 (New International Version)

¹⁷ You may say to yourself, "My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me." ¹⁸ But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.

It's a wonderful picture isn't it! God creating the world, his providing us with wealth, housing, education, and money. Tiarnee even read to us of how we can put our

"hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment."

I mentioned to one of Tiarnees friends in Adelaide during the week that I was preaching a sermon on 'money'. Her response was one of surprise "How can you preach on money? Don't Christians think that money is evil?"

It was a fair question. Christians often quote from our reading this morning, "the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil". Or they'll misquote it: "Money is the root of all evil". They do this without knowing that same chapter speaks of God providing wealth for our enjoyment!

If only I could end the sermon there. We could all leave feeling good, reminded of a God who created us, loves us & is generous in his blessings to us. Yet, there's more.

My final point for the morning:

3) Warnings against desiring money.

Both of today's readings carry specific warnings about what can happen when we do forget God & lust after money. Our reading from 1 Timothy 6 has a specific message for Christians who believe "godliness is a means to financial gain". Amongst other things, they are 'conceited and understand nothing".

Paul also warns more generally against desiring wealth. People who wish to get rich give in to "many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction."

It seems here, as in many other forms of idolatry, that the problem is the desire of the creation and not the creator. As we know, God detests idolatry, and a very ominous warning is given to those who forget the true source of their wealth.

Listen to the 2 verses immediately following our previous Deuteronomy reading:

Deuteronomy 8:19-20 ¹⁹ If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed. ²⁰ Like the nations the LORD destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the LORD your God.

Tying it all together

So what should our response be to all of this? Well, let's look again at points 1 & 2.

By remembering that our wealth is Gods, and he created it, we acknowledge who God is. He is above and beyond us, and has no need or use for even the finest goods.

By remembering to thank God for his provisions and gifts of money, we rejoice and are glad in a God who is generous above and beyond all reason. This should also encourage us to be generous in our giving, yet cautious and prudent in the way we spend the Lords money.

If we concentrate and remember these 2 things, that will assist us greatly in avoiding the pitfalls of the final point.

There are warnings aplenty in the bible for those who do not ascribe God as the provider of their wealth. Let us not be one of those who becomes conceited and proud.

Instead let us live with godliness and contentment, as Paul commanded us:

1 Timothy 6:6-7 ⁶But godliness with contentment is great gain. ⁷For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. ⁸But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.

Debut Sermon

Those of you that follow me on twitter will know that I preached my first ever sermon last weekend. I preached at my small home church, the Kaniva Church of Christ. I preached on the subject of 'Money'. I selected this subject because it was topical for me, having recently lead a series of studies on it (see earlier posts!) & because I'm interested in it. As I think we all are!

It was an interesting and enjoyable experience. I'd always wanted to give preaching a go, to see if I could do it. While it's hard for me to say how it went, it seemed to go well and I recieved a lot of positive feedback. Hopefully not too much of it was politeness. I was quite nervous at first, but managed to relax a bit more as I got into it.

It took a long time to prepare, several hours for a 10-15 minute talk. But I'd definitely do it again. Hopefully God used and spoke through what I said, and hopefully he'll do it again.

It was quite a family service, with my talented wife Tiarnee doing the bible readings and kids talk, my dad leading communion, my mum playing piano/ organ & my sister running the data projector. For all you comedians out there, no we werent the only ones there....

I'll post the notes that I spoke from in the next day or two. Maybe someone else out there will find it encouraging.

NZ Photos

For those of you interested, I've uploaded a selection of our photos from our trip to New Zealand & Melbourne. You can access them via the link just above this post. Of if you're reading an RSS feed and are lazy, by clicking HERE.

Here are a couple of good ones:

NZ Holiday Wrap Up!

Starting Sunday week ago (27th Sept.) Tiarnee and I set out on an 'end of Uni' holiday for Tiarnee. She's finished her study and when her registration comes through she's able to start teaching. Very cool! So being the last chance we'll have to take extended holidays for a while we headed off to the South Island of New Zealand for 8 days, and then 2 days in Melbourne when we returned. A brief summary of the trip: (Pictures to follow when I return to an ADSL2+ net connection!)

Day 1: Minimay - Melbourne (drive) - Christchurch
Set out nice and early to arrive at Tullarmarine Airport with plenty of time to check-in and fulfill some duty-free orders for family. The drive was a really good 5 hours, and the flight a smooth 3.5.

Day 2: Christchurch - Franz Josef
After getting up at 8:10 local time (which was 5:10 according to our body clocks!) we rushed though brekky and picked up our hire car. As the weather was miserable we headed out of Christchurch, taking the stunning drive through Arthur's Pass across to the west coast. We then headed down the coast, arriving at Franz Joseph on sunset. We soaked the evening away in some beautiful 38 degree hot pools.

Day 3: Franz Josef - Haast
As the Franz Joseph walk was booked out, we quickly drove down to Fox glacier in time to take the morning half-day glacier walk. This river of ice is 17 km long & 300m wide. It was a massive walk but a clear-blue sky made for spectacular scenery and a great walk on the ice. One of the highlights of the trip.

Day 4: Haast - Queenstown
On this morning we drove through more snow-capped mountains and beautiful clear lakes as we drove through the Haast pass. A stop at Wanaka for lunch, before driving to on to Queenstown where we checked into the Crowne Plaza!

Day 5: Queenstown
The most awesome day of the trip! Sleep-in, free cooked breakfast and the Shotover Jet in the morning! In the afternoon, up to Coronet Peak for snow sightseeing, before shopping in town (for Tiarnee) and a ride up the Skyline Gondola for yet more spectacular scenery, downhill luge, and a buffet tea! After tea what better than for a drink? So we headed to the 'Minus 5' bar where everything including the cup you drink from is made from ice! You can only be in the bar (temp of -8 while we were in it!) for 30 mins. Took lots of photos of each other and the ice sculptures inside.

Day 6: Queenstown - Invercargill
Much more low key. Another awesome cooked brekky in Queenstown (not free this time!) before we drove south to Invercargil. The further we went the worse the weather became. Went all the way down to the bottom of the South Island. Before the hail, rain and wind got the better of us and we retreated for the evening.

Day 7. Invercargill - Dunedin
Heading back up the east coast, we arrived in Dunedin in the early afternoon. A visit to the Cadbury factory there was literally 'sweet as'! We also visited NZs only 'castle' which wasn't really a castle, as there were no walls or moat. But it was a huge old Victorian mansion with elaborate garden etc. For tea this night I ordered Crayfish! Expensive but delicious! It was the first time I'd ever ordered Cray, but hopefully won't be the last.

Day 8 - Dunedin - Christchurch
In icy 5-6 degree temperatures we set out on the 5 hour drive back to Christchurch. We arrived in time to have a walk around the Cathedral Square and finish off our souvenir shopping. We also went to the even church service in the Christchurch cathedral. A very ornate church!

Day 9 - Christchurch - Melbourne
Clothes shopping in the Christchurch mall for Tiarnee, followed by a quick visit to the fantastic International Antarctic Center before dropping off Earl our hired car and heading to the airport. Our flight home was perfectly smooth, and featured a stunning flight across NZs southern alps.

Day 10 - Melbourne
A relaxing holiday day to recover from our holiday! More shopping by my beautiful wife before heading to the Melbourne Museum to visit the Pompeii exhibition & a movie at the IMAX! We rounded out the day with a delicious meal on South bank.

Day 11 - Melbourne -Minimay
Another sleep-in before our long drive back to the Wimmera. We were glad to breakup the drive by having lunch with some friends in Ballarat, and tea with some other friends in Nhill!

All in all a fantastic holiday that I'm still enjoying!

Money As God - Part 1

This is a summary of the things we covered in Week 2 of our study on 'God & Money':

1. What alternatives are discussed in these verses?
Matthew 6:19-24 - There are only 2 alternatives given in these verses, there doesn't seem to be any 'middle ground'. These are:

• Serving God Vs Serving Money
• Treasures on earth Vs Treasures in Heaven

2. What does it mean to 'serve money'?
We serve money by seeking it instead of God, in this way it becomes a form of idolatry.

Romans 1:21-25
3. What ought we be spurred to do as we regard God's good creation?

• Glorify God.
• Give thanks to God.
• Worship & Serve God.

4. What do we tend to do instead?

• Our thinking becomes futile.
• Our hearts become dark.
• We exchange the truth for a lie.
• We worship & serve created things.

5. We then looked at some of the dangers of money:

• Becomming proud & as a result forgetting God. (Deut 8:6-18)
  
• Worries of this life & wealth can choke the word of God out of our lives. (Matt 13:18-23)
• It causes us unnecessary worry! (Luke 12:16-31)

6. Some attitudes towards money that we should avoid:

• Becomming proud. (Deut 8:6-18)
• Thinking that we gained our wealth by our own strength and effort. (Deut 8:6-18)
• Being overawed or jealous of those that are rich. (Psalm 49:16-20)
• 'Setting our hearts on what we eat or drink. (Matt 13:18-23)

7. Godly attitudes we should adopt

• Remembering that it is God who gives you the ability to produce wealth. (Deut 8:6-18)
• Hearing Gods word & understanding it. (Matt 13:18-23)
• Seeking God & his kingdom! (Luke 12:16-31)

That was all from last week. There is alot that we've covered so far and a lot more that we're going to cover.