From His Heart

Dr. Jeff Schreve: Jesus told a number of parables and almost half of them had to do with money. Because if you think about it, the one thing, if you had to have one test to see how well you're doing spiritually, the one thing that's probably greater than any one thing to tell you if you're doing well or you're doing poorly is your attitude toward money.

Guest (Male): Believe it or not, your attitude towards money is one of the clearest indicators of where you are in your relationship with Jesus. Today on From His Heart with Pastor Jeff Schreve, he begins a new practical and biblically clear series called God and Money: What the Bible Says About Managing Money.

We'll be exploring what scripture teaches about finances, stewardship, and the heart behind our giving. The message today is entitled The Love of Money, where we'll learn four truths to help us understand the dangers of loving money. If you miss any of this dynamic series, you can catch up online once it's aired when you go to fromhisheart.org. Just click the listen link. Now though, open your Bible to 1 Timothy chapter six. Here's Pastor Jeff to explain the downfall that comes with the love of money.

Dr. Jeff Schreve: Please turn to 1 Timothy chapter six. We're starting a brand new series today. We're calling it God and Money: What the Bible Says About Managing Money. You know, the Bible has a lot to say about money and how we are to manage money.

Jesus told a number of parables and almost half of them had to do with money. Because if you think about it, the one thing, if you had to have one test to see how well you're doing spiritually, the one thing that's probably greater than any one thing to tell you if you're doing well or you're doing poorly is your attitude toward money.

Because Jesus said no one can serve two masters. He'll either hate the one and despise the other or cling to one and hate the other. You can't serve God and money, God and riches.

And so we want to talk today, as we kick off this series, about one of the most famous verses in the Bible, 1 Timothy chapter six, that speaks about money and our attitude toward money. I'll read in verse seven of chapter six, 1 Timothy: "For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either. If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content."

"But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs."

The love of money. You know, when we talk about greed, the last of the ten commandments, you shall not covet your neighbor's house, your neighbor's spouse, anything that belongs to your neighbor. That's this desire for more and more. I want what you have, this love of money.

We typically think that's somebody else's problem, right? I mean, we're not the greedy person. It's our neighbor. It's the guy down the street. It's the person sitting next to you at church this morning, provided that's not your husband or wife. It's this other person that's greedy. And they might have, Jeff, you get on to them because they might have a love of money, but I don't have the love of money.

Well, I hope that's true, but we need to pray with David, search me O God and know my heart. Try me and know my anxious thoughts and see if there be any hurtful, evil way in me. Lord, show me if perhaps I don't even know it, but I have this love for money because I can't serve you. No one can serve two masters. You can't serve God and money.

So let's take a little test together to see if you love money. Now listen, the love of money, which is a root, not the only root, but a root of all sorts of evil, the love of money has nothing to do with how much money you have.

Some people have a lot of money and they don't love it. Other people have very little money and they love it. It's not money that's the problem. It's your attitude toward it. So, do you love money? Let's take a little test.

Question number one: Do you find yourself thinking about money much of the time? How to get it, how to get more of it, how to spend it, how to save it, how to protect it? Some of you may remember the television show Gilligan's Island.

Gilligan's Island had Thurston Howell III, who was a plutocrat. He goes on a three-hour tour and brings a chest of money with him. I mean, who does that? And you would see him on Gilligan's Island and he's dreaming about money. And in his sleep, he's just repeating money, money, money, money. Everything in his life was about money. Do you find yourself thinking a lot about money?

Question number two: Do you find yourself worrying about money? I'm just so worried there's not going to be enough. Worried that you don't have enough money, worried that somebody's going to get the money you have.

You know, one of the fanciest watches you can get is a Rolex President. And I've known some people that have a Rolex President, but they keep it in the safety deposit box because they're afraid if they wear it, somebody will steal it. So they like to say they wear a Tolex, which is a Timex that looks like a Rolex.

They wear the Tolex and say this subs in for my Rolex. My Rolex is in the safety deposit box. Somebody will try and steal it. You say nobody would do that. I had a friend of mine that was robbed at gunpoint at his house and the man that robbed him wanted one thing and that was his Rolex President watch. Amazing. So do you find yourself worrying about that?

Question number three: Do you never seem to have enough money? Do you always wish you had more? Question number four: Does it pain you to part with your money? To give your money away to the Lord's work? Do you just feel like, oh, I don't want to do that. I don't want to part with my Benjamins.

Question number five: Do you sin to get money? Cheat on your taxes? Cheat on your expense report? Cheat on a business deal? Lie on an insurance claim? Steal or commit an act of immorality just to get money? Now that's a big one. If you're going to sin against God to get money, that's going to show you that your attitude toward money is not good, to say the least.

And then number six: Do you think you would be happier if you just had more money? Those are all indicators that maybe indeed you do have a problem with the love of money.

Now, I want to share with you four truths from the passage that we read to help us understand this issue of the love of money. Truth number one: It is easy to fall in love with money. Now, we ask ourselves the question, am I driven by the love of God, which is the greatest commandment?

Deuteronomy chapter six, verses four and five: "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might." And Jesus said this is the great and foremost commandment. And so the love of God versus the love of money, those are going to in two different directions. That's why you can't serve God and money.

But here's the bottom line: It's easy to fall in love with money. Now, obviously, there's a strong, strong warning from the Lord to not do that. But it's easy to do. You say why is it so easy? Because all of us need money to live.

I mean, money is something that you can't get around and just say, well, you know, I'm warding off money completely. Well, how are you going to live without money? You have to have money. You have to be able to pay for food and you have to be able to pay for shelter. And he says if we have food and covering, with these we shall be content.

But you have to have money for that. And so we all deal with money. And it becomes easy for us because we need it, because we have to pay for things on a regular basis, that we can start thinking about money far too much of the time.

Now, you know, you say to yourself, for those who are working, if your boss came in Monday morning and said, hey, I got something for you. Just going to throw this out here. What would you think if we took your current salary and added no more work to what you're doing on a given week, but we'd just double your pay? Would you be okay with that?

Everybody would be like, yes, I'm okay with that. That doesn't mean you love money, but you love a bigger paycheck. I mean, let's just be honest. So, you know, it's one of those things that's like, hey, if I have a choice, I would choose more money versus less money. You can do a lot with money. And so we need money to live.

I heard about a guy fresh out of school, an engineer. He was on his job interview and he was talking to the HR director. And the HR director said to him, well, what are you thinking in terms of salary for this job? He said, well, I think that you guys ought to pay me $200,000 plus a healthy benefits package.

And the HR director said, you're fresh out of school, right? He said, yes, I just graduated. He said, okay. He said, well, what about this? He said, what if we gave you full dental, full medical, five weeks paid vacation, a gym membership, covered all your meals when you were at work, and gave you a Lamborghini as a company car? What would you think of that? And the guy said, man, are you kidding? He said, yes, but you started it.

We can, because we need it, we can start to love it. So all of us need money to live and all of us battle with the desires of the flesh. But I say walk by the spirit, you will not carry out the desires of the flesh. And your flesh is that old residual part of you, that old adamic nature, the residual of the adamic nature that wants what it wants when it wants it. It's all about self. And so we battle that. It's an internal battle.

Guest (Male): Pastor Jeff will expand a bit more on this in just a moment with the message The Love of Money. This message is from the new series God and Money: What the Bible Says About Managing Money. Hey, the bottom line on money is this: Your attitude toward money is one of the clearest indicators of where you are in your relationship with Jesus.

In Pastor Jeff Schreve's new series that we're airing now, God and Money, he explores what scripture teaches about our finances, stewardship, and the heart behind our giving. In this compact three-message series, you'll be challenged to evaluate who or what is truly on the throne of your life and discover the blessings that come from putting God first in your finances.

This new series is our gift of thanks to you for your financial support this month to From His Heart. And your gift will go a long way in helping us get these programs on hundreds of stations around the world. Pastor Jeff is a volunteer for From His Heart, receives no income from it at all.

For your gift today to From His Heart, we'll send you a copy of God and Money on CDs, DVDs, or an MP3 digital download, or on a USB flash drive. Your choice. Just make your gift today when you call 866-40-BIBLE, 866-40-BIBLE, or go online to fromhisheart.org.

Thank you. Thank you so very much for making a special and appreciated gift today to From His Heart. Together, we are telling the world about Jesus, and it matters. To get your copy, again, call 866-40-BIBLE or go to fromhisheart.org. The series title: God and Money. You'll be a blessing to us and to many around the world. Now, let's continue today's lesson, part one of God and Money: What the Bible Says About Managing Money.

Dr. Jeff Schreve: 2 Timothy chapter three, verses one and two: "But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money." And then it lists seventeen other things, negative things, ungodly things that come.

But the first one is loving self. You're not going to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, so you end up loving yourself. And when you love yourself, then it is not a leap to love money. What can I obtain to pamper myself? So I can go on trips, so I can buy these things for me because it's all about me.

I heard about a very wealthy man and he was very unhappy. He was all into money. And he went to the therapist and he wanted to talk about his sorry life. And even though he was very wealthy, he was very unhappy. And so the therapist was very wise.

The therapist said, well, let me show you something. And he takes him to a window at his office building and he said, what do you see? And the man looks out the window, he said, well, I see a mother with her kids, I see people at the bus stop, I see a man working on his computer at the little outdoor cafe. He said, that's what I see.

And then he takes him to a mirror that was in his office. He said, now what do you see? He said, well, I see myself. And he said, that's right. And he said, you know what's interesting? He said, both the window and the mirror are made of glass. But the mirror has a thin coating of silver behind the glass. And so all you see through that glass is yourself.

The love of money blocks out everything else. You just think about yourself. Men will be lovers of self, lovers of money. It's easy to fall in love with money. So we need to be very careful with it. As someone said, you know, money is amoral. It's neither good nor bad. It's kind of like a gun. You can have a gun and use it for good purposes, or you can have a gun and use it for nefarious purposes. It has to do with your attitude toward it.

Truth number two: Not only is it easy to fall in love with money, but it is foolish to fall in love with money. It's foolish to fall in love with money. You say why is it foolish? Because money is temporary.

Money doesn't last. Riches do not profit in the day of wrath. Proverbs chapter three says this: "Do not weary yourself to gain wealth. Cease from your consideration of it. When you set your eyes on it, it is gone. For wealth certainly makes itself wings like an eagle that flies toward the heavens."

You know, we have that expression, well, money talks. And it does. It says goodbye. Money just, you set your mind on it and it's gone. And so he says in verse seven of 1 Timothy 6: "For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either."

You come into the world as every baby comes into this world, just as you and I came into this world. You come in naked. As Job said, "Naked I came to this world and naked I shall return there. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." We come in naked and we go out of this world naked.

And when a person dies, this is a profound statement I heard years and years and years ago. When you die, you leave behind all that you have, and you take with you all that you are. Isn't that interesting?

We focus in so much time, effort, and resources associated with what we have. That has our attention and we so often don't really spend the time on who we are. Building our character. We'd rather build our bank account than build our character. But when you die, you leave it all behind. You leave behind all that you have, you take with you all that you are.

You remember the parable Jesus told in Luke chapter 12. He starts the parable or gives the little introduction to it. He said, "Beware and be on your guard against every form of greed, for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions."

And then he tells about the farmer. Said there was a farmer and his land was very productive and he had a bumper crop and he had more grain and goods and things than he could hold. And he said, what am I going to do? My barns can't hold all this. I know what I'll do. I'll build bigger barns. I'll tear these down and build bigger barns and fill them up and I'll say to myself, soul, you have many goods laid up for many years, eat, drink, and be merry.

And the Lord said to him, "You fool. This very night your soul is required of you, and now who will own what you have prepared?" So is the man who is laying up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. And Jesus called him a fool. Hey, it is foolish to fall in love with money because money is so temporary and because money can never satisfy your heart.

It can't. It wasn't made for that. You know, Jesus talked about the deceitfulness of riches. You know, when he told the parable about the seed that was sown on the thorny soil. He said the seed tried to grow up, but it got choked out by the worries and cares of this world and by the deceitfulness of riches.

What are the deceitfulness of riches? Riches deceive because they tell us that they will satisfy and they can't satisfy. Now, I say riches tell us that. The devil tells us that, that riches will satisfy. If you just had more, then you would be satisfied. You would be happy. If you could just win the lottery, then you would be happy.

But riches can't do that. There are a lot of people who have a lot who are miserable. As the statement goes, they have a lot in their purse but very little in their person, and they're very, very unhappy. Well, Solomon, who had so much, he said this in Ecclesiastes chapter five, verse 10, in the easy-to-read version: "Those who love money will never be satisfied with the money they have. Those who love wealth will not be satisfied when they get more and more. This is also senseless."

Remember in Ecclesiastes: "Vanity of vanity," says the preacher, "vanity of vanities, all is vanity." And so he says this is vanity, this is senseless, this is dumb, because it's not going to satisfy you. You've heard me say before and it's so true: Trying to satisfy yourself with money, satisfy the longings of your soul with money, is like drinking salt water to try and quench your thirst. It can't do it. It'll just make you more thirsty until it kills you.

I ran across this statement from William Henry Vanderbilt. William Henry Vanderbilt was very, very wealthy, a man that lived in the 1800s, shipping and railroad tycoon. He had a net worth of $200 million. But $200 million in the 1800s was equivalent to about $50 billion today. So he's wealthy beyond our imagination.

And he said this: "The care of $200 million is enough to kill anyone. There is no pleasure in it." Money can't make you happy. It doesn't have that ability. As Solomon said, who can eat and who can have enjoyment without him? Answer: no one. Because you were made and I was made for the Lord. And as Augustine said, "Lord, our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you."

So it's easy to fall in love with money. It's foolish to fall in love with money. Truth number three: It is devastating to fall in love with money. Devastating to fall in love with money. Let's read it again, beginning in verse eight: "If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content."

That's having your contentment in the Lord and what he provides. "But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men in," a drowning of men, "into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and have pierced themselves with many griefs."

Guest (Male): This has truly been an urgent call to believers everywhere, and particularly you, to seriously seek to know what your current attitude toward money really is and how that aligns with God's desire for you in this message The Love of Money. From the new series God and Money: What the Bible Says About Managing Money. It's our gift to you for your support this month of any amount to From His Heart.

To get your copy, go to fromhisheart.org or call 866-40-BIBLE, 866-40-BIBLE. We're going to pause right there in our lesson for today, but we'll be back tomorrow when we'll have a brief review and continue this lesson, The Love of Money. Here's just part of what's to come.

Dr. Jeff Schreve: I had a conversation with my dear, dear friend years and years ago, and he told me one day, he said, well Jeff, I can tell you right now, there's nothing wrong with wanting to get rich. I said, well there is. 1 Timothy chapter six, verse nine. There's a big warning about those who want to get rich, when that's the desire of their heart. When you want to get rich, well then you're subject to temptation and difficulty and problems and adversity and a snare.

Guest (Male): From His Heart is the listener-supported broadcast ministry of Dr. Jeff Schreve, whose calling in life is to speak the truth in love to a lost and hurting world. No matter what, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Find out about that. Go to fromhisheart.org.