God’s Level is Abundance

It’s good to be with you again, as we draw near to the close of another week. Today I’ll continue and complete the theme that I’ve been following for the past two weeks, “God’s Plan for Your Money.”

In my previous talks this week, I’ve established six important facts in connection with giving. First, the key to right giving is grace and grace comes only through Jesus, through the cross and is received only by faith. Second, we must first give ourselves—we cannot buy God’s favor, He requires that we first surrender ourselves to Him before our gifts become acceptable. Third, after that giving completes and establishes our righteousness. Fourth, giving is a proof of the sincerity of our love, both for God and for our fellow-believers. Fifth, giving calls down God’s favor and love upon us. “God loves a hilarious giver.” Sixth, giving is sowing—it’s sowing in God’s harvest field. And the same principles that apply to agriculture apply to giving and the Lord wants us to understand and apply these principles so that we may be blessed, we may have enough food for ourselves, we may have seed to sow, our barns for storage may be enlarged and our harvest may increase.

Today I’m going to share a seventh wonderful fact about giving in God’s laws of finance and it is this: The level of God’s provision for His people is abundance. This is stated by Paul in one of the most powerful verses in the New Testament: 2 Corinthians 9:8. I want you to listen carefully:

“God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.”

Notice first of all, as I’ve been saying all along, it’s by grace—it’s not by law. And the principle of grace is stated in 2 Corinthians 8:9. We’ve already looked at it but we’ll look once more:

“For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.”

You need to keep those two references to those two Bible passages in your mind: 2 Corinthians 8:9 and 2 Corinthians 9:8. 2 Corinthians 8:9 speaks about the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ that on the cross He became poor with our poverty that we might by faith share His riches. And then 2 Corinthians 9:8 tells us the level of the grace that’s released to us through the cross and it says, as I’ve already read it, but I’ll read it once more: “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.” Now, if you analyze that verse, there are two key words: the word “abound” and the word “all.” And “abound” occurs twice and “all” occurs five times in that one verse. I cannot think of any way the language could be more emphatic and it’s speaking about the level of God’s provision for His people. It says, “...all grace ...so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.” Now, the last word in English is “every” but in the Greek it’s the same word “all.” So, if you have all that you need, in all things, at all times, to abound to every good work, there is absolutely no room for unsupplied need anywhere in that verse.

And then, let’s consider for a moment the meaning of abundance. What does abundance mean? Well, by origin (it comes from a Latin word) it speaks of “a wave that overflows.” So, your swimming pool has abundance when it overflows. Your sink has abundance when it overflows. A thing has no abundance until it overflows. Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh.” So, when your heart overflows, it overflows through your mouth.

Now, what does it mean to have overflowing provision? Let me illustrate it very simply. You need $50 worth of groceries and you have $40. So you go to the grocery store but you’re shopping out of insufficiency. Then consider you have $50. You need $50 worth of groceries. You go to the grocery store—you’re shopping out of sufficiency--you’ve got just enough. But you need $50 worth of groceries. You go to the store with $60—you’re shopping out of... what? Out of abundance. You have more than enough, there’s an overflow. And God’s provision is on that level. God does not merely offer us just enough but if we, by faith, appropriate His grace, then the level of His provision is abundance. We have more than enough for all our needs and for ourselves. But you must notice the end purpose of abundance is “every good work.” It’s not “selfish indulgence.” It’s being able to do good works.

Now, why does God want His children to have abundance? I can tell you one reason. I’m not sure it’s the only reason. I think one reason is just that God loves us. But I think there’s a specific practical reason and it’s contained in Acts 20:35, where Paul is quoting Jesus and He says:

“The Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

So the receiving has a blessing, but giving has a greater blessing. And God has no favorites amongst His children. He wants all His children to enjoy the greater blessing of giving. And we cannot enjoy that greater blessing of giving until God makes available to us His abundance. But He makes His abundance available to us that we may not just be limited to blessing of receiving but that we may be in a position to enjoy the greater blessing of giving.

To complete what I’ve been teaching in this series of talks about finance and giving and God’s provision and God’s blessing, I want to add a word of warning. And my warning is this: If you want to enter into what I’ve been teaching you will have to express your faith in action. It will not be enough merely to give mental assent to what I’m saying. “Well, that was good teaching. Isn’t that wonderful! God wants me to prosper. He wants me to have abundance.” Nothing will change in your life if you go no further than that. At some point, you’ve got to express this teaching, if you believe it, in your action, in acting by faith.

In James 2:26, it says, “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds [or actions] is dead.” You can believe everything and have nothing unless to your faith you add action. You have to act in faith.

I’ve pointed out, more than once already in this series, but it’s so important I’m going to say it again: If you want this kind of abundance, which comes by grace, not by law, then you’ve got to act in faith and that means you have to give first. The words of Jesus again, in Luke 6:38:

“Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”

So, you want it to be given to you? Sure. But then you have to give first. That’s faith. And if you’re not willing to act in faith, you do not set in motion the processes which will bring God’s prosperity and God’s abundance into your life.

We need to bear in mind, in terms, again, of agriculture, that there is usually an interval between sowing and reaping. The farmer does not sow one day and reap the next. He has to let the seed fall into the ground and apparently die and when it’s fallen into the ground and died then the harvest comes up. This is expressed by Paul in Galatians 6:9 and it’s got an important lesson.

“Let us not become weary in doing good [and that includes doing good with our money]... Let us not become weary in doing good for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

So, we sow and Paul says in that same passage, “whatever a man sows he will also reap.” And then we have to wait for God’s appointed time for the harvest and the harvest will come if we do not give up. But if we become impatient, or lose our faith or turn away from these principles, then God does not guarantee the harvest. We have to live and act in faith in every area of our lives including our money.

Our time is up for today. I’ll be back with you again next week at this same time, Monday through Friday. Next week I’ll be sharing with you on another exciting theme from the Word of God. My special offer this week is my book Faith to Live By. This book places in your hand the essential key to finding and fulfilling God’s plan for your life; that is, faith. It explains in simple practical language what faith is, what faith will do for you and most important of all, how you can get faith even if you have none to start with. Also my complete series of messages this week on “God’s Plan for Your Money, Part 2” is available in a single, carefully-edited cassette. Stay tuned for details.