Last Sunday evening, an enthusiastic member from the congregation said, "I can hardly wait for next Easter." That's the way it ought to be. Easter Sunday is the highlight of the Christian calendar. What follows it, almost inevitably must suffer by comparison and seem like an anti-climax. All the more so, when we have a topic like stewardship or money as the focus of the morning's sermon.
That's exactly the sequence that is followed in the Scriptures. The apostle Paul ends his famous chapter on the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15 with these words: "Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord for as much as you know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord." Having said that, without missing a beat, he continues, "Now concerning the collection for the saints. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store as God has prospered him so that there be no gatherings when I come."
In the Greek there is no paragraph division. He isn't moving to a new subject. The giving of God's people is intimately related to the glories of the resurrection. It is very much a part of being "steadfast, unmovable and always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that our labour is not in vain." We are stewards of everything that God has given to us. For example, we are stewards of the gospel message. We focused on that responsibility during our World Missions Conference and series on Lifestyle Evangelism. We are stewards of our time. We focused on that aspect of stewardship in our series on prayer when we talked about the importance of taking time to hear God and listen to Him speak to us. These four messages on stewardship are not only connected and fit in with the resurrection emphasis of last week; they are part and parcel of the overall emphasis on stewardship that has been our emphasis for this whole year.
You might say, "I understand that but why now? We are 24% ahead of last year in our giving. Why do we need messages on stewardship?" Actually it is the best time to hear what God has to say from His word on this important subject. Then there is no danger of you misunderstanding my motives. There is no need for cajoling and scolding. There's no fear of being manipulated to do things that you are already