James: Invisible Greed

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 Open your Bibles to James chapter 5. We’re almost done with this book. And I’m just so grateful for the way that it’s served us. Thank you for everybody who’s here today. I know sickness has been a thing lately, praying in the name of Jesus, that just goes away.

It’s what, there’s a 40 degree swing yesterday alone, from 50 to 90. What in the world? Alright, we’re praying against that. Alright, let’s begin. So early on, I discovered there was two ways to connect with Pastor Caleb. Number one was to talk about coffee. Do not talk about Starbucks unless you’re trashing it because they have burnt, they burn the thing to make it more, I don’t know, it’s a whole coffee thing.

I don’t connect. I actually just recently started having coffee, but I think you’d be ashamed how much creamer I put into it. So I’ve learned. You cannot, I cannot connect with Caleb to talk about coffee, but one thing that I can talk to Caleb about, we’re good friends now, but if we want to really connect, uh, with Shelby it was about Disney Channel original movies, but with Caleb, it’s all things movies.

And so, uh, every once in a while, like, let’s connect on a non ministry level. And let’s just do something. So I’m not going to take credit. He said, Hey, let’s, let’s go this week. And so we went and saw Killers of the Flower Moon. Have you guys heard of this? Martin Scorsese film with Leonardo DiCaprio. It was a Wednesday morning at 11 a.

m. Me and Caleb were there with our fellow retirees. It was wonderful. And we were sitting there going to watch this three and a half hour long movie in a row. I mean, there’s no intermission. I mean, you just got to be there for the full three and a half. And right when the movie started, I know he scoffed at me, I always time every movie I’m in.

Cause I’m always interested, is it really as long as they say? And so I got my watch, right when the movie started, and I’m here to tell you, it’s the full. 3 hours and 30 minutes, that doesn’t even include credits. And so, I, you know, got a little antsy midway through, checked my phone a couple times, had to go to the bathroom because…

I cannot hold my bladder that long. Caleb was there the whole time. Never touched his phone. I didn’t know if he brought it in. And he was engaged. Did not go to the restroom. He was engaged. Fully in. And you know, he’s kind of sitting there like this, like thinking. I’m like, I’m just like taking it in. He’s like, okay, what is the, you know, I don’t know.

You know, stuff that happens. And so we had a good time. It was a long movie, but it was a good movie. And, uh, towards the end of the movie, I started getting nervous. Because I know the post movie friendship chat is about to happen. Uh, I learned this. It was one of the first times. Me, uh, uh, me and Jordan went with Shelby and Caleb to the movies, you’re not in your head, yes.

We ended the movie and me and Jordan were like, alright, see ya, and just left. And Caleb and Shelby were like, No, this is a part of the movie. You have to stay after. You have to talk about the philosophy, and the director, and which actor didn’t do a good job. Who’s in the running for the Oscars. You gotta do all these things.

We didn’t know. We were like, the thing is done. We’re going home now. And she’s, you know, so, I’ve learned this. You have to talk. You have to chat. And so, I was like, oh no. I’ve just been kind of watching the movie. I have no idea what’s going on. Who am I going to talk about? You know, and I’m just going to Google some trick.

Like, yeah, this is what I think Leo did in this movie. You know, I was a little bit nervous. The movie ended and, um. Uh, we, we go out to the parking lot, which was my win because I don’t have my sunglasses on. That’s my excuse. I’m like, bro, I’d like to talk more. Like there’s so much I have on my mind, but the sun and the reflection in the parking lot, you know, so we talked about it a little bit.

My problem is I don’t have any original thoughts. What I do is I watch a movie. I don’t know if I like it or not. I go home, watch like five YouTube videos. Analyzing the movie, and now I’m brilliant. I take all five, bring them together into one cohesive thought, probably rhymes, and now I’m ready to talk.

And so, like, now I’m ready to tell Caleb what I thought about the movie. I typically include these kind of intros without telling Caleb, but he read my notes, so this doesn’t feel as authentic. But here is what the movie was about without ruining it for those who still want to watch it. It’s three and a half hours, by the way.

Uh, it was a story about a man who was so strangled by greed. He was fine killing his own partners as long as it filled his own pockets. It’s this crazy chokehold of greed. You see him slowly but surely give in and do things it looks like against his own heart, but it certainly helped his own bank account.

And Scorsese, he’s using this movie to show the complexity of humanity because you kind of like this character, you kind of don’t. You kind of feel like he’s struggling and thinking, but I think he does love these people, but yet he’s willing to cut them off. It’s really complex, and I think Scorsese, right, loves to show the complexity of humanity.

I’m looking for my professor to approve my grade here. And just like, it’s not as cut and dry, right? It’s not just like a world full of just good people and bad people. Good people do bad things. Bad people sometimes do good things. It’s really ambiguous. And so, at age 83, Scorsese, this is kind of an indictment to our culture at large.

And it’s true, many of the issues we face in society today stem from this chokehold of greed. I’m reading a book this week, uh, he’s talking about the creators of social media, interviewing them and, and their product has turned into something they didn’t want it to become. But these social media companies, they’re very well aware what it’s doing to society.

Lowering our thoughtful discourse. It is raising suicide rates, particularly among young girls. And it’s spreading disinformation on both sides of the political aisle. The problem is, these social media companies will not change, because if they do, it will affect their bottom line. They’re not gonna change the strategy, even though it’s killing our society.

Why? Because it’s filling their bank accounts. It is the most lucrative way to do business. And so it’s kind of like throwing your hands in the air. And not only that, there’s a lot of industries and products we have here in America. We use different places around the world and they use slave labor, labor, and they hide the evidence and they know what’s wrong and, and we all kind of like, yeah, I don’t want to buy from people who do that, but the companies go, yeah, it’s wrong, but we get more money this way.

And so we just kind of push it through. There’s so much evil and injustice that happens in this world because we just want to make more money. And there’s a lot to worry about in our cultural moment. We like to be positive here, but we also like to expose the negative before entering the gospel message that there is always hope.

But one that is very alarming, and write this down, we are fine with raiding our souls as long as it’s raising our salaries. James wants to address that today. A lot of us, we make decisions, it’s gonna hurt us, it’s gonna hurt our family life, it’s gonna hurt our Christian life, and we may not read the scriptures as much anymore, but, I’m gonna make more money, I’m gonna be satisfied because I finally have enough money to fulfill all my…

Longings and that’s the atrocities of greed are all around us and yet we don’t seem to care enough to change it We like to complain about it, but we leave it there up till Upton Sinclair He’s the novelist and political activist of the 20th century He’s once had this line quote it is difficult to get a man To understand something when his salary depends upon him not understanding it Could it be that Jesus teaching on money is good, beautiful, and true, and yet we have determined it too difficult to understand?

Jesus, he was the one who said, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and yet lose his soul? In other words, why would you raise your salary if it raids your soul? But many of us think it’s a worthy bet. Let’s try anyways and see if we were the ones who figured out how to deal with so much money.

Today in James chapter 5, he addresses money and wealth. Now let me be loud and clear as we begin. Money is not evil. Okay, a lazy reading of the text here would assume money and wealth are always bad and everyone who has a lot of it is not fit for the kingdom. You do have scriptures where Jesus said it is hard for a rich man to enter in the kingdom of heaven, right?

There is this reality where it is a bit difficult. However, our church, we could do so much more for the kingdom if more of us were more well off. If we had wealth and were Generous to fund the vision that God has for us money itself is not evil What does the Bible say in 1st Timothy 6 money is not evil But the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil So it is that desire that heart that wanting this more than anything else That’s what leads to destructive ends, which you see that Again, in Killers of the Flower Moon.

And if you’re thinking, way to go Trey, you spoiled the movie. Guys, it’s literally called Killers of the Flower Moon. Like, I’m not really giving too much away by telling you somebody killed a bunch of people for money. Okay? It’s in the headline. It’s alright, you wouldn’t watch a three and a half hour movie.

Anyways, now, this is what James is gonna rail against. You will see James, he’s actually very stern, very direct. Uh, in fact, there is literally nothing positive. There’s no, like, positive spin at the end of this. This is hard hitting. And we’re going to read it. Aren’t you happy you’re here today? James chapter 5, verse 1.

It says, Come now, you rich people, weep and wail over the miseries that are coming on you. Your wealth has rotted and your clothes are moth eaten. Your gold and silver are corroded and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up treasure. In the last days.

Look. The pay, I want you to imagine when he’s saying, come now, look, he’s like clapping his hands. Look at me. This is urgent. You need to hear this quit ignoring me. Look, the pay that you withheld from the workers who mowed your fields cries out. And the outcry of the harvesters has reached the ears of the Lord of Armies.

This Lord of Armies is insinuating to the Lord who actually has power, to the God who can judge, to the one that you cannot, no matter how much money you have in the world, you cannot out defeat His army. Verse 5. You have lived luxuriously on the earth and have indulged yourselves. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.

You have condemned you have murdered the righteous who does not resist you. There’s actually some People’s commentaries in verse six trying to figure out some of your translations may say you have murdered the righteous one leading some to assume He’s saying it’s the rich who really murdered Christ who is the ultimate righteous one?

But yet as Christ went to the cross, he did not resist that killing He took it because he knew he would resurrect most though I believe what he’s saying is these righteous poor who actually cannot resist both because Christ has called us to non resistance. We just know that our life, uh, you know, we could be killed for our faith, but we know we have heaven on the other side so we can keep pushing through.

And so he’s saying, you, you rich, you think you take advantage of the poor. You think, man, because they don’t fight back, there’s going to be no punishment. He’s saying, no, you need to be careful here because even though the poor are not resisting you because they don’t have the power or the means. God will resist you in the end.

So, many assume here James is writing to, about non believers, to comfort believers. Okay, so 5, 1 through 6, by the grace of God, this actually doesn’t describe any of you in the room. These are unrighteous, unregenerate, not followers of the way, who have found their only hope in life is in money, and so now he is condemning this group of people.

But what’s weird is this letter, it’s not written to those people, it’s written to a church. And so the question is, why would you write towards these people if these people are never going to read the letter? This comforts believers. This is actually an Old Testament use. The prophets of old would pronounce judgments on other nations.

And most believe those nations never got those judgments. But it was a comfort to those who were being oppressed. Look, God sees the oppressor and he will judge the oppressor. So it’s almost this comforting thing of like, Oh, good. God recognizes these unrighteous rich and God’s going to judge these. Even if those righteous, unrighteous rich people never hear this letter, I need to hear it.

Because this life is so hard and these unrighteous people seem to be getting their way. So James is pronouncing judgment in order to bring comfort to those who are being. punished by them. But there’s also another thing it does for you. So most believe, and I’m in this camp, this is unregenerate.

Unregenerate means, uh, to be regenerated. It means to be when you come to Christ, your heart is literally regenerated. It’s brought to life, uh, without Christ, we are dead spiritually. And so this is unregenerate means your spirit is dead. And you don’t, of course you run after money. You run after everything in the world because you haven’t seen Christ and, and him glorified in your life.

So this also serves as a caution though. So it’s judgment over the oppressors, but it’s also a subtle reminder to the church saying, okay, I know this isn’t you. If you have been saved by Jesus, this, this isn’t you, but I’m here to tell you don’t envy them. Anybody feel that, right? You see these people that just are super wealthy and you’re like, But man, I, I know what they’re doing is wrong and we’re about to show all the different ways that they’ve been wrong, but man, it’d be nice for me to have that money.

It’d be nice for me to be in that position. And he wants to assure you, no, you would be worse off if you were in this boat. So I want us to point out, according to this text, there are three traits of the unregenerate rich. Three traits that honestly, the scripture says we need to analyze our own hearts.

We need to ask. Do I exemplify any of these traits? And then I’ll tell you what you do if your answer is yes on any of these. There is hope, but we first need to hear about what those are. Let me be clear. Having a lot of money is fine, but not if you have these three traits that come along with having a lot of money.

Trait number one is hoarding. Look again, if you have your Bible in front of you, verse two and three, your wealth has rotted and your clothes are moth eaten, your gold and silver are corroded. Now, when do clothes get eaten by moths? When does gold and silver corrode? When does wealth or money just rot away?

When it’s not in use. Implying there’s these rich people who just store and hoard not to use, not to bless, not to invest, literally to build. We looked at Luke 12 during our simplicity series, build these bigger barns just to house these things with no intent on using the money. I remember we had a member at our church a few years ago, moved to another house and anybody, this is the hardest thing to sell a home and get another home within like the same.

You want them to overlap. I know for me and Abby’s going, yes, she’s moving to Idaho. Talk about, yeah, terrible. We had to live with my parents for three months during that transition. And we were like, was this worth it? I don’t know. Um, but I remember I had one, one, uh, a member of ours. They did that. They did that kind of move.

And, but they had this like three month, they couldn’t be in a home. So they had to rent and all this stuff. And so they decided just to buy this huge, uh, like container and just put all their clothes, all their possessions in there. And they lived as if they’re on vacation for three months, right? Just everything in one little piece of luggage.

They eventually get back. Finally, when they move into the house, they open up this container unit and moths have literally eaten away all of their clothes. They had to start completely over. Right. How did that happen? That doesn’t happen if it’s in your own closet, you’re taking it off the hanger, putting it on, then putting it back, which hopefully you put it in the dirty clothes first, get it washed, and then you put it back, right?

I don’t know some of us, huh? I’ve smelt you lately, right? So this is the process. Hoarding is that idea. He’s saying, okay, he’s implying if these things are rotting away, it’s showing you’re just grabbing money to grab money. And so James is clear here. Wealth is to be used, not to be stored. Now, does this mean we can’t save?

Of course not. The Bible helps us interpret the Bible. The Proverbs are clear. There is so much wisdom in saving. Uh, the general wisdom perpetuated by someone like Dave Ramsey says three to six months of living expenses is good standard wisdom. After being debt free, this is smart. Saving to bless your children is key to help them with their college fund.

But let me just say this. Some people don’t have to go to college with certain trades. And so, save that money and bless them with something else. So there is actually a lot of, the fool is the one who doesn’t save at all, right? It’s harsh to live paycheck to paycheck and it inhibits you from living a life of generosity.

So I want to be clear here. The text is not saying never save anything. But the text is saying there is a way to overly save and it’s no longer just called saving, it’s called hoarding. Saving serves a purpose. Hoarding is this anxious attachment to something to try to make you feel better. For example, during our simplicity practice, I did the really, really hard work of finally getting rid of clothes in my closet.

You can check it out on Instagram and YouTube, right? It’s a fun video, but it was hard for me. I didn’t include in there as much because I only had one minute to make the video. I have this weird attachment to memories, and I’m like the most nostalgic person you’ve ever met. And so, like, I have a shirt that I had in third grade, and friends, that shirt will not fit me ever again, even if I go on the most robust diet, okay?

But I, like, won a championship in that shirt, and so I have to keep it, because it reminds me, you know, like, I have all these just really dumb excuses. I’m waiting for her to make me, like, those blankets, right, that are just, uh, are they called blankets? What are those things? A quilt. A quilt of all the shirts so that there’s a purpose, right?

But I’m somebody who hoards, right? And so, it really, what I had to do was, okay, I’m going to get rid of it, but also ask myself the hard question. Why do I think it’s good, why do I need to hoard? What do I, what do I feel like I’m missing out on life that I have to save things? In case life gets hard, I can go back to these weird random possessions and feel better about my life.

That’s hoarding. Where you have items that you haven’t seen in years, but you won’t get rid of. That is called hoarding. And James is warning. This is a really bad sign that your heart is not in a good place. Also notice in verse 3, he ends it by saying, You have stored up treasure in the last days. This phrase, in the last days, is just kind of implying, Look, hoarding is really foolish.

When you realize you can’t take any of this with you. Either the end of time is coming, or your end will come soon enough. Why hoard all these things? It makes absolutely no sense. Okay, so this is what the unregenerate, unrighteous rich, they hoard, and they hoard a lot of things. I’m not here to condemn you, oh no, I do have that baseball that I got a perfect game in when I was nine, and I’m not, you can keep some things, we’re not legalistic here.

But if your whole life, if you, if you’ve been on that TV show, what’s the TV show called? The Hoarders Show. You guys are so, is it called hoarders? Look, that’s why you’re not answering back because I got it right. If you’ve been on the TV show, this is for you. Okay, but if not, you know, whatever. Trait number two, extravagance.

So hoarding, but another sign. You have this really unhealthy, unrighteous attachment to wealth is extravagance. Verse 5, he makes that point. You have lived luxuriously on the earth, and you have indulged yourselves. Other translations say you have engaged in self indulgence, and you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.

Eugene Peterson paraphrases that verse saying you’ve looted the earth and lived it up, but all you have, excuse me, all you’ll have to show for it is a fatter than usual corpse. This is really provocative language here, saying the only thing it helps you with is you might need a bigger grave because you’re fat from all the extravagance that you’ve engaged in.

Of course, this is metaphorical here. So this is a picture of self indulgence. I’ve been thinking through how do we communicate this Greek word. It essentially is saying, it’s like, it’s like you baking 20 cakes just for you to take one bite of each. And you don’t share those 20 cakes with anybody else.

That’s self indulgence. Wasting your money. I’m gonna get all these things just because I want a little bit of everything. And nobody gets my leftovers. That is the spirit of extravagance. Supreme selfishness. And let me be clear here that I think it’s helpful. Again, we’re using the Bible to interpret the Bible.

There is a vast difference between excellence and extravagance. I’ve grown up. I’ve been in part of some churches where like everything is just like real shabby and nasty and not excellent. And they’re like, well, we don’t want to be extravagant, brother. We don’t want to, you know, be obsessed with wealth.

It’s like, yeah, but like it stinks in here, you know, like you need to do something like the pea stains on the. Let’s get, let’s get rid of that. Right? And so there needs to be some standard because we honor the Lord with good things, but we can’t go into extravagance. A fun story is my wife for about 10 months straight.

She went through about 11 different iPhone cases. And her justification every time, I asked her if I could share this story. So, I’m being a good husband this week. I usually don’t ask, so shout out to me. Uh, I asked her, I said, hey, um, I’m gonna share the story. She said, that’s fine. So, she went through like 11 cases through 10 months.

And I kept telling her, why another case? She says, it’s fine, it’s like 5 bucks. Like, don’t worry. I’m like, I know, but like 11 times 5, now we’re talking. You know, so like you’re starting to spend a lot of money and so that the thing here is for her She’s like, I don’t want to waste money. I want to be kind to our budget I don’t need to have a 50 case, but I told her no get the 50 case so that we that’s excellence So we don’t have to keep buying a new 5 one every single month for the rest of eternity Right that there’s something about that math It’s okay to have excellent things this can apply to vehicles all sorts of things because you go really bad You’re gonna be spending just as much money just to kind of Tape it up together.

So that is really helpful thing for us at our church Went this last January when we got all this stuff together. It hurt our budget I mean it was we bought a lot of things by the grace of God were able to to buy it But we kept saying we’re gonna be excellent here. We need to show the Lord is worthy of our sacrifice and our investment We’re not gonna cut corners.

We’re going to spend what we can but we’re gonna make sure that line We’re gonna be excellent, but we’re not gonna be extravagant I’m not putting a chandelier here in the middle of the service so you guys can swing on it and act like we’re Pentecostals. We’re not going to go that far. But we’re going to be excellent.

We’re going to make sure both speakers work. Amen to the glory of God. Excellence. So we honor the Lord with our money. We honor our neighbors with our money when we are excellent. We dishonor the Lord and our neighbors when we engage in extravagance. Hope you see the difference there. So, hoarding.

Extravagance. Point number three. Trait number three, injustice. This one, sadly, has become a political topic, and so some people get a little angry here, but hey, James is making people angry, so maybe I. Verse 4, look, the pay that you withheld from the workers who mowed your fields cries out, and the outcry of the harvesters has reached the ears of the Lord of armies.

Remember, James is writing to Jewish people. This should evoke a memory. Of the exodus, the exodus, the people were crying out to God and God heard their cry and delivered them. There needs to, you need to see that connection there. Uh, verse six though, you have condemned, you have murdered the righteous who does not resist you.

You’re being unjust. Here. It’s not a sin to be wealthy. In fact, in my experience, wealthy people can be the biggest blessings to a church, can be the biggest blessing to the workforce. They create new jobs and new opportunities. They’re able to assist people in lifting them out of poverty. So I want to make sure I’m constantly clear on that.

However, it does become sin when you are so obsessed with wealth that you use it to oppress and abuse your labor. Slave labor is a lot more common today than most of us would like to admit. The statistics say there’s actually over 28 million slaves around the world today, more than any other time in history.

And so part of that is we have to be careful with our own purchases, which I know it just, I like to say as far as it depends on us, because it seems overwhelming. We cannot perpetuate injustice by rewarding those companies who do that. And so I know I have some people within our church, they do the hard work of only supporting certain companies.

And it’s always good to hear from those people and which companies to avoid. But it’s complex, because it’s getting more and more difficult. The odds are, if you have a smartphone in this room, you have, that phone was created by slave laborers, at least a part of it. Apparently, the worksite. I heard this the other day where they helped build the iPhone has nets.

This is in a third world country and there’s this tall building and they have nets under each floor because so many people were jumping out of the window to commit suicide because they were engaged in so much slave labor, right? We as followers of the way, we cannot perpetuate this. But God is here to comfort those who are in that slave labor saying, I hear you.

I will bring vengeance. Just as I heard your call from Exodus, went against Pharaoh, Pharaoh not only lost, but was washed away in the sea. I will save you. So God says to the oppressed people, he sees you, he hears you, he loves you, he cares for you. But as I was wrestling with this passage this week, I kept thinking, how will any of this be applicable to us?

Right? Like, I talk to most of you. And there are a lot of us with inflation and accidents, emergencies, medical debt, like, some of us, many of us are living paycheck to paycheck. And so we hear a sermon like this, it’s like, yeah, like I’m just gonna check out cause everybody, I’m not wealthy, I’m barely making it.

And I know, there’s many of you in this room, you would do better in life if you had more money. I think that’s, the Bible’s clear on that, it’s okay to admit that out loud. There are some who are well off, shout out to you, right? But, but here we have to do the hard work because James in chapter one says we need to hold up the God’s truth like a mirror and really look to see, really do the hard work.

Okay, maybe I’m not this complete unregenerate rich, I’m a follower of the way, but do I have any wrestlings with wealth? And, and I think this is going to take extra examination because write this down. Greed is often invisible, but its pain is always inevitable. I have never met a greedy person who knew they were greedy.

When I meet greedy people, they say, I don’t hoard, I save. Greedy people say, no, no, no, no, no, I don’t do extravagance, I just believe in excellence. But they’re somewhere along that line, right? They’re able to justify and say, no, it’s not hoarding, it’s saving for a really, really big rainy day. This is hard.

Without doing life on life, it’s hard for me as a pastor to declare if you’re greedy or not. That’s, oh, that’s a lot of discipleship. That’s a lot of figuring things out. But what’s crazy about greed is it’s like a disease that is dormant or that is in your body and it goes undetected. What greed does, because I know this because I saw Killers of the Flower Moon.

No, what greed does is it spreads from limb to limb until it completely consumes you. And you had no idea but you wake up one day and you’re willing to kill your family to fill your finances. How does that happen? It is so slow and subtle. Um, another reason I believe greed is often invisible is because on the outside you are poor.

Richard Foster, in his book on simplicity that we went through for our simplicity practice, he said the greediest people he has ever met are actually some of the poorest people he’s ever met. Meaning, there are some of you. who are so fascinated with money because you’ve never had it. And so every day, you look at the plot of your life, you look at the, the issues, and you think, well, all of this is because I don’t have money.

Once I have money, my marriage will get better. Once I have money, I’ll be a better dad. Once I have money, I’ll actually be able to give to the church and do some really good things. That is actually, at the heart of it, a greedy person. Right. And so the heart of the heart of this passage, I think the problem here is contentment.

Many commentators again, believe James is addressing nonbelievers because here’s the simple gospel truth. When we have experienced Christ, we are way too content to engage in these evil practices. In other words, write this down on your notes in Christ. We have no reason to hoard why we’re satisfied. We have the rich provision of Christ Jesus.

Do I have more needs that should be met? Do I have medical debt that’s annoying? Do I have student loans that, you know, someone just needs to come and wave a magic wand and get rid of? Yes, to the glory of God! I sure hope so! But I don’t have a reason to hoard. Because I have enough. I don’t need to look back.

I can look forward to His second coming. I have enough in that I don’t need This life is not all there is. I have confidence in that. I don’t need to hoard and act like everything is dependent on this life. In Christ, I have no reason for extravagance. I personally, I just want like a vehicle that functions, right?

I don’t need those things. Why? Because my treasure is laid up in heaven. I know that I’m with him for eternity. I have a church who takes care for me and helps me. I have nothing to prove. I don’t need to be extravagant. Do I want excellence? Yeah. I think it blesses people around. It helps me. It gives me more efficient, all this stuff.

But you know what I’m saying? I don’t need extravagance. I’m confident enough in who I am in Christ. In Christ, we have no reason to abuse other people. In fact, we are repulsed at the idea of being a part of a company. I know somebody in here in this room actually left his job because what they were doing was not honoring the Lord.

Even though it was really good pay, he just couldn’t involve himself in that anymore. And God has actually eventually really blessed him down the road. Right? We’re not going to be involved in abusing others. How? When we have been given new eyes to see the grace of Jesus on our own life, we now have that ability to extend that mercy and grace to every other image bearer of God on the planet.

No reason to abuse and bring about injustice. Look, until you see the riches that are in Christ Jesus.

See, it’s easy for possessions and things to have a grip on our lives when we feel like we’re not taken care of, but when we encounter the goodness of God, we have a totally different relationship with money. And that actually serves as a warning. I want to be very clear. I hope the Holy Spirit speaks to your heart in this moment.

If you find hoarding or injustice or extravagance to be irresistible, like worthy of doing like I know it’s considered bad, but I don’t want to try it as long as I get these other things. May I submit to you, there is a possibility you have not actually experienced the grace of God in your life and you are not a regenerated, new human, new life in Christ.

You are still, the scripture says, the old sinful nature. Because when Christ comes, he changes our appetites. He shows us the good life. And we begin to more and more. To have wisdom to see injustice, extravagance, hoarding, that life is not for me because I have something so much better. So I need to wrestle with that.

If you don’t think it’s better, I will confidently say you just haven’t experienced Christ yet. Today’s a wonderful day to submit to him, to surrender to him, to pray to him and receive him. So let’s shift to the practice. As a community, we want to help each other, right? Because there’s an idea where at our core part of us, we don’t want to engage in any of those things.

We know that they’re bad, but it’s always going to be a temptation. We’re going to have those days, man, it’d be nice to hoard, right? It’d be nice to do this and do that. And so we, as a community, we’re supposed to help each other out. And so write this down. We choose the way of contentment in a world of consumption through the practice of simplicity.

Trey, here he goes again, bringing up simplicity. Yep. We’re still doing that practice and we hope you engage in it. If you weren’t here, we’ve called since August a call to simplicity and specifically for this text, material simplicity. So in August, we asked you to do some experiments, right? If you exercise this, some of us cleaned out our closets, others of us.

donated, uh, certain things or items or we downgraded our vehicles, all sorts of things to help free us up so we can have a simplified life. Now, the point of something like simplicity is to have more of Jesus. Right? So for my life, I’m engaging in this practice of simplicity because I want more of Christ and I’ve realized some of these material possessions grab my heart and attention way more than I’d like to admit.

So I want to get rid of those things so that I see who I really have in Christ and I have much more contentment. Thomas Aquinas, he’s this medieval philosopher and theologian. He was studying Acts 3 with a companion. Peter says, silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you in the name of Jesus.

Get up and walk. Anybody remember that story? Right? His companion noted when they were studying this passage, isn’t it great? The church now doesn’t have to say silver and gold I do not have. This is the medieval times. They had wealth upon wealth because they were selling indulgences and other corrupt stuff.

But they had all these things and Thomas Aquinas looked at his companion in grief and he says, yes, but we can no longer say what I have is Jesus. All we can give people now is silver and gold because we have sacrificed Christ in the name of wealth. What a damning statement. And this is why we choose simplicity.

So that can’t be said of us real quick. We want you to do it in your groups this week. A key experiment for material simplicity is I will live without blank some sort of possessions for blank days, right? So it could be seven days. I’m not going to have this thing or 30 days. And then we encourage you after that experiment realized you probably didn’t need it like you thought, and then sell it, donate it.

Or trash it, because let’s be real, some of us, you know, what’s one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Sometimes it’s just trash, okay? And so we encourage you to do that experiment. But let me end with this. Resistance to simplicity points to the existence of greed. I have felt that when we work through simplicity practice, and I have felt resistance both within myself and within our own people.

It’s a hard practice. It’s so countercultural. But because greed is so invisible, I think this is one way we can detect it. If you hear something like, hey, this church is calling me to let go of, to sell, to donate, to throw away, and that bothers you, it might be a sign that greed has choked over your life more than you’d like to admit.

Maybe a sign that Christ hasn’t grabbed your life like you thought. Because when Christ has sufficiently filled your spirit, you see the world with different eyes. And you say, nothing in my hands I bring, simply to Christ I cling. I bring no other argument, I bring no other plea but that Jesus died and he died for me.

So I want you to wrestle with that thought. What resistance is within your spirit and how does the Holy Spirit now saying, okay, don’t condemn yourself. Let this conviction point you to Christ and his sufficiency for your life. This is my prayer. Proverbs 30 verse 8 and 9. This is my prayer that we as a church body can say this with full assurance that we mean it.

Give me neither poverty nor wealth. Feed me with. The food I need. Otherwise, I might have too much, and deny you, saying, who is the Lord? Or I might have nothing, and still, profaning the name of my God. Christ wants you to have your daily bread. Christ wants you, desires for you, helps you, assists you in having enough.

But I wonder, Is this an invitation to you and to me to make sure we are as far away from the unregenerate rich as possible? Because it’s not just that those people are bad, they’re miserable. That’s why James says, weep and mourn you miserable people. You think you have the good life, you have the worst life.

And so I’m inviting the Holy Spirit to change our perspective on our possessions and where we’re standing and maybe leaving here with a spirit of gratitude. We actually had more than we ever thought we did. And we’re so grateful for God’s provision of our daily bread.