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Well, welcome to the house everybody. If we've never met, my name is Greg Hampton.

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I'm one of the pastors here. I'd love to buy you a coffee, get to know you a little

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bit better, hear your story and all that. Today we do finish our series on

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worship. With everything so far we have covered, worshipping with praying the

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scriptures, with writing new songs, with our instruments, worship through our

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trials, worshiping together in community and worshiping God with our bodies and

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a special thanks to Scott McConnell, to Pastor Jen, to Tony, to Marissa, to Andy

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and to Robin, a round of applause for all of them that brought messages out this

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series. And now one more just to embarrass him, just one for Andy. I'm just

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playing, I'm joking, I'm joking.

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Would you like, Andy, you want to make a round, you want to walk around and

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shake everyone's hand real quick? Simply put, God gave me my voice and so I

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worship God with my voice. Yeah? That's easy. God gave me the scriptures so I

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worship God with the scriptures. That makes sense. God gave me an instrument

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and so I worship God with my instrument. God gave me creativity and so I worship

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God with my creativity. God gave me this very life and so I worship God through

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trials, through the good and the bad. God gave me this community so I worship God

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in and through this community. God gave me this body so I worship God with the

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movements of this body. Today we wrap it up with the subject that the Bible talks

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about a lot. God gave me my finances and so I'll worship God with my finances.

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I'll use it to glorify His name. So I'm gonna read nine different passages and

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they only represent a tiny percentage of how often that subject of finance has

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come up in the scripture. So go ahead and stay seated since I'm going to be

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reading extended and an extended amount of passages. The first one is in Mark 12.

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It says this, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with

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all your mind, with all your strength. The second is this, love your neighbor as

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yourself. There is no commandment greater than these. We established in that first

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message that we worship God with everything and so we have to remember

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that that is the verse that we began with. Proverbs 19, whoever is kind to the

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poor lends to the Lord. I'll say that again. Whoever is kind to the poor lends to

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the Lord and will be paid and repaid in full. Matthew 6, for where your treasure

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is there your heart will be also. No one can serve two masters either you will

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hate the one and love the other or you will be devoted to the one and despise

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the other. You cannot serve both God and money. Proverbs 3, honor the Lord with

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your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops. 1st Timothy 6, as for those

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who in the present age are rich command them to be to not be haughty or to set

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their hopes on the uncertainty of riches but rather on God who richly provides us

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with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works,

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generous and ready to share thus storing up for themselves the treasures of a

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good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of the life that

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really is life. 1st Corinthians 16, now about the collection for the Lord's

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people do what I told the Galatian Church to do. On the first day of every

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week each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income

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saving it up so that when I come no collection will have to be made. 2nd

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Corinthians 9, each of you must give as you have made up your mind not

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regretfully or under compulsion for God loves a cheerful giver. Deuteronomy 8, you

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may say to yourself my power and the strength of my hands have produced this

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wealth for me but remember the Lord your God for it is he who gives the ability

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to produce wealth and so confirms his covenant which he swore to your

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ancestors as it is today. Matthew 23, last one. Woe to you teachers of the law and

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Pharisees you hypocrites you give a tenth of your spices mint dill and cumin

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but you have neglected the more important matters of the law justice

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mercy and faithfulness you should have practiced the latter without neglecting

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the former. Let us pray. God of every tribe every tongue every color every

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nation thank you for the scriptures they have persisted throughout the millennia

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that we have them to read and consider I pray that today whatever you have for us

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to learn that it would stick that would become a part of the framework of our

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faith that our faith will become stronger as we become more like your

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son Jesus amen. So whether God wants us to use our finances to worship him isn't

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really the question I think that as you read throughout the scriptures and you

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see all the times that it's referenced it becomes pretty obvious that this is

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part of the deal of worship as well week I don't want to say as strongly say like

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all there's no debating it I'm just saying that it's pretty clear that God

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wants us to use our finances to worship him you can read the Bible and see it

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over and over and over again that it is one way to worship God and to honor God

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and to use on others as well money isn't just for your bills y'all just like

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anything money is a gift from God and it's a tool that can be used for his

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glory so bivouacally speaking it's normal to plan how to give back to God

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as an act of worship and use part of our finances as well to help others now

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where it gets messy is when we turn our finances into a matter of shame or guilt

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I think in the ten years of being a church and preaching on Sunday mornings

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and those of you who have been here since they only can probably contest this

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we average less than one sermon a year that's specifically just about finances

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it's we don't focus just on it very often one of the reasons is we know that

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historically there's been a lot of shame and guilt attached to the subject of

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finances and so we want to be purposeful about how when we talk about it so

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specifically our giving shouldn't come from a place of shame shouldn't come

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from a place of guilt it should come from a place of readiness of alertness

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of awareness because all of those things are worship if we're gonna give God all

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of our attention and all of our affection we will inevitably develop a

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level of alertness and awareness of the needs that are around us and that will

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translate into what we do with our finances to be clear if you haven't

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noticed already this isn't only about what you give back to a church that's

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not what worshiping with our finances is about listen again to what Jesus said to

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the religious leaders you give a tenth of your spices your mint your dill and

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cumin but you have neglected the more important matters of the law justice

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mercy and faithfulness you should have practiced the latter tithing without

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neglecting the former of caring for people that were around you these

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religious leaders knew the scriptures had taught them to tithe to give 10% of

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what they had the temple and so they did to a fault to into the tiny minutiae of

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everything they possibly could but things like mint dill cumin I thought

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about getting like the little herb rack and bringing it up here and like forcing

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you out like hey let's all divvy this up into 10 you're like imagine weighing out

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your dill to try and figure out what's 10% of the dill in this bottle these

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things mint dill cumin they weren't things that the scripture had explicitly

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asked to be tithed from so what's happening here why are they doing this

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Jesus is telling these religious leaders I know what you're doing it's easier to

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give a tenth of all you have to the temple even the little things the

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scriptures don't mention then it is to pay attention to the needs around you

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and to give to both it's the only giving to the temple gave them permission to

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ignore the needs of their neighbors well I already gave the church I can't help my

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neighbor gave them permission to neglect the needs they were coming in contact

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with and y'all we need to watch out for the same thing last month as a church we

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were able to give a total of three hundred dollars to different people in

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the congregation that shared that they needed something for what was happening

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in their life you shared your finances we met budget we had above and beyond

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they shared their need and we were able to help that's awesome that's important

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I would love for us to do that every single month because it means that we

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did something together but that doesn't absolve each of us from the individual

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opportunities God may offer us between Sundays between offerings that's why

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Jesus told these leaders leaders do both give to the temple yes pay the pastor

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salary pay the lease make sure the lights stay on buy those treehouse

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supplies all that stuff that's great and give to your neighbor love the Lord your

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God with your whole self and love your neighbor as yourself give to God and

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give to your neighbor when our kids get a check from doing something if they get

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paid for something other than like the allowance they get from us we've always

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been like all right so this is the percent we want you to save set aside

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this is the percent that is safe for you to spend but we want to encourage you to

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give this this amounts to God and save a little let's let's save this to the side

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so that you can give it to a friend or someone that you think might need it

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because we're not supposed to are called to only give to God through the local

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church but to give to the people that we come in contact with it's past Wednesday

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and Thursday Cindy and I took a little day and a half trip to Chicago to see

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one of our favorite bands Josiah in the Bonnevilles most of you if not all of

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you never heard of them before unless I mentioned them to you back in 2006

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Josiah was earned seven two thousand seven he was 17 years old he was on

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American Idol he did not make the top 20 but he did get a record deal out of it

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he proceeded to get three record deals that all went bad and during COVID he

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started posting music every day on tik-tok he had moved back to Tennessee

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he'd been tending bar he'd been working at an Amazon warehouse and he started

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posting every single day and back when Taylor Swift's antihero came out I was

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like oh that's that's catchy I like that and so I looked it up and one of the

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things that came up was antihero parentheses country version and I was

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like okay Taylor's all right she put out two versions okay and I clicked on it

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and it was Josiah he cut he within like two days he had covered the song and he

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had changed the melody and he changed the rhythm a little bit and he'd made it

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more of a country Americana song and I was like oh I dig everything about this

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everything about and so then I just went down the rabbit hole of his music and

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listen and listen and listen and you can ask my children Wallace now knows all

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the words to all the songs because it's the only thing I've been listening to in

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my car for like a year year and a half so we went to see Josiah in Chicago and

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he says that we're the Bonnevilles okay so he's Josiah we're the Bonnevilles

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that makes sense here's thing you you probably already know this you cannot go

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to Chicago walk or drive the streets without interacting with people that are

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in need and people that are asking for help and I had cash in my pocket so we

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helped a couple different people that asked I'm not telling you so that you

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pat me on the back because it's not the point and it wasn't that much I'm

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telling you to illustrate something else Paul said in 2nd Corinthians each of

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you must give as you have made up your mind not regretfully or under compulsion

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for God loves a cheerful giver I have a personal conviction of what I think God

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wants me in my family to give back to him through this local church when it's

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time to give here I'm going to give what I plans to give here so what I gave in

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Chicago what was that that was mint that was dill that was cumin now someone could

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say that's fine for you you had extra mint and you're right I had money set

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aside for this trip but I also knew before I went that I would be prepared

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to give to people that I met it was a decision that I had made because I

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honestly asked myself without shame listen without shame how could I justify

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pulling together enough money to stay in Chicago for a night to pay for meals

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while we were there to pay for uber rides to and from the venue to buy the

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kids cupcakes from a bakery and bring them back to not only buy the tickets to

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the show but because we wanted to tell him we were so proud of him we bought

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the pre-show ticket so that we could meet him in person how can I do all of

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that but not have a few dollars to meet Jesus on the corner someone asked me for

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help it was an easy decision because it was a decision that had already been

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made when it's a hard decision listen when it's a hard decision is when I

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haven't already set in my heart what I am willing to do with what God has given

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me when it's time to give to church it's only a hard decision if we haven't

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already talked to God about it when it's time to give to a neighbor it's only a

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hard decision if we haven't already talked to God about it God cares what we

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do with our money because everything we have comes from him all the way back all

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the way back into Deuteronomy one of the very first books of the Bible God knew

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that it was our tendency to get something and think that it came from us

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so he had them write down you may say to yourself my power and the strength of my

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hands have produced this wealth for me but remember the Lord your God for it is

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he who gave you the ability to produce wealth it's why Jesus said for where

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your treasure is there your heart will be also no one can serve two masters you

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cannot serve both God and money so Jesus told the religious leaders tithe that's

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great that is awesome but don't do that in such a way that gives you permission

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to not also help your neighbors the point isn't to only give to the temple or

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the church y'all because and I hope this is man this is I want everyone to hear

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this because there is a faithfulness to God that can only be found in our

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faithfulness with each other there's a faithfulness of God you will experience

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in a new and different way because of the faithfulness that you experience

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with each other now I need someone that thinks they're strong who thinks they're

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strong particularly a child would be great

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Kaden you're strong we know that come on up here Kaden and then Wallace you too

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buddy you're strong right okay I need you to give two of these to everybody

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then to every to anyone that doesn't get those for every two people give them one

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of these okay so you're giving two to somebody and you're giving one to every

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two people that doesn't already have that okay okay the goal is for you to

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have one dollar in your hand okay so I got rolls of pennies that are 50 cents

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each and I got rolls of nickels that are two dollars each so the goal is for

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every person to have one dollar so some of you can be paired up with nickels

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anyone else needs pennies I got a bunch I got bunch I got a bunch of pennies here

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you go Jen

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my glasses are here you go Alex good hey maybe

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all right back there

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all right so everyone should have at least a dollar okay there's more here

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all right got pennies from Jenny listen Kaden will give you some all right so

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here's the rules all right because there's some rules everybody ready for

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the rules all right yeah I heard one person say yes everyone ready for the

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rules all right everyone's mesmerized by the money right you know so I've never

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seen this much money before rule number one no one can leave with nothing you

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have been given something by God you cannot leave here with nothing someone

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should say amen you have been given something from God you cannot leave the

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presence of God with nothing you cannot put the whole roll of coins into the

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giving boxes it's not physically possible the rolls will not fit through

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the shape the rolls cannot remain unopened you have to open them because

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God does not give us something for it to remain unopened

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amen you have been given something you cannot leave here with nothing you can't

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just absolve yourself from thinking about it by giving it all back to the

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church and you cannot leave it unopened my point is this you have to think about

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what you're gonna do with this money today and you have to think about it

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before you leave this place you have to make a decision you have to make a

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decision and listen once you have made that decision it will be easier for you

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to do so you might ask yourself what if this will I give to God it's okay to put

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some of it back in the boxes go ahead it's gonna be loud and and Andy doesn't

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really want to count it but I told I apologized to him ahead of time when I

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told him I was gonna do this I said I texted I texted him I said I'm sorry I'm

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sorry you might have to count so much but you know what some of you have pennies

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you have a hundred it's easy to count out tenths of that you have nickels it's

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easy two nickels is a tenth you cannot leave here with nothing you cannot leave

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it unopened and you cannot give it all back to God and so now I leave it to you

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begin thinking about what you're gonna do because we're gonna share communion

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together and we're gonna hear about the connection card and before you leave

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this building you have to have decided what to do with what God gave you and I

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want you to learn that before you come here again God wants you to decide what

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you will do before coming back here does that make sense because we're all in

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this together God has not given you something to leave it unopened unused or

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left behind amen amen