Title: Let's Dig the Ditch of Blessing!!
Contents
When I was young, I watched my parents farm in the countryside. Before the rainy season begins or in spring, there are certain things you must do before you confine the paddy fields for annual farming. That's just digging a ditch. This is to allow water to flow and enter the rice fields. If the ditch is not dug or the ditch is not cleared of obstacles, water will not flow properly into the paddy field. So, you must dig a ditch to get full water.
The land of Israel is mostly made up of barren deserts. Especially in the Negev.
Most of the Negev region is a dry desert area, and it is a small area centered on an oasis where people have stayed for a while because it is difficult for people to live because of the lack of water for living, let alone agriculture. However, in the 1960s, the Negev, a desert area, was transformed into an agricultural area where agricultural development was revitalized as a settlement area for people to stay as the nationwide waterway project was completed by connecting waterways to Lake Tiberia and the Yarkon River. In the barren desert, which was unthinkable, there were many state-owned farms called Kibbutz and private farms called Moshabra, where sprinklers were installed for farming. Here, citrus crops are grown and exported in excess of $300 million annually.
It has become an agricultural powerhouse that grows flowers and exports them to all over the world. Also, people from all over the world go on agricultural tours to learn this.
The unimaginable happened in the barren desert of Israel.
How did this happen?
It was made possible by providing water through agricultural canals in the barren desert without water.
In other words, they dug a ditch to get water.
dear ones
In order for us as saints to be filled with God's blessings, we must dig a ditch that deserves to be blessed.
The blockage must be cleared and the shallow must be dug deep.
Then, what kind of ditch should the saints dig in order to receive God's blessings?
That's tithing.
But this sermon is absolutely necessary for the saints. why? Because it is a ditch that can receive blessings This is because unless this ditch is prepared, we cannot fully receive the blessings God has prepared for us.
I do not want our members to live in poverty and poverty. So, with the earnest desire to make the saints blessed, this year, the saints who pay tithing are included in the church's goal of practice.
I pray that all of us will dig a ditch to receive God's blessings during this time.
Everyone!
Do you want to be blessed before God? In particular, if you want to receive material blessings, you must pay tithing.
What is Tithing?
A tithe is when a believer who believes in God and has Jesus Christ as the Savior in his heart and is saved and becomes a child of God knows that his material income is from God and gives a tenth of that income to God with a grateful heart.
However, there are people who say they have been saved and have an allergic reaction to just preaching tithes and offerings.
That's weird! Why?
First of all, because people think money is the best value.
Today's era is called a materialistic society. Since they have the mindset that money is everything, materialism takes precedence over people's lives, and in order to get money, they have to lose others, and in severe cases, they take away the lives of others. As a result, you will see that money is above people and above the Word of God.
The era has come, even if you forsake God and turn your back on you, you cannot throw away money.
Therefore, there is a saying that “to know the level of faith, you can find out by looking at the tithing life of the believer.”
When Jericho was captured, it was said that everything belongs to God, but Achan was blinded by material things and disobeyed God's word and secretly took his coat and money. It is said that the love of money is the root of all evil. Money itself is not a sin.
But if you love it and put the highest value on it, you are creating the consequences of the sin of disobeying God's word and stealing God's things.
Everyone!
Please do not love money more than God. I pray that there will always be a confession that even if you live without money, you cannot live without God.
Second, it is because the material view is not good.
When it comes into my hands, everything is known as mine, but not mine. I can't claim that I've worked hard and earned everything I've invested in.
Who is the creator of this earth? “God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1)
The Bible begins the work of God by declaring that the Creator of everything is God.
If you make an object, who will it belong to? will be the one who made it.
“The LORD gave and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD” (Job 1:21).
“The Lord holds man’s life and death; he drops them down and lifts them up” (1 Samuel 2:6).
God Himself proclaims that I am the master of everything in the world, and both Job, the great forerunner of faith, and Samuel the prophet confess that God is the sovereign over the life and death of people.
In verses 8 and 9 of the text, God Himself is saying that the material of the world is God, and the world itself is God.
Everyone!
Where in the world is mine?
If it's in my hands, it's mine! It was loaned to us by God for a while so that we could live comfortably in the world. Everything belongs to God, and it is to give tithes as a sign of acknowledging God's sovereignty. Tithing is the basis of believers who serve God.
You must have a new view of materialism.
Aren't our lives coming empty-handed and going empty-handed?
But why do you think and act as if God's things were mine?
So, a problem arises before God.
what's the problem What does God say? he's a thief
If you think that God's things are yours and steal them, you must repent.
You should not be tempted by preaching tithing, but you must hear the voice of God and repent.
And let's turn around! There must be a determination to return God's things to God.
Then why does God tell us to tithe?
It is given because it belongs to God, but God says in verse 10, “See, I will not open the gates of heaven and pour out my blessings on you so that you have no place to store them.”
He says that material blessings are guaranteed.
As the saying goes, you reap what you sow, dig the ditch for tithing. Blessings come.
Abraham - Isaac - Give it / Why did you say it?
To make Abraham suffer, to make it hard, no. To bless/ the father of faith, he was told to dig a ditch of blessing in order to become a source of blessing.
The widow of Zarephath - Elijah - Bring a loaf of bread in your hand / Why did I tell you to bring the last meal?
“Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, “The cask of flour will not run out, and the jar of oil will not run out until the day the LORD sends rain on the face of the earth.” (1 Kings 17:14)
Digging a ditch of blessing to bless them.
We too must dig a ditch of blessing.
The materials I accumulate have limitations. However, the blessings of material things that God accumulates are infinite blessings that overflow so that there is no place to accumulate them.
There are people who can't make the big decisions they want to give. Why can't I give it to you?
I can't give it because the amount is small. I can't give it when I feel it is an amount that I feel sorry to give because I am in a situation where I can't even use it when I am exhausted with material things. But in times like these, you have to give even more. You have to give in order to live a life full of blessings from a life that is scarce and lacking.
Jesus remembered the widow's hand and blessed it. He blessed two fish and five barley loaves and gave them the blessing that 12 light bulbs remained even after feeding 5,000 people. I wish you the best of luck when you don't have it.
Conversely, there are times when the amount is too large to give.
You can boldly give an appropriate amount, because the thicker the volume of money, the more likely it is to feel like it's wasted. Someone said this. “When it comes to ten thousand won, there is a mistake and I give it out quickly, but when it exceeds 50-100, it takes too much time.”
If you think it's a waste, you can never open your wallet.
Also, please do not divide other offerings with your tithe.
A tithe is a tithe. No offering shall be substituted for tithing.
What does the Lord say in verse 10?
“Bring your whole tithe into the storehouse, saith the LORD of hosts.”
Tithing should be given wholeheartedly.
Tithing is not for me. God has already set the standard.
It is a full tithe.
Dear all!
Before God, the problem is not whether the amount is large or small, but whether or not to pay a full tithe to God is important.
I pray that you will give a full tithe, a ditch of blessing.
All.
God is good. why?
Knowing that there are people who are troubled because they do not have faith, he proposes this.
“Test me and see if I will not open the gates of heaven and pour out your blessings so that there is no room for them.”