James, The Gospel At Work - Part 2

All right, I get to talk to you guys about money today, one of my favorite topics. Not giving money—that seems to be when you go to church, if they do talk about money, it's usually like, why you should give more money, right? I think you should give more money, but I'm not going to get into it today because that's not what the verse is about. Instead, we're going to talk about wealth and riches and what it means.

There's a hotly debated question: Is everybody rich just because we live here in America? Like, do you have air conditioning in your window or your whole house? Maybe, right? Do you have a car that works? You're richer than a lot of people. But is that what the Bible's talking about? We're going to get into it a little bit, and I might tell you some things you haven't heard before. I hope so.

I was looking into money this week and happened upon an interview with Jerry Seinfeld, a pretty rich guy. He was commenting on what life was like when he was growing up, talking about what kind of jobs would impress your friends. He said, back then, you wanted to have the coolest job, one that people would be jealous of and wish was theirs. But now, when you hear especially young people talk about what job matters to them, it's how much money do you make. Money became the driving force in our culture that he thought shouldn't be.

Every older guy complains that the culture has degraded over time, right? Things are worse than they used to be. Some say that's not true because everybody complains about it. I disagree. Culture is definitely getting worse. You can see it in just the last couple of years; it's gotten a lot worse. The reason it's always getting worse is the same reason you are always getting worse. Your body's getting worse; you're getting a little lazier, a little thicker in the middle as time goes on. Why? Because you are in need of revival, a new dose of strength and courage. So is our culture, a new outpouring of God convicting us of sin and setting us back in the right direction. Left alone, we always degrade. Everything does. I tell my kids everything breaks, but we don't break things on purpose, right?

We've got hustle culture, buying Ferraris or Bugattis (my kids tell me that's better than a Ferrari), chasing after status. It's all just greed. The Bible breaks down three big categories of sin. In 1 John, it talks about the three temptations of Christ. Even when Eve was tempted with the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, it describes three ways she was tempted, and they all work together. The three temptations are the lust of the flesh, the desires of your body corrupted by sin since the beginning; the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Today we're going to talk about the lust of the eyes: what it is, where it comes from, what part of you it's tempting, and what to do about it.

So, what do we do with money? The passage says, "Let the lowly brother exalt in his exaltation, and the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass; its flowers fall, and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits."

James is writing to Jews before the Christians understood that the Gentiles would become Christians also. If you read through the book of Acts, right around the middle of chapter 10 there's this big miracle. These non-jews become Christians and the Jewish Believers, all of the Apostles, all of the original disciples who are all Jews, they're looking over at these Gentiles perplexed. They thought these people were unclean and not fit to be brought into your home (you wouldn't sit and eat with any of them). What are they doing with this outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the speaking in tongues and prophecy? We thought this was just our deal.

So the reason that we can enjoy this message even though from James's perspective he's only writing to Jewish people is because James is describing what the Bible broadly describes, which is that The Old Testament, Jewish faith, rightly understood, is the Christian faith. Jesus said if you've seen me, you've seen the Father, and the whole Old Testament speaks to the message Jesus brings. We are right on track to receive the message described by James.

Let's talk about boasting. We've got lowly brothers boasting and rich boasting. The rich should boast in their humiliation. There is a humble place for rich people in the Kingdom of Heaven.  there is a humble place for rich people to understand where they are in the Kingdom of Heaven Kingdom of Heaven as we've often talk about is this idea of the inverted Kingdom right the pyramids flipped upside down or sometimes you'll hear language like the inside out right God works from the heart and brings out transformation that the good deeds the good work that you're called to do as Christians is fruit

God works from the heart and brings out transformation. Those of you who are wealthy now should understand that your wealth will disappear in an instant. When it does, you are in a place of glory according to this passage. There's a glory in understanding that you weren't relying on that wealth. The Bible warned you it was going to disappear, and now it has. You will continue to rely on God.

The reason it’s lowly is that the Bible has a specific blessing for the actual poor. They are exalted in the teachings of Jesus. Let's look at Luke 6:20. While you’re going there I want to mention sometime James will hint at—and we will explore more later—an idea that the Bible frequently addresses: the concept of "the world." This idea will come up again in James and is mentioned throughout the New Testament as part of a corrupt system that is opposed to the kingdom of God. These two ideas are set in contrast to each other.

The world system glorifies wealth, power, position, beauty, and talent—things that make someone look impressive. As you invest your heart into these things and are constantly sold on their importance, you allow them to invade your heart and priorities, you become part of the world. This results in becoming part of the world and being influenced by its power. In contrast, we seek a power that is inverted through humility, allowing God to raise us up. 

Let’s look at Luke 6. Jesus says, "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God." He didn't say poor in spirit; that's in Matthew. This time, he's talking about actual poor people. "Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven. For so their fathers did to the prophets." That’s the blessing for the poor, we’ll get to the rich in a second.

You can tell how well you've resisted the world's indoctrination by how blessed you feel when you don't have the money or things you wish you had. How blessed do you actually feel? When you pause and thank God for your lowly position, He gives grace to the humble, the poor. If you can pause and receive that grace, you are living in and abiding by the kingdom of God instead of the kingdoms of this world. 

Jesus says if you are really doing that, the world will begin to hate you because you're playing by a different set of rules. Have you ever played in a sport where the other team shows up and they’re playing by a different set of rules and the refs are a little sleepy that day and they’re getting away with some things. There’s nothing that inspires hatred like getting an elbow to the teeth and no one cares. That's how the world sees us. 

The world views us, Christians, as living according to a different set of values. How dare you find joy and happiness in the presence of God and His blessings when you don't have the money and things everyone else is chasing? They will hate you if you live according to God's kingdom. But in the midst of that blessing and joy, some will want to know more, and that's when you have to be ready to share the reason for the hope that you have.

Now, let's get to the woes to the rich in Luke 6:24-26: "Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep. Woe to you when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets."

The world and its system is collecting prophets who speak in the name of God to tell them they are doing the right thing. False prophets use the name of Jesus to pursue vain things like wealth and power. That’s why God says in the ten commandments not to use the name of God in vain. Don't fall for those lies because they will tempt you constantly. If you're rich, you're in a low place in God's kingdom. 

The world will tempt you, and temptation will be at your door.  the world will hate you if you don't seek to climb their ladders but you can still have confidence in the truth glory in your humiliation before God all your wealth comes from him all your wealth comes from him when you think it's yours that it belongs to you that it came through your abilities and not his blessing is when you begin to fall into the Temptation and the trap the world has set

Let's go to Deuteronomy 8:17-18: "Beware lest you say in your heart, 'My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.' You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day." If you forget the Lord your God and go after other gods, you shall surely perish.”

Your ability to gain wealth, any wealth you have, comes from God. God wants to bless you to fulfill the covenant he made with your fathers. The covenants of the Old Testament are encapsulated in the covenant of Christ. For those of you whose God has given the ability to gain wealth, it's from God, a blessing to remind you of His love for you. But remember James' teaching: it’s a lowly position in God’s kingdom, and a temptation you must beware of. 

Creating wealth is not the same as getting paid by a boss. I told you we were going to talk about are you actually rich or are you just poor because some people say, and I've heard it a lot, everybody in America’s rich. On some level, having been to Sierra Leone and some other third-world countries, they’re poor for real. Nobody here is poor like they are there; you're hoping to get food. But at the same time, I look at how Americans live with money, and I don’t see wealth far and wide. I see it concentrated in just a small segment of our population.

Here’s what I mean: you might own a home, for example, although fewer and fewer people do. For the most part, that home just belongs to the bank, and you just make payments. Most people have little to no assets. When you pass away, if you kept a home and had some equity in it, that equity will be split among your offspring, and then they'll probably use that money to pay down whatever debt they've been accruing over time, and it's gone. Your wealth that you think you’re building might last a decade; it might last two, but for 99% of Americans, there is no generational wealth. In fact, almost everybody not only lives paycheck to paycheck—something I heard different estimates this week, between 60 and almost 80% of Americans—but if you don’t get paid one month, you're out of money; you're in trouble. They don’t have any stores of wealth built up in case hard times come, which is wisdom, as the Bible says to do not only in Proverbs but also if you look at the life of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.

Our house, our home loan, is, I think, 10 years old now, so we're just inundated with offers to refinance. I don't know if you know this, but banks make the most money off of you in those first 10 years of your loan and when you refinance. So you can pay off that other debt you’ve got or so you can add onto your kitchen, make it fancier, or whatever it is you want to do. You start again, and now almost every dollar of the payment you make each month goes back into the bank’s profits. You think you're making the same payment all the way through the 15 or the 30-year mortgage; you are, but those last 10 years of payments almost all go back into your pocket as value in the home that you now have. The first 10 years go almost completely into the bank’s pocket, so they're very invested in making you more of a debtor.

Let's look at what the Bible says about debtors. Let’s go to Proverbs 13:22: “A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children.” A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children. Now, we’re reading this, and we have to read it all at once, and it’s been a little tricky for me this week, and I want you to feel this tension. It’s going to get worse before it gets better, but we’ve got James saying the wealthy people are in a lowly position. It’s a humiliating thing in the Kingdom of Heaven. We’ve got Jesus saying in Luke 6 that there is a woe in store, meaning a painful reality you will live through, for those who are wealthy. Life is going to get worse, if not now, then in the afterlife. In fact, Jesus in Luke tells that parable of Lazarus in heaven looking down at the rich man who’s suffering in hell, and the clear distinction Jesus is making is Lazarus suffered on Earth, and now he’s got Heaven. You got to enjoy comforts on Earth, and now you’re suffering. If that’s all you had, you would just conclude, “Eat the Rich,” right? Tax them into oblivion, redistribute all the wealth. Let’s be Communists; this is going to be great, right? Except for that whole “do not steal” and “do not covet,” but besides that, let’s do it. Because this is what Jesus is blessing; he’s blessing the poor. But we have to see the scripture in total; we have to see the whole counsel of God on this matter, and Proverbs is included in that.

It says again, “A good man leaves an inheritance to his grandchildren.” He builds wealth in a way that carries on through the family line. You not only make disciples by training your children in righteousness and then at 18 sending them off; that’s not it. It’s building a heritage that lasts generation after generation of righteousness and stability. This is how civilizations are built; this is why we don’t have bands of warlords roaming through our streets yet, right? Because civilization is built by godly men and women who are creating and leaving an inheritance of righteousness to their children’s children, remembering the teaching of James that it can be gone in an instant.

In the midst of your striving, chasing after that wealth, that car, that house, those clothes, those shoes, whatever it is—chasing after it—it will be gone. It was never yours; it belongs to God, and it's an inheritance to your children's children. In fact, inheritance is a great word. Paul speaks of his inheritance in heaven as being the people that he ministered to. He says, "You're my letter of recommendation," speaking to the Corinthian Church, "written on your hearts because I loved you so much." And I will receive that inheritance when we receive glory in heaven for how we've lived and what we've done here on Earth.

There's another one I want to show you: Proverbs 22:7. It says, "The borrower is a slave to the lender." The borrower is a slave to the lender. It's hard to count mortgages, but it's the biggest loan you'll ever take. Almost everyone in America, at some time or another, if not their whole adult lives, according to the Bible, is in debt—slavery to a bank or to a landlord or to somebody. The Bible says if you are in slavery, receive it as God has put you, but if you can get free, do it. Don't go back again into bondage. Get free from your slavery. Maybe you're in too much debt now, chasing after the world's temptations for glory, wealth, power, prestige, and control. Trust God with your finances and get out of debt.

Jesus calls one rich man a fool in Luke 12. If one of the four Gospels focuses on rich and poor, it's definitely the Gospel of Luke. Let's look at Luke 12:13. Someone in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me." I imagine Jesus just sitting in someone's house, and then people start shouting questions. This guy, it didn't go so well for him. Let's read what happened when he did it. Jesus replied, "Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?" Then he said to them, "Take care and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions."

Covetousness wants to tell you… covetousness and greed are the same idea, right? You look at what someone else has; it's the lust of the eyes. I look at what someone else has and I want it for myself. And he says, "Beware of this covetousness. Why? One's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions." That's the lie—that your life won't be a real life, won't be of real quality until you've got the stuff—the right coffee mug, whatever the thing is. We all have the thing. Some of us just try to pick a lower class thing, but we still glory in it. I like to brag that these flip-flops were the cheapest, but they're the best because they're the cheapest. It's all the same thing. Do you see what I'm saying? What we're all doing is buying into this tale that somehow the things you own determine your value. It's a lie. It will destroy you. It will destroy your fruitfulness.

Let's keep going. He told this parable: The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, "What should I do? I've got nowhere to store my crops." He said, "I'll do this: I'll tear down my barns and build larger ones, and I'll store all my grain and my goods. Then I'll relax, eat, drink, and be merry." He's ready to retire. It's going to be great. It's the American dream. But God said to him, "Fool, this night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be? So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God."

If that's your version of the American dream—to lay up treasure so you can take life easy, get that retirement account padded just enough so you can play golf and go on those trips—you are a fool. Don't be a fool. God's calling you to not only be rich to the kingdom of heaven with your money (I told you I was going to mention that you're going to give some), but with your life, your time, your effort, because it all belongs to him. Will you be faithful with it?

Proverbs 28 tells us to create wealth slowly. Proverbs 28:20 says, "A faithful man will abound with blessings, but whoever hastens to be rich will not go unpunished." If you're in a hurry to get rich, there are a lot of people out there trying to tempt you with this—with these side hustles that promise so much money quickly. We have a market now built internationally where the internet has allowed people to make wealth in ways like never before. I was explaining this at school to my students. In the past, if you had a store downtown, your market was all the people who might go by the store downtown. That market was diverse in interests, ages, and experiences. You had to make your store as broadly appealing as possible, which culminated in these giant stores with giant parking lots that have everything you can imagine. 

But with the internet, you can find people who really love mustard. Maybe it's like half of 1% of Americans who really love mustard, but that's millions of people. You can become wealthy selling just mustard to the nerds who love that kind of mustard, or hot sauce, or t-shirts with certain stripes. We're in a world where wealth comes and goes faster than ever. Don't fall into the trap. Don't be the rich fool who says, "I got all this money, now I'll take life easy." That's not what life is for. Your life is not your own.

Jesus says invest in heaven in Matthew 6:19: "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

Remember I said greed is the lust of the eyes. Listen to what Jesus says: "The eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is that darkness."

That seems like a weird sidebar, right? The eye is the lamp? To his audience, they completely understood because they had an idiom in common use, called having an evil eye. The evil eye is the lust of the eyes. It's the same thing, right? Your evil eye looks to and fro for what it can get for you. When you've got an evil eye, it's like everything's value is to give you value. Everything and maybe everyone becomes a prop in the play or the movie that is your life, and you're just collecting accessories. This is not how God intends you to live. Jesus says if that's how your eyes work, he calls it having an evil eye. Your whole body is poisoned. It fills you with darkness. It destroys your relationships. Don't fall into that trap.

The lust of the eyes is the lust of your heart. Now this is my theory a little bit, but I've got a lot of verses to back this up. The body has obvious lusts, and greed is the sin of the heart. It's the sin of your spirit. It corrupts your spirit as you let it rule you. Pride is the sin of the mind. If you ever hang out with scientists or really smart people, like I got my math degree and there were some really smart people, pride is a thing. You don’t know about that thing until you hang out with math professors. 

Greed poisons your heart. Your heart was meant to do two things: trust God and trust other people. So it's poisoning your relationships, it's poisoning your faith. Your heart is also where creativity is born. That's why Jesus says, "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money." The place of your heart meant to love and trust God is tempted to chase after wealth, money, prestige, and recognition. It's the lust of the eyes. It will destroy your heart. When it destroys your heart, it will destroy your whole being. That's what Jesus is teaching.

Wanting to get rich is a trap. Now we're holding two things in tension here. God gives money as a blessing. Building wealth slowly so it can be intergenerational is a good thing. But chasing after money, chasing after wealth, the desire to be rich is a trap. It poisons you from the inside out, in a way similar to how God wants to bless and renew you from the inside out. It's inverting and stealing the fruit from his kingdom.

When Jesus tells the parable of the sower, the seed is God's word. How does the heart respond to it? He speaks of those who are alive but unfruitful. He says it's the worries of this world, the temptations of wealth, that draw them away. Their faith comes to nothing. They're in heaven, but barely. Some people will be in heaven, but barely. Some people will receive glory and honor from Christ for the things you've done, the things you've said, and the way you've served him with your whole heart, or not. But you can't serve him with your whole heart if it's pulled away toward wealth. You can't serve two masters.

Let's look at 1 Timothy 6:6

"Godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we can be content. Those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows."

If you have food and clothing, with these we can be content. You know, in Matthew 6 (or possibly chapter 7) during the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus talks about not worrying. We love that passage—how God takes care of the sparrows and the lilies of the field. But have you ever noticed that what He tells us not to worry about is just food and clothes? That's why Paul is saying in 1 Timothy that if you have food and clothes, that's enough.

When was the last time you worried about just food and clothes? It's been a while, right? We're worried about things like whether the shoes are arranged neatly at the front door when people come over. We worry about so many things, and Jesus has no comfort for us in that. He's not saying to put your trust in Him for those shoes. Instead, He’s saying that stupid. He’s saying you fool. Your life does not consist in your possessions. I can't stress this enough: your heart is in danger when you let this obsession seep into every part of your life. Resist it and hate it the way God does when He sees His children destroyed by this temptation.

We are paid by a wealth creator, but wealth is created by actual assets that are passed down across multiple generations. This is why I would argue that very few of us are actually wealthy. If your inheritance, whatever you've accumulated over your life, is split up among siblings and then used to pay off other debts, and it’s gone within a decade, you don’t actually have wealth; you have comfort. You have comfort slavery because you're in debt to maintain that comfort, and debt is slavery.

Maybe you didn't know it, but that's what everyone does. I'm not blaming you, but it is your fault. You decided that in order to be comfortable, you were willing to be a slave to the system of the world, which corrupts your heart into thinking that your life consists of your possessions. I hope right now that the Spirit of God is shining a light on this in your heart like never before because everyone here has at least a kernel of this issue, if not more. We live in it like a fish lives in water. Our culture dedicated to this lie. The lust of the eyes will kill you.

I want to encourage you, if this is you, to recognize that you are not wealthy. Learn how true wealth actually works. Be faithful with it, build it slowly as a blessing from God—not for your comforts and not for your glory, but to be rich toward God's kingdom. Remember that it is God, not your boss, not the government, or the economy that provides for you. Glory in the position that God has put you in now.

For those of you who are in debt slavery and therefore poor according to what I’m reading in the Bible, glory in your low position in the world's eyes, but in the opportunity in the Kingdom of Heaven to receive extra grace. Blessed are those who are poor; there is something extra that God wants to give you if you receive it from Him in a way that puts aside the love of money and the chasing after possessions. Build wealth with creativity, wisdom, and hard work.

To summarize, and we’ll read the second half of the passage from James together to see if it connects, I want to summarize this idea of how to treat wealth as akin to a marriage vow. For richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, in all the ups and downs of life, you remain faithful. That’s what marriage is designed to be. When you make those marriage vows, you’re saying, whether it’s good or bad, easy or hard, I will be faithful.

If I were to summarize the message of the Scriptures about wealth, it is to be faithful with your wealth; it doesn’t belong to you. 

Let’s look at the end of James: "Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial. For when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life which God has promised to those who love Him."

Jesus said to invest in heaven. There’s a story I like to tell, which you may have heard if you’ve listened to me preach before, about research involving little kids and their ability to resist the temptation to eat a marshmallow. The marshmallow test involves placing a marshmallow in front of a child and telling them that if it remains uneaten for five minutes, they will get another one. The researchers track how long each child can wait before eating the marshmallow. The results show a significant correlation between how long children can wait and their future success in various areas, including financial and personal achievements.

Why? Because the ability to delay immediate pleasure for something better in the future correlates with greater success. Jesus takes this value system to its highest level, saying that if you can wait your whole life to receive your treasure in heaven, it would be the highest value way to live. That’s what it means to invest in heaven. It’s not just about giving money to nonprofits or serving the poor, though it can include that. What it really asks is where your treasure is—where your heart longs to keep and protect. Is it here, or is it there?

James reminds us that we will receive the crown of life in heaven, which God has promised to those who love Him. You cannot love Him if you are loving money. James continues:

"Let no one say when he is tempted, 'I am being tempted by God,' for God cannot be tempted by evil and He Himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. That desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death."

Your trial and temptation may be wealth. There’s a good chance that some of you here have a lot of money. Glory in your humble position; you are being tempted as we speak to fall into the world’s trap and be rich toward the Kingdom of Heaven. Your trial and temptation may be poverty. Glory in your exaltation before God; He has a special grace for you, a gift to live in poverty. This is not so that you can someday be rich, as the prosperity gospel wrongly teaches. The Bible does not teach that poverty is a blessing because it will lead to future wealth.

Instead, the Bible teaches there is a blessing in poverty if you can receive it from Him. Are you faithful or are you comfortable? Are you measuring your worth by your paycheck? Are you generous or greedy? I want to encourage you to realign your thinking about your value, about the work you do, and about how much money it earns. It’s time to awaken to the pursuit of something greater—not glory, power, or wealth, but adventure. Ask yourself, what’s the calling that God has given me? Do something that’s worth doing, live a life with good stories, and use your wealth to facilitate that life in yourself and others. Then be faithful to God because none of it is yours—neither your time nor your money.

Let’s read the end of James, and I’ll be done:

"Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of Lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. Of His own will, He brought us forth by the word of truth that we should be a kind of first fruits of His creatures."

Let’s pray:

Father, thank You for wealth, that it comes from You as a gift and fulfills Your promises. Thank You for poverty, that when we don’t have enough, we can turn to You. When we don’t have what we need, we can trust each other. Thank You for all You provide. In Jesus' name, amen.

As the band begins to play, I want to encourage you to respond to this message in a few different ways. One is with prayer cards. I don’t see them right now, but they might be in the back. If they show up, prayer cards are meant to be filled out and shared with each other—both your needs and your praises. In fact, I would encourage you, especially if you write a prayer request every single week, to also write a testimony to share.

Number two: We’ll come back in a few minutes to do communion. After filling out your prayer card, you can leave it here and then grab a communion cup. Remember that communion is a reminder and a participation in the sacrifice that Jesus made on the cross. Almost every religion throughout history has made sacrifices, and we do too. We participate in the sacrifice of Christ because He did it all.

Number three: You can give money. You can put it into the prayer card bucket whenever it appears. Give of your wealth, be generous to the Kingdom of God in this setting. There are many ways to do that; this is just one of them.

And I want to add a fourth: Confess your sins. Some of you might have sins to confess right now. If you feel the weight of temptation and have fallen into the trap of the world and its system, repent and take communion.