Transcript

Take your Bibles and let’s go back to the old part of the book. We’re going through Malachi, if you’re visiting with us, verse by verse, chapter by chapter. And I have really been, shouldn’t be, astonished by the amount of strong and practical application there is from this Old Testament book for the church today. And let me remind you afresh that the old ordinances, the law, The precepts of the Old Testament mostly are brought over into the New Testament in the church age, but they are perfected there.

They are completed there. The simplest illustration of Jesus. In the Old Testament, you went to the temple, you brought sacrifices, and that was a temporal and imperfect, but yet a holding back or a cleansing of sin for a time. And then Jesus comes in the New Testament, and he says, you don’t need the temple anymore, you don’t need the priest anymore, you don’t need the sacrificial system anymore, because I am the sacrificed — once for all. So the principle of a third party sacrifice covering us of our sins is taken out of the Old into the New Testament dispensation and so we see the completion of it, the perfection of it.

And there’s many, many, many other areas like that. And so when you study through the Old Testament, you’re seeing the embryonic form of what comes to completion in the New. And we will see that today. There’s so many things in Baptist and evangelical life, and this is true in every generation, where the church in general has been weak. They haven’t taught and looked at these areas, exhorted them, called the people to repentance concerning them as they should have. And as a young pastor, I noticed that very clearly across the Baptist and evangelical landscape. And some of those doctrines that seem to be just neglected and not in a wicked way, but just are not being addressed nearly the way the text addressed them.

Things like the doctrine of conversion. That conversion has to be more than just raising a hand or repeating a prayer or walking to the front of a building. Those things may be fine, but they’re not everything you look for to gain assurance of salvation. The doctrine of sovereignty. It’s a massive, mind-blowing truth about God, but he is sovereign or he’s not God. And if he’s not sovereign, he’s not God. So that’s a doctrine that’s been seemingly neglected for generations. The doctrine of family, God’s role for the family. What defines a family?

Now, it’s taught in the Old Testament, but it’s perfected in the New. One quick way we can say that is, God told wives to submit to their husbands in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament, he tells wives, submit to your husband, but love your husband. Don’t just do it out of cold ritual legalism. From your heart, love him and submit to him. He tells men in the Old Testament that they’re the heads of their wives, but in the New Testament he said, you’re not just the head of your wife to rule her and have your way, you’re to love her like Christ loves the church.

So he completes it and perfects the doctrine. as we come into the new, because see, now you have the Holy Spirit inside your heart. Now Christ lives in you. Now you have the enablement of God spiritually inside of you to bring you to that higher fulfillment of the original precept. Are y’all with me? You follow what I’m saying?

Now, here’s an area, though, that we’re going to look at, because it’s what Malachi tells us to look at, and that is the area of tithing and giving to the Lord’s work. and what we’re gonna say here particularly to the Lord’s ministers. And so let’s look at that together and then we will take some time to examine how it’s completed and perfected in the New Testament text and for us in the church age. Here we are, Malachi chapter three, we come to verse seven. And Malachi writes, “from the days of your fathers, you have turned aside for my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. But you say, well, how shall we return?” Verse 8, “will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, well, how have we robbed you? The prophet for God answers in tithes and offerings”. Verse 9, “you are cursed with the curse for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse so that there may be food in my house and test me now. And this says the Lord, if I will not open up for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows, then I will rebuke the devourer. so that it will not destroy the fruits of the ground, nor will your vine in the fields cast its grapes, says the Lord of Hosts. All the nations will call you blessed, for you shall be a delightful land, says the Lord of Hosts”.

Now, we’ve already started on this, so this’ll be the second installment, and let me give you a disclaimer up front. This is an awkward way to form a sermon. You’d think after 45 years I could do better. It is, but it gives me a chance to give some real clarity and some real exhortation to what God’s Word teaches in this very, very neglected area of giving and supporting God’s ministers. Now, pastors are terrified of this kind of thing. They say, oh, if I do that, my church, men in my church are going to think it’s all about me. I’m just promoting myself, et cetera, et cetera. I don’t have the privilege of deciding which part of the Word of God I’m going to preach and not preach. When Paul left the Ephesian elders, he said, one way you know that I was your true pastor and a man of God is this way: I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God. If it was truth, I gave you the truth.

And you and I covenanted together some almost 40 years ago that we were gonna strive to be thoroughly biblical, never perfect. We have to repent and do better every week. Can I get amen there? But we should be striving to be thoroughly biblical that we might encourage other pastors in churches that God will bless that and he will enable you and he’ll protect you and he will keep you if you’ll strive to be disciplined about those things. And as we plant churches, we have 50 something churches now, we’re part of planting and other partner churches that we’re involved with mentoring literally around the world. I do not know of an area that we have to address more than church finances. It’s just an area where our natural inclination, we just feel this is right and what we feel is not right, biblically speaking. It’s one of those areas where the natural inclination is so radically opposite of the biblical revelation on this topic.

And I’m sure that’s why Malachi is so strong and forceful, giving this word to the children of Israel. So I entitled the whole exposition of this text, Return to Me and Glorify Me. I didn’t put anything about tithing or giving in that title because that’s not the primary thing. Are you listening? The primary thing is that you love God from your heart. That’s why I’ve got here, return to God. Because if your heart’s right, giving takes care of itself. I mean, I’m probably good enough to scheme, to devise, to manipulate, to get funds in for the work in the ministry. But I choose not to do that. I want my people to treasure and joy in Christ. And because of that, choose to joyfully and cheerfully, as the Bible says, support the work of God.

So return to me, God is saying through Malachi to Israel, and glorify me again as I deserve to be glorified. Now we talked, first of all, from verse seven, that these people were discipled in sin. He says to them in verse 7, your fathers were this way and your fathers were that way. They sinned and they compromised. Now we have several generations where you’ve learned from your forefathers how to sin and dishonor me. God forbid in the New Testament church age we do that very thing. I’m afraid we’ve done it a lot. Well, my dad did it that way, my granddad did it that way, and they viewed it that way. Well, that doesn’t mean we don’t honor them for a lot of good that they taught us and did, but on that point, they’re unscriptural, so we don’t need to agree with them. They were discipled in sin.

We don’t have time to unpack all of that again, but let me go on to the second major point that we saw here. There’s another dispute with God, Roman numeral two. And we see, I’ve told you all through Malachi, there’s these times when the people just dispute, just retort back. Well, Malachi, here’s what you say. Well, here’s what we say, Malachi, show us where we’ve been so bad. How have we dishonored God? How are we sinning against God? And that’s what they do here. They just retort back. Well, tell us, what are we doing that’s so bad? And it’s as if Malachi, the prophet says, okay, you asked for it.

So here we come to Roman numeral three. He said, you’re God robbers. You’ve been discipled in compromise and sin. You always wanted to dispute with God and make excuses for yourself. Sir, can I ask you this morning? Ma’am, can I ask you this morning? Who told you you were the exception to the clear teaching of God’s word? And if I love you, I’m gonna try to rattle that out of you. so that you can be under God’s blessing and not under God’s curse, which we’re going to see very clearly in just a moment. He said, you’re God robbers.

First of all, he says, A, in our outline, you’re God robbers by neglecting or withholding, bringing the tithes and the offerings. Now, we spent some time here on tithing and how it’s an old, old principle. First of all, it’s an old principle. Matter of fact, the ancient Babylonians, the ancient Assyrians, the ancient Egyptians and others, before God gave the law to Israel, practiced tithing to their gods. It’s something of an innate natural law that men know that they are to honor their religion with their tithes and their offerings. We talked about how thoroughly tithing was commanded and taught in the Old Testament so very clearly. Then we looked at tithing in the New Testament, that though it is not explicitly commanded, it’s understood. I gave you the idea there that in the Old Testament, we tithed under law. In the New Testament, we give under grace. In every way where precepts are compared, the Old Testament precept was expanded, amplified under the New Testament precept.

I challenge you, not a law, not an edict. You won’t be disciplined if you don’t do it. I challenge you, begin with a tithe and see what else God might have you do. Because God forbid, under grace, you look at God and say, I did minimally what the Old Testament law required, and I think God will say to you, did you not get more under Jesus than you got under the law?

So it’s not commanded, but it’s understood. It’s a good pattern, it’s a good set of training wheels to get us going in our giving. And so I’m going to give you a loophole. I’m going to give you an out. All right, here it is. 2 Corinthians 9:7, “Each one must do just as he’s purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver”. I’ve told you for decades, if you can’t bring it with some joy and believing in God, then listen, keep it. Keep it. I mean, here I am 45 years in this thing, and I would hate to know that just to pay the bills, I had to keep scheming and pampering and conjoling and manipulating to keep the giving up. No, I want you to have a joyful heart of love for God and bring the tithes and offerings.

And that’s what the New Testament would teach us. Well, so he talks about here, you’ve been withholding tithes and offerings. Now, here’s new material. B. You’ve been robbing God withholding tithes and offerings but be because you’re robbing God you are cursed with a curse. Verse 9 of our text. “You are cursed with a cursed for you are robbing me the whole nation of you”.

Now, it’s hard to believe, but it looks like the Jews of Malachi’s day are falling below the backslidden condition of the Jews of Jesus’ day, and that’s hard to do because the Jews of Jesus’ day continually received his corrections and his rebukes, i.e., even in this area of giving and how they gave and the hard attitude behind it. Because these people in Malachi’s day, unlike the Jewish religious authorities of Jesus’ day, who would often tithe, but they would tithe with a sense of pride. They wanted to make a show of their tithing. And Jesus, in effect, says, well, here’s the problem with that if your heart’s wrong, your tithe doesn’t matter that much to me. Just the financial amount is not a big deal if your heart’s not right. But here we have going back to Malachi’s day from Jesus’ day, these guys, they were not tithing out of pride or impure motives. They were not tithing at all.

You know what we learn is is that if you want God to bless you out of his treasure, you must first open yours. So he said you’re cursed with a curse. Now we see in verse 11 something of what this curse must include. “I will rebuke the devourer for you so that it will not destroy the fruit of the ground, nor your vine in the field cast its grapes.” So what’s he saying? If you return to me and start obeying me from the heart, then I’ll rebuke the devourer and you’ll have a good increase from all your wealth, your investments, your businesses, your livestock, your agricultural endeavors. But if you don’t, then this curse remains on you.

Now, this is an agriculturally based people, and when God says, I’m going to curse your crops, it doesn’t mean that there’s going to be inflation because of a shortage of crops, and that the bills are going to be higher at the grocery store. It doesn’t mean that. What it means is, is you may not eat this winter. You’ll become a bunch of beggars, shameful among the nations of the earth. He says, you’re cursed with the curse. You’re robbing me of tithes and offerings. Literally, the word robbing there is the idea of cheating. God is saying, we had a covenant relationship. I blessed you. I birthed you. I’ve kept you. I’ve provided for you. I’ve protected you. I brought you out of Egypt. I’ve been for you everything you need, and we have a covenant agreement. You are going to take care of my ministers with tithes and offerings, and you’re cheating me. You’re cheating on your end of the deal. Strong words here from the prophet.

Leviticus 27:30 reminded us, “the tithe is the Lord’s, it is holy to the Lord”. He’s saying, Israel, when you go out there and you take in your crops, matter of fact, Leviticus adds on, I want the first and the best 10%. Don’t have 100 acres of crops and give me the part that’s down there in the swamp that almost produced nothing. I don’t want those 10 acres. You’re to give me a really good, 10 acres and bring it in as your tithe and your offerings unto me because by the way, it’s not yours. It’s holy unto the Lord.

So they’ve been robbing him. They’ve been cheating him out of something that belongs to him. So God says I’m cursing it. It’ll rot in your hands. You know, what’s far worse than not having any wealth is having wealth that is cursed by God. It eventually It’ll rot in your hands and break your heart and soul. Well, unfaithfulness brings punishment. There’s an old parable of an eagle that swooped down on one of these old altars in the Old Testament. You know, they would put the sacrifice on an altar of coals. And the animal had just been placed there and the eagle flies down and snatches up that little lamb and flies off with it. However, embedded in the corpse, the carcass of that lamb are some burning coals. And when the eagle lands on his nest, he burns the whole treetop out. So it is with men who rob God. They take into their bosom what is used of God to destroy them.

That’s why 1 Timothy 6:10 reminds us, “for the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many a grief”. There’s something about the love of money. Now look, be balanced here. We can enjoy what money buys us. Nice car, nice home, nice clothes. That’s not necessarily wrong or sin. The key is, is it more important to you than God? Are you able to say with a clear conscience, God, if I don’t have any of this, just don’t take yourself away from me. I’ve still got you. That’s my main love. I’ve said this before, and I don’t want you to carelessly take this and quote it places. People misunderstand. But as a child of God, you’re born again, and Christ lives in you. But your old rotten, depraved flesh is still there too with its lust and desires. Romans 7. Can I get amen there? So there’s two natures as such going on. Some people kind of disregard that, but I’ve been studying the text for 45 years, and I think it’s very valid. You have the spiritual man in you, but the old man with its old desires is still there. So in one sense of the word, you still love sin, but because you’re born again and God’s given you a new heart, you love God more than you love sin.

We can enjoy the things money provides, but we don’t make them our God. We don’t make them our end. We don’t make them our idol. And that’s what Paul told Timothy and warned him about. Men get into this love of money and putting money first, and they end up wandering away from the faith. They end up losing their devotion to Christ and his church. It steals them away. And understand something, friend. Satan always pays with counterfeit deals. Someone said, no one has ever lost by serving God with his whole heart. and no one has ever gained by serving him with half of one. You know, I’ve been working with churches and encouraging pastors and helping church reform and revive for many years now, and I can say this emphatically, there is no such thing as a God-blessed, spiritually empowered, stingy church. There’s just no such thing. Generosity and joy in supporting God’s work parallels the Spirit of God and the blessing of God on the church. Always, always.

Well, they were robbing God by neglecting tithes and offerings. They were robbing God, and now they’re cursed with the curse. And thirdly, they were robbing God by neglecting the support of his ministers. Now, this jumped out to me because, honestly, I’ve never really thought this way until more recent years. I don’t know how many, but more recent years. And that is that the prophet points out the key factor And what they were doing was they were neglecting the portion that went to the Levites, the priest. The entire tribe of Levi were to work in the priest ministry. Not all of them were actual priests, but many of them were associates and assistants and support tasks in that giant temple and supporting the overall work, the services of the priest. And he says, that’s who’s being hurt in this because all of these tithes and offerings go for my ministers. How does he word it there in verse 10? “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, sow that to the end for this purpose, that there may be food in my house”. Food there means the literal material financial sustenance that the Levites are to live on. Remember, the tribe of Levi was not allowed to buy land, build businesses, and make an advance in profit. No, they were to devote themselves to ministry, but the other tribes were required by God, you bring your tithes and offerings and they will live off of that because they’re performing an essential service for you in the priestly ministry. They’re doing it for God, but they’re doing it for the people.

So, the giving pattern of the Old Testament was primarily, not exclusively, but primarily for the support of God’s ministers. That’s why it’s called food because God appeared in the temple from time to time. We know that. His shekinah glory would show up in the temple, but God never showed up at the temple for lunch because he doesn’t eat. but His ministers do. That’s why he says, I want you to take good care of the men of God. I’ve set us apart for this task. I’m going to mention this now. I’ll talk a little more about it later, but you know what’s interesting? Do you remember where we’ve been? Do you remember what Malachi said in these earlier chapters about the priest? They were so unfaithful, they were so sinful, and they were so corrupted that God literally said, I’m going to pile you guys up. with the manure from all these sacrificial animals that would be around the temple. Can you imagine how many animals were brought by all of Israel for all those sacrifices? Manure everywhere. God literally says, in Malachi, you’re so bad, you priests, I’m gonna bind you up, pick you up with the manure and throw you out with it. Man, God turns around, and cast judgment on the people for not bringing their tithes and offerings to support those very priests. Principle is, you’re bringing your tithes and offerings as a holy worship unto the Lord, period. Interesting. I’m gonna bring some balance to that thought here in a minute, so don’t leave that just yet, all right?

Now here’s kind of the awkward, but I’m going to insert at this point the New Testament completion or perfection of this principle. All right, the New Testament. giving and supporting of God’s ministers, the way I would have entitled this. Here’s some conclusions for practical application from the basic principle of Malachi that’s expanded on, completed, and perfected for the church in the New Testament age. Now, where are my elders, church elders? You guys out there somewhere? There’s Phil back there. He’s the chairman of the finance committee, so this is really important to him. And by the way, Phil has helped us many times in going to church plants and partner who say, we need to set up our books, and we need to have a view of how we support our pastor. Phil does a great job at that. But here’s what I’m saying, Phil, and to all the elders, here’s some additional insights that I’m confident God’s given me, not my insights, but from the text that should guide the way we view taking care of the minister of God.

And let me give this… addendum remark at this point. These elders take good care of me and they take good care of our staff. Now, none of them will say they’ve arrived. We’re always being sharpened. We always need to grow, but they do a good job. So I commend them that they basically walk in the truths that we are looking at today. Now, if they didn’t, I wouldn’t say that. I’d say, guys, we need to do better. But at this point, I don’t really need to do that, other than to say, join your preaching pastor with a renewing of our hearts in these areas.

All right, New Testament giving that supports, and the support, rather, of God’s minister. Number one, it is based off of the Old Testament pattern. We’ve talked about that over and over, so here you have the Old Testament pattern, bring the tithes and offerings, I want my ministers taken care of. You come to the New Testament, same basic thing, bring your gifts and take care of the pastor and the preaching of the word of God. So the New Testament pattern expands on the Old Testament pattern. The New Testament pattern is a maturation of the Old Testament pattern. It is a completion and a perfection of the Old Testament pattern. No longer do we give the priest in a temple, we give to pastors and leaders of the local church. That’s the way it’s progressed as we come across.

Matter of fact, Paul makes this building on the Old Testament model for the New Testament church explicitly clear as he is arguing with the church at Corinth. They were very carnal, very immature, and they had a problem with Paul talking about needing financial support. And they were having a big problem with all the way to accusing Paul of being a false teacher. And Paul loads his guns and blasts back at them. There’s no other way to interpret the text. Strongly reproving those Corinthians in the local church there at Corinth.

And one of the things, we’re going to look at other things in a moment, but one of the things he says is 1 Corinthians 9:13-14. In defending his right, he uses that word four times, by the way, I have a right to it, I have a right to it, I have a right to it, I have a right to it. That is your financial resources to be supported. 1 Corinthians 9:13 to 14, he says, “Do you not know that those who perform sacred services”, that’s the Old Testament, priestly service, and now, by the way, they were very aware of that. The Jews and the Gentiles of this age understood the Jewish holy ordinance of the priest being supported by the gifts and the tithes and the offerings of the people. “Those who attend regularly to the altar have their share from the altar”. He says, as the Old Testament priest was supported, so should the New Testament gospel preacher pastor be supported. That’s what he’s building on. He continues on in verse 14. “So also the Lord directed those who proclaim the gospel to get their living from the gospel”. The word directed there in our text means prescribed or commands or to set in order. It’s as if Paul is saying, this is the Old Testament order. Now we got to set things in order for the church age, the New Testament age. And so we’re setting things in order. Don’t take any more offerings to the priest down there at that temple. You’re a Christian now, bring your offerings to the local church. Not to support the old priest, but now to support the gospel preacher. So, there’s a new congregational order established here. From the priest serving in the temple, now that’s replaced by preachers serving in local churches.

The gospel preacher has replaced the Levitical priest in God’s order. Basically, the means, tithes and offerings, about the same. I see no real difference there, other than we’re under love and under grace, so it’s not this austere, cold law. We’re to be bringing tithes and offerings under the joy of the love we found in Christ. Just to point out how Paul goes back to the old order to affirm the new order. In Philippians 4.18, Paul is talking about how generously the church at Philippi has supported his preaching ministry, his pastoring ministry. And he says, but I’ve received everything in the full, I have an abundance. So they gave big gifts to Paul. Amply supplied, having received from Epaphroditus that which you sent. Notice, this is Old Testament priestly terminology now. A fragrant aroma, because the priest would put up incense as he would give the offerings and the prayers on behalf of the people. An acceptable sacrifice. The priest would bring your animal and sacrifice it on your behalf. well pleasing, not just pleasing, well pleasing to God. Here’s what he said, you know how you admired and honored the Old Testament system of the sacrifices and the prayers and how pleasing that was viewed to God? He said, that’s all been replaced now by you giving generously to my preaching pastoral ministry. Exactly. There’s no other way to interpret the text. I don’t think many of you go to bed at night grieved because you haven’t given anything to the local Jewish temple. But you don’t need to be grieved by it because that’s over. It’s been replaced.

You know, in the Old Testament, they went to a temple to seek salvation. Jesus in the New Testament says, I am the temple of salvation. Matter of fact, he says, I’ll tear this building down. Titus of Rome did it in 70 AD. He said, but the temple of my body is going to be raised in three days. Pointing us to Him as our source and our sacrifice and our Savior. Everything moves over from the old Jewish economy to the Christian New Testament church.

All right, number one. The New Testament guide for giving to support God’s ministers is based off the Old Testament pattern, but it’s a completion, a perfection of it.

Number two, it fulfills the principle of work and income. And we’ve got a bunch in our day today. Over on the left side. who want to say that work and income don’t have to be together. You can just have a guaranteed income for everybody. There’s only one problem with that. That doesn’t work. It’s not of God. The general rule of you work, you receive compensation is ordained of God. Matter of fact, I’d go further. It’s something of an innate natural law. What do I mean by that? I mean, you don’t really have to teach this. People know it’s right. Amen? You know it’s right.

Matter of fact, some people in Thessalonica were getting lazy and not working in the church there. And they were kind of depending on other people in the church to give them handouts. And Paul writes and said, by the way, if you don’t work, you don’t eat. Income and work always go together.

And so Paul takes this basic premise, now listen, that even unbelievers, the Gentiles would get this. And he’s using that to support his teaching that he had a right to receive financial compensation from them for his ministry among them. Let’s see. 1 Corinthians 9:7-14. Here’s the way he gives this common sense, natural principle as a foundation for why preachers should be supported from the tithes and offerings of the local church. First of all, he says, by the way, if you have a soldier, no soldier goes out there and serves at his own expense. He’s to be paid for that work. He’s a service he’s rendering for you. Then he says a vineyard keeper, he labors hoping that there’s compensation, income from the crop. A flock keeper, same way. He wants some milk back. That’s common sense. The plowman plows in hope. Plowman’s out there plowing, and it’s righteous and godly and good that he says, boy, I hope I make a good profit by helping this brother with his crop. He’s hired me to plow. He said the thresher. Threshers would have diverse ways. They’d separate the husk off of the kernel of wheat. It’s an important role, and he says, the guy who threshes for you, He threshes in hope, hoping he’s going to get some income back from his work. He’s saying, these things are common sense. It’s a part of God’s natural law that’s in all men’s hearts. So why do you Corinthians have a problem with faithfully and generously taking care of me, your pastor? That’s exactly what Paul’s saying. Then he goes on again with 2 Corinthians 9:14 to summarize it all up and bring it over into the church. He says so also the Lord directed just as it’s common sense in the secular culture. So it’s common sense in the church. The Lord directed those who proclaim the gospel to get their living from the gospel. So he appeals to that principle of natural common law as a basis for continued support of God’s minister.

Now number three. It fulfills a great debt we all owe. When you bring tithes and offerings, you are servicing a debt you have to God and to his ministers. In Numbers 18:31, this is seen in the Old Testament economy. You may eat it anywhere and in your household. This is the priest, the Levitical priest. For it is your reward or it is your compensation. in return for your service in the tent of meeting. They owe you a debt because you’ve served them in an essential way in which they cannot serve themselves. God is saying this is the way I set up the order and the structure. So now Paul brings that over to the New Testament in a very pointed and specific way as he deals with Philemon in Philemon 18, 19, and 20. Are y’all listening? Y’all okay? I don’t have to do this again next week.

Philemon has a runaway slave called Onesimus. In the providence of God, Onesimus runs into Paul while he’s run away and gets gloriously saved. And Onesimus says to Paul, I’ve got to go back to Philemon, who’s a devout Christian man, and I’ve robbed Philemon. I’ve robbed him of my service and my labor. I’m legally his slave. What am I going to do? And Paul says, hang on, Onesimus. I’m going to write Philemon a letter because Philemon and I are very tight. Philemon is an ardent supporter of my ministry, my preaching, my pastoral work. Let me write to him and see what we can do. And then he writes.

Verse 18, “but if he, [Onesimus], [Philemon], has wronged you in any way or owes you”, matter of fact, the word owes there could be robbed. You’ve heard that word today, haven’t you? If he’s actually robbed you of his services that he owes you, “charge that to my account”. Here’s what he’s saying, Philemon, I’ll bring my checkbook. I’ve got an account at First Baptist Church of Antioch, where I started, and I’ll write you a check. Everything Onesimus owes you. He doesn’t end there, does he? This is so incredible.

Verse 19, “I, Paul, I’m writing this with my own hand”. That emphasized that when you had a debt obligation, you had to write it out with your hand and sign it. Then you were legally bound, obligated to it. He said, I’m writing it with my own hand because usually Paul dictated his letters and signed the end of them. But here he says, I’m writing all this out. So Philemon, you know I’m serious about this. I’m legally bound to pay Onesimus’ debt to you. And also it has a personal and sincere element that I’m writing this out with my own hand. And he says, “I will repay it. Not to mention that you owe me, you’re in debt to me for your own self as well”. Philemon, can I remind you as your brother who loves you? You just don’t owe me materially, you owe me your whole life. Because what I brought you with the gospel as God’s instrument is radically more valuable than anything, any material thing could reach up to.

Brother David Young and I have a little joke we pass back and forth. He’s never failed the test, not one time. You might say, why do you hang out with Brother David? He’s the only one that would hang out with me for a long time, first of all. Kind of like a dog with a pork chop around his neck, you know, trying to get somebody to run around with him. But David was saved and Rhonda was saved and baptized here. And we were going to a restaurant. He started taking me hunting and got me back in hunting. I’d given it up, to be honest. I think he had a little pity for me, thought this guy’s gonna burn out and die if he don’t do something different. So he got me back out in the woods and I’ve been going ever since. And we’d go out to eat and we’d be sitting there and I said, well, look, I’m gonna pay for your lunch. He said, “well, let me pay for it”. And I said, “well, you ought to, you owe me your life”. Every time he said, “I sure do, absolutely”. But somehow I still ended up paying for the lunch, but nevertheless, he’s never failed to agree to that. Now, here’s what I’m saying to you. It’s not the human instrument. I can tell you from the depth of my heart, I’ve never sensed that I’m more expendable than I do in these days. I’m not essential. God can raise up a rock to do His work if He needs to. but you should carry in your heart that the man of God who’s been faithful to preach and teach the unsearchable riches to Christ, and I’m saved and my wife is saved, my children are saved, I’ve seen my grandchildren get saved, we’re eternally secure, I have a debt to that instrument of God I could never repay.

I’m not asking for anything more from any of you except a heart that agrees with the principle of God’s word. Can I get amen there? You would not believe the faithful ministers, the faithful, Dr. Seale, faithful brothers all over who live just above the poverty line because our doggone church leadership and so many of our Baptist evangelical churches have adapted the concept of Roman Catholic error, some sort of poverty theology, that if he’s a man of God, he don’t want or need anything anyway. Where did you get that? He’s not the leader of a charitable organization. He’s a servant of God rendering a service to you that you owe him a debt for. Now, Pastor, now I know why preachers don’t preach this stuff. You’re going to get in trouble if you keep preaching this stuff. Well, it would be convenient for me, would it not, now that I’m at my age and I could make it on what’s been put back in my retirement fund by the church over the years? Church has been generous in taking care of me, but what about Brother Matt? What about Brother Nathan? What about Brother Luke?

If I put on a false humility, oh, don’t take good care of me, oh, I don’t need anything, I guarantee you Satan the next year or two is gonna get in that elder finance committee meeting and Satan’s gonna prick two or three of those boys to say, well, no, they ought to be like Brother Jeff and not expect nothing. They ought to be like Brother Jeff and not expect a raise. And they forget where Brother Jeff put on that humility after he had his kids raised and his retirement account was at least enough to live on. But these boys still got three or four kids in school, some that need to be paid through college, cars to pay for for kids. Why shouldn’t the pastor be able to do that for his kids? And I’ve seen, I believe, good men put on that face to their church, don’t give me anything, I don’t want any raise. Here’s what you’re doing, you’re doing two things. You’re robbing the next generation of pastors because they’re going to live up to that.

Brother Steve and I know a church, a great, great big church with a good and godly pastor and a good and godly staff. And they paid their support staff, Brother Steve, their associate pastor, so little, they lived off the gifts of their church members. Like little birds in a nest with their mouths open. “Oh, please help me”. It’s pitiful, it’s pathetic, it’s ungodly, it’s unbiblical. How could you do that? You couldn’t, but I’m just saying generally. Some of those guys, Jim, told me he drives a car and the only way he could afford a car is because some church members would give him their leftover old cars when they got a new one. This is a church with tons of money. Some false, unbiblical doctrine. Now listen to me, if God’s will is that I finish out my ministry the way I started. You know, I’ve told you, you couldn’t have had more of nothing than I had when I started. Then so be it. Test me and see. I will do exactly what I’m doing if you pay me nothing. I have no choice. That’s who I am. And you started at almost nothing. You paid me $50 a week when I started. And I did what I do now. Thank you for getting past that point. I really appreciate that very much, but that’s where we started. Oh, I digress. Some of y’all want to go to lunch, but I’m feeding you something to eat if you’ll eat it.

Then in Philemon 20, Paul continues writing to Philemon about the debt his runaway slave Onesimus owes him. And he said, “yes, brother, let me benefit from you in the Lord. Refresh my heart in Christ”. Here’s what he’s saying. Now, now, now, now, Philemon, based on all that I’ve just written to you in this letter, I’ll pay the debt, but you owe me your whole life, Philemon. Just, just bless your pastor here and don’t charge me, okay? That’s what he’s saying.

Now, let me give some clarification here. I’m not going to come to your place of business and look for a pastoral deal, okay? I’ll pay full price. I’m well taken care of. I’m not looking for special deals. What I’m looking for is a heart that agrees with the Word of God on this truth. We are indebted to you for unflinchingly and faithfully giving to us the whole counsel of God. That’s enough. And as you’re able, take good care of me and also the extended staff, pastors and associates. Do I need to get through this or y’all, can y’all handle it one more week? Let’s see, one, two, three, four, five, six.

We better make it a third parter. You, Grace Life, are the exception. When we’re, and I, as Phil, as Matt, I have very little say in salaries at all. I will sometimes say, now that brother ought to have more, but very little. We have historically looked at there’s like three or four surveys of ministers around the country and for size of church and income. And we generally follow that outline. But let me ask you something. In every other area, we didn’t stop where everybody else stopped. We stopped where the book stopped. So we don’t want to be just like churches that are mildly biblical. So let’s kick out thinking that seems right, but it’s not right.

One final statement, I’m going to close. God forbid a man of God say this, I will not preach or teach or lead if they don’t give me X amount of money. God forbid, that’s wickedness. God forbid the church who has faithful pastors, plural, and they refuse to generously and joyously take care of it. Can I get amen there? Both sides of that coin are essential. Well, Paul affirms Malachi that the tithes and offerings have application for the Old Testament priest and for the New Testament pastor.