May 26, 2025 • 43 mins
What did you think of today's message?
With Northgate Online, you can join us every Sunday live at 9:00a and 11:00a, and our gatherings are available on-demand starting at 7p! Join us at https://thisis.church
Subscribe to our channel to see more messages from Northgate: https://www.youtube.com/@Northgate2201
—
If you would like to give, visit https://thisis.church/give/
—
Check out our Care Ministries for prayer, food pantry, memorial services and more at https://thisis.church/care
—
You are welcome at Northgate just like you are. Life may be going great for you or you may have hurts, hang-ups, and habits. No matter where you are on your spiritual journey, you are welcome at Northgate. We value the process of journey. We believe in the transformative power of Christ. Northgate has a clear vision of transforming our homes, communities, and world by Pursuing God, Building Community, and Unleashing Compassion.
—
Follow Northgate on Instagram: https://instgram.com/ngatecf
Follow Northgate on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ThisIsNorthgate/
Follow Larry Davis: https://www.instagram.com/sirlawrencedavis
Subscribe to Northgate's Podcast (Apple): https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/northgate/id1583512612
Subscribe to Northgate's Podcast (Google): https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5idXp6c3Byb3V0LmNvbS81ODE2ODAucnNz
Share your experience with Northgate by leaving a review: https://g.page/r/CRHE7UBydhxzEBM/review
...
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
So April 22nd 1990, exactly 35 years and one month
ago from today, a group of 12adults, five kids, one infant
and myself gathered together forthe very first time in Benicia,
and that was the beginnings ofNorthgate Christian Fellowship.
(00:21):
I think we have pictures therewe are.
That's church in my living room.
That's when I had hair Iactually had a I was cruising a
mullet back then and that wasthe beginnings of our very first
gathering here in Benicia.
Now, it wasn't the first timethat we had gotten together.
(00:44):
Actually, for about the first,about two months prior to this,
we had been meeting together andtalking about and kind of
envisioning what it would belike to be a church for
unchurched people, what it wouldbe like to be a church whose
vision and purpose was to helpunchurched people become
wholehearted followers of JesusChrist.
(01:05):
By the way, anybody want toguess what is the most
unchurched region in all of theUnited States?
If you guessed, the SanFrancisco Bay Area, you got it.
We live in one of the mostunchurched areas of the country.
We live in one of the mostunchurched areas of the country
(01:32):
and we started with this visionof what would it look like if we
purposely went and tried toreach unchurched people and what
that would mean for us.
Because what that would meanfor us that group of 12 adults
and five kids and one infantwould mean if we're going to be
reaching unchurched people, wellthen they're not going to know
about Jesus unless we tell them.
So it's going to be up to us tobuild relationships and meet
(01:52):
people and share our faith andinvite them to be a part of our
group.
And if we're reachingunchurched people, well, they
don't have any ministry orchurch experience, or very
little maybe, and so it's goingto be all on us to do all of the
work of the ministry, at leastwhen we get started.
And because we were going to bereaching unchurched people who
are not usually regularly givingto a church, it is going to be
(02:16):
up to us to support this workfinancially.
So we started talking honestlyabout what this was going to
look like.
And then, at the end of all ofthose informational meetings,
what I did was I asked everybodythat was a part of that group
to say now I want you to go homeand I want you to pray over
this and I want you to thinkabout this and let God move your
(02:36):
heart.
And then what I want you to dois to write me a letter and in
that letter I want you to writeto me why you believe God is
calling you to be a part of thisnew church project, what areas
of ministry that you are willingto serve in because you're
going to have to be serving inministry and that you are
willing to commit financially tomake this thing get going.
(03:00):
So by the time we met for thevery first time there in my
living room, we were all in.
Now we didn't know what we wereall in for, but we were all in.
We were making that commitment.
And then over the years, all ofthose things that we talked
about in that meeting, we kindof refined over the years to
(03:20):
really say these become our corevalues, that we are going to be
a grace-filled community whereeveryone is welcome, no matter
where they've been or whatthey've done.
They'll be welcome with us.
And that also means that we areall going to recognize that we
are all people in process.
None of us has it all together,none of us has it all figured
(03:41):
out.
None of us are perfect.
We are just going to learn andgrow together with each other,
and that we are going to beredemptive in our relationships.
In other words, recognize thatGod brings people across your
path and he's doing something intheir life, as he's doing
something in your life and theymay not even know it yet, but
(04:01):
part of our job is as Christfollowers all in Christ
followers is to help people seewhat God wants to do with their
life so they would come to puttheir faith and trust in him and
that we would recognize thatall of our lives is an act of
worship, not just what we dowhen we get together on Sunday
(04:21):
morning, but how we live ourlives in a way that honors and
glorifies God, that our worshipis meant to be a lifestyle.
And then that last one, thatcore value that we said we are
called to live generous lives,lives of generosity.
And the reason we picked thatas one of our core values from
(04:43):
the very, very beginning is itgoes all the way back to the
book of Acts, chapter four,where it talks about that God's
grace was so powerfully at workamong them all, that early
church, that there were no needypersons among them, that people
were generous and cared for andgave for each other, because
Jesus had taught aboutgenerosity.
(05:03):
Jesus had taught about usingyour resources for the kingdom
of God, and the apostle John.
He wrote about it in his letter, and James did in his letter,
and the apostle Peter did too,and Paul wrote about it.
Paul gave instructions to ayoung pastor named Timothy of
the church in Ephesus and toldhim make sure that you tell your
(05:24):
people about not to put theirtrust in their wealth but to be
generous and to share, and healso wrote about.
Paul also wrote about it to thechurch in Rome, he wrote about
it to the church in Philippi andhe wrote it in both of his
letters to the church in Corinthand that's where we're going to
kind of focus this morning.
His second letter to the churchin Corinth.
Let me read to you from chapter9, 2 Corinthians 9.
(05:46):
If you want to follow alongwith your Bible app, you can
Otherwise just listen.
This is what Paul wrote to theCorinthian church, for I know
your eagerness to help and Ihave been boasting about it to
the Macedonians, telling themthat since last year you and
Achaia were ready to give andyour enthusiasm stirred most of
them to action.
But I'm sending the brothers inorder that our boasting about
(06:08):
you in this matter should notprove hollow, but that you may
be ready, as I said you would be.
For if any Macedonians comewith me and find you unprepared,
we not to say anything aboutyou would be ashamed about
having been so confident.
So I thought it necessary tourge the brothers to visit you
in advance to finish thearrangements for the generous
gift you had promised.
(06:29):
Then it will be ready as agenerous gift, not as one
grudgingly given.
Remember this whoever sowssparingly will also reap
sparingly, and whoever sowsgenerously will also reap
generously.
Each of you should give whatyou've decided in your heart to
you, not reluctantly or under,and whoever sows generously will
also reap generously.
Each of you should give whatyou've decided in your heart to
give, not reluctantly or undercompulsion, for God loves a
(06:51):
cheerful giver and God is ableto bless you abundantly so that
in all things, at all times,having all that you need, you
will abound in every good work.
As it is written, they havefreely scattered their gifts to
the poor.
Their righteousness enduresforever.
Now, he who supplies seed forthe sower and bread for food
(07:13):
will also supply and increaseyour store of seed and will
enlarge the harvest of yourrighteousness.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can be generous
on every occasion.
And through us, your generositywill result in thanksgiving to
God.
This service you perform is notonly supplying the needs of the
Lord's people, but is alsooverflowing in many expressions
(07:34):
of thanks to God because of theservice by which you have proved
yourselves.
Others will praise God for yourobedience that accompanies your
confession of the gospel ofChrist and for your generosity
in sharing with them and witheveryone else.
And in their prayers for you,their hearts will go out to you
because of the surpassing graceGod has given you.
Thanks be to God for hisindescribable gift.
(08:00):
So this morning I want to unpackthis as a part of our All In
series.
I want to kind of unpack thisidea of living generously.
It's a pattern throughout theNew Testament.
It's how God designed us tolive, and I want to start with
this really simple idea Livinggenerously is a choice.
Generous living is a choice.
(08:21):
I have never met anyone whostumbled into a life of
generosity.
It doesn't happen by accident,because it's our natural bent is
to keep and hoard, so it's achoice.
Paul wrote about it this way.
He said each of you should givewhat you've decided in your
heart to give, not reluctantlyor under compulsion, for God
(08:42):
loves a cheerful giver.
So let me give you a little bitof background, because you've
got to know what's going on withthis whole thing.
It all goes back to thescripture that Pastor Larry
started this whole series on.
When Jesus gave the commissionto his disciples, he said go and
make disciples of all nations,baptizing them in the name of
the Father and of the Son and ofthe Holy Spirit, and teaching
(09:05):
them to obey everything I havecommanded you.
Jesus gave that commission tohis followers and then he
ascended back up into heaven andthen, on the day of Pentecost,
about 50 days later, the HolySpirit exploded on the scene and
it says the church grew in oneday to 3,000 people.
(09:26):
3,000 people in one day puttheir faith and trust in Jesus
Christ.
Now that's a huge talk aboutchurch growth.
That is huge.
And what happened was everybodywas so excited and the church
was growing and great thingswere happening and all of that,
that they missed the first partof what Jesus had said, because
(09:47):
God is doing all these greatthings and our church is growing
and man, all this stuff is socool.
But Jesus said go.
And they stayed, and theystayed, and they stayed.
And it's not until you get tochapter eight that a great
persecution breaks out againstthe church.
And it's not until you get tochapter 8 that a great
persecution breaks out againstthe church, and it's almost like
(10:08):
God is saying okay, if you'renot going to go on your own, I'm
going to give you a littlenudge.
And the whole church wasscattered, and when they
scattered, they went and taughtand preached wherever they went
and told about this good news ofJesus Christ giving his life
for your sins so that you couldlive in a relationship with God.
And all around theMediterranean, different cities,
(10:30):
all around churches sprung upand new believers gathered
together.
What happened back in Jerusalem, though, was the church was
under such persecution and wentthrough such a difficult time
that they were destitute, and sowhat Paul did was he contacted
all these other churches allaround the Mediterranean.
He said listen, we need to takeup a collection for the church
(10:50):
in Jerusalem, because ourbrothers back there are
suffering and we need to helpthem out Now.
There was no Venmo or PayPal orZelle at the time, so this all
had to kind of be a planned outdeal.
And so he wrote them and hevisited them and told them to
start making this collection.
So what he's talking about nowis this collection.
This all kind of started like ayear ago and they're supposed
(11:12):
to have been collecting and Paulsaid hey, I'm coming, and when
I come I want to make sure thatyou fulfill the promise.
You made a decision.
Now you got to follow throughon it.
So here's how we instructedthem.
He says each of you should givewhat you have decided in your
heart to give.
Now, that word decided in yourheart, okay, the Greek word is
actually prosareo, which reallyimpresses you, doesn't it?
(11:36):
Bible college will do that.
You just call it these Greekwords.
What it literally means isforethought Pros.
That preposition pros meansforward, or ahead of time, or
towards.
And so he says listen, you dothis ahead of time.
You decide it in your heart.
It should be something that youthink about, that, you pray
(11:56):
about, that you deliberatelyconsider and then make a
decision.
So you should give what you'vedecided in your heart.
And he says also, notreluctantly or under compulsion.
In other words, we're not goingto twist your arm, we're not
going to lay a guilt trip on you.
This has to be between you andGod, because he said God loves a
(12:17):
cheerful giver.
And that's the idea.
It's about changing yourattitude.
It's about changing your mind,your frame of mind.
By the way, the word cheerfulthere you want another great
Greek word, this one, you'llremember.
The Greek word for cheerfulthere is hilarios, which
(12:37):
translates into our English wordhilarious.
You ought to be laughing whenyou write out your tithe check.
You ought to just having agreat old time when you make
that donation, because that'sthe kind of giving God wants.
By the way, do you know thatmisery and miser have the same
root word as well?
He says if you want to live acheerful life, an abundant life,
(13:01):
live a generous life.
So here I'm going to give yousome very practical, helpful
steps in that wholedecision-making process.
He says you ought to give thissome forethought, you ought to
be deliberate and considerateabout that.
So here's some very practicalsteps.
The first is draw your line atenough For yourself.
Draw a line that says enough, Ihave enough, I am living
(13:28):
comfortably and most of us inthis room would say I'm living
pretty comfortably, especiallycompared to most of the rest of
the world.
When you draw your line atenough.
What happens is, every time youget a promotion or a raise, you
don't just automatically raiseyour standard of living.
You say, no, I have enough.
(13:50):
So anything that comes in extra, yeah, you can enjoy some of
that, but kind of draw your lineso you can even say I have
enough.
Because even now, whateveryou're making, whatever raise
you may or may not, promotionyou may or may not give, you
have enough.
In fact, my guess is you havemore than enough.
(14:11):
If you go home today, drivehome, pull your car into your
garage if there's room in yourgarage but pull your car into
the garage and before you getout of your car, just sit in the
car and look around your garageand I bet every one of us in
this room could identify atleast 10 items that you have not
touched for a year.
But they're sitting in a boxsomewhere in your garage because
(14:35):
you have more than enough.
Men, how many t-shirts do youhave?
I'll be honest, I have twodrawers in my dresser that are
just t-shirts, because I havet-shirts for when I go sailing.
I have t-shirts from when Iwork in the yard, I have
(14:56):
t-shirts from the places thatI've been that are special to me
and I've got two drawers and mywife says you don't get to buy
one more t-shirt because you getevery.
The rule is now I can't getanother t-shirt unless I'm
willing to give up one, whichmakes it really hard.
Women, men, this is where youget back.
How many pairs of shoes do youhave?
(15:19):
See, I don't know what it isabout women in shoes and men in
T-shirts, but there just seemsto be a thing.
Now, I'm not talking about thisto give you a guilt trip.
What I want you to do isunderstand gratitude, because we
all have enough.
So draw your line and it'sgoing to be different for every
(15:42):
one of us and it might changebut kind of draw a line in which
you can say you know, this isenough, I don't really need more
.
There's another idea Audit yourhousehold budget, or make a
household budget and just seewhere your money goes and maybe
(16:04):
take a look at where am Ioverspending, where could I cut
back?
Where could I use that?
Maybe for the kingdom of God'swork.
And then here's another one, avery practical one.
I talked about this a coupleweeks ago Set a giving goal,
because it's about beingdeliberate and considerate and
having forethought, so set agiving goal.
Most of you already did yourtaxes.
(16:25):
You maybe already got your taxreturn, but when you did your
taxes there was a line item forcharitable contributions.
I'd like you to go home, lookat that number and say, okay,
how much more could I give?
Because it's about changingyour lives.
It's a deliberate decision.
Living generously is a choice.
Secondly, living generouslywill require consistency,
(16:51):
because you can get all excitedabout this and be very
enthusiastic about now.
I want to live a generous life.
But all that enthusiasm,whatever moves you in that
direction, it eventually wearsoff, and that's true of just
about anything.
Show of hands this morning.
How many of you have at leastone unfinished project back at
home?
Yeah, when we first startedNorthgate once, we moved out of
(17:16):
our living room and I'll tellthe story a little bit later,
but we moved into the old postoffice building downtown which
now houses Benicia.
Fellowship now meets there andwe did all the work on this
place and in one of thebathrooms I think it was in the
men's room one of the guys onour original team he was a
(17:37):
building contractor and he hadone of those medicine cabinet
mirrors that are meant to sit inthe wall and then you open it
up and you can keep yourmedicine there, but it's just a
mirror on the surface.
Well, we needed a mirror in themen's bathroom and he had one
of these in his shop, so webrought it, we hung it up there
and we didn't recess it in thewall because we didn't want to
(17:57):
put medicine in there, but weneeded a mirror.
Put it up there and then PastorMegan wrote a little note, a
little sign that says this isnot a permanent fixture, and put
it on the mirror.
I'm willing to bet, if you goback and visit that church, that
is still hanging on that wallback there the sign might have
been taken off.
But we get all enthused aboutprojects, we get all enthused
(18:21):
about things, but the enthusiasmwears off, and this is kind of
what happened with theCorinthians.
This is what he writes about.
He says I know your eagernessto help and I've been boasting
about it to the Macedonians,telling them that since last
year in Achaia you were ready togive and your enthusiasm has
stirred most of them to action.
But I'm sending the brothers inorder that our boasting about
(18:42):
you in this matter may not provehollow, but that you may be
ready as you said you would be.
Why?
Because we get all enthusedabout it, but enthusiasm wears
off and it takes someconsistency.
This had actually started ayear previously.
This is what he wrote in 2Corinthians 8.
(19:03):
He says last year you were thefirst not only to give, but also
to have the desire to do so.
Now finish the work so thatyour eager willingness to do it
may be matched by yourcompletion of it, because when
your enthusiasm wanes, you needto determine to continue on.
(19:26):
So another idea, some practicalideas here Create new habits
that will reinforce a generouslifestyle, because it takes that
consistency.
Paul gave them instructions.
By the way, in his first letterhe says this he says on the
first day of every week, each ofyou should set aside a sum of
(19:48):
money in keeping with yourincome, saving it up so that
when I come, no collections willhave to be made.
He says do this regularly.
You know you can make a bigpledge, you can get all excited
about something, but just it'sthe consistency in it.
So he says do it each week sothat when I come to collect it
(20:11):
next year to make sure that it'sready.
So again, here's the ideaReview your monthly budget.
Set aside a sum in keeping withyour income, he says.
Saving it up so that when Icome no collections will have to
be made.
Review your monthly budget.
Do you know?
I read this not too long ago.
(20:33):
The average American has $33 amonth worth of unused
subscriptions If it's astreaming TV subscription or an
(20:56):
app subscription and the averageAmerican has $33 worth each
month of money they're justthrowing away and not even using
.
Do you know?
$33 a month could sponsor anorphan in Uganda and provide
them with schooling and food andclothes, just by eliminating an
unused thing.
So do that.
Cancel those unusedsubscriptions.
Here's a habit I read about.
Jeff Schoenbacher wrote a bookcalled More or Less and he tells
(21:21):
a story of a woman named Ashleyand she had kind of decided
that she was getting too wrappedup in all of her clothes and
she's had this full closet, andso she decided she was going to
change her habits and she did anexperiment.
She said she would not wear thesame outfit until she had worn
(21:45):
every single outfit in hercloset and she thought well,
probably in a month I'll gothrough all of my clothes and
then I'll go again.
She went a whole year beforeshe wore the last outfit, she
even wore an old bridesmaid'sdress because it was in her
closet and she had committed tothis.
You don't have to go to thatextreme, but just creating some
(22:07):
new habits.
Here's another one Choose not toupgrade.
You know, like when you go toMcDonald's and they say, would
you like to supersize thatPractice this term, say it with
me.
No, thank you.
Once more, no, thank you.
Yeah, when the new iPhone comesout and yours is only a 15, and
(22:31):
that's 16, and now it's comingout the 17.
Just say no, thank you.
See, you get all the.
Anything you do, any purchaseyou make, somebody is going to
try to upsell you.
You know, do you want to addthis?
Do you want to do that?
Here's another x-ray, and justa little bit more, and just say
(22:56):
no, thank you, because you don'treally need any of that stuff.
And here's the last ideaLevering generously.
When you live generously, youmake room for God.
And here's where I'm going totell some stories.
And here's where I'm going totell some stories.
(23:19):
I'm going to try it withoutchoking up, which obviously is
not going to work, but when yougo all in, when you determine
those five core values that wesay we have as a church.
When you go all in with all ofit, when you go all in with
living generously, what happensis it stretches your faith.
(23:43):
Paul wrote God is able to blessyou abundantly so that in all
things, at all times, having allthat you need, you will abound
in every good work.
Now I'm gonna read that againand where I pause, I want you to
fill in the blank.
Okay, god is able to bless youabundantly so that, in at having
(24:03):
you will abound in all thingsall times.
Having all that you need, youcould abound in every good work.
See, when you go and stretchbeyond yourself, when you go all
in, god starts to do stuff.
(24:25):
So we got to a point where wehad actually got people coming
to my living room to church.
We grew to like 35 people,which was bigger than my living
room could handle anymore.
So we started looking for aplace that we could meet, and we
(24:48):
found that the old post officea new post office had been built
.
The old post office had beensitting empty, and so what we
did was that's the wrongpictures, back it up.
Well, that's fine, leave themup there.
We got a lease on the old postoffice building, and so what we
did was every Saturday we hadwork days and it was just us all
(25:12):
volunteers, and so we hadworked.
We had framed Because the placewas a mess, and so we did some
dry work.
We got some money from theowners so we could buy materials
to put up walls and build alittle platform and whatever it
took.
So we did all of this work.
We were working like everySaturday for months.
(25:33):
I mean, we started in.
I think we started like inOctober and November and
December and January, and wewere dead tired and we had
everything done.
The walls had been painted, wehad bought the carpet, but we
were out of money.
And when I went to pick up thecarpet carpet and some of you
(25:55):
have heard this story, if youhaven't been here in the last
eight years, you haven't heardthis story went to pick up the
carpet and the guy selling it tous he said well, who's going to
lay the carpet for you?
And I said well, you know mybrother-in-law.
He laid carpet once.
I think he's going to do.
He said wait, wait, don't dothat.
I'll give you the name of oneof our installers.
He does side jobs on the side.
He can probably do it for youfor less, because he knew we
(26:16):
were a church.
So we had one of our last workdays and it was on a Saturday
and we had worked all day longand then he was going to come
meet me like five or six o'clockthat evening, so everybody had
gone home and I'm there, I meethim.
He comes, he measureseverything up and does his
(26:38):
figurine square footage, blah,blah, blah, blah, blah, and he
says I'll do it for $2,000, Ithink it was maybe $1,800, but
right around the $2,000 range.
So I said well, I was expectinga little bit less than that.
Do you think you know, like we,as a lot of volunteers, we can
do all the grunt work and movethe carpet around and all we can
(26:59):
do is the seams and the tuckingand the corners and all that
kind of stuff?
Could you give us a break,because we're a church and we're
just really trying to getstarted and everything's ready
to go, but we just need to getthis carpet laid, okay, okay,
I'll tell you what I'll do thewhole thing.
If you provide all thevolunteers, I'll do it for you
for a thousand bucks Whoa, likehe came down like 50%.
(27:24):
But we didn't have a thousandbucks either.
So I said, I said, well, I'lltell you what, let me call our
treasurer and talk with her andsee what we've got and I'll get
back to you.
And I knew, I knew what ourbudget was like.
We were done, you know.
But I thought okay.
So I called the treasurer,Becky Cosmetis, and I'm thinking
(27:50):
, okay, what's been our averagegiving?
How long would it take for usto save up $1,000 so we could
pay to get the carpet laid?
And so I call her.
We had installed the phonethere.
So I called her up and I askedher that question.
She goes I don't know, I'llhave to go back and look over
the last couple of months.
I said, ok, well, I'm on my wayhome, I'll call you when I get
home.
So hang up.
I leave the old post office thatwe were trying to turn into a
(28:12):
church, went to the new postoffice where we had a post
office box, and picked up themail from the post office box.
And I'm sitting in my car andthere's this envelope.
(28:32):
The return address is Mrs JaneGrant, 4700 Riverview Road,
atlanta, georgia.
I don't know Jane Grant.
In fact I don't know anybodywho lives in Atlanta, georgia.
That's weird.
So I opened it up and theletter says Dear Ken, you don't
(29:01):
know me, but my good friend LynnKnight and I had breakfast
together this morning here inAtlanta.
As she was passing through, shewas telling me about a church
that you have started in Benicia.
I felt led to send a donationto your church to use wherever
(29:31):
it is needed.
And inside the fold was a checkfor $1,000.
And I almost got through thatwithout choking up, because when
you go all in and you come tothe end of your resources,
that's where God begins to dohis work.
(29:52):
Paul said it this way Now, hewho supplies seed to the sower
and bread for food will alsosupply and increase your store
of seed and will enlarge theharvest of your righteousness.
Now notice what he says.
He provides seed to the sowerand bread for food that he's
going to take care of your breadfor food.
But also understand he's alsogiving you some to sow and he is
(30:18):
able to increase your store ofseed and will enlarge your
harvest of righteousness.
He provides for your needs andwhat you can now use for his
kingdom.
He says you will be enriched inevery way so that you can be
generous on every occasion.
(30:38):
And, through us, yourgenerosity will result in
thanksgiving to God.
You will be enriched in everyway, so that those are two
really important words.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can buy anything
you want.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can buy that
brand new.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can be generous
(31:05):
on every occasion.
Tell you another story.
My wife and I have for the lastalmost 20 years, been
supporting orphans in Uganda.
That's our family.
Actually, that's only part ofit, because that's currently
(31:29):
three, six, seven, eight Okay,so it's eight now, because we've
had others that we've gone allthe way through the program and
some have dropped out.
Over the years we've probablysponsored close to 15, right?
So those kids are all growingup.
The one in green, that's Becca.
We've sponsored her since shewas five years old.
She is now just wrapping up.
(31:50):
She's going to be graduating inNovember from university.
Now what happens is $31 a monthsponsors a child, but as they
grow up, the needs get more.
Now basic sponsorship is still$31.
But now they're at an age wherethey're ready for college or
secondary school and that'sgoing to be boarding school and
that's going to cost a littlebit more.
(32:11):
So last year we got a call fromHope for Kids and they said you
know there's four of your kidsin the program that are really
ready to advance and you knowwe're giving you a little bit of
a heads up on it because forall of them to advance and if
you want to continue to supportthem, you know it's going to
(32:32):
increase.
It was going to increase like$500 a month, which is like a
really big shock to our budget.
Right, we don't have an extra$500 a month.
So they said now we know that'sa lot and one of the things
that we've encouraged people todo is maybe you can get a
co-sponsor that will you knowkind of supplement and help them
(32:52):
to be able to do it.
So we're wrestling with thisbecause we just didn't feel
right about asking somebody elseto help sponsor our kids'
education kind of a thing.
But we knew we really didn'thave the money and the budget
and it was just like, what arewe going to do?
And we came to church thatSunday morning.
Pastor Larry was talking aboutthis whole idea of listening to
God's voice and responding towhat he wants you to do.
(33:12):
And I turned to Betty and Iwhispered in her ear.
I says I guess we're going tofind $500 to sponsor these kids,
aren't we?
And she said I think we are.
And so we called Hope for Kidsand we just said you know what,
we'll figure it out, just goahead.
So we did.
(33:33):
That week we got an unexpectedcheck out of the blue.
We didn't even know why we weregetting it, but we got a check
for like $450.
And then the following month wegot another check out of the
blue and it was like $300 orsomething like that.
And it was like God was sayingokay, I'll bring your life
(33:54):
slowly.
I'll kind of upfront it for thefirst month and I'll support it
for the second month, andthat'll give you a couple of
months to kind of rearrange yourbudget so you can do that.
And now we are doing thatbecause we decided this is what
God's calling us to do.
We didn't have the resources atthe time, but he gave us the
ability to be able to do it.
When you make room for God andtrust him, he brings the results
(34:18):
.
The property that we are meetingon, the building that we are
meeting in today another one ofthose stories.
So we outgrew the post officeand we moved in.
We rented the warehouse on theother side of the freeway and
the church continued to grow andmore and more unchurched people
started becoming followers ofJesus Christ, which was our goal
(34:40):
, and we were doing fourservices down in the old
warehouse building.
We did a Saturday night andthree Sunday mornings and I was
exhausted and we were lookingfor property because we'd
outgrown the warehouse now andDave McMurtry, who was vice
chair of the board at the timethey have since moved to North
(35:02):
Carolina, Dave and Kendra, butthey were a big, big part of
Northgate all along and he atthe time was working for a
company called IT Corporationwhich owns like acres all around
us here, and so he went to thepresident.
He was the vice president withthe corporation.
He went to the president and hesaid listen, the church that
(35:24):
I'm a part of we are looking tobuy some property and we just
need a place, have a home tocall our own and we need about
20 acres.
I know IT owns all of thisproperty all around here.
Do you think we could carve outlike 20 acres that the church
could buy.
And the president of thecorporation said well, couldn't
(35:46):
we just make that a donation?
And Dave went yeah, I guess wecould.
So he said well, let's do ourdue diligence.
What do you think the propertyis worth?
He says I don't know.
It's barren land.
It's zoned ag 20, you 20, maybea couple hundred thousand.
He says, okay, well, do all theresearch, figure it all out and
(36:07):
let's see if we get this done.
Well, dave did the research andit turned out that this
property was going to be worthover a million dollars.
And again, we did not have amillion dollars.
And so Dave calls me and he sayswell, I'm going back to DC.
We got corporate meetings backthere.
I'm hoping to talk to thepresident.
He said but I don't know.
(36:28):
He said I told him it was goingto be worth maybe $200,000.
It's going to be like fivetimes that.
I don't know if it's stillgoing to go for this deal.
So I said, okay, oh, and wehadn't told anybody, it was just
Dave and me and our churchboard.
And I just called the churchboard.
I just said, okay, you guys gotto be praying.
Dave's going back next week.
(36:49):
He's going to have thesemeetings, hoping to talk to the
president back there.
Ba, ba, ba, ba ba.
So we're just praying.
We couldn't say a word toanybody.
It was just me, dave and ourchurch board praying.
And Dave calls me from DC Ithink it was a Thursday night.
He says are you sitting down?
I said should I?
He said you might want to.
(37:10):
He said it turns out I met withhim.
We were going out to dinner.
We happened to be in the samecar and he turned to me and he
said so what's the deal withthis church property deal?
And they said well, funny, Iwas going to ask you about that
and kind of give you a reportwhile I was back here.
He said it came in a little bithigher than I thought.
And he said well, okay, so whatwas it?
(37:32):
And he told them what theamount was.
I can't even remember what theexact amount was.
It was over a million.
And the president of thecorporation said well, okay,
let's get it done.
So the property that we aremeeting on today and this was
one of our first gatherings justwe did a dedication of the
(37:56):
property, we paid $1.
And I could tell you storyafter story after story of all
of this.
But here's the thing when youlive generously, you make room
for God, and when you make roomfor God, he shows up.
(38:17):
Paul wrote because of theservice by which you have proved
yourselves, others will praiseGod for the obedience that
accompanies your confession ofthe gospel of Christ and for
your generosity in sharing withthem and with everyone else.
You are sitting here thismorning because a small group of
12 adults, five kids and oneinfant went all in, and you are
(38:47):
sitting in this roomparticularly because, about 10
years, 12 years later, anothergroup of people of about 400
went all in.
Group of people of about 400went all in.
And when Paul writes, becauseof service by which you have
(39:08):
proved yourselves, others willpraise God.
You are here to praise God.
Thank God for those 12 people35 years ago who went all in,
for those 400 people 10 yearsago who went all in.
And now it's your turn and Idon't say your turn, I say our
(39:32):
turn, because I'm still a partof it To go all in, one of the
things we've said.
In everything that we've donehere, we are always paving the
way for those who are not yethere, and that's why we do it.
It's not about buildings, it'snot about property.
It's about people and helpingunchurched people become a whole
(39:52):
heart of followers of JesusChrist.
And you don't get to tell postoffice carpet stories and
property donation stories unlessyou're willing to take those
all-in type of steps of faith.
So I want to encourage you,wherever you're at and whatever
it looks like for you and it'sgoing to look different for
(40:13):
every one of us but whatever itis that God wants to do through
you, don't hold back, go all in.
It will change your life and itwill change the life of the
people you love and in theirprayers for you, their hearts
(40:38):
will go out to you because ofthe surpassing grace that God
has given you.
Two very practical things youcan do.
On your way out, you'll see oneof these commitment cards all
in and we'll explain next week alittle bit more about what this
is going to look like.
But it's just saying, in termsof generous living, I'm all in
(41:01):
and here's my commitment Notjust a burst of enthusiasm, but
a regular commitment.
The other thing you can do iswe offer it's a weekend retreat.
It's a Friday night.
Saturday you get to go home andsleep in your own bed.
You don't have to camp out here.
It's called Journey ofGenerosity.
My wife and I went through thisa couple years ago, changed our
(41:22):
lives and we'd always felt likewe were being generous people,
but it just changed our wholeperspective.
And there's no ask, there is nofee required in this.
It is something that we areoffering freely to the church.
If you want to join in ajourney of generosity and see
what that looks like and howit's impacted other people and
what it could look like for you,I would encourage you to sign
(41:45):
up for this at the Northgate Utable.
You can use the QR code on theseat back in front of you and
sign up for that.
I would hope that you would makethose decisions so that someday
, someday, you're going to beable to tell the story of your
life where you went all in andyou made room for God.
(42:06):
God showed up and you'll tellthe story without cracking up.
Let's pray God.
Thank you for your faithfulness.
Let's pray God.
Thank you for your faithfulness.
You have done so much for us asindividuals and as a church,
(42:30):
and you did it because youcalled us to live an abundant
life, and sometimes the hardpart is seeing the abundance
when it's asking so much of us,but everything that you do is
good, and your grace extends inus and through us to others, and
may we be faithful to that InJesus' name amen.
So April 22nd 1990, exactly 35 years and one month
ago from today, a group of 12adults, five kids, one infant
and myself gathered together forthe very first time in Benicia,
and that was the beginnings ofNorthgate Christian Fellowship.
(00:21):
I think we have pictures therewe are.
That's church in my living room.
That's when I had hair Iactually had a I was cruising a
mullet back then and that wasthe beginnings of our very first
gathering here in Benicia.
Now, it wasn't the first timethat we had gotten together.
(00:44):
Actually, for about the first,about two months prior to this,
we had been meeting together andtalking about and kind of
envisioning what it would belike to be a church for
unchurched people, what it wouldbe like to be a church whose
vision and purpose was to helpunchurched people become
wholehearted followers of JesusChrist.
(01:05):
By the way, anybody want toguess what is the most
unchurched region in all of theUnited States?
If you guessed, the SanFrancisco Bay Area, you got it.
We live in one of the mostunchurched areas of the country.
We live in one of the mostunchurched areas of the country
(01:32):
and we started with this visionof what would it look like if we
purposely went and tried toreach unchurched people and what
that would mean for us.
Because what that would meanfor us that group of 12 adults
and five kids and one infantwould mean if we're going to be
reaching unchurched people, wellthen they're not going to know
about Jesus unless we tell them.
So it's going to be up to us tobuild relationships and meet
(01:52):
people and share our faith andinvite them to be a part of our
group.
And if we're reachingunchurched people, well, they
don't have any ministry orchurch experience, or very
little maybe, and so it's goingto be all on us to do all of the
work of the ministry, at leastwhen we get started.
And because we were going to bereaching unchurched people who
are not usually regularly givingto a church, it is going to be
(02:16):
up to us to support this workfinancially.
So we started talking honestlyabout what this was going to
look like.
And then, at the end of all ofthose informational meetings,
what I did was I asked everybodythat was a part of that group
to say now I want you to go homeand I want you to pray over
this and I want you to thinkabout this and let God move your
(02:36):
heart.
And then what I want you to dois to write me a letter and in
that letter I want you to writeto me why you believe God is
calling you to be a part of thisnew church project, what areas
of ministry that you are willingto serve in because you're
going to have to be serving inministry and that you are
willing to commit financially tomake this thing get going.
(03:00):
So by the time we met for thevery first time there in my
living room, we were all in.
Now we didn't know what we wereall in for, but we were all in.
We were making that commitment.
And then over the years, all ofthose things that we talked
about in that meeting, we kindof refined over the years to
(03:20):
really say these become our corevalues, that we are going to be
a grace-filled community whereeveryone is welcome, no matter
where they've been or whatthey've done.
They'll be welcome with us.
And that also means that we areall going to recognize that we
are all people in process.
None of us has it all together,none of us has it all figured
(03:41):
out.
None of us are perfect.
We are just going to learn andgrow together with each other,
and that we are going to beredemptive in our relationships.
In other words, recognize thatGod brings people across your
path and he's doing something intheir life, as he's doing
something in your life and theymay not even know it yet, but
(04:01):
part of our job is as Christfollowers all in Christ
followers is to help people seewhat God wants to do with their
life so they would come to puttheir faith and trust in him and
that we would recognize thatall of our lives is an act of
worship, not just what we dowhen we get together on Sunday
(04:21):
morning, but how we live ourlives in a way that honors and
glorifies God, that our worshipis meant to be a lifestyle.
And then that last one, thatcore value that we said we are
called to live generous lives,lives of generosity.
And the reason we picked thatas one of our core values from
(04:43):
the very, very beginning is itgoes all the way back to the
book of Acts, chapter four,where it talks about that God's
grace was so powerfully at workamong them all, that early
church, that there were no needypersons among them, that people
were generous and cared for andgave for each other, because
Jesus had taught aboutgenerosity.
(05:03):
Jesus had taught about usingyour resources for the kingdom
of God, and the apostle John.
He wrote about it in his letter, and James did in his letter,
and the apostle Peter did too,and Paul wrote about it.
Paul gave instructions to ayoung pastor named Timothy of
the church in Ephesus and toldhim make sure that you tell your
(05:24):
people about not to put theirtrust in their wealth but to be
generous and to share, and healso wrote about.
Paul also wrote about it to thechurch in Rome, he wrote about
it to the church in Philippi andhe wrote it in both of his
letters to the church in Corinthand that's where we're going to
kind of focus this morning.
His second letter to the churchin Corinth.
Let me read to you from chapter9, 2 Corinthians 9.
(05:46):
If you want to follow alongwith your Bible app, you can
Otherwise just listen.
This is what Paul wrote to theCorinthian church, for I know
your eagerness to help and Ihave been boasting about it to
the Macedonians, telling themthat since last year you and
Achaia were ready to give andyour enthusiasm stirred most of
them to action.
But I'm sending the brothers inorder that our boasting about
(06:08):
you in this matter should notprove hollow, but that you may
be ready, as I said you would be.
For if any Macedonians comewith me and find you unprepared,
we not to say anything aboutyou would be ashamed about
having been so confident.
So I thought it necessary tourge the brothers to visit you
in advance to finish thearrangements for the generous
gift you had promised.
(06:29):
Then it will be ready as agenerous gift, not as one
grudgingly given.
Remember this whoever sowssparingly will also reap
sparingly, and whoever sowsgenerously will also reap
generously.
Each of you should give whatyou've decided in your heart to
you, not reluctantly or under,and whoever sows generously will
also reap generously.
Each of you should give whatyou've decided in your heart to
give, not reluctantly or undercompulsion, for God loves a
(06:51):
cheerful giver and God is ableto bless you abundantly so that
in all things, at all times,having all that you need, you
will abound in every good work.
As it is written, they havefreely scattered their gifts to
the poor.
Their righteousness enduresforever.
Now, he who supplies seed forthe sower and bread for food
(07:13):
will also supply and increaseyour store of seed and will
enlarge the harvest of yourrighteousness.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can be generous
on every occasion.
And through us, your generositywill result in thanksgiving to
God.
This service you perform is notonly supplying the needs of the
Lord's people, but is alsooverflowing in many expressions
(07:34):
of thanks to God because of theservice by which you have proved
yourselves.
Others will praise God for yourobedience that accompanies your
confession of the gospel ofChrist and for your generosity
in sharing with them and witheveryone else.
And in their prayers for you,their hearts will go out to you
because of the surpassing graceGod has given you.
Thanks be to God for hisindescribable gift.
(08:00):
So this morning I want to unpackthis as a part of our All In
series.
I want to kind of unpack thisidea of living generously.
It's a pattern throughout theNew Testament.
It's how God designed us tolive, and I want to start with
this really simple idea Livinggenerously is a choice.
Generous living is a choice.
(08:21):
I have never met anyone whostumbled into a life of
generosity.
It doesn't happen by accident,because it's our natural bent is
to keep and hoard, so it's achoice.
Paul wrote about it this way.
He said each of you should givewhat you've decided in your
heart to give, not reluctantlyor under compulsion, for God
(08:42):
loves a cheerful giver.
So let me give you a little bitof background, because you've
got to know what's going on withthis whole thing.
It all goes back to thescripture that Pastor Larry
started this whole series on.
When Jesus gave the commissionto his disciples, he said go and
make disciples of all nations,baptizing them in the name of
the Father and of the Son and ofthe Holy Spirit, and teaching
(09:05):
them to obey everything I havecommanded you.
Jesus gave that commission tohis followers and then he
ascended back up into heaven andthen, on the day of Pentecost,
about 50 days later, the HolySpirit exploded on the scene and
it says the church grew in oneday to 3,000 people.
(09:26):
3,000 people in one day puttheir faith and trust in Jesus
Christ.
Now that's a huge talk aboutchurch growth.
That is huge.
And what happened was everybodywas so excited and the church
was growing and great thingswere happening and all of that,
that they missed the first partof what Jesus had said, because
(09:47):
God is doing all these greatthings and our church is growing
and man, all this stuff is socool.
But Jesus said go.
And they stayed, and theystayed, and they stayed.
And it's not until you get tochapter eight that a great
persecution breaks out againstthe church.
And it's not until you get tochapter 8 that a great
persecution breaks out againstthe church, and it's almost like
(10:08):
God is saying okay, if you'renot going to go on your own, I'm
going to give you a littlenudge.
And the whole church wasscattered, and when they
scattered, they went and taughtand preached wherever they went
and told about this good news ofJesus Christ giving his life
for your sins so that you couldlive in a relationship with God.
And all around theMediterranean, different cities,
(10:30):
all around churches sprung upand new believers gathered
together.
What happened back in Jerusalem, though, was the church was
under such persecution and wentthrough such a difficult time
that they were destitute, and sowhat Paul did was he contacted
all these other churches allaround the Mediterranean.
He said listen, we need to takeup a collection for the church
(10:50):
in Jerusalem, because ourbrothers back there are
suffering and we need to helpthem out Now.
There was no Venmo or PayPal orZelle at the time, so this all
had to kind of be a planned outdeal.
And so he wrote them and hevisited them and told them to
start making this collection.
So what he's talking about nowis this collection.
This all kind of started like ayear ago and they're supposed
(11:12):
to have been collecting and Paulsaid hey, I'm coming, and when
I come I want to make sure thatyou fulfill the promise.
You made a decision.
Now you got to follow throughon it.
So here's how we instructedthem.
He says each of you should givewhat you have decided in your
heart to give.
Now, that word decided in yourheart, okay, the Greek word is
actually prosareo, which reallyimpresses you, doesn't it?
(11:36):
Bible college will do that.
You just call it these Greekwords.
What it literally means isforethought Pros.
That preposition pros meansforward, or ahead of time, or
towards.
And so he says listen, you dothis ahead of time.
You decide it in your heart.
It should be something that youthink about, that, you pray
(11:56):
about, that you deliberatelyconsider and then make a
decision.
So you should give what you'vedecided in your heart.
And he says also, notreluctantly or under compulsion.
In other words, we're not goingto twist your arm, we're not
going to lay a guilt trip on you.
This has to be between you andGod, because he said God loves a
(12:17):
cheerful giver.
And that's the idea.
It's about changing yourattitude.
It's about changing your mind,your frame of mind.
By the way, the word cheerfulthere you want another great
Greek word, this one, you'llremember.
The Greek word for cheerfulthere is hilarios, which
(12:37):
translates into our English wordhilarious.
You ought to be laughing whenyou write out your tithe check.
You ought to just having agreat old time when you make
that donation, because that'sthe kind of giving God wants.
By the way, do you know thatmisery and miser have the same
root word as well?
He says if you want to live acheerful life, an abundant life,
(13:01):
live a generous life.
So here I'm going to give yousome very practical, helpful
steps in that wholedecision-making process.
He says you ought to give thissome forethought, you ought to
be deliberate and considerateabout that.
So here's some very practicalsteps.
The first is draw your line atenough For yourself.
Draw a line that says enough, Ihave enough, I am living
(13:28):
comfortably and most of us inthis room would say I'm living
pretty comfortably, especiallycompared to most of the rest of
the world.
When you draw your line atenough.
What happens is, every time youget a promotion or a raise, you
don't just automatically raiseyour standard of living.
You say, no, I have enough.
(13:50):
So anything that comes in extra, yeah, you can enjoy some of
that, but kind of draw your lineso you can even say I have
enough.
Because even now, whateveryou're making, whatever raise
you may or may not, promotionyou may or may not give, you
have enough.
In fact, my guess is you havemore than enough.
(14:11):
If you go home today, drivehome, pull your car into your
garage if there's room in yourgarage but pull your car into
the garage and before you getout of your car, just sit in the
car and look around your garageand I bet every one of us in
this room could identify atleast 10 items that you have not
touched for a year.
But they're sitting in a boxsomewhere in your garage because
(14:35):
you have more than enough.
Men, how many t-shirts do youhave?
I'll be honest, I have twodrawers in my dresser that are
just t-shirts, because I havet-shirts for when I go sailing.
I have t-shirts from when Iwork in the yard, I have
(14:56):
t-shirts from the places thatI've been that are special to me
and I've got two drawers and mywife says you don't get to buy
one more t-shirt because you getevery.
The rule is now I can't getanother t-shirt unless I'm
willing to give up one, whichmakes it really hard.
Women, men, this is where youget back.
How many pairs of shoes do youhave?
(15:19):
See, I don't know what it isabout women in shoes and men in
T-shirts, but there just seemsto be a thing.
Now, I'm not talking about thisto give you a guilt trip.
What I want you to do isunderstand gratitude, because we
all have enough.
So draw your line and it'sgoing to be different for every
(15:42):
one of us and it might changebut kind of draw a line in which
you can say you know, this isenough, I don't really need more
.
There's another idea Audit yourhousehold budget, or make a
household budget and just seewhere your money goes and maybe
(16:04):
take a look at where am Ioverspending, where could I cut
back?
Where could I use that?
Maybe for the kingdom of God'swork.
And then here's another one, avery practical one.
I talked about this a coupleweeks ago Set a giving goal,
because it's about beingdeliberate and considerate and
having forethought, so set agiving goal.
Most of you already did yourtaxes.
(16:25):
You maybe already got your taxreturn, but when you did your
taxes there was a line item forcharitable contributions.
I'd like you to go home, lookat that number and say, okay,
how much more could I give?
Because it's about changingyour lives.
It's a deliberate decision.
Living generously is a choice.
Secondly, living generouslywill require consistency,
(16:51):
because you can get all excitedabout this and be very
enthusiastic about now.
I want to live a generous life.
But all that enthusiasm,whatever moves you in that
direction, it eventually wearsoff, and that's true of just
about anything.
Show of hands this morning.
How many of you have at leastone unfinished project back at
home?
Yeah, when we first startedNorthgate once, we moved out of
(17:16):
our living room and I'll tellthe story a little bit later,
but we moved into the old postoffice building downtown which
now houses Benicia.
Fellowship now meets there andwe did all the work on this
place and in one of thebathrooms I think it was in the
men's room one of the guys onour original team he was a
(17:37):
building contractor and he hadone of those medicine cabinet
mirrors that are meant to sit inthe wall and then you open it
up and you can keep yourmedicine there, but it's just a
mirror on the surface.
Well, we needed a mirror in themen's bathroom and he had one
of these in his shop, so webrought it, we hung it up there
and we didn't recess it in thewall because we didn't want to
(17:57):
put medicine in there, but weneeded a mirror.
Put it up there and then PastorMegan wrote a little note, a
little sign that says this isnot a permanent fixture, and put
it on the mirror.
I'm willing to bet, if you goback and visit that church, that
is still hanging on that wallback there the sign might have
been taken off.
But we get all enthused aboutprojects, we get all enthused
(18:21):
about things, but the enthusiasmwears off, and this is kind of
what happened with theCorinthians.
This is what he writes about.
He says I know your eagernessto help and I've been boasting
about it to the Macedonians,telling them that since last
year in Achaia you were ready togive and your enthusiasm has
stirred most of them to action.
But I'm sending the brothers inorder that our boasting about
(18:42):
you in this matter may not provehollow, but that you may be
ready as you said you would be.
Why?
Because we get all enthusedabout it, but enthusiasm wears
off and it takes someconsistency.
This had actually started ayear previously.
This is what he wrote in 2Corinthians 8.
(19:03):
He says last year you were thefirst not only to give, but also
to have the desire to do so.
Now finish the work so thatyour eager willingness to do it
may be matched by yourcompletion of it, because when
your enthusiasm wanes, you needto determine to continue on.
(19:26):
So another idea, some practicalideas here Create new habits
that will reinforce a generouslifestyle, because it takes that
consistency.
Paul gave them instructions.
By the way, in his first letterhe says this he says on the
first day of every week, each ofyou should set aside a sum of
(19:48):
money in keeping with yourincome, saving it up so that
when I come, no collections willhave to be made.
He says do this regularly.
You know you can make a bigpledge, you can get all excited
about something, but just it'sthe consistency in it.
So he says do it each week sothat when I come to collect it
(20:11):
next year to make sure that it'sready.
So again, here's the ideaReview your monthly budget.
Set aside a sum in keeping withyour income, he says.
Saving it up so that when Icome no collections will have to
be made.
Review your monthly budget.
Do you know?
I read this not too long ago.
(20:33):
The average American has $33 amonth worth of unused
subscriptions If it's astreaming TV subscription or an
(20:56):
app subscription and the averageAmerican has $33 worth each
month of money they're justthrowing away and not even using
.
Do you know?
$33 a month could sponsor anorphan in Uganda and provide
them with schooling and food andclothes, just by eliminating an
unused thing.
So do that.
Cancel those unusedsubscriptions.
Here's a habit I read about.
Jeff Schoenbacher wrote a bookcalled More or Less and he tells
(21:21):
a story of a woman named Ashleyand she had kind of decided
that she was getting too wrappedup in all of her clothes and
she's had this full closet, andso she decided she was going to
change her habits and she did anexperiment.
She said she would not wear thesame outfit until she had worn
(21:45):
every single outfit in hercloset and she thought well,
probably in a month I'll gothrough all of my clothes and
then I'll go again.
She went a whole year beforeshe wore the last outfit, she
even wore an old bridesmaid'sdress because it was in her
closet and she had committed tothis.
You don't have to go to thatextreme, but just creating some
(22:07):
new habits.
Here's another one Choose not toupgrade.
You know, like when you go toMcDonald's and they say, would
you like to supersize thatPractice this term, say it with
me.
No, thank you.
Once more, no, thank you.
Yeah, when the new iPhone comesout and yours is only a 15, and
(22:31):
that's 16, and now it's comingout the 17.
Just say no, thank you.
See, you get all the.
Anything you do, any purchaseyou make, somebody is going to
try to upsell you.
You know, do you want to addthis?
Do you want to do that?
Here's another x-ray, and justa little bit more, and just say
(22:56):
no, thank you, because you don'treally need any of that stuff.
And here's the last ideaLevering generously.
When you live generously, youmake room for God.
And here's where I'm going totell some stories.
And here's where I'm going totell some stories.
(23:19):
I'm going to try it withoutchoking up, which obviously is
not going to work, but when yougo all in, when you determine
those five core values that wesay we have as a church.
When you go all in with all ofit, when you go all in with
living generously, what happensis it stretches your faith.
(23:43):
Paul wrote God is able to blessyou abundantly so that in all
things, at all times, having allthat you need, you will abound
in every good work.
Now I'm gonna read that againand where I pause, I want you to
fill in the blank.
Okay, god is able to bless youabundantly so that, in at having
(24:03):
you will abound in all thingsall times.
Having all that you need, youcould abound in every good work.
See, when you go and stretchbeyond yourself, when you go all
in, god starts to do stuff.
(24:25):
So we got to a point where wehad actually got people coming
to my living room to church.
We grew to like 35 people,which was bigger than my living
room could handle anymore.
So we started looking for aplace that we could meet, and we
(24:48):
found that the old post officea new post office had been built
.
The old post office had beensitting empty, and so what we
did was that's the wrongpictures, back it up.
Well, that's fine, leave themup there.
We got a lease on the old postoffice building, and so what we
did was every Saturday we hadwork days and it was just us all
(25:12):
volunteers, and so we hadworked.
We had framed Because the placewas a mess, and so we did some
dry work.
We got some money from theowners so we could buy materials
to put up walls and build alittle platform and whatever it
took.
So we did all of this work.
We were working like everySaturday for months.
(25:33):
I mean, we started in.
I think we started like inOctober and November and
December and January, and wewere dead tired and we had
everything done.
The walls had been painted, wehad bought the carpet, but we
were out of money.
And when I went to pick up thecarpet carpet and some of you
(25:55):
have heard this story, if youhaven't been here in the last
eight years, you haven't heardthis story went to pick up the
carpet and the guy selling it tous he said well, who's going to
lay the carpet for you?
And I said well, you know mybrother-in-law.
He laid carpet once.
I think he's going to do.
He said wait, wait, don't dothat.
I'll give you the name of oneof our installers.
He does side jobs on the side.
He can probably do it for youfor less, because he knew we
(26:16):
were a church.
So we had one of our last workdays and it was on a Saturday
and we had worked all day longand then he was going to come
meet me like five or six o'clockthat evening, so everybody had
gone home and I'm there, I meethim.
He comes, he measureseverything up and does his
(26:38):
figurine square footage, blah,blah, blah, blah, blah, and he
says I'll do it for $2,000, Ithink it was maybe $1,800, but
right around the $2,000 range.
So I said well, I was expectinga little bit less than that.
Do you think you know, like we,as a lot of volunteers, we can
do all the grunt work and movethe carpet around and all we can
(26:59):
do is the seams and the tuckingand the corners and all that
kind of stuff?
Could you give us a break,because we're a church and we're
just really trying to getstarted and everything's ready
to go, but we just need to getthis carpet laid, okay, okay,
I'll tell you what I'll do thewhole thing.
If you provide all thevolunteers, I'll do it for you
for a thousand bucks Whoa, likehe came down like 50%.
(27:24):
But we didn't have a thousandbucks either.
So I said, I said, well, I'lltell you what, let me call our
treasurer and talk with her andsee what we've got and I'll get
back to you.
And I knew, I knew what ourbudget was like.
We were done, you know.
But I thought okay.
So I called the treasurer,Becky Cosmetis, and I'm thinking
(27:50):
, okay, what's been our averagegiving?
How long would it take for usto save up $1,000 so we could
pay to get the carpet laid?
And so I call her.
We had installed the phonethere.
So I called her up and I askedher that question.
She goes I don't know, I'llhave to go back and look over
the last couple of months.
I said, ok, well, I'm on my wayhome, I'll call you when I get
home.
So hang up.
I leave the old post office thatwe were trying to turn into a
(28:12):
church, went to the new postoffice where we had a post
office box, and picked up themail from the post office box.
And I'm sitting in my car andthere's this envelope.
(28:32):
The return address is Mrs JaneGrant, 4700 Riverview Road,
atlanta, georgia.
I don't know Jane Grant.
In fact I don't know anybodywho lives in Atlanta, georgia.
That's weird.
So I opened it up and theletter says Dear Ken, you don't
(29:01):
know me, but my good friend LynnKnight and I had breakfast
together this morning here inAtlanta.
As she was passing through, shewas telling me about a church
that you have started in Benicia.
I felt led to send a donationto your church to use wherever
(29:31):
it is needed.
And inside the fold was a checkfor $1,000.
And I almost got through thatwithout choking up, because when
you go all in and you come tothe end of your resources,
that's where God begins to dohis work.
(29:52):
Paul said it this way Now, hewho supplies seed to the sower
and bread for food will alsosupply and increase your store
of seed and will enlarge theharvest of your righteousness.
Now notice what he says.
He provides seed to the sowerand bread for food that he's
going to take care of your breadfor food.
But also understand he's alsogiving you some to sow and he is
(30:18):
able to increase your store ofseed and will enlarge your
harvest of righteousness.
He provides for your needs andwhat you can now use for his
kingdom.
He says you will be enriched inevery way so that you can be
generous on every occasion.
(30:38):
And, through us, yourgenerosity will result in
thanksgiving to God.
You will be enriched in everyway, so that those are two
really important words.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can buy anything
you want.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can buy that
brand new.
You will be enriched in everyway so that you can be generous
(31:05):
on every occasion.
Tell you another story.
My wife and I have for the lastalmost 20 years, been
supporting orphans in Uganda.
That's our family.
Actually, that's only part ofit, because that's currently
(31:29):
three, six, seven, eight Okay,so it's eight now, because we've
had others that we've gone allthe way through the program and
some have dropped out.
Over the years we've probablysponsored close to 15, right?
So those kids are all growingup.
The one in green, that's Becca.
We've sponsored her since shewas five years old.
She is now just wrapping up.
(31:50):
She's going to be graduating inNovember from university.
Now what happens is $31 a monthsponsors a child, but as they
grow up, the needs get more.
Now basic sponsorship is still$31.
But now they're at an age wherethey're ready for college or
secondary school and that'sgoing to be boarding school and
that's going to cost a littlebit more.
(32:11):
So last year we got a call fromHope for Kids and they said you
know there's four of your kidsin the program that are really
ready to advance and you knowwe're giving you a little bit of
a heads up on it because forall of them to advance and if
you want to continue to supportthem, you know it's going to
(32:32):
increase.
It was going to increase like$500 a month, which is like a
really big shock to our budget.
Right, we don't have an extra$500 a month.
So they said now we know that'sa lot and one of the things
that we've encouraged people todo is maybe you can get a
co-sponsor that will you knowkind of supplement and help them
(32:52):
to be able to do it.
So we're wrestling with thisbecause we just didn't feel
right about asking somebody elseto help sponsor our kids'
education kind of a thing.
But we knew we really didn'thave the money and the budget
and it was just like, what arewe going to do?
And we came to church thatSunday morning.
Pastor Larry was talking aboutthis whole idea of listening to
God's voice and responding towhat he wants you to do.
(33:12):
And I turned to Betty and Iwhispered in her ear.
I says I guess we're going tofind $500 to sponsor these kids,
aren't we?
And she said I think we are.
And so we called Hope for Kidsand we just said you know what,
we'll figure it out, just goahead.
So we did.
(33:33):
That week we got an unexpectedcheck out of the blue.
We didn't even know why we weregetting it, but we got a check
for like $450.
And then the following month wegot another check out of the
blue and it was like $300 orsomething like that.
And it was like God was sayingokay, I'll bring your life
(33:54):
slowly.
I'll kind of upfront it for thefirst month and I'll support it
for the second month, andthat'll give you a couple of
months to kind of rearrange yourbudget so you can do that.
And now we are doing thatbecause we decided this is what
God's calling us to do.
We didn't have the resources atthe time, but he gave us the
ability to be able to do it.
When you make room for God andtrust him, he brings the results
(34:18):
.
The property that we are meetingon, the building that we are
meeting in today another one ofthose stories.
So we outgrew the post officeand we moved in.
We rented the warehouse on theother side of the freeway and
the church continued to grow andmore and more unchurched people
started becoming followers ofJesus Christ, which was our goal
(34:40):
, and we were doing fourservices down in the old
warehouse building.
We did a Saturday night andthree Sunday mornings and I was
exhausted and we were lookingfor property because we'd
outgrown the warehouse now andDave McMurtry, who was vice
chair of the board at the timethey have since moved to North
(35:02):
Carolina, Dave and Kendra, butthey were a big, big part of
Northgate all along and he atthe time was working for a
company called IT Corporationwhich owns like acres all around
us here, and so he went to thepresident.
He was the vice president withthe corporation.
He went to the president and hesaid listen, the church that
(35:24):
I'm a part of we are looking tobuy some property and we just
need a place, have a home tocall our own and we need about
20 acres.
I know IT owns all of thisproperty all around here.
Do you think we could carve outlike 20 acres that the church
could buy.
And the president of thecorporation said well, couldn't
(35:46):
we just make that a donation?
And Dave went yeah, I guess wecould.
So he said well, let's do ourdue diligence.
What do you think the propertyis worth?
He says I don't know.
It's barren land.
It's zoned ag 20, you 20, maybea couple hundred thousand.
He says, okay, well, do all theresearch, figure it all out and
(36:07):
let's see if we get this done.
Well, dave did the research andit turned out that this
property was going to be worthover a million dollars.
And again, we did not have amillion dollars.
And so Dave calls me and he sayswell, I'm going back to DC.
We got corporate meetings backthere.
I'm hoping to talk to thepresident.
He said but I don't know.
(36:28):
He said I told him it was goingto be worth maybe $200,000.
It's going to be like fivetimes that.
I don't know if it's stillgoing to go for this deal.
So I said, okay, oh, and wehadn't told anybody, it was just
Dave and me and our churchboard.
And I just called the churchboard.
I just said, okay, you guys gotto be praying.
Dave's going back next week.
(36:49):
He's going to have thesemeetings, hoping to talk to the
president back there.
Ba, ba, ba, ba ba.
So we're just praying.
We couldn't say a word toanybody.
It was just me, dave and ourchurch board praying.
And Dave calls me from DC Ithink it was a Thursday night.
He says are you sitting down?
I said should I?
He said you might want to.
(37:10):
He said it turns out I met withhim.
We were going out to dinner.
We happened to be in the samecar and he turned to me and he
said so what's the deal withthis church property deal?
And they said well, funny, Iwas going to ask you about that
and kind of give you a reportwhile I was back here.
He said it came in a little bithigher than I thought.
And he said well, okay, so whatwas it?
(37:32):
And he told them what theamount was.
I can't even remember what theexact amount was.
It was over a million.
And the president of thecorporation said well, okay,
let's get it done.
So the property that we aremeeting on today and this was
one of our first gatherings justwe did a dedication of the
(37:56):
property, we paid $1.
And I could tell you storyafter story after story of all
of this.
But here's the thing when youlive generously, you make room
for God, and when you make roomfor God, he shows up.
(38:17):
Paul wrote because of theservice by which you have proved
yourselves, others will praiseGod for the obedience that
accompanies your confession ofthe gospel of Christ and for
your generosity in sharing withthem and with everyone else.
You are sitting here thismorning because a small group of
12 adults, five kids and oneinfant went all in, and you are
(38:47):
sitting in this roomparticularly because, about 10
years, 12 years later, anothergroup of people of about 400
went all in.
Group of people of about 400went all in.
And when Paul writes, becauseof service by which you have
(39:08):
proved yourselves, others willpraise God.
You are here to praise God.
Thank God for those 12 people35 years ago who went all in,
for those 400 people 10 yearsago who went all in.
And now it's your turn and Idon't say your turn, I say our
(39:32):
turn, because I'm still a partof it To go all in, one of the
things we've said.
In everything that we've donehere, we are always paving the
way for those who are not yethere, and that's why we do it.
It's not about buildings, it'snot about property.
It's about people and helpingunchurched people become a whole
(39:52):
heart of followers of JesusChrist.
And you don't get to tell postoffice carpet stories and
property donation stories unlessyou're willing to take those
all-in type of steps of faith.
So I want to encourage you,wherever you're at and whatever
it looks like for you and it'sgoing to look different for
(40:13):
every one of us but whatever itis that God wants to do through
you, don't hold back, go all in.
It will change your life and itwill change the life of the
people you love and in theirprayers for you, their hearts
(40:38):
will go out to you because ofthe surpassing grace that God
has given you.
Two very practical things youcan do.
On your way out, you'll see oneof these commitment cards all
in and we'll explain next week alittle bit more about what this
is going to look like.
But it's just saying, in termsof generous living, I'm all in
(41:01):
and here's my commitment Notjust a burst of enthusiasm, but
a regular commitment.
The other thing you can do iswe offer it's a weekend retreat.
It's a Friday night.
Saturday you get to go home andsleep in your own bed.
You don't have to camp out here.
It's called Journey ofGenerosity.
My wife and I went through thisa couple years ago, changed our
(41:22):
lives and we'd always felt likewe were being generous people,
but it just changed our wholeperspective.
And there's no ask, there is nofee required in this.
It is something that we areoffering freely to the church.
If you want to join in ajourney of generosity and see
what that looks like and howit's impacted other people and
what it could look like for you,I would encourage you to sign
(41:45):
up for this at the Northgate Utable.
You can use the QR code on theseat back in front of you and
sign up for that.
I would hope that you would makethose decisions so that someday
, someday, you're going to beable to tell the story of your
life where you went all in andyou made room for God.
(42:06):
God showed up and you'll tellthe story without cracking up.
Let's pray God.
Thank you for your faithfulness.
Let's pray God.
Thank you for your faithfulness.
You have done so much for us asindividuals and as a church,
(42:30):
and you did it because youcalled us to live an abundant
life, and sometimes the hardpart is seeing the abundance
when it's asking so much of us,but everything that you do is
good, and your grace extends inus and through us to others, and
may we be faithful to that InJesus' name amen.
Popular Podcasts
Fudd Around And Find Out
UConn basketball star Azzi Fudd brings her championship swag to iHeart Women’s Sports with Fudd Around and Find Out, a weekly podcast that takes fans along for the ride as Azzi spends her final year of college trying to reclaim the National Championship and prepare to be a first round WNBA draft pick. Ever wonder what it’s like to be a world-class athlete in the public spotlight while still managing schoolwork, friendships and family time? It’s time to Fudd Around and Find Out!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!