You are invited to step out in faith and sow your seed into God's work, trusting that He will multiply what you give. Don't let fear of lack hold you back from partnering with the ministry, because God is ready to make room for more in your life. Take a moment to pray about your finances and let His peace guide your decisions.
How you guys doing this morning? Good. Oh, what a good day. Praise the Lord. Yeah.
My name is Mariah Mullins. I get to bring the word today. We've been in the series called Beyond Blessed, and, I think this is our fourth sermon in the series. So, I get to teach on the principles of multiplication this morning. Very excited about that.
Pastor David spoke a few times already, and then Daniel Mannix spoke last week, which was powerful word. He and Esther have been married just over 3 months now. Yeah? Yes. He nods.
Yeah. And, we're just so thankful for them and what they bring to the church, what they've gifted us. We pray blessings over them and their marriage and that the Lord would keep Daniel far away from any trash shoots. If you did not hear last week's message, I hope that that is enough to encourage you to go back and listen to the podcast. It will bless you.
Oh, I was so blessed. It will bless you. So, I'm gonna teach on principles of multiplication. I was homeschooled. If you guys don't know, I was homeschooled.
Both of my parents are here right now. Yeah? So, the 3 of us, you know, we're very aware that math was not my strongest subject. But, I'm gonna teach on multiplication and praise the Lord for his *miracles redemption* and that he is here today. Amen?
Amen. I'm gonna pray. Let's open up. Let's pray first and then we'll open. Okay.
Oh, Lord, we thank you so much for who you are. We thank you God that your presence is here. We thank you for who you are. We thank you that you are good. I pray that this word would be impactful to the deepest parts of us, that we would be changed, that we would hear you, not that we would hear my words, God, but that we would hear what you're trying to communicate to us.
I thank you for your Holy Spirit that will interpret, that will speak, that will guide. We lean into your spirit. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. Alright.
Let's open up to John-6. We're gonna read *Jesus* feeds the 5,000. Maybe you know this story. *John-6* verse 1. And let me just set the scene for you here.
Before this story, *Jesus had gathered the disciples*, and he had said to the disciples, he had he had anointed them, he had given them power to do miracles, to heal the sick, to cast out demons, and to teach. So, the disciples at this point in their journey with Jesus, they've already gone out, they've done miracles, and they've come back, and they've told Jesus what has happened, just so that you have a perspective of where the disciples are in this. Okay? So, let's start off and read *John-6* verse 1. It says, after this, Jesus crossed over to the far side of the Sea Of Galilee, also known as the Sea Of Tiberias.
So, at this time, they're trying to separate themselves from people. They're trying to get away a little bit. Okay? So, they're they're going away from towns from where lots of people are. Okay?
First 2. A huge crowd kept following him wherever he went because they saw his miraculous signs as he healed the sick. Then, Jesus climbed a hill and sat down with his disciples around him. It was nearly time for the Jewish Passover celebration. Jesus soon saw a huge crowd.
Let's talk about that a minute. He saw a huge crowd. Now, we already read the title, it says Jesus feeds 5,000, but I wanna give you a little bit more insight. See, later on in this verse, and also, this story is told in all 4 of the gospels. So, it gives us hints throughout.
It says that they counted 5,000 men, and then other versions say that they counted the men, not counting the women and children. So, they mention that they're only counting men when they say 5,000. Now, culturally, it was typical for men to be married at a young age, and it was also very typical that everyone would have 4 or 5 children. That's just typical of that day. Okay?
So, when they're saying 5,000 men, they actually mean that they're counting 5,000 families. Are you following me? Okay. So, if there are 5,000 men and most families have 4 to 5 children, let's just say that we're gonna count a family of 2 parents, 4 kids, it's a family of 6. Right?
So, let's say 5,000 times 6 equals 30,000. That was the hardest part of this whole thing. We made it. 30,000. Now, I've heard this preached before as it's 30,000, some say 20,000.
But I wanna give you a visual because I think it's hard to imagine how many people that really is. Okay? So I've got some pictures of some crowds. Can we see this? 1 is 20,000, 1 is 30,000.
I think that's the 30,000 crowd. And, that's 20,000. So, that's quite a bit of people. Okay? So, that's what Jesus is saying when he says there's a huge crowd forming.
It's forming into this many people. Okay? There's miracles. People are coming. Alright?
So, Jesus saw a huge crowd we're back in verse 5. A huge crowd of people coming to look for him. Turning to Philip, he asks, where can we buy bread to feed all these people? Listen, if I was Philip and I saw a crowd that big coming and Jesus turns and says, hey, what's the plan for food? You got a plan?
I'd be like, this is a joke. You're just kidding. You're totally joking. And Philip, it says that oh, verse 6, it says, Jesus, he was testing Philip for he already knew what he was going to do. Turn to your neighbor and say, he already knew.
Turn to your other neighbor and say, God's not worried. God's worried. That's right. God is not worried. He already knew.
He already had a plan. Verse 7, Philip replied, even if we worked for months, we wouldn't have enough money to feed them. So Philip's going, yeah, I don't I don't have the funds for this. I don't see this happening. I'm I'm assessing what I have, and I don't have enough here.
And remember, the disciples, they've already been out, they've already seen miracles, they've seen Jesus do mighty works, they've had mighty works happen through them. There's this verse, it's Ephesians-3:20, I wanna read it with you. It says, now all glory to God who is able through his mighty power at work within us to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. See, they've already seen miracles. They know Jesus can open blind eyes.
They can he can make the lame walk. But they didn't know that he could do something with food yet. They were like, this is this is "beyond what I might ask or think". Some versions of this scripture say, infinitely more than we might ask or imagine. Have you ever just tried to imagine what God can do?
What are the the types of *miracles* that God can do? Well, whatever you imagine, he can do more. So, the greatest things that you can imagine, God can do more. And the disciples, this is more than they can imagine. Okay?
Let's just let me just mention worrying a second because Philip, you know, he seems a little worried. He's like, I don't have enough money. Maybe he was. I don't know. I would be worried if I was Philip.
I'm like, oh, you're giving me this responsibility right now. In some other versions of this story, in in the other gospels, it actually says that Jesus turned to the disciples and says, you feed them. You want me to feed them? And that's what Jesus says. See see, remember, God already has a plan.
Jesus already had a plan to feed the people. He was giving Philip an opportunity to partner with what he was going to do, and God is not worried. He's not worried. So why should I worry? If God is not worried, why should I worry?
I think I've heard people say, oh, you know, I'm just a worrier. It's just who I am. Oh, you know, I just it's just I just care a lot, so I just worry. Did you know it is part of your *inheritance* as a son or daughter of the king to not worry? I laid my life down before Jesus, and I gave him all the opportunity.
You make all the plans, Jesus. You make all the plans so I don't worry. It is part of my inheritance. *Isaiah-26:3 says, You will keep in *perfect peace** all who trust in you, all whose thoughts are fixed on you. My thoughts are fixed on God because my life is fixed on God because my life belongs to him.
Amen? Alright. Let's jump back into this. Where are we? I think verse 8.
Yeah. Then Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up. There is a young boy here with 5 barley loaves and 2 fish, but what good is that with this huge crowd? Tell everyone to sit down, Jesus said. So they all sat down on the grassy slopes.
The men alone numbered about 5,000. Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks to God, and distributed them to the people. Afterward, he did the same with the fish, and they all ate as much as they wanted. That crowd that crowd of 20 to 30,000 people, they all ate as much as they wanted. Now, if I was the disciple in this scenario, I'd be like, wait a second.
Right? Like, I'd be like, okay, so Jesus was over there. Now, I counted 5 loaves. And I'd asked the other disciples, you counted 5 loaves. Right?
It was it was only 5 loaves and 2 fish. Right? And he was over here, and he blessed it, then he broke it. He handed some to me, and I distributed some. Did he hand some to you?
Did you distribute Yeah. See, how does this work? And I know I'm not good at math. I know that. But how does this work?
See, and he was here, he had the bag, and, like, was it like, what in the Mary Poppins just happened here? But they all ate as much as they wanted. So now, their imagination is growing. So he can multiply food too? What?
What can't he do? This is amazing. Verse 12 says, after everyone was full, Jesus told his disciples, now gather the leftovers so that "nothing is wasted". In heavenly multiplication, there is abundance, yet there is not waste. That's pretty cool.
I'm gonna say that again. In heavenly multiplication, there is abundance, yet there is not waste. Very cool. Let's keep going. Verse 13.
So they picked up the pieces and filled 12 baskets with scraps left by the people who had eaten from the 5 barley loaves. Okay. So this is easy math, in my opinion. There were 12 baskets left over, and there were 12 disciples. So each disciple got their own basket.
How cool is that? Let's just recap this. So the disciples, they had this moment where they were able to assess what they had in their hands. Okay? Let's let's hop back to that.
We have Philip saying, yeah, we don't have enough money for this. We have somebody else saying, well, all we have is 5 loaves and 2 fish. That's all we have. Right? And in that moment, they have to make a decision.
And in in Mark-6, it actually mentions that the disciples, they didn't have a chance to eat. Isn't that funny? Like, we know that the disciples, they were hungry. 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish could have given them just a little bit in their bellies to to keep going. And they had been with Jesus.
Like, they'd been working the whole time. Right? They were ministering. They were trying to eat. People were chasing them down.
See, when you add God into the equation, you unlock his just unlimited resources. Okay? So, when you have 5 loaves of bread plus 2 fish times *Jesus' *unlimited resources**, how many of you know that God has unlimited resources? Amen? Then you then you are "partnering with him" in that miracle.
Okay? So so the disciples, they could have decided, oh, I'm hungry. I'm gonna eat this. You know, Jesus, you need to send all these people away. Other versions of this story says that the disciples say, maybe you should just, you know, wrap it up and send them away so they can get into town before, you know, there's no food for them.
How about we just send them away? But God already has a plan, and if you allow him to enter into the equation how many of you guys know about girl math? Does anyone know about girl math? Okay. So, I'm a girl.
I use girl math. So, if I go to the store and I bring a return to the store, that means that I made money. That's girl math. Here's here's another example. If I go to the store and I bring a return, but then I buy something else while while I'm there, the thing that I bought was free.
That's girl math. It's great. I love girl math. But God math is better. God math is better than girl math.
Okay? You you add God into the equation, and you have "unlimited potential". By myself, I can work pretty hard. When I enter God into the equation, I get a whole basket left over. That's what the disciples got when they partnered with God.
They could have gotten a snack, but they were like, no, let's sow this. Let's give it to Jesus. He blesses it, and then they give it back to him to distribute, and they distribute it to all the people. And because of their obedience, they were able to enter into what God actually had for them, which was more than a snack. God actually had 12 baskets of leftovers for all of them.
Let's make this personal. There will be times in your life when you're hungry, just like the disciples in many ways. You're hungry, your bills are hungry, your kids are hungry, the cat is hungry. And you go to God and you get on your knees, oh, and you just say, God, *Lord*, please just give me the bare minimum of my needs. And you know what God does?
He says, hey, look what you have in your hand. And he he has you assess what's in your hand. Well, this is all I have. And God says, that's actually seed. You know, there's a difference between **food and seed**.
And I'm not saying that God's trying to make you hungry. God has a lot of leftovers for you. God wants to give you abundance in his blessings. Okay? There is a difference between food and seed, and seed will multiply.
It is the vision of multiplication. Okay? When you when you understand that you have seed and you trust God, your hands go from closed to open. And if I have a moment where I'm like, oh, Lord, this is all I have, and I start to get I get a little greedy, I get a little like, okay, this is all I have. And this can happen at any level.
At any level, you say, oh, this is all I have, or I've never had this much before, and I'm just holding on to it, God. And you can have everything else, but I'm just gonna hold on to this much. Just this. But, you know, when your hands are closed, closed hands cannot receive. They can't give, which was the goal, but they also can't receive.
So when you open your hands unto the Lord, you give him both the opportunity to take and give to you. Right? This is this is how this works. This is how entering into heaven's multiplication system. Okay?
And, that **"poverty mentality"** can make you start saying, oh, this is all I have. This is all I have. But if we know what God can do, right, just like that Ephesians-3:20 verse, more than we can ask or imagine. He can do more than we ask or imagine through us. And then, you have those moments like the disciples, wait, so you mean even the wind and the waves obey him?
Are you trying to tell me we can walk on water? You mean he can multiply food? When we partner with God, we have unlimited potential, unlimited resources. I don't know who needs to hear this, but God wants to bless you with more than your minimum needs. And the only way to get there is to grow your faith and to grow your trust in him.
You have to trust him to open your hands unto him. You know, we can we can get kind of awkward when we talk about money. I've noticed. There's that verse that says, don't let the right hand know what the left hand is doing, and that's true. We don't want to be boasting about, hey, I gave this much, or I have this much, or I do this much.
We don't boast in that, so we do keep that between us and the Lord. But actually, it's all God's anyways. So I have nothing to boast about when we really get down to it. I'm just boasting about what God can do. Okay?
And what God has done and how his multiplication works, really. There's this there's a story of *Jesus* in Mark-12, and it's Jesus in the temple, and it says that he's just watching the collection plate. Oh, I love this story. It says that he's just sitting there, he's just watching it. Now, if I see somebody filling out their envelope or putting money in there, I look away.
That's between you and God, and it is. But, like Jesus, who it's between just stands there watching it. And he sees how much everybody's putting in, and then there's a woman that comes by and she puts 2 small coins in in the offering box. And he not only does he see it, not only is he watching intensely, but then he calls his disciples together, and he's like, let me tell you about this that I saw. Let's talk about this.
Come close. So, he brings his disciples close, and he says, out of everyone, she gave the most, Because where your heart is, your treasure is also. And she gave all and trusted the Lord. Because she had to. Right?
She trusted the Lord. She said, it's either going be money or it's going be God, and this is all I have, so it's God. I trust the Lord. And I'm gonna I'm gonna take a little note out of Jesus' book, and I'm gonna tell you a story about some wonderful people. Mike and Angie, over there, they're deacons here at this church.
They've been here since the beginning, just foundational people here, a real church. I was talking to Angie about this story not too long ago, and she says that that there was a time where they would they would host interns for the aquarium, and it would give them some income. And they had lost their interns, and they were down about 1000 dollars of income every month. Okay? So they have this deficit in their income.
And then, Angie's praying and hears from the Lord, and the Lord says, you should give a $100 more each month in your monthly giving. Increase your tithe by a $100. So she's like, alright. So she brings it to Mike, and they talk about it, and they have to make a decision, and they decide to be obedient unto what God has said. And when I when I hear this story from Angie, it's so fun.
She gets so excited. She's like, Mariah, money started coming out of nowhere. Like, they sell these hockey tickets, and they were just able to sell hockey tickets for way more than they normally would be able to. For no reason, their power bill is just super low. Like like, money is just flowing.
Right? Because they figured out how to open their hands unto the Lord. And then not only that, she's like, you know what? We started just getting excited about tipping. Now, we're we're, like, tipping people better, we're telling them Jesus loves them.
Like, they have this open hand, the doorway is open, up and down. It's just open. Right? See, I'm not just teaching this just to I'm not teaching this just to get your money. I'm definitely not.
I'm teaching you this because we do this, our leadership does this, our church does this, and we know what the word says about it, and we see the fruit from it. Amen? See, our church felt called. There there was a meeting. We have we have leaders meetings pretty often.
We had this leaders meeting where we were praying and just asking the Lord, like, what's next for for real church? And, we felt like the Lord, had given us a word that there's a building coming. "Praise the Lord". So, we're like, awesome. We wanna steward this word well.
Let's keep staying in prayer about it and seek the Lord in it. And then, we had a financial meeting not too long after, and there was a we were just organizing the money, putting it all where it needs to be, being good stewards. And, there was this certain amount of money that we said, okay, should this go into the building fund since the Lord is telling us about a building? Should we do that? And, Gabe, my husband said, you know, I feel like there's gonna be an opportunity to make this into seed.
Okay. So, this this what we have, it's gonna turn into seed, and and I think we need to just have our eyes and ears open for where it's gonna go. Alright? So so, we're like, praise the Lord. We just feel the spirit on it.
We're all in agreement, but we're like, let's just keep our eyes open and see if there's any opportunities. We even mentioned, hey, maybe there's going to be an opportunity to sow into someone else's building. How cool would that be to sow into a building when when the Lord's telling us that we're gonna have a building coming? It's amazing. I kid you not, the very next day, pastor David sends all the elders a message and he says, hey, we have an opportunity to sow into 2 churches in Uganda.
Praise the Lord. They had they had a lot of their their finances covered for the 2 churches, but there was some leftover that needed to be covered. And we got to step in and do that as a church body. That's what we did. Now now realize this, that, not only did we get to sow into just 2 churches in Uganda, it was with you guys know pastor John Mondera.
A lot of you know him. It was with somebody that we have a strong relationship with. Like, this is "good soil". It is such a blessing to know that we're sowing seed into such good soil, and the Lord would would prime our hearts for this, that he would ready us so that we could say, let's move forward, let's do this. So, as a church, we got to do that, all of us, you included.
We got to sow into that into those 2 churches. See, husband, he he recently preached on the widow of Zarephath. Okay. So, the widow of Zarephath, there there was a drought in the land, and Elijah, a prophet, was told to go to the widow so that he could be fed by her and and be kinda taken care of. Right?
And this widow says to Elijah when he comes, well, this is all I have. I have 1 meal left, my son and I were going to eat it, and then we were going to die. That was all she had left. And Elijah said, well, just give me a small amount, and then you and your son can have the rest. And out of obedience, she gives that portion to Elijah, out of obedience, she gives that unto the Lord, and because of that, she enters God into the equation.
Right? And and the end of the story goes that they that she never ran out of flour and oil. She never ran out of flour and oil because she tapped into the unlimited resources of God. Do you you hear what I mean when I say seed? **seed is the vision** of multiplication.
I have some pictures of fruit. Let's look at I've got let's look at the banana picture that we have. Is it up there? Alright. So bananas produce up to 240 bananas from 1 seed.
This is in nature. This is how God created nature to function. That's some growth right there. That's a lot of multiplication. Let's look at the apple tree.
Apples produce up to 800 apples every season. That's crazy, from 1 seed. And then not to mention, some fruits just have a lot of seeds. Let's look at the pomegranate. See, a pomegranate, I read that it can have up to 1,400 seeds in 1 pomegranate.
This is how God created nature to multiply. It is in his nature. The glory of God is displayed in the earth, in the way that he created nature to work. And God, see, he requires you to honor what is in your hands. *Luke-16:11* says, and if you are untrustworthy about worldly wealth, who will trust you with the true riches of heaven?
In Luke-19, there's this story. It's a parable that Jesus tells, and it's about a king who gives silver to his servants, to some of his servants. Says that he gives 3 months worth of silver. Okay? And when he comes back, he sees how they were able to multiply it.
What what did you do? And this is a statement that he says just to 1 of the good servants. I just wanna read this 1. It's Luke-19:17. It says, well done, the king the king exclaimed.
You are a good servant. You have been **faithful with the little** I trusted to you. So you will be governor of 10 cities as your reward. Can everybody say the little? So for me, and my my earthly brain says that 3 months of income is quite a lot.
But God says that that's just a little. Do you know whatever you have on this earth, I don't care who you are, whatever you have in worldly wealth, that is a little to the Lord. And he's watching and seeing how you manage just whatever is in your hands. I think sometimes we wanna wait until we have a little more and then, oh, I'll manage it better when I have more. But that's not how this works.
See, God is looking at how you manage just the little, just whatever you have in your hands. And then it is multiplied to 10 cities. That's a big difference. He says, because I know that you can just manage what you have in your hand, I know that you'll manage 10 cities. In this case, he doesn't just say, because you manage manage 3 months worth of income, I'll now give you 6 months.
He says, because you manage the little, the 3 months that I gave you, now you get exponential growth into a new category of managing because you learned how to manage just what you have in your hands. And if you start to feel uncomfortable about this wealth conversation, I just wanna wanna give us a minute to just brush it off, okay, and to move on. If you don't like wealth, I don't know if you're going to like heaven. I'm talking about relating to the God who paved heaven's streets with gold. Right?
Like the Lord, he understands wealth more than we ever can. And and when and and poverty mentality, it can it can nag at us and it can say, well, you can't have more than you think you're worth. Everything on earth is little. Everything on earth is little. This is small stuff to the Lord.
And the Lord sent the *treasure* of heaven. He sent Jesus Christ, the treasure of heaven. We're talking top of the scale, and that is what your value is now. See, whatever you were were bought with, you were bought with the price of Jesus Christ, so you were bought with the treasure of heaven. That's now the stamp of your value.
Okay? So, let's just brush off this worry about worldly wealth. God understands wealth, more than I even do. Let's just brush off the worries of this world. If you walk into somebody's house that's nicer than your house and it makes you uncomfortable, you gotta brush off that poverty mentality.
Okay? We are all sons and daughters of the king. See, and this is how spiritual multiplication works. He he he sees how you're managing what's in your hand, and then there's great multiplication, and the same thing works with spiritual *blessings*. Okay?
If you want more words from the Lord, "use the words" that you already got. If you want more increase in in the dreams that you have at night, start writing them down and reading them back. Right? Give honor to what he's given you. Take a note of what you have in your hands.
The test, it's not coming. You're living the test right now. And, let's let's talk about poverty mentality a little bit. Pastor David, he talked a little bit about it, but I just wanna give you a little story. My parents, I love talking about them while they're here, especially, and all the time.
But, my parents, they were very frugal in my childhood. Okay? So, I I'm 1 of 5 kids. 3 of my siblings were adopted from Korea, and my dad, was a teacher. So, we had a teacher's salary.
My mom stayed home. She homeschooled us, and then she also taught some homeschool classes. My parents, they didn't have a washer and dryer for a while. My mom would wash the clothes in the tub and then line dry them. Right?
We would go to thrift stores before it was cool. We learned how to sew because that's part of it. When you go to the thrift store, you just sew it and make it fit you. Okay? At 1 point, my parents said, out of the joy of the challenge of stewarding the season that they were in, they said, let's just see if we can save some money and just not eat out for a whole year.
And then they, like, never ate out again. And I'm telling you, we were not poor. We were not poor. My family, we were not poor. They were great stewards of the season that they were in, but they never disconnected themselves from the relationship that they had with God and knowing that, like, let's have fun with this.
Let's have fun with the season that we're in. Let's steward. God called us to have these children, they eat. Let's do something with this. Right?
And so, were great stewards of the season that they were in, and we were not poor. See, you're only poor when your mentality shifts and you remove your partnership with God. You're poor when you disconnect yourself from the reality that you are a son or a daughter of God, and everything that he has is yours. There's that story of the prodigal son, and and the 1 son, he goes off, and when he finally comes back, the father has a great big feast and a party for him. And the other son that had stayed home, he's mad.
And and the father comes to him and is like, don't you know everything I have is yours? Don't you know that everything that the Lord has is yours? You are poor anytime you claim something for yourself that is not true about Christ. Amen? Amen.
*Matthew-25:29* says, to those who use well what they are given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance. But from those who do nothing, even what little they have will be taken away. My husband and I, we we support the beams, they're missionaries. This church supports the beams. We some of you have met them.
I think they came just over a year ago. And, we were we were at a conference where they were speaking just some testimonies, were speaking testimonies to other missionaries and encouraging other missionaries. And, we heard them say, you know, God is good and we don't need money. We don't need money. We're doing good.
We don't need money. We're blessed. And in that moment, God told Gabe and I, we need to give something to them, like, needed to up our giving. So we're like, okay, Lord, isn't that funny that this is where this is the moment where it says, actually, those who use well what they are given will be given more. Those who have will have more.
And that was what he was doing. And not only that, but we gave to them, and then they said, man, there's this there's this outreach opportunity where we are, and and we actually they needed the money already. See, God, he sees the hungry coming and he already has a plan. There's a this saying of don't just give to get, And, I do think that that there's a there's a really good point in saying that. We're not we're not saying, oh, just keep giving, giving, giving so that you can have more things and more life, although he has things for you and more life for you.
But, that don't give to get, we can sometimes miss out on the fact that there's a reward system in heaven. Okay? There is a what you give, you will receive reward system in heaven. See, there's no farmer who would put seed in the ground if he didn't expect it to multiply back to him. And, it would be silly for us to go out into a field where we planted no seed and then say, where's all my fruit?
Where's all my multiplication? You have to put your seed in the ground if you plan on being hungry. *Luke-6:38* says, give and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full, "pressed down", shaken together, to make room for more, running over, poured onto your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.
See, givers, they're excited to give, Not for boasting purposes, but to boast in what the Lord can do, to boast in how he multiplies, and and to be a part of what God's doing. Givers are really, really excited to give. 1 incorrect way of giving is to throw money at something and look away. I think sometimes we do that, and we're like, oh, I just don't want this to hurt. If I look away, it won't hurt so much.
I'll just throw it and look away. When you sow your *seed* somewhere, okay, you are partnering with them. You're partnering with that ministry, with that person, and it's important that you know what you're partnering with. It's important that you know that that you're you should be praying for them, you should be you should be partnering with them in other ways physically, whether it's labor or just like being support, you should be support for wherever you're sowing your seed, and you should be aware of the fruit that they produce. Let's talk about Real Church.
Real Church, we have our hands in a lot of things. We've pioneered ministries overseas, we've made partnerships, we have local outreach, we have had our hand in leading over 55,000 people to Christ. Let's let's give a hand clap to the Lord for that. As as an elder here, want you to know that this is good soil, and also you should care about if something is good soil or not. If this is not your church, go to your church and see if they have good soil.
See if you can participate in being good soil. See if if you can participate in outreach. See if you can be good soil in your day to day life. Amen? You know, we've been we've been talking about finance for a little bit now, and I do this is kind of a bunny trail, but I just think it's important.
This is specifically for married people or people who plan on being married. Right? Money is in the top reason for why people get divorced. Okay? So when we're challenging you with these things, the Lord is not trying to divide your marriage.
He's not trying to create strife. I'm sure that that these talks will bring up conversations in your marriage, and that's great. Not too long ago, Gabe and I, we had a disagreement in a financial decision that we were making. And, we both felt pretty spiritually led on on the decision that was before us. And, in that moment, I just said, you know, I I have no desire for your position.
I have no desire to make this decision that you're called to make. See, my husband is the leader of my house. That's biblical. Okay? So so, I put mine aside and I say, it's up to him to make the decision, and he also carries the call of being in unity with the Lord.
That's his call. Okay? So so, the Lord isn't trying to create division between you, and if you're a wife here and that and you're having some discomfort, I'd love to talk to you about it, I'd love to pray with you about it, and I also wanna encourage you to grow your trust in the Lord. Okay? The Lord will give you peace in the way that you honor your spouse, in the ways that you disagree, in the ways that you have to work through things.
But, the Lord will lead you and he will guide you, he will lead your husband, and the best way to disagree with a partner is to pray because the Lord will either change your heart or theirs through prayer. Amen? Okay. I just felt the need to bring that up. I wanna see a raise of hands.
Who here has seen the Lord move in their finances before? And just look around, like, a minute and realize how many people would would say yes to that. Just take note at the goodness of God. Okay? That's a powerful testimony to see that many hands raised.
It should speak to you and it should grow your faith. Alright? We're gonna I'm I'm gonna close-up soon here, but we're gonna have the ministry team be up here in a moment. And, if you want prayer for your finances, if you need prayer that that the Lord would help you understand what is seed and what is food, if you want prayer to know if it's if it's time to to do something, if you need prayer because obedience is hard sometimes and you want your heart to be softened, it it'd be a good idea to come up. And, that doesn't mean that you don't have, things going well for you, it just means you want more.
Who doesn't want more, Lord? Amen? Alright. Also, the prayer team will be up here if you are in need of healing, if you are in need of salvation, if you're ready to say Jesus is my Lord, the word says that if if you speak with your mouth and believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord, that he died and rose again to save you from your sins, so that you can have a relationship with Jesus, so we're gonna give you an opportunity to do that. So, if you come up for prayer for that, then I want you to say out of your mouth, "I need salvation".
Okay? I'm ready to receive salvation, and they would be glad to pray with you and get connected with you and get you ready to go on the walk of being committed and committing your life to the Lord. Alright? I'm gonna I'm gonna pray and we're gonna close out. Alright?
Let's pray altogether. Heavenly Father, Lord, I thank you for everything that you have given us in our hands. I thank you, Lord, that you are the 1 that makes us good stewards. I pray that you would soften our hearts, that we would receive, and that we would be filled with the grace of "stepping forward", just stepping forward into your arms, into your plans. God, we give you our finances, we give you everything that you've given us spiritually and physically, God.
We thank you, and we give it all to you. You are our *Lord* and our king, and we worship you. In Jesus' name, Amen.